Three productions highlight arts festival this weekend

An extended season at Southeast Missouri State University's third annual River Campus Summer Arts Festival is bringing three productions -- "Always ... Patsy Cline," "Steel Magnolias" and "Honk! Jr." -- to its stages, beginning this week.

"We are excited to offer an expanded summer season with something for everyone," Rhonda Weller-Stilson, associate dean and director of the Earl and Margie Holland School of Visual and Performing Arts, said in a news release. "All three shows have a Southern theme. We open with 'Always ... Patsy Cline' and its wonderful classic country music. Audiences will laugh and cry at the hit show 'Steel Magnolias,' and children will delight at the musical 'Honk! Jr.'"

Performances of "Always ... Patsy Cline" are slated for 2 p.m. Sunday and 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and June 24, 26 and 29 in the Rust Flexible Theatre at the River Campus. Tickets are $20.

"Honk! Jr." will be performed in the Bedell Performance Hall at 7:30 p.m. today and 2 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $10. Two free performances of "Honk! Jr." are scheduled for 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. Saturday as part of the River Campus Summer Arts Festival.

Performances of "Steel Magnolias" are set for 7:30 p.m. today, Saturday, Wednesday, Thursday and June 28 and 2 p.m. June 26 in the Rust Flexible Theatre at the River Campus. Tickets are $20.

"Always ... Patsy Cline" by Ted Swindley is the musical true story of Patsy Cline's friendship with a Houston housewife that began at one of Cline's concerts and lasted until her untimely death, according to the news release.

"'Always ... Patsy Cline' is a fun, song-filled Valentine," director Michael McIntosh said in the release. "It offers fans who remember Cline while she was alive a chance to look back, while giving new fans an idea of what seeing her was like and what she meant to her original fans. You'll get to relive a Patsy Cline concert with the hits that made her famous: 'Anytime,' 'Walkin' After Midnight,' 'I Fall to Pieces' and 'Crazy,' to name a few.

"We're bringing the Grand Ole Opry to Cape Girardeau," he said in the release. "'Always ... Patsy Cline' is a story of the endurance of friendship and good music."

Also highlighting the summer season is "Honk! Jr.," a show set on a farm and based on Hans Christian Anderson's "The Ugly Duckling," the release states. The play was written by Anthony Drewe and George Stiles. The production will be directed by Hilary Peterson, and the cast consists of children from the community ages 10 to 15.

This summer's repertory theater also features "Steel Magnolias."

"'Steel Magnolias' is still one of the most popular plays in America, and we're excited to bring this professional production to Cape Girardeau," director Kenn Stilson, chairman of the Department of Theatre and Dance, said in the release. "It centers on the friendship of six Southern women who gossip, needle and harangue each other through the best of times, while they comfort and care for one another through the worst. The play alternates between hilarious and touching, which is one of the primary reasons it has remained so popular.

"Robert Harling was inspired to write 'Steel Magnolias' after his sister Susan died of complications from diabetes, so its premise is so painfully truthful," Stilson said in the release. "Yet the characters are all based on people from the playwright's actual life, and we feel like we know these ladies. They are our friends, our relatives, our sisters, mothers, aunts and acquaintances."

Tickets may be purchased at the River Campus box office, 518 S. Fountain St., by calling (573) 651-2265 or by visiting RiverCampusEvents.com.

Pertinent address:

518 S. Fountain St., Cape Girardeau, Mo.