2024 Rivertown Follies:
“The Fabulous Fifties”
April 25-27, 7:30pm & Sunday, April 28, 2:00pm
Get ready for the return of this Cheboygan community theater classic! The Follies offers a madcap cast engaged in sketch comedy, song & dance sure to please audiences of all ages. This year the theme is “The Fabulous Fifties”, and will be directed by Chris & Danielle Fettig of CAP Follies, Inc.
Interested in trying out for a part? We need you! “Meet the Director” takes place Monday, April 8, 7:00pm at the Opera House. This is an opportunity to meet the directors, learn about this year’s production, and get involved. It is free and open to the public. Anyone who is interested in joining the theater group or taking part in an upcoming production is encouraged to attend. For any questions about casting, you can call 231-445-0238 or email rivertownfollies@gmail.com
Proceeds from the 2024 Follies will be donated towards the Cheboygan County Habitat for Humanity. Tickets are $20, and $16 for Students and Seniors for all shows.
“The First Ladies of Song”, starring Helen Welch
Friday, May 3, 7:30pm
Celebrating the music of the the greatest female phenoms of all time including Ella Fitzgerald, Aretha Franklin, Karen Carpenter, Etta James, Judy Garland, Peggy Lee and more!
Helen Welch is an internationally acclaimed vocalist, entertainer, producer and band-leader. Her unique talent for arranging songs to make them her own, coupled with her ability to intimately engage her audience, has quickly earned her a large and devoted following around the globe.
A native of England, Helen began her career on television’s Romper Room. Since her early success, she has headlined with world-class organizations such as the BBC Big Band, Glenn Miller Europe, Opus One and others at some of the UK’s most prestigious venues including: The Ritz, The Savoy, Blenheim Palace, The Grosvenor House Great Room, Claridges and many theatres in London’s West End. Additionally, she held starring roles in a variety of popular musicals including: Hello Dolly, Barnum, Carousel, 42nd Street, Calamity Jane, and Oliver Twist.
After a very successful run in the U.K., Helen relocated to the United States to guest star in the Broadway musical Smokey Joe’s Cafe. Her immediate success landed her as a fronting vocalist for The Cleveland Orchestra, The Breckenridge Summer Orchestra, The Cleveland Jazz Orchestra, The Grant Park Symphony Orchestra (Chicago), The Florida Symphony and the Columbus Jazz Orchestra. Since that time, Helen has been producing her own shows for Cleveland’s Playhouse Square, The Akron Civic Theatre, The Chautauqua Institution and many other theatres and performing arts centers around the country.
In 2006 Helen produced her big band CD One Dream using the nationally renowned Cleveland Jazz Orchestra. Rosemary Riddle, daughter of famed arranger Nelson Riddle, gave Helen the original Nelson Riddle arrangement of “Zing Went the Strings of my Heart” for her to perform and record on this CD. Apart from Judy Garland, Helen is the only other vocalist to have used and performed this arrangement on a recording and she still uses it today in her big band performances.
Helen has had world-class symphony pops arrangements for 3 of her productions and has performed with many different symphony orchestras throughout the U.S. and in England. Helen was invited twice to perform with the Blossom Festival Orchestra, which is part of the Cleveland Orchestra. For these particular concerts the Ella Fitzgerald Foundation gave Helen permission to go to the Library of Congress in Washington to go through Ella’s collection of music which she then used for these special symphony orchestra concerts at Blossom.
In 2016, her musical release, “Spellbound” was an entry for the Traditional Pop Category of the Grammy Awards.
Tickets are $25-40 for Adults ($5 discount for Veterans) and $10 for Students. A cash bar (beer & wine) will be offered at this event.
Film Screening: “Bad River”
Saturday, May 11, 7:30pm
The Straits of Mackinac Alliance presents this FREE screening of the new film “Bad River” (87 minutes).
BAD RIVER, narrated by Quannah ChasingHorse and Academy-Award nominee, Edward Norton, is produced by Grant Hill (owner of the Atlanta Hawks), Allison Abner (writer for Narcos and West Wing) and award-winning filmmaker, Mary Mazzio. The film chronicles the Wisconsin-based Bad River Band and the Band’s ongoing fight for sovereignty, which unfolds in a groundbreaking way through a series of shocking revelations, devastating losses, and a powerful legacy of defiance and resilience. This inspiring project brings us through the epic sweep of history into the present, with a David and Goliath battle over a 70-year-old pipeline on the brink of rupture into Lake Superior, the largest freshwater resource in America. As Eldred Corbine, a Bad River Tribal Elder declares in the film… “we gotta protect it… die for it, if we have to.”
The film screening will be followed by a Q & A with Dr. Ed Timm, Roger Gauthier, and Andrea Pierce (Little Traverse Bay Band of Odawa Indians member and Chair of the Anishinaabek Caucus)
This FREE event is presented and made possible by the Straits of Mackinac Alliance, a 501c3 nonprofit. Donations to SMA to cover the costs of the film are encouraged and are tax deductible.
