VTM’s A Christmas Carol at Hardywood

Ring in the holidays with the mother of all Christmas stories—Charles Dickens beloved classic, “A Christmas Carol”. And see and hear it performed in its entirety by the Virginia Theatre Machine (VTM), and its unique cast of thespians, puppet and human alike. And the special effects, and the use of light and sound rival a Lucas production.  What’s more you can see it all unfold in less than half an hour.  Magic doesn’t begin to describe it. 

VTM will perform two shows in Richmond: one at Hardywood Richmond on December 23 at 5pm; another at Hardywood West Creek December 24 at 2pm.

Here’s a link to an audio story about the Virginia Theatre Machine and its creator, Mark Lerman.

https://exchange.prx.org/pieces/301806-christmas-stories-part-2-a-christmas-carol-on-whee

Music in the Time of the Coronavirus:

Bellevue Porchella with Brooke Ullman

COVID-19 cancelled Richmond's premier music event--the Richmond Folk Festival, which annually attracts a couple hundred thousand people to three days of music. They had a virtual festival, but it wasn't the same. Brooke Ullman from Richmond's Northside created a full afternoon of music performed on porches throughout the neighborhood of Bellevue. "A mini-folk festival", as my son put it.

How the murder of George Floyd at the hands of four Minneapolis police officers led to an ever-expanding ripple of protests across the country and around the world. And how these protests in turn led to the removal of statues to Confederate leaders who fought to uphold the barbaric institution of slavery, and the idiotic notion of white supremacy. Of all those statues throughout the South, among the largest stand on Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy. They have become flashpoints for protests in the past, and are now at Richmond’s epicenter of the BLM protests in the wake of George Floyd’s sadistic murder. Over the past several weeks, protesters have tagged the bases of the monuments with graffiti, and have splashed paint on a number of the statues, even pulled down the one of Jefferson Davis, perhaps the greatest treasonist in American history. And much more, including an insightful interview with Rose Simmons, daughter of one of the Charleston Nine.

When he was just a boy, Victor Ayala, whose family was struggling in Guadalajara, crossed the Rio Bravo on his own, only to be taken back to Mexico. But Victor persisted and created his own American dream.  

It’s about as American as apple pie. The official kickoff of the long summer.  As American as a cookout with hot dogs and hamburgers. Almost as American as Independence Day. But where July 4th commemorates our victory over the British, Memorial Day, as it was first observed, remembered the dead of the Civil War. And there were a lot of them to be remembered. Upward of 600,000.

Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, a man of faith and a student of American history as well as a former litigator, has been working diligently in the U.S. Capitol to help us navigate the waters during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Today we visit remotely with Nicole Roberts owner of Nicola Flora, a florist on Richmond, Virginia’s Northside. She and her husband continue to provide people with flowers in these existential times. Clusters of natural beauty to remind us of the way things will be again.

There’s a man in a small city thirty miles south of Richmond Virginia whose business was pretty much wiped out by the COVID-19 pandemic. But despite that, he’s already giving back to his community in a very big way.

Leigh Carter, an ER nurse at McGuire VA Hospital in Richmond, Virginia, talks about the woeful shortage of N-95 face masks, how he and his colleagues are battling this pandemic daily, and the problem of misinformation on the novel coronavirus.

Tracey Wingold has worked as a counselor for well over a decade, and with three years of teletherapy under her belt she had a sort of head start on the COVID-19 crisis. Tracey offers a number of tips to maintain your mental health in these unusual times.

Even before the Richmond Public Schools closed their doors for the year, RPS Superintendent Jason Kamras was already planning what to do during this unprecedented pandemic. Now our city schools are supplying students with laptops of their own, along with 13,000 meal bags each day. And there’s so much more.