Entertainment

Brrr. Ever notice how winter in movies looks a lot better than living in wintertime really is? It’s all beautiful and etherial and bursting with emotion - or at least that’s how studios in southern California imagine it - as opposed to getting frostbite shoveling dirty snow out of your driveway for the umpteenth time this week. and ending up falling on your butt...

Nationally-known blues-rock guitarist Paul Nelson will be appearing with his band at Byron’s in Pomeroy, February 9. Showtime is 5 p.m. Being blues/rock icon Johnny Winter‘s hand-picked touring and recording guitarist is just one of the accolades held by Grammy-winning guitarist Paul Nelson who has also shared the world’s stages or recorded alongside Eric Clapton, Buddy Guy, Billy Gibbons, Slash, Vince Gill, Sonny Landreth, Ben Harper, Joe Bonamassa and the list goes on...

Timeless rock act The Doobie Brothers have announced 23 additional dates for their 50th anniversary tour, including an August 12 show at the Tyson Events Center in Sioux City. The dates were added in response to overwhelming fan excitement following the band’s surprise announcement at Ryman Auditorium that Michael McDonald will join the group on a North American tour.  The original members, four-time Grammy Award winners and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nominees will be touring together for the first time in nearly 25 years. ...

Spencer Community Theatre will present “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” February 21, 22, 23, 28, 29, and March 1. Tickets go on sale to the public February 11. “A refined girl like I” is the way Lorelei describes herself, and it’s a role in which any young actress can have the time of her life. ...

Seasons Center for Behavioral Health and Autumn’s Center are hosting the eighth annual Winter Games Free Kids’ Carnival on Saturday, January 25, from 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at the Bedell Family YMCA in Spirit Lake. Attendees can choose from many different activities, including: face painting, carnival games, inflatables, rock climbing wall, and a craft table. ...

Coming March 14 to the Community Education Performing Arts Series is the popular family musical group, The Hall Sisters. Showtime is 7:30 p.m. at Storm Lake High School Auditorium. For ticket information, visit the CE office or call 712-732-5711. The Hall Sisters have established themselves as one of the up-and-coming and premier acts in the country pop genre. ...

Magic realism is most convincing when it places ordinary characters in extraordinary situations. That’s exactly what South Dakota State University associate professor Steven Wingate does in his novel Of Fathers and Fire. Tommy Sandor, disenchanted teenage son of a single mother, Connie, lives in 1980 Suborney, Colo., at the height of the Iran hostage crisis. ...

There’s usually one film that tops lists whenever powerful legal thrillers are debated — “To Kill a Mockingbird,” set in the 1930s. Now comes a film showing how little has changed since then, based on a murder in the same Alabama town where Harper Lee wrote her masterpiece...

Tonight, at 8 p.m., “Dateline” will air a two-hour program on NBC regarding the 1992 cold case murder of Corey Wieneke, in West Liberty. Wieneke was found bludgeoned to death in his rural home in October 1992. For 27 years, no one was charged in relation to his death. ...

The Clay County Fair announced Skillet as part of the SRG Concert Series in the Sleep Number Grandstand at the 2020 Clay County Fair at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 12. One of the best-selling rock bands of the 21st century, the two-time Grammy Award-nominated multiplatinum Wisconsin quartet, Skillet, ignites seismic anthems highlighted by chantable choruses, thunderous rhythms, symphonic electronics and intricate musicality. ...

The Witter Gallery will be hosting a reception for artist Erin Nguyen, whose work is currently on display at the gallery, on Jan. 31 from 5-6 p.m. Nguyen, who was raised in Storm Lake and formerly taught at Storm Lake Middle School, will discuss her artwork and be available to answer questions about her process and her craft...

Richard Marx: An Acoustic Evening of Love Songs, comes to the Hard Rock resort in Sioux City, February 1. Showtime is 8 p.m., and tickets are on sale now. As a performer, songwriter and producer, Richard Marx’s nearly three-decade-long career has had innumerable of highlights. ...

The Clay County Regional Events Center filled with families Saturday as children and their parents watched the “PJ Masks” on stage instead of the TV. The children’s show superheroes Catboy, Owlette, Gekko and PJ Robot faced off with archnemeses Romeo, Luna Girl and Night Ninja as the crowd of youngsters, some donning their own “PJ Masks” costumes, watched the drama unfold. ...

Female filmmakers were shut out, “Parasite” made history and “Joker” edged out “The Irishman,” “1917” and “Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood” in Monday’s Oscar nominations. Todd Phillips’ R-rated superhero smash “Joker” topped all films with 11 nominations to the 92nd Academy Awards, while Martin Scorsese’s elegiac crime epic “The Irishman,” Quentin Tarantino’s 1960s Los Angeles fairy tale “Once Upon a Time ... ...

The Holy Rocka Rollaz return to the area Friday, January 24, for an Okoboji Winter Games concert. The show starts at 7:30 p.m. at the Lakes Art Center. Tickets are on sale at $35 on the center’s website. Take an authentic trip back to the fantastic ‘50s this Winter Games weekend! If it’s the classic early rock ‘n’ roll and rockabilly of Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, Johnny Cash (and many more!) that you want, played just the way those legends played it… you have found your dream band. ...

It’s been a good time for World War I buffs — especially if they’re also movie buffs. A year ago director Peter Jackson applied state-of-the-art technology to century-old war footage to bring the Great War alive with sudden, stunning immediacy in his documentary “They Shall Not Grow Old.”...

Rachael Kilgour will be in concert Sunday, January 19 at Byron’s in Pomeroy. Rachael is a Minnesotan songwriter and performing artist whose sincere, lyric-driven work has been called both brave and humane. The 2015 grand prize winner of the esteemed international NewSong Music Performance & Songwriting Competition and winner of the 2017 Kerrville New Folk Contest, Kilgour has been featured at NYC’s Lincoln Center, at The Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. and at the Sundance Film Festival. ...

Clay County Heritage announced two new exhibits opening at the Heritage Center starting in January 2020. A new interactive exhibit about the Spencer Fire of 1931 is available in the Dvergsten Gallery at the Heritage Center. This interactive exhibit utilizes a touchscreen to navigate the user through a map of downtown Spencer in 1931, chronicling the story of the fateful fire on June 27, 1931. ...

Next up for KeeLive Entertainers next up for the KeeLive Festival in Cherokee Jan. 17-18 are blue’s musician Kevin Burt , and local rock band favorites Jimmy Davis and Friends. Burt will be performing at the Brightside Lounge on Saturday, January 18, from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Jimmy Davis and Friends will be performing at the Gathering Place on Saturday, January 18, from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m...

What better way to start off the 2020 year with some good music. KeeLive will be starting off on January 17, 2020 and January 18, 2020. We will periodically talk about each band preforming as the CT issues get published. Our first band will be two musicians; Mark Pender and Glenn Alexander. Both of these musicians will be performing at The Gathering Place, located on 207 W. Main St., on Friday, January 17, 2020. They will go from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m...

Saturday, March 7 marks another first for the Clausen Center in Holstein as it presents two separate and distinct headliners. Etta May will open the show with her take-no-prisoners performance full of truth, irony, humor and wisdom. Winner of the prestigious American Comedy Award’s Comic of the Year, she has been hailed as the Polyester Princess and the Queen of Southern Sass...

North Dakotans Never Give Up Larry Aasen Ellery Press ISBN 978-0-578-48791-5 $18 Larry Aasen’s North Dakotans Never Give Up: A Memoir describes the challenges that Aasen, his relatives, neighbors and many famous North Dakotans faced as they experienced the Dust Bowl, blizzards and war to make a great state. As Aasen tells us, it was not in spite of those calamities that North Dakotans succeeded, but because of them...

Entertainment to suit all tastes is on tap for the 40th Annual University of Okoboji Winter Games, January 23-26. Here’s the full performance schedule: Thursday, January 23 • 6-9 p.m. - Rock the Roof, doors open at 5, The Majestic Pavilion, Arnolds Park...

The last 10 years will probably go down as the decade of Marvel’s domination and Netflix’s ascension. But despite all the tumult and the perpetual rumors of cinema’s supposed demise, good stuff — no, great stuff — kept getting made. It can be harder to find. ...

Sanford Museum and Planetarium in Cherokee will host Meet the Scientist Day Sunday February 16, 1-4 p.m. At this come-and-go event, kids will have a chance to learn more about different jobs and applications of science. This is a family-fun event that will showcase a variety of scientists from around Northwest Iowa and beyond. Admission to this event is free and it is open to the public...

Freekbass will be on stage at Byron’s in Pomeroy, Friday January 17. Showtime is 7 p.m. Freekbass is one of the world’s great bass players. He has been on the cover of Bass Musician Magazine, Bass Guitar Magazine/UK, three times, and has been featured in Bass Player Magazine numerous times. ...

Arch Allies, with their reputation as “America’s Ultimate Rock Tribute Show,” will rock the Clay County Fairgrounds Events Center Saturday, February 8. Showtime is 7:30 p.m. Featuring the hits of Bon Jovi, Boston, Journey, Styx ,REO Speedwagon and Def Leppard, this high energy band knows how to connect with an audience and faithfully recreate some of the best music from the ‘80s...

Omaha-based rock/soul group The Kris Lager Band will be one of the main attractions for the KeeLive Music Festival in Cherokee (formerly Cherokee Jazz & Blues Fest), Saturday, January 18. Showtime is 9 p.m. at Little Sioux Events Center. Doors open at 8. For advance tickets, see keelivemusicl.com...

County singing legend Lorrie Morgan will be on stage at the Wild Rose Casino in Emmetsburg, February 28. Doors open at 6:15 p.m., the show starts at 7. Tickets are on sale at $20 through wildroseresorts.ticketforce.com. Lorrie Morgan, a child of the Opry, staked her claim as being one of the youngest to have made his/her debut at the Mother Church of Country. ...

Former St. Mary’s educator Brad Wilkening will present “Lessons of the Holocaust,” at the Newell Public Library, Monday, January 27, 6-8 p.m. Admission is free. Wilkening has been studying an lecturing on the Holocaust for years. His presentation gives historical background on the Nazi party’s rise to power, shares stories from survivors that in many cases he has met personally, and uses the history to encourage his audience to make righteous decision in their own lives...