The winter landscape is fading away. The stark grays and blacks of leafless trees and shrubs are now covered with soft greens, whites, and various shades of peach, gold, and pink. Bare branches now flutter with soft petals and colorful birds move between them like flecks of confetti against a cerulean blue sky. The beige and gray grasses of the salt marshes have given way to the new greens of this year’s growt...

Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater (WHAT) is back with a concise summer season, presented under the stars starting June 30. After a year without in-person performances, live theater returns on a new garden stage situated in front of the theater and in the Larry Phillips Performance Pavilion. The season starts off with an epic high seas tale, “Shipwrecked! An Entertainment, The Amazing Adv entures of Louis de Rou...

Otis Russell of Chatham, well-known locally after 45 years in the hospitality business, has just published his first book for “edgy children,” “Sammy Finds a Home” (Wicked Whale Publishing, 2021). The 49-page hardcover combines Russell’s words with the gorgeous illustrations of award-winning artist Barbara Harmon. Harmon has made a name for herself as a biological and medical illustrator. She lives in Orleans ...

The announcement that Cape Cod Theatre Company/HJT lovers have been waiting for about live summer in-person performances is finally here. Get ready to mark your calendar, because we now have official dates and shows to look forward to. CCTC/HJT's 70th anniversary summer season will include four family shows on the new outdoor CCTC/HJT stage (under construction), sponsored by the Bilezikian Family Foundation, w...

CHATHAMPORT – What was it like to retire to Cape Cod in the mid 1660s? That was a question that archeologist Craig Chartier asked himself while overseeing excavations over the past five years at the homesite of Chatham founder William Nickerson and his wife Anne. More than two dozen people turned out recently for the Protect Our Past virtual Speakers Series presentation by Chartier, focused on what was learned...

After a very long pandemic, audiences will be thrilled to hear that the show will finally go on at the Chatham Drama Guild, as the comedy “Leading Ladies” by Ken Ludwig opens July 8 and runs through Aug. 8. Guild President Pam Banas had a difficult decision to make when COVID-19 health restrictions made in-person performances impossible last year. With “Leading Ladies” on the docket for the opening show of summer...

It’s not often that a writer has the opportunity to see their work transformed into a new format. So, when renowned playwright and sound designer J Hagenbuckle approached Jen Sexton-Riley asking her if she had any short fiction she felt would make a good radio play adaptation, Sexton-Riley jumped at the opportunity. Sexton-Riley, a Chronicle feature writer and ArtCast columnist, presented Hagenbuckle with mult...

Some days I wake with storm clouds in my head, even when the sun is rising over the horizon and there are few actual clouds in sight. Nothing easily clears that stain of grumpiness, whether from a leftover dream gone wrong, the endless drone of depressing world news, or a spontaneous but uninvited countdown of every regret I’ve ever had, real or imagined. Even a good cup of coffee fails to make them go away.  ...

Although ArtWeek, the annual statewide creative festival produced by the Boch Center, is taking an official intermission this year due to the pandemic, t he Harwich Cultural Center has decided to celebrate ArtWeek virtually this week, May 1 through 10. While the center remains closed to the public, the creative heart inside is going strong with a virtual studio tour and reading, an online video playlist from...

There are some rare and wonderful days that become stamped on our memories forever. They often start out with a plan that is simple and ordinary but which, in the end, morphs into a delightful sequence of events that add up to a unique and memorable day. Last week was a school vacation week locally and my youngest grandson, who is 14, and I had planned a day to go out birding. He has done the Mass Audubon Bird...

CHATHAM – Even as the vaccination rate increases, it's likely that large, in-person gatherings will be limited this year. Among the hardest hit by this are local nonprofits, which depend on summer fundraisers for support. Many local organizations are planning to either continue virtual events begun last summer or launch new ones. Next month, the Chatham Marconi Maritime Center will hold its first-ever “Antenna...

Almost a year ago to the day, I spoke with local singer Lisa Jason about a project she took part in to record a collaged, socially distanced version of the 1957 Patty Page tune “Old Cape Cod.” The project was the brainchild of Chatham's Tony Raine, general manager and head of production at the Cape Cod Melody Tent since 1994, who found himself thinking of ways to bring local musicians out of isolation and crea...