Elsewhere in entertainment, events and the arts:
'Crawford Weekend'
Beth Brickell, Arkansas-born author and film director now based in Los Angeles, will be in Camden for "Maud Crawford Weekend," Friday-June 5.
Brickell has been chasing down the case of Crawford for more than three decades. Crawford was a prominent Camden lawyer and civic leader who disappeared on March 2, 1957. Brickell will sign copies of "Solving the Maud Crawford Puzzle," the latest of her four books about the case, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Friday at Real Estate Pro, 230 Cash Road, "around the corner from Woods Place," according to a flyer for the event. She'll also give a talk at 2 p.m. Saturday at Southern Arkansas University Tech, 6286 Coleman Road, East Camden. And she'll be on hand to walk visitors through Crawford's last night as Laura and DeWayne Gordon open the Crawford home, 430 Clifton St., for a tour of the downstairs, 1-5 p.m. June 5. Admission is $10.
Brickell's Camden visit is part of a tour involving talks in seven Arkansas cities Thursday-June 10 — Pine Bluff, Fort Smith, Fayetteville, Camden, Conway, Little Rock and Hot Springs — on having solved the Maud Crawford mystery. "All that is left unfinished is to excavate Miss Maud's remains and bury them next to her husband in the Camden cemetery," she says in a news release.
Crawford had been an associate in a law firm with John McClellan before he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1942. Her disappearance from her home on a cold, rainy, foggy Saturday night came while McClellan was heading up Senate hearings on organized crime, but no evidence of Mafia involvement ever surfaced. The original police investigation turned up no body, clue, trace or motive.
Brickell began examining the cold case in 1985 with the intention of writing a screenplay for a movie; her 16-month investigation resulted in a multi-part investigative series on the front pages of the Arkansas Gazette over a five-month period in 1986.
Visit the website of Brickell's film company, luminousfilms.net.
Road trip musical
A whip-smart, deeply imaginative teenager sets out on an unexpected road trip with her free-spirited mother all the way from Philadelphia to Los Angeles in the musical "Miss You Like Hell" (music and lyrics by Erin McKeown; book and lyrics by Quiara Alegria Hudes, the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning co-creator of "In the Heights"), opening Tuesday in the limited-capacity Spring Theatre at TheatreSquared, 477 W. Spring St., Fayetteville. McKeown will attend a special pre-show happy hour concert at 6 p.m. Thursday. The show runs 7:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday through July 10. Tickets are $20-$54; call (479) 777-7477 or visit theatre2.org.
“Alex, Anna, and Jo” by Rachel Trusty is part of “Queer,” opening Thursday and on display through July 30 at Fenix Gallery in Fayetteville. (Special to the Democrat-Gazette)
Fayetteville exhibition
"Queer," an exhibition of work by LGBT artists from the Mid-South with a performance aspect, opens with a reception, 5-8 p.m. Thursday at Fenix Gallery at Mt. Sequoyah Center, 150 N. Skyline Drive, Fayetteville. An artists' discussion panel will take place, 6-8 p.m. Friday. The exhibition, for which Brad Cushman — retired University of Arkansas at Little Rock art gallery director and curator of exhibits — was the juror, will remain up, 1-5 p.m. Wednesday-Friday, noon-6 p.m. Saturday, through July 30. Admission is free. Visit fenixarts.org.
Rogers Family Day
Farm animals, face painting, blacksmithing demonstrations, hand-dipped candle making and Butterfly Park tours are part of the Rogers Historical Museum's Family Day, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday at the museum, 313 S. Second St., Rogers. Families can have an old-time photo taken in front of the museum's historic First Street display, watch wood carvers create new pieces, visit the "Civil War in Benton County: Untold Stories" exhibit and take a photo with Civil War re-enactors. Food trucks will be selling comestibles, including snow cones and kettle corn. Admission is free. Call (479) 621-1154 or visit rogershistoricalmuseum.org.
Heritage grants
June 15 is the first of two deadlines for community-based nonprofit groups and others to apply for Arkansas Heritage Grants, which are, according to a news release, "designed to help promote awareness and enjoyment of Arkansas' heritage; increase community-based nonprofit groups' abilities to create heritage-related programs, especially in places where they would otherwise not occur; foster cooperative efforts among organizations, businesses and government to increase the size and scope of events; and create ongoing components to existing heritage-related celebrations." Maximum amount is $5,000; money must go toward the proposed program and not operating costs or infrastructure. For more information on grant criteria, visit arkansasheritage.com or email debra.fithen@arkansas.gov.