🎭 Georgia Tech historian Matthew Hild spent years researching the woman behind the pop star — and he argues the most iconic thing Olivia Newton-John ever did wasn’t star in “Grease” or sing “Physical.” It was the cancer treatment center she fought to build in Australia, which now draws patients from around the world. Hild talks with WABE Arts and Culture Editor Sherri Daye Scott about why John Travolta compared Newton-John’s star power to Taylor Swift’s, how “Grease” erased her country music legacy, and the Atlanta ties that thread through her story. 🎵 

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🎭 Shakespeare’s “Macbeth,” reimagined as a ’90s sitcom, staged outdoors in a Georgia meadow. Producer Lena deLoache had never produced live theatre outside before writer and director Erin Stegeman invited her to help bring “M.A.C.B.E.T.H.” to life at Art Farm at Serenbe in Chattahoochee Hills. The world premiere opened May 8 and runs through May 17. deLoache talks with WABE Arts and Culture Editor Sherri Daye Scott about what the show actually is and what staging a world premiere outdoors in May in Georgia demands — technically, physically, and creatively. 🎭 

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🧵 Atlanta fiber artist Honey Pierre’s solo show “Notions” opened May 2 at One Contemporary Gallery, a survey of six years of work tracing her practice from canvas to punch needle and back to paper. Pierre talks with WABE Arts and Culture Editor Sherri Daye Scott about what people will find when they walk through the door, how she picked up punch-needle on YouTube during the pandemic, and what it means to be part of bringing a craft into fine-art spaces. Plus, One Contemporary Gallery Director and Curator Faron Manuel on why the title “Notions” fits and what the show reveals about where the textile art movement is headed.  

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🎭 Atlanta Ballet opens the East Coast premiere of "Frida," a full-length narrative ballet about the life of Frida Kahlo, May 8–10 at Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre. Choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa talks with WABE Arts and Culture Editor Sherri Daye Scott about how she put Kahlo's pain, resilience, and artistic legacy into movement. Plus, Fernanda Cámara of the Consulate General of Mexico in Atlanta on what the world gets wrong about Frida and what this production gets right.

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🎬 The Atlanta Film Festival marks its 50th anniversary this year Executive Director Chris Escobar traces how a short film by Ray McKinnon and Walton Goggins won the 2001 festival, qualified for the Oscars — and launched careers still building today. Plus: what Escobar says Atlanta needs to invest in to become a world-class festival city. 🎧

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🎹 Eight-time Grammy winner Jon Batiste opens his 2026 Fantastical Tour Saturday at Chastain Park with the Atlanta Pops Orchestra, a rare orchestral date. He tells WABE Arts what keeps him grounded on the road, why all music is folk music, and what Atlanta means to him. 🎧

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🌳 The neighbors called it the Tree House before Colin Sutter ever moved in. Built in 1999, 231 DeGress Avenue is one of Inman Park's few modern homes: four stories, floor-to-ceiling windows, trees close enough to touch from inside. It has never been on the Inman Park Festival Tour of Homes. Until now. WABE Arts and Culture Editor Sherri Daye Scott talks with co-owner Sutter about the house, a garden with a story, what keeps two Chicagoans rooted in Atlanta and what made them take part in the 2026 Inman Park Festival Tour of Homes. 🎧 

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🎧 She's back. Beloved City Lights host and public radio legend Lois Reitzes returns to WABE for a special conversation with conductor Robert Spano ahead of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra's America @ 250 concert series. Spano reflects on the music, the moment, and what it means to mark 250 years of American history through live performance. The ASO's America @ 250 runs April 30 – May 2 and May 7 – 9. 🎭

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🎭 Seven years after her first turn as Ruth Younger, actor Isa Miles is back in Lorraine Hansberry's "A Raisin in the Sun.” She says the intervening years have given her something new to bring to the role. Miles speaks with WABE Arts and Culture Editor Sherri Daye Scott about returning to one of American theater's most iconic characters, why the play's themes remain universal, and what it means to lay yourself bare on stage. The Black Renaissance Arts Collective presents the production Apr. 24–26 at the Porter Sanford Arts and Community Center in Decatur. 🎧

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🎭 A Roswell High School senior won Georgia's top poetry competition — and Walt Whitman helped her do it. Rory Berg, the 2026 Poetry Out Loud Georgia state champion, talks with WABE Arts about the Whitman poem that sealed her win, what drew her to the competition as an actor, and the new poems she's bringing to the Poetry Out Loud National Finals in Washington, D.C., April 27–29. 🎧

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