The annual Tales of the Crypt, scheduled for tonight at Mount Holly Cemetery, has been postponed for a week’s time.
The guided tour of the historic Cemetery features costumed students from Parkview Arts and Science Magnet interpreting famed Arkansans’ lives graveside, and draws hundreds of attendees each year. Due to impending thunderstorms this afternoon and evening, the event has been delayed to Tuesday, October 16. Lace gloves and lightning, after all, do not co-mingle well.
Here’s a short preview of ‘Tales,’ part of the To-Do List in this week’s entertainment section.
TUESDAY 10/9 POSTPONED: TUESDAY 10/16
24TH ANNUAL ‘TALES OF THE CRYPT”‘
5:30 p.m. Mount Holly Cemetery, 1200 Broadway. Donations.
A lot of storied lives were led by those interred at Little Rock’s 175-year-old Mount Holly Cemetery, and nearly a quarter-century ago an English teacher at Parkview Arts and Science Magnet, Susan Taylor Barham, teamed up with playwright/educator Judy Goss, Fred Busey, the Arkansas Arts Center and the Arkansas Historic Preservation Program to tell some of those tales with a program called “Tales of the Crypt.” Student performers were outfitted with period-specific costumery and assigned the role of some Arkansawyer interred there to re-enact graveside, and instead of the expected 300 attendees, Mount Holly’s website reads, 1,200 people showed up. The event is still going strong, and Arkansas figures like Eleanor Counts, Quatie Ross and David O. Dodd are represented by drama students in dialogue and monologue along one of the event’s tours, which begin at both the north and south ends of the cemetery. Admission is free, but anything you can donate goes to the maintenance fund for the cemetery.