Anchorage Daily News

All Alaska performances of a musical based on Palmer author Eowyn Ivey’s highly praised first novel “The Snow Child” have been canceled. The show was scheduled for performances in Anchorage and Juneau.

Juneau-based Perseverance Theatre, Alaska’s only professional theater company, announced the cancellation in a statement Friday.

“Perseverance Theatre stands by its reputation to create professional, high-quality theatre productions,” executive and artistic director Art Rotch wrote. “Unfortunately, at this time, we are unable to meet the logistical needs this beautiful production deserves in order to stay true to our mission and the vision of the show.”

The theater will contact ticket holders for a “Snow Child” performance with options for refunding or repurposing costs, Rotch said.

“We regret we couldn’t successfully bring ‘Snow Child’ to Alaska this season and will look for other ways to share this adaptation of Eowyn Ivey’s novel with Alaskans in the future,” the statement continued.

Additional details weren’t immediately available Friday morning.

Ivey’s novel was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2013.

She took to Facebook on Friday morning with a brief note about the “disappointing news” of the cancellation.

“My understanding is that Arena Stage and Perseverance Theatre concluded that it was not economically feasible to bring the show north,” Ivey wrote in a post on her page.

The stage production was described on the Perseverance website as as “a magical new musical that dances on the edge of legend. In the 1920s Alaskan wilderness, a couple reeling from the loss of an unborn child struggles to rebuild their lives. Everything changes suddenly when they are visited by a wild, mysterious girl who embodies the dark woods that surround their cabin.”

The musical has a “bluegrass-infused” score, the site says.

Arena Stage, which is working in partnership with Perseverance Theatre, premiered the musical at the Kreeger Theater in Washington D.C., according to a report in Playbill. The production was scheduled to close at that 514-seat theater on Sunday.

The musical was slated to open in Anchorage on May 25 and run through May 27. It was also scheduled for a limited run in Juneau on June 9 and 10. An Arena Stage representative directed all questions to Perseverance Theatre on Friday.

Republished with permission from the Anchorage Daily News. 

WASHINGTON — All three members of Alaska’s congressional delegation backed President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the Obama administration’s nuclear agreement with Iran, they said.

On Tuesday, Trump announced that he is removing the United States from an international nuclear agreement with Iran and reinstating economic sanctions against the country. Trump has long heralded the agreement as a bad deal that does not offer long-term security for the United States.

Republican response to the announcement was not uniform, but Alaska’s all-Republican congressional delegation agreed with the president’s move, saying a better deal is necessary and that the deal negotiated under the Obama administration fell short.

“I am hopeful today’s announcement is the first in a series of steps to craft a real deal that encourages true peace and security in the region,” said Alaska Rep. Don Young said.

“I agree with President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action – a fatally flawed deal that did nothing to stop Iran’s continued development of ballistic missile technology, little to check its destructive behaviors across the region, and would have eventually removed restrictions on the regime’s ability to pursue nuclear weapons technologies,” said Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski.

Opponents to Trump’s decision to pull out of the deal expressed worry that the move would undercut the ability of the United States to negotiate in good faith on agreements in the future. British, German and French leadership expressed disappointment and said they remained committed to the agreement.

Members of Alaska’s delegation said they were looking forward to learning about Trump’s plan to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

Sen. Dan Sullivan said that he opposed the Obama administration’s nuclear deal with Iran “as a matter of both policy and process.”

Young agreed, and said the Obama agreement bypassed the “advice and consent of Congress. Instead, the American people were forced to accept a plan that did nothing to prioritize the interests of our national security,” Young said. “We have seen that lifting the economic sanctions was the wrong approach to dealing with the rogue and unstable regime that thrives on terror and violence.”

“The message we send today is that Iran, the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism and violator of human rights, should never be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon,” Sullivan said.

“Moving forward, U.S. strategy towards Iran must soberly recognize the realities on the ground: Iran continues to engage in extreme and hostile behavior towards Israel and our Gulf-Arab allies, Iran continues to act as a destabilizing force in the Middle East and across the globe, and Iran has violated the spirit and what I believe to be the letter of the nuclear agreement from the very beginning,” Sullivan said.

He encouraged new sanctions against Iran, and requiring “numerous improvements” to the deal, “including the elimination of sunset provisions, a cease in all ballistic missile activities, and legitimate efforts to address Iran’s global terrorism activities.”

In a statement, President Barack Obama called the announcement “misguided” and said abandoning the deal “turns our back on America’s closest allies, and an agreement that our country’s leading diplomats, scientists, and intelligence professionals negotiated.”

Republished with permission from the Anchorage Daily News.