Lewisville's Poet Laureate Takes the Grand Theater Stage on June 18

A Microphone, a Stage, and Words That Belong to This City

The Lewisville Grand Theater has hosted honky-tonk legends and tribute bands this month, but on the evening of June 18 the spotlight shifts to something quieter and arguably more particular to this community: a special event hosted by Lewisville’s own Poet Laureate, James Mardis.

The program begins at 7:30 p.m. inside the Grand, the same arts facility on the edge of Old Town that has anchored the city’s cultural life since its inaugural season in 2011.

What a Poet Laureate Actually Does Here

The title carries weight beyond ceremony. Lewisville’s Poet Laureate program sits within the Grand Theater’s broader mission of connecting literary and performing arts to the people who live here. It is not an honorary shelf decoration. The laureate is expected to show up, and on June 18, Mardis does exactly that.

For residents who associate the Grand primarily with ticketed concerts or the Texas Tunes series, an evening built around poetry and the spoken word represents a different register of the same commitment. The building was designed to hold more than amplified guitars, and this event is evidence of that.

James Mardis and the Role

Mardis carries the title of Lewisville Poet Laureate into this evening as its host. The Grand’s poet laureate program has tracked past holders of the position, situating the role within a continuing local tradition rather than treating each appointment as a standalone curiosity. That lineage matters. It signals that Lewisville has been deliberate about sustaining literary arts alongside the visual and performing arts that get more marquee attention.

The June 18 event is framed as a special evening, which distinguishes it from a routine reading or a tucked-away workshop. It is on the main calendar at the Lewisville Grand Theater, alongside Dale Watson and the Eras Tour tribute night, which says something about how the city values the work.

Getting There: What to Know Before You Go

One practical note worth flagging before you plan your evening: construction in the Lewisville Grand Theater Courtyard is expected to wrap up through spring and summer 2026, and during that period all Charles Street entrances remain closed. Guests should plan to enter through the Main Street and Church Street entrances instead.

It is a minor detour, but the kind that catches people off guard if they have been coming to the Grand for years and have a habitual route. Give yourself a few extra minutes, especially if this is your first visit since the construction began.

An Evening Worth the Detour

Lewisville’s June calendar has been full of outdoor sound and motion — food trucks at Wayne Ferguson Plaza, kayaks at LLELA, tribute bands drawing crowds to the lawn. The June 18 event at the Grand offers a different pace. It asks you to sit, listen, and pay attention to language shaped specifically for this place and this community.

That is not a small thing. Cities that invest in a poet laureate program are making a statement about what they think culture is for. It is not only for the nights when a crowd of several hundred gathers under string lights at Wayne Ferguson Plaza, though those nights matter too. It is also for the quieter room, the careful line, the voice that earns its authority one word at a time.

The Bigger Picture at the Grand

The Lewisville Grand Theater opened as part of the city’s investment in a permanent home for the arts in 2011. In the fifteen years since, it has built a programming identity that ranges widely — Texas-rooted music, theatrical productions, community events, and now a poet laureate series that puts local literary voices on the same stage used for professional touring acts.

That range is a point of civic pride worth naming plainly. Not every city of Lewisville’s size maintains this kind of infrastructure and keeps it genuinely active across multiple art forms. The June 18 event with James Mardis is one evening on one calendar, but it represents a sustained choice the city has made about what the Grand is for.

The doors open for an 7:30 p.m. start. Enter from Main Street or Church Street, find your seat, and let someone who has spent time listening to this city speak.