Weekend Event Planner

These are the 13 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

It will be a diverse slate of events in and around Dallas this weekend. There will be four distinct concerts, a new theater production, an Irish festival, classical music, two well-known comedians, a great magician, top-notch rodeo, dancing with reality stars, and a screening of a 1980s classic with the star in attendance.

Below are the best ways to spend your free time this weekend. Want more options? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city's best events.

Thursday, March 5

Lauren Daigle in concert with Johnnyswim
Being a Christian singer can sometimes be limiting given the very specific audience, but Lauren Daigle has been one of the few to have broken through to the mainstream. Her 2018 album, Look Up Child, not only set the record for most weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Christian and Gospel charts, but it went to No. 3 on the Billboard 200 charts as well. More evidence of her success is that she'll be performing at American Airlines Center, with Johnnyswim as her opening act.

AT&T Performing Arts Center presents Playwrights in the Newsroom
Playwrights in the Newsroom is an immersive, theatrical experience orchestrated by two playwrights who’ve spent hundreds of hours shadowing The Dallas Morning News. Playwrights Brigham Mosley and Janielle Kastner are fairly literate people who, until recently, got their news from Buzzfeed and/or Twitter. When given the opportunity to write a play about journalism, these fiction-writing story-embellishers are faced with a new mandate: seek the truth and report it. The play will be at Wyly Theatre through March 15.

Jill Scott in concert
Jill Scott comes back to Dallas to commemorate the 20th anniversary of her critically-acclaimed, Grammy-nominated debut album, Who Is Jill Scott? Words and Sounds Vol. 1. Scott will perform the album in order in its entirety, along with other songs from her career. She'll play at the Music Hall at Fair Park.

Friday, March 6

Southwest Celtic Music Association presents North Texas Irish Festival
One of the largest Irish festivals in the U.S., the North Texas Irish Festival celebrates the music, dance, and cultural talent in the tradition of Irish and other Celtic influences. The festival will feature musicians, dancers, and cultural presentations on 13 stages. There will also be whiskey tastings, Celtic storytelling, kids' activities, the North Texas Irish Festival Fun Run, and more. The festival takes place through Sunday at Fair Park.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents Rachmaninoff Symphonic Dances
There’s much to savor in Rachmaninoff’s stirring Symphonic Dances, an alto saxophone and pulsating percussion in the first; a dark, eerie waltz in the second; and Russian Orthodox chants, tubular bells, and the composer’s go-to Dies irae in the last. Also, Pianist Garrick Ohlsson will be highlighted during Barber’s breathtaking Piano Concerto. The concert will take place three times through Sunday at Bass Performance Hall.

Improv Arlington presents Nicole Byer
Nicole Byer is an actress, comedian, and writer who hosts the baking show Nailed It, currently streaming on Netflix. She also has a sitcom loosely based on her life, streaming on Facebook Watch, called Loosely Exactly Nicole; and hosts a podcast called Why Won't You Date Me?. She''ll perform five times through Sunday at Improv Arlington.

AT&T Performing Arts Center presents One Night of Queen
One Night of Queen, performed by Gary Mullen & The Works, is a touring two-hour stage show paying tribute to the stage theatrics and music of Queen. One Night of Queen is a live concert, recreating the look, sound, pomp, and showmanship of arguably the greatest rock band of all time. The one-night-only performance will be at Winspear Opera House.

Saturday, March 7

Ivan Amodei: Secrets & Illusions
Illusionist Ivan Amodei, who has been a winner on Penn & Teller: Fool Us, will take the audience on an epic journey to discover the secrets of life in his brand new stage show, Secrets & Illusions. Filled with brain-games, secrets, magic, music, illusion, and tons of audience participation, anything can happen to anyone at any time. There will be two performances at Eisemann Center for the Performing Arts in Richardson.

RFD-TV’s The American Rodeo
RFD-TV’s The American is a two-day event, making it the richest weekend in western sports at AT&T Stadium. The American will have final qualification rounds on Saturday and the finals round on Sunday. The Top 10 rodeo athletes in the world will compete against everyday cowboys and cowgirls for the biggest two-day payout in rodeo.

Hyena's presents TJ Miller
TJ Miller has been diligently working to make people laugh for over 15 years, and is driven by the altruistic mission statement that life is fundamentally tragic and the best thing he can do is provide an ephemeral escapism from that tragedy which permeates everyday life by doing comedy. He has starred in Silicon Valley, Big Hero 6, the Deadpool series, and the How to Train Your Dragon series. He'll perform on Saturday and Sunday at Hyena's Comedy Nightclub in Dallas.

Sunday, March 8

Harry Connick, Jr in concert
Crooner Harry Connick, Jr. has led quite the varied career, from the When Harry Met Sally... soundtrack to starring in movies like Hope Floats to starring in a Broadway musical. But it's his music that has kept him relevant for over 30 years, which fans will see in this concert at Winspear Opera House. He'll perform songs from his new album, True Love: A Celebration of Cole Porter, as well as classics from his career.

Dancing with the Stars: Live
Dancing with the Stars: Live will celebrate the year 2020 in style with favorite dancers from the hit ABC show. The all-new production will feature fan-favorite routines from the TV series and new numbers choreographed just for the live audiences. The show, taking place at The Theatre at Grand Prairie, will showcase the professional dancers and special guest Sailor Brinkley-Cook in a brand-new production featuring a wide variety of dance styles.

Pee-wee’s Big Adventure 35th Anniversary Tour with Paul Reubens
Back in the 1980s, Pee-wee Herman — aka Paul Reubens — was as big as they get thanks to the 1-2 punch of Pee-wee’s Big Adventure and Pee-wee’s Playhouse. Reubens will celebrate the 35th anniversary of the film with this tour that will include a special screening of the film, followed by stories about the making of the movie told by Reubens himself. The event will be at Majestic Theatre.

RFD-TV's The American Rodeo takes place at AT&T Stadium on March 7 and 8.

Photo courtesy of RFD-TV Events, LLC

RFD-TV's The American Rodeo takes place at AT&T Stadium on March 7 and 8.

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Movie Review

Matt Damon and Ben Affleck team up for Netflix crime thriller The Rip

Photo by Claire Folger/Netflix

Ben Affleck and Matt Damon in The Rip.

For as closely tied together as Matt Damon and Ben Affleck are, it might come as a surprise how few times they’ve led a movie together. They’ve appeared alongside each other in Good Will Hunting, The Last Duel, and Air, but the only time they were on equal footing in a story was Kevin Smith’s Dogma. So the fact that they are the two true stars of the new Netflix movie The Rip makes it a rare opportunity for the longtime friends to square off against each other.

Damon and Affleck play Lt. Dane Dumars and Detective Sgt. J.D Byrne, respectively, the two highest ranking members of a Miami police department squad that specializes in drug and drug money raids. A tragedy to begin the film already has the team - which includes Detectives Mike Ro (Steven Yeun), Numa Baptiste (Teyana Taylor), and Lolo Salazar (Catalina Sandina Moreno) - on edge, with the FBI and DEA breathing down their neck.

Going off a tip, Dumars gathers the team to raid a house in nearby Hialeah that is supposed to have a stash of a relatively small amount of money. But when they get to the house occupied only by Desiree Molina (Sasha Calle), they soon discover that there’s close to $20 million there instead. The team, required by law to count the money on site, must not only fight the urge to skim a little off the top for themselves, but also worry about the Cartel and other agencies that might want a slice of the pie.

Written and directed by Joe Carnahan, the film is a surprisingly effective crime thriller made even better by its high-quality cast, which also includes Kyle Chandler as a DEA agent. The story is designed for the audience to not know who’s trustworthy until the last possible second, and the various twists and turns it takes are well done, with barely a hint of narrative cheating.

Taking place entirely at night, the mood is set right from the start, with the only surprise being that Carnahan didn’t add in rain for extra effect. He keeps things tense with a number of subtle elements, including having the house located in a seemingly deserted cul-de-sac. This allows for the characters to remain on high alert at all times, with anything out of the ordinary - an unexpected noise, a flashing light, etc. - adding to the stress of the situation.

The only element that could have used a bit more of a punch-up is the characterization. The story is set up to cast suspicion on almost everybody, making it tougher to understand exactly what type of person each of them is. As the two leads, more time is spent with Dumars and Byrne, leaving everyone else with slightly underwhelming arcs. It’s to the credit of the actors that everyone else below Damon and Affleck is still compelling.

Damon and Affleck play their sometimes friendly, sometimes adversarial roles well, showing an ease together that’s a result of their friendship and the acting skills they’ve honed over 30+ years. Taylor, an Oscar hopeful for One Battle After Another, and Oscar nominee/Emmy winner Yeun have a pedigree that elevates their supporting roles. Chandler, Moreno, and Calle each get just enough to demonstrate why they were cast in their respective roles.

Damon and Affleck have had their individual ups and downs throughout their careers, but when they choose to work together, the results are usually good-to-great, as they are in The Rip. It’s a different take on a crime thriller that features a story that will keep viewers guessing until the very end.

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The Rip is now streaming on Netflix.

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