Weekend Event Planner

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

Although sports is big in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, it's unusual when it's the top dog in the weekly events roundup. But three events — two spectator and one participatory — are among the choices this weekend, as well as two new theater productions, a big new art exhibition, a music festival, a pride celebration, two unique symphony performances, and more.

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, June 20

2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup
The next few weeks are heaven for soccer fans, as the FIFA Women's World Cup is currently taking place in France, and the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup — which pits national soccer teams from North America, Central America, and the Caribbean against each other — is taking place at locations around the U.S. and the Caribbean. Toyota Stadium in Frisco, one of nine cities hosting early round games, will be the site for this doubleheader featuring Nicaragua vs. Haiti and Costa Rica vs. Bermuda.

AT&T Performing Arts Center presents Broadway Series: Beautiful: The Carole King Musical
Long before she was Carole King, chart-topping music legend, she was Carol Klein, Brooklyn girl with passion and chutzpah. Beautiful tells the inspiring true story of King’s remarkable rise to stardom, featuring an array of beloved songs like "I Feel The Earth Move," "One Fine Day," "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman," "You’ve Got A Friend," and the title song. The musical will play at Winspear Opera House through Sunday.

Improv Addison presents Maz Jobrani
Comedian Maz Jobrani is a founding member of The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour, which first aired on Comedy Central. He has had three Showtime specials, Brown and Friendly, I Come In Peace, and I’m Not a Terrorist but I’ve Played One on TV. He is also a regular panelist on NPR’s Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me!. He'll perform five times through Saturday at Improv Addison.

Ochre House Theater presents La Muerte De Don Quixote
La Muerte De Don Quixote is a flamenco theater fantasia inspired by Miguel de Cervante’s Don Quixote that imagines the last day of Don Quixote and explores the human condition of love, loss, success, and failure in the face of his greatest giant, Death. The production will run at Ochre House Theater through June 29.

Friday, June 21

Arlington Museum of Art presents Keith Haring: "Against All Odds"
The Arlington Museum of Art will present Keith Haring: "Against All Odds,” featuring more than 50 original works that serve to deconstruct the traditional view of Haring as an artist. Beyond his well-known graphic iconography, the exhibition also explores his use of mark-making as a metaphor and his desire to address weighty subjects, such as consumerism, poverty, religious dogma, violence, racism, and AIDS. The exhibition will be on display through September 15.

Rockstar Energy Drink Disrupt Festival
The Rockstar Energy Drink Disrupt Festival, taking place at Dos Equis Pavilion, will feature performances by The Used, Thrice, Circa Survive, The Story So Far, Sleeping With Sirens, Four Year Strong, Memphis May Fire, Trophy Eyes, Juliet Simms, and Hyro The Hero. Fans will be immersed into a full-day interactive experience where they will not only be able to see some of their favorite bands live, but will also be exposed to the latest in lifestyle brands and pop-up activations.

Dallas Arts District presents Pride Block Party
The Dallas Arts District, in collaboration with Late Nights at the DMA and Nasher Sculpture Center ‘til Midnight, presents the second annual Dallas Arts District Pride Block Party. In celebration of national LGBTQ Pride Month, there will be pride-themed tours, performances, story time, movies, local artists, food trucks, makers and artisans, drag shows, runways, outdoor activities, and more. The party will be on Flora Street (between Olive and Harwood streets) and Harwood Street (between Woodall Rodgers frontage road and Ross Avenue).

Jeff Dunham: Passively Aggressive
International comedy sensation comic/ventriloquist Jeff Dunham, along with his cast of hilarious characters, will come to American Airlines Center as part of his Passively Aggressive tour. Dunham and his world famous characters — Walter, Achmed, Bubba J, Peanut, and Jose Jalapeño — have garnered numerous accolades and entertained generations of people. He'll perform on both Friday and Saturday.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents Erykah Badu
The Dallas Symphony Orchestra will present a special one-night-only concert featuring Erykah Badu, who will perform with her hometown orchestra. A prodigious talent in R&B, hip-hop, neo-soul and jazz, Badu continues to captivate in performances like her annual birthday party at Deep Ellum’s Bomb Factory, which sells out each year. The concert will be at Meyerson Symphony Center.

Saturday, June 22

The Original Harlem Globetrotters
The Harlem Globetrotters will celebrate their fans during the all-new Fan Powered World Tour, coming to College Park Center at UT Arlington. Guests can interact with Globetrotters stars more than ever before, both on and off the court, and use an interactive mobile application with exclusive features, including an augmented reality basketball toss game and custom photo filters.

Reunion Tower presents Reunion Lawn Party
With the Dallas skyline as its backdrop, Reunion Lawn Party will return for its fifth year. Hosted on the lawn of Reunion Tower, live music will be provided by DJ Sprinkles and Emerald City’s Party Machine Band. There will also be food trucks, lawn games, entertainment, and surprise guests, including some of Dallas’ most admired athletes. The backyard bash will conclude with a special light show on the Reunion Tower Ball.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra and Perot Museum of Nature and Science present National Geographic: Symphony for Our World
Combining stunning National Geographic natural-history footage with an original symphony and theme created by Bleeding Fingers Music, Symphony for Our World is a breathtaking musical journey through some of the world’s most incredible wildlife spectacles. The performance, featuring the Dallas Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kelly Corcoran, will play on Saturday and Sunday at Meyerson Symphony Center.

Spartan Stadion Series
Spartan, the world’s largest obstacle race and endurance brand, is taking over AT&T Stadium in Arlington with its newest series, Stadion. The colossal stadium turns into a battlefield where Spartans test their mettle against obstacles in and around the stadium. The battle ends as they dash across the 50 yard line and cross the finish in epic fashion as friends and family cheer on from the stands.

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical will be at Winspear Opera House through June 23.

Julia Knitel in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical

Photo by Joan Marcus

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical will be at Winspear Opera House through June 23.

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Movie Review

Remake of Schwarzenegger classic The Running Man stumbles

Photo courtesy of Paramount Pictures

Glen Powell in The Running Man.

For all its cheesy ‘80s greatness, the original version of The Running Man starring Arnold Schwarzenegger was a very loose adaptation of the novel by Stephen King. For the new remake, writer/director Edgar Wright has tried to hue much closer to the story laid out in the book, a decision that has both its positive and negative aspects.

Glen Powell takes over for Schwarzenegger as Ben Richards, a family man/hothead who can’t seem to hold a job in the dystopian America in which he lives. Desperate to take care of his family, he applies to be on one of the many game shows fed to the masses that promise riches in exchange for humiliation or worse. Thanks to his temper, Ben is chosen for the most popular one of all, The Running Man, in which contestants must survive 30 days while hunters, as well as the general population, track them down.

Given a 12-hour head start, Ben earns money for every day he survives, as well as every hunter he eliminates. Since he only has a relatively small amount of money to use as he pleases, Ben must rely on friendly citizens who are willing to put their own lives on the line to help him. That’s a task made even more difficult as the gamemakers, led by Dan Killian (Josh Brolin), use advanced AI to manipulate footage of Ben to make him seem like a guy for which no one should root.

Co-written by Michael Bacall, the film is shockingly uninteresting, working neither as an exciting action film, a fun quippy comedy, or social commentary. The biggest problem is that Wright seems to have no interest in developing any of his characters, starting with Ben. Our introduction to the protagonist is him trying to get his job back, a situation for which there is little context even after we’re beaten over the head with exposition.

The situation in which Ben finds himself should be easy to make sympathetic, but Wright and Bacall speed through scenes that might have emphasized that aspect in favor of ones that make the story less personal. The filmmakers really want to showcase the supposed antagonistic relationship between Ben and Dan (and the system which Dan represents), but all that effort results in little drama.

Ben has a number of close calls, and while those scenes are full of action and violence, almost every one of them feels emotionally inert, as if there was nothing at stake. It doesn’t help that Wright doesn’t set the scene well, making it unclear how far Ben has traveled or who/what he’s up against. There are times when Ben feels surrounded and others when he can walk freely, weird for a society that’s supposed to be under almost complete surveillance.

Powell has been touted as a movie star in the making for several years following his turn in Top Gun: Maverick, but he does little here to make that label stick. With no consistent co-star thanks to the structure of the story, he’s required to carry the film, and he just doesn’t have the juice that a true movie star is supposed to have. Nobody else is served well by the scattershot film, including normally reliable people like Brolin, Colman Domingo, Michael Cera, and Lee Pace.

The Running Man is a big misfire by Wright and a blow to Powell’s star power. On the surface, it has all the hallmarks of an action thriller with a side of social commentary, but nothing it does or says lands in any meaningful way. Schwarzenegger’s one-liners in the original film may have been goofy and over-the-top, but at least they made the movie memorable, which is way more than can be said of the remake.

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The Running Man opens in theaters on November 14.

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