Weekend Event Planner

These are the 11 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

There is no one big event to unite people in and around Dallas this weekend. Instead, you have a variety of interesting choices, including two theatrical productions, a pair of unique comedians, classical music on a small and large scale, great dancers, a Chinese New Year celebration, a Groundhog Day celebration, and both the opening and closing of various art exhibitions.

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, January 30

The Firehouse Theatre presents The Drowsy Chaperone
With the houselights down, a man in a chair appears on stage and puts on his favorite record: the cast recording of a fictitious 1928 musical. The recording comes to life and The Drowsy Chaperone begins as the man in the chair looks on. Mix in two lovers on the eve of their wedding, a bumbling best man, a desperate theater producer, a not-so-bright hostess, two gangsters posing as pastry chefs, a misguided Don Juan, and an intoxicated chaperone, and you have the ingredients for an evening of madcap delight. The Firehouse Theatre in Farmers Branch will present the production through February 23.

Theatre Three presents Imagine Broadway
Four of Dallas' top vocal talents — Marisa Diotalevi, Blake Hackler, Quintin Jones, and Cherish Robinson — will perform a concert showcasing Broadway's best musicals, including some familiar favorites from Theatre Three's history. The foursome will sing everything from classic show tunes to contemporary hits, with plenty of creative twists and turns along the way. All proceeds from the concert, playing three times through Saturday, will benefit Theatre Three’s programming.

Tim and Eric: 2020 Mandatory Attendance World Tour
Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim — aka Tim and Eric — are a comedy duo best known for their Adult Swim show, Tim and Eric Awesome Show. Their brand of surreal and absurd comedy is an acquired taste, but it has won them many fans over the years. The Tim and Eric Mandatory Attendance Tour, coming to Majestic Theatre, will be filled with more spoofs, goofs, and insanity, including some very special surprises.

Friday, January 31

Eisemann Center presents Piano Battle: Andreas Kern vs. Paul Cibis
The brainchild of internationally accomplished pianists Andreas Kern and Paul Cibis, the Piano Battle sees the duo go head-to-head on stage, entertaining the audience with a variety of classical pieces. The two artists, with distinctly different performance styles, take turns to perform pieces by composers such as Chopin, Liszt, and Debussy, or improvise based on the tunes the audience requests. The performance will be at Eisemann Center for the Performing Arts in Richardson.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents Salome
The scandalous subject of Salome put Richard Strauss’ opera-writing career on a fast, if not notorious, track. It’s about the depraved teen who, in exchange for a dance with seven veils, gets what she asks for, the head of John the Baptist, on a silver platter, then pays for it. In the hair-raising final scene, a crazed Salome sings some of the most spine tingling music you’ll ever hear. There will be two performances — one Friday and one Sunday — at Meyerson Symphony Center.

TITAS/Dance Unbound: Delfos Danza Contemporánea
Delfos Danza Contemporánea is Mexico’s premiere contemporary dance company, ranking among the best in Latin America. Cuando los Disfraces se Cuelgan (When the Disguises are Hung Up) is an evening-length reflection on appearances and the disguises we put on in order to navigate a world. This one-night-only performance will be at Winspear Opera House.

Saturday, February 1

Crow Museum of Asian Art presents Chinese New Year Festival (This event has been postponed due to coronavirus concerns)
Celebrating the Year of the Rat, the Crow Museum of Asian Art of The University of Texas at Dallas will present the 21st annual Chinese New Year Festival. The signature event will feature dragon and lion dances, musical and martial-arts demos, art making and calligraphy, specialty booths, wellness activities, colorful entertainment, and cultural performances. The event will be at NorthPark Center.

Dallas Museum of Art presents "My|gration" opening day
"My|gration" is an installation of works that will trace the migration of people, objects, and ideas in art across times and cultures. Composed of works from the DMA’s collection, "My|gration" highlights the contributions of artists who immigrated to the United States, examines how the movement of people is expressed through art, and illuminates ways cross-cultural connections inform artistic production. The exhibition will be on display through January 3, 2021.

DMA Arts & Letters Live: Selected Shorts
Selected Shorts comes to the Dallas Museum of Art for an evening of O. Henry Prize-winning stories. A selection of award-winning stories — Midrash on Happiness by Grace Paley, Nayla by Youmna Chlala, A Permanent Member of the Family by Russell Banks, and Oh Shenandoah by Maura Stanton — will be brought to life on stage through readings by acclaimed actors, including two-time Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Wendie Malick.

Sunday, February 2

Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden presents Arboretum Annie
Pennsylvania may have Punxsutawney Phil, but Dallas has Arboretum Annie, the groundhog meteorologist that will return to predict the weather based on if she sees her shadow or not at the Dallas Arboretum's sunrise ceremony. Guests can enjoy a full day of fun, starting with complimentary coffee or hot chocolate, breakfast food vendor sales in the garden, and a screening of Groundhog Day starring Bill Murray.

Art exhibit closings
Both Nasher Sculpture Center and the Dallas Museum of Art will close exhibitions on Sunday. Sightings: Anne Le Troter at the Nasher isa a sound piece based on Le Troter's research on fertility tourism and the history of sperm banks in the U.S., where the lack of governmental regulation has resulted in the rise of so-called “designer babies." Concentrations 62: Wanda Koop - "Dreamline" is the first U.S. solo museum exhibition for Koop, an established Canadian painter whose practice depicts how modern urban society intersects with the natural environment.

Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden presents Arboretum Annie on February 2, Groundhog Day.

Photo courtesy of Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden

Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden presents Arboretum Annie on February 2, Groundhog Day.

event-planner opera theater museums

Movie review

Over-the-top The Bride! makes other Frankenstein movies seem subtle

Photo by Niko Tavernise

Christian Bale and Jessie Buckley in The Bride!.

The story of Dr. Frankenstein and his monster is now over 200 years old, with Mary Shelley’s book having been adapted or referenced in close to 500 films. Less common is the character of The Bride of Frankenstein, which existed in the original text but has more often than not been excised in adaptations. Writer/director Maggie Gyllenhaal has tried to rectify that by giving the character a big showcase in her new film, The Bride!.

Gyllenhaal has reimagined the story as one in which a woman named Ida (Jessie Buckley) becomes possessed by the spirit of Shelley (also Buckley). At the same time, the already-existing Frankenstein’s monster (Christian Bale) approaches Dr. Euphronius (Annette Bening), who specializes in reanimation, with the request to make him a wife. When Ida falls to her death in an “accident” involving her boyfriend (John Magaro), the ideal corpse becomes available.

After Ida’s resurrection, she and the monster become restless being studied by Dr. Euphronius and decide to break out to experience the world. The world, naturally, is not exactly welcoming to them, and soon the couple are on the run for causing mayhem, including a few murders. In hot pursuit are detective Jake Wiles (Peter Sarsgaard) and his assistant, Myrna Mallow (Penélope Cruz), as well as other authorities.

It’s clear that Gyllenhaal wanted to merge the Frankenstein story with Bonnie & Clyde, especially since she sets the film in the mid-1930s. And that wouldn’t have been a bad idea if having the monster and The Bride going on a crime spree was truly the focus of the movie. But most of the time there’s less intentionality in their misdeeds and more confusion, leading to a muddled plot with no clear direction or end goal in mind.

One of the biggest problems is that Gyllenhaal starts the energy of the film at an 11, giving her and everyone else nowhere to go but down. She dabbles in multiple different tones, at times going the straight drama route and other times making what seems like full-on camp. At one point, she even has the monster and the Bride in a dance sequence set to “Puttin’ on the Ritz,” which would be hilarious as an homage to Young Frankenstein if the film weren’t so disjointed.

Most baffling of all is what Gyllenhaal wants from The Bride character. She morphs multiple times over the course of the film, from close to unintelligible at the beginning to rough-and-tumble at the end. There are hints at the lack of control she has over her autonomy, including Shelley’s possession of her and the monster lying to her about her past, but any commentary that Gyllenhaal might be trying to make gets lost amid the oddity of the film as a whole.

Both Buckley and Bale are all-in for their performances, which definitely fall in the “love it or hate it” dichotomy. Each scene is pitched so high that there’s little nuance to either of them, and neither is on par with their previous Oscar-caliber roles. The high-powered supporting cast of Bening, Sarsgaard, Cruz, and Jake Gyllenhaal is watchable based on previous roles, but none of them elevate this particular movie.

Whatever intentions Maggie Gyllenhaal had in making The Bride! are only halfway legible in a film that can never find its tonal footing. There has rarely been subtlety in movies featuring Frankenstein’s monster and related characters, but this one makes all the others seem like stuffy dramas in comparison.

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The Bride! is now playing in theaters.

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