Weekend Event Planner

These are the 8 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

The beginning of June is the unofficial start to summer, as kids are finishing up school across Dallas-Fort Worth. To celebrate that new freedom, kids and adults can enjoy an outdoor movie, the opening of an anticipated new development, the conclusion of a classical music festival, a classic story told through dance, a concert with country music superstars, and more.

Below are the best options for your precious free time Thursday through Sunday. Don't like what you see? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city's best events.

Thursday, June 1

Main Street Garden presents Movies in the Park
In honor of the reawakening of its neighbor, The Statler, Main Street Garden is presenting a monthly throwback Movies in the Park series. This month, the series has reached the 1970s, celebrated with a screening of the original Superman from 1978, starring Christopher Reeve.

Friday, June 2

Legacy West Grand Opening
If you've driven on the Dallas North Tollway in North Plano recently, it's impossible to miss the construction of the monolithic Legacy West, the largest new mixed-use development in the area. Legacy West finally celebrates its grand opening all weekend long with live music, food and drink tastings, special store discounts, and a “sneak peek” first look inside Legacy Hall, the 55,000-square-foot food hall.

Soluna Festival conclusion
The three-week-long Soluna Festival comes to a close with a special concert from the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. On Friday and Sunday, the orchestra presents a regular version, featuring Prokofiev's Symphony No. 5 and Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 2, while on Saturday, it enhances the show with Beyond the Score, which incorporates projections of moving and still images, actors, soloists, and narration into the performance, setting the composers and their masterpieces in an artistic, social, political, and cultural context. All performances are at Meyerson Symphony Center.

WaterTower Theatre presents Native Gardens
Gardens and cultures clash, turning friendly neighbors into feuding enemies in this funny regional premiere written by Karen Zacarías. Pablo, a high-powered lawyer, and his very pregnant wife, Tania, a doctoral candidate, are realizing the American dream when they purchase a house next door to community stalwarts Virginia and Frank. But a disagreement over a longstanding fence line soon spirals into an all-out war of taste, class, privilege, and entitlement. The play runs at WaterTower Theatre through June 25.

CeCe Winans in concert
The best-selling and most-awarded female gospel artist of all time, CeCe Winans has long-since cemented her status as one of the most accomplished and celebrated women in modern music history. Winans performs at the Majestic Theatre in support of her new album, Let Them Fall In Love, her first in nearly a decade.

Texas Ballet Theater presents Alice in Wonderland
Texas Ballet Theater ends its season with Ben Stevenson’s Alice in Wonderland. The Dallas Opera Orchestra accompanies TBT for the famous storybook ballet, which features the rushed rabbit, a spiteful queen, the Cheshire cat, the Mad Hatter and, of course, Alice. The production plays five times through Sunday at Winspear Opera House.

Saturday, June 3

VolunteerNow presents Voly in the Park
Voly in the Park is Dallas' only volunteerism festival and showcase of vibrant nonprofits in North Texas. More than 75 organizations set up booths at Klyde Warren Park with games, interactive information, and hands-on volunteer projects. The festival showcases VolunteerNow's volunteer matching program, VOLY.org, which makes it quick and easy for volunteers to connect with more than 1,000 North Texas nonprofits and 900-plus volunteer opportunities.

Florida Georgia Line in concert with Nelly and Chris Lane
Country duo Florida Georgia Line hit the ground running in 2012, reaching No. 1 with their debut album, Here's to the Good Times, a feat they repeated with their next two albums, including 2016's Dig Your Roots. They play at Starplex Pavilion in support of that album, and are joined by opening acts Nelly and Chris Lane.

Florida Georgia Line plays at Starplex Pavilion with Nelly and Chris Lane on June 3.

Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo RodeoHouston entertainers January 2015 Florida Georgia Line

Photo courtesy of Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo

Florida Georgia Line plays at Starplex Pavilion with Nelly and Chris Lane on June 3.

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Movie Review

Michelle Pfeiffer is an unappreciated mom in Oh. What. Fun.

Photo courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios

Michelle Pfeiffer in Oh. What. Fun.

Of all the formulaic movie genres, Christmas/holiday movies are among the most predictable. No matter what the problem is that arises between family members, friends, or potential romantic partners, the stories in holiday movies are designed to give viewers a feel-good ending even if the majority of the movie makes you feel pretty bad.

That’s certainly the case in Oh. What. Fun., in which Michelle Pfeiffer plays Claire, an underappreciated mom living in Houston with her inattentive husband, Nick (Denis Leary). As the film begins, her three children are arriving back home for Christmas: The high-strung Channing (Felicity Jones) is married to the milquetoast Doug (Jason Schwartzman); the aloof Taylor (Chloë Grace Moretz) brings home yet another new girlfriend; and the perpetual child Sammy (Dominic Sessa) has just broken up with his girlfriend.

Each of the family members seems to be oblivious to everything Claire does for them, especially when it comes to what she really wants: For them to nominate her to win a trip to see a talk show in L.A. hosted by Zazzy Tims (Eva Longoria). When she accidentally gets left behind on a planned outing to see a show, Claire reaches her breaking point and — in a kind of Home Alone in reverse — she decides to drive across the country to get to the show herself.

Written and directed by Michael Showalter (The Idea of You), and co-written by Chandler Baker (who wrote the short story on which the film is based), the movie never establishes any kind of enjoyable rhythm. Each of the characters, including competitive neighbor Jeanne (Joan Chen), is assigned a character trait that becomes their entire personality, with none of them allowed to evolve into something deeper.

The filmmakers lean hard into the idea that Claire is a person who always puts her family first and receives very little in return, but the evidence presented in the story is sketchy at best. Every situation shown in the film is so superficial that tension barely exists, and the (over)reactions by Claire give her family members few opportunities to make up for their failings.

The most interesting part of the movie comes when Claire actually makes it to the Zazzy Sims show. Even though what happens there is just as unbelievable as anything else presented in the story, Showalter and Baker concoct a scene that allows Claire and others to fully express the central theme of the film, and for a few minutes the movie actually lives up to its title.

Pfeiffer, given her first leading role since 2020’s French Exit, is a somewhat manic presence, and her thick Texas accent and unnecessary voiceover don’t do her any favors. It seems weird to have such a strong supporting cast with almost nothing of substance to do, but almost all of them are wasted, including Danielle Brooks in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo. The lone exception is Longoria, who is a blast in the few scenes she gets.

Oh. What. Fun. is far from the first movie to try and fail at becoming a new holiday classic, but the pedigree of Showalter and the cast make this dismal viewing experience extra disappointing. Ironically, overworked and underappreciated moms deserve a much better story than the one this movie delivers.

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Oh. What. Fun. is now streaming on Prime Video.

movies film