Weekend Event Planner

These are the 12 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

This is one of those weekends in Dallas where there's almost too much to do. A dozen events made the list, but it could've easily been expanded to 20 or more. Those that did make the cut include four new theater productions, three separate chances to spend some quality time outdoors, three big-time concerts, 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, September 20

Bishop Arts Theatre Center presents "Denise Lee Sings Miss Simone"
Bishop Arts Theatre Center presents "Denise Lee Sings Miss Simone," a special North Texas Giving Day event and concert featuring Denise Lee. The concert will feature songs made famous by Nina Simone, who is the focus of the 25th Anniversary Season opening play, The Champion, by Amy Evans. They're far from the only local organization seeking donations on this special day; go to northtexasgivingday.org for more information.

Pegasus Theatre presents The Cuban and the Redhead
Escaping bloodshed in Cuba, a young man named Desi Arnaz sets sail on a turbulent journey that leads him all the way to Hollywood and into the arms of a fiery, redheaded movie star named Lucille Ball. Desi and Lucy put their egos and dreams of stardom on the line in a gamble to save one thing — their marriage — risking it all on an untested and floundering new medium called television. The musical will play at Eisemann Center for the Performing Arts in Richardson through September 30.

Cara Mia Theatre presents WET: A DACAmented Journey
WET: A DACAmented Journey is the story of what it means to be an American in every sense of the word except one: on paper. Based on a true story, WET chronicles one DACA recipient’s ongoing battle of living all but his first three months of life in the United States as an undocumented citizen. The production, taking place in the Theatre Too space at Theatre Three through September 30, is making the first of several nationwide stops in Dallas.

Shakespeare Dallas presents Othello
The fall season of Shakespeare Dallas' Shakespeare in the Park will feature Othello. Othello is a general in the Venetian army who chooses Cassio to be his lieutenant. This angers Iago, who wanted the position for himself. Iago and Roderigo devise a plan to get back at Othello by making a nighttime visit to Brabantio, the father of Desdemona, claiming that she has been stolen by and married to Othello, the Moor. The production will run at Samuell-Grand Amphitheatre through September 29 before moving to Addison.

Friday, September 21

Dallas Arboretum events
The Dallas Arboretum will celebrate the 5th birthday of the Rory Meyers Children’s Adventure Garden with special events all weekend, including scavenger hunts, birthday cake, and more. They'll officially welcome fall starting on Saturday with their annual Autumn at the Arboretum, featuring pumpkin houses and creative displays incorporating more than 90,000 pumpkins, gourds, squash, cornstalks, and a hay bale maze.

InTouch Credit Union Plano Balloon Festival
The annual Plano Balloon Festival is a three-day event that features a balloon glow, skydivers, hot air balloons, concerts, a huge kids' fun zone, merchandise vendors, corporate exhibitors, and variety of foods. There will also be a half marathon, relay, 5K run/walk, and 1-mile Fun Run. The event will take place through Sunday at Oak Point Park and Nature Preserve.

The City of Grand Prairie Parks, Arts & Recreation Department presents EpicFest (UPDATE: Due to expected inclement weather, this event has been canceled.)
The City of Grand Prairie Parks, Arts & Recreation Department will present the first ever EpicFest. The festival will celebrate the culture, nature, and arts of Grand Prairie with performances by the Kumbia Kings, Sister Hazel, and many others. Guests can also enjoy a variety of other activities, including monarch butterfly releases, live entertainment, educational components, multicultural performances, vendors, lawn games, food, and beer gardens. The festival will take place on Friday and Saturday.

Lyric Stage presents Newsies
Set in turn-of-the century New York City, Newsies is the rousing tale of Jack Kelly, a charismatic newsboy and leader of a band of teenaged “newsies.” When titans of publishing Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst raise distribution prices at the newsboys’ expense, Jack rallies newsies from across the city to strike against the unfair conditions and fight for what’s right. Lyric Stage will put on four performances of the Tony Award-winning musical at Majestic Theatre through Sunday.

Troye Sivan in concert with Kim Petras
Watch out, because Troye Sivan is about to take over the world. The former YouTube personality hit the top 5 in Billboard Top 20 with his second album, 2018's Bloom, and he's part of the cast of the buzzy fall movie Boy Erased, starring Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman, and Russell Crowe. Sivan will perform at the Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory in Irving, with Kim Petras serving as opening act.

Saturday, September 22

Dierks Bentley in concert with Brothers Osborne and LANCO
There are few country singers with a higher profile than Dierks Bentley. He has released nine albums since his debut in 2003, including 2018's The Mountain, with all but two of them reaching the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Country charts. Those albums have yielded 11 No. 1 songs, including "Come A Little Closer," "Free and Easy," and "Somewhere on a Beach." Bentley will play at Dos Equis Pavilion alongside Brothers Osborne and LANCO.

Interabang Books and USA Film Festival present An Evening with Sally Field
Interabang Books and the USA Film Festival will honor Sally Field in conjunction with the publication of her new memoir, In Pieces. The evening will kick off with a film clip compilation tribute featuring Field’s film and television works. Field will then take the stage at Dallas Trade Mart for a conversation moderated by Krys Boyd, the host of KERA’s Think, and take the audience behind the scenes for the highs and lows of her Hollywood career and her lifelong relationships.

Sunday, September 23

Childish Gambino in concert with Rae Sremmurd
If you're into pop culture at all, then you know that Childish Gambino — aka Donald Glover — took over the music world earlier this year with the video for his highly political No. 1 song, "This is America." This concert at American Airlines Center will be your last chance to enjoy Glover's music persona, as he announced he was retiring the name during the first stop on the tour. But given how ubiquitous Glover is in music, TV, and movies, don't expect the man to disappear anytime soon.

Childish Gambino, aka Donald Glover, will perform at American Airlines Center on September 23.

Donald Glover/Facebook

Childish Gambino, aka Donald Glover, will perform at American Airlines Center on September 23.

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Wicked News

Wizard of Oz ruby slippers bought by mystery bidder for $28 million

Heritage Auctions

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A pair of iconic ruby slippers that were worn by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz and stolen from a museum nearly two decades ago sold for a winning bid of $28 million at auction on December 7.

Dallas-based Heritage Auctions had estimated that they would fetch $3 million or more, but the fast-paced bidding far outpaced that amount within seconds and tripled it within minutes. A few bidders making offers by phone volleyed back and forth for 15 minutes as the price climbed to the final, eye-popping sum.

Including the auction house fee, the unknown buyer will ultimately pay $32.5 million.

Online bidding, which opened last month, had stood at $1.55 million before live bidding began late Saturday afternoon.

The sparkly red heels were on display at the Judy Garland Museum in her hometown of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, in 2005 when Terry Jon Martin used a hammer to smash the glass of the museum’s door and display case. Their whereabouts remained a mystery until the FBI recovered them in 2018.

Martin, now 77, who lives near Grand Rapids in northern Minnesota, wasn’t publicly exposed as the thief until he was indicted in May 2023. He pleaded guilty in October 2023. He was in a wheelchair and on supplementary oxygen when he was sentenced last January to time served because of his poor health.

The shoes were returned in February to memorabilia collector Michael Shaw, who had loaned them to the museum. They were one of several pairs that Garland wore during the filming, but only four pairs are known to have survived. In the movie, to return from Oz to Kansas, Dorothy had to click her heels three times and repeat, “There’s no place like home.”

As Rhys Thomas, author of The Ruby Slippers of Oz, put it, the sequined shoes from the beloved 1939 musical have seen “more twists and turns than the Yellow Brick Road.”

Over 800 people had been tracking the slippers, and the company’s webpage for the auction had hit nearly 43,000 page views by Thursday, said Robert Wilonsky, a vice president with the auction house.

Among those bidding to bring the slippers home was the Judy Garland Museum, which posted on Facebook shortly after that it did not place the winning bid. The museum had campaigned for donations to supplement money raised by the city of Grand Rapids at its annual Judy Garland festival and the $100,000 set aside this year by Minnesota lawmakers to help the museum purchase the slippers.

After the slippers sold, the auctioneer told bidders and spectators in the room and watching online that the previous record for a piece of entertainment memorabilia was $5.52 million, for the white dress Marilyn Monroe famously wore atop a windy subway grate.

The auction also included other memorabilia from The Wizard of Oz, such as a hat worn by Margaret Hamilton, who played the original Wicked Witch of the West. That item went for $2.4 million, or a total final cost to the buyer of $2.93 million.

The Wizard of Oz story has gained new attention in recent weeks with the release of the movieWicked, an adaptation of the megahit Broadway musical, a prequel of sorts that reimagines the character of the Wicked Witch of the West.

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