Weekend Event Planner

Hadestown jazzes up the 13 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

Performing arts will once again dominate the slate of events in and around Dallas this weekend, with five theater productions, two comedians, a chamber opera, a full-scale opera, and a dance production. There will also be two different festivals and a concert to celebrate a historic music venue.

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, February 27

Dallas Theater Center presents Primary Trust
Kenneth lives in a small town in upstate New York. For 15 years his life has been the same: by day, he works at a bookstore, in the evening, he drinks mai tais with his friend Bert. When the bookstore shuts down, Kenneth is forced out of his comfort zone to face a world he has long avoided - with transformative and heartwarming results. Performances of Primary Trust, winner of the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, run through March 23 at Bryant Hall in the Kalita Humphreys Theater complex.

Undermain Theatre presents Box
Part magic show, part historical speculation, part romantic drama, Box explores the harrowing story of Henry Box Brown, the abolitionist lecturer and early magician who escaped slavery by mailing himself to freedom and went on to become a famed magician on the London stage. Using actual magic, the world premiere imagines an unwritten chapter in the story of one of history’s most overlooked folk heroes. The production runs through March 24 at Undermain Theatre.

Broadway Dallas presents Hadestown
Hadestown intertwines two mythic tales - that of young dreamers Orpheus and Eurydice, and that of King Hades and his wife Persephone - as it invites the audience on a hell-raising journey to the underworld and back. Singer-songwriter Anaïs Mitchell’s beguiling melodies and director Rachel Chavkin’s poetic imagination pit industry against nature, doubt against faith, and fear against love. The national tour of the jazzy Tony Award-winning musical runs through Sunday at the Music Hall at Fair Park.

Live With Jake Shane
Jake Shane is an influencer and comedian who became well-known for his viral TikTok videos featuring humorous re-enactments of historical events. In 2023, he was nominated for a Streamy Award and appeared on TikTok's inaugural LGBTQ+ Pride Visionary Voices List and on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list. He'll perform at Majestic Theatre.

Friday, February 28

North Texas Irish Festival
The North Texas Irish Festival celebrates the best in music, dance, food and spirits, storytelling, art, and more originating in the Emerald Isle. The festival features 10 stages of live music, Irish step dancing, chef demonstrations and more. Guests will also enjoy beer and whiskey tastings, shopping, horse shows, sheepherding demonstrations, animal rescue groups, child-friendly entertainment, and arts and crafts for the kids. The festival takes place through Sunday at Fair Park.

Verdigris Ensemble presents Song From The Uproar: The Lives And Deaths of Isabelle Eberhardt
In Song From The Uproar: The Lives And Deaths of Isabelle Eberhardt, composer Missy Mazzoli brings to life the remarkable journey of Isabelle Eberhardt, a Swiss explorer who abandoned European privilege to roam the Sahara as a Sufi mystic. Through a blend of live instruments and electronics, the chamber opera illuminates the tensions between opposing forces - man and woman, water and sand, Europe and Africa. The production will have three performances through Sunday at Theatre Three.

The Dallas Opera presents La bohème
Hungry, cold, broke, and deliriously in love, the artists in Puccini’s masterpiece La bohème break hearts over and over again each time it is performed, with pulses quickening as Rodolfo lights Mimì’s candle anew. The Dallas Opera’s period production returns with a fresh cast of some of opera’s brightest rising stars, transporting audiences to the cafés and corridors of Paris’s Latin Quarter as tragedy hovers nearby. The production will have five performances through March 9 at Winspear Opera House.

Teatro Dallas presents Nuevo Mundo (A New Directors Festival)
The final weekend of Teatro Dallas' Nuevo Mundo, a festival that incubates new directors and playwrights, will feature a semi-devised premiere piece called In the Beginning, created by Gerald Taylor II under the mentorship of Lauren Leblanc. In a world where everything feels like it is ending, sometimes the answer lies at the start. The production, an exploration of several creation myths from around the world told by four storytellers, will have three performances through Sunday at Latino Cultural Center.

Texas Ballet Theater presents International Woman
In a celebration of female creativity and choreography, Texas Ballet Theater presents International Woman, an evening dedicated entirely to works by female choreographers. Highlights include Annabelle Lopez Ochoa's Shibuya Blues, an exploration of modern life and dance; Lamentation Variations, inspired by Martha Graham's elegy in movement; Martha Graham’s whimsical Maple Leaf Rag; and Natalie Weir’s vibrant Jabula, a celebration of motion and dance through the music of Hans Zimmer’s The Power of One. There will be four performances through Sunday at Wyly Theatre.

Majestic Theatre presents Luenell
Luenell is a force of nature best known for her role as the “hooker with the heart of gold” in Borat. She's also appeared in feature films like I Hate You Dad with Adam Sandler and Leighton Meester and Think Like a Man with Arielle Kebell and Meagan Good, as well as TV shows like The Middle and Always Sunny In Philadelphia. She'll perform for one night only at Majestic Theatre.

Saturday, March 1

Kitchen Dog Theater presents New Works Festival Staged Reading Series: Bad Books
When a troubled teen is given a controversial book, his mother visits the local library to discuss “appropriate” reading material with the librarian. However, their reasonable discussion quickly turns into a heated confrontation, sparking a dramatic chain reaction of unexpected consequences. With both heartbreak and humor, playwright Sharyn Rothstein offers compassion and empathy as an antidote to the deep debates that divide us. Part of Kitchen Dog Theater's Staged Reading Series, the production will be at Kitchen Dog Theater's new location in Expo Park.

City of Carrollton presents TEXFest
The 10th annual TEXFest is a celebration of Texas Independence Day. The Texas-sized festival features craft beer, good grub, and local artists performing Texas music. Visitors can ride on a mechanical bull, participate in two-stepping and lawn games, and more. The festival takes place in Historic Downtown Carrollton.

Sunday, March 2

Longhorn Jubilee featuring Toadies
To celebrate Longhorn Ballroom’s 75th anniversary, the venue will host a series of events to honor the iconic room's past, present, and future. Dubbed the Longhorn Jubilee, the all-genre-encompassing events will unfold both inside the Ballroom and outside in the Courtyard combining music with food trucks, local vendors, brand activations, and more. The inaugural event takes on Texas Independence Day, featuring performances by Toadies, The Band of Heathens, Bob Wills’ Texas Playboys, and more.

Photo by Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade

Hadestown will play at the Music Hall at Fair Park through March 2.

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Movie Review

Military vet gives war film My Dead Friend Zoe warmth and integrity

Photo courtesy of Briarcliff Entertainment

Natalie Morale and Sonequa Martin-Green in My Dead Friend Zoe.

When you think about the “war is hell” genre, it’s easy to picture movies that actually depict combat. There have been fewer movies made about what happens after someone returns from war, although they include films like 1947 Best Picture winner The Best Years of Our Lives, the Oscar-winning The Deer Hunter and Born on the Fourth of July, and more recent films like Thank You for Your Service.

My Dead Friend Zoe does double duty in its storytelling, taking on PTSD in the modern soldier and framing it through the eyes of women, who rarely get showcased in movies about the military. Merit (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Zoe (Natalie Morales) served together in the Army in Afghanistan in 2016, becoming fast friends not least because of the high male-to-female ratio there.

The bulk of the film takes place sometime after their stint together, with Merit in group therapy with fellow veterans under the guidance of Dr. Cole (Morgan Freeman). Zoe accompanies her everywhere she goes, but - as the title tells you - Zoe is dead, appearing as a hallucination for Merit and alternately helping and torturing her with comments about what Merit is doing with her life. To add even more stress onto Merit, she’s enlisted by her mother, Kris, (Gloria Reuben) to look after her grandfather, Dale (Ed Harris), who’s been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

Directed by Kyle Hausmann-Stokes (an Army veteran himself), and adapted by Hausmann-Stokes and A.J. Bermudez from Hausmann-Stokes’ short film, Merit x Zoe, the film is a strong combination of a story about friendship, family, and the difficulty of reintegrating into a “normal” life after being in a war. Merit’s ability to “see” Zoe is a double-edged sword, as it allows her some measure of happiness in her otherwise depressed state, but it also is indicative of a deep well of pain that she’s not ready to confront.

To underscore Merit’s mental state, Hausmann-Stokes goes back and forth between scenes depicting Merit and Zoe’s time serving together and the current day. The juxtaposition of the two time periods allows the audience to understand the two women’s friendship better, as well as why Merit continues to find it tough to adjust to life outside of the military. The bond between her and Dale, who also served in the Army, brings an added element of gravity to her story.

The only slight misstep Hausmann-Stokes makes is by introducing Alex (Utkarsh Ambudkar), a possible romantic interest for Merit. On their own, the scenes between the two of them are relatively charming and it’s easy to understand the temptation to add some levity to the heavy plot. But the subplot never brings anything of substance to the overall film, and it could have easily been excised without affecting the story as a whole.

Martin-Green is an industry veteran best known for starring in the TV shows The Walking Dead and Star Trek: Discovery. She ably holds her own as the star of the film, cycling through Merit’s highs and lows with ease. Morales is allowed to be more fast and loose with her performance, and she proves to be a great complement to Martin-Green. The steady hands of Freeman, Harris, and Reuben help to keep the story grounded and provide the familiarity that the two stars might not have for all moviegoers.

My Dead Friend Zoe is a message movie whose message changes as the film goes along. Made by a former member of the military in dedication to people with which he served, it’s an impressive debut feature film for Hausmann-Stokes that brings a desire to see more from him, as well as the two main actors.

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My Dead Friend Zoe opens in theaters on February 28.

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