Weekend Event Planner

These are the 10 best things to do in Dallas this weekend

If you like music, comedy, or theater, this weekend across Dallas will bring you plenty of options for each. The weekend kicks off with two well-known comedians, before bands take center stage at no fewer than five concerts, along with a barbecue festival with a side of music. Theater productions include one aimed at kids and another featuring five short plays.

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 5

Whitney Cummings: Big Baby Tour
Comedian Whitney Cummings is best known for creating and starring in the NBC series Whitney. She also co-created the CBS comedy series 2 Broke Girls. She is currently the host of the podcast Good for You, which features conversations with her friends, fellow comedians, and experts in a variety of fields. She'll perform for one night only at Majestic Theatre.

Friday, September 6

Dallas Comedy Club presents Devon Walker
Before his current job as a featured player on Saturday Night Live, Devon Walker wrote for the hit Netflix animated series Big Mouth, as well as the Freeform series, Everything’s Trash (starring Phoebe Robinson). Walker was named one of Vulture’s "Comedians You Should And Will Know" in 2022, and has been featured on Comedy Central, NBC, and more. He'll perform four times through Saturday at Dallas Comedy Club.

Yesterday & Today: The Interactive Beatles Experience
Yesterday and Today: The Interactive Beatles Experience is a band, anchored by brothers Billy, Matthew, and Ryan McGuigan, that uses the works of The Beatles and leaves the song choices completely in the hands of the audience. Audience members fill out request cards prior to the show, and a set list is created based upon the songs chosen by that particular audience. The concert takes place at Wyly Theatre.

Incubus in concert
Unlike some, alt-rock band Incubus was not an overnight success. After forming in 1991, they didn't release their first album until 1995. Their third album featured some of their most popular songs to date, including "Pardon Me" and "Drive," and they finally broke through for good with 2001's Morning View. Although there's no particular notable anniversary for that album, they'll play it in its entirety at this concert, along with their other hits. The concert takes place at The Pavilion At Toyota Music Factory, with Coheed and Cambria as special guest.

Twenty One Pilots in concert
The rock/hip hop duo Twenty One Pilots also had a bit of a slow rise, releasing three albums before hitting it big with 2015's Blurryface and its inescapable hit, "Stressed Out." The hits and top-selling albums have only continued since then, with each of their next three albums making the top three on the Billboard 200 chart. They'll play at American Airlines Center on both Friday and Saturday in support of their new album, Clancy.

Saturday, September 7

TheatreWorks USA presents Cat Kid Comic Club: The Musical
In this production based on the work of author Dav Pilkey, Cat Kid and Molly Pollywog have started an epic club to teach 21 rambunctious baby frogs how to make their own comics. Their fishy father Flippy is overjoyed that his kids will learn to unleash their creativity, but when the frogs’ constant bickering and outrageous imaginations send their comics comically off the rails, Flippy flips out. There will be two performances at Wyly Theatre.

The Smokeout Fest
The Smokeout Fest will kick off with a barbecue competition with more than 50 teams showcasing their unique styles and secret recipes. Attendees will have the opportunity to taste the specialties and cast votes for their favorites, with the top three teams earning a share of $5,000 in prize money. The festival, taking place at Southfork Ranch, will also feature music performances from Gary Allan, Casey Donahew, Ryder Grimes, and Paul Cauthen.

The Mavericks in concert
For more than 30 years, The Mavericks have made their own way in the music industry, along the way becoming masters of country-Latin rock ’n’ roll. The band, born in the rich cultural mix of Miami, found their biggest success during their Nashville days in the 1990s, with hits like "O What a Thrill" and "Here Comes the Rain." They'll play at Majestic Theatre in support of their new album, Moon & Stars.

Rover Dramawerks presents One Day Only 30
Theater productions usually have months, if not years, to be perfected. At One Day Only, presented for the 30th time by Rover Dramawerks, five short plays will go from concept to curtain in just one day. The results can be seen at Cox Playhouse in Plano.

Sunday, September 8

Bush in concert
If you want to make Gen Xers feel old, just let them know that 2024 marks the 30th anniversary of Sixteen Stone, the debut album for British rock band Bush. That and their 1996 follow-up, Razorblade Suitcase, made them big stars thanks to hits like "Everything Zen," "Glycerine," and "Machinehead." Not so coincidentally, this tour is in support of their first-ever greatest hits album, Loaded: The Greatest Hits 1994–2023. They'll play at Dos Equis Pavilion, joined by special guests Jerry Cantrell and Candlebox.

Photo by Shervin Lainez

Bush will play at Dos Equis Pavilion on September 8.

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Movie Review

Emma Stone is a fierce presence in conspiracy theory movie Bugonia

Photo by Atsushi Nishijima/Focus Features

Emma Stone in Bugonia.

Few other current directors can evoke strong reactions like Yorgos Lanthimos. Since the Greek filmmaker got his first big exposure with The Lobster in 2015, his films have become the epitome of the love it/hate it dichotomy, with some films lavished with Oscar nominations and others ending up on the worst movies of the year lists. So there’s no doubt that his latest, Bugonia, will divide audiences as well.

On the surface, the film is Lanthimos’ most accessible one yet. Teddy (Jesse Plemons) is your classic conspiracy theorist, blaming his and the world’s woes on corporations and the aliens he believes run them. At the top of his revenge list is Michelle (Emma Stone), who leads a diversified company that includes the Amazon-esque warehouse where Teddy works.

Teddy convinces his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis) that the only way to get the world right again is to kidnap Michelle and convince her to take them to her leader. But what Teddy doesn’t anticipate is the response he will get from Michelle. Instead of reacting in fear after waking up in Teddy’s basement with her head shaved, she uses her assertive nature to try to take control of the situation.

The film is written by Will Tracy, whose recent projects like the film The Menu and the HBO series Succession both took aim at the ultra-rich. He does so again here, as Teddy and Don’s modest home in the country, where they keep bees as a side gig, is juxtaposed with the lavish lifestyle of Michelle, who thinks offering her workers the “option” of leaving for the day at 5:30 pm is a big perk.

When the film is focused on this part of the story is when it’s at its most successful. Teddy and Michelle have multiple confrontations while she’s chained up, with Teddy trying to break her by any means necessary, and Michelle pushing back with the only thing she has at her disposal: Her words. The film is alternately brutal and funny as each uses their form of power to try to manipulate the other.

Other elements are, as expected, head-scratching. Lanthimos includes brief black-and-white segments showing Teddy’s mom Sandy (Alicia Silverstone) fighting an unexplained illness, one which inexplicably has her floating in mid-air. Don — and the actor playing him — is autistic, a fact that the filmmakers don’t necessarily have to explain save for the slightly icky feeling it brings up about both the character and actor being exploited.

Stone, working with Lanthimos for the fourth time, turns in a fierce and compelling performance. Her character can be a bit clueless as to how her actions affect others, and Stone rides the line between heartlessness and forced niceness well. Plemons goes against type as a man with possible mental health issues, but he maintains the same level of intensity he’s brought to other recent roles. Novice actor Delbis makes for an interesting presence even as he’s not asked to do more than react to the weird ideas of Plemons’ character.

Bugonia doesn’t have the consistent WTF-ness of Lanthimos’ most outlandish projects, something that has made his most acclaimed films so memorable. But it also contains a fair amount of intrigue and two great actors going head-to-head for much of its running time, so it’ll more than likely end up on the positive side of the ledger for most viewers.

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Bugonia opens in theaters on October 31.

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