Weekend Event Planner

Houston Beer Fest, Habsburg masterpieces and rap legends top best weekend events in Houston

As the temperatures heat up, you may find yourself choosing indoor events over outdoor ones. While there are some great indoor choices this week, most of the big ones will take place in the great outdoors, where you'll be able to enjoy a GLBT celebration, great beer and some classic hip hop, among other things.

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 11

Houston Ballet presents The Taming of the Shrew
For the final production of their 2014-2015 season, the Houston Ballet will adapt one of William Shakespeare's most iconic plays, The Taming of the Shrew. The comic nature of the play is a great fit for ballet, as the feisty Katherina attempts to elude the advances of Petruchio at every turn. The production will run at Wortham Theater Center through June 21.

TUTS Underground presents First Date
The final show of TUTS Underground's 2014-2015 season is an event that's alternately thrilling and nerve-wracking in anybody's life: a first date. A blind date turns into a uproarious high-stakes dinner when other restaurant patrons transform into supportive best friends, manipulative exes and protective parents. It will play at Hobby Center for the Performing Arts through June 21.

Friday, June 12

Rainbow on the Green
In advance of Pride Houston week, which starts on June 21, Discovery Green will host Rainbow on the Green, a citywide GLBT celebration. Among the performers at the free event will be Lady Gaga and Britney Spears impersonator Derrick Barry, RuPaul's Drag Race contestant Coco Montrese and more.

Houston Symphony presents Disney in Concert
Among the more accessible concerts the Houston Symphony puts on during the summer is Disney in Concert, in which they play selections from a variety of classic Disney movies like Frozen, Aladdin, The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid. The performance, which is also affordable at $20, will be at Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion.

Bayou City Theatrics presents Sunset Boulevard
The latest from Bayou City Theatrics is Sunset Boulevard, Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical adaptation of Billy Wilder's Oscar-winning film. Featuring Norma Desmond, one of the most indelible characters in movie history, and her relationship with writer Joe Gillis, the production gives a great spin on a classic story. It will run at The Kaleidoscope through June 27.

Saturday, June 13

Pop Shop Houston Summer Festival
If you're on the hunt for handmade or vintage goods, there will be no better place to be this weekend than Silver Street Studios, which will host the Pop Shop Houston Summer Festival. While perusing the wares from over 90 vendors, you can also participate in outdoor and art activities, dance to some great music and more.

2015 Houston Beer Fest
Beer lovers will be in heaven at Hermann Square Park on Saturday and Sunday as more than 60 breweries will be doling out samples of their latest and most special creations. As if that wasn't enough, more than 20 musical acts will put on performances, including Chamillionaire, Hayes Carll, MuteMath, Scarface and more.

LL Cool J in concert with Public Enemy, Doug E. Fresh and others
Scarface will be pulling double duty this weekend, as he will join a whole host of other rap/hip hop legends at Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion as part of The Kings of the Mic Tour. The concert is headlined by LL Cool J, but it will also feature Public Enemy, Doug E. Fresh, Whodini, Big Daddy Kane, DJ Jazzy Jeff, Sugarhill Gang and The Furious 5.

Sunday, June 14

MFAH art opening: Habsburg Splendor: Masterpieces from Vienna's Imperial Collections
After a day full of outdoor fun on Saturday, you can have a low-key, air-conditioned Sunday by taking in the latest exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Largely composed of works that have never traveled outside of Austria, Habsburg Splendor explores the dramatic rise and fall of the Habsburgs and their global empire. The exhibit will be on view through September 13.

Houston Ballet will present The Taming of the Shrew at Wortham Theater Center through June 21.

Houston Ballet 2014-15 season announcement January 2014 The Taming of the Shrew Melody Mennite Connor Walsh

Photo by © Amitava Sarkar

Houston Ballet will present The Taming of the Shrew at Wortham Theater Center through June 21.

unspecified

Movie Review

New horror movie Sinners sings the blues with twin turn from Michael B. Jordan

Photo courtesy of Warner Bros.

Michael B. Jordan and Miles Caton in Sinners.

Writer/director Ryan Coogler has become so well-known for his blockbuster films — Creed, Black Panther, and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever — that it’s easy to forget that he made his debut with the small-but-powerful 2013 film, Fruitvale Station. After more than a decade, he’s finally returning to original material with his latest film, Sinners.

Each of Coogler’s films has either starred or featured Michael B. Jordan, and this one gives moviegoers a double dose, as Jordan plays twins who go by the nicknames of Smoke and Stack. Set in 1932, the two hustlers have recently returned from mysterious (and possibly criminal) work in Chicago to their hometown of Clarksdale, Mississippi to open a juke joint.

They call upon a number of friends and family to help them with the venture, including cousin and guitar player Sammie Moore (Miles Caton), Smoke’s old girlfriend Annie (Wunmi Mosaku), piano player Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo), bouncer Cornbread (Omar Miller), and Chinese couple Bo and Grace Chow (Yao and Li Jun Li). Trouble is never far from the brothers, though, whether it’s Stack’s old girlfriend Mary (Hailee Steinfeld), the Ku Klux Klan leader who sold them the property for the juke joint, or something even more sinister.

Coogler began his feature film career by confronting the issue of unjustified shootings of Black people by police. How Black people are perceived by society has been a part of everything he’s done since. By placing this film firmly in the middle of the Jim Crow era, he infuses the story with all manner of subtext, including the injustice of sharecropping and prevalent segregation in the South.

Music, specifically Blues, plays a big part in the film as well. It’s championed through the emerging talent of Sammie and the veteran presence of Delta Slim, but it’s also a driving force for other parts of the plot. Sammie is decried by his pastor father for playing “the devil’s music,” while strange newcomer Remmick (Jack O’Connell) seems to appreciate it a little too much. A fantastically surreal scene at the juke joint turns into an entertaining and educational lesson on the history of Black music.

It’s Remmick’s obsession that’s at the center of the final hour or so of the film, one in which all hell breaks loose. The manner of that hell is probably better enjoyed if it’s not spoiled here, but suffice it to say that Remmick has an evil to him that threatens to destroy Smoke and Stack’s venture before it even gets started. The horror aspect of the film is fine, but it winds up being the least interesting part of the story.

Jordan can occasionally go over-the-top with his performances, and with him playing twins the threat of doing so was doubled. But he remains relatively restrained for most of the film, giving each twin their own unique spin. Caton, a rising R&B singer, makes his acting debut in the film and winds up stealing every scene he’s in. The rest of the cast complements each other well, with Mosaku and Steinfeld being standouts.

Coogler has proven himself to be a savvy filmmaker in each of his previous four films, and with Sinners he combines the personal with crowd-pleasing elements to great effect. It features great music, an insightful story, and even some gory action for an experience you’re not likely to find anywhere else.

---

Sinners opens in theaters on April 18.

movies film sinners movie