weekend event planner

Here are the top 10 things to do in Houston this weekend

Turn the beats up (quietly) with Silent Disco.

Photo courtesy of The Houston Downtown Management District and The Department of Dance

We are moving on from — and trying to rebuild after — that tropical menace known as Imelda, and it looks like the weather will be kind to us this weekend. As the temps cool, it's time to emerge and enjoy weekend with these fun offerings.

Thursday, September 26

Spring Awakening: The Spotlight Series at St. Luke's United Methodist Church
Theatre Under the Stars is doing a periodic event known as The Spotlight Series. This free event will take you behind the scenes of our productions. You'll also meet the creative team and cast members from the show, as well as experience live performances in an intimate setting. First up is a toned-down version of the Grammy and Tony-winning rock musical Spring Awakening. Watch as they take a different approach with the subject matter, in order to create a safe space both in the rehearsal room and on stage for the actors. 6:30 pm.

RYDE for a Reason Benefit and Silent Auction at The Astorian
RYDE prides itself on being a premium, indoor-cycling experience, where participants cycle to "the beat of the music for forty-five minutes while toning your core, back, arms and legs." This weekend, RYDE will throw this event to benefit United Against Human Trafficking. Guests will enjoy live music, a DJ, food from Wolfgang Puck, and more. Following the kickoff party, an indoor cycling event will take place on Saturday, with five cycling classes from 8 am to 2 pm at RYDE. Tickets are $75. 7-11 pm.

Friday, September 27

Fall Exhibitions Opening at Houston Center for Contemporary Craft
The Houston Center for Contemporary Craft will be celebrating the opening of two fall exhibitions, OBJECTS: REDUX–How 50 Years Made Craft Contemporary, a seminal exhibition of American craft that debuted at the Smithsonian National Collection of Fine Arts in 1969, and Nathalie Miebach: The Water Line, a solo exhibition by the contemporary basket weaver and sculptor. The evening will also feature open studios by the current resident artists, and beer will be generously provided by Buffalo Bayou. 5:30-8 pm.

Homemade Hope Home is Where the Heart Is Gala at The Ballroom at Bayou Place
Homemade Hope, a 501(c)(3) that provides hands-on cooking classes, holiday celebrations and field trips for children living in Houston-area homeless shelters, is throwing this very special gala. Guests will enjoy cocktails, dinner, a live and silent auction, dancing, and more. Former KHOU anchor Lily Jang will be the emcee, and DJ Kalkutta is flying in from NYC to play the event. Tickets prices range from $250 to $20,000. All guests will receive complimentary tickets to the afterparty. 7 pm.

Nosferatu at Alamo Drafthouse LaCenterra
Since October and Halloween are around the corner, expect a lot of multiplexes and revival houses to do screenings of Nosferatu, F. W. Murnau's eternally creepy vampire movie from 1922. Alamo Drafthouse in Katy will be the first out of the gate with a screening this weekend, featuring live music from The Invisible Czars. This is actually the first stop on a fall tour, where they will be doing live scores of Nosferatu and The Phantom of the Opera in venues all over the country. (They'll be back here for Phantom in November.) 7:45 pm.

Saturday, September 28

Goat Yoga at Armadillo Palace
Armadillo Palace, Goode Company’s flagship restaurant, has a massive backyard constructed in homage to all things Texas. So, it's the right kind of place for a good ol' goat yoga session. Some 20 baby goats will wander around, nuzzling guests and hopping on some downward dog-posed backs for a spiritual fusion of exercise and nature. Afterwards, sip on the new summer cocktail list or grab lunch with your new goat yoga friends. This class is designed for beginners, but all experience levels are welcome. 10:30 am to noon.

ScaryDad Horror Convention at Crowne Plaza Houston Galleria
How did we just find out about the ScaryDad Horror Convention, which is now in its third year? The two-day convention not only has exhibitors, cosplayers, a costume contest, and DIY workshops on turning your house into a haunt, it also features professional Houston-based writers and filmmakers giving panels and workshops on how to write and sell your horror novel or film and how to distribute horror movies. Also, new this year are discussion panels and interactive demonstrations with top-notch programming. 11 am.

LEVEL: Rooftop Silent Disco at GreenStreet Garage
In this 21-and-up event, the rooftop of the GreenStreet Garage will transform into downtown Houston’s largest — and quietest — dance floor. People will be given special headphones, which they can use to tune into one of three channels broadcasting music spun live. A selection of local DJs will open, with DJ Charles Feelgood headlining. The evening will also feature immersive art installations from Fifth World Collective, light bites from Umbrella Fellas and an illuminated lounge for partiers to rest with a view of the skyline. 9 pm.

Sunday, September 29

CIGNA Sunday Streets at Washington Avenue
Now in its sixth year, Cigna Sunday Streets continues to spotlight Houston’s most unique neighborhoods around the city with a focus on promoting alternative transportation, supporting neighborhood economies, and creating a sense of community. For this season, the monthly, free, family-friendly event will start off on Washington Avenue between Studemont and Sabine streets, a popular location in the Arts District with some of the city’s hottest dining destinations. Noon to 4 pm.

Houston Slavic Heritage Festival at North Side Columbus Club / KC Hall
It's the 56th annual Houston Slavic Heritage Festival, the unique indoor festival which brings the Slavic community together in a celebration rich in heritage, traditions, food, music, dance, and accomplishments through their cuisines (all the kielbasa you can eat!), custom beers, music, and displays. This one-day fest is an amazing opportunity to get together with the Czech, Croatians, Polish, and Ukrainians for one day, in one place and be enveloped by the rich traditions of the Slavs. Noon to 6 pm.

event-planner

Movie Review

Meta-comedy remake Anaconda coils itself into an unfunny mess

Photo by Matt Grace

Jack Black and Paul Rudd in Anaconda.

In Hollywood’s never-ending quest to take advantage of existing intellectual property, seemingly no older movie is off limits, even if the original was not well-regarded. That’s certainly the case with 1997’s Anaconda, which is best known for being a lesser entry on the filmography of Ice Cube and Jennifer Lopez, as well as some horrendous accent work by Jon Voight.

The idea behind the new meta-sequel Anaconda is arguably a good one. Four friends — Doug (Jack Black), Griff (Paul Rudd), Claire (Thandiwe Newton), and Kenny (Steve Zahn) — who made homemade movies when they were teenagers decide to remake Anaconda on a shoestring budget. Egged on by Griff, an actor who can’t catch a break, the four of them pull together enough money to fly down to Brazil, hire a boat, and film a script written by Doug.

Naturally, almost nothing goes as planned in the Amazon, including losing their trained snake and running headlong into a criminal enterprise. Soon enough, everything else takes second place to the presence of a giant anaconda that is stalking them and anyone else who crosses its path.

Written and directed by Tom Gormican, with help from co-writer Kevin Etten, the film is designed to be an outrageous comedy peppered with laugh-out-loud moments that cover up the fact that there’s really no story. That would be all well and good … if anything the film had to offer was truly funny. Only a few scenes elicit any honest laughter, and so instead the audience is fed half-baked jokes, a story with no focus, and actors who ham it up to get any kind of reaction.

The biggest problem is that the meta-ness of the film goes too far. None of the core four characters possess any interesting traits, and their blandness is transferred over to the actors playing them. And so even as they face some harrowing situations or ones that could be funny, it’s difficult to care about anything they do since the filmmakers never make the basic effort of making the audience care about them.

It’s weird to say in a movie called Anaconda, but it becomes much too focused on the snake in the second half of the film. If the goal is to be a straight-up comedy, then everything up to and including the snake attacks should be serving that objective. But most of the time the attacks are either random or moments when the characters are already scared, and so any humor that could be mined all but disappears.

Black and Rudd are comedy all-stars who can typically be counted on to elevate even subpar material. That’s not the case here, as each only scores on a few occasions, with Black’s physicality being the funniest thing in the movie. Newton is not a good fit with this type of movie, and she isn’t done any favors by some seriously bad wigs. Zahn used to be the go-to guy for funny sidekicks, but he brings little to the table in this role.

Any attempt at rebooting/remaking an old piece of IP should make a concerted effort to differentiate itself from the original, and in that way, the new Anaconda succeeds. Unfortunately, that’s its only success, as the filmmakers can never find the right balance to turn it into the bawdy comedy they seemed to want.

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Anaconda is now playing in theaters.

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