weekend event planner

Here are the top 12 things to do in Houston this weekend

Head to Uptown on Thanksgiving Day for the Uptown Lighting.

Photo courtesy of Uptown Houston

Thanksgiving weekend is here, Houston. Whether that means time with family and friends or time alone, look for plenty of events to burn off that pumpkin pie and dressing.

Have a safe, happy, Thanksgiving. Here are your best bets for the weekend.

Griff's Thanksgiving Feast
If you don't have family and/or friends to hang with this Thanksgiving, Griff's has got you covered. The pub will have turkey and ham and all the fixings, including Layne's World Famous Broccoli Cheese Casserole.

The best part of all — other than being with your Griff's family — is that it's all free. It's starts on time and ends when the food is gone. So come celebrate with the folk at Griff's and have a great holiday. 12:30 pm.

33rd Annual Uptown Holiday Lighting
Here's another holiday light show that's happening. It will begin with the illumination of Uptown’s 300 custom, 20-foot holiday trees along Post Oak Boulevard, from the West Loop to Richmond Avenue.

The family event will feature festive holiday shopping and treats, unique street entertainment, and the sights and sounds of the holiday season, along with a special appearance from Santa.

Following the ceremonial lighting of Uptown’s holiday trees, the evening will culminate with a fireworks display, followed by a light show. 4 pm.

The Riot Comedy Show presents Live LAUGH Love Thanksgiving Special
It appears this monthly tradition will have a Thanksgiving theme this time around.

The evening will feature stand-up comedy from some of Houston's funniest comedians share their takes on holiday dating and relationships.

Relationship questions will be answered by comics during the comics' panel. If you're looking to break away from the family for a hot minute, these comics are here to get some of that tension outta you. 8 pm.

Friday, November 26

TFTI - Houston Selfie Museum
This interactive selfie experience will catch the eye of Houston holiday shoppers with a limited-time experience opening at The Galleria. The novel, fun-filled activation will offer over 15 themed, picturesque studios designed specifically with Instagram feeds in mind.

The exhibit features a range of out-of-the-box rooms such as the seasonal Upside-Down X-Mas Tree Room, Pillow Fight Room, Infinity Mirror Room, DJ Confetti Room, Space Room and more. Through Wednesday, January 1. 10 am (11 am Sunday).

Downtown District presents Thing-A-Ma-Jingle
The Houston Downtown Management District (Downtown District) is shutting down Main Street on Friday for the return of this night of festive fun. The giant block party will feature a night market, carol-oke, photo ops with hipster Santa, lighting projections, and more.

Event goers will enjoy food and drink specials and live music at area bars and restaurants. This event is recommended for ages 21 years old and above. 5 pm.

The Grand Ol' Christmas Show
Will Hearn’s Grand Ol’ Christmas Show is a raucous, rollicking, one-of-a-kind musical comedy featuring Americana standout Blue Water Highway. The retro radio show brings sketch comedy antics and Christmas classics to a traditional Christmas Eve broadcast, led by Nick Brown’s Radio Orchestra and Gospel Singers.

Made for music and comedy lovers, this tribute to American Christmas traditions cleverly and progressively blurs the lines between heartfelt nostalgia and contemporary pop-culture satire. 7:30 pm.

Saturday, November 27

Trill Burgers Pop-Up
Bun B's Trill Burgers will be hosting a pop-up at Sticky's Chicken this weekend. The pop-up will include Trill Burgers' new vegan smash burger — a 100 percent, plant-based Beleaf burger made with Impossible meat — plus the “OG Classic” burger and Grilled Onion Smashburger.

Burgers will be available to first-come, first-served at the restaurant until supplies last. Vegan burgers are expected to sell out quickly. 2 pm.

Waterparks in concert
Off the back of their highly anticipated album Greatest Hits, pop-punk trio Waterparks is bringing their infectious energy on the road and they are ready to rock out in Houston, where it all started.

This band excitedly blends genre lines — jiving between fits of rock, alternative, and electronic with pop ambition and hip-hop’s bold and blatant disregard for the rules. They have garnered a massive cult following and amassed over 195 million streams and over 175,000 US album sales to date. 6 pm.

No Limit Reunion Tour
No Limit Records was an American record label founded by Master P. The label included artists such as Snoop Dogg, Silkk the Shocker, Mystikal, Mia X, C-Murder, Romeo Miller, and more.

The label is often credited as forebearers furthering the rise of southern hip-hop and laying the blueprint for independent ownership in rap music. And, now, they're back on tour, featuring Master P, Mystikal, Slikk The Shocker, Mia X, Fiend, Mercedes, and Mr Serv-On. 7:30 pm.

Sunday, November 28

Hanukkah Film Festival
The Hanukkah Film Festival will celebrate the Hanukkah season with eight nights of exclusive, award-winning new films.

The Austin Jewish Film Festival is joining with film festivals, synagogues, and Jewish organizations across the U.S. and Canada in partnership with Menemsha Films in this new, virtual holiday celebration.

Opening night will feature the world premiere of the animated Hanukkah short The Broken Candle. Through Sunday, December 5. 9 am.

Parkway Market Days at Regent Square
In partnership with The Art Cellar of Houston, the popular, outdoor local artisan market series is set to stock you with gifts for the holidays.

Grab a bite from one of the onsite food trucks and a cocktail from Jo’s Mini Mobil Bar, as you listen to the sounds of Keith Vivens Due and peruse curated vendors selling specialty jewelry and accessories, artwork, candles, culinary treats and more.

It's free to attend, and the first 25 attendees will have the opportunity to decorate a kite to fly at adjacent Buffalo Bayou Park. 2 pm.

Youth Soul Love presents Sounds of the City
This show is presented by the Art of Soul and Wear Models and hosted by Houston hip-hop artist/fashion influencer Youth Soul Love.

Expect a dynamic cultural experience reanimates the urban music scenes of the cities that birthed today's music culture and highlights music influence on the fashion and art created in the respective periods of time.

Fashion designer Nicholas Phat Nguyen's Mysterious line will be honored, while Love, Julian Caesar, and other artists will perform. 6 pm.

event-planner

Movie Review

Camp Miasma puts a comedic twist on the classic slasher movie

Photo courtesy of MUBI

Hannah Einbinder and Gillian Anderson in Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma.

The horror genre really ramped up in the 1970s and ‘80s, bringing the slasher subgenre that gave audiences new visuals of gore, but also a reliance on sexism and homophobia that would come to define the era. The new film Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma wrestles with that legacy in ways that are funny, thought-provoking, and downright strange.

Kris (Hannah Einbinder) is a queer filmmaker who has been hired to reboot the moldy IP that is the Camp Miasma franchise, one that was fresh in the 1970s but which numerous shlocky sequels have rendered irrelevant. In an attempt to get to know the property better, Kris has scored a meeting with the reclusive Billy (Gillian Anderson), the star of the original film who has shunned the public eye for decades.

Turns out that Billy lives deep in the woods at Camp Rivoli, which served as the location for the first film. As Kris tries to get to know Billy and convince her to be a part of the new film, she starts to fall under Billy’s spell and the lore of the franchise as a whole. That includes believing that the movie’s villain, Little Death — a transgender person who has an air conditioning vent as a head/mask — may not just be a character created for the movies.

Written and directed by Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw the TV Glow), the film at first feels like it’s going to go the straight-up comedy route, with comic explosions of blood, a strange fascination with candy brands, and a production design that does nothing to hide that the two main actors are on a movie set with painted backdrops. This is backed up by Kris’ phone conversations with her girlfriend, Mari (Jasmine Savoy Brown) and her agent (Sarah Sherman), as well as numerous other details.

But the film starts to go down the surreal route the longer Kris stays at the camp with Billy, especially when they sit down to watch the original Camp Miasma. An extended sequence shows a good amount of that film-within-the-film, demonstrating why Kris and Billy have a love/hate relationship with the property. For Kris, though, the lines between the film and the real world start to blur, and Schoenbrun uses a variety of out-there elements to drive the point home.

The final act of the film can barely be described as Kris goes deeper down the rabbit hole, with Schoenbrun using her film to comment on the horror genre as a whole, its treatment of women and LGBT people, the movie industry, and more. All the while the “camp” of Camp Miasma maintains a presence, with candy wrappers showing up everywhere and the tongue-in-cheek references to Little Death (the French term La petite mort, which means “the little death,” is a euphemism for orgasm).

Einbinder, an Emmy winner for Hacks, is the perfect person to inhabit her role. Her established real-life and fictional personas color everything she does in the film, with her enthusiasm and curiosity shining through. Anderson leans heavily into another reference — Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard — to create a character that is as mysterious as she is alluring. Supporting actors like Brown, Sherman, Patrick Fischler, Dylan Baker, and Eva Victor keep the movie at the right pitch all the way through.

While other films have made fun of horror movie tropes before, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma finds a wholly unique way of doing so. It’s a funny and daring trip into the psyches of two women who may be victims of their own obsessions, and of the movies that made them that way.

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Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma is now playing in select theaters

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