weekend event planner

Here are the 15 best things to do in Houston this weekend

This weekend is Father’s Day weekend. If you have one of those dads who likes leaving the house and doing stuff, lots of events are happening where you can hang and chill with Pops.

Take dad to an art-show opening, a one-night-only haunted house, a Japanese indoor festival, a white linen night, two concerts featuring two legendary, renegade groups, or a new digital restoration of an indie-film classic. If all else fails, head over to Typhoon Texas and let dad float a lazy river for free.

Thursday, June 12

Architecture Center Houston presents Falon Mihalic: "Verdant Laboratory" opening reception
This immersive exhibition by artist and landscape architect Falon Mihalic explores Houston’s wild ecologies through large-scale drawings, sculpture, and video. The exhibition highlights the city’s living landscape as a vital force in building urban resilience. As the effects of climate change become more visible and the city of Houston continues to grow, this exhibit prompts a critical question: How can we foreground landscape ecology in shaping the resilient cities of tomorrow? Through Friday, August 22. 5:30 pm.

The Wiggles: Bouncing Balls! Tour
With this interactive show based on the hit single “Bouncing Balls,” The Wiggles aims to spark creativity, curiosity, and a love of learning through their signature mix of entertainment and education. Families can sing, dance, and wiggle along to the high energy musical extravaganza, featuring all eight Wiggles: OG Blue Wiggle Anthony, Simon, Lachy, Tsehay, John, Lucia, Caterina, and Evie. 6 pm.

Houston Ballet presents Sparrow
Houston Ballet's final program of their 2024-2025 season, Sparrow features three one-act ballets by choreographers spanning from yesterday’s eminence to today’s prominence: George Balanchine, Houston Ballet director emeritus Ben Stevenson, and artistic director Stanton Welch. Along with Balanchine’s Theme and Variations and Stevenson’s Four Last Songs, Welch’s Sparrow, set to some of Simon & Garfunkel’s most recognizable music, fills the stage with a vibrant and large ensemble cast. Through Sunday, June 22. 7:30 pm (2 pm Sunday).

Friday, June 13

Clear Lake Symphony presents Season Closing Concert
The Clear Lake Symphony will perform their sixth and final concert of their 49th season, with music including Russian Sailor’s Dance by Gliere; Piano Concerto No. 2 Opus 18 by Rachmaninoff (featuring Dr. Stephanie Chen, guest pianist); and Symphony No 3 in C Minor (Organ Symphony) by Saint-Saens (featuring Dr. Brad Morrison, guest organist). The Symphony will be led by Robert Wall, in his 31st year as conductor. 7:30 pm.

Cultural Center "Our Texas" presents Kseniia Abramovskaia: "The Artist Behind The Trees & Cats" opening reception
Russian-born, Houston-based artist Kseniia Abramovskaia transforms wood and canvas into worlds where nature pulses with life, and the mystical feline reigns. With acrylics, spray paint, palette knives, and brushes, she constructs textured landscapes brimming with movement and emotion. Her pieces are more than visual treats; they are storytelling spectacles. The exhibition marks Abramovskaia's first solo show, where nature meets the artist, one tree, one cat, and one bold brushstroke at a time. Through Friday, July 18. 7:30 pm.

Punch Line Houston presents Emil Wakim
Brooklyn comedian Emil Wakim just finished his first year as the first Lebanese-American cast member on Saturday Night Live’s milestone 50th season. He made his late-night television debut on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and was selected as a New Face of Comedy at the Just For Laughs Comedy Festival in Montreal. Wakim has also opened for comedians like Roy Wood Jr., Kyle Kinane, Nikki Glaser, Hasan Minhaj, and Neal Brennan. 7:30 pm (7 and 9:15 pm Saturday).

13th Floor Haunted House presents Blackout
We know it’s the summer, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get a bit frightened this time of year. Blackout is a one-day event where monsters and mayhem lurk in total darkness. Upon arriving, each group (not each person) is given one glow stick. Venturing into the depths of darkness, a horde of monsters roam freely. Visitors may catch a glimpse of them under the glow of black lights, but monsters may steal glow sticks, leaving groups in the dark. 8 pm.

Saturday, June 14

Tokyo X
There’s a good chance all the weebs (translation: non-Japanese people who like Japanese stuff) in town will be at NRG Center for Houston’s biggest Japanese indoor festival. Tokyo X is a two-day celebration of Japanese culture that seamlessly blends modern and traditional elements. It will be a showcase of Japanese culture featuring renowned anime voice actors, cosplay, a car show, live concerts, martial arts demonstrations, workshops, free arcades, 30+ food vendors, and more. 10 am.

White Linen Night—A Local Art Affair
Residents and visitors to League City are invited to dress in white and step into an enchanting evening of art, culture, and community during the City’s White Linen Night—A Local Art Affair. Inspired by the timeless New Orleans tradition of wearing white linen to embrace the summer season and stay cool in the heat, this night invites guests to enjoy an evening of artistic discovery, local talent, live entertainment, food and drinks, and neighborly connection under the canopy of century-old oak trees. 4 pm.

City Place presents Hot Nights, Cool Grooves
At the summer concert experience Hot Nights, Cool Grooves, guests can enjoy a picturesque setting overlooking waterfront City Place Park and a monthly showcase of regional musical artists from a variety of genres. Each evening will feature back-to-back sets, food trucks, promotional pop-ups, beer samplings from Saint Arnold, photo opportunities, swag giveaways, and other surprise elements. Through Thursday, August 2. 5:30 pm.

Metallica and Wu Tang Clan in concert
Two legendary groups will be in Houston this Saturday night. For the hardcore metal heads, Metallica will be at NRG Stadium, performing the same headbanging classics that made them the veteran rock giants they are today. For all the hardcore hip-hop heads, the surviving members of the Wu-Tang Clan (RIP ODB!) will be at Toyota Center. They’ll be hitting you with some iconic, East Coast rap as part of their final tour, Wu-Tang Forever: The Final Chamber. 6 pm and 8 pm.

Sunday, June 15

Father’s Day at Typhoon Texas
This weekend, all the fathers out there will be getting a hookup, courtesy of Typhoon Texas. Simply purchase any ticket at the gate, and dad gets in free. The offer is valid only at the gate, and cannot be combined with any other offer. (It’s also not available online.) Now celebrating its 10th year, Typhoon Texas offers multiple water slides, a massive wave pool, a winding lazy river, and a child-friendly play area including Typhoon Jr., aka five, junior-sized versions of its most popular waterslides. 11 am.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston presents Killer of Sheep
Killer of Sheep examines life in mid-’70s, Los Angeles neighborhood Watts through the eyes of Stan (Houston native Henry G. Sanders), a sensitive dreamer who is growing detached from the psychic toll of working at a slaughterhouse. Frustrated by money problems, he finds respite in moments of simple beauty. Charles Burnett’s acclaimed debut — screening in a stunning new restoration — combines lyrical elements with a starkly neorealist, documentary-style approach that chronicles the unfolding story with depth and riveting simplicity. 5 pm.

Performing Arts Houston presents Glory to Glory (A Revival For Spiritual and Devotional Art)
The only event from Solange Knowles’ Eldorado Ballroom live music series that isn’t sold out, this program celebrates women shaping Black praise in contemporary spiritual and devotional sounds. Gospel icon Twinkie Clark takes center stage alongside The Clark Sisters in a tribute to her unmatched artistry. The evening also pays tribute to Mary Lou Williams, a jazz luminary whose spiritual choral works continue to resonate with the brilliance that once guided legends like Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, and Miles Davis. 6:30 pm.

Photo by Herring Herring

Metallica performs at NRG Stadium on Saturday.

weekend events event-planner

cult classic

Performer John Cameron Mitchell celebrate 25 years of Hedwig at Houston show

Courtesy of John Cameron Mitchell

Hedwin and the Angry Inch will celebrate its 25th anniversary in 2026.

Next year will mark the 25th anniversary of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the 2001 cult queer musical and directorial debut of veteran stage actor John Cameron Mitchell. First debuting in Sundance before hitting theaters later that summer, Hedwig (based on the 1998 off-Broadway play Mitchell co-wrote and starred in) became a favorite for those who like their rock musicals anarchic and androgynous.

Mitchell will be celebrating Hedwig’s anniversary early – right here in Houston. This Sunday, December 28, the film will be shown at legendary Montrose club Numbers, and Mitchell will be there for a live director’s commentary and a post-screening live performance. The screening is one part of a day-long event for Mitchell, who will be teaching a sold-out master class at Cafe Brasil later that day.

Local nonprofit Arthouse Houston reached out to Mitchell about revisiting Hedwig in H-Town. “I got good buddies from there,” the El Paso-born military brat, 62, tells CultureMap during a Zoom call from his New Orleans home. “My friend Amber Martin, who's from the area and who I’ve sung and DJed with for many, many years, is coming – especially for this. She used to go to Numbers as a kid. My friend Jonathan Caouette, who directed the film Tarnation, lives there. He used to go to Visions in the '80s. So, it's kind of fun to come to an old, classic club and show the film, do some songs, hang around, and do a drunk live director's commentary – or maybe stoned, depending on my feelings that day.”

John Cameron Mitchell will perform at Numbers this Sunday, December 28.Courtesy of John Cameron Mitchell

For Mitchell, revisiting Hedwig takes him back to a simpler time, when an actor/playwright could get a film about a gay, East German rocker whose signature song is about his botched sex reassignment surgery (now you know where “angry inch” comes from) financed and distributed by a major studio. Even though Hedwig flopped in theaters, it would eventually gain a cult following. Mitchell would follow it up with an even more provocative film, the 2005 ensemble comedy Shortbus, which featured actors engaging in graphic, unsimulated sex.

“That was the last golden age of independent film in the U.S.,” he says. “It was the '90s and 2000s, which pretty much ended at the financial collapse of 2006, which coincided with the rise of the streamers, which really put the final nail in the coffin for independent film as we know it in terms of it being a viable commercial thing. So, a lot of people made fewer films. They had to have more stars. They had to have more Oscar gloss. And the habit of going to see the best-reviewed film that week just because the critics were telling you went away, of course.”

MItchell still does the acting thing from time-to-time – in February, he’ll take over as Mary Todd Lincoln in Cole Escola’s Broadway drag hit Oh Mary!. But, these days, he;s been teaching master classes and film courses at various colleges (like his “Problemagic Cinema” course at the University of Michigan).

Along with teaching them film history, he encourages his students to take things – whether it’s a film they want to make or a movement they want to start – in their own hands. “I'm telling my students it's like this: now is the time to create a new kind of underground film, and other things,” he says. “The big question, of course, is how do you get them out there? How do you monetize them so there can be more? I can't quite answer that, but I also know that when corporations abandon a certain form, that's the time to step up and take it back.”

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