It’s National Best Friends Day, so grab your bestie and check out some of this week’s best bets. We’ve got jazz on film at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, slapstick-y commedia dell’arte at the Alley Theatre, and lots for you dance lovers out there. Keep reading to learn more about these events and much more coming up over the next seven days.
The Houston Ballet concludes its season on Thursday, June 8, at 7:30 p.m. with Artistic Director Stanton Welch’s take on the ever-popular Swan Lake, about a woman cursed to live as a swan by day until someone who has never been in love swears their love to her – all set to a timeless score by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Houston Ballet Soloist Naazir Muhammad, who will play the role of Prince Siegfried during the production’s run, recently told the Houston Press that getting the role “means a lot,” and not only does the dancing make the three-hour ballet “a pretty hard night,” but Prince Siegfried is “kind of a complex role there’s a big story behind it.” Performances of Swan Lake will continue at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays at the Wortham Theater Center through June 18. Tickets are available here for $25 to $220.
It’s not too late to catch Dance Source Houston’s Barnstorm Dance Fest 2023, which is currently ongoing over at The MATCH through June 10. Three different programs (A, B and C) make up the festival, which highlights the work of dancemakers across the country and across genres, and altogether the programs cover 19 live performances and nine dance films. Tonight, Thursday, June 8, you can catch program C at 7:30 p.m., followed by program A on Friday, June 9, and programs B and C (again) on Saturday, June 10. The full schedule can be found here and tickets to any one of the three individual programs can be purchased here for $25 (or you can buy a festival pass for $70 here to see all three programs).
A documentary about “perhaps the greatest drummer in the history of jazz,” Max Roach: The Drum Also Waltzes, kicks off “Jazz on Film” at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, on Friday, June 9, at 7 p.m. Directed by Samuel Pollard and Ben Shapiro, the film “presents an overall biography of a significant life in music as well as a revealing portrait of what made the artist, a Black man who made his bones in Jim Crow America, tick” and should appeal to both “jazz novices and well-steeped aficionados.” The annual series, which continues through June 24, will screen four additional films, including Shirley Clarke’s “masterwork of cinéma-vérité composition,” The Cool World, and the Sammy Davis Jr.-led film, A Man Called Adam. You can find the full schedule, as well as buy tickets to individual screenings for $7 to $9, here.
Experience a world premiere dance work exploring the nuclear family during having been breathed out, a dance program presented by ISHIDA Dance Company, in collaboration with Asia Society Texas, on Friday, June 9, at 8 p.m. In addition to the world premiere of ISHIDA’s “American Gothic,” the program will include Greek choreographer Andonis Foniadakis’s “Horizons” and Romanian-born Edward Clug’s “highly energetic” work, “Mutual Comfort.” The program will be performed twice more, on Saturday, June 10, at 8 p.m. and Sunday, June 11, at 3 p.m. Tickets can be purchased for any of the three performances here for $40 to $120. Also, for Friday and Saturday night, you have the option to purchase premium seats which include a VIP reception, and on Sunday, all audience members are invited to stay for a post-show talkback with ISHIDA Artistic Director Brett Ishida.
On Friday, June 9, at 8:30 p.m. Houston Contemporary Dance Company (HCDC) will visit Miller Outdoor Theatre with an evening of dance titled Restore. The program will include new works and pieces from the HCDC’s past four seasons. These include works from McKinley Willis and Carmen Cage, both members of Dallas Black Dance Theatre; New York City-based artist Alexander Anderson; South Chicago Dance Theatre Artistic Director Kia Smith; and “4yous,” by chuthis. Artistic Director Peter Chu, a work that was added to HCDC’s repertory in 2022. The performance will be livestreamed on the Miller Outdoor Theatre website, YouTube channel and Facebook page. As are all performances at Miller, it’s free and you can either reserve a ticket here (as of June 8 at 10 a.m.) or you can grab a blanket or lawn chair and head for un-ticketed seating on the Hill.
It’s Pride Month, and though you’ve probably got a full slate of celebratory events already planned, we want to recommend one more that we think you should have on your list. On Saturday, June 10, at 8 p.m. Houston Pride Band – which has served as a concert and marching band in Houston’s gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community for more than 40 years – will visit The MATCH to present Summer Love. The two-hour long concert will combine chart-toppers, songs from Broadway, and even a couple of world premieres – all of which relate to the seasonal theme, love, and famous love stories. Tickets are available here for $5 to $15.
It’s possible that the term “Buffalo Soldiers” was coined by Native Americans “either because the soldiers’ dark curly hair resembled a buffalo mane or because the soldiers fought like the fierce Great Plains buffalo.” Though it’s not known for sure, the term has been accepted to represent all those, including “former slaves and veterans from service in the Civil War,” that comprised “the first Black professional soldiers in a peacetime army.” On Monday, June 12, at 6:30 p.m. the Buffalo Soldiers National Museum will host a screening of Surrounded, a film about a Buffalo Soldier and freedwoman, played by Black Panther: Wakanda Forever star Letitia Wright, who disguises herself as a man, sets out to locate a gold mine and, along the way, takes an infamous outlaw captive in post-Civil War America. The screening is free with advanced registration here.
It’s been said that “if you’ve watched an American sitcom, then you’ve already had your first lesson in the 16th century theater style of commedia dell’arte.” You can catch your second lesson in the Italian theatrical form starting Wednesday, June 14, at 7:30 p.m. when the Alley Theatre opens Carlo Goldoni’s The Servant of Two Masters. The world premiere adaptation – adapted, as well as translated and directed, by the Alley’s Artistic Director Rob Melrose – follows servant Truffaldino in his attempts to serve two bosses and the mayhem that ensues. We’re talking disguises, mistaken identities, breakups, makeups and much more. Performances continue through July 2 at 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays; 8 p.m. Fridays; 2:30 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; and 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. Sundays. Tickets can be purchased here for $26 to $92.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
