Happy August, y’all! It’s another month, but two things you can count on are the continued heat outside and the strength of the art offerings across the city. But, in acknowledgement of the scorching temperatures, every one of this week’s best bets will keep you inside blessed air conditioning. Keep reading for more.
Deep dive into the only X-rated movie to win the Oscar for Best Picture on Thursday, August 3, at 7 p.m. when the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, presents Desperate Souls, Dark City and the Legend of “Midnight Cowboy”. Nancy Buirski’s film, a “rapt, incisive, and beautifully exploratory making-of-a-movie documentary” about John Schlesinger’s 1969 movie, Midnight Cowboy, is heavily concerned “with the emotional metaphysics of how a movie about a blinkered hustler and a homeless loser came to embody what Hollywood was becoming: not a dream factory but a truth factory, an eerie moving mirror of who we were.” The documentary will also screen on Friday, August 4, at 7 p.m. and Saturday, August 5, at 2 p.m. If you’d also like to revisit the film itself, the museum will also screen Midnight Cowboy on August 5 and 20. Tickets for any of the screenings are available for $7 to $9.
Since the premiere of Steven Spielberg’s 1993 film Jurassic Park – yep, it’s 30 years old now – the franchise has grown to include “five sequels and more than $6 billion” made at the box office, meaning that it’s “one of the world’s most successful and enduring film series.” On Friday, August 4, at 11 a.m. you can visit Isla Nublar and get up close and personal with a 40-foot-long tyrannosaurus rex, everyone’s favorite velociraptor Blue, and more when the Jurassic World Live Tour comes to NRG Stadium. The live, family-friendly production features an original story, projections, and more than 24 life-size dinosaurs. You can also catch the Jurassic World Live Tour at 7:30 p.m. Friday, August 4; 11 a.m. and 3 and 7 p.m. on Saturday, August 5; and 1 and 5 p.m. Sunday, August 6. Tickets, which include a pre-show photo op experience, are available here for $20 to $90.
Raised in Pflugerville, employed at H-E-B for around five years and the wearer of a Texas-shaped pendant, stand-up comic and new Saturday Night Live cast member Devon Walker is unapologetically Texan. He also honed his comedy craft in Austin before starting the job at SNL in September 2022, where you may have seen his work, like the “Kenan & Kelly” sketch featuring Keke Palmer or “Hot Girl Hospital” with Megan Thee Stallion. On Friday, August 4, at 7 p.m. Walker will swing by The Riot Comedy Club at Rudyard’s for the first of four sets over two days. He may talk SNL, family, love, and the “awkward encounters he’s having these days, where people recognize his face but have no idea who he is yet.” Walker will also perform at 9 p.m. on Friday, August 4, and at 7 and 9 p.m. on Saturday, August 5. Tickets can be purchased here for $20 to $150.
If you’re the kind of person to get excited at the sight of an air hockey table, then you have to check out the 2023 Air Hockey World Championships this weekend, from August 4 to 6, at the University of Houston – Hilton Hotel. In a recent interview with the Houston Press, the current No. 4 ranked player in the world, Connor Cummings, said that every player “is different, and that’s what makes it a very unique and personal sport.” And in regard to the 16-table, double-elimination format, Cummings said that when in “those upper level matches, there’s a lot of pressure on you to score the next point or to block a shot. There’s so much pressure built up because one loss can be the difference in you coming in the top 10 or being kicked out of the tournament.” Spectators can enter free to watch the tournament.
One of the greatest epic poems of India is the Sanskrit-written Ramayana, a tale about Prince Rama’s attempt to rescue his wife, Sita, from the 10-headed, 20-armed bad guy, Ravana, told across 24,000 verses. On Saturday, August 5, at 7 p.m. Asia Society Texas will host the world premiere of a new telling of the epic, Transcending Borders: The Ramayana Project, conceived and choreographed by Rathna Kumar. Participants in the cross-cultural production, which features South and Southeast Asian music and dance traditions, include Anjali Dance Company, Gamelan of the New Moon, Mey Lee’s Indonesian Dance Ensemble, SaLaRu Sri Lankan Dance Academy, percussionist Naga Srinidhi Kuruvada and violinist Abhishek Balakrishnan. Tickets for the production can be purchased here for $25.
In conjunction with the “William Kentridge: In Praise of Shadows” exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the museum will be the Metropolitan Opera’s 2015 production of Lulu, Alban Berg’s “rich fantasia on the themes of memory, lust and death” on Sunday, August, 6, 2 p.m. The Johannesburg-born directed the production, as well as contributed the Expressionistic stage designs and projections, for what could be “the 20th century’s greatest opera.” Because the screening is intended to complement the William Kentridge exhibit, it is included with regular museum admission, which can be purchased here for free to $19. If you can’t make it, a second screening of Lulu is scheduled for Sunday, August 13, at 2 p.m. and the exhibit, “William Kentridge: In Praise of Shadows,” will continue through September 10.
While it may be a little unclear how it got its spot as regular Christmastime programming, the film Grease, a ‘50s nostalgia fest made in 1978, is an undeniable classic. In their 1978 review of the film, The Hollywood Reporter said “what makes it work is its youthful vitality, the tremendous energy and imagination expended on its virtually wall-to-wall song and dance number.” On Sunday, August 6, at 6 p.m. you can sing out those classic tunes like “Summer Nights” and “You’re The One That I Want” to your heart’s content during the Grease Sing-a-long Party at Alamo Drafthouse Cinema. You can don a poodle skirt or black leather jacket, get there early for the pre-screening hand jive contest, or just enjoy the props that will be provided, including salon caps, combs and candy cigarettes. And, of course, the lyrics will be up on screen for you. You can buy a ticket here for $15.15.
Motown comes to the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts on Tuesday, August 8, at 7:30 p.m. when the touring production of Ain’t Too Proud – The Life and Times of The Temptations opens in Houston, courtesy of Memorial Hermann Broadway at the Hobby Center. The show is based on original Temptations member Otis Williams’s memoir and features a book by playwright Dominique Morisseau. Performer Elijah Ahmad Lewis recently told the Houston Press that “the Temptation story in this show is a copy of what an American story looks like. You have a dream and even though the circumstances you’re in may not show that dream is possible, through perseverance and trust and belief and faith, you can get to where you want to be.” Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday, and 2 and 7:30 p.m. Sunday through August 13. Tickets are available here for $40 to $150.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2023.
