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10 Things to Do Now in NYC
It’s a big city, with plenty to do, see, hear and watch. Here’s a sampling of cultural highlights this weekend and over the week ahead.
SPARE TIMES
Arts and Minds, and Gifts
The Bust Holiday Craftacular at the Brooklyn Expo Center
The feminist bimonthly magazine Bust has been around since 1993, emerging from a culture embracing riot grrrl bands and, to a lesser extent, Jane Pratt’s seminal girl-centric teenage publication Sassy. Part of Bust’s tradition — besides its downtown cultural sensibility, D.I.Y. ethos and enlightened political consciousness — is the Craftacular, a riot of music, “indie shopping” (as Bust puts it) and progressive attitude. Begun 12 years ago as a holiday event in Brooklyn, the Craftacular has expanded to other seasons, and to cities like London, Boston and Los Angeles.
This year’s New York holiday installment — from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday at the Brooklyn Expo Center in Greenpoint — features about 150 vendors selling a variety of gifts, many homemade. A new companion event (also at the center) is the Bust School of Creative Living, offering guest speakers like the New York Times columnist Lindy West and the actress-writer Amber Tamblyn; music from female-centric bands; and educational workshops in areas like wellness, crafting and herbalism. (The vendor area is free; a $40 day pass allows admission to all talks, performances and workshops.) Guests will find high spirits, interesting ideas and probably the perfect gift for their favorite feminist. ANDY WEBSTER
For more information, check the event website.
CLASSICAL MUSIC
From Artist to Nobleman With Love
‘La Dolce Morte’ at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Suzanne Farrin’s monodrama, based on love poems written by Michelangelo for a young Roman nobleman, returns to the Met (at 7 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Sunday) after its powerful premiere performances last year. Eric Jurenas is now the countertenor in a production created by the director Doug Fitch, with accompaniment provided by the International Contemporary Ensemble. DAVID ALLEN
See a list of mini-reviews for more current productions.
POP & ROCK
An Album’s Intimate Scale, in Venues to Match
Perfume Genius at the Bowery Ballroom and Music Hall of Williamsburg
Many musicians spend their careers building up to an album like “No Shape,” the one that the singer-songwriter Perfume Genius (known offstage as Mike Hadreas) released in May. It’s a revelatory work, developing Mr. Hadreas’s experiences of love and loss into a virtuosic song cycle of himself — at turns bold (“Slip Away”), elegiac (“Wreath”) and sexy (“Die 4 U”), and quite often all three at once. The album’s intimate scale has translated well to large rooms this year, but these performances at a pair of smaller venues (the first two dates, at 9 p.m. on Sunday and Monday, are sold out; the Williamsburg dates are at 9 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday) are likely to be particularly powerful. SIMON VOZICK-LEVINSON
Andrea Bocelli, Lil Pump, Yo La Tengo and more pop and rock concerts.
COMEDY
West Coast Humor Comes East
‘Asian AF’ at Upright Citizens Brigade Theater East Village
This variety show, originally created by the actor Will Choi at U.C.B.’s Los Angeles outpost, eventually made its way to the East Coast with great fanfare — and fans. Tickets to the show, which features Asian-American improv, sketch, stand-up and musical performers, regularly sell out. Aparna Nancherla is slated for this installment, at 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday, along with Fumi Abe, Jordan Mendoza and improv from a handful of U.C.B. regulars. KASIA PILAT
See who else is making New Yorkers laugh this week.
FILM SERIES
Movies, Italian Style
‘Roman Hollywood’ at Film Forum
Italy became a hot spot for Hollywood filmmakers after World War II. Through Dec. 21, Film Forum is surveying the results, along with the work of some Italian directors gone American (Sergio Leone’s “Once Upon a Time in America,” screening Dec. 21). Making movies abroad is dramatized in Vincente Minnelli’s “Two Weeks in Another Town” (Friday and Dec. 19), a 1962 spiritual sequel to “The Bad and the Beautiful” in which an aging star (Kirk Douglas) is lured to Italy by a longtime collaborator (Edward G. Robinson). Other highlights include Billy Wilder’s poignant “Avanti!” (Friday and Dec. 21); Martin Scorsese’s “Gangs of New York” (Friday); and even Wes Anderson’s “The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou” (Dec. 15).
BEN KENIGSBERG
Want more? See a guide to film series and screenings in New York.
ART & MUSEUMS
You’re on Candid Canvas
‘Murillo: The Self-Portraits’ at the Frick Collection
Two flawlessly executed selfies (on display through Feb. 4) by Bartolomé Estebana Murillo, a leading painter of the Spanish Golden Age, are united for the first time in centuries in this revealing, somewhat melancholy exhibition on mastery and aging. Around 1650, the 30-something Murillo painted himself as an ambitious young painter with pursed lips and arched eyebrows, staring out incongruously from a block of ancient marble. He was already imagining himself as a man for the ages, but success seems to have worn down Murillo in the later self-portrait (above), from about 1670. His hair is thinner, he has developed a double chin, and he extends his hand as if desperate to connect to us. JASON FARAGO
See a selection of mini-reviews of current exhibitions.
THEATER
Beauty, Competition and Malice
‘School Girls; or, The African Mean Girls Play’ at the Lucille Lortel Theater
In Jocelyn Bioh’s comedy about beauty, difference and malice, the pupils at a Ghanaian girls school compete for their shot at beauty pageant fame. In his review for The New York Times, Jesse Green wrote, “The nasty-teen comedy genre emerges wonderfully refreshed and even deepened by its immersion in a world it never considered.” Under the Tony winner Rebecca Taichman’s direction, Zainab Jah and Myra Lucretia Taylor star in this MCC production, now extended for a second time, through Dec. 31. ALEXIS SOLOSKI
FOR CHILDREN
Holiday Cheer, Hand-Delivered
‘The Black Glove’ at the Gene Frankel Theater
It certainly doesn’t sound like a holiday title. But then, you wouldn’t expect August Strindberg to create anything called “The Red Mitten.” Yes, this dour Swedish master wrote a Christmas play and, even more surprisingly, it’s for children. Presented through Dec. 16 by August Strindberg Repertory Theater, in a new verse translation by Anne-Charlotte Hanes Harvey, the production centers on the lost object of the title, which seems to confer the season’s spirit on anyone who finds it. Its original owner, however, has none of that warmth. A meanspirited, wealthy young mother, she thinks that her maid has stolen her ring, which is actually inside the missing glove. A tomte (Pilar Garcia), similar to an elf, conspires with the Christmas Angel to teach the woman a lesson. Points are scored, but this being a holiday entertainment, she ends up more like Scrooge than like Miss Julie. LAUREL GRAEBER
Find more events for children and families.
JAZZ
Hot Sessions Under Club Lights
Nublu Jazz Festival at Nublu 151
Nublu 151 is a dimly lit dance club that presents the odd jazz star every now and again. This week is the start of its eighth annual jazz festival (at 8 p.m. through Dec. 17), which features a long list of heavyweights. On Saturday, Vijay Iyer plays with his trio, and the veteran trumpeter Eddie Henderson performs with a quartet. On Sunday, Theo Croker, a rising trumpet talent, shares the bill with the collective Innov Gnawa. Thursday’s show might be the highlight: It features the young vibraphonist Joel Ross; the drummer Nate Smith’s band, Kinfolk; and the trumpeter Steven Bernstein’s group Sexmob. GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO
Find more jazz shows for the coming week.
DANCE
It’s Live, No, It’s on Film, No, It’s Both at Once
Charles Atlas, Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener at Brooklyn Academy of Music, Harvey Theater
In the early ’70s, the video artist Charles Atlas began working with the choreographer Merce Cunningham; one project was called “A Video Event.” Now Mr. Atlas teams with two former Cunningham dancers, Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener, on another video event: “Tesseract.” The program (at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday through Friday, and at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 16) begins with a 3D dance film, followed by a live performance that’s filmed, then manipulated by Mr. Atlas, and projected in front of the dancers, creating layers nodding to history. BRIAN SCHAEFER
See what’s happening around the city’s dance scene.
And There’s More
What to cook this weekend and what to read this week.
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