Theater
1. See A Streetcar Named Desire
The belle is back.
BAM, through April 6.
Director Rebecca Frecknall brings her young and sexy take on Tennessee Williams to Brooklyn for a limited run. Paul Mescal won an Olivier for his Stanley, as did Anjana Vasan for her Stella. Joining them as Blanche DuBois, Patsy Ferran turns the lights down and demands magic. —Sara Holdren
TV
2. Watch The Studio
Lights, camera, Seth Rogen.
Apple TV+, March 26.
The star of Knocked Up — who co-created this series alongside longtime collaborator Evan Goldberg, Frida Perez, and former Veep writers Peter Huyck and Alex Gregory — plays the head of a movie studio who finds new ways to make an ass of himself in every episode. If you’re looking for a comedy where several directors play versions of themselves (Martin Scorsese! Ron Howard! Olivia Wilde!), this is the show for you. —Jen Chaney
Movies
3. See My Beautiful Laundrette
No quarters required.
The Paris Theater, March 22.
Few things are sexier than Gordon Warnecke drinking Champagne from Daniel Day-Lewis’s mouth in the back room of a laundromat in this 1985 Thatcher-era London drama; this spectacle will screen in 35-mm. —Alison Willmore
TV
4. Watch The Wheel of Time Season Three
Can we get a Chosen One over here, please?
Prime, March 13.
You’d be excused for tuning out during season one, but this has turned into a legitimately entertaining big fantasy series, especially after the introduction of its dark-mommy character, Lanfear. And who’s not craving some good-versus-evil stuff right now? —Kathryn VanArendonk
Music
5. See The Sun Ra Arkestra
Cosmic happenings.
TV Eye, March 17.
Led by 100-year-old Marshall Allen, who just set a Guinness World Record for being the oldest person to release a debut album, the Sun Ra Arkestra — a collective comprising longtime collaborators of the late Sun Ra and others — graces Ridgewood with its sprawling majesty. —Caig Jenkins
Art
6. See Kelly Sinnapah Mary
Hidden histories come into the light.
James Cohan Gallery, 48 Walker Street; through March 22.
The painter discovered as an adult that she is a descendant of indentured workers brought to Guadeloupe from India. In her work, forests are peopled by mythical figures, spirits, and deities, reflecting this estuary of inspiration and conflicting histories. —Jerry Saltz
Theater
7. See Vanya
All the lonely people.
Lucille Lortel Theatre, in previews March 10; opens March 18.
Andrew Scott, like his All of Us Strangers co-star Mescal, is spending early spring in New York. Catch him in this one-man adaptation of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, by Simon Stephens, with Scott embodying the whole aching, pining population of one claustrophobic Russian estate. —S.H.
Music
8. Hear The Cleveland Orchestra
Period authentic.
Carnegie Hall, March 18 and 19.
There is no more reliable purveyor of symphonic standards than the Cleveland Orchestra, whose programs could be period reproductions. In part one of the orchestra’s two-night stand, soprano Asmik Grigorian joins the ensemble for Strauss’s Four Last Songs and the final scene from Puccini’s opera Suor Angelica, alongside other selections. —Justin Davidson
TV
9. Watch Ludwig
Every Brit-mystery trope in one place.
BritBox, March 20.
If you were a master at creating puzzles and your identical twin disappeared, would you decide to … treat his disappearance like a puzzle to solve? David Mitchell plays both puzzle-setter Ludwig and his detective-inspector brother, James; when James disappears, Ludwig assumes his life in order to find out what trouble he could be in. Cozy mystery is the formula, and it works. —Roxana Hadadi
Books
10. Read Blazing Eye Sees All
A deep dive into America’s contemporary cults.
Grand Central, March 25.
Leah Sottile’s second book charts the often hateful beliefs of the New Age movement and some of its female leaders, with a focus on the cult Love Has Won. Its founder, Mother God, ruled with an iron fist, but the colloidal silver she guzzled tinted her skin blue, her mummified corpse ending up a shrine to the conspiracy theories she preached. —Camille Cauti
TV
11. Watch Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light
You can leave your hat on.
PBS, March 23.
Mark Rylance and Damien Lewis return as Thomas Cromwell and Henry VIII in a continuing adaptation of Hilary Mantel’s stunning trilogy. The performances are the chief reason to watch, especially Rylance’s Cromwell, but there’s at least one other draw: great hats. —K.V.A.
Music
12. See The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die
Emo survives and thrives.
Brooklyn Monarch, March 20.
The Connecticut indie-rock outfit revisits the aching melodicism of its acclaimed 2015 sophomore album, Harmlessness, in a string of tenth-anniversary shows where the band plays the album in its entirety. —C.J.
TV
13. Watch Long Bright River
That Pennsy accent is back!
Peacock, March 13.
Your days of pining for Mare of Easttown are over. Amanda Seyfried stars in this limited series as a police officer investigating the murders of three young women in a Philadelphia neighborhood devastated by opioid addiction. When someone close to her disappears, she becomes obsessed with the case. —R.H.
Music
14. Go to Wild Up: Darkness Sounding
Crunchy drones from California.
92nd Street Y, March 21 through 23.
The Los Angeles–based ensemble brings a West Coast vibe to its festival of music that connects to the natural world. This buzzing, droning swarm includes works by Claude Vivier, Scott Walker, and Sarah Davachi. —J.D.
Books
15. Read Perfection
Falling in (and out) of love with Berlin.
New York Review Books, March 18.
Like many expat creatives before them, Anna and Tom have built a charmed life in Berlin. Except that as time passes, nothing stays the same. Vincenzo Latronico’s Oulipian novel — translated by Sophie Hughes and longlisted for the International Booker Prize — captures a generation’s restless longings and disenchantment. —Jasmine Vojdani
The 60-Second Book Excerpt
Sister Europe
She wasn’t having an out-of-body experience — it was more like the opposite — but still she was struggling to maintain her own perspective, a view of the world through her own eyes. She felt looked-at and hollowed-out. In her party dress and scarlet bee-stung mouth on a Tuesday afternoon, she was coming to feel that outfits designed to draw attention might be better confined to situations where distractions were plentiful and attention was hard to come by, such as nightclubs. The scenery consisted of gray concrete sidewalks with granite curbs bordering asphalt in a darker gray, gray trees streaked with black, and façades the color of ashes. Her sensitive, suffering flesh with its chafed red highlights was like a gaping wound that had heaved to its pointy feet and was lurching around. Her face was a portal leaking anguish to an inanimate world, and with every step, her dress ratcheted upward, climbing her tights like a lumberjack.
Theater
16. See Operation Mincemeat
Dead man skydiving.
John Golden Theatre, in previews; opens March 20.
In 1943, British intelligence dressed a John Doe dead body as an officer in the Royal Marines, planted fake documents on it, and tossed it out of a plane near Axis territory in an attempt to wrongfoot the Nazis. And it worked! And now there’s a musical about it! This historical farce by the comedy troupe SpitLip parachutes onto Broadway after two years of rave reviews in the West End. —S.H.
TV
17. Watch Dope Thief
Drug bust? Fake news.
Apple TV+, March 14.
There’s great chemistry right off the bat between Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura, who play robbers posing as DEA agents so they can steal drugs and cash. Their ruse is not foolproof, but this series, executive-produced by the legendary Ridley Scott, is gripping from the first episode. —J.C.
Movies
18. See Zodiac Killer Project
True crime gets meta.
Museum of the Moving Image, March 15.
Not a true-crime documentary so much as a meditation on the tics, tropes, and ethical lapses of the omnipresent genre, Charlie Shackleton’s wry feature describes the Zodiac Killer film he would have made had he been granted the rights to the book he tried to adapt. —A.W.
Music
19. See GloRilla
Bubbly, devil-may-care southern rap.
Hammerstein Ballroom, March 19.
The rapper makes music that calls back to her hometown of Memphis while keeping pace with an increasingly competitive field of mainstream rhymers. Catch gems from her debut album Glorious and beyond, with Florida’s Real Boston Richey and Illinois upstart Queen Key opening. —C.J.
Podcasts
20. Listen to Embedded: Alternate Realities
Through the looking glass — and back?
NPR.
A son makes a $10,000 bet with his father in a bid to pull the latter out of his deep obsession with conspiracy theories. A poignant and melancholic portrait of a family in crisis unfolds. —Nicholas Quah
TV
21. Watch Happy Face
Big-time daddy issues.
Paramount+, March 20.
Annaleigh Ashford stars as a woman who learns that her father (Dennis Quaid) is the serial killer known as Happy Face. Developed by Jennifer Cacicio (Your Honor) and Robert and Michelle King (Evil), the series is inspired by a true story. —J.C.
Art
22. See Carl D’Alvia
Bewitching drawings from a sculptor.
Dashwood Projects, 63 East 4th Street; through March 22.
The artist may be known for sculptures that resemble hassocks covered in hair, fur, or unidentifiable growth tissue, but in this show, “Paper Trail,” we are mainly treated to his careful drawings. It’s an unusual glimpse into an active artistic imagination. —J.S.
Movies
23. See Mary Jane’s Not a Virgin Anymore
Not another teen movie.
Museum of Modern Art, March 15.
Sarah Jacobson’s punk-rock coming-of-age indie focuses on the gap between pop-culture depictions and the reality of a high-school girl’s first forays into sex, with music from Mudhoney and Babes in Toyland and a cameo from Jello Biafra. —A.W.
Books
24. Read Paradise Logic
Manic-pixie dream girl does Brooklyn.
Simon & Schuster, March 25.
Reality Kahn, 23 and living in Gowanus, has a big heart and a low quantitative IQ (“This was a girl who could not draw a cube”) but wants to be the best girlfriend of all time. First, though, she’ll need to get a boyfriend. Sophie Kemp’s debut novel is odd, sexual, and very funny. —Emma Alpern
Music
25. Hear Leif Ove Andsnes
A tasteful keyboard.
Carnegie Hall, March 25.
The Norwegian pianist has never lost touch with his Nordicness in the cool sagacity of his playing and taste in composers. Here, he leads off with sonatas by compatriots Edvard Grieg and Geirr Tveitt and concludes with Chopin’s preludes. —J.D.