To Do: June 28–July 12, 2017

To Do: June 28ï¿½July 12, 2017

Twenty-five things to see, hear, watch, and read.

Published Jun 25, 2017

(Photo: Courtesy of Twentieth Century Fox (Naked Lunch); courtesy of FX (Snowfall); courtesy of Warner Bros. (The House))

TV
1. Watch Snowfall
Brooding and strategizing.ï¿½
A worthy successor to FX’s American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson, this series from executive producers John Singleton, Eric Amadio, and Dave Andron tracks the roots of the crack-cocaine epidemic starting in the early ’80s and shows how it affected not just politics, criminal justice, and race relations but the lives of individual families. —Matt Zoller Seitz
FX, July 5.

Movies
2. See The House
Mayhem in the burbs.ï¿½
It hasn’t screened for critics at press time, but how wrong can you go with Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler in a comedy about a suburban couple who start an illegal casino in their basement to pay their daughter’s tuition? Okay, pretty wrong, if the stars aren’t aligned. But here, they’ve surrounded themselves with madly creative people like Nick Kroll, Allison Tolman, and Jason Mantzoukas. —David Edelstein
Opens June 30.

Pop
3. Listen to Something to Tell You
Effervescent hooks, subversive feelings.
The sophomore album from the pop-rock sister act Haim nudges the Fleetwood Mac vibe of its debut album Days Are Gone closer to the flashy ’80s dance pop of singing groups like Wilson Phillips. —Craig Jenkins
Polydor, July 7.

Art
4. See Devir
Good wood.ï¿½
Brazilian artist Henrique Oliveira, known for richly colored wood configurations that bring to mind undergrowth, women’s bodies, and Lord of the Rings, creates a huge walk-in room of twisting trees at this tony gallery. You could be underground, in a horror film, or at any biennial in the world right now. —Jerry Saltz
Van de Weghe Fine Art, 1018 Madison Ave., through June 30.

Movies
5. See The Concert Film
As American as rock and roll.ï¿½ ï¿½
Some of us dream of spending a Fourth of July weekend at a rock festival, smoking a little weed, and eating barbecue. While we dream, we can head to this concert-film series, which includes some rarities like Chuck Johnson’s 1973 The Black Moses of Soul, starring Isaac Hayes. You should also catch Willie Nelson’s 4th of July Celebration from 1979. —D.E.
Metrograph, July 1–5.

Theater
6. See Cost of Living
Human behavior.ï¿½
There are both agonizing and genuinely funny moments in this astute play by Martyna Majok, which, through its four characters — a graduate student with cerebral palsy and the caregiver he hires, and a post-accident double amputee and her estranged truck-driving husband — examines alienation, privilege, and just how much we need each other.
City Center Stage I, Manhattan Theatre Club, through July 16.

Pop
7. Listen to TLC
Last dance.
In 2013, TLC helped put to bed the rumor that they planned to use a tacky Left Eye avatar on a concert tour. Now they hope to execute a similarly tasteful studio exit on their fifth and final album. On the nostalgic “Way Back,” Chili and T-Boz hit a particular sweet spot, with Snoop Dogg subbing in for their late rapping wild card.
852 Musiq, June 30.

Classical
8. Hear Aci, Galatea, e Polifemo
Hitting close to home.ï¿½
If the Public Theater’s Trumpian Julius Caesar left you craving even more explicit political relevance, Christopher Alden’s staging of a Handel rarity, featuring countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo, should satisfy that desire. —Justin Davidson
National Sawdust, opens July 12.

Jazz
9. See Tony Allen Quartet
Keeping the beat.
Born in Lagos in 1940, drummer Tony Allen dove into jazz prior to his role in Fela Kuti’s Afrobeat revolution. Here, he pays homage to another architect of rhythm, the hard-bop expert Art Blakey.
(Le) Poisson Rouge, July 5.

Theater Music
10. Hear 54 Sings 1776
We hold these truths to be self-evident.ï¿½
Stars of Broadway shows including The Color Purple and Wicked fulfill their patriotic duty this Independence Day at the fourth annual theatrical staging of songs from the musical 1776. Costumed characters will include Abigail and John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson.
Feinstein’s/54 Below, July 3 and 4.

Pop
11. Go to Full Moon Festival
Hop on the ferry.ï¿½ ï¿½
Rap sensation Vic Mensa headlines this independent music festival on the water at Governors Island, rounding out a lineup including DJ and producer Larry Heard (Mr. Fingers) and singer-songwriter Kelela.
Governors Island, July 8.

Books
12. Read The Answers
Exploring unknowability.ï¿½
Catherine Lacey’s new novel takes a sharp dystopic turn from her realist debut, Nobody Is Ever Missing. This one follows a woman paying for a bizarre medical treatment by submitting to a “girlfriend experiment,” playing one of a stable of companions fulfilling one man’s needs. —Boris Kachka
FSG.

Art
13. See Mark Flood: Google Murder — Suicide
Digital dreamscapes.ï¿½
It isn’t an insult to say that Mark Flood’s vibrant, fuzzy paintings of Google’s logo and other familiar stops in our online lives could adorn the headquarters of these megacorporations themselves. The canvases radiate strange, self-critical messages of encroaching otherness. They wow in spite of their made-for-consumption feeling. —J.S.
Maccarone, 630 Greenwich St., through July 28.

Books
14. Read Black Moses
Tales of a would-be prophet.ï¿½
Born in the Republic of the Congo, Alain Mabanckou left for Paris as a young man; he drew on interviews with people in his coastal hometown to write this wild picaresque (translated by Helen Stevenson). Shortlisted for a Booker, this isn’t exactly a happy story, but it’s vivid, funny, and pointed on Africa’s political horrors. —B.K.
The New Press.

TV
15. Watch States of Undress
You are what you wear. ï¿½
The second season of this documentary series chronicling the politics of women’s clothing around the world has only deepened in step with these complex times. A recent episode followed host Hailey Gates talking to Muslim women living under France’s burka ban; future shows spotlight Syrian refugees crafting haute couture in Lebanon.
Viceland.

Pop
16. See Joe Bataan
Sounds of the city.ï¿½
In the 1960s, Afro-Filipino Harlem native Joe Bataan became the godfather of New York–style Latin Soul. At this free show, the 72-year-old will perform alongside a screening of the documentary he stars in: We Like It Like That: The Story of Latin Boogaloo.
Union Pool, July 1.

Cabaret
17. See Jennifer Damiano
And everything else goes away.
Damiano earned a Tony nomination for playing the yearning, neglected daughter in Next to Normal, but you might remember her more as Mary Jane in Spider-Man, Turn Off the Dark. Expect greatest hits from both shows in this intimate evening.
Joe’s Pub, July 10.

Opera
18. See Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater
Site specific.
If you were going to stage the scene of the Virgin Mary looking on in anguish as her son hangs bleeding on his cross, your first choice of setting might not be a circus school in Brooklyn. But that’s where LoftOpera is presenting Pergolesi’s 18th-century choral setting of the hymn in a production by John de los Santos, filled with dance and video projections. —J.D.
The Muse, June 30–July 8.

Pop
19. Listen to Hug of Thunder
Back in action.
One of Canada’s most celebrated indie-rock bands (not named Arcade Fire), Broken Social Scene is so sprawling that even its splinter projects have found success. This summer’s new album sees Feist returning to the fold as a warm counterpoint to the shimmering guitars and anthemic shouts. —C.J.
Arts & Crafts, July 7.

Jazz
20. See Ornette Coleman: Tomorrow Is the Question
A score to remember.
Lincoln Center Festival revisits one of its original heroes: Ornette Coleman, the radical, ecstatic saxophonist and composer who died in 2015. The four-night tribute series opens with a screening of David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch and the live Ensemble Signal performing the soundtrack Coleman co-created with Howard Shore. —J.D.
Alice Tully Hall, July 11.

Theater
21. See Marvin’s Room
Laughter in the dark.
Marvin’s Room premiered Off Broadway in 1991; it was adapted into the Meryl Streep, Diane Keaton, and Leonardo DiCaprio movie in 1997, but it’s just now making its Broadway debut. Janeane Garofalo, Lili Taylor, and Celia Weston will star in this new production, directed by Anne Kauffman (Marjorie Prime).
American Airlines Theatre, opens June 29.

Books
22. Read The Weight of Lies
Don’t forget the sunblock.
An early entry in the beach-thriller sweepstakes, Emily Carpenter’s novel is layered and nuanced. Contracted to write a memoir of life with her mother, famous thriller author Frances Ashley, Megan takes the opportunity to explore the true crime behind Frances’s best-known novel, Kitten (amply sampled in an elaborate metafiction), which the novelist had pinned on an 8-year-old girl. —B.K.
Lake Union.

TV
23. Watch America in Color
Pulling focus.
The premise of this five-part series might horrify photographic purists, but as a thought experiment, you can’t beat it: It takes striking, sometimes iconic black-and-white film and video of American history from the 1920s through the 1960s and colorizes it. Liev Schreiber narrates.ï¿½ï¿½ï¿½ —M.Z.S.
Smithsonian Channel, July 2.

Movies
24. See My Journey Through French Cinema
It will make you want to jet to Paris.
Director-enthusiast Bertrand Tavernier (Coup de Torchon, A Sunday in the Country) shows us his life and loves in this chocolate box of a movie. It’s one delight after another, each loving segment — on Renoir, Carné, Melville, and Godard — unique but somehow connected to all the others. —D.E.
Quad Cinema.

Pop
25. See Echo and the Bunnymen and the Violent Femmes
Double bill on the beach.ï¿½
At first pass, these two groups seem like strange bedfellows: The latter makes upbeat, bookish folk punk while the former is known for moody, windswept guitar rock. It works because both acts have undeniable pop sensibilities. Come for “Blister in the Sun”; stay for “The Killing Moon.” —C.J.
Ford Amphitheater at Coney Island, July 12.