Weekend arts forecast: Hello, is it Lionel you’re looking for?
Lionel Richie, the one-time Commodore who gave the world “Sail On,” “Still,” “Easy,” “Three Times a Lady,” “All Night Long” and so many more, is in concert Saturday at Amalie Arena, sharing the bill with Earth, Wind & Fire (original members: 3, although one of them is original co-lead singer Philip Bailey). The tour is called, cleverly, Sing a Song All Night Long. Tickets are here. (Personal favorite from the Lionel songbook: “Brick House”).
Concerts and comedy
Stalwart New Orleans rock quintet Cowboy Mouth plays the Central Park Performing Arts Center in Largo tonight (Thursday, Aug. 24). Drummer and lead vocalist Fred LeBlanc (formerly of Dash Rip Rock) is still kicking out the jams, alongside founding guitarist John Thomas Griffith. The band was inducted into the Louisiana Hall of Fame in 2011. Tickets.
Paging Mr. Johansson: Saturday Night Live writer and cast member Colin Jost (one of the “Weekend Update” guys, and a multiple Emmy nominee ) is also a standup comedian, and he’s performing tonight (Thursday, Aug. 24) at the Seminole Hard Rock Event Center. Tickets are here.
Rock ‘n’ roll horrormeister Rob Zombie, a platinum-plus recording artist (Hellbilly Deluxe) and film director (The Devil’s Rejects) shares top billing Saturday with Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Alice Cooper. The tour, dubbed Freaks on Parade, stops at the Mid-Florida Credit Union Amphitheater. Tickets are here.
Zombie and Cooper are longtime friends, and have toured together in the past. In 1996, they recorded “Hands of Death (Burn Baby Burn),” which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance.
Saturday at the Palladium, it’s St. Pete bossa nova singer Daniela Soledade with Deco Tropical, a program of Brazilian music, soul music and more – with a seven-piece band. Read our interview with Daniela here.
It’s the final weekend for Jobsite’s “Twilight: Los Angeles 1992,” with Andresia Moseley. Photo provided.
On theater stages
Broadway veteran Chester Gregory (Motown: The Musical, Dreamgirls) sings the songs of the Miracles, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, Stevie Wonder and more in A Motown Celebration, onstage this weekend (and through Sept. 10) at freeFall Theater (tickets here). Gregory is our guest on Friday’s Arts Alive! podcast.
This weekend at Stageworks Theatre, the bay area’s Theatre For Young Audiences (TYA) company, ThinkTank, debuts the thought-provoking drama Star Stuff (read all about it here). There’s also free readings of winning plays from ThinkTank’s 2023 Young Playwrights Festival.
Andresia Moselely is onstage through Sunday (in the Straz Center’s Shimberg Playhouse) playing more than 20 characters in the Jobsite Theatre production of Anna Deveare Smith’s scintillating one-person production Twilight: Los Angeles 1992. Find tickets here.
Local playwright Steven R. James’ original drama A Soul’s Final Journey has staged readings at 7 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday. It’s the story of Andrew “Paige” Turner who is, according to the playwright’s program notes, “traveling backwards to relive a very traumatic time in his life. As the story unfolds, you will see how people impact other people’s lives. We watch as one person’s trauma and anger, coupled with another person’s drug abuse, is directed at Paige … this is about how the good and bad can affect us all and last a lifetime.” Find tickets here.
The Weekend arts forecast appears every Thursday in the Catalyst.
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