Your weekend arts forecast: A few recommendations

Even without the usual mass gatherings of family, the days after Thanksgiving might very well be filled with age-old questions: What’s going on in this town? What can we do with all this spare time?

Live performances, of course, are few and far between in these days of masks and Covid (cue the music of Henry Mancini), even moreso over the impending long holiday weekend.

Still, here are a few ways to connect with the bay area and its arts community while you’re digesting and reflecting:

1. War of the Worlds at freeFall Theatre. This mash-up of a radio variety show (being performed live on an outdoor stage) and a Martian invasion is fun and frivolous; although it’s an odd sensation to watch events unfold from one’s car, with the sound piping in via a phone audio app (and/or the car radio), the whole thing works as an enjoyable, let’s-stay-safe adventure. Matthew McGee makes several welcome appearances; Kudos and a big thanks to WTSP’s Josh Sidorowicz for his “narration” as the aliens set down, via video, in Plant City (!). Times and tickets here.
2. Singer/songwriter Connor Christian at the Safety Harbor Art and Music Center. The main man from the Atlanta Americana band The Southern Gothic in a solo show called “Live and Outside” Saturday (Nov. 28). All details are here. Hillsborough fans can see the performance Friday at the Fountainhead in Westchase (north county). TSG has a new EP out, Burnin’ Moonlight.
   

   Connor Christian

3. Stream exceptional local theater. Today (Nov. 25) is the last day Tampa Repertory Theatre’s production of Lauren Gunderson’s I And You is streaming (click here); available through the weekend is Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus (Jobsite/Straz) and Kate: The Unexplained Life of Katharine Hepburn (American Stage). With Giles Davies in the former, and Janis Stevens in the latter, these are one-person shows with riveting acting talents.
4. Living Color: The Art of the Highwaymen at the Tampa Museum of Art. This extraordinary exhibit includes 100 brilliant paintings, from five different private collections, by the legendary St. Lucie County landscape artists, ranging from the 1950s through the ‘80s. They were all done to be sold to the public, out of automobile trunks (hence the name Highwaymen), and only in more recent years did art aficionados come to realize their beauty, craft and genuine artistic value. Info here.
   

   “Living Color”

5. Van Gogh Alive at the Dali Museum is highly recommended, but it’s sold out through Monday. So, nothing to see here, people. Move along.

Have a wonderful holiday. Stay safe. See you Monday.