Our music critics have already recommended the 22 best concerts in Seattle this week, but now it’s our arts critics’ turn: Here are their top picks for things to do in Seattle this week, including the Seattle Outdoor Theater Festival, the Ballard SeafoodFest, and the Cary Grant for President film festival. See them all below, and find even more events on our complete Things To Do calendar.
Want this in your inbox? Sign up for the Stranger Things To Do newsletter.
Jump to: Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday
TUESDAY
READINGS
Ask the Oracle
Presented by Hugo House, this mystic event about precognition features Rich Smith, Alexis Smith, and EJ Koh, and is hosted by Johnny Horton. Before the show, audience members will write down questions about their futures, and Horton (in a velvet tuxedo) will pose them to the “writer-oracles.” Rich Smith, The Stranger‘s books and theater editor and one of the oracles, says, “Come ask us your private questions and we’ll respond by reading a relevant passage from our respective books. At least one of my responses will involve pastries.”
MUSIC
Music Under the Stars
The concept of Music Under the Stars is simple but compelling: A professional or student ensemble sets up in a park and plays to whoever shows up at 7:15pm, often folk with picnic blankets in tow and maybe a surreptitious bottle of wine or two. Then, at eight, Benaroya Hall pipes in whatever performance is happening that night to the assembled throng—it’s basically two shows for the price of none! This week, there will be shows in Delridge Park on Tuesday, Volunteer Park on Wednesday, and Columbia Park and Freeway Park on Friday.
2016 Seattle Chamber Music Society Summer Festival
Seattle Chamber Music Society is once again throwing their Summer Festival, with free informal recitals and full orchestral performances for all ages throughout the month of July. See the complete schedule here.
ART
Imagined Futures: Science Fiction, Art, and Artifacts from the Paul G. Allen Family Collection
Imagined Futures is a kaleidoscopic mishmash of space-themed ephemera owned by Paul Allen, running the gamut from awe-inspiring to snicker-inducing. Eccentric Hollywood memorabilia sits beside a genuine, gorgeously coruscating IBM spaceflight computer. Meticulous blueprints of never-were satellites by Wernher von Braun hang by vivid, wildly implausible paintings commissioned as science-fiction book covers. Chesley Bonestell’s eerily accurate paintings of planetary surfaces from the 1940s, which helped inspire the US space program, conduct stilted conversations with hallucinatory works by Max Ernst and René Magritte. It’s enough to induce whiplash—the fun kind you get from riding Space Mountain. SARRA SCHERB (Closes Sunday)
Katie Metz: Connections
Katie Metz’ paintings in Connections demonstrate the chaos, intensity, and urbanity of our city—but through sparkling lights, cars, and architecture, rather than figures. (Closes Saturday)
Ramon Murillo: Petroglyphs in a Modern World
For their annual Asian Pacific Heritage Exhibit, the Ethnic Heritage Gallery presents Petroglyphs in a Modern World: a solo show by Ramon Murillo, who’s known for his etchings, serigraphs, and painted drums. (Closes Friday)
WEDNESDAY
FOOD & DRINK
The Basque Book Dinner
Celebrate the release of Basque chefs Alex Raij and Eder Montero’s new cookbook, The Basque Book, with a multi-course dinner and optional wine pairing. All attendees will receive a copy of the cookbook, so they can (attempt to) recreate the dishes at home. The menu includes arroz con txirlas(Basque rice with clams), arraultza (fried quail egg and chorizo), Basque pimientos (peppers), lomo adobado (paprika-cured pork loin), and torrijas (Basque bread pudding).
Celebrate Eid
This pop up created by Taylor Cheney will celebrate Eid al-Fitr (which marks the end of Ramadan with a ceremonial, delicious breaking of the fast) with a variety of Mediterranean-inspired small plates, your choice of entrée, and “an inspired sweet.”
FILM
Coffy, Presented with NAAM
This “iconic Blaxploitation film” from 1973, featuring the incomparable Pam Grier as a black female vigilante named Coffy (and a score by the immortal Roy Ayers), is presented with a special introduction by the Northwest African American Museum.
An Evening with Steve De Jarnatt: Miracle Mile and Cherry 2000
Director Steve De Jarnatt will be in attendance for this double feature screening of two of his best-loved (and yet eternally underrated) movies, remastered: 1988’s world-about-to-end thriller Miracle Mile and the 1987 post-apocalyptic science fiction film Cherry 2000, starring Melanie Griffith.
READINGS
Silent Reading Party
Invented by our own Christopher Frizzelle, the reading party is every first Wednesday of the month at 6 p.m. That’s when the Fireside Room at the Sorrento Hotel goes quiet and fills with people with books tucked under their arms. (And, occasionally, a Kindle or two.) By 7 p.m., you often can’t get a seat. And there’s always free music from 6 to 8 pm. Lately the resident musician is pianist Paul Matthew Moore. He’s amazing.
PERFORMANCE
The Gay Uncle Time
It’s an avuncular variety show starring Santa-esque comedian Jeffrey Robert and a rotating cavalcade of local stars, drag queens, storytellers, and weirdos. Get a healthy dose of history, comedy, and song from the gay uncle you always wished you had and his friends you always suspected were up to no good. Get there early if you want a seat—their shows are often filled to capacity, with latecomers turned away. Hey, a room can fit only so many nieces and nephews. MATT BAUME
THURSDAY
COMEDY
Neil Hamburger
The Stranger published the following words more than a decade ago, and they’re still true, for good and ill: “Neil Hamburger understands the stereotype of comedians as low-life losers and becomes the role with exquisite relevance; a common initial reaction to his performance is abhorrence and resentment. His art dwells in catching audiences at their most unwelcoming: some level of drunk and waiting for the next band. His clever repertoire balances the audacious and mundane until the line is blurred to a totally ridiculous degree. If you can restrain yourself from heckling, you’ll find his material bursting with some of the most brilliant and relevant comedy that our era has to offer.” JAMES SQUEAKY
Brett Hamil
Brett Hamil (the mind behind The Seattle Process with Brett Hamil, a talk show with politics, exasperation, information, and comedy, and a man whom we’ve previously called “a Capitol Hill treasure. And ham. A truly treasured ham”) will present an evening of new standup material with Jesse Weyrick and special guests.
READINGS
Small Po_tions Reading
This is the first reading organized by Small Po[r]tions, a literary journal that specializes in book art, text-centered multimedia art, and formally challenging/ambitious poetry, i.e., stuff you’re not going to be able to understand after a single read. The journal is a gorgeous thing, and they turn some of the work they publish into gorgeous bits of ephemera that you can hang all over your wall, which will give you ample time to really engage with the work. This reading features Stranger Genius Award winner Maged Zaher, whose latest book, The Consequences of My Body, is humorous, semi-sad, and really good. Jeanne Heuving (who ALSO has a new book out, this one related to avant-garde and love), Samar Abulhassan, Christina Montilla, and Travis A. Sharp will also read. While you’re there, you can buy “chap-po_tions,” which they say is “a potion that includes a poem from each of the readers.” Yay, poetic witchery! RICH SMITH
Seattle StorySLAM
A live amateur storytelling competition in which audience members who put their names in a hat are randomly chosen to tell stories on a theme (this week, it’s “pressure”). Local comedians tend to show up, but lots of nonperformers get in on the action as well.
ART
First Thursday Art Walk
Once a month, Seattleites flock to the streets in Pioneer Square for a chance to stroll, sip on booze, and attend as many art openings as possible at First Thursday. It’s the city’s central and oldest art walk, and takes place in a historic neighborhood known for its abundance of galleries. Wine and hobnobbing will steal the scene for some, but at its core, it’s an impressive communal unveiling of new artwork. This month, don’t miss the opening of Amanda Manitach’s exhibition Nothing Left to Say, about the West Seattle High School student who would become the movie star Frances Farmer and who wrote an essay in which she declared God dead.
American Power
CoCA presents American Power, an exhibit about the current cultural climate in the United States: from gun violence to ostracizing “the other.” The exhibit will feature a partial remounting of Paul Rucker’s Rewind Exhibit, as well as work by Pacific Northwest artists Tracy Boyd, Chris Crites, Rebecca Cummins and Troy Gua.
Summer at SAM: Kickoff
Summer At SAM happens every Thursday from July through the end of August, but the one and only kickoff party is today, with food trucks, DIY projects and kid-friendly play-stations, live sets from local bands, and (ostensibly) a beautiful sunset over the Sound.
FILM
Cary Grant for President
Starting today and continuing on Thursdays through August 11, SAM will celebrate the “comic perfection” of this classic, handsome film star in this series, whose title is an appeal to the political nature of 2016. Scheduled films are Bringing Up Baby (1938), My Favorite Wife (1940), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948), and Charade (1963).
Czech That Film
This weekend-long festival promises seven films highlighting the best of Czech cinema: drama The Way Out, beautiful and emotionally devastating Home Care, crime thriller Ganster Ka, puppet animation The Little Man, sci-fi classic Invention for Destruction, and comedies Chasing Fifty and Schmitke. (Through July 10)
Ghost in the Shell
How can I best describe the depth of the love that I feel for the images in and the soundtrack for the anime masterpiece Ghost in the Shell? Let’s try this: The weird music of Kenji Kawai (Japanese ghosts and beats like bones) and the images (the crowded streets of Hong Kong—the buses, the boats, the crowds, the new and old buildings) enter my soul in the way that stretches of light and stars enter an unavoidable black hole and are eventually concentrated at a single and very intense/dense point. Yes, that is almost how I feel about Ghost in the Shell, which is one of the top three science-fiction films of the 1990s (the other two are, of course, The Matrix and Gattaca). CHARLES MUDEDE
Under the Bridge: The Criminalization of Homelessness
The Seattle Public Library presents a screening of Under the Bridge: The Criminalization of Homelessness, a documentary film about the impending closure of the Davidson St. homeless camp in Indianapolis.
MUSIC
Northwest Heavy Fest
A husband-wife boutique of bombast, regional label Devil’s Child Records has developed a national rep as a go-to source for Pacific Northwest bands that seemingly take their musical cues from the heft and density of Mount Rainier. At the two-day Northwest Heavy Fest, Devil’s Child will host a loud, lovingly curated survey of nearly a dozen bands it’s worked with, including stoner metal battering ram Mother Crone, interstellar instrumentalists X Suns, boogie rocker badasses Mos Generator, and the “grade school math metal” of the awesomely named Teepee Creeper, among others. Devil’s Child prides itself on crafting gorgeous looking artisanal vinyl, meaning the only thing as heavy as the sounds this weekend will be the crate of records plenty of longhairs will be carting home. JASON BRACELIN (Through Saturday)
FRIDAY
FOOD & DRINK
Seattle International Beerfest
Look forward to trying new brews at this weekend full of people celebrating beer: specifically, beer that’s “rare, hard-to-find, and exotic…no matter what the cost or where they’re from.” Sample from more than 220 beers on the grounds underneath the Space Needle, and, if you’re overwhelmed by the choices, there will also be $3 pints of Pilsner Urquell. (Through Sunday)
THEATER
Daisy
Based on the true story that led to the infamous “Daisy” attack ad from 1964 (in which voters were encouraged to vote for Lyndon B. Johnson or risk letting little girls die in nuclear war), this world premiere show tells the story of the “ad-men” working for Johnson’s presidential campaign and their decision that has forever changed American elections.
Suffering, Inc.
Pony World Theatre presents a revamped production of Suffering, Inc., which debuted in 2011 at Washington Hall. They’ll return with an edited script, new staging, and new and returning cast members at 12th Avenue Arts. Former Stranger theater editor Brendan Kiley wrote that the premiere was “a gorgeous mix of office-speak, poetry, and understated violence and romance.” (Through July 30)
SATURDAY
FOOD & DRINK
Ballard SeafoodFest
Lutefisk is, objectively, sort of an effed-up substance: whitefish soaked in lye (a caustic, corrosive substance) for many days until it develops a jellylike texture, and then soaked in water for another few days (to wash the burning poison out of the meat). But, like so many foods around the world, lutefisk is much more than a food—it’s also a powerful cultural tradition. Lutefisk is a proud emblem of Scandinavian culture, which is the foundation of Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood. Sure, you can drink beer, listen to local bands, and skateboard at the 42nd Ballard SeafoodFest, but you’re missing the boat if you don’t check out the riotous annual lutefisk eating contest or line up for a piece of the alder-smoked salmon that’s flown in directly from Alaska just for the event. Skol! ANGELA GARBES (Through Sunday)
Polish Festival Seattle
The fifth annual festival honors the Polish Highlands with food and drink, music and dance, exhibits and workshops, and more. Treat your tastebuds to smoked sheep’s milk cheese (oscypek), tap your toes to Polish folk songs, and take on activities including cabbage roll (gołąbki) cooking classes and wycinanki (paper cutout art) workshops.
Proof: Washington Distillers Festival
Sample craft gin, whiskey, vodka, bourbon, and other spirits from more than 40 Washington distillers, and then purchase your favorite. Local restaurants (including Theo Chocolate and Uli’s Famous Sausage) will also provide savory and sweet bites.
FESTIVALS
TUF FEST
The first annual TUF FEST is an all-day/all-night extravaganza spotlighting musical performances, visual art installations, workshops, and artist discussions by female/nonbinary/trans members of the electronic-music community. Powered by the local TUF collective, the event features live sets by Bolivian-born abstract beat scientist Elysia Crampton, Seattle hiphop phenom DoNormaal, Oakland synth-builder and avant-garde electronic producer Kaori Suzuki, former Soft Metals minimal-synth musician/vocalist Patricia Hall, and others. At the TUF FEST ’Til Dawn after-hours party, German DJ Lena Willikens and Discwoman cofounder UMFANG lead you down some strange techno and electro wormholes. In a field dominated by male-centric bills, TUF FEST is a spring-loaded step into a fresh future. DAVE SEGAL
Seattle Outdoor Theater Festival
For the 16th year, eight local theater companies will present 16 performances outside at Volunteer Park, including multiple Shakespeare plays, the 14/48 Projects’ The Siblings Grimm, Jet City Improv’s The Lost Folio, and Theater Schmeater’s Raggedy Ann and Andy.
READINGS
Hot off the Press Book Fair
This book fair doubles as the final Intruder issue release party and the opening of the Intruder exhibit, and will feature special guest and acclaimed indie comics artist Sammy Harkham (who will be signing copies of his new Kramer’s Ergot 9 anthology and self-published serial Crickets), Seattle artist Josh Simmons (who will be signing the latest installment of the Jessica Farm project), and other comics and zines from Northwest artists.
ART
Georgetown Art Attack
Once a month, the art that resides in the tiny airport hamlet of Georgetown ATTACKS all passersby. In more literal terms, it’s the day of art openings and street wonderment.
SUNDAY
ART
Cross Pollinate
The community-oriented art and performance component of the Georgetown Gardenwalk will feature a wide variety of local artists and musicians.
READINGS
Jeanne Heuving and Maged Zaher
This artist talk/lecture series organized by Hami Bohadori and Matt Bell promises a take on the intersection of commercial and academic art through a variety of forms of communication, from performances and presentations to lectures and “beneficial experiences.” This time, hear from writer Jeanne Heuving (Incapacity) and Stranger Genius award-winner in literature, Maged Zaher.
PERFORMANCE
Wine Shots: Comedy’s Happiest Hour
This all-female comedy variety show comes complete with an all-female Michael Bolton cover band, Lightning Bolton. Organized by the very funny Elicia Sanchez, it’s every second Sunday of the month in the Grotto at the Rendezvous, and every audience member gets a free shot of wine.
