Or don't! Enjoy the fact that it isn't actually winter yet by bicycling around the city with the Cranksgiving celebrants — and raise money for a good cause, too.
Here are our picks for this week's nine best things to do.
1. See a new show at Mad Art
Famous Fictional, the group show at Mad Art Gallery (2727 South Twelfth Street; www.madart.com), is back for its tenth year. Artists create portraits of pop culture and fictional characters in all media. There's a different theme for each outing; this year's guiding principle is "versus." Den Smith's wooden sculpture is based on the fable of the tortoise and the hare, but with Japanese sci-fi monster turtle Gamera and the rabbit from Donnie Darko in place of more mundane fauna. Both characters are mounted on wooden wheels so they can be used as pull toys. Barbara Rutledge chose surprise hit TV show Stranger Things as her inspiration; her embroidered portraits are immediately recognizable. Famous Fictional opens with a free reception from 7 to 11 p.m. tonight.
2. Thrill to Prokofiev's Romeo & Juliet
Despite its unhappy ending, Romeo & Juliet remains a perpetual crowd-pleaser. Is it the young love theme people are attracted to, or perhaps the "two against the world" defiance that binds the two lovers? Mario Radacovsky takes the latter approach for his specially commissioned adaptation of the Prokofiev ballet. His focus is on the social barriers that insulated the wealthy Capulet and Montague families, and how Romeo and Juliet are willing to break those barriers for love. Grand Rapids Ballet dances Radacovsky's interpretation of Romeo & Juliet at 8 p.m. Friday and 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday (November 4 and 5) at the Touhill Performing Arts Center on the University of Missouri-St. Louis campus (1 University Drive at Natural Bridge Road; www.touhill.org). Tickets are $30 to $50.
3. See a new show at the Kranzberg Arts Center
Vita Eruhimovitz's new show, Synthetic Landscapes, is all about the artist's fears of a mechanized future and the rise of man-made environments over the natural world. Her mixed-media pieces combine sculptural and electronic elements with traditional painting methods. A vertical abstract painting that could be a noxious landscape has metal washers stuck to its surface; artificial clouds of colored Plexiglass are bolted to the painting in rising tiers. Synthetic Landscapes opens with a free reception from 6 to 9 p.m. Friday, November 4, at the Kranzberg Arts Center (501 North Grand Boulevard; www.kranzbergartscenter.org). The work remains up through Sunday, December 18, and the gallery is open Wednesday through Sunday.
4. Witness a new play coming together in just 24 hours
You might recall the Immediacy Theatre Project, the company that produced 24-hour play festivals in the early aughts. Kyle Kratky was its co-founder, and he's now formed with Andrea Standby a new company called Prime that hopes to present four 24-hour play festivals every year. Transmigration is Prime's debut production. Inspired by the tenets of reincarnation, Transmigration provides six writers each a different reason for reincarnation. Those writers will then have until the following dawn to write a short play from that prompt. By nightfall, a team of two actors will perform the cycle of new lives to their ultimate reward. Transmigration takes place at 8 p.m. Saturday at Southampton Presbyterian Church (4716 Macklind Avenue; 314-884-1647). Tickets are $10 at the door.
Turn the page for more of this week's events.
