Welcome to Big Week, our weekly guide to cool things to do, put together by our expert critics and writers.
GENERAL ARTS
Marke B. keeps an eye and ear out.
SAT/6 + SUN/7: FESTA ITALIANA Absolutely one of my favorite annual events, with live music, a parade, tons of delicious food (duh) and this: “Pizza toss performance by 13 time World Champion and restaurateur Tony Gemignani of Tony’s Pizza Napoletana.” If it all gets a little overwhelming, well, you’re in North Beach—head to Cafe Zoetrope for an Aperol spritz, bambino. 11am-5pm, Stockton and Filbert Streets, SF. More info here.
SAT/6 + SUN/7: UNION STREET FESTIVAL Street Festival season has truly arrived, and after you’ve whooped it up with poppa and nonna at Festa Italiana, it’s time to breeze through the well-heeled pleasures of the Marina at this concurrent affair, full of music, food, craft beers, and Marina joie de vivre. 11am-7pm, Union Street, SF. More info here.
SUN/7: JUNETEENTH ON THE WATERFRONT The Bay Area’s thriving Black food and crafts scene comes out to show us the goods outside the Ferry Building, and while this year it’s not timed to coincide with the city’s awesome Juneteenth Parade (that’s June 20), you will get plenty of local culture and soul from dozens of vendors and food trucks. 11am-4pm, Ferry plaza, SF. More info here.
SUN/7: GOLDEN GATE PARK BAND—A CELEBRATION OF PRIDE Darling SF Drag Laureate Persia joins performer Lambert Moss and the 144-year-old Golden Gate Park Band for a little sonic sparkle in the Spreckles Temple of Music, celebrating Pride Time. 1pm-2:30pm, Golden Gate Park, SF. More info here.
SUN/7: PRIDE IN YERBA BUENA! Hang on, honey, Persia isn’t finished with you yet! After Golden Gate, zip down to Yerba Buena Gardens on your unicorn of choice for another outdoor Pride event she’s hosting, with With drag king Tyson Check-In, aerialists Vix Nolan and Joey Tiger, juggler Lucy, drag queen and vocalist Militia Scunt and Puerto Rican drag prince Tito Soto. 2pm-4pm, Yerba Buena Gardens, SF. More info here.
SUN/7: THE KLEZMATICS Seminal NYC klezmer-punk band is celebrating 40 years of “protest, resilience, spiritual endurance, and radical joy”—and I can’t tell you how important their groundbreaking fusion has been not just to developments like the Balkan nightlife explosion and Burning Man musical Bohemianism, but also to the many queer kids who found their beat-up CDs in the back of their cool older cousin’s car and heard something as wildly genre-crossing as they longed to be. 7pm, JCCSF. More info here.
MUSIC
Hit up John-Paul Shiver’s Under the Stars column for great tunes and shows every week.
THURS/4 MARBLED EYE Post-punk out of Oakland, no cutesy pop ditties built for the high-end professional “mixologist” craft cocktail set. Order up your beer and a shot to go with those atonal guitar riffs, off-the-rails basslines, dart-rushing drum licks, and breezeway choruses that fit charmingly within all the blunderbuss going on. Marbled Eye, the no-frills all-kills four-top, will be playing their record release party on behalf of tight instant-classic EP Forever. And you need to bear witness, because this frenetic take on the much-ballyhooed abused genre is…well…to borrow from their ripper of a track, “Something’s different / I can’t explain.” 8pm, Thee Stork Club, Oakland. More info here.
SAT/6: SATYA In recent years, a new generation of Oakland neo-soul and R&B stars has been transforming their genres, while receiving well-earned exposure. Satya Hawley, a vocalist with roots in Oakland and New Orleans, is holding an album listening party for new release Yellow House at Blk Girls Green House, the only Black women-owned plant nursery in Oakland. Come celebrate this emerging artist, whose diverse talents blend indie rock and R&B. Her unique sound, reminiscent of Mazzy Star, Sade, and Prince, shines in all environments but will glisten even brighter here. 6:30pm, Blk Girls Green House, Oakland. More info here.
FOOD & DRINK
Tamara Palmer’s weekly Good Taste column tells you where to stick your fork.
GET IN THE JUNIPER LINE I endeavor to be sparing about the lines I suggest that you wait in, especially on a weekend. But it’s always fast-moving and worthwhile to hop in the line that forms daily for Saint Frank coffee and pastries at Juniper. Current bangers in rotation that deserve your attention include a mulberry lemon cream danish and an asparagus and potato danish. The latter offers yet more evidence that the Bay Area is turning out incredible savory pastries right now. 1401 Polk Street, SF. www.juniper.cafe
STAGE
Charles Lewis III checks out theaters and performance spaces every week in the Drama Masks column.
THROUGH JULY 5: THE LUNCHBOX A Bombay wife delivers lunch to her husband. It winds up with the wrong man, and that’s the best thing that could have happened. The world premiere of Ritesh Batra’s The Lunchbox is not only one of Berkeley Rep’s better musicals, but a terrific example of how to do film-to-stage the right. Berkeley Rep, more info here.
THROUGH JUNE 14: BECOMING A MAN P. Carl’s memoir-adaptation of his trans journey is strongest when it allows the characters to feel the emotional weight that comes when its lead decides to live as his true self. Scenes like the protagonist entering a sports bar for the first time have a true power that overshadows the piece’s TED talk-like segments, as honest and soul-baring as those are. Z Space, SF. More info here.
FILM
Dennis Harvey’s long-running Screen Grabs has tons more flicks to recommend.
OPENING FRI/5: TIME AND WATER This National Geographic documentary from Sara Dosa (Fire of Love), is basically a highly worked audiovisual letter to people of the future from Icelandic poet and sci-fi novelist Andri Snaer Magnason. “I can’t send you a glacier, but I can send you this” he says in voiceover, commencing a lament as to why very soon there will be no glaciers left, period. Of course in the biggest possible picture, there is nothing more pressing than climate change—and this beautifully produced plea would make a very good case-plead for anyone who might find their skepticism melted by its tasteful “family values” emphasis. SF’s Roxie and Marin’s Smith Rafael Center, expanding to Berkeley and Sebastopol venues the next week.
NOW STREAMING: STRANGE JOURNEY: THE STORY OF ROCKY HORROR This surprisingly straightforward (ahem) doc provides an overview of the legendarily louche musical’s voyage from fringe London stage hit to mainstream theater, then on to a film incarnation that preserved much of the work’s existing character (and cast) simply because it was too low-budget for any Hollywood executives to bother meddling with. Then came the bad news: A Broadway mounting flopped just months before bewildered 20th Century-Fox dumped the completed movie in a handful of 1975 theaters, where it was ignored. Then a bit down the road, somebody had the bright idea of trying to build a following with weekly midnight showings… and we all know where that led. Apple TV and other VOD services.
NIGHTLIFE
Marke B. usually knows what’s up.
SAT/6: FREE TECHNO IN UNION SQUARE WITH ADAM X AND FRANKIE BONES I stay a little leery of the big parties happening downtown in conjunction with our public-private partnership government—it’s too easy for shady groups like Civic Joy Fund to get involved and throw the vibe off. That said, let’s have all the fun we can while it’s all still free—and I adore the Direct to Earth crew that is putting on the Free Techno in Unio Square parties. I’m still kicking myself for missing Joey Beltram last month; this time around brings NYC rave legends Adam X and Frankie Bones, and who can really fault that? 4pm-8pm, Union Square, SF. More info here.
SAT/6: ALL DAY I DREAM OF GOLDEN DAYS ‘Tis the season of outdoor parties, whether it be Union Square or this lovely annual affair in Golden Gate Park’s Hellman Hollow, with British burner bigwig (and longtime local favorite) Lee Burridge, Enamour, and Facundo Mohrr. Pack a pic-a-nic basket and your beater sneakers for dancing on the grass. (Afterparty at the Great Northern, too.) Noon-7pm, Hellman Hollow, SF. More info here.
SAT/6: HORSE MEAT DISCO Can the new Castro Theater really throw off its indie muumuu and reveal a throbbing gay disco underneath? I guess we will find out this Saturday, as one of the biggest queer-centric parties in the city, Stardella, takes over the cavernous space, with special guests from the UK Horse Meat, who are fantastic in their retro-faggotry. 7pm-midnight, Castro Theater, SF. More info here.
