Weekly Entertainment Guide
It’s cold outside! Here are some recommendations to keep you warm as you start out the New Year.
Even though the weather is cold, there is still a lot of outdoor nature activity to explore in winter months when signs of wildlife begin to appear in the snow and places that are normally covered by green leaves. Follow animal tracks, explore rocks and ponds, and walk the trails to see birds in flight. Bird watch inside as well through February 18 with the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education’s display, “Flock, An Exhibition Inspired by the Schuylkill Center’s Bird Collection.” The exhibit is a fresh look at the Center’s permanent bird collection through the eyes of photographer Lisa Haun, accompanied by sound displays. Visitors are invited to touch and open handmade birdhouses that come to life with songs and calls of birds. SCEE is one of the first urban environmental education centers in the country, encompassing over 340 acres of privately held land in Roxborough with the mission to promote the preservation and improvement of our natural environment through education, outreach, and the conservation of its land, 8480 Hagy’s Mill Road, Philadelphia.
Commemorating 30 years of AIDS
The Asian Arts Initiative looks back on 30 years of the AIDS pandemic with a multi-media visual arts exhibition on view through January 27 at 1219 Vine Street, Philadelphia. Witness: Artists reflect on 30 years of the AIDS Pandemic features the work of Zoe Strauss, Link Harper, Marta Sanchez, Ronald Corbin, Peter Lien, Gabriel Martinez (image: Anthology), and more, and represents a gathering of voices across race, age, gender, sexual orientation and geographic location focusing on the impact that the HIV/AIDS epidemic has had on social, cultural, and political spheres for the past three decades.
The Philadelphia Drinking Play
After a successful debut and weeks of sold out performances, Bye Bye Liver: The Philadelphia Drinking Play is now a permanent feature every Saturday night at Downey’s Pub on South Street, in Philadelphia beginning January 7, 9pm.
Hosted by The Pub Theater Company, the show is part social game and part sketch comedy with audience interaction, 21+ only, with $10 buckets of Bud Lite and Miller Lite. Tickets $15
Vox Populi, the nonprofit artist collective that supports the work of under-represented artists, continues its guest artist program this month with painting, video, and mixed-media work by Catherine Maloney, Leah Beeferman, Guy Ben-Ari (image: Father Can’t You See I’m Burning), and Brie Ruais. The critical exploration of art-historical narratives and futuristic tropes, from psychoanalysis, gendered subjectivity, and baroque formlessness, to sci-fi television, physics and geometry, is on view through January 29, 319 N. 11th Street, 3rd Floor, Philadelphia.
Onstage at Wilma Theater is the Philadelphia premiere of the Off-Broadway hit comedy Body Awareness, by Obie Award winning playwright Annie Baker, directed by Anne Kauffman, through February 5, 265 S. Broad Street, Philadelphia.
Grammy-nominated saxophonist Ravi Coltrane (and son of John Coltrane) performs with his quartet Saturday, January 14, 8pm (with pre-show chat at 7pm), at the Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, University of Pennsylvania, 3680 Walnut Street, Philadelphia.
Other listings throughout the region:
The Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Art After 5 offers a unique blend of entertainment from 5-8:45pm in the Great Stair Hall with an eclectic mix of international music on the first Friday of each month, and recognized and emerging jazz artists on all other Fridays. This month: Tango Night, January 6, Eldar, January 13, Philadelphia Dance Party with DJs King Britt and Jerry Blavat, January 20, Django-a-Go-Go Festival, January 27. Guided gallery tours offered, included with museum admission.
The 3rd Annual Independent Voices Festival takes place January 6-23, highlighting premieres and performances from many genres, including theatre, movement, music and puppetry including the one-woman show She Moved Through the Fair, inspired by and freely adapted from the works of the Irish writer Edna O’Brien, Saturday, January 14, 8pm & Sunday, January 15, 2pm, Centre Theater, Montgomery County Cultural Center, 208 DeKalb Street, Norristown, PA. Tickets $15
Opening Wednesday, January 11 at People’s Light & Theater is the World Premiere of “Fallow,” by Kenneth Lin, exploring what holds us to the families we are born into and how we seek new families of our own, through February 5, 39 Conestoga Road, Malvern, PA. Tickets $25-$45
Opening January 13 at Old Academy Players is Skin Deep, by Jon Lonoff through January 29 at their historic theater on Indian Queen Lane in East Falls. Tickets $15
The hit “Sing-a-long-a Sound of Music” returns to the State Theatre in Easton, PA for one night only, on Sunday, January 15, 2pm. Tickets $20, $10 for children under 10. The show features a costume contest, props, and subtitles.
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