Best Things To Do in Dallas This Weekend

Friday

If you’re going to live in a place as hot as a desert, you might as well see something that fits the climate. The Uptown Players are staging the Tony-winning musical adaptation of the Oscar-winning film Priscilla: Queen of the Desert at the Kalita Humphreys Theater, 3636 Turtle Creek Blvd. The show opens at 8 p.m. Friday, and performances run through July 29. The musical tells the tale of Tick, Bernadette and Adam, who take their extravagant drag show on the road through the Australian Outback with their well-worn tour bus, Priscilla. The show features extravagant costumes, hilarious scenes, and numbers directed and choreographed by Ann Nieman to dance music favorites like “It’s Raining Men” by the Weather Girls, “I Will Survive” by Donna Summer and “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” by Cyndi Lauper. Tickets are $35-$60. Visit uptownplayers.org for showtimes and tickets. Danny Gallagher

Beauty pageants are among the most insidious vestiges of the patriarchy. The superficial judgments, the fat-shaming beauty standards, and especially the leering judges and pageant owners — it all seems like a relic. But when you replace male gaze with male gays, it’s a completely different story. That brings us to Miss Gay Texas America 2018, which claims to be “the oldest and largest pageant system for female impersonators” in the state. The revue show is at 10:30 Thursday, with a $10 cover, and the top 10 compete on the final night at 9 p.m. Friday, when the cover is $25. The contest all takes place at S4 in the Rose Room, 3911 Cedar Springs Road. It’s an official preliminary to Miss Gay America 2019, so this is a can’t-miss for anyone with an interest in who represents the Lone Star State in that prestigious competition. Visit missgaytexasamerica.com for more information. Jesse Hughey

Weary of Hairspray and Steel Magnolias? Celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Festival of Independent Theatres, representing eight theater companies, as they stage their one-acts Friday through Aug. 4 at the Bath House Cultural Center, 521 E. Lawther Drive at White Rock Lake. David Meglino is managing director of the lineup: Camp Death Productions, Danielle Georgiou Dance Group, Eccentric Bear Productions, Echo Theatre, Imprint Theatreworks, Laughter League, Prism Movement Theater and WingSpan Theatre Co. Echo's Bible Women features cabaret diva Denise Lee. WingSpan's Harold Pinter play, Landscape, deals with repairing a relationship (starring Van Quattro and Moira Wilson). Single tickets are $18; passes are $60-$70. Call 800-617-6904 or visit festivalofindependenttheatres.org. Reba Liner

Football season is just around the corner, and just because you’re a Cowboys fan doesn’t mean you have to put up with another year of pain. Fantasy football is a gift to the chronically disappointed football fan. You can still root for your hometown team, but fantasy football lets you put together your own team of players for another chance at victorious redemption. It’s a beautiful mix of strategy, competitiveness and pure sporting fandom. Learn all about this modern sports tradition at the National Fantasy Football Convention from Friday through Sunday at the Will Rogers Memorial Center, 3401 W. Lancaster Ave. in Fort Worth. This three-day gathering will give fans access to fantasy football industry experts and even real National Football League players such as Ezekiel Elliott, Melvin Gordon, Dez Bryant and Michael Irvin. General admission passes are $119 and include access to all nonexclusive events. Passes are available for children ages 5-12 for $24. Children 4 and younger get in free. Visit gonffc.com for tickets. Danny Gallagher

Saturday

Ludovico Einaudi is one of the world’s most celebrated modern classical composers, and his latest tour, Essential Einaudi, includes his first visit to North Texas. With music spanning the pianist’s entire career — from folk-adjacent arrangements to pop, rock and even electronic — these live performances will also focus on the composer’s 2015 album, Elements, an ambitious, large-statement work inspired by the elemental forces of nature. Einaudi’s North Texas show starts at 8 p.m. Saturday at the Music Hall at Fair Park, 909 First Ave. Tickets start at $35. For more information, visit liveatthemusichall.com. Jonathan Patrick

Ever had a great banana? Of course not. Bananas may go bad, but they never aspire to greatness. The best banana is just a banana. The peach, though ... now there's a fruit to warm the heart of an artist. A bad peach — namely those sour, dry croquet balls from California sold in supermarkets — are travesties of modern agriculture. Great peaches — fuzzy, tree-ripened beauties, not hard, spongy, stringy or sour but juicy, sweet and just-right firm — are God's blessings, brought to table by the diligent, patient efforts of orchard growers who must endure finicky trees, variable weather and a host of peach-killing pests. A basic rule is that if you can't readily drive to the orchard that grows your peaches, chances are they're not very good. Luckily, the city of Weatherford is only 58 miles from Dallas, so it's an easy weekend trip to celebrate nature's greatest fruit at the Parker County Peach Festival from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday in historic downtown Weatherford. Live music, kids’ games, a bike ride and more than 200 vendors take a back seat to the star of the show: Parker County's peaches, in pies, ice cream and cobblers and, best of all, straight-up from the tree. Tickets are $5 for adults, and kids younger than 12 get in for free. Find maps and more details at parkercountypeachfestival.org. Patrick Williams

It's midsummer, and it's starting to feel like the kids have been out of school for a year. It's too hot for any outdoor activities besides swimming, and you've been to every museum within a 50-mile radius. You're short on cash and even shorter on patience. Good news: The J. Erik Jonsson Central Library, 1515 Young St., is hosting its Discovery Faire for school-age children from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday. All eight floors of the library will feature activities such as juggling and dance lessons, art projects, electronics experiments, photography, CPR classes, making slime and meeting miniature horses. (We're not sure what floor the snakes are on, but we suggest avoiding it.) You can even teach your kid about a time when people used to print the news on actual paper while finding the front page from the day he or she was born. Admission and parking are free. For more information, call 214-670-7943 or email [email protected]. Emily Goldstein

Laughing is good for you. It decreases stress hormones and increases immune cells and, overall, makes you look like an enjoyable human being. Make yourself feel better with a few laughs by heading to Verizon Theatre, 1001 Performance Place in Grand Prairie, for The Funnier Than A Mutha Tour at 7:30 p.m. July 14. The show includes comedians Bill Bellamy, Dominique, Huggy Lowdown and Guy Torry. Tickets start at $35 at axs.com. Paige Skinner

Sunday

As one of Dallas longest-running music festivals, Basically Beethoven Fest has been showcasing North Texas' best classical talents, both amateur professional, for nearly 30 years. Each Basically Beethoven event — Sundays in July at Moody Performance Hall, 2520 Flora St. — includes both a rising star recital with a young local artist and a feature performance starring a professional musician from one of our city’s finest orchestras. True to its mission, Basically Beethoven remains an inclusive festival open to the public, with each show free and accessible via public transportation. This is a family friendly event. The earlier you arrive, the better your seats. Sunday’s event focuses on piano and percussion performance and covers the music of Rachmaninoff and Bartòk. Rising star recitals start at 2:30 p.m., and feature performances follow at 3 p.m; doors open at 2 p.m. Find more information at fineartschamberplayers.org. Jonathan Patrick

Here's a fun stat: In their quarterfinal World Cup match, England and Sweden combined had five attempted goals that were "on target," meaning they we're headed for the net and either went in or were blocked. That's five from two teams in about 90 minutes, or one potentially scoring shot every 18 minutes or so. Many exciting, interesting things surely happened during those 18-minute bits, but we can't tell you what they are because we don't know. Academy Award-level dramatic falling down, probably, or something pretty thrilling, anyhow, since so many people love this game so much. Perhaps you're one of them. (Welcome to America, friend! Or, if you're a native, enjoy your soccer until real football starts!) In any case, head to the Box Garden at Legacy Hall, 7800 Windrose Ave. in Plano, for the official North Dallas World Cup Watch Party Finale at 10 a.m. Sunday. The party includes FIFA PlayStation gaming, the FC Drumline, appearances by FC Dallas players and more. Admission is free. Patrick Williams