1. Australian singer-songwriter Courtney Barnett is a frequent visitor to Chicago. She plays a gig under the Tiffany dome at the Chicago Cultural Center’s Preston Bradley Hall tonight; the 8:30pm show is sold out, but if you can’t find tickets on the resale market, don’t stress—she’ll be back in July to play Pitchfork.
2. The Chicago Humanities Festival hosts a pair of cookbook talks tonight at the Chicago Athletic Association. From 6 to 7pm, Chicago restaurateur Stephanie Izard will dish on her new cookbook, Gather and Graze, with Check, Please! host Catherine De Orio. Then at 8pm, food writer Mark Bittman, author of many cookbooks under the How to Cook Everything umbrella, will talk about his latest, How to Grill Everything, with Chicago encased-meats icon Doug Sohn. Tickets are $15 for each event.
3. A Somali airport shuttle driver in Minneapolis agrees to drive a white teenager to Chicago in Damascus, a new play opening tonight at Strawdog Theatre Company. The world premiere by local playwright Bennett Fisher is described as “a claustrophobic thriller about privilege, paranoia, and the assumptions we make about one another.” Tonight’s performance is at 8pm and the show continues through June 23; tickets are $35–$40.
For more events, check in with Time Out throughout the day.