Things to do in L.A. this weekend

The food truck and live music-filled outdoor movie screening series returns for the season with a kickoff screening of Barbie at the Autry.

Carb lovers, rejoice: this two-day festival dedicated to all things pizza is returning to L.A. Live. Sample over 40 different vendors, watch live dough demos and hear from pizza experts like Danny Boy’s Daniel Holzman and food writer and pizza maker Karen Palmer. More than a handful of Time Out’s favorite pizzerias in town: Pizzana, Schellz Pizza Co., Apollonia’s, La Sorted’s and Ozzy’s Apizza. Newcomers this year include Pizzeria Sei and Triple Beam. 

Walk, run, skate, bike and explore car-free stretches of South Pasadena, Alhambra and San Gabriel during the latest edition of this open streets event series. The Metro-presented 626 Golden Streets clears cars off the road in different parts of the San Gabriel Valley for one day only. On Sunday, April 28 you’ll be able to set foot on five miles of streets sans cars, from Mission Street in South Pasadena, down Marengo Avenue and along Alhambra Road, Main Street and Las Tunas Drive toward Mission Drive in San Gabriel (hence the “Mission-to-Mission” name of this particular event).

Former HiFi space Gabba Gallery ushers in its new DTLA home with this retrospective of counterculture illustrator EMEK, famous for his posters for the likes of Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age, Nine Inch Nails and Neil Young, as well as the annual Coachella poster.

In case “uncensored” wasn’t enough warning, make sure you leave the kids at home for this one. Part puppet show, part improv show, “Puppet Up! Uncensored” combines top puppeteering talent with music, jokes and shenanigans. It’s not just about watching the puppets either—you’ll be mesmerized by the sheer skill of the puppeteers on full display, who are coming up with songs on the fly while manipulating puppets on stage. If you’re a Jim Henson buff, this show is not to be missed: it’s put on by Henson Alternative (the official adults-only arm of The Jim Henson Company), and you’ll see recreations of Henson classics with a twist.

The show will host a string of special performances on the historic Jim Henson Company Lot in Hollywood, formerly Charlie Chaplin’s studio.

Named for the Canadian electro-tech jacker’s cat (how sweet!), the rodentia-head-sporting deadmau5 (Joel Thomas Zimmerman) brings his mind-melting array of flashing lights and sonic boom to the Hollywood Bowl for “retro5pective,” a show to celebrate two decades of his music. You might want to pack your sunglasses.

Men’s beachwear brand Chubbies is setting up a giant inflatable waterslide on the Santa Monica Pier on April 27, and if you’re among the first to brave it you’ll walk away with a free pair of swim trunks. Other activities include live music, free food and beverages and carnival games.

Learn about traditional pottery and pepper planting, catch DJ sets and fill up on tamales during this free, family-friendly Cinco de Mayo celebration at LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes.

The most appropriately named shoegaze band of the early ’90s heads back to L.A. for more nostalgic dreamweaving. Neil Halstead and Rachel Goswell float their opium vocals over sun-on-lake guitar shimmer, including on tracks from their seminal album, Souvlaki.

Feeling like you and your four-legged friend are attached at the hip right now? Spend even more quality time together during this dog-friendly series at Palos Verdes’ South Coast Botanic Garden. Every third Sunday, you can roam the gardens’ 87 acres with your fur baby. You—the human—will need a reservation, while your best friend—the pup—will need to remain on their leash at all times, including in the parking lot.

Dedicate three hours of your Saturday to promoting AIDS awareness in the most amusing way possible. Peanuts and Cracker Jack don't hold a candle to watching burly men in pink wigs play ball for a cause. Even the least sporty of spectactors will get a kick out of the third annual Drag Queen World Series; your $10 advanced admission ($15 at the door) earns you an afternoon of watching cross-dressed divas honor America's favorite pastime while supporting HIV/AIDS support organization, the Life Group LA. Snag tickets for you and your most fun-loving friends, and head to the Glendale Sports Complex (2200 Fern Ln).

Home studio Two Faced Ceramics is setting up poolside at DTLA’s Hotel Figueroa for this series of classes. Each $75 class includes all of the equipment and materials you need, plus mimosas and a hotel tote bag. The made-for-beginners classes cover a different theme each time, including handle-less tea mugs, celestial catchall dishes and a succulent holder.

Strap on your cowboy hat and make the pilgrimage to country music’s biggest jamboree, taking up residence at Coachella’s digs, the Empire Polo Club. Stagecoach is coming back for a three-day fest; expect the usual mix of contemporary and classic country.

Eric Church, Miranda Lambert and Morgan Wallen headline the 2024 edition, with additional sets from Jelly Roll, Elle King, Post Malone, Willie Nelson and more.

An unaffiliated, detail-oriented homage to Glasgow’s train wreck of an unauthorized “immersive” Willy Wonka event, this L.A. version is taking the original’s most memorably miserable ingredients, but with the addition of a for-charity assembly of “full weirdo experiential” performers pulled from L.A.’s alternative arts, music and nightlife scenes. You’ll find it at 2346 Porter Street  on the edge of DTLA. Admission is $44 and benefits the National Alliance on Mental Illness. You can find out all about it in our interview with the event’s mysterious organizers.

No, the Academy Museum isn’t staying open past midnight—but it is celebrating films that have typically screened then. To complement the museum’s John Waters exhibition and Pink Flamingos’ place as a late-night mainstay, it’ll be screening some cult favorites this April and May, including Eraserhead, Up in Smoke, Donnie Darko and The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Watch a slate of classics from the past couple of decades on one of the prettiest rooftops—now called Anita’s Oasis—in Hollywood at this outdoor screenings series. All movies are piped in over sets of provided wireless headphones. Before showtime, make sure to hit up the bar or the on-site kitchen.

The hour stands before another springtime, and the Renaissance Pleasure Faire is nigh. Good mistresses and masters, prepareth thy schedules and costumes for the return of the oldest Ren Faire in the country, a spectacle that cov’reth 20 Irwindale acres with Elizabethan libations and amusement: fully armored joust tournaments and tea parties with the Queen along with beguiling stage acts, rides, games, delicious edibles and ales abound. The fesitivies will transpire each weekend at the Santa Fe Dam Recreational Area; procureth day or season passes in advance by visiting ye olde online box office. And no, we can’t stop talking like this.

When is the Renaissance Pleasure Faire near Los Angeles?

The event takes place Saturdays and Sundays (10am–7pm) from April 6 to May 19, 2024 at the Santa Fe Dam Recreation Area in Irwindale.

How much are tickets?

Tickets cost $42 for adults, $37 for seniors (62+) and those with military IDs, $21 for kids ages 5 to 15 and free for kids 4 and under. A season pass costs $225. Parking is $12, with a VIP option available for $25.

This biomusical about Ziegfeld Follies comedian Fanny Brice had never been revived on Broadway since its original 1964 production, which helped propel Barbra Streisand to megastardom. Beanie Feldstein stepped into an ill-received production in 2022, though replacement Lea Michele significantly turned things around. For this touring production, newcomer Katerina McCrimmon has stepped into the role.

Nature lovers rejoice! Spend a day at the Natural History Museum’s Butterfly Pavilion, which will open from March 17 through August 25 with up to 30 butterfly and moth species and an assortment of California plants. The seasonal outdoor exhibit allows for adults and children alike to witness nature up close—we’re talking having bufferlies take flight and land on your arms or shoulders. Prime time for these unique butterfly flight experiences are between 10 and 11am each morning.

The masters of alfresco rooftop movie viewing have returned for another season of screenings in Downtown L.A., with nearly-nightly showings this spring.

Every Sunday you can find dozens of food vendors at this market at ROW DTLA, with a mix of much-loved pop-ups and future foodie stars. Look out for this year’s new vendors, including Basket Taco Co, Battambong Barbecue and Taste of the Pacific.

For one summer in 1987, a carnival popped up in Germany with traditional rides adorned with artwork by Salvador Dalí, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring, David Hockney, Sonia Delaunay and a couple dozen others. And then… it kind of just vanished, sent off into storage for decades. But now, thanks to a couple of art world partners and Drake, Luna Luna has been revived in L.A., restored and reassembled in a soundstage in Boyle Heights.

Let the wild rumpus start at this celebration of beloved children’s author and illustrator Maurice Sendak. The Skirball Cultural Center will be displaying more than 150 sketches, storyboards and paintings from the Where the Wild Things Are creator.

This major Ed Ruscha retrospective includes his meticulous photos of L.A. streets and a reconstruction of his Chocolate Room (which, yes, is a room made out sheets upon sheets of chocolate).

Did this past year’s Basquiat exhibition in DTLA leave you wanting more? Head to Beverly Hills where Gagosian will be displaying 50 rarely loaned Jean-Michel Basquiat pieces that were created in L.A. during the iconic artist’s time spent at his Venice studio between 1982 and 1984.

You might’ve noticed Johnson’s beautifully carved and gilded redwood organ screen on recent visits to the Huntington. Now, for the first time in four decades, you can see it paired with other pieces he created for the California School for the Blind in Berkeley, California—with 41 works in total on display.

In 1993, artist Charles Gaines mounted “ The Theater of Refusal: Black Art and Mainstream Criticism,” a UC Irvine gallery show that responded to the country’s cultural and political crises with works from then-up-and-coming Black artists. Now, three decades later, Hauser & Wirth has revived the show in two parts: a small reprise of “The Theater of Refusal” with ’90s pieces from Gaines, Gary Simmons and Lorna Simpson, as well as a larger room that continues the show’s themes with recent works from Lauren Halsey, Rashid Johnson, Caroline Kent and more.

Judy Baca’s half-mile–long The Great Wall of Los Angeles, a collaborative mural painted in the ’70s along the Tujunga Wash, has received all sorts of museum love in the past few years. But LACMA has a particularly unique show to boast about: The local Chicana muralist and SPARC artists will paint two new sections of The Great Wall during museum hours. The exhibit also debuts a new section of the wall, in honor of activists known as the Freedom Riders, dubbed Generation on Fire.

See how the Hairspray and Pink Flamingos writer and director’s delightfully filthy style has redefined the possibilities of independent cinema—as well as what exactly goes into making an indie movie—during this career-spanning exhibition at the Academy Museum.

Nonprofit arts organization the Billboard Creative mounts this annual show around town which, as you probably guessed, covers about 30 billboards around L.A. with works from artists. The 10-year-anniversary edition will run from April to 30.

See works from seven contemporary artists (Eliseo Art Silva, Allison Hueman, Anthony Francisco, Maryrose Cobarrubias Mendoza, Christine Morla, Maria Villote and Junn Roca) who address issues related to Filipino culture and the Filipino-American experience during this exhibition at the Forest Lawn Museum.

See early works in assemblage, installation, happenings and conceptual artmaking at this examination of art from the decades that followed the Korean War, the first such exhibition in North America to focus on this period.

What does living in L.A. look like? It’s a wildly different picture depending on each Angeleno’s point of view, and so to celebrate that diversity of perspectives, Hollywood gallery Jeffrey Deitch will display pieces from a dozen local artists that delve into underground economies, landscapes, surveillance, backyard hangouts and public transit, among other topics.

See 1930s-to-50s concept cars plus artwork from Ed Ruscha, Andy Warhol and David Hockney at this Petersen exhibition.

The GRAMMY Museum celebrates hip-hop’s 50th anniversary with interactive DJing, rapping and sampling stations and instantly recognizable artifacts like LL Cool J’s red Kangol bucket hat and the Notorious B.I.G.’s red leather pea coat.

Alex Garland’s brutal, dystopian vision of America at war with itself is visceral but vague.

Eschewing gimmicky callbacks, this horror prequel is thoughtful and engaging—but still unsettling.

Dev Patel conceives, directs, produces, punches, stabs and brawls his way through this brash and frequently brilliant action flick.

It’s not clever, but it is big.

Sydney Sweeney’s blood-splashed nunsploitation horror falls just short of divine.