Things to do on a Sunday in New York

If you’ve ever been told you look exactly like a deadpan comedian or a disgraced Theranos CEO, your moment has arrived. A week after documentary You Can See Everything finally hit theaters, NYC will find out who looks most like two of the internet’s favorite subjects for awkward fascination: Nathan Fielder and Elizabeth Holmes. A dual look-alike contest is taking over Washington Square Park this Sunday, October 25, at 1pm.

Organizers are also planning a ticketed afterparty at The Alligator in Williamsburg, a bar with a particularly appropriate connection to Fielder: an early episode of his HBO series The Rehearsal was filmed there.

Participation is free, just RSVP if you plan on taking part.

Giant monarch butterflies are taking over the New York Botanical Garden for two afternoons on October 24 and 25, as part of its Día de los Muertos celebration. From 11am to 3pm, larger-than-life monarch puppets created by internationally renowned artists Lucrecia Novoa and Mascara Viva will roam the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, bringing the iconic insects to life through masks, costumes, storytelling and dance. The colorful procession celebrates the monarch’s remarkable migration between Mexico and the United States while connecting the butterfly’s annual journey with Día de los Muertos traditions. The monarch puppet parade is included with an All-Garden Pass.

Get a rare glimpse inside a quintessential Brooklyn Heights 1839 Greek Revival townhouse, just steps from the world-famous Brooklyn Heights Promenade. The townhouse (1 Monroe Pl.) features a grand double parlor with soaring 13-foot ceilings and preserved period details, a spacious full-floor primary bedroom suite and five beautifully landscaped outdoor spaces. A fifth floor features floating stairs to the roof deck with both city and water views. Marvel at each room decked out by talented interior designers from New York and Brooklyn.

The Brooklyn Heights Designer Showhouse is open through November 1. It's closed Monday through Wednesday, operating from 11am to 7pm Thursdays and Fridays, and 10am to 6pm Saturdays and Sundays. Tickets cost $50 per person or $450 for a group of 10. Brooklyn Heights Association members can get in for $40.

Art history gets a shake-up in Roméo Mivekannin’s first New York solo exhibition, Porteurs de feu (Bearers of Fire). At Southern Guild in Tribeca (75 Leonard St), the artist reimagines iconic works by the likes of Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Winslow Homer, inserting his own likeness into paintings on black velvet to challenge how Black histories, migration and cultural identity are represented. An expansive portrait installation inspired by W.E.B. Du Bois’s The Souls of Black Folk rounds out this thought-provoking show. Catch it through October 29.

Photography can do more than document a crisis—it can challenge why the world has ignored it for so long. "Through Her Lens," a project from the END Fund and African Women in Photography, brings together five African woman photographers to explore how neglected tropical diseases affect women and girls across the continent. The resulting series moves beyond medical statistics to capture the people, families and communities living with these often-treatable illnesses. Maureen Gathoni, Maheder Haileselassie, Temiloluwa Johnson, Amarachi Nnoli and Jodi Windvogel have each spent time in the communities they photographed, contributing to the project. Their work addresses conditions including trachoma, intestinal parasites, schistosomiasis and lymphatic filariasis. The photographs explore everything from the stigma surrounding illness to barriers to clean water and healthcare, centering the dignity and resilience of those affected rather than reducing them to patients. Explore the outdoor exhibition at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza through December 3.

It may be third in the Olympics, but bronze is No. 1 at The Frick Collection. "Siena: The Art of Bronze, 1450–1500" brings together roughly 40 works exploring how Sienese sculptors turned the metal into objects of extraordinary beauty and technical sophistication. The exhibition features masters including Donatello, Vecchietta and Francesco di Giorgio, with many works that are rarely seen outside of Tuscany. Beyond the artistry, the show examines the technical hurdles and political complications that shaped bronze production in 15th-century Siena, revealing the ingenuity behind these intricate creations. It’s a chance to see Renaissance sculpture through a fresh lens and appreciate just how much craftsmanship goes into making something look effortless.

Tickets for The Frick Collection run between $17 (student) and $30 (adult) depending on the ticket you qualify for.

Some films are important regardless of their cinematic quality. They have an urgency and a relevance that go beyond aesthetic consideration. This new film from Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, two of the filmmakers behind Palestinian-Israeli Oscar-winner No Other Land, is one of those. And it’s one of the year’s best.

The film consists of the testimony of 24 anonymous ex-members of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). The interviews take place in the dark on rooftops in Tel Aviv, overlooking apartment buildings and streets where the night-time traffic passes. Abraham questions his subjects and listens to what they have to say—they are anonymous shapes in the dark with quiet reasonable voices. 

NAZA puts together a restrained, intelligent, articulate, precise and utterly damning case against Israel’s actions in Gaza and their ongoing actions throughout the region. As a work of cinema, it is exemplary. As a work of journalism, it is inarguable.

Read more of John Bleasdale's review here.

In cinemas worldwide October 15.

Fall means a lot of things, but one of the most universal—in the U.S. anyway—is football. Long ago, New York City was blessed with not one, but two NFL teams: the Jets and the Giants. Unfortunately, the Jets were not blessed with the ability to win (we're still holding onto Super Bowl III), and while the Giants do have four championships under their belt, 2012 was a long time ago in sports years. Still, heading to MetLife Stadium on a Sunday in the fall is a bucket-list experience you'll want to check off—and it's one you may get to have for a lower price than exprected, thanks to those records and the fact that the North East stadium doesn't have a roof (bring a poncho if it's going to rain and a heavy blanket if it's below 35 degrees). If you don't care as much about seeing a good game, and a good time is all you're after, grab some friends and tailgate gear and join the most optimistic pessimists you've ever seen—we're actually a lot of fun.

(Written by a lifelong Jets fan.)

Check the game schedules for the Jets here, and the Giants here.

New Yorkers spend plenty of time trying to avoid the city’s smells. An upcoming East Village exhibition would like you to lean in—although, mercifully, its scratch-and-sniff offerings include Christmas trees and fortune cookie factories. 

Opening October 8 at City Lore Gallery, Sense & the City: Exploring New York City Through the Five Senses turns writer Caitlin Van Dusen’s urban adventures into a multisensory tour of the five boroughs. Nearly 200 places appear through photographs and excerpts from her namesake City Lore blog, along with interactive features that invite visitors to sniff, touch and listen their way around town.

The scent strips capture everything from sidewalk Christmas tree stands to a Bronx pickle factory. A “tactile rail” offers objects to handle, including dirt from Aqueduct Racetrack. For the soundtrack, there’s Surround Sounds Piano_QNS—each key plays a sound collected in Queens.

Part of City Lore’s 40th-anniversary programming, the show runs through January 18, 2027, at 56 East 1st Street. Regular gallery hours are Saturdays and Sundays, from noon to 6pm.

Director Alex Gibney’s Musk is about Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest man. Some viewers will be impressed with the scope and scale of this riveting documentary which flies by despite running at almost four hours—235 minutes including a 10-minute intermission—and gives plenty of insight into who he really is. Gibney brings detailed analysis of Musk’s relationship with Trump and how he turned Twitter into X, along with a concerning final section about his foray into AI.

Musk refused to participate in the documentary, so his words are culled from existing quotes and spoken by an AI avatar, though there’s also a huge amount of archive footage of him being interviewed, overseeing rocket-building at Space X, unveiling new Tesla models and so forth. Many key people in his life are interviewed on camera, including father Errol and mother Maye, ex-wife Justine Musk, ex-girlfriend Ashley St Clair, alongside former employees and journalists who’ve covered his work on the tech beat.

Read the rest of Lou Thomas's review here.

In US theaters from October 9.