Our expert critics supply a guide to film, dance, visual art, theater, author readings, and music. More offerings will be added as they come in.

Film

Return to Reason
June 2 and 3
Brattle Theatre in Cambridge

Restored on the occasion of its 100th anniversary, this is Man Ray’s first foray into filmmaking. Wildly improvisational and unapologetically fragmentary, Return to Reason finds the artist “exploding and reconstructing the cinematic medium as a vehicle for accessing the abstract essence of things by way of the rhythmic accumulation of visual details glimpsed in part, never in their wholeness” (Lincoln Center).

Opponent
June 3 at 7:30 p.m.
West Newton Cinema, 1296 Washington St., West Newton

From Belmont World Film, a screening of Sweden’s submission for the Best International Feature Film Oscar. The plot: mild-mannered Olympic wrestler Iman (Payman Maadi) enjoys a quiet life in Iran with his wife Maryam (Marall Nasiri) and their daughters Asal (Nicole Mehrbod) and Sahar (Diana Farzami). After he is outed as a homosexual by one of his close friends, he is forced to flee his home because the accusation could lead to a death sentence. He escapes to Scandinavia to start afresh, reluctantly turning his back on the sport. However, when Iman finds that he can’t be given asylum without having established a steady career, he returns to the ring to compete for the Swedish national team.

New Queer Cinema
June 4-30
Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brookline

In 1992, critic B. Ruby Rich wrote a fine essay on the work of then contemporary mainstream filmmakers grappling with LGBTQ themes. Here is a valuable opportunity to see a sampling of these films, ranging from the best to the lesser known. All titles are linked to their description on the Coolidge site.

Poison, June 4: A trailblazing landmark of queer cinema from director Todd Haynes.

My Own Private Idaho, June 9: Gus Van Sant’s loose reworking of Shakespeare’s Henry IV is a deeply moving look at unrequited love and life on society’s margins.

Young Soul Rebels, June 11: British youth culture during the late ’70s — the debut feature film of director Isaac Julien.

Edward II, June 18: Derek Jarman’s postmodern take on Christopher Marlowe’s homoerotic Elizabethan drama.

Nowhere, July 25: An American black comedy drama written and directed by Gregg Araki. Described by Araki as Beverly Hills 90210 on acid.

Go Fish, July 30: Rose Troche’s warmhearted romantic comedy about the quest for Ms. Right!

The People’s Joker
June 7 – 9
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge

This revolutionary DIY parody film and hilarious reimagining of the classic autobiographical coming-of-age story follows an unconfident, closeted trans girl as she moves to Gotham City to make it big as a comedian by joining the cast of UCB Live — a government-sanctioned late night sketch show in a world where comedy has been outlawed. Arts Fuse review

Road to Boston
June 8 at 2:30 p.m.
Museum of Fine Arts Boston

A historical drama based on the life story of Korean athlete Son Kee-chung, the marathon gold medalist at the 1936 Berlin Olympics who was  forced to represent Japan in competition. Because he covered the flag on his uniform, his career is cut short as punishment. Years later, the athlete reluctantly agreed to train the Korean running team for the 1950 Boston International Marathon, the first international marathon since World War II. Part of the Hallyu Hits: Korean Film Series.

The Humbler – Danny Gatton
June 12 at 7:30
Regent Theatre, Arlington

Regent’s Midweek Music Movies presents this documentary about guitarist Danny Gatton, master of blues, jazz, rock, country, bluegrass, and rockabilly. He was so good other guitarists called him “The Humbler.” Director Virginia Quesada will be in-house for a live panel discussion after the screening.

26th Annual Provincetown Film Festival
June 12-16

Five days of film will showcase over 80 American and international independent narrative, documentary, and animated features and shorts. Along with all that, there will be panel discussions and special events. This year’s awards: Andrew Haigh (All of Us Strangers) is Filmmaker on the Edge; Colman Domingo (If Beale Street Could Talk, Lincoln, The Butler, and Selma) is being handed Excellence in Acting, and Joel Kim Booster (Loot and Fire Island) is getting the Next Wave Award. Full Schedule of Films

Noir City Boston
June 14 – June 17
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge

A rare collection of noir films will be screened, with Foster Hirsch, author of 16 books on subjects related to theater and film, on hand to introduce them. All titles below are linked to descriptions on the Brattle Theatre site.

June 14

Street of Chance at 5 p.m.

Never Open That Door at 7 p.m.

June 15

Across the Bridge at 12 p.m.

Zero Focus at 2:30 p.m.

Black Tuesday at 5 p.m.

Hardly a Criminal at 7 p.m.

June 16

Union Station at 12 p.m.

Cairo Station at 2 p.m.

Smog at 4 p.m.

City of Fear at 7 p.m. in a 35 mm restoration

June 17

Elevator to the Gallows at 5 and 7 p.m.

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Pick of the Week

The Last Stop in Yuma County
Streaming on Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Fandango Plus

This debut “sleeper” by writer/director Francis Galluppi had few theatrical screenings. The action takes place at an Arizona truck stop and diner where a skittish looking traveling knife salesman stops to fill his tank. Told that the gas truck delivery is delayed — and that the next station is 400 miles down the road — he goes for a bite at the diner next door, which has one waitress and a broken air conditioner. He will soon be joined by a mismatched group of travelers including two bank robbers, an elderly couple, a wannabe Bonnie and Clyde couple, and an occasional clueless sheriff’s deputy. The set of this lovely ’50s diner is bathed in warm pastel desert light. Predictable plot elements are buoyed by lively performances from Faizon Love (Prince of Detroit), Jim Cummings (director/actor Thunder Road), Jocelin Donahue (House of the Devil), Richard Brake (The Devil’s Rejects) and Gene Jones (No Country for Old Men). Shot in the style of Quentin Tarantino, the film is a satisfying blend of Sartre’s No Exit and Erich von Stroheim’s Greed (with a touch of Archie Mayo’s The Petrified Forest).

— Tim Jackson

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Classical Music

BachFest in Boston
Presented by Emmanuel Music
June 5, 5 p.m.
Emmanuel Church, Boston

Emmanuel Music is headed to Leipzig. Before they depart, though, the group offers a concert of four Bach cantatas — Was frag ich nach der Welt; Nimm von uns, Herr, du treuer Gott; Herr Jesu Christ, du höchste Gut; and Lobe den Herren, den mächtigen König der Ehren — alongside motets by Marti Epstein, John Harbison, Elena Ruehr, and Erollyn Wallen that were commissioned as contemporary “responses” to the older works.

Garrick Ohlsson in recital
Presented by Rockport Music
June 7, 7:30 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, MA

Pianist Ohlsson opens Rockport Music’s Chamber Music Festival with an evening of favorites by Beethoven, Schubert, and Chopin.

Strings of Light
Presented by Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra
June 9, 3 p.m.
Second Church, West Newton

Pro Arte wraps its season with a survey of music for strings by Vivaldi, Peteris Vasks, Reena Esmail, and Beethoven. Adrian Slywotzky conducts.

Third Coast Percussion & Blake Pouliot
Presented by Rockport Music
June 13, 7:30 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, MA

Third Coast and violinist Pouliot join forces for a program of works by Tigran Hamasyan, Philip Glass, and Jessie Montgomery. Also on tap is a rare performance of Lou Harrison’s Violin Concerto.

Christina & Michelle Naughton
Presented by Rockport Music
June 14, 7:30 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, MA

The celebrated sister act returns to Rockport with a concert of duos by Mozart, Ravel, Albeniz, Debussy, and Rachmaninoff in tow.

A Juneteenth Celebration
Presented by Boston Landmarks Orchestra
June 15, 4 p.m.
The Salvation Army Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Center, Boston

Landmarks Orchestra marks Juneteenth with a concert that celebrates some of the orchestral contributions of Black composers to the symphonic repertoire. Christopher Wilkins conducts the performance, which is presented in partnership with Castle of Our Skins.

— Jonathan Blumhofer

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World Music and Roots

Niki + Donna: Songs & Stories
June 5
City Winery, Boston

During Madonna’s creative and commercial peak, background singers Donna De Lory and Niki Haris were a constant presence in the Material Girl’s videos and concerts. It’s no surprise that they’ve both kept busy since then, singing with everyone from Selena to Leonard Cohen to Prince and releasing their own albums, whose material ranges from New Age to jazz. (Such talent and versatility might be hereditary: De Lory is the daughter of Wrecking Crew session player Al De Lory, and Haris’s dad Gene Harris was a famed soul jazz pianist.) Now they’re reuniting for a Pride Month show that looks back on the stories and songs generated by their 15 years with Madonna.

Carlton Livingston with Dub Apocalypse
June 6, 6:30 p.m. Medusa Brewery, Hudson
June 7, 10 p.m., Slade’s, Boston

Reggae trends come and go, but some songs never go out of fashion. One of these is Carlton Livingston’s early ’80s ganja-smuggling anthem “100 Weight of Collie Weed,” an early example of a reggae classic that was spawned in Brooklyn, not Kingston or London. Always a top-tier live performer, Livingston will be expertly backed by Boston’s Dub Apocalypse for an encore run of a Reggae Takeova–presented tour they did earlier this year.

Invincible Casuals and The Buttercups
June 7
Midway Cafe, Jamaica Plain

For decades beloved Massachusetts rocker Chandler Travis and drummer Rickie Bates were part of the Incredible Casuals, the roots rockin’ house band at the Beachcomber in Wellfleet. Now those two, plus Casuals associate Steve “Woo Woo” Wood, have put together the Invincible Casuals for what Travis reports will be the first Casuals gig in Boston in a decade. Opening is The Buttercups, the noise duo of Travis and Bates. It all goes down at what Chandler quips is “Boston’s most romantic bar.”

Tony Trischka’s Earl Jam
June 8
Club Passim

For the past few years banjo pioneer Tony Trischka has been touring a show dedicated to the musician who started it all, as far as bluegrass banjo is concerned: Earl Scruggs. Now the project has become an album (Earl Jam) released by Down the Road, the label recently launched by the three founders of Rounder Records. After his days with Bill Monroe and Flatt & Scruggs, the tribute’s subject founded the progressive Earl Scruggs Revue, so it makes sense that Earl Jam features everything from old-time music to the Beatles. Guests like Del McCoury and Billy Strings are part of the homage.

Seun Kuti and Egypt 80 with the A-Beez
June 11
Soundcheck Studio, Pembroke

The son of the Afrobeat king Fela Kuti, Seun Kuti has inherited both his dad’s Egypt 80 band name and his ability to produce earth-shattering, booty-shaking Afro-Funk marathons. South Shore denizens are sure lucky that Kuti’s only local date on his summer tour will take place in their backyard.

Bettye LaVette
June 13
Spire Center for Performing Arts, Plymouth

No ’60s soul singer has had the enduring renaissance that Bettye LaVette has enjoyed over the past two decades. Perhaps the last of the true song stylists, she’s been able to make all kinds of songs her own. Last year she released the Steve Jordan-produced LaVette!, a collection of material penned by the underrated Southern songwriter Randall Bramblett. After years of working with musicians from her native Detroit, she recently started touring with a Boston-based band led by drummer Marco Giovino. The group also includes guitarist Bobby Keyes, keyboardist Tom West, and bassist Marc Hickox.

Caio e Jess
June 13
Eustis Estate, Milton

The jazz/indie pop duo of American vocalist Jessica Curran and Brazilian guitarist Caio Afiune has been gigging steadily as they fundraise for their upcoming debut album. Their dreamy sound will be the soundtrack to this sunset affair produced by Mandorla Music.

Cambridge Arts River Festival
June 15

The Cambridge River Fest hasn’t been tossed since 2019, so this is a most welcome comeback for this free affair. As in the past, folk and jazz stages will curated by Club Passim and the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center (the latter headlined by a homecoming for Harvard grad saxophonist Don Braden, who’ll be joined by singer Vanessa Rubin). And there are two new additions. One is a stage that pays tribute to the late great Western Front reggae club; performances there will include the Soca Fusion dance company and the mighty Naya Rockers band. The other is a stage programmed by Global Arts Live. They’ve booked a trio of Boston groups — Albino Mbie, Kotoko Brass, and the Veronica Robles Female Mariachi Band — and, from Guinea via Harlem, there’ll be the versatile Natu Camara, who has been turning a lot of heads in the Afropop world lately.

Make Them Hear You Benefit Concert with PJ Morton and Issac Delgado 
June 15
Berklee Performance Center

Roxbury’s Hamilton-Garrett Center for Music and Arts provides Boston youth with invaluable arts educational opportunities. The program is a pipeline to both Boston Arts Academy and Berklee — rising saxophonist and recent ArtsFuse profile subject Gregory Groover Jr. being just one of its alumni. For the organization’s benefit concert they’re bringing in some big guns: Pop/R&B star PJ Morton, and one of the all-time greats of modern Cuban music, Issac Delgado. Both will perform and Delgado will be given an award.

— Noah Schaffer

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Popular Music

Joe Jackson
June 4 (doors at 7/show at 8)
The Wilbur, Boston

Joe Jackson’s upcoming Two Rounds of Racket show – featuring one solo set and another with a nine-piece band – at The Wilbur is sold-out. So if you don’t have tickets and can’t get them at a reasonable price from a second-hand vendor, then Jason Rubin’s Arts Fuse review should convince you to spend some time with Jackson’s new album, Max Champion in “What a Racket!”.

Andy Summers
June 4, Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport (show at 8)
June 5, Cary Memorial Hall, Lexington (show at 7:30)

Versatile guitarist Andy Summers had a highly artistically fruitful career prior to 1978. Between 1965 and that year, during which time he was briefly married to Boston music legend Robin Lane, Summers recorded with R&B/blues group Zoot Money’s Big Roll Band, proto-punk/art rock singer-songwriter Kevin Coyne, and experimental composer Eberhard Schoener. It was between 1978 and 1983, however, that he achieved his greatest commercial success as a member of The Police, who were ubiquitous on radio and MTV during that time. (That’s his guitar riff on Puff Daddy’s 1997 smash “I’ll Be Missing You,” and Summers continues to battle Sting over his share of songwriting credits and royalties.) Since The Police’s demise, Summers has scored films, recorded more than a dozen solo albums, and collaborated with musicians of a stylistically wide variety. His The Cracked Lens + A Missing String Tour makes stop in the Boston area on June 4 and 5.

of Montreal with Godcaster
June 5 (doors at 7/show at 8)
The Sinclair, Cambridge

The wildly unpredictable of Montreal returned in May with their 19^th studio offering, Lady On the Cusp. Shortly after its completion, founder and forever leader Kevin Barnes relocated to Vermont, where their personal and musical partner Christina Schneider had gone to high school and college. Preceding the album’s release were the funky (via the bass) and danceable “Yung Hearts Bleed Free”, the psychedelically folky “Rude Girl on Rotation”, and the Todd Rundgren-by-way-of- Carol King verses and also funked-up (via guitar) “Soporific Cell”. Overall, this is another fine entry for an endlessly imaginatively and ever-inspired artist.

Swansea Sound with Jeanines and Zowy
June 7 (show at 8)
O’Brien’s Pub, Allston

Swansea Sound comprises vocalists Hue Williams and Amelia Fletcher of The Pooh Sticks, Fletcher and guitarist/bassist Rob Pursey of Heavenly (who recently played their first stateside gigs in 29 years in Brooklyn), Talulah Gosh, The Catenary Wires, and Tender Trap, and the guitar/drums combo of the well-résuméd Bob Collins and Ian Button. Together, they constitute a supernova supergroup of K Records, Sarah Records, twee pop, and C-86 movement all-stars of the late-’80 and early ‘90s. Their 2023 release Twentieth Century – with highlights such as “Paradise”, “Seven in the Car”, “Click It and Pay”, “Far Far Away”,  will delight old fans and new, and if you couldn’t make it to Brooklyn, then Allston will serve as the next best thing, especially when the band has its jangly 21^st century kindred spirits Jeanines opening. (The inclusion of Providence’s Zowy certainly doesn’t hurt.)

English Teacher
June 12 (doors at 7)
Sonia, Cambridge

“Despite appearances, I haven’t got the voice for R&B,” sings Lily Fontaine of English Teacher on one of her band’s recent singles. This claim is not, however, an act of false modesty. Even if this particular genre is not her forte, the 13 entries on their debut LP, This Could Be Texas, demonstrate that the unflappable but unpretentious vocalist and synth player’s voice is perfectly suited for her Leeds, UK quartet’s spirited take on contemporary post-punk in the broadest and most inclusive senses of the term. Whether pensive, eerie, urgent, or straightforward, Fontaine is 100% up to the task. But she couldn’t do it without her bandmates, who contribute all of the sprinkles, textures, and soundscapes necessary to make This Could Be Texas one of the most interesting, rewarding, and diverse releases of 2024. My bet is that their June 12 show at Sonia will have attendees bragging about having been there as English Teacher’s stature inevitably blossoms.

The Umbrellas with Mall Cops
June 15 (doors at 9/show at 9:30)
4th Wall (Capitol Theatre), Arlington

It took only a few spins for The Umbrellas’ 2021 debut to secure its place among my favorite albums of that year. In my Short Fuses review, I described it as a “delectable concoction” that achieved “an ideal ratio of delicacy and vigor.” Needless to say, it left me hungry for more, and the result of the three-year wait has transported me from starving to satiated. To call Fairweather Friend “more of the same” would be high praise indeed, and many – probably most – of these new songs reinforce what made its predecessor so immediate and irresistible. The trading of disheartened and jaunty tones, the sharing and exchange of male and female vocals, and the mix of indie rock and jangle pop à la K Records, Sarah Records, and C-86 amount to a second consecutive deluge of expert songwriting (the lyrics to which should not go unmentioned) that will indubitably be savored by the type of fans who were at the Swansea Sound show the week before The Umbrellas’ visit to Arlington as part of their first headlining tour. (The one disappointing thing that expect from both is that neither band will be able to perform their entire catalogs.)

— Blake Maddux

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Theater

COVID PROTOCOLS: Check with specific theaters.

Toni Stone, written and directed by Lydia R. Diamond. At the Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave, Boston, through June 16.

A drama inspired by the book Curveball: The Remarkable Story of Toni Stone. According to Huntington Theatre publicity, the play “follows the experiences of Toni Stone, an ace ballplayer who knows her stats and has a great arm. Rejected by the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League because of her race, she becomes the first woman to play professional baseball on a man’s team in the Negro Leagues, shattering expectations and creating her own set of rules.” Arts Fuse interview with Lydia Diamond. Arts Fuse review

Next to Normal Book and lyrics by Brian Yorkey, music by Tom Kitt. Directed and choreographed by Pascale Florestal. Staged by Central Square Theater and the Front Porch Arts Collective at the Central Square Theatre, 450 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, through June 30.

This Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award–winning musical “tells the story of an American family affected by mental illness. The musical was groundbreaking in its portrayal of the day-to-day realities of bipolar disorder, its sometimes harsh treatments and medications, and its gnawing impact on family relationships. An energetic pop-rock score punctuates the rollercoaster of emotions that the characters experience. In telling the story from the perspective of a Black upper-middle-class family, the production brings audiences to an intersection of mental health, race, gender and class…. The First New England production to feature a Black family.”

The Plastic Bag Store Created, written, designed, and directed by Robin Frohardt. Music by Freddi Price. Produced by Pomegranate Arts. Presented by Mass MoCA and Williamstown Theatre Festival at Mass MoCA, North Adams, MA, through September 2.

Billed by Mass MoCA as “an immersive, multimedia experience by Brooklyn-based artist Robin Frohardt that uses humor, craft, and a critical lens to question our culture of consumption and convenience — specifically, the enduring effects of single-use plastics. The shelves are stocked with thousands of original, hand-sculpted items — produce and meat, dry goods and toiletries, cakes and sushi rolls — all made from discarded, single-use plastics in an endless cacophony of packaging.”

Yellow Face by David Henry Hwang. Directed by Ted Hewlett. Staged by the Lyric Stage at 140 Clarendon Street, Boston, through June 23.

According to the Lyric Stage publicity, in this drama an “engrossing and surprisingly humorous look at race and assimilation questions how well-intentioned motives can lead to hypocrisy and misdeeds. In a scramble to make things right, an uncomfortable situation gets even more tangled and fractured leaving many newfound realizations along the way. ”

Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike by Christopher Durang. Directed by Rebecca Bradshaw. Staged by Gloucester Stage, 267 East Main Street, Gloucester, through June 23.

Here is what I said about Durang’s Tony award–winning comedy in my review of the 2013 Trinity Rep production: “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike is an example of a new genre, sentimental plays that purport to focus on the plight of baby boomers who are beginning to feel their age. The dramatic approach flirts with revelations of futility and regret, but then pulls back on the intimations of mortality. By turning Chekhov on his head, the playwright manages to head off real world anxieties through a convenient ‘literary’ framing device, making extra sure there are no upsets by supplying a relatively upbeat ending for characters who are — after decades of inaction or blindness — suddenly raging against the dying of the light.”

The Dybbuk by Roy Chen, based on the original play by S. Ansky. Adapted by Igor Golyak with Dr. Rachel Merrill Moss. With additional material from the translation by Joachim Neugroschel. Directed by Igor Golyak. Staged by Arlekin Players Theatre at the Vilna Shul, Boston’s Center for Jewish Culture, 18 Phillips St., Beacon Hill, Boston, through June 30.

Well, something different … this expressionistic drama in four acts by S. Ansky was inspired by Hasidic Jewish folklore. It premiered, via a Yiddish theater production, in 1920. This production stars “Andrey Burkovskiy as Khonen/The Dybbuk and Yana Gladkikh as Leah, as the tragic young lovers hovering between the worlds of the living and the beyond.” The Times of Israel sums the play up with showbiz pizazz: “A supernatural thriller, a courtroom drama, a tale of love and obsession, and an elegy for a dying culture, this Fiddler-on-the-Roof-meets-The-Exorcist has something for everyone.”

Puppet Showplace Theater: 50th Anniversary Open House at the Puppet Showplace Theater, 32 Station Street Brookline, from 10:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. on June 8

“Puppet Showplace Theater is hosting a day of public festivity to mark the start of its 50th anniversary year as a cornerstone of local and regional entertainment and education. The event will be a fun-filled celebration featuring puppet shows, live music, interactive play, crafts, and general merriment for families and individuals of all ages.” The lineup will feature The Fairy Tailor, Harry LaCoste, and The Gosh Darn Brass Band.

The day’s show, The Fairy Tailor, was created by Resident Artist Sarah Nolen with support from then-Artistic Director Roxanna Myhrum through Puppet Showplace’s Incubator program. Puppet Showplace’s investment in artists and new works has been part of the theater’s identity since its founding in 1974 by visionary educator and puppeteer Mary Churchill. Puppet Showplace’s new works umbrella currently includes the Incubator Program — which has launched 18 family-friendly puppet shows in 11 years; these have gone on to be seen by over 50,000 people in at least 6 countries and at least 18 U.S. states! — and the Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers, which has invested in 20 works by Black creatives over its 4-year history.”

Gatsby Based on the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Directed by Rachel Chavkin. Music by Florence Welch and Thomas Bartlett. Lyrics by Florence Welch. Book by Martyna Majok. Choreography by Sonya Tayeh. Staged by the American Repertory Theater at the Loeb Drama Center, through August 3.

Yet another musical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby that hopes to be the toast of Broadway. One opened in April and the show has been nominated for a Tony Award for Best Costume Design. The A.R.T.’s song-and-dance version is subtitled, for some reason, “An American Myth.”

Revolution’s Edge by Patrick Gabridge. Directed by Alexandra Smith. Staged by Plays in Place in the Old North Church & Historic Site, 193 Salem St, Boston, June 7 through August 10.

The 45-minute historical drama is back at the Old North Church for its second season. The action “is set in Boston’s oldest surviving church on April 18, 1775, the day before the Battles of Lexington & Concord and mere hours before the famous ‘two if by sea’ lantern signals … three men share a faith but have very different beliefs concerning the right path ahead for themselves, their families, and the colonies. Their conversation explores the intersection of faith and freedom on the edge of the American Revolution.”

Abe Lincoln in Illinois by Robert Sherwood. Directed by David Auburn. Movement by Isadora Wolfe. Staged by Berkshire Theatre Group at the Unicorn Theatre, 6 East Street, Stockbridge, June 13 through July 14.

Sherwood’s 1938 Pulitzer prize-winning script, based on Carl Sandburg’s 1926 biography of Lincoln before he went to Washington, DC, “weaves together fictional dialogue and Lincoln’s own words to create a poignant portrayal of a man driven by ideas, haunted by premonitions, and destined for greatness. As the play unfolds, audiences witness the pivotal moments that shaped Lincoln’s early manhood, providing a compelling glimpse into the life of a man who would go on to become an American legend.”

— Bill Marx

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Visual Arts 

In their ongoing attempts to expand beyond the old school dead white man canon, American art museums have lately rummaged through the forgotten artists of the past, sometimes highlighting faded figures of unconventional heritage that, ironically, commanded much more respect and success in their own time. One such artist is the mixed race Caribbean artist featured in the Clark Art Institute exhibition, Guillaume Lethiere, which opens in Williamstown on June 15.

Born in 1760 on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe to a white French government official and a former slave of mixed race, Lethiere came to France with his father at age 14 to study art (he later devised his own surname, based on the French for “third son”). During a long, prolific career that took place during turbulent times — the French Revolution, the Napoleonic era, the Bourbon Restoration, and the Revolution of 1830 — Lethiere flourished, with patrons in the imperial family, a large studio, a reputation as a respected teacher, dozens of students, and most of the artistic honors France could bestow, including directorship of the prestigious French Academy in Rome, professorship at the official Ecole de Beaux Arts, and election to the French Academy and the Institut de France. His work is well represented in museum collections (the Clark owns his Brutus Condemning His Sons to Death of 1788 and a number of his drawings), but he is little known outside specialists of the period.

The Clark exhibition, co-organized with the Louvre, Paris, will be a major survey, with a hundred or so paintings, drawings, and prints. Besides featuring the work of an important historic artist of color, the show seeks to shed “new light on the presence and reception of Caribbean artists” in France during the revolutionary period.

The Brazilian illustrator Roger Mello creates illustrations so brilliantly neon in color and so energetically flamboyant in composition that you wonder what texts could stand up to them. His first exhibition in the United States, Fuzuê! Invention & Imagination in the Art of Roger Mello, opens June 16 at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst. “Fuzuê,” the museum explains, “comes from a Portuguese expression that captures a uniquely Brazilian sense of playful commotion.” Inspired by his native Brazilian culture and folkways, Mello takes particular delight in his country’s rich and exuberant flora and fauna.

The Bates College Museum of Art in Lewiston, Maine, opens two graphic arts shows on June 7, featuring three classic American artists. Hartley | Hopper: Drawings from Two New England Collections blends selections from two sources: over 600 objects and archival materials from Edward Hopper and his wife, Josephine, in the Provincetown Art Association and Museum and over 400 objects and personal effects bequeathed by Marsden Hartley to Bates in 1943, long before the then very small school had a museum to put them in. Near contemporaries who shared a special affinity for Maine, the two were actually quite different as artists and had distinctly different careers (Hopper was much more successful during his lifetime).

Besides an exchange of works, the show is also a trading of New England places of sorts. Born in Lewiston, Hartley traveled widely inside and outside the US and spent a memorable summer in Provincetown before finally settling again in Maine and becoming, as he put it, a “Maine artist.” Based in his Greenwich Village studio, Hopper spent many productive working summers in Maine and other New England locations before building a summer home and studio in Truro, on the fringes of the seasonal, bohemian Provincetown art scene.

Besides the selection of drawings, many of which are studies for paintings now recognized as monuments of 20th-century American art, the show will include books and archival materials.

The Bates Museum’s Saul Steinberg: Brilliant Witty Inventive Cerebral is selected from a gift to the museum from the Saul Steinberg Foundation: 10 prints, four drawings, and one watercolor created between 1965 and 1984. Known for his contributions to the New Yorker magazine, especially the over 80 unforgettable covers he created for the publication, Steinberg’s fantastic and inventive oeuvre, the museum says, “could be described as absurd, cerebral, witty, childlike, hilarious, insightful, and a painful critique of contemporary life.”

Another graphic artist known for her amusing New Yorker contributions is the subject of a show at the Portland Museum of Art. Born Margaret Francis Bacon, Peggy Bacon grew up to be famous as a caricaturist and illustrator, whose popular drawings and prints, archly revealing documents of American society of the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s, appeared in the New Yorker, New Republic, Fortune, and Vanity Fair. Bacon also illustrated over 60 books, 19 of which she wrote herself, exhibited widely, won major awards, and had connections to virtually every important figure in American art. Later in life, she settled in Cape Porpoise, Maine, and died at 91 in nearby Kennebunk.

The Portland Museum show, Peggy Bacon: Biting, Never Bitter, opens June 14. It features some 60 prints, drawings, paintings, and pastels, along with first editions of her most famous books, The True Philosopher and Other Cat Tales and Off with Their Heads!, with a particular emphasis on very early work, made during her formative studies at New York’s Art Students League, when she and her fellow students published a satirical magazine, Bad News, which is also on view in original and facsimile copies.

The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art opens the latest installment in its long-running, distinguished contemporary art series on June 7 with Kyle Dunn/Matrix 194. Dunn’s brightly lit paintings are realistic, even trompe l’oeil, and imply narratives that are suggestive and sensual, domestic and intimate against a big city backdrop. The museum says their “spatially ambiguous settings” invite us “to question the boundaries between public and private.” The show includes a selection of very recent work along with paintings made specifically for the Wadsworth, a tradition of the series. This is the artist’s first institutional exhibition.

Michael C. Thorpe is a “conceptual” artist who makes quilts — perhaps the perfect profile for the Fuller Museum of Craft’s fairly cerebral approach to handicraft, which often blurs the boundaries between fine art and craft, decorative, and practical arts. The 15 examples in the Fuller’s Michael C. Thorpe: Homeowner Insurance illustrate, the museum says, “Thorpe’s distinct visual language known for its geometric shapes, colorful textures, and energetic stitching.” Frequently representational, Thorpe’s work often shares his friends and family, daily environment, or athletic endeavors. The show opens June 8.

Two exhibitions opening at the New Bedford Whaling Museum on June 14 explore the classic sailor art form of scrimshaw, made by carving or inscribing whales’ teeth, bones, or other leftovers from marine mammal fishing. BREACH: Logbook 24 | SCRIMSHAW is part of artist Courtney M. Leonard’s ongoing exploration of “the historical and contemporary ties between place, community, whales, and the maritime environment.” The Wider World & Scrimshaw integrates examples from the museum collection and “places it in conversation with carved decorative arts and material culture made by indigenous community members from across the Pacific and Arctic.”

— Peter Walsh

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Jazz

Felipe Salles
June 3 at 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The São Paulo–born composer, educator, and multi-instrumentalist Felipe Salles fills the Monday night big band slot at the Regattabar with his Interconnections Ensemble. The band’s name is meant to evoke a layered artistic vision, “including dualities of musical and cultural influences, as well as the juxtaposition of composition and improvisation.” The players include reed and wind players Jonathan Ball, John Mastroianni, Mike Caudill (also on electronics), Tyler Burchfield, and Melanie Howell Brooks; trumpet/flugelhorns Don Clough, Jeff Holmes, Seth Bailey, and Jerry Sabatini; trombones Clayton DeWalt, Randy Pingrey, Bob Pilkington, and Angel Subero: pianist Nando Michelin, guitarist Kevin Grudecki, vibraphonist Luke Glavanovits, bassist Keala Kaumeheiwa, and Bertram Lehmann on drums and percussion.

George Russell Jr.
June 6 at 6 p.m.
Long Live Roxbury Boston Brewery Taproom
FREE

The Boston Brewery Taproom continues its free early-evening Thursday shows, this week with George Russell Jr. (chair of Berklee’s Harmony and Jazz Composition department, no less) and his trio-mates Wesley Wirth on bass and drummer Dave Cowan. (Next week, June 13, the excellent Brazilian-born singer and songwriter Teresa Ines will lead a quartet with keyboardist Maxim Lubarsky, bassist Fernando Huergo, and drummer Mark Walker.)

The Late Risers with Farayi Malek
June 6 at 7:30 p.m.
City Winery, Boston

Any trad jazz band that’s willing to assay a syncopated lindy-hopping version of the “Game of Thrones” theme has our attention. Hey, they swing the hell out it. And of course, they dig into a lot of other material from early, pre-swing-era jazz from New Orleans to Chicago and beyond. For this gig, trumpeter and bandleader Sam Dechenne is joined by tubist Josiah Reibstein (of Charlie Kohlhase’s Explorers Club; see June 9), clarinetist Nat Seelen, and drummer David Andrew Moore, as well as talented young guest singer Farayi Malek. They’ll be playing City Winery’s smaller Haymarket Room, with free dance lessons before the show.

Aardvark Jazz Orchestra
June 6 at 8 p.m.
GBH Studios, Brighton, Mass.
Free Live Stream

The magnificent Aardvark Jazz Orchestra is celebrating the 125^th birthday of Duke Ellington (April 29) with this show from GBH’s Calderwood Studio. The program will include Aardvark’s wonderful vocalist, Grace Hughes, singing the Ellington hit “I’m Beginning to See the Light” as well as “Come Sunday,” from Ellington’s epic suite, “Black, Brown, and Beige” and pianist Tim Ray in a solo rendition of Ellington’s “New World A’ Comin.’ ” Other pieces will include Ellington and Juan Tizol’s “Caravan”; “Blues to Be There,” a Billy Strayhorn collaboration from The Newport Jazz Festival Suite; “Chinoiserie,” from The Afro-Eurasian Eclipse Suite;  and “It’s Freedom,” from the Second Sacred Concert. Also on the program will be composer and Aardvark musical director Mark Harvey’s anthem of inclusivity “No Walls,” “inspired by Ellington’s credo to move ‘beyond category’ in life as in music.” Seats for the live event at GBH’s Calderwood Studio are sold out, but you can still catch this show in the free live video stream by registering at this link.

Eliane Elias
June 7 and 8 at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston

Eliane Elias has long combined jazz piano mastery with equal authority in the samba and bossa nova vocal-music tradition of her native São Paulo. Her latest album, Time and Again, features her songwriting and singing (with Bill Frisell and Brazilian song immortal Djavan as special guests). She comes to Scullers for four shows leading a quartet with her husband and musical partner Marc Johnson on bass, Leandro Pellegrino on guitar, and Rafael Barata on drums.

TrioCast
June 9 at 5 p.m.
Eliot School, Jamaica Plain
FREE

The Eliot School of Fine & Applied Arts begins its summer program of free early-evening concerts in its outdoor (schoolyard) space with the Brazilian jazz trio TrioCast — singer Asa Runefelt, pianist Brian Friedland, and cellist Catherine Bent. Audience members are invited to hang and picnic — and hope for good weather.

Charlie Kohlhase’s Explorers Club
June 9 at 7:30 p.m.
Peabody Hall, Parish of All Saints, Dorchester

Charlie Kohlhase — an essential part of the Boston jazz ecosystem, as leader of his own bands as well as for his participation in bands like the Either/Orchestra and the Makanda Project, and for his WMBR-FM radio show “Research & Development” — hasn’t released a new album under his own name since 2019 (Impermanence, recorded in 2013). So when Jeb Bishop, a longtime member of Kohlhase’s Explorers Club, announced a few year ago that he was heading back to his hometown of Chicago, Kohlhase decided it was time to get that band down on wax (or at least on 1’s and 0’s). The result: the gorgeous new A Second Life — a reference to the second life Kohlhase has been leading since being diagnosed HIV+ in 2016. (See Michael Ullman’s Fuse review of the CD here.)

Kohlhase plays this Mandorla Music/Dot Jazz show with the Explorers Club: himself and Seth Meicht on saxophones, Dan Rosenthal on trumpet and flugelhorn, tubist Josiah Reibstein, guitarist Eric Hofbauer, bassist Tony Leva, drummer Curt Newton, and Bill Lowe as the new man in the trombone chair for Bishop.

Point01 Percent
June 11 at 7:30 p.m.
Lilypad, Cambridge, Mass.

The Point01 Percent residency continues its endlessly provocative and exciting Point01 Percent Contemporary series, in which they match a set of free improvisation with work from living composers who cross modern classical and free-improv procedures and sounds. For this edition, the first set will feature the music of Curtis Hughes (b. 1974) — “recent works for piano and for strings, including premiere performances of two short new piano solo compositions, and a sampling of older chamber music.” The players will include violinists Gabriela Diaz and Katherine Winterstein, cellist Francesca McNeeley, and pianist Sarah Bob. The second set will feature a typically diverse crew of top-notch improvisers: trumpeter Vance Provey, pianist Tatiana Castro Mejía, bassist Bruno Råberg, and drummer Eric Rosenthal.

Benny Benack III
June 14 at 7 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston

Benny Benack III has won accolades for his trumpet playing (Thelonious Monk Competition 2014 finalist) and singing (Sarah Vaughan Vocal Competition 2021 third place), as well as in both DownBeat “rising star” categories. He comes to Scullers leading a quartet with pianist Miki Yamanaka, bassist Alex Claffy, and drummer Joe Peri.

Revolutionary Snake Ensemble
June 14 at 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The Revolutionary Snake Ensemble — a “costumed funk/street beat improvisational brass band performing a unique blend of original and traditional music” — is celebrating its 35th anniversary at this show, which they will also be recording for a live album. The band’s roots are in the second-line brass-and-rhythm of New Orleans parade music, but their explorations can range far and wide. Bandleader/saxophonist Ken Field has been with this particular excellent lineup for 10 years: tenor saxophonist Tom Hall, trumpeter Jerry Sabatini, tubist/trombonist Dave Harris, bassist Blake Newman, and drummer Phil Neighbors.

— Jon Garelick

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Author Events

Virtual Event: Alice Wong – Harvard Book Store
Disability Intimacy: Essays on Love, Care, and Desire
June 3 at 6 p.m.
Free

“What is intimacy? More than sex, more than romantic love, the pieces in this stunning and illuminating new anthology offer broader and more inclusive definitions of what it can mean to be intimate with another person. Explorations of caregiving, community, access, and friendship offer us alternative ways of thinking about the connections we form with others — a vital reimagining in an era when forced physical distance is at times a necessary norm.

“But don’t worry: there’s still sex to consider — and the numerous ways sexual liberation intersects with disability justice. Plunge between these pages and you’ll also find disabled sexual discovery, disabled love stories, and disabled joy. These twenty-five stunning original pieces — plus other modern classics on the subject, all carefully curated by acclaimed activist Alice Wong — include essays, photo essays, poetry, drama, and erotica: a full spectrum of the dreams, fantasies, and deeply personal realities of a wide range of beautiful bodies and minds. Disability Intimacy will free your thinking, invigorate your spirit, and delight your desires.”

Percival Everett with Kim McLarin – brookline booksmith
James and American Fiction
June 4 at 6 p.m.
Tickets are $15.50

“In person at the Coolidge Corner Theatre, presented with Brookline Booksmith! Celebrate Percival Everett’s newest novel, James, with a discussion moderated by Kim McLarin, followed by a screening of the Oscar-nominated film American Fiction, based on Everett’s book Erasure.”

Dr. Karen Tang at the Cambridge Public Library – Harvard Book Store
It’s Not Hysteria: Everything You Need to Know About Your Reproductive Health
(but Were Never Told) 
June 4 at 6:30 p.m.
Tickets are free with RSVP or $32.9

“Dr. Karen Tang is a literal godsend to women in a time still filled with great ignorance in medical research and financing of women’s health initiatives. Please read her book, follow her on Instagram as I have, and feel blessed as I do to have an advocate for our body, our health, and our human rights.” —Sharon Stone, New York Times bestselling author of The Beauty of Living Twice

Garth Risk Hallberg at Harvard Book Store
The Second Coming
June 6 at 7 p.m.
Free

“When thirteen-year-old Jolie Aspern drops her phone onto the subway tracks in 2011, her estranged dad, Ethan, seems like the furthest thing from her mind. A convicted felon and recovering addict, Ethan has long struggled to see beyond himself. But then a call from New York makes him fear his daughter’s in deeper trouble than anyone realizes. And believing he’s the only one who can save her, he decides to return home.

So begins the journey that will, in time, push Jolie and Ethan — child and adult, apart and together, different yet the same — out past their depths. Full of yearning and revelation, The Second Coming is at once an incandescent feat of storytelling and an exploration of an enduring mystery: Can the people we love ever really change?”

Virtual Event: noam keim in conversation with Hanif Abdurraqib – brookline booksmith
The Land is Holy 
June 7 at 7 p.m.
Brookline Booksmith, Coolidge Corner

“Home has meant many different things to noam keim. Born a Queer Arab Jew in a settler family in Occupied Palestine, raised in the cobblestone streets of Mulhouse, France; a lifetime of escape across Europe, the foothills of Himalayas in Nepal, Bangkok, and then the makings of a chosen family on Occupied Lenape Land, known as Philadelphia. Through it all, the memory of one’s homes, the persistence of kin persecuted across timelines, their complicity in settler colonialism, and a dogged disavowal of inherited trauma. In this staunchly anti-zionist and abolitionist project, the author considers the wounds of diaspora ache by turning to the fierce primal inhabitants of their lineage for answers.

“The stork in cyclical rotation, the bitter shiba, the prickly sweet Sabra, the blooming Lindens form larger-than-life metaphors in these essays. Surviving through violent crises and cruel political turns of hand, they are the salve to a world that can be possible with nurture. Keim writes, ‘I want to believe that we carry, in our bodies and bones and blood, the particles of the leaves and flowers that saw our lineages past. Kin.’ And in turn they urge us to find kinship with the world that wants us alive and buoyant.”

Emily Hamilton in conversation with Nathan Tavares – Porter Square Books
The Stars Too Fondly
June 12 at 7 p.m.
Free

“In her breathtaking debut — part space odyssey, part sapphic rom-com — Emily Hamilton weaves a suspenseful, charming, and irresistibly joyous tale of fierce friendship, improbable love, and wonder as vast as the universe itself. … The Stars Too Fondly is a soaring near-future adventure about dark matter and alternate dimensions, leaving home and finding family, and the galaxy-saving power of letting yourself love and be loved.”

Desmond Hallin in conversation with Michelle Hoover – Porter Square Books
Better Must Come
June 13 at 7 p.m.
Free

“Barely Missing Everything meets American Street in this fiercely evocative, action-packed young adult thriller that looks at the darker side of light-filled Jamaica and how a tragedy and missing drug money helplessly entangle the lives of two teens who want to change their fate.”

Natalie Dykstra in conversation with Megan Marshall at Harvard Book Store
Chasing Beauty: The Life of Isabella Stewart Gardner 
June 18 at 7 p.m.
Free

“An extraordinary achievement of storytelling and scholarship, Chasing Beauty illuminates the fascinating ways the museum and its holdings can be seen as a kind of memoir, dazzling and haunting, created with objects instead of words and displayed per Isabella’s wishes in the exact placements she initially curated.”

James Parker with Carlo Rotella – brookline booksmith
Get Me Through the Next Five Minutes
June 18 at 7 p.m.
Tickets are free or $24 with in-store pickup

“From the vertiginously talented James Parker, a collection of uproarious odes that show how to find gratitude in unexpected places.Our politics are broken; our world is melting; the next catastrophe looms.

“Enter James Parker, who for years now has been writing odes of appreciation on subjects from the seemingly minor (‘Ode to Naps’) to the unexpected (‘Ode to Giving People Money’) to the seemingly minor, unexpected, and hyperspecific (‘Ode to Running in Movies’). Finally collecting Parker’s beloved and much-lauded odes in one place, Get Me Through the Next Five Minutes demonstrates the profound power of the form. Each ode is an exercise in gratitude. Each celebrates the permanent susceptibility of everyday humdrum life to dazzling saturations of divine light: the squirrel in the street, the crying baby, the misplaced cup of tea.

“Parker’s odes are songs of praise, but with a decent amount of complaining in there, too: a human ratio of moans. Varied in length but unified in tone, mostly in prose, sometimes toppling into verse, the odes range across music, movies, literature, psychology, and beyond, all through the lens of Parker’s personal history. Gathered together, they form an accidental how-to guide to honoring your own experience — and to finding your own odes.”

— Matt Hanson