Pre Covid-19 we searched the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you didn’t have to.” We made it as easy as 1-2-3.
Covid-19 has required some changes for the time being. Stay Safe.
For November we are going to try a different format – “Top 10 Corona Culture” – updated info and video especially suited to these difficult times OR NYC related visual info (Instagram and YouTube) OR all the NYC news you need to start your day.
We hope you will come back often to see what’s cooking here.
Today it’s NYC Weekend Corona Culture (sun). NEW STUFF!
Thrillist, a site with tons of food, drink, travel & entertainment info, introduces folks to the coolest things to do in NYC (and other places when you are traveling). I like to check them out regularly. You should, too.
“Now that the strangest Thanksgiving of our lives has passed (did you catch the no-crowds-allowed Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade?), we can rest easy knowing that 2020 is almost officially over. While you might be tempted to spend your post-Thanksgiving weekend sprawled out on the couch, recovering from too much turkey and too many Zoom calls with your extended family, it’s worth putting on some hard pants and stepping outside to see what NYC has in store.
This weekend, you can take a Black Friday hike to power through your post-Thanksgiving hangover, shop for the whole family at an inclusive holiday market, or sip a glittery mocktail at an augmented reality bar—we’ve rounded up everything to eat, drink, see, and do in NYC.”
Weekend-longEast VillageTemakase, a new hand roll bar, combines temaki (cone-shaped sushi hand rolls) with omakase (chef-guided tastings of single bites). Order up dishes like truffle blue crab, toro takuan, and uni toro or choose the “Catch of the Bay,” the chef’s choice of the best seafood. You can order for delivery or eat inside at one of the two 10-seat sushi bars outfitted with clear dividers to watch the chefs as they roll and slice your meal.
Cost: Rolls start at $6.75
Weekend-longWilliamsburgNewly-opened restaurant Winona’s is a café by day and a natural wine bar by night. While the breakfast and lunch menus include full meals of smoked salmon tartine, brioche toast with whipped ricotta, and chicken congee, the dinner menu transitions into a variety of snacks (scotch egg, lamb belly fritters, charcuterie) that pair with their list of natural and biodynamic wines from small producers. You can eat inside or order your meal to-go to recreate the romantic restaurant vibes at home.
Cost: Wine by the glass starts at $13
Weekend-longChelsea MarketIf the boozing you did this week was all too real, head to a not-quite-real bar for a mocktail. At ARTECHOUSE’S AR Bar, they’re using augmented reality to recreate Edward Hopper’s iconic bar from the ‘42 painting
Nighthawks. The interactive AR art installation lets you purchase non-alcoholic cocktails at the Merch Shop, then interact with the bar through a mobile app. If you just
have to have some real booze, they’ve collaborated with nearby bars
Helen’s and
The Chester, where AR-activating coasters let you use your app to interact with the drinks.
Cost: $24 to enter ARTECHOUSE; non-alcoholic drinks in the Merch Shop cost $8.50
Weekend-longRockefeller CenterIt may not be fair, but everybody’s clowning on this year’s Rockefeller Center tree—and you can, too! With its rescued
stowaway owl and no shortage of
impassioned commenters, it seems to be the tree this year deserves (at least until they turn its lights on come December 2nd). Until then, you can get into the holiday spirit before the rest of the crowds by schlepping uptown, taking a photo of its scraggly branches, and captioning it “Me in 2020.”
Cost: Free
Friday, November 27, 11 amRiverside ParkThe city’s yearly Black Friday hikes offer an alternative to shoving your way to the front of the line for gigantic TVs (or, in a more likely 2020 scenario, staring at your screen until your eyes hurt). After Thursday’s big day of eating marshmallow-topped potatoes and drinking whatever you can find, it feels good to get outside and breathe in some fresh air. If you can’t make it to Manhattan’s hike, they’ve got one in every borough: head to
Marine Park in Brooklyn,
Alley Pond Park in Queens,
Latourette Park in Staten Island, or
Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx.
Cost: Free, registration is required
Weekend-longCity PointWhile many of NYC’s holiday markets are staying shuttered this year, City Point’s The Makers Show is opening this weekend for all of your holiday shopping needs. Co-curated by NYC Pride Marketfest and Da Spot, the market features an inclusive selection of BIPOC and LGBTQIA artisans and entrepreneurs including
Beriqisu,
Kimberly House, and
Pamela Barsky. While you shop, munch on some snacks from DeKalb Market Hall’s vendors, with treats from
The Flo Kiss,
Creamline, and more.
Cost: Free to browse
Friday, November 27 – Saturday, November 28GreenpointA brand-new new deli window from Louie’s Luncheonette has opened in Brooklyn to serve up plant-based cold cuts on
She Wolf Bakery bread. Their sandwiches—including the Italian, with plant-based ham and pepperoni, mozzarella, and tons of veggies on focaccia; and the BBQ Chicken, with plant-based chicken, pickles, onion garlic jam, and jalapeños on sourdough—have been selling out within hours, so be sure to show up early (they open at noon on Fridays and 10am on Saturdays).
Cost: Sandwiches start at $12
Weekend-longIndustry CityIndustry City’s ice rink is opening for the season so you can show off your triple salchows (or, depending on your skill level, how good you are at falling on your tush). The uncovered outdoor rink requires both masks and social distancing, making it a safe place to take your family or a post-Thanksgiving date. You can buy tickets online or in-person, but you might want to get yours in advance to ensure your spot on the ice.
Cost: Tickets are $12; skate rentals are $10
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WFUV-FM 90.7 is my fave local radio station. Noncommercial, member-supported with a format of adult album alternative music, WFUV is doing it’s best to keep us connected to our music with a comprehensive, updated list of live music online.
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11/25 – Drive-By Truckers Thanksgiving Filter Variety Show with all five members
11/25 – Django Django live record release set for Glowing in the Dark
11/25-29 – The 40th Annual John Lennon Tribute concert (repeat) with Jackson Browne, Rosanne Cash, Natalie Merchant, Taj Mahal and more
11/27 – Patti Smith Black Friday performance
11/27 – Trey Anastasio from the Beacon Theatre
11/27 – “A Rufus-Retro-Wainwright-Spective” Q&A
11/27 – Dua Lipa “Studio 2054” music, mayhem, performance, theatre and dance
11/27-8 – Mary Chapin Carpenter, “One Night Lonely Live” from Wolf Trap
11/28 – Dinosaur Jr. “Live & Alone from Look Park”
11/29 – The Jayhawks XOXO release show series
12/1 – Sylvan Esso, “With Love” concert
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New York magazine is biweekly these days and every issue has a wonderful section, “The Culture Pages,” which includes a “To Do” list – 25 things to see, hear, watch, and read. Here are my favorites from the current issue (Nov.25-Dec.9).
Opera
Elektra
Holiday in the House of Atreus.
The Met oddly chose Thanksgiving to stream Strauss’s Elektra, in which children gather at home, sing bloody murder, and commit it, too. In this spectacular 2016 performance of a production directed by Patrice Chéreau, Nina Stemme delivers an extra helping of sublime rage, and Esa-Pekka Salonen keeps the home bonfires burning. —Justin Davidson
metopera.org, November 26.
Classical Music
Con Alma
With soul.
New York composer Paola Prestini and Mexico-based singer-songwriter Magos Herrera (plus a crew of musicians) used the lockdown to collaborate at a distance, and the result is a melancholy but uplifting quasi-cantata full of bird calls, phone calls, and calls across frozen borders. —J.D.
National Sawdust Tracks, December 4; live.nationalsawdust.org, December 13.
Art
Tom Sachs: Handmade Paintings
A mad man.
Sparks crackle at the sight of Tom Sachs’s perennially engaging squirrelly trickster art. Here, bumpy paintings of logos, slogans, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, McDonald’s Golden Arches, the American flag. It’s steampunk hand-painted Pop Art made by some uniquely American Rube Goldberg–Unabomber sensibility. —Jerry Saltz
Acquavella Galleries, 18 East 79th Street, through December 18.
Classical Music
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Exploring the theme “American promise.”
Tested, masked, and distanced, the BSO returns to its native stage at Symphony Hall, minus a live audience. The lone advantage of canceled seasons and rare performances is that orchestras have become nimble enough to respond to the world around them. This program, the second in the series “Music in Changing Times,” brings together music by three Black composers, Jessie Montgomery, William Grant Still, and Duke Ellington (plus two works by Osvaldo Golijov), led by the Black conductor Thomas Wilkins. —Justin Davidson
bso.org, November 26 to December 26.
Theater
This Is Who I Am
Gather ’round.
A wide coalition of theaters (including New York’s PlayCo) has joined virtual hands to present Amir Nizar Zuabi’s Zoom drama about a father and son, one in Ramallah, the other in New York. The two men talk from their respective kitchens, trying to bridge their political and physical gulf by making a traditional dish together. —Helen Shaw
woollymammoth.net, November 29 to December 27.
Classical Music
New York Festival of Song
Highbrow fables.
At a time when every news day seems to bring another epic struggle, vertiginous downfall, and act of hubris, soprano Julia Bullock and pianist Steven Blier are here to remind us that we’ve seen it all before. They’ve organized songs by Kurt Weill, Billy Strayhorn, Hall Johnson, and other composers into an evergreen program called “Myths to Live By.” —J.D.
nyfos.org/athome, available through December 31.
Art
Kim Jones: Rats Live on No Evil Star
The artist served in the Vietnam War.
Here, the scratchy, challenging battlefield pencil drawings of veteran Kim Jones. Some of these images covered whole walls with erased ships and columns of troops moving forward, retreating, being blown up, setting bulwarks, and regrouping. This retrospective show of paintings, drawings, sculpture, and videos will establish this artist’s bona fides as a connoisseur of visionary windmills of the mind. —J.S.
Bridget Donahue, 99 Bowery, through January 9.
Theater
The Future
Presto.
Earlier this year, card-handler and illusionist Helder Guimarães made one of the few true blockbuster quarantine theatrical performances, The Present. We got to do magic in our own homes. And only felt lightly manipulated. Now he returns with The Future, which will include interactive illusions, a mysterious kit mailed to you before the show, his rather wistful style of storytelling, and a choose-your-own-adventure flourish. —H.S.
geffenplayhouse.org, December 4 to January 31.
Art
Salman Toor: How Will I Know
Overdue.
Salman Toor’s first solo exhibition of his queer rococo paintings, which live, as he does, between worlds (Lahore, Pakistan, where he was born and has a studio, and New York, where he lives) was supposed to open at the Whitney in April; it went into pandemic hibernation, but you can finally see it in person. —Carl Swanson
Whitney Museum, 99 Gansevoort Street, through April 2, 2021.
*This article appears in the November 23, 2020, issue of New York Magazine.
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Decades old movies, songs and video games have ssurged in popularity over the pandemic. Psychologists say conjuring nostalgia during stressful times is a healthy coping mechanism.
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Stay home for a bit longer. Mask up and stay safe
NYCity 1-2-3 : What's Happening / Manhattan's WestSide 