ARTS CALENDAR: HAPPENINGS FOR THE WEEK OF JUNE 30

Film

• “Despicable Me 4” (July 3): In the latest installment of the animated “Despicable Me” franchise, Steve Carrell reprises his role as Gru, reformed supervillain and father of four. Gru enlists the help of the minions to face off against a former schoolmate, Maxime Le Mal (Will Ferrell), bent on destroying his family. Supporting characters are voiced by Stephen Colbert, Sofía Vergara and Kristen Wiig.

• “Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot” (July 4): Written and produced by husband-wife duo Joshua and Rebekah Weigel (along with executive producer Letitia Wright), this drama follows a married couple in rural Texas who face a daunting task: finding homes for 77 foster children. Donna (Nika King) and her pastor husband, Martin (Demetrius Grosse), try to persuade their East Texas congregation to come to the aid of America’s most vulnerable.

• “MaXXXine” (July 5): Mia Goth stars in this sequel to the 2022 slasher flick “X” as Maxine Minx, an aspiring actress and survivor of a Texas massacre. This time, Maxine makes her debut in Tinseltown, but her newfound success is threatened by a mysterious killer targeting Hollywood starlets. The cast includes Elizabeth Debicki, Moses Sumney, Michelle Monaghan and Bobby Cannavale.

• “Murder Company” (July 5): This World War II action thriller directed by Shane Dax Taylor follows a group of U.S. soldiers in the midst of the D-Day invasion as they attempt to smuggle a French Resistance operative behind enemy lines. Kelsey Grammer, William Moseley and Pooch Hall star.

TV

• “Star Trek: Prodigy” (Netflix, July 1): In the second season of the kid-friendly animated Star Trek spinoff, a ragtag group of aliens work together to track down the crew of the spaceship USS Protostar.

• “Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F” (Netflix, July 3): Eddie Murphy returns as charismatic police detective Axel Foley in the fourth Beverly Hills Cop movie—the first addition to the franchise in 30 years. After a threat against his daughter, Jane, Foley teams up with her to uncover a wider criminal conspiracy in the city, armed with his trademark mix of bullets and bravado. Directed by Mark Molloy in his feature debut, the film also stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Taylour Paige and Kevin Bacon, plus returning cast members Judge Reinhold, John Ashton, Bronson Pinchot and Paul Reiser.

• “Space Cadet” (Prime Video, July 4): In this Amazon Prime comedy, Emma Roberts plays a Florida party girl whose fabricated credentials win her a spot in NASA’s astronaut training program. Liz W. Garcia wrote and directed the film, which includes supporting performances by Tom Hopper, Poppy Liu and Gabrielle Union.

• “The Imaginary” (Netflix, July 5): The latest feature from Japanese animation house Studio Ponoc is an adaptation of A.F. Harrold’s children’s novel. We follow a young girl, Amanda, whose imaginary friend, Rudger, appears in her wardrobe one day to whisk her away on a dreamlike adventure.

• “The Real Bros of Simi Valley: High School Reunion” (The Roku Channel, July 5): Jimmy Tatro directs and stars in a film continuation of his comedy series that first aired on Facebook Watch in 2017. The story picks up with the 10-year high-school reunion of the original cast, a squad of hapless man-children struggling to make the rocky transition from party animals to working adults. The new film also stars Tony Hawk, Rob Riggle, Tyler Posey, Zoey Deutch, Retta, and Shaun White.

Music

• FINK, “Beauty in Your Wake” (July 5): The alt-folk trio made up of Fin Greenall, Guy Whittaker and Tim Thornton returns with an album delicate and rugged by turns, intended to mirror the harsh Cornish landscape where it was recorded.

• Kasabian, “Happenings” (July 5): The British rock band returns for its eighth studio album, a 10-track record inspired by the psychedelic music of the ’60s and perfectly suited to summertime languor.

• Kiasmos, “II” (July 5): On its sophomore album, the Icelandic-Faroese techno duo, composed of Ólafur Arnalds and Janus Rasmussen, retains its trademark style: long tracks that open quietly and crest into blistering dance beats.

• KOKOKO!, “BUTU” (July 5): The second album by the Kinshasa-based DIY instrumentalists is an homage to the pulsing nightlife of the Congolese capital. Tracks integrate found noises: car horns, chattering pedestrians and football chants plucked from the city streets.

Opera

• “Pelléas & Mélisande” (Des Moines Metro Opera, Iowa, July 6-21): The lone opera Claude Debussy completed during his lifetime—about the fateful love triangle of a prince, his half-brother and the mysterious woman they love, and based on the play by Maurice Maeterlinck—gets a new staging from Chas Rader-Shieber.

Art

• “Teresita Fernández / Robert Smithson” (SITE Santa Fe, July 5-Oct. 28): The artist Teresita Fernández, who often uses unconventional materials (volcanic rock, fused nylon, silk yarn) in works that explore man’s relationship to nature, co-curates this exhibition of her new and recent pieces, which are juxtaposed with those of seminal land artist Robert Smithson—many of which are being exhibited for the first time—to explore the contemporary creator’s connections with the past.

• Tokyo Gendai (Pacifico Yokohama, July 4-7): This young fair returns for its second outing, marking the continued ascendance of East Asia as an important hub in the contemporary-art landscape. With 69 participating galleries—an international roster that features many from the region—the show also includes sections dedicated to presentations of historically significant artists, thematic displays, and showcases of emerging and midcareer talent.

• “Bruts” (David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles, July 2-Aug. 24): Rashid Johnson, whose often large-scale works grapple with the black experience, curates this group show of artists whose creations are realized through feats of physical and emotional strength. The exhibition focuses on works whose unpolished materiality echoes the “raw art” described in the 1940s by Jean Dubuffet—one of the artists included here along with Huma Bhabha, Isa Genzken, Mr. Johnson, Dana Schutz, Bill Traylor, Peter Voulkos and others.

• “Fragile Beauty: Treasures From the Corning Museum of Glass” (The Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Mass., July 4-Oct. 27): The singular collection of the Corning Museum of Glass, in Corning, N.Y., offers an exploration of the beauty of that material, both liquid and solid. This show collects highlights from its holdings that explore the way glass artists have been influenced by nature’s glory, and range from shining utilitarian wares like glasses and vases to delicate decorative objects like a giant flower.

Videogames

• “Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail” (PlayStation 4 & 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC, Mac, July 2): That a game released over a decade ago still has regular players—let alone demand for new content—is testament to the enduring pleasures of Final Fantasy XIV. The Square Enix MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) now gets its fifth expansion pack, which wraps up the storyline of earlier releases and opens a fresh tale that ships players off to a new continent where they find themselves mixed up in a succession ritual.

Last Call

• “Merrily We Roll Along” (Hudson Theatre, New York, through July 7): Stephen Sondheim’s 1981 musical about relationships and curdled dreams is back on Broadway—and just won four Tonys—with Maria Friedman’s production, featuring the superb trio of Daniel Radcliffe, Jonathan Groff and Lindsay Mendez. Our critic called it a “thrillingly good staging” and cheered its “emotional clarity, sharply delineated humor, and musical richness.”

• “Hippolyte Bayard: A Persistent Pioneer” (Getty Center, Los Angeles, through July 7): This exhibition examines one of the lesser-known founding fathers of photography. While not as famous as Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre or William Henry Fox Talbot, Bayard, as our writer explained, “made constant improvements in several processes, took admirable photographs, and was appreciated by his contemporaries.”

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2024-06-30T09:07:14Z dg43tfdfdgfd