Theater: Ed Asner as Franklin Delano Roosevelt. It is one liberal icon playing another liberal icon in the one-man show FDR, opening a brief five-day run at the Caldwell Theatre in Boca Raton beginning Wednesday evening. The play, written by Roosevelt scholar Dore Schary (Sunrise at Campobello), looks at the public man who presided over the country during the Great Depression and World War II. To Asner, a seven-time Emmy winner, playing Roosevelt is more of a political mission than an artistic one, reminding the nation of the positive, lasting effects of government as a nurturer of social programs and the man who initiated them. At 81, Asner insists he is a better actor than he ever has been and the critical response from other cities where FDR has played suggests he may be right. Through June 5. Call (561) 241-7432 for tickets.
Film: Foreign language Oscar nominees get distribution around the country eventually, and South Florida at last gets to see the superb French-Canadian film Incendies (Scorched). It begins with the dying request of a mother to her twin grown children to travel from Montreal to the Middle East to discover their roots — to find their real father and to meet the brother they never knew they had. Written and directed by Denis Villeneuve, it is a tale of identity, a story of the ongoing conflict over there and a saga of love and hatred, exquisitely and painfully rendered. At area theaters beginning today.
Music: On Sunday, PBS will broadcast its annual Memorial Day concert from the National Mall in Washington, D.C., with the National Symphony, the various armed forces musical groups and big TV stars such as Gary Sinise (CSI: New York) and Joe Mantegna (Criminal Minds). But the tradition of concerts on Memorial Day weekend continues here with the New Gardens Band on Saturday. Owen Seward leads his community band in a patriotic program called Remembering America’s Fallen at the Eissey Campus Theatre at Palm Beach State College in Palm Beach Gardens. Tickets are $15 for the 3 p.m. concert, and $20 at 8 p.m. It’s a tribute to the men and women in the U.S. military, who truth be told have one of the toughest, most important jobs anyone could have, and it’s worth noting that on this long weekend. For more information, call 207-5900.
Dance: Florida Classical Ballet Theatre heads to Cuba this August for four performances of its ballet For Such a Time as This: The Queen Esther Story. This ballet, choreographed by FCBT founder Colleen Smith to music by Grieg, tells the Purim story of the queen who saved the Jews from the evil Persian Empire. But you can see the ballet twice today in Palm Beach Gardens, as the company presents this ballet and two others including Fish Tales, a retitling of a charming seaside ballet set by Smith to incidental music by Mozart. Performances are set for 1 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. today at the Eissey Campus Theatre in Palm Beach Gardens. Tickets range from $22-$32. Call 207-5900 or visit www.fcbt.org.