Theater: Many a musical has made fun of the process of making musicals. Think The Producers or Something Rotten! Now, from off-Broadway in 2007 comes the improbable Gutenberg! The Musical!, a two-man spoof of a pair of over-zealous, but alas untalented, musical theater writers. Yes, they have written a show about the inventor of the printing press and movable type, which, let’s face it, is no worse an idea than a musical about Alexander Hamilton. The writers bravely hold a backers’ audition for their Gutenberg show, manically playing all the roles. Evening Star Productions has the chutzpah to bring the musical to South Florida, to Sol Theatre in Boca Raton, through Oct. 2. Call 561-447-8829 for tickets.
Art: The Ann Norton Sculpture Gardens gets its season off to an intriguing start this weekend with a show of antique engravings and lithographs from the 16th to the 19th centuries. These are the kinds of artworks that our ancestors loved to pore through when they wanted to think about visiting strange and distant lands and didn’t have the luxury of calling up a YouTube travelogue to check it out. All of the works are displayed in handmade frames made by Giovanni Bello, an Italian craftsman, and everything in the exhibit — which features drawings of botanicals, fruit, architecture and coats of arms — is for sale, with proceeds benefiting the Gardens. The show, called Botanicals, Antique Engravings and Lithographs, opened Thursday and runs through Nov. 13. Call 832-5238 or visit www.ansg.org for more information.
Film: The story of whistleblower Edward Snowden is complex and controversial, which is catnip for three-time Academy Award winner Oliver Stone. In telling the story of the young man who exposed the National Security Agency’s telephone surveillance of everyday Americans, Stone comes down decisively on the side of those who consider Snowden a patriot rather than a traitor. But beyond that central question, the film – titled simply Snowden – humanizes its subject, through a terrific, intense performance by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and through the plot thread of his relationship with Lindsey Mills (Shailene Woodley), the girlfriend he kept in the dark about his felonious intentions. The movie is relatively straightforward for Stone, but it is surely his best feature film since JFK – Can that really be 25 years ago? Snowden tends to bog down in tech jargon, but when it stays personal and dramatic, it is first-rate informative entertainment. Opening this weekend in several locations around South Florida.
Music: It’s been a couple years since a classical concert has come to Delray Beach’s Arts Garage, but tonight, a duo-pianist sister team from Michigan by way of Japan presents music for this combination that includes some of the Slavonic Dances of Dvořák, Faure’s beautiful Dolly Suite, two tangos by Piazzolla and the Rhapsody in Blue of Gershwin. The concert starts at 8 p.m.; tickets are $30-$45. And on Sunday, the 29th season of the Music at St. Paul’s series gets underway with an appearance by the Amernet String Quartet, now with new violinist Franz Felkl. This fine quartet has scheduled the Beethoven Quartetto Serioso (No. 11 in F minor, Op. 95), Grieg’s lovely String Quartet and a string trio by the Czech composer and Holocaust victim Gideon Klein. The concert starts at 3 p.m. Sunday; tickets are $15-$20.