Start 2025 Off Right with Can’t-Miss Events Around the Region
Concerts, art exhibits and more are starting the year on a high note.
Image courtesy of TCD/Prod.DB/Alamy
Birdman Live
Jan. 19 When Birdman premiered a decade ago on its way to winning the 2015 best picture Oscar, The New York Times hailed it as “funny, frenetic, buoyant and rambunctiously showboating entertainment.” Artfully stitched together as if shot in a single take, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s heart-pounding, stream-of-consciousness masterpiece tracks an aging action star portrayed by Michael Keaton as he attempts to stage a vaingloriously “serious” Broadway production—to an increasingly furious inner drumbeat. Much of that energy derives from the music: a thundering, continuous drum solo by Mexican composer and jazz percussionist Antonio Sánchez. For Birdman’s 10th anniversary, the five-time Grammy winner will be appearing at the Crest Theatre, performing his dynamic score live while the film plays on the downtown landmark’s 42-foot screen. crestsacramento.com
Untitled (Not ugly enough) by Barbara Kruger (Courtesy of Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo and the Manetti Shrem Museum)
Through Their Eyes
Jan. 26–June 22 How better to celebrate and investigate the impact of feminist art than through the eyes of one of the world’s fiercest female art patrons? Through Their Eyes—which draws from the holdings of Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, dubbed “Italy’s Peggy Guggenheim” by style bible W magazine—presents 60 contemporary pieces by 30 renowned women artists, from self-portraits by Cindy Sherman (aka the original selfie queen) to Zoe Leonard’s photographs Chastity Belt and Gynecological Instruments that evoke the medicalization of feminine desire. Other highlights include works by Paulina Olowska, Berlinde De Bruyckere, Danielle McKinney and Barbara Kruger, whose 1997 photographic silkscreen Untitled (Not ugly enough) is shown above. This Manetti Shrem exhibit, the first show at the Davis museum to focus solely on female artists, marks the U.S. debut of Sandretto Re Rebaudengo’s extensive collection. manettishremmuseum.ucdavis.edu
Portrait courtesy of Thunder Valley Casino Resort
Sebastian Maniscalco
Jan. 31 Martin Scorsese has a knack for slipping comedians into dramatic roles in a way that totally energizes a scene—think Albert Brooks in Taxi Driver and Jerry Lewis in The King of Comedy. But when the maestro cast Sebastian Maniscalco as real-life mobster “Crazy” Joe Gallo in The Irishman, he caught a tiger by the tail. Going toe-to-toe with Robert De Niro, the Italian American funnyman perfectly captured the gangster’s unhinged, menacing vibe. De Niro was so impressed that he teamed up with Maniscalco again, playing his dad in the comedian’s 2023 autobiographical film, About My Father. Maniscalco has always worn his Sicilian roots on his tuxedo sleeve, whether that’s in a half-dozen comedy specials, his HBO Max sitcom Bookie (season two premiered in December) or five sold-out gigs at Madison Square Garden this past fall—smashing the arena’s record for comedy shows. On stage, Maniscalco’s outsized style of physical comedy echoes Buster Keaton, with a hint of Andrew Dice Clay swagger thrown in for good measure. Skip his “It Ain’t Right” tour at Thunder Valley? Fuhgeddaboudit. thundervalleyresort.com
For even more reasons to hit the town all year long, pick up our January-February issue, with the full list of 25 Can’t-Miss Events to Check Out in 2025
