Your work week just got a whole lot more exciting, Phoenix. Here's something to do every day before the weekend arrives.
Jackalope Ranch Presents Bingo @ Crescent Ballroom Dig up your dauber and get ready for a game of chance. New Times culture blog Jackalope Ranch Presents Bingo in the lounge at Crescent Ballroom on June 17.
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Arizona's resident hip-storian Marshall Shore will emcee the evening of gaming, which will feature custom-made, jackalope-adorned bingo cards from Phoenix-based artist (and 2011 Big Brain finalist) Sarah Hurwitz.
Admission and participation are free. Play begins at 7 p.m. at 308 North Second Avenue. Prizes, including tickets to Herberger Theater's upcoming season and gift cards to Antique Sugar and Retro Ranch, will be awarded to winners. Visit www.crescentphx.com or call 602-716-2222. -- Becky Bartkowski
Into The Woods @ Arizona Broadway Theatre Stephen Sondheim's Into the Woods, presented by Peoria's Arizona Broadway Theatre through Sunday, June 23, is a musical with a dark side. Parents will want to accompany their children (12 and older) even though it's a mash-up of characters like Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, Jack, Jack's cow, some princes who married Cinderella and Snow White, and a mysterious witch. Hit showtunes include "No One Is Alone" and "Children Will Listen," and, because Woods premièred in the '80s, there's a huge technical spectacle that should, if possible, remain a surprise.
Enter the forest of 7701 West Paradise Lane at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, June 18, for a banquet that may include magical bean soup and pumpkin ice cream, along with specialty cocktail, The Witch's Brew, followed by the show. Regular tickets range from $49 to $85, and admission to the play only is also available; order at www.tickets.azbroadwaytheatre.com or call 623-776-8400 for details. -- Julie Peterson
Arizona Diamondbacks vs. Miami Marlins @ Chase Field In our experience, if you're going to skip work, Wednesday is the best day to do it. It breaks up the week, giving you the boost you need to push through til Friday. If you can pull a Ferris Bueller and catch a ball game while you play hooky, all the better.
So on Wednesday, June 19, you should head to Chase Field to watch the Arizona Diamondbacks as they face the Miami Marlins, bottom-dwellers of the NL East. Not only is the game mid-week, but it's mid-day, meaning you can get special matinee-priced tickets loaded with $5 in D-bucks in select seating areas. Just don't get caught on TV catching any fly balls.
The first pitch goes out at 12:40 p.m. Wednesday, June 19, at Chase Field, 401 East Jefferson Street. Visit www.azdbacks.com or call 602-462-6500 for tickets, $9 and up. -- Zachary Fowle
"The Art of Video Games" @ Phoenix Art Museum Video games are art. That is the unwavering stance of Java innovator and noted game aficionado Chris Melissinos. When he talks about writing gaming code, he compares it to writing poetry. These games are more than digitized pastimes - they're an amalgam of all forms of traditional art, he says.
And if you take a second to consider his equation (Narrative plus orchestration plus painting plus social reflection plus sculpture equals video game) there's really no way to argue the point. For more evidence, there's the exhibition Melissinos curated, "The Art of Video Games," on view at Phoenix Art Museum through Sunday, September 29. The show looks at the 40-year history of gaming and how it has evolved over that span of time - from Pac-Man and Pong to World of Warcraft.
Interact with your art from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Thursday, June 20, in the museum's Steele Gallery at 1625 North Central Avenue. Admission is $15 for adults, $12 for seniors, $10 for students, and $6 for those ages 6 to 17. For more details and a full schedule of the museum's complementary programming for the exhibition (including film screenings and lectures), see www.phxart.org or call 602-257-1222. -- Becky Bartkowski
The Mousetrap @ Scottsdale Desert Stages Theatre Like Queen Elizabeth II, Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap has been running in London since 1952. Some monarchs held on to their, ah, seats longer, but no other show's graced the same boards for 25,000 performances and counting. Richard Attenborough's share in the production, in which he acted at its West End opening, helped finance the film Gandhi. Before it began generating its own box of cultural trivia, however, the play started out as a darn good mystery: Someone's been killed, and a small hotel full of suspects is snowed in.
Though audiences have always been asked to keep the twist ending secret, Wikipedia has, in wiki fashion, leaked it. If you're that kind of person, please skip the paragraph about where and when to see The Mousetrap, and turn yourself in to Homeland Security.
Scottsdale Desert Stages Theatre presents the whodunit through Sunday, July 28. Hmph. It's no six decades, but good on them. Showtime's 7:30 p.m. Friday, June 21, at 4720 North Scottsdale Road. Tickets are $22 and $25 and available at www.desertstages.org or 480-483-1664. -- Julie Peterson