FRIDAY, July 19
After Hours at the Speed + GonzoFest Speed Art Museum $20, nonmembers | 5-10 p.m. GonzoFest is Saturday at the Main Library, but on Friday, it’s the Speed that’s gone Gonzo. In partnership with GonzoFest (and inspired by the museum’s new Hunter S. Thompson exhibit), the museum has turned After Hours into a celebration of the famous author and his manic, brilliant writing. Get a Gonzo tattoo from Tattoo Charlies; a talk with HST’s so Juan Thompson and Thompson-inspired writers Tim Denevi and Ron Whitehead; a tour of the new exhibit with the Speed’s curator Erika Holmquist-Wall and Thompson scholar Rory Feehan; and a presentation on Gonzo-style cartoons with Bellarmine University professor Eric Roorda — with a Thompson stand-in watching over it all with help from Squallis Puppeteers. Some not-Gonzo related activities will be music from Scott T. Smith and Brooks Ritter, as well as a screening of 2019 Sundance Film Festival shorts if you don’t mind paying a little extra. As always, there will be speciality cocktails and food.
SATURDAY, July 20
Better than Hate Community Walk Big Four Bridge Free | 10 a.m. In response to President Donald Trump’s racist tweets about women-of-color congresswomen and the subsequent racist chants at his rally, LEO columnist, poet and activist Hannah L Drake is hosting a “Better than Hate Community Walk” meeting underneath the round part of the Big Four Bridge on the Louisville side. It features remarks by the Rev. F. Bruce Williams from Bates Memorial Baptist, U.S. Rep. and LEO founder John Yarmuth, state Rep. Attica Scott, Mayor Greg Fischer, former Floyd County Commissioner candidate Lamicra Martin, state Rep. Charles Booker and Drake herself. Come early for 9 a.m. yoga.
The Moth Ball Idlewild Butterfly Farm $10, adults; $8, children/seniors/veterans | 6-10 p.m. You’re invited to the Moth Ball, where there’s no dancing or dresses, but there are lots and lots of moths (and food and drink). To celebrate National Moth Week, Idlewild Butterfly Farm is inviting the public into its Nighttime Moth House where you’ll observe moths with entomologists and moth experts and have a chance to buy moth merch. There will be food from Red Top Hotdogs and Atrium Kitchen, beer by Mile Wide Beer Co. and face painting.
A Night of Magic: Tanya Solomon and Sansa the Singing Mindreader Zanzabar $10 | 8 p.m. Two accomplished female magicians with big-time credits, Tanya Solomon and Sansa Asylum, have come to Louisville to entertain with an evening of magic. Acts include live fish appearing from nowhere, blindfolded knife throwing, telekinesis, singing and dancing.
SUNDAY, July 21
The Derby City Playwrights New Play Festival The Bard’s Town $18-$20 | Times vary Fifty-six Louisville artists. Four full-length original productions. Three readings from local writers. The Derby City Playwrights New Play Festival, which has been ongoing since July 12 and will run through July 28, features work from Louisville writers covering dark comedy and intimate drama. On Sunday, catch “Neutral Position,” about a couple whose jobs force them onto different sides of the death penalty argument and “On the Road with Bernice and Robin,” following a mother and daughter on their journey through all of America’s zoos. On Friday and Saturday, or in the coming weeks, you’ll have the chance to view other productions: “Punk Snot,” a coming-of-age story bout the “gritty world of punk rock,” “gods play,” a Greek tragedy told through an action blockbuster” and three readings, “Good Grief,” a musical, “The Devil in Clean Pressed Clothes,” a morality tale about “love, art and the selling of one’s soul and “No Cake,” a love story featuring an Indian goddess and Ireland.
This article appears in July 17, 2019.