TUESDAY
What: “Nature Connects”
Where: Mounts Botanical Garden, 531 N. Military Trail, West Palm Beach
When: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Cost: free for members, $5 donation for nonmembers
Contact: 561/233-1757, mounts.org
Vibrant, supersized animals began to dot the grounds of the Mounts Botanical Garden this past Saturday—and the best part is that nobody needs to feed them. The giant peacock, dragonfly, monarch butterfly and family of deer are part of “Nature Connects,” the largest exhibition in the Garden’s 30-year history. These sculptures by creator Sean Kenney are made entirely from LEGO bricks, the young-at-heart artist’s medium of choice—nearly half a million colorful rectangles in all. A Bonsai tree, a girl with a watering can, a wheelbarrow add ambience to the animal kingdom, with the total number of displays reaching a baker’s dozen. Or should we say a bricklayer’s dozen? “Nature Connects” is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays, and it runs through mid-February.
WEDNESDAY
What: Great Chefs Tailgate and College Football Spirit Night
Where: Via Mizner Golf and Country Club, 6200 Boca Del Mar Drive, Boca Raton
When: 6 p.m.
Cost: $40
Contact: 561/385-0144, spiritofgivingnetwork.com
We’re still over a month away from the second-annual Boca Raton Bowl, which promises to be an economic boon for the city when teams from the Mid-American and American Athletic conferences square off at FAU Stadium Dec. 22. To build anticipation for the event—and to provide another outlet for the region’s imaginative toques to compete with each other in their own friendly gridiron rivalry—the Spirit of Giving network is hosting this inaugural tailgating party and College Football Spirit Night. Show your alumni colors at this foodie extravaganza, which will feature chef’s selections from 11 area restaurants, country clubs and resorts, including M.E.A.T., the Tilted Kilt, Boca Raton Resort & Club and Rebel House. The $40 ticket provides food tastings and two cocktails, with all proceeds benefiting the Spirit of Giving’s 2015 holiday gift drive.
What: An Evening With Tom Brokaw
Where: Chapman Conference Center, 300 N.E. Second Ave., Miami
When: 8 p.m.
Cost: $15
Contact: 305/237-3258, miamibookfair.com
You might want to have handkerchiefs handy for this appearance by the NBC News titan—or maybe not. Brokaw was never much of a sentimentalist on the air, so perhaps his appearance at the Miami Book Fair won’t be an occasion for collective weeping. Either way, expect Brokaw’s talk to get personal. The former “NBC Nightly News” anchor usually avoids memoiristic writing in his best-selling cultural histories about the WWII generation and the ‘60s, but his latest book, A Lucky Life Interrupted, is a reflection on his 2013 diagnosis of multiple myeloma. With a prognosis of eight years max—barring the discovery of a miracle treatment—Brokaw is living in the midst of what he calls “the Mortality Zone.” Sadly, any South Florida appearance by the veteran newsman may be his last; certainly, if the content of his book is any indication, it’ll be his most emotionally naked discussion yet.
FRIDAY
What: Opening night of “I Hate Hamlet”
Where: Lake Worth Playhouse, 713 Lake Ave., Lake Worth
When: 8 p.m.
Cost: $29–$35
Contact: 561/586-6410, lakeworthplayhouse.org
The iconic part of Shakespeare’s troubled prince of Denmark has attracted everyone from Constantin Stanislavski and Laurence Olivier to Mel Gibson and Kevin Kline. For many actors, playing the title role in what has been described as “the world’s most filmed story after ‘Cinderella’” is a rite of passage. But as humorist and playwright Paul Rudnick reminds us, not everybody is cut out to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. His 1991 comedy “I Hate Hamlet” follows one such actor, a Shakespeare-phobic TV star named Andrew Rally, who, in a lull between screen projects, is offered a role as Hamlet in a stage production. At least he has some supernatural help in his corner: Thanks his new loft—a gothic-style brownstone once home to a seminal Hamlet, John Barrymore—Andrew is able to summon the late actor in a séance. Barrymore’s spirit turns out to be as demanding and abrasive as his flesh-and-blood form, debating the young actor about women, art, success, duty and television, and even engaging in a swashbuckling swordfight. By the end, it will answer a fundamental question: To be or not to be Hamlet? The show runs through Dec. 6.
What: Straight No Chaser
Where: Kravis Center, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach
When: 8 p.m.
Cost: $25-$95
Contact: 561/832-7469, kravis.org
This 10-member a cappella chorus originated the way most a cappella choruses do: on a college campus, in this case Indiana University in 1996. Two years later, the group released a music video for its innovative cover of “The 12 Days of Christmas,” which integrated samples of “I Have a Little Dreidel” and Toto’s “Africa.” Hardly anyone noticed at the time, but when it was rediscovered in 2006, it rocketed across the Web, earning some 18 million YouTube hits and leading to an Atlantic Records deal in 2008. These days, Straight no Chaser, with its cheeky alcohol/bar-themed album titles, is arguably the nation’s most well-known a cappella group, having performed everywhere from Carnegie Hall and Wrigley Field to “The Today Show.” Christmas melodies are a specialty of this impeccably skilled chorus, but for this tour, the group is supporting its latest album “The New Old Fashioned,” whose reimagined covers include cuts by Pharrell, Hozier, Bob Dylan, Radiohead, Otis Redding and more.
FRIDAY TO SUNDAY
What: Chris Evert Pro-Celebrity Tennis Classic
Where: Delray Beach Tennis Center, 201 W. Atlantic Ave., and Boca Raton Resort and Club, 501 E. Camino Real
When: Event times vary
Cost: $20-$2,500
Contact: 561/394-2400, chrisevert.org
Obscure reference alert! If you happen to be sitting in the bleachers of the Delray Beach Tennis Center for this month’s annual Chris Evert/Raymond James Pro-Celebrity Tennis Classic, and an esoteric quip about Spiro Agnew or “Ishtar” or Marshall McLuhan wafts through the speakers, that’s because comedian Dennis Miller is on the court, serving up more than aces. The former “SNL” fake-news anchor will compete in the charity event for the first time alongside returning raqueteers Alan Thicke, Timothy Olyphant, Maeve Quinlan, singer-songwriter David Cook, Tennis Hall of Famer Pam Shriver and more. Off-the-court activities continue at the Boca Raton Resort & Club, which will host the event’s Classic Cocktail Reception and Charity Gala. Evert is hoping to top last year’s $700,000 raised to combat drug abuse and child neglect.
SATURDAY
What: Martin Barre
Where: Arts Garage, 180 N.E. First St., Delray Beach
When: 8 p.m.
Cost: $45
Contact: 561/450-6357, artsgarage.org
Guitarist Martin Barre’s live show is a self-described combination of “blues, rock and Tull.” That’s because, for 45 years, until its dissolution in 2014, Barre was a staple in Jethro Tull, the innovative English prog-rock band. His guitar playing, adopted prodigiously and without lessons—he studied architecture in college, not music, but quickly left the profession because he found it “boring”—was a major factor in Jethro’s amalgam of hard rock, blues and British folk music. Barre is known for composing melodies in his elaborate solos, as opposed to just riffing, and his work on the Tull smash “Aqualung” is regularly cited as one of the 25 best rock solos of all-time. Barre’s sixth solo album, 2014’s “Order of Play,” features 14 Jethro Tull classics, rerecorded with Barre’s four-piece band, and he’ll be playing many of them at this rare tour appearance. It arrives on the heels of his performances on Yes’ Cruise to the Edge, which returns to Miami Thusday, so welcome him back to dry land along with vocalist Dan Crisp, drummer George Lindsay, saxophonist/clarinetist Richard Beesley and bassist Alan Thompson.
SUNDAY
What: Jesse Eisenberg and Kunal Nayyar
Where: Chapman Conference Center, 300 N.E. Second Ave., Miami
When: 12:30 p.m.
Cost: Free
Contact: 305/237-3258, miamibookfair.com
Since emerging onto the art-house movie circuit with the 2002 cult comedy “Roger Dodger,” Jesse Eisenberg has been the favored casting for socially awkward, preternaturally brilliant brainiacs like Mark Zuckerberg (“The Social Network”) and Rolling Stone writer David Lipsky (“The End of the Tour”). But the Oscar-nominated actor is also a deft writer of short comic fiction, and his appearance at this fall’s Miami Book Fair will support his debut collectionBream Gives Me Hiccups. This compilation of sly, comedic short stories includes everything from contemporary dorm-room crises to historically reimagined scenes from ancient Pompeii and the time of Alexander Graham Bell’s invention of the telephone. He’ll be joined onstage by another voice of authentic humor in the entertainment world: Kunal Nayyar, aka Raj on “The Big Bang Theory,” who will support his autobiographical story collection Yes, My Accent is Real: And Some Other Things I Haven’t Told You.
