P!nk spectacle to RuPaul winner
TUESDAY
P!nk Watch This For: A party of the highest flying order. Since her Y2K arrival, P!nk, as Alecia Moore’s stage name is stylized, has methodically ascended the pop ladder while many of her more celebrated peers from those days have faded — “damn Britney Spears … that just ain’t me,” was how she put it then. She hasn’t so much changed as put her rebel persona, her rasping, mighty voice and breath control, and her emancipating anthems at the centre of a well-honed spectacle. Fans just love to sing along to the hits, at least when they’re not picking their jaws up off the floor. A chandelier and an oversized Eminem inflatable are among the props for this Beautiful Trauma tour, in for two nights, including Wednesday. (Air Canada Centre, 40 Bay St., 7:30 p.m.) —Chris Young What a Young Wife Ought to Know Watch this if: You have a womb or came out of one. Playwright Hannah Moscovitch is on a roll: she’s got two plays opening in Toronto in the span of a month, another in New York City and several more projects to be revealed next season. Crow’s Theatre presents the Toronto premiere of her new play about the social circumstances that led to widespread birth control. Customary to Moscovitch’s stories, it’s funny, heartbreaking, dark and vulnerable. (Streetcar Crowsnest, 345 Carlaw Ave., until April 25) —Carly Maga
Blame it on Bianca
Watch this if: You love a clown in a dress. Bianca Del Rio, alias Roy Haylock, is the Season 6 winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race and a prime example of that show’s knack for turning niche performers into megastars. Del Rio has parlayed her TV win into a movie, comedy tours and, now, a book of qualified life advice called
Blame It on Bianca Del Rio. To promote the book, the queen is embarking on another comedy tour. A warning to anyone: cross this barb-wire-sharp-witted queen and she’ll read you for filth. (Danforth Music Hall, 147 Danforth Ave., doors at 7 p.m.) —CM
WEDNESDAY
Jaws in Concert Watch this if: You haven’t been able to go in the water since 1975. If it feels like the summer is taking too long to come to Toronto this year, first relax; it’s only March. Second, grab your best beach pal and check out the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and its screening of Steven Spielberg’s 1975 summer horror Jaws, complete with live accompaniment of John Williams’s legendary score. (Roy Thomson Hall, 60 Simcoe St., 7:30 p.m.) —CM
FRIDAY
Room for Rent at the Canadian Film Fest
Watch this if: You can appreciate memorably unhinged homegrown comedy. One of many great flicks by Toronto teams making hometown debuts at the Canadian Film Fest, director Matt Atkinson’s comedy Room for Rent stars
Mr. D’s Mark Little as a young man who won a huge lottery prize while in high school but who now lives with his beleaguered parents (Mark McKinney and Stephnie Weir) after squandering the money. His troubles get worse when his family takes in a boarder played by Brett Gelman, the American comic actor who may have been the wildest thing about Stranger Things Season 2. Patriotic fans of funny stuff should also check out The Go-Getters and A Swingers’ Weekend at the CFF, which runs March 20 to 24. (Royal Cinema, 608 College St., canfilmfest.ca, 9:30 p.m.) —Jason Anderson
SATURDAY
Mangoshake at the What the Film Festival Watch this if: You want a wilder kind of teen movie. Made with a minuscule budget by a group of teenage friends, Mangoshake is a proudly raw and ragged portrait of adolescence that’s wholly unlike any Hollywood version of young people’s misadventures. As such, it’s primo fodder for the What the Film Festival, an annual showcase of eccentric and outsider cinema curated by TIFF and Fantastic Fest programmer Peter Kuplowsky. The weekend of weirdness also includes the 1994 Cancon curio Anchor Zone, a fascinatingly misbegotten effort to make a postapocalyptic thriller in Newfoundland, complete with an appearance by future This Hour Has 22 Minutes mainstay Mark Critch as a skateboarding punk. (Royal Cinema, 608 College St., 9:30 p.m.) —JA
Land of Kush
Watch this for: A mesmerizing trip to a place somewhere between rock, free jazz and Sahara dunes. Composer, guitarist and oudist Sam Shalabi lives mostly in Cairo, but he’s kept up with Montreal friends with whom he’s adventured in various avantrock and improv settings, including the ever-shifting Land of Kush. At 23 players strong for this first show outside of Quebec, they’ll unveil Sand Enigma, Shalabi’s first new music for the project in five years, with imports Nadah El Shazly’s haunting vocals and Maurice Louca on keyboards. Note the ticket’s same-day admission to the museum, a treasure house of Islamic art. (Aga Khan Museum, 77 Wynford Dr., doors 7 p.m.) —CY
SUNDAY
The 2018 Juno Awards Watch this if: You’re willing to overlook your awards-show fatigue to root for the home team. Yes, this year’s Juno Awards will have cheesy dialogue, speeches full of names you never heard of and other awardsshow clichés, but they also feature performances by Canadian musicians from a range of genres. Superstar crooner Michael Bublé is hosting. Highlights include a one-off Barenaked Ladies reunion and a tribute to the late Gord Downie by Dallas Green and Sarah Harmer. (CBC and cbcmusic.ca/junos at 8 p.m.) —Debra Yeo
Trust
Watch this if: You want to see a family that trumps the dysfunction of everybody else’s. If you think All the Money in the World told you all you need to know about the 1973 kidnapping of John Paul Getty III, this 10-part TV series is out to change your mind. Sumptuously lensed and expertly acted, it has the imprimatur of writer Simon Beaufoy and director Danny Boyle. Donald Sutherland shows us the deep sadness and disappointment behind the callousness of the senior Getty. (FX at 10 p.m.) —DY