Dallas, TX
These are the 14 best things to do in Dallas this weekend
Although March had a few festivals, the month of April is when festival season kicks into high gear. This weekend will feature three of them in and around Dallas, along with two local theater productions, a symphony concert, three comedians, two dance productions, a quartet of art openings, and a concert from a Dallas favorite.
Below are the best ways to spend your free time this weekend. Want more options? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city’s best events.
Thursday, April 3
The Firehouse Theatre presents Godspell
Godspell was the first major musical theatre offering from Stephen Schwartz (Wicked, Pippin, Children of Eden), and it took the world by storm. Led by the international hit, “Day by Day,” Godspell features a parade of songs, including “Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord,” “Learn Your Lessons Well,” “All for the Best,” “All Good Gifts,” “Turn Back, O Man,” and “By My Side.” The production runs through April 19 at The Firehouse Theatre in Farmers Branch.
Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents “Sibelius’ Symphony No. 3”
The Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s Principal Harp Emily Levin will be front and center for Henriette Renié’s Concerto for Harp and Orchestra. Widely recognized for his dual career, John Storgårds both plays and conducts Beethoven’s Romance and Keith Jarrett’s Elegy. The concert is headlined by Sibelius’ Third Symphony. The concert will have three performances through Sunday at Meyerson Symphony Center.
Improv Addison presents Frank Caliendo
From his many appearances on late night shows to his weekly picks segment on the FOX NFL pregame show, comedian/actor/impressionist Frank Caliendo has been seen all over television. He’s known for his impressions of John Madden, Jon Gruden, Al Pacino, and many others. He’ll perform for one night only at Improv Addison.
Friday, April 4
Deep Ellum Community Arts Fair
The third annual Deep Ellum Community Arts Fair transforms Deep Ellum’s streets into a three-day celebration of art, music, community, and culture. Festival goers can discover booths from more than 120 fine and decorative artists, while enjoying sounds from more than 80 bands and performing artists spread across four stages. A wide variety of food and drink specials will be available throughout the weekend from the neighborhood’s restaurants and bars. The fair takes place through Sunday.
The State Ballet Theatre of Ukraine presents Swan Lake
The State Ballet Theatre of Ukraine will present Swan Lake, the most famous love story of all time. With completely new choreography and stage production by Andrei Litvinov, the classical score by Tchaikovsky comes to life. The performance, taking place at the Music Hall at Fair Park, features a ballet troupe of 50 dancers, and more than 200 new costumes created specifically for this production.
Lewisville Playhouse presents Uncle Vanya
Sonia and her uncle Vanya have devoted their lives to managing the family farm in isolation, but when her celebrated, ailing father and his charismatic wife move in, their lives are upended. In the heat of the summer, all the wrong people fall in love, desires and resentments erupt, and the family is forced to reckon with the ghosts of their unlived lives. Lewisville Playhouse will present an intimate, immersive new adaptation of Chekhov’s classic Uncle Vanya from Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Annie Baker. The production runs through April 20.
Saturday, April 5
Crow Museum of Asian Art exhibition openings
The Crow Museum of Asian Art will open three new exhibitions on Saturday. In the solo exhibition “Let One Bird Sing,” Anila Agha addresses the violence and destruction of natural environments such as plants, trees, and entire ecosystems. “The Shogun’s World: Japanese Maps from The Maclean Collection” features ceramic plates that the Japanese used to give a worm’s-eye view of the world. And Cecilia Chiang: “Don’t Tell Me What To Do” features work from the self-taught artist who operates beyond the confines of the traditional artistic canon, expressing her spontaneity and creativity across a broad spectrum of media.
Breakaway Music Festival
The Breakaway Music Festival is an electronic music event that will be headlined by Slander, Zedd, Afrojack, GRYFFIN, and Louis The Child. They will be joined by 16 national touring acts and four local DJs across two nights. The experience will also include a silent disco featuring local artists and brand activations. Originally scheduled to take place on Friday and Saturday at Fair Park, it will shift to Saturday and Sunday due to expected inclement weather on Friday.
Dallas Country, Blues & Red Dirt Festival
The Dallas Country, Blues & Red Dirt Festival will feature five different performers, including Jarrod Sterrett & The Hired Guns, Brennen Leigh, Jeremiah Johnson, Sundance Head, and headliner Wesley Pruitt. There will also be an arts & crafts marketplace and a gourmet food garden with craft beverages. It takes place at Flower Mound Riverwalk.
Nasher Sculpture Center presents “Otobong Nkanga” opening day
The Nasher Sculpture Center will present a new and re-envisioned work from the 2025 Nasher Prize laureate, Otobong Nkanga. The work of Nkanga reconsiders people’s relationship with the land and the materials extracted from it. For this exhibition, Nkanga will engage with Texan history, material culture, ecology, and community through a process of deep research and an exchange of knowledge. The exhibition will remain on display through August 17.
Michael Blaustein: The Taste of Me Tour
Comedian Michael Blaustein has had appearances on the Comedy Central Campus Tour, The College Humor Tour, and the Oddball Comedy Fest. Along with his college campus experience, Blaustein performed at prestigious festivals such as Just For Laughs 42 and The New York Comedy Festival. He currently co-hosts the podcast Stiff Socks with Trevor Wallace. He’ll perform at Majestic Theatre.
Ballet Ensemble of Texas presents Gaîté Parisienne and Other Works
Ballet Ensemble of Texas’ annual Celebration of Dance will feature a revival of Gaîté Parisienne, along with other works. The troupe is the official performing company of the Ballet Academy of Texas and trains dancers who are recognized by prestigious pre-professional training programs across the country. The production takes place at Irving Arts Center on Saturday and Sunday.
Sunday, April 6
Josh Johnson: The Flowers Tour
Josh Johnson is an Emmy-nominated writer, stand-up, actor, and NAACP award-winner from Louisiana by way of Chicago. He is currently a writer/correspondent on The Daily Show, and is a former writer and performer on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where he made his late-night debut in 2017. Johnson’s most recent stand-up special, Josh Johnson: Up Here Killing Myself, premiered on Peacock. He’ll perform twice on Sunday at Majestic Theatre.
St. Vincent in concert
Dallas can claim musician and songwriter Annie Clark – aka St. Vincent – as its own, as she spent her formative years here and was once a member of The Polyphonic Spree. One of the most distinctive artistic voices and original guitarists of her generation, she’s collaborated with such big names as David Byrne, Taylor Swift, and The Chicks. She’ll play at The Bomb Factory in support of her 2024 album, All Born Screaming.
Dallas, TX
Packers star Micah Parsons heads to Dallas while awaiting ACL surgery
Packers coach Matt LaFleur updates on injuries ahead of Bears rematch
The Green Bay Packers had a number on injuries in the Broncos game, including Micah Parsons’ season-ending ACL injury. Matt LaFleur has latest on them.
GREEN BAY – Packers edge rusher Micah Parsons won’t be with the team as he awaits surgery on his torn left ACL.
But it’s for a good reason.
“He’s about to have another child here pretty quick,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said Dec. 16 in his press conference.
Parsons has a home in the Dallas area and has returned there for the birth of his third child. He has not had surgery on his knee and LaFleur said he did not have a timeline on when that might occur.
Typically, doctors allow swelling to go down before they operate to repair the ligament, and so it’s possible surgery hasn’t been scheduled.
Parsons tore his ACL late in the third quarter of the Packers’ 34-26 loss to the Broncos on Dec. 14. Tests confirmed the injury Dec. 15.
LaFleur said he didn’t know if Parsons would have the surgery in Dallas.
As for the rest of the season, LaFleur said he thought Parsons would be around to support his teammates once his child is born and his medical situation is settled.
“He’ll be around, for sure,” LaFleur said.
Dallas, TX
City Hall’s future is an opportunity for its leadership
Recent activities reminded me of a simple roadmap I laid out in these pages (Aug. 31, 2025, “Lessons from George W. Bush, his institution”) for effective leadership: providing safety, security, solvency and sanity.
In short, great leadership should provide physical safety for those being led and the security that they can trust the institutions to govern intelligently and with their best interests at heart, while ensuring both the financial solvency of the enterprise and the sanity to keep the place focused optimistically on the future.
Good leadership should do what it is strong at and be intellectually honest to own up to what it does not do well. Then, it should simply stop wasting time on those things outside its core competency. As my former boss was prone to pointing out — a government should do fewer things, but do them well!
As it relates to the current debate over the future of Dallas City Hall, applying these basic principles is instructive as the issue touches each of these priorities.
Our city government should exit the real estate business, since it is clearly not its core competency, especially given its record of mismanagement of City Hall over the years as well as other well-documented and costly recent real estate dalliances. It is time to own that track record and begin to be better stewards of taxpayer money. Plus, given the large vacancies in existing downtown buildings, relocating city functions as a renter will be much more economical.
The definition of insanity is to do the same thing and expect different results. Thinking that the city will be able to remediate City Hall’s issues in a permanent and economically feasible way is naïve. It is time for sanity to prevail — for the city to move on from an anachronistic building that is beyond repair, returning that land to the tax rolls while saving both tenancy costs and reducing downtown office vacancies at the same time.
I appreciate that the iconic architect’s name on the building is a city asset and demolition would toss that aside. But our neglect up to this point is evidence that it was already being tossed, just one unaddressed issue at a time. While punting is not ideal, neither is being in the predicament we are in. Leaders must constantly weigh costs and benefits as part of the job and make sound decisions going forward.
We now have an opportunity to demonstrate leadership and apply all of our energy and careful thought to execute on a dynamic plan to activate that part of downtown for the benefit of the next generation. Engaging Linda McMahon, who is CEO of the Dallas Economic Development Corporation, is heartening on this issue given her experience and leadership in real estate.
This is a commercial decision and ignoring economic realities is foolhardy. We have the chance to do something special that future citizens will look back upon and see that today’s leaders were visionary.
I’d like to see the city exercise its common sense and pursue the win-win strategy. By doing so, all Dallas citizens will be more secure knowing that its leadership is capable of making smart decisions, even if it means admitting past mistakes. The first rule when you’ve dug yourself into a hole: “Stop digging!”
It is time for our leaders to lead.
Ken Hersh is the co-founder and former CEO of NGP Energy Capital Management and former CEO of the George W. Bush Presidential Center.
Dallas, TX
81-year-old North Texas trailblazer to graduate from UNT Dallas
DALLAS – History will be made this week when the University of North Texas at Dallas holds its commencement. Among the graduates is an 81-year-old woman with an incredible story.
Cheryl Hurdle Wyatt’s Story
The backstory:
Cheryl Hurdle Wyatt first made history back in 1955 when, as a 10-year-old girl, she and her sister were part of a historic Dallas NAACP lawsuit to desegregate Dallas public schools.
“When my parents moved us to South Dallas from Oak Cliff, and we were five doors from the school at the end of the corner that was all white, and we were not allowed to attend,” she said. “I do remember the principal saying you can’t come to this school.”
While Wyatt never got to attend Brown Elementary School, the lawsuit opened the doors for others. Her younger brother did go to the school.
“The year we went to high school is the year they opened up John Henry Brown for Blacks,” she said.
After graduating from high school, Wyatt went to Texas Southern University. But instead of graduating, she came home to help her older sister open a beauty school.
“Velma B’s Beauty Academy in Dallas. Everybody who was in Dallas during that time knew of Velma Brooks,” she said.
Along life’s journey, Wyatt blazed her own professional path.
“At the Lancaster-Kiest shopping center, I was there for maybe 10 years then moved up to Camp Wisdom. Had a salon there and then I’ve had about maybe two or three other locations,” she said.
81-year-old College Graduate
What’s next:
On Tuesday, Wyatt will finally complete her 60-year journey to her college degree.
She credits her father as her inspiration. Although he had seven children at home, he went to night school to earn his high school diploma.
“So, that taught us that it’s never too late. You can always go back and make something that you wanted to happen, happen,” she said.
Her father’s perseverance during the desegregation lawsuit also taught her not to give up.
“Well, it taught me that we should always preserve, don’t give up. If it doesn’t happen this way, just keep on. It will happen. The only way you cannot win is if you stop,” she said.
All of Wyatt’s children and grandchildren are expected to be in the crowd cheering for her as she walks across the stage.
The Source: FOX 4’s Shaun Rabb gathered information for this story by interviewing Cheryl Hurdle Wyatt.
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