MONDAY, MAY 8
PLANTS + PLANT-BASED: D.C.’s Plant Week and Veg Week coincide this week. Plant Week kicks off Monday with 10-20% discounts at various shops around the D.C. area, and events later in the week. Enjoy a wreath-building workshop at Jungle & Loom on Tuesday, a kickoff party and warehouse sale with Little Leaf at The Sun Room on Wednesday, or a plant swap happy hour at Botanologica on Thursday (FREE admission). For DC Veg Week, celebrate vegan cuisine in the nation’s capital with meal deals and special menus at participating restaurants, including Teaism, Rasa, Beefsteak, HipCityVeg, Shouk, Bubbie’s, Equinox, Cielo Rojo, Supra, El Tamarindo, and DC Vegan. Events are sold out, but meals are not! (FREE admission)
AANHPI HERITAGE MONTH: Celebrate Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month with the Mayor’s office which is hosting cultural performances and an awards ceremony highlighting community service. (Lincoln Theatre; 6:30 p.m.; FREE)
MORE: Jessica Moss / Ka Baird / Greg Davis / Alma Laprida (Rhizome DC; 6 p.m.; $10), You Should Be So Lucky reading and talkback (Keegan Theatre; 7 p.m.; $25 donation recommended), Hidden History of Louisiana Jazz featuring Author Sam Irwin (Potomac River Jazz Club; virtual; 7 p.m.; FREE), Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra (Kennedy Center Concert Hall; 8 p.m.; $30), YJP LAG B’OMER BBQ & BONFIRE (Chabad Lubavitch of Alexandria-Arlington; 7 p.m.; $18), Del Maguey Mezcal Tasting & Food Pairing (Taco Rock Alexandria; 7 p.m.; $10), May True Story! Book Club: Saving Time by Jenny Odell (Old Town Books; 7 p.m.; FREE)
TUESDAY, MAY 9
WATCH PARTY: Watch the EuroVision song contest at a giant watch party celebration. WunderGarten hosts D.C.-based Eurovision blogger and expert Alesia Michelle for the semifinals and finals broadcast. A pre-show with games, local drag performers, and a costume contest will pump the crowd up, and there will be food available for purchase from CaliBurger. (WunderGarten; 2 p.m.; FREE admission)
TRAILBLAZER TALK: Join the National Museum of Women in the Arts for a virtual talk about Lavinia Fontana, the first female artist to achieve professional success. Aoife Brady, curator of Italian and Spanish art at the National Gallery of Ireland, will discuss her upcoming exhibition celebrating Fontana’s portraits. (Virtual; 12 p.m.; FREE)
MORE: Tuesday Talk: Bound to the Fire: How Virginia’s Enslaved Cooks Helped Invent American Cuisine (DAR Museum; virtual or in-person; 12 p.m.; FREE), A Trip to Japan – Onigiri (Hill Center at the Old Naval Hospital; 6 p.m.; $69), An Evening with John Butler (Lincoln Theatre; 8 p.m.; $55), NoMa Nights Tuesday Concert Series: Cecily Duo (Alethia Tanner Park; 6:30 p.m.; FREE), Film Screening of “La Grande Boucle” (La Maison Française; 7 p.m.; $5), NMAA’s Birthday Bash with Chromic Duo (Freer Courtyard; 7 p.m.; FREE), Bingo Series (The Fainting Goat; 6:30 p.m.; FREE), Houseplants 101 Workshop (PlantHouse; 6:30 p.m.; FREE), The Supreme Court Film Series: On the Basis of Sex (The Avalon Theatre; 8 p.m.; FREE), Street Reporter Documentary Screening & Panel Discussion (West End Neighborhood Library; 6:30 p.m.; FREE), Mothers Day Gift Basket Making (Made with Love; 11 a.m.; FREE), Book Discussion of Black Ball: The Generation that Saved the Soul of NBA (Creative Grounds; 6:30 p.m.; FREE), Bird Walk (Four Mile Run Park; 8 a.m.; FREE)
WEDNESDAY, MAY 10
FILM SCREENINGS: Join DAR for six film screenings on Gold Star daughters and a sister of the Vietnam War. Each woman shows their losses to war through powerful storytelling in the films He’s Only Missing & Letting Go, Gold Star Children, They Were Our Fathers, The 2 Sides Project, Sijan, and Blood Road. A reception at 5:45 p.m. will break up the schedule and the day will end with cookies and conversations. (DAR Constitution Hall; 10:30 a.m.-9:15 p.m.; FREE)
INVENTOR TALK: The Smithsonian National Museum of American History hosts inventors Theresa Dankovich and Madison Maxey for an Innovative Lives program focusing on places of invention. Both inventors have found their places of invention across the world, where they created germ-killing water filters and fabrics that act as circuit boards. Before the talk, enjoy a reception and a tour of the Smithsonian’s Lemelson Center’s exhibition (Smithsonian National Museum of American History; 6:15 p.m.; FREE)
POETRY FINALS: Joy Sunday from Netflix’s Wednesday hosts the National Endowment of the Arts’ Poetry Out Loud National Finals. Witness finalists perform their pieces as a part of the national arts education program that will award grants and stipends for the champions. (GWU Lisner Auditorium; 7 p.m.; FREE)
MORE: Seal with The Buggles (The Anthem; 7:30 p.m.; $79.50), Citizen Cope: Spring 2023 Solo Acoustic (9:30 Club; 7 p.m.; $56), Bonnie Garmus (Sixth & I; 7 p.m.; in-person $20 or virtual $12), Folger Poetry Board Reading: Naomi Shihab Nye (The Lutheran Church of the Reformation; 7:30 p.m.; $15), The Kneeling Man with author Leta McCollough Seletzky (International Spy Museum; virtual; 12 p.m.; FREE), When the Smoke Cleared book talk (Busboys and Poets Anacostia; 6 p.m.; FREE), Atlanta Dream vs. Washington Mystics (Entertainment & Sports Area; 11:30 a.m.; $11), French and Ukrainian Music with Annabelle Berthomé-Reynolds and Guest (La Maison Française; 7:30 p.m.; $15), CiNoMatic Presents Black Panther (Alethia Tanner Park; 8:15 p.m.; FREE), VIDA x Pacers Running Spring Bootcamp Series (Mosaic Park; 6:30 p.m.; FREE), National Museum of the United States Navy Talk with Gordon Calhoun: “Goats on Boats: Pets in Naval History” (Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library; 12 p.m.; FREE), Chair Yoga in the Galleries (Museum of Contemporary Art Arlington; 1 p.m.; $15)
THURSDAY, MAY 11
MUSIC FOR A CAUSE: Join the Physicians Committee for an evening of music and art in support of animals. Local band CarbonWorks will debut their new album with new videos and a special live performance after a meet and mingle with the staff. A cupcake reception will end the night, with proceeds benefiting the committee and their mission. (AFI Silver Theatre; 6:15 p.m.; $15)
FILM SCREENING: Join Planet Word Museum for a film screening of the documentary The Right to Read, produced by LeVar Burton. A reception will follow where viewers can share thoughts and reactions. The event is part of the museum’s programming on the literary crisis in the U.S. (Friedman Family Auditorium at Planet Word; 6:30 p.m.; FREE)
THREE PLAYS: See three short plays by the great Irish writer William Butler Yeats. DC Arts Center hosts an evening celebrating Irish culture with drama, music, dance, and song through a trio of plays by Yeats. The plays include At the Hawk’s Well, The Death of Cuchulain, and Purgatory. (DC Arts Center; 7:30 p.m.; FREE)
CASSETTE PLAY: Enjoy a new play by Asif Majid and the Storytellers, a group of local asylum seekers that worked with local nonprofit AsylumWorks. The Cassette Shop is set in a vintage cassette shop in Montana and follows two asylum seekers’ unlikely friendship. (Anacostia Arts Center; 7:30 p.m.; $25)
MORE: Full Circle Comedy Presents Applause Break (DC Comedy Loft; 8 p.m.; $15), Empower Hour (InterContinental Hotel; 11:30 a.m.; $250), Profs & Pints DC: Latin America’s Indigenous Movements (Hill Center at the Old Naval Hospital; 6 p.m.; $14.31), Andy Cohen In Conversation with Jen Psaki (Sixth and I; virtual; 7 p.m.; $12), Microcinema: Cash Cow, a documentary by Matt Barats (Rhizome DC; 7 p.m.; $10), Tom Sandoval and the Most Extras (Howard Theatre; 8 p.m.; $39), An Evening with You’re Wrong About (The Fillmore; 8 p.m.; $125), Shadowlands Film Screening & Discussion with Nida Kimani + Bol Coop (The Outrage; 6:30 p.m.; pay what you can), New Horizons: The Future of Creative and AI (Taoti Creative; 5:30 p.m.; $5), Patron El Cielo Tequila Launch Party (Upstairs at The Morrow; 6 p.m.; FREE admission), Customer Appreciation Party (Bistro Cacao; 5 p.m.; FREE admission), Film Screening: And Now, Love (National Museum of American Jewish Military History; 6 p.m.; FREE)
This post has been updated to reflect the correct location for the Little Leaf kickoff party for DC Plant Week. It’s happening at The Sun Room.
