Best Bets the Week of September 18-24, 2025

It’s National Locate an Old Friend Day, and if you find an old friend and would like to make plans for the weekend with them, we’ve got some ideas for you. This week, both a popular movie and a bestselling book come to the stage, a choir all the way from Mexico City stops in for a joint concert, and much more await you, so keep reading for these and all of our picks for best bets.

Houston Ballet returns to the Wortham Theater Center on Thursday, September 18, at 7:30 p.m. for their latest mixed repertory program: Rock, Roll & Tutus. The program includes Brett Ishida’s Houston Ballet-commissioned what i was thinking while i was waltzing, which first premiered in 2024; Christopher Bruce’s Rooster, set to music by The Rolling Stones; Illuminate, a debut work from Soloist Jacquelyn Long; and an expanded Vi et animo from Artistic Director Stanton Welch. First Soloist Tyler Donatelli told the Houston Press the movements “all have a very grand classical feel…He really pushes the classical technique and is always reaching for more perfection every time, and there’s always something more to give.” Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. Saturdays and Friday, September 26; 1:30 p.m. Saturday, September 27; and 2 p.m. Sundays through September 28. Tickets are available here for $75 to $170.

In 2006, Akeelah and the Bee, starring Keke Palmer, Laurence Fishburne, and Angela Bassett, proved to be “an underdog tale that manages to inspire without being sappy.” Writer-director Doug Atchison’s film has since been adapted for the stage by Cheryl L. West, and you can catch it at The Ensemble Theatre on Friday, September 19, at 7:30 p.m. Bria Washington, who plays the role of Akeelah in the production, recently told BroadwayWorld Houston, “Akeelah’s story feels so universal—it speaks to kids finding their voice, but also to adults remembering the power of resilience. She’s layered, full of internal and external battles, and that challenge excites me as an actor.” Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays, 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays, 3 p.m. Sundays, and 1 p.m. on Wednesday, October 8, through October 12. Tickets can be purchased here for $35 to $50.

A classic Russian folklore character that symbolizes “rebirth, beauty, and magic” will take center stage on Friday, September 19, at 7:30 p.m. when the Houston Symphony opens its season with Valčuha Conducts Stravinsky’s Firebird at Jones Hall. Music Director Juraj Valčuha will lead the orchestra in the concert, which also includes Florent Schmitt’s Psalm 47 and the world premiere of Julia Wolfe’s Houston Symphony-commissioned Liberty Bell, plus special guests Angel Blue; Houston Chamber Choir, under Artistic Director Betsy Cook Weber; and Houston Symphony Chorus, under Director Anthony J. Maglione. The concert will be performed again on Saturday, September 20, at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, September 21, at 2 p.m. Tickets to in-hall performances can be purchased here for $29 to $159. Saturday night’s concert will also be livestreamed, with access to the video performance available here for $20.

If you’re used to his serious, sacred cantatas, hear another side of Johann Sebastian Bach on Friday, September 19, at 7:30 p.m., when Ars Lyrica Houston opens its season with Bach’s Divine Comedy at the Hobby Center for the Performing Arts. The program will feature three works by Bach, including The Dispute between Phoebus and Pan, which refers to a comical singing contest drawn from a Greek myth, by way of the Roman poet Ovid. Matthew Dirst, the artistic director of Ars Lyrica, has described the secular cantata as “theatrical, tongue in cheek, and it’s filled with clever references to contemporary music taste.” Tickets can be purchased here for $15 to $80. If you can’t attend the performance in person, you can buy a $20 ticket to view the digital livestream here.

A mumps outbreak at a private school leads to increasingly contentious meetings between the school’s headmaster, four parents on the campus board of directors, and more parents over Zoom in Jonathan Spector’s Eureka Day, which 4th Wall Theatre Co. will open at Spring Street Studios on Friday, September 19, at 7:30 p.m. 4th Wall Artistic Director (and play director) Jennifer Dean told the Houston Press the play will allow audiences to reflect on things like, “What am I doing in my own life that is shutting people down or not taking care of each other?…And that you can’t have dialogue with each other and make progress if we’re not willing to listen to each other’s point of view.” Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 2:30 p.m. Sundays through October 11. Tickets are available here for $25 to $70.

Be in the room at the Wortham Theater Center for the first time Pride Chorus Houston performs with an international choir at 8 p.m. Saturday, September 20, during Mi Familia. The joint concert, performed with Mexico City-based Coro Gay Ciudad de México LGBTIQPA+, will feature a world premiere work and arrangements of music from different Spanish-language icons, such as Diego Torres and Juan Gabriel. Speaking to the Houston Press, David York, the artistic director of Pride Chorus Houston, said of the setlist, “We started looking at these artists as being an accurate representation of what we wanted to say as a pride chorus in an international concert. In a way, we’re representing America and we’re representing Latin culture in our set.” Tickets to the concert are available here for $28.75 to $74.75.

The Catastrophic Theatre will open its season with dependency, futility, and existential inevitability – i.e., Samuel Beckett – on Friday, September 19, at 8 p.m. at the MATCH when they present Beckett’s Endgame, about one man, blind and unable to stand up, who lords over another man, who is unable to sit down. Catastrophic Co-Artistic Director Jason Nodler, who is directing the play for the third time, told the Houston Press he considers Beckett’s plays “tragic comedies,” adding that they “are not particularly dour. They’re certainly often considered to be about despair, and they really aren’t. None of Beckett’s characters are without hope or they wouldn’t continue.” Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 2:30 p.m. Sundays through October 11. Tickets are pay-what-you-can (with a suggested price of $40) and can be purchased here.

When American professor Robert Langdon is implicated in the murder of a Louvre curator, he finds himself forced to unravel a mystery hidden in codes and symbols—which happen to be his specialty—in Dan Brown’s bestseller-turned-Hollywood movie and now play, The Da Vinci Code, opening at the Alley Theatre on Wednesday, September 24, at 7:30 p.m. Zack Fine, who plays Langdon, recently spoke to the Houston Press about the success of Brown’s story, saying, “He’s done a great job of pulling us into a mystery. And that mystery is specific to Leonardo Da Vinci and Christianity. It pulls at the part of us that goes ‘I think there’s something more underneath what we call the truth.’” Performances will continue at 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays through October 19. Tickets are available here for $36 to $135.