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Though the weekend starts in Austin on Thursday, good seats remain for the first of a two-night Lyle Lovett stand at ACL Live. Cosmopolitan country is still what the lanky, Klein-born song genius is known for, but he also encompasses Americana, bluegrass, swing, folk, pop, and rock. At 61, he keeps the vintage goodies golden and experiment strains constant.

A play, set somewhere in the Jim Crow South, about civil rights and unrest. Returning to the director’s seat, Tarik Daniels brings: Donja R. Love’s work to the Austin stage.

Oh, holy shit. That unstoppable Trouble Puppet crew, led by Connor Hopkins, often as sick and twisted as they are brilliant – and, yeah, they've been mind-bogglingly good at times – returns with a true-historical tale of the sort of privilege, entitlement, and hubris that leads to nation-building … and sometimes cannibalism. This spectacle is performed by Zac Crofford, Caroline Reck, Marina DeYoe-Pedraza, Indigo Rael, Jay Young, Zac Carr, and Melissa Vogt. It's a musical, too, with an original score by Mother Falcon. Recommended, but note: This is not the sort of puppet show you wanna take your smaller kids to – unless you've been feeding them long pig all this time.

The Central Texas Food Bank announces the return of Austin Restaurant Weeks for 2019, with Tito’s Handmade Vodka as the main sponsor and an impressive array of venues offering prix fixe meals and drink specials and – oh, here comes the final weekend of an incredible two weeks’ worth of culinary goodness, with proceeds going to sustain that community-forward Food Bank while you happily feast at, for example, Barley Swine, Café No Sé, the Capital Grille, Caroline Restaurant, Central Standard, Citizen Eatery, Contigo, the Driskill Grill, Easy Tiger Downtown & the Linc, Goodall’s Kitchen, Gusto Italian Kitchen, Hideaway Kitchen & Bar, Il Brutto, Intero, Le Politique, L’Oca d’Oro, Olive & June, Oskar Blues Brewery, Parkside, the Peached Tortilla, Perry’s Steakhouse & Grille, Sala & Betty, Salt & Time, Sway, and more. See website for specific menus and details!

Lates: In this anarchic film from France’s enfant terrible of the cinema, Monsieur Oscar (Lavant) is driven around Paris via limousine to various “appointments,” each stop requiring a different dramatic disguise. Holy Motors is as individualistic a movie as you’re likely to encounter.

You know Johannsen is "one of the finest and more cerebral comics around," right? That's why you're reserving a seat for the weekend's shows right now.

"Three talent-packed days of staged readings of new plays by five great playwrights." We'd usually rewrite an opening PR statement like that. You know: ditching most of the adjectives? But, no, from our experience of theatre in this town, that description is pretty spot-on – concerning the writers and directors and performers alike. A veritable company of glory is gathered to present this showcase of original works for you. Friday features Austin Traffic: The Musical pReview by Megan Ortiz (7pm) and Europa, about "two women, their children, and the after-effects of sexual violence," by Sarah Saltwick (8:30pm); Saturday brings Megan Tabaque’s Two Sweaty, about the "unexpected friendship between two women in an urban cycling studio" (3pm) and Travis Tate's Seneca, a time-shifting tale of a town of freed slaves and immigrants in the mid-1800s, that is where New York City's Central Park is now (8pm); and the series wraps on Sunday with Ruby, Raul Garza's "poetic journey through realms of art, science, and the natural world" (3pm) and Lulu in Rochester by Allison Gregory, about "silent film star Louise Brooks’ temporary emergence from obscurity in the Fifties" (8pm). See website for details.

Robert Mueller (as played by Hyde Park Theatre's own Ken Webster), with help from a rotation of local all-star actors, presents highlights of the special counsel’s two-volume, 400-plus page report in this staged reading – including, of course, the Mueller team's assessment of Russian interference and the president’s efforts to obstruct the investigation into his campaign. Conceived and directed by Mark Pickell for Capital T Theatre. (Also, we feel compelled to add, in the interests of full disclosure: FUCK TRUMP.)

The photographer Ilana Panich-Linsman gives us a small glimpse into the lives of those detained and displaced, via images captured on the U.S.-Mexican Border.

World Cinema Classics: Pasolini's adaptation of nine stories from Bocaccio's Decameron is the first film in his "Trilogy of Life," which continues with The Canterbury Tales and concludes with The Arabian Nights. Even though The Decameron catches Pasolini at his most classical, the film still crackles with the filmmaker's signature naturalism, anticlericalism, and lustiness.

The Faint’s first album in five years, Egowerk offers an overarching chaotic energy infused with dance beats and prickling punk anxiety, homing in on the toxicity of the internet via amorphous, pulsating tracks of synth-pop urgency as told by Todd Fink’s distorted vocals. Detroit’s Ritual Howls also plays alongside Fink’s project with wife Orenda Fink, Closeness.

This new play, devised by a trans/nonbinary ensemble – the lead writers are Libby Carr and Lane Stanley – tells the story of a "found family" living together in the same house, redefining the meaning and importance of community and overcoming personal grief and loss while fostering an atmosphere of love and acceptance. Directed by Lisa Scheps and Jess O'Rear for Ground Floor Theatre.

UK Dirtybird DJ.