50 must-see plays, parties, films, arts, concerts, and events this season Winter Arts Winter Music Winter Food and Drink Winter Stage Winter Readings and Lectures Winter Comedy Winter Dance Winter Film Winter Parties and Events...

DRINKS Pittsburgh's Bloody Mary Festival Legend has it that French bartender Fernand Petiot was the first to spice up a common vodka-and-tomato juice cocktail with cayenne, salt, pepper, lemon, and Worcestershire sauce, thus creating the Bloody Mary. If only he knew the monster he'd created: These days, toppings range from whole lobster claws to pepperoni pizzas...

In Sharp Focus, the new Charles “Teenie” Harris gallery at the Carnegie Museum of Art (CMOA), is not the first time the iconic photographer’s work has been shown in Pittsburgh, but it's likely the most comprehensive. Thanks to an interactive touchscreen installation designed in partnership with faculty and students at the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, the research laboratory at the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) School of Fine Arts, visitors can browse through roughly 60,000 images from Harris’ archives...

The textbooks of my childhood were not inclusive of the women artists, activists, and authors that positively impacted Brown and Black people like me. As a young adult, Black History Month was recognized by only a few states, had no presence in my Massachusetts high school or Pennsylvania undergraduate college. My attention to this missing history piqued as a graduate student when I was able to intentionally choose topics relating to women leaders in history or stories about the African-American experience...

The 2020 Oscar nominations have drawn criticism for being even less diverse than previous years, which was already a comically low bar. But the shorts categories, which include animated, documentary, and live-action films timed at 40 minutes or less, offer a more interesting and complex slate...

STAGE Terminer Part of New Hazlett Theater’s CSA series for emerging artists, Terminer is a play by Philip Wesley Gates about a “cyborg coven” that calls upon the spirit of the Salem Witch Trials to address issues of power and justice in contemporary life. Featuring an all-queer cast, the play combines movement, algorithms, and found text into something hopeful...

When it comes to Pittsburgh band Rave Ami, fans and critics seem to agree on one thing: this is a group you need to see live. Whether it’s because the trio have been together since high school, because they all lived together after college, or simply because they have been playing and performing together for 10 years, Joe Praksti, Pat O'Toole, and Evan Meindl have chemistry on stage (and off) that can't be reached by shortcuts. 

As wildfires ravaged Australia, Pittsburgh thermostats reached 70 degrees in January, and climate change denial remains endemic to people in power around the globe, the members of the mysterious Pittsburgh melodic metal band Deathwhite were channeling their rage into a new album.  Grave Image, Deathwhite’s second album for esteemed French label Season of Mist, is an extroverted effort that reflects "the world as it is … a sounding board of how we feel about the world right now,” says a member of Deathwhite, whose identity, like the other bandmates, is not known to the public...

You could be forgiven for thinking that the most important thing that architect Lina Bo Bardi ever did was construct remarkable buildings. The native Italian practiced largely in Brazil in the post-World War II era until her passing in 1992...

Boyce Park 35 minutes from Downtown Pittsburgh 675 Old Frankstown Road, Plum. alleghenycounty.us/parks Boyce Park offers the only downhill skiing and snow tubing hills in Allegheny County...

Labor-Inducing Vegetarian Chili at Harris Grill Multiple locations. harrisgrill.com...

I’m writing this week from the Adult Video Network convention in Las Vegas. The annual convention hosts both the largest porn awards show of the year and also the Adult Entertainment Expo, where fans can meet their favorite porn stars, attend seminars about the state of the industry, and shop for the newest sex-tech gadgets and sex toys...

Venture Outdoors ventureoutdoors.org The local member-supported nonprofit offers winter hikes, cross-country skiing, and snowshoeing at various Southwestern Pennsylvania locations. Event of note: Winter Tree ID Walk Local ecologist Henry Schumacher leads a walk, helping identify trees in winter...

Axe Throwing LumberjAxes Locations in Cranberry, Millvale, Monroeville and Mt. Lebanon. axethrowingpgh.com...

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):  Please don't imitate or repeat yourself in the coming weeks...

The name Inner Groove Brewing has nothing to do with beer. The Verona brewery was founded by two couples — Kelly and Tim Melle, and Kevin and Jennifer Walzer — who have a deep appreciation for old vinyl records and relied on them to soundtrack their meetings as they built the company...

After finishing The Illness Lesson, readers might think it’s a new edition of a late 19th-century novel. The style, language, dialect, and images evoke the feeling of an elite girls school, circa 1871, that takes a horrendous turn after a promising start...

In June 2018, Jimmy Brown and Lyndsey Shumate, the duo behind Ease: Modern Comfort Cuisine, knew it was time for a change. The upscale joint, which had replaced Dunning’s Grill after its 30-year run in Regent Square, was struggling to win over the neighborhood...

ART Vanishing Black Bars & Lounges/I came by Boat so Meet me at the BeachThe August Wilson African American Cultural Center presents two exhibitions highlighting the Black experience; I came by Boat so Meet me at the Beach includes collaborative works by New York-based performance artist Ayana M. Evans and Tsedaye Makonnen, a multidisciplinary artist from Washington, D.C. Vanishing Black Bars & Lounges looks at the loss of safe gathering places for Black people through images by New Orleans-based photographer L. Kasimu Harris. Continues through Sun., March 29...

MUSIC Phat Man Dee’s Roaring 2020s The "Roaring Twenties" are best left in the past; we’re all about the Roaring 2020s now. With jazz musician extraordinaire Phat Man Dee at the helm with her band The Cultural District, this party is guaranteed to be swingin’!