Bay Ridge is acting out!
This weekend the Ridge will be filled with drama, in both films and theater. Start your weekend with a free screening of “The Day the Earth Stood Still” at the Narrows Botanical Gardens (Shore Road at 72nd Street). The 90-minute sci-fi film from 1951 features the melodramatic warnings of the alien Klaatu and his robot buddy Gort. The alien invasion starts at sundown, so you should get to the gardens by 8:30 pm.
On Saturday, get thee to Owl’s Head Park (68th Street at Colonial Road) to enjoy BrooklynOne Production’s annual Brooklyn Shakespeare Festival. The company will perform the Bard’s “Much Ado About Nothing” at noon, at 3 pm, and at 6 pm, with music and activities between each installment of the witty romantic comedy.
Then go from comedy to melody, with a head-banging performance from the all-kid cast of “School of Rock.” You can catch the Narrows Community Theater’s production of the rock musical at 8 pm at the Fort Hamilton Army Base Theater (enter at Fort Hamilton Parkway and 101st Street) — but if you miss it, the final performance is on Sunday at 2 pm. Visit www.narro
On Sunday, you can get just the musical part of musical theater at Circles Grill and Café (6931 Third Ave. at Ovington Ave.), where crooner Martin McQuade will perform songs from “West Side Story,” “On The Town,” and “My Fair Lady” as part of a centennial tribute to composer Leonard Bernstein and lyricist Alan Jay Lerner, each born in August of 1918. The free, three-hour shows begins at 3 pm.
On Thursday night, take a break for drama of a different sort at Bookmark Shoppe (8415 Third Ave. between 84th and 85th streets), where a pack of Bay Ridge bibliophiles will discuss Jennifer Egan’s novel “Manhattan Beach” — set mostly in the Brooklyn Navy Yard during World War II. You can join the discussion for free, and if you buy the book at the store you will get a 10% discount.
