Looking for something to do on Friday? The Straight’s got you covered. Here are ?? events happening in or around Vancouver on Friday, October 18.

CONCERTS

Irish indie-rock singer-songwriter Hozier plays UBC's Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre, with guest Freya Ridings.

Local gospel trio the Sojourners play St. James Hall, with guest Tonye Aganaba.

Juno-winning singer-songwriter Justin Rutledge plays the WISE Hall, with guest Oh Susanna.

Ardent Tribe plays a Halloween Soul Party at False Creek Yacht Club.

Classic Ronstadt is a tribute to Linda Ronstadt featuring vocalist D.L. Car at the Centennial Theatre.

Canadian soul-blues artist Jessica Beach plays Tyrant Studios, with guest Raene.

Dance-rock outfit Mating Ritual plays the Biltmore Cabaret.

Canadian jazz pianist John Stetch leads his combo in TV theme songs of the '70s and '80s at Maple Ridge's ACT Arts Centre.

ETCETERA

The Pumpkin Patch at Richmond Country Farms features pumpkins, a live band, a wagon ride, and an animal farm.

FORUMS

Author Lucinda Herring shows how families and communities are reclaiming the innate and legal right to care for their own loved ones after death at Banyen Books and Sound.

The Smart Power Talks series at UBC's Nest Building features the success stories of prominent entrepreneurs, global leaders, innovators, and academicians.

KIDS' STUFF

The Stanley Park Ghost Train takes kids into the mystical and magical world of Alice in Nightmareland, with tombs, tombstones, crypts, and catacombs.

SPORTS

The B.C. Lions take on the Saskatchewan Roughriders in Canadian Football League action at BC Place Stadium.

COMEDY

Canadian comedian Jon Dore performs the first of two nights of standup at Yuk Yuk's Comedy Club.

Jump on a bus with masked Mexican Luchador El Jaguar for an “alternative facts” tour of Vancouver as part of the International TheatreSports Festival.

Comedy Here Often? is a monthly comedy showcase at 604 Records.

An all-star cast of Vancouver TheatreSports ensemble members and visiting international improvisers explore the funny side of naughty at the Improv Centre.

ARTS ETCETERA

Grab a pen, start drawing, and meet new friends in a casual environment at Mobil Art School's Drink & Draw with Neil Wedman.

Tours for the Recently Deceased at Beaumont Studios are interactive, darkly comedic, "choose your own adventure"-style guided tours, exploring the iconic characters and creations of Tim Burton.

How Many Likes Until You Like Yourself? is a show centered around the theme of social media and how it relates to our mental health.

Cirque du Soleil presents a performance of Luzia under the Grand Chapiteau (Big Top) at Concord Pacific Place.

Kitty Nights Productions presents Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps): A Rock and Roll Cabaret, featuring live music, dancing, burlesque, and carnival acts at New Westminster's Columbia Theatre.

LITERARY

Book launch at Massy Books for Kai Cheng Thom's newest book, I Hope We Choose Love: A Trans Girl's Notes from the End of the World.

MUSIC

The duo Meagan & Amy reveals the connections between Canadian music and music from the European tradition through the works of André Mathieu, David L. McIntyre, and Claude Debussy.

The West Coast Symphony Orchestra joins conductor Hal Beckett, the Phoenix Chamber Choir, and solo violinist Nancy DiNovo for a program of Halloween Movie Music at Christ Church Cathedral.

The Meeks Duo performs transcriptions of works by Tchaikovsky, Liszt, and Joplin at North Van's BlueShore Financial Centre for the Performing Arts.

THEATRE

Performance at the Goldcorp Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre of Cost of Living, a Pulitzer Prize–winning play about relationships and living with physical disabilities.

Performance at Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre of Norwegian realist Henrik Ibsen’s psychological drama Hedda Gabler.

Suitcase Theatre presents performances of the Vancouver Fringe Festival faves Legoland (by Jacob Richmond) and Didn't Hurt (by Rodney Decroo) at Havana Theatre as part of Replay: A Bunch of Great Plays, Again.

The Arts Club Theatre Company presents a performance at the Granville Island Stage of The Birds & the Bees, a Canadian comedy about love, lust, beekeeping, and the artificial insemination of turkeys.

Vagabond Players present a performance at New Westminster's Bernie Legge Theatre of Terror By Gaslight.

Naked Goddess Productions presents a performance at Jericho Arts Centre of Dancing Lessons, about a professor with autism who approaches his neighbour for a dancing lesson.

Performance at the Metro Theatre of Ken Ludwig's A Comedy of Tenors, about the last frantic hours before a Three Tenors-style concert in Paris.

Mitch & Murray Productions presents a performance of Annie Baker's comedy Body Awareness, directed by Aaron Craven.

Performance at Bobby's Apartment of Company, an immersive production about Bobby’s life as a bachelor, told in the context of his 35th birthday.

Performance at Richmond's Gateway Theatre of China Doll, a coming-of-age story about a young girl’s path to freedom through books and reading.

Stage 43 Theatrical Society presents a performance at Coquitlam's Evergreen Cultural Centre of The Creature Creeps, a throwback to classic (and campy) Hollywood horror.

North Vancouver Community Players present a performance at the Theatre at Hendry Hall of the psychological thriller The Business of Murder.

Performance at the Historic Theatre of Hold These Truths, starring Joel de la Fuente as Gordon Hirabayashi, a U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient who fought against the mass incarceration of people of Japanese ancestry during WWII.

Performance at Pacific Theatre of Frankenstein: Lost in Darkness, Mary Shelley’s haunting fable of hubris and loss re-interpreted as an immersive audio drama.

Performance at North Van's Deep Cove Shaw Theatre of the suspense drama Bear Witness, about a young woman who takes her baby out for a stroll and witnesses a murder.

GALLERIES

Transits and Returns at the Vancouver Art Gallery explores the dynamic between place and movement in the work of twenty-one Indigenous artists from around the Pacific.

Without a Word at the Polygon presents a selection of portrait photographs from the private collection of Bill Wu, including works by Berenice Abbott, Robert Doisneau, Walker Evans, Graciela Iturbide, and Mary Ellen Mark.

Vikky Alexander: Extreme Beauty at the Vancouver Art Gallery features photography, sculpture, collage, and installation, including new massive murals created in 2019.

Robert Rauschenberg 1965-1980 at the Vancouver Art Gallery features rarely seen prints, drawings, collages, sculptural works, and large-scale works from one of the most experimental periods in the artist's career.

Views of the Collection: The Street at the Vancouver Art Gallery focuses on the street as a source of inspiration and site for the production and enactment of culture, with works by Roy Arden, Kati Campbell, Robert Capa, Robert Frank, Fred Herzog, Hong Chan Park, Judy Radul, Jack Shadbolt, Danny Singer, and Ian Wallace.

MUSEUMS

In a Different Light: Reflecting on Northwest Coast Art at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC features more than 110 historical Indigenous artworks and explores what we can learn from these works and how they relate to Indigenous peoples’ relationships to their lands.

There is Truth Here at the Museum of Vancouver focuses on rare surviving artworks created by children who attended the Inkameep Day School (Okanagan), St. Michael’s Indian Residential School (Alert Bay); the Alberni Indian Residential School (Vancouver Island); and Mackay Indian Residential School (Manitoba).

Haida Now: A Visual Feast of Innovation and Tradition at the Museum of Vancouver is guest-curated by Kwiaahwah Jones and features more than 450 works by carvers, weavers, photographers, and printmakers, collected as early as the 1890s.

ATTRACTIONS

Potter’s House of Horrors, one of the Lower Mainland’s largest Halloween attractions, features two ultra-scary haunted houses and one geared for kids 12 and under.

North Vancouver's Grouse Mountain features a Skyride to the peak with views of the city and the Pacific Ocean.

The 22-hectare VanDusen Botanical Garden features over 255,000 plants from around the world and almost two dozen sculptures.

Parq Vancouver is a 24-hour casino with 600 slot machines and 75 table games, eight restaurants and lounges, and the sixth-floor outdoor Parq.

Science World features hundreds of interactive exhibits in five permanent galleries, live science demonstrations and workshops, and giant movies in the Omnimax Theatre.

At the Bloedel Conservatory you can take in more than 200 free-flying exotic birds and 500 exotic plants and flowers.

Capilano Suspension Bridge features seven cable bridges suspended in trees, the Living Forest exhibit, totem-pole collection, Cliffwalk, and Treetop Adventure. 

The B.C. Sports Hall of Fame and Museum features permanent galleries devoted to Terry Fox and Rick Hansen, a rock-climbing wall, a virtual sports simulator, and history galleries.

Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden is an authentic representation of an age-old garden tradition that reached its peak in the Ming Dynasty.

The Vancouver Aquarium features almost 800 animal species in galleries ranging from Canada's Arctic to the Amazon rainforest.

The Deeley Motorcycle Exhibition features more than 250 privately-owned bikes from around the world.

Stanley Park features 400 hectares of trails, with scenic walking and biking along the 8.8-kilometre seawall and totem park featuring eight poles by First Nations artists.

Nitobe Memorial Garden is a traditional Japanese garden located at the University of British Columbia with waterfalls, stone lanterns, audio guides and tours, and a ceremonial teahouse.

MOVIES

Screening at Vancity Theatre of directors Waad Al-Khateab and Edward Watts's For Sama, documenting the devastation visited on the city of Aleppo in the wake of the short-lived Arab Spring.

Screening at the Cinematheque of And Life Goes On, director Abbas Kiarostami’s docudrama made in the aftermath of a 1990 earthquake that killed tens of thousands in northern Iran.

Screening at the Rio Theatre of the new ski and snowboard film Winterland.

For all the latest Metro Vancouver event announcements and updates follow @VanHappenings.