Weekend: Outfest Opens

The 11-day LGBT film festival includes major premieres, big stars, and a starry slate of cinematic works.

Outfest 2017: If you began attending films when this industry-leading LGBT film festival first debuted, then you've been a part of the Outfest family since 1982. So how will the celebrated, cinematically top-notch, party-laden, star-major celebration mark its festive 35th anniversary? With more talked-about films like "Freak Show," directed by Trudie Styler, and the documentary "Kevyn Aucoin Beauty & the Beast in Me." The numbers? Some "194 films from 30 countries" will screen around town over 11 days. Those delightful days? July 6 through 16.

Pageant of the Masters opens: Visiting a museum is typically a treat, but you can, for sure, count on the figures in the paintings not to move a centimenter. That's not the case at this venerable, decades-old spectacle, a Laguna Beach tradition that asks amazingly costumed and be-wigged volunteers to hold a well-known painting- or sculpture-inspired pose for several minutes. The famous Festival of the Arts is going on, too, at the same time. It's SoCal enchantment, old-school, and it's on from July 7 through Aug. 31.

Save the Vaquita Day: Even if you've never spied the somewhat wee porpoise out in the waves, you likely know it is "the world's most endangered mammal." Eager to know more, including how you can help and what efforts to assist vaquitadom are afoot? The Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach is devoting a full day, on Saturday, July 8, to supporting the vaquita through a host of informative activities and presentations.

Salsa Night at Union Station: Dancing in a big ballroom to the live orchestra-amazing salsa sands of a big, trombone-cool band? Daydream no longer, twirlers and dippers of dance-loving LA, for this free (yes, free) event will spread out in the ballroom-like historic ticketing hall of the landmark train station on Friday, July 7. Rumbankete is on the stage, and you're gamboling on the dance floor from 8 to 10:30.

Tiki Night at the Egyptian: If it is warmish out, as in, wish-you-had-a-tiki-beverage warmish, as in, wish-you-were-under-a-swaying-palm warmish, then you're surely aware of this summertime tradition, a tradition that happens when the weather turns warmish. It's not at the beach, though, but in the heart of Old Hollywood, at the Egyptian Theatre courtyard. Live tunes from King Kukulele & The Friki Tikis, a hula dance presentation, and a screening of "Tiki Volume 1: Paradise Lost" await lei-wearing adventurers.

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