Welcome back to The Big To-Do. It’s already the last week of July, with blistering heat and dramatic storms in the Friday forecast. Temperatures moderate for the weekend, when the International Sand Sculpting Festival takes over Revere Beach and the Cambridge Jazz Festival takes over Danehy Park. And if you’re catching up after a busy week of celebrity deaths, carve out some time for the Globe’s Ronke Idowu Reeves appreciation of Malcolm-Jamal Warner, and the Globe’s Mark Shanahan’s take on Ozzy Osbourne.

Movies

From left: Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Ben Grimm/The Thing, Vanessa Kirby as Sue Storm/Invisible Woman, Pedro Pascal as Reed Richards/Mister Fantastic, and Joseph Quinn as Johnny Storm/Human Torch in "The Fantastic Four: First Steps." MARVEL STUDIOS

At a minute short of two hours, “The Fantastic Four: First Steps” is “mercifully short by Marvel standards.” Globe film critic Odie Henderson praises the Pedro Pascal-led cast, but even they can’t boost this one past 1½ stars. “The actors play this poorly written material as if they were doing Ibsen, which is commendable, but their attempts fail because you truly don’t give a damn about their plight.”

The cringe comedy “Oh, Hi!” is best understood through the concept of the “Idiot Plot.” Henderson explains, “That’s a story that requires everyone to act like an idiot in order for the movie to work.” In broad strokes, “Oh, Hi!” sounds like “Misery,” he writes in a 1½-star review. But “despite all its nastiness, ‘Misery’ is funnier than ‘Oh, Hi!’”

“Happy Gilmore 2,” the sequel to Adam Sandler’s 1996 golf comedy, features “a who’s who list of legends and today’s stars.” Costars Christopher McDonald and Julie Bowen chat with the Globe’s Matt Juul about the original and the sequel, which Bowen calls “a little bit more sad and heartfelt.” Says McDonald, “I’m glad I’m back, and I’m over the moon about how it turned out.”

Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing’s documentary “Folktales” introduces a high school above the Arctic Circle. It’s a destination “where young adults go to learn traditional Norwegian cultural practices” — partly by working with sled dogs. “We’ve filmed many young people over a couple of decades,” Grady says in an interview with Globe correspondent James Sullivan. “But being a 20-year-old in 2025 is specific.”

TV & Streaming

Ernest Kingsley Junior in "Washington Black" on Hulu. CHRISTIAN SALVATIERRA/DISNEY

Based on Esi Edugyan’s novel, “Washington Black” is “equal parts odyssey and bildungsroman.” The title character goes “from slavery in the blistering cane fields of Barbados to the young United States to the icy Arctic to the last stop on the Underground Railroad” and farther afield, writes Globe correspondent Laura Zornosa. “This show has a salient point to make, but can’t quite seem to get there organically.”

In its 27th season premiere, “South Park” cut through the week’s (month’s, year’s) firehose of news. “Tackling everything from the alleged Jeffrey Epstein client list to the tariff situation with countries like Canada,” the show steered into “outright parodying President Trump,” the Globe’s Matt Juul writes. He has the lowdown on the episode, which in classic “South Park” fashion also involves Satan and Jesus.

No matter what amuses you, “streaming services from Netflix to Tubi to YouTube have hundreds of comedy specials that will get the job done.” Globe correspondent Nick A. Zaino III picks 15, all between 45 and 60 minutes, “the gold standard of a stand-up special.” His three categories, “legends, locals, and landmarks,” encompass an impressive range of eras, styles, and subjects.

The Big Day

Katie Croyle and Steve Hayward wed on Memorial Day weekend 2025 with a weekend-long party in their hometown of Harvard. They had their reception at Harvard General Store. HENRY & MAC

The Globe’s weddings column, The Big Day, tells stories of how couples found each other, fell in love, and said “I do.” Kathryn Croyle and Stephen Hayward, who grew up in Harvard, Mass., now live in Brooklyn. They returned to their hometown for their May wedding and celebrated afterward at the Harvard General Store, which Steve’s dad owns. “[H]aving a wedding is like betting on the future in a time when it feels really dark to do so,” Katie tells Globe correspondent Rachel Kim Raczka.

To apply to be featured, recently married and engaged couples (vow renewals and commitment ceremonies, too!) with ties to New England can click here for the application form.

Theater

Ngolela Kamanampata, left, and Levi Mngomezulu in "Kufre N' Quay." ANNIELLY CAMARGO

“Kufre N’ Quay,” the fifth of nine plays in Mfoniso Udofia’s Ufot Family Cycle, “fuses a coming-of-age story with a strangers-in-a-strange-land narrative.” The Boston Arts Academy and Wheelock Family Theatre production “begins to round into form in Act Two,” writes Globe theater critic Don Aucoin. In the young cast, Ngolela Kamanampata, who plays Quay, is a “clear standout.

Playing Joan Rivers in “Joan” is “an impossible task,” says star Tessa Auberjonois. Playwright Daniel Goldstein calls the production, which has its regional premiere next week at Barrington Stage, a “theatrical cavalcade.” He “kept returning to the mother-daughter relationship, and to the advantage — and burden — of being Joan Rivers’s daughter,” writes Globe correspondent Terry Byrne, who has a preview.

Tennessee Williams’s prison drama “Not About Nightingales” wasn’t produced during his lifetime. “More’s the pity,” writes Aucoin, “because ‘Nightingales’ is quite a good play, made better-than-good in performance by Robert O’Hara’s bravura direction at Williamstown Theatre Festival.” The director “keeps the story grounded, even gritty, with an intensity of focus that largely prevents any drift.”

The festival also features Williams’s “Camino Real” (1953), “a rare flop in the middle of his exceptional hot streak.” The play is “a visually arresting fantasia populated with original characters and figures from literature whom Williams saw, in their creativity and individuality, as kindred spirits,” Aucoin writes. The cast includes Pamela Anderson (“Baywatch,” “Pamela, a Love Story”).

Museums & Visual Art

Stone carver Jay Hungate's other artistic passion is making human-powered sculptures to compete in an annual race in his hometown of Lowell. His three-wheeled entry this year is to be a giant snail. DAVID L RYAN/GLOBE STAFF

In this year’s Lowell Kinetic Sculpture Race, keep an eye on the snail. Jay Hungate, who won in 2022, says he’s “just kind of winging it” as he creates a craft for his daughter and two friends to pilot. “I love the creative path of trying to figure out: How can I fix that?” he tells Globe correspondent Cate McQuaid for the Working Artist series. “It’s like being a big kid with the knowledge and tools of an adult.”

“Good design doesn’t have to be anonymous, but it often is.” The design of the items in “Pirouette: Turning Points in Design,” at the Museum of Modern Art, is “both revelatory and fun,” the Globe’s Mark Feeney writes from New York. “Sometimes design begins with appearance — Swatches, say. Sometimes it begins with function — the Sony Walkman. Ultimately, any successful design involves both.”

Music

Globe music writers select their favorite releases from 2025. RSEZA/GLOBE STAFF/ALBUM ART COURTESY OF RECORD LABELS

Just over halfway through 2025, 10 of the Globe’s music experts already have 20 selections for a list of the year’s best albums. From Tuareg guitarist Mdou Moctar’s “nimble riffs” to Latin pop artist Kali Uchis’s fifth album (“Sincerely”) to the latest from Vijay Iyer and 83-year-old Wadada Leo Smith (“Defiant Life”), it’s prime territory for anyone assembling a road-trip playlist.

As curator of the Festival of Contemporary Music, composer Gabriela Ortiz is visiting Tanglewood for the first time. “I really wanted to establish that Mexican music has a line that is important to Tanglewood,” she tells the Globe’s A.Z. Madonna. They talk process, inspiration, and the state of Mexican music. “I don’t try to sound Mexican when I compose. What I have in mind is to discover my inner voice, and be honest.”

The Velvet Sundown has released three albums in less than two months, which isn’t as impressive as it sounds. “The Velvet Sundown isn’t a band at all,” writes Globe correspondent James Sullivan; “it’s a cryptic product of artificial intelligence that has amassed nearly 1.4 million monthly Spotify listeners.” He dives deep into the phenomenon, “certainly not the first time the music industry has grappled with deception.”

Tickets for this weekend’s Newport Folk Festival went on sale before the lineup announcement, and fans’ faith was rewarded. Alongside “need-no-introduction acts — Mary Chapin Carpenter, Luke Combs, Public Enemy, and Kenny Loggins, to name a few — this year’s lineup boasts a solid concentration of acts with ties to New England,” Globe correspondent Victoria Wasylak writes for Sound Check.

The Logan Airport pilot program bringing live music to baggage claim has sparked skepticism, but “I have to say that it kind of worked,” writes Madonna. “It kind of adds a nice charm now that we’re all stuck here waiting on our luggage,” said one traveler. “I hope it takes off.”

The Swedish metal band Ghost’s show at TD Garden this week was a “phone-free experience.” With their devices “locked in a small pouch that they carried or wore on lanyards,” fans encountered “a minor inconvenience that yielded a meaningful return to tradition,” writes Wasylak.

Lou’s opens Saturday in Harvard Square, returning live music to the Beat Brasserie space on Brattle Street. “[I]t’s just really exciting to get to hopefully revive something that has been missing in the Square,” general manager Allison Finney tells the Globe’s Matt Juul. “It might not be something you’re familiar with, but we really want to be a place of discovery for people as well.”

Toad is back after a lengthy closure, filling an important niche in the local music scene. The compact Cambridge club is now under the same ownership as The Burren in Somerville. “All of these smaller places, they are a lifeline to the culture of art in the whole Boston area,” guitarist Johnny Trama tells the Globe’s Danny McDonald. “More of them, the better.”

Books

Young aspiring artists at the 2024 Massachusetts Independent Comics Expo at Boston University School of Visual Arts in December 2024. PROVIDED

The Boston Comic Arts Foundation’s inaugural Boston Reads Comics program wraps up Saturday with an appearance by Svetlana Chmakova. The author of the graphic novel “Awkward,” a part-time Massachusetts resident, tells Globe correspondent James Sullivan, “Comics should be in every classroom under the sun.” He has a look at the event and the rise of the art form.

Stephanie Wambugu’s “Lonely Crowds” is a “masterful, thoughtful debut novel.” The author “plays in different registers, from the brevity of her exposition to the occasional lingering image,” writes Globe reviewer Kate Tuttle. “[A]s the novel unfolds, it emerges as one of the most emotionally and intellectually rich debuts I can remember reading in this or any year.”

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