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Weekend picks: Andy Warhol on film and a rom-com opera

The "symphonic theater" work O Monsters First Draft performed by New Paradise Laboratories tells a fractured fairy tale about an odd family living in a "mansion made of numbers" and living under the rule of a matriarch who bases her de

"O Monsters First Draft" by New Paradise Laboratories at FringeArts.
"O Monsters First Draft" by New Paradise Laboratories at FringeArts.Read moreKate Raines / plate3.com

Friday-Saturday

By the numbers

The "symphonic theater" work O Monsters First Draft performed by New Paradise Laboratories tells a fractured fairy tale about an odd family living in a "mansion made of numbers" and living under the rule of a matriarch who bases her decisions on a mysterious poetic equation that keeps the house from disintegrating. It's set to a score by the intriguing composer Bhob Rainey, derived from the mathematics of NASA asteroid tracking, Internet traffic patterns, and stock market prices ("phenomena that represent, to me, a certain unruly indifference that the universe holds towards our interpretation of it"). The show goes on at FringeArts, Columbus Boulevard and Race Street.

Times: 8 p.m. Friday, 4 and 8 p.m. Saturday. Tickets: $29; $15 students. Information: 215-413-1318 or www.fringearts.com.

Friday

Two by Warhol

Between 1963 and 1968, Andy Warhol created a distinctive body of film, using the denizens of the New York scenesters populating his Warehouse, and playing with the conventions of the popular media, sometimes focusing for long takes on situations and objects, and sometimes presenting disjointed near-narratives. Here're two examples from 1965: Restaurant, a slow zoom back from a tablecloth, accompanied by indistinct conversation from a crowd including Warhol superstar Edie Sedgwick; and The Life of Juanita Castro, in which the Cuban Revolution is reenacted in a inept improv, with women playing Fidel and Che, and with the cast facing a nonworking camera while being filmed from the side. The films screen at International House, 3701 Chestnut St.

Time: 7 p.m. Admission is free; ticket required. Information: 215-387-5125 or ihousephilly.org

Friday & Sunday

Love potion

Opera, gloriously goofy and grand, doesn't come much goofier or grander than Donizetti's rom-com The Elixir of Love, about a shy peasant in love with a wealthy woman (she loves him, too, but doesn't know it yet). He turns to a quack's concoction to inspire amorous devotion in her before she marries a swaggering soldier. Opera Philadelphia stages the work at the Academy of Music, Broad and Locust Streets.

Times: 8 p.m. Friday, 2:30 p.m. Sunday (also 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, 8 p.m. next Friday, and 2:30 p.m. May 8). Tickets: $19 to $239. Information: 215-732-8400 or operaphila.org

Sunday

Get sprung

Flowers are in bloom, trees are green again, temperatures are rising - spring is here at last. Celebrate at the Haverford Spring Fest, a street fair featuring music from the Verve Pipe, Chico's Vibe, Mason Porter, Cheerleader, and Lisa Chavous, plus a pitching cage with former major-leaguer Mike Costanzo, food, crafts, children's activities, and more. It's at Brookline Boulevard and Darby Road, Havertown.

Tickets: $3. Time: Noon to 7 p.m. Information: HaverfordSpringFest.com

Sunday

Dance on film

Quintessential Bolshoi Ballet, the Alexei Fadeyechev adaptation of Marius Petipa and Alexander Gorsky's Don Quixote hits the screen at the Bryn Mawr Film Institute, 824 W. Lancaster Ave., Bryn Mawr.

Time: 1 p.m. Tickets: $20; $10 students. Information: 610-527-9898 or brynmawrfilm.org