concerts Max Weinberg Big Band
Max, Max. We miss your deadpan humor, your hangdog demeanor, your blank stares. Since we won’t be able to catch you on Conan come November, we’ll be sure to make your concert this week at the Old Town School. We hear, in addition to your comedy career, you occasionally play drums for some guy named Bruce.
GO: Oct 24 at 7. $34­–$38. Old Town School of Folk Music, 4544 N Lincoln. oldtownschool.org

museums Gold
That’s it. Pick your jaw up off the floor. Because while this exhibition on one of the world’s earliest and most enduring status symbols includes plenty of eye candy (doubloons salvaged from sunken Spanish galleons, 13th-century Persian jewelry, Shani Davis’s Olympic speed-skating medals), there are also historical and geological lessons to absorb, and you might want to ask a question. Like how, exactly, did museum preparators cover a 300-square-foot room with one measly three-ounce hunk of metal?
GO: Oct 20–Mar 6. $15–$29 ($8 on Oct 20, when general admission is free). Field Museum, 1400 S Lake Shore. fieldmuseum.org

theatre 26 Miles
Quiara Alegría Hudes’s book for In the Heights revealed a writer with an ear for urban poetry. Here she plumbs a different kind of street: the family road trip. With an ensemble that includes the reliably excellent Eddie Torres (The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity), this one should be worth the drive.
GO: Previews through Oct 21. Regular run continues through Nov 21. All tickets $25. Teatro Vista and Rivendell Theatre at Chicago Dramatists, 1105 W Chicago. teatrovista.org

theatre Traces
Merge The Road’s apocalyptic ambiance with Cirque du Soleil’s acrobatic wonders and you get an idea of the harsh beauty that defines Traces, a play that is as philosophical as it is physical in mulling whether creation can triumph over destruction. You might not leave with the answer, but the visuals will stay with you a long time.
GO: Opens Oct 26. $50–$71.50. Broadway Playhouse, 175 E Chestnut. broadwayinchicago.com

film Tony & Janina’s American Wedding
When Janina was deported to Poland after 18 years in the U.S., her husband, Tony, launched a campaign for her, and their six-year-old son’s, safe return to Chicago—a labor of love that brought him into contact with immigration activists and opponents, as well as then-senator Barack Obama. This documentary follows his efforts, with the director, Ruth Leitman, and coproducer Steve Dixon participating in a Q&A along with the film’s subject, Tony Wasilewski, following the Oct 22 screening; Leitman sits in again Oct 27.
GO: Oct 22, 27 at 8. $7–$10. Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N State. siskelfilmcenter.org

ALSO THIS WEEK: Chicago Short Film Brigade returns for two shows, Oct 21 and 24, at the Hideout, brought to you in part by one of our stunning 2010 singles, the filmmaker extraordinaire Xan Aranda. And at Northwestern, WBEZ’s Gabriel Spitzer recruits a few NU scientists to weigh in on the Oct 20 program Mutants, Androids, and Cyborgs: The Science of Pop Culture Films.