Here they are, nine necessary know-abouts for the week ahead. It’s the leftover-turkey-sandwiches B9:
➤ The difference between Santa Claus and John Waters is a bit more than merely the difference between a big bushy beard and a pencil-thin mustache. Waters, the arch and slithery director of such camp classics as “Hairspray” and “Serial Mom,” offers up a show of comedy and storytelling for those who feel a tad steamrolled by the holiday season. “A John Waters Christmas,” coming to the Rio on Sunday, is a queer-friendly and contrarian view of the season, not for the easily offended, and a secret joy for all those who fantasize about spending December in a sensory-deprivation chamber.
➤ The Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, everybody’s famous summer place, is working to convince us all it can do winter pretty well too. The six-week “Winter Wonderland” opens this weekend.
➤ For the third time, the San Lorenzo Valley’s own Coffis Brothers team up with producer Tim Bluhm for another fine album of harmony-driven rock & soul. They unleash the new record Saturday.
➤ She is a lively mind and a seasoned soul. Celebrated writer Marilynne Robinson might be someone to turn to in these uncertain times. She visits the Rio Theatre on Tuesday.
➤ His day job is lecturer in jazz studies at San Jose State University, but the rest of the time, Jon Dryden is out on the edges of his own creative universe, exploring what he can do in the idiom of jazz piano. He is at Kuumbwa next week.
➤ The elegant jazz diva China Forbes leads her saucy band Pink Martini into the Rio Theatre to mark the band’s 30th anniversary of seductive swankiness.
➤ Santa Cruz Shakespeare debuts what it is counting on becoming an annual Santa Cruz tradition, its own take on the Charles Dickens classic tale “A Christmas Carol.”
➤ Driving around gazing at Christmas light displays has now become an art form thanks to the annual Holiday Lights extravaganza at the county fairgrounds, featuring more than half a mile of oohs and aahs. It opens this weekend.
➤ And, speaking of the Holiday Lights at the fairgrounds, next Thursday, Dec. 5, the event will transform into the realm of Krampus, the half-goat/half-demon figure from German mythology. Intrigued?