Mikey G's Picks of the Week

This week’s top arts and entertainment picks around town, from the guy who’s paid to pick them: Monday: The Cleveland Botanical Garden’s A Taste of Tuscany loads up on Italian flavors with a smorgasbord of special exhibits, displays, and programs. The showpiece is a horticultural show featuring fountains, statues, and lots of exotic plants. A photo exhibit, Giardini di Toscana, includes 50 color pics of Italian gardens and villas. And the venue’s café serves rosemary- and garlic-flavored dishes throughout the exhibition’s three-month run. That’s-a good! Tuesday: The unlikely pairing of Marilyn Manson and Slayer on the road this summer has metal fans stumped. Slayer is one of the most real bands in the game; Manson is, well, Manson. Still, the ear-bleeding potential is paramount. They play Tower City’s Time Warner Cable Amphitheater. Wednesday: It seems that Ted Leo & the Pharmacists have been on the road every single day since their 2003 breakthrough, Hearts of Oak. Every once in a while, they get around to releasing a pretty good album too – like the new Living With the Living. Leo brings his mix of old-school punk and pop anthems to the Beachland. Thursday: The Vans Warped Tour comes to Tower City’s Time Warner Cable Amphitheater today. There’s gonna be more bands there than you can possibly see. Try not to miss Paramore , a young Tennessee band led by the spunky Hayley Williams. Their new album, Riot!, rocks. Friday: Allegro starts off as a pretty conventional love story between an ambitious pianist and a woman he meets after he locks himself out of his apartment. But within 20 minutes, this terrific film takes a wide turn. The woman leaves the brilliant but emotionally detached musician during a recital. Soon after, their Copenhagen neighborhood becomes mysteriously surrounded by an impenetrable force field, sealing off from the rest of the world. It’s a mind-fuck on the scale of Kubrick’s best. It screens at the Cleveland Cinematheque tonight and Sunday. -- Michael Gallucci