Friday Night Live at the ROM

Friday Night Live at the ROM is part trip to the Royal Ontario Museum, part evening out at a well-appointed night club, with goodies from local chefs thrown thrown in. Every Friday evening from now until June 22nd will see the ROM drop its admission price to $9, take on one-night-only displays from a selection of Toronto cultural institutions from local musicians to Toronto Fashion Incubator to the Inside Out Film Festival and feature bars and pop-up kitchens by Fidel Gastro, Jamie Kennedy, Waffle Bar and Corbin Tomaszeski. And yes, you can even see the regular museum exhibits until they close at 9:30.

My friends Marichka and Matt (as in Little Kitchen / Secret Pickle chef Kantor) put out an invitation to check out the fun last Friday night. Hilary said she’d like to come and it turned out that Eldon and Natalie also wanted to go as well.

Better yet, Anitra was in town! Now that’s what I call a perfect night out.

“It’s like a human-scale club!” said Marichka. It was actually larger than most clubs, but it certainly felt less claustrophobia-inducing. The place had club music and a clubby feel, but fewer of the annoyances. There were still people aplenty, but there was also a reasonable amount of elbow room. The lines for bars and food were a good deal shorter than any place in the Entertainment District, and it was actually possible to hold a conversation (at least until later in the evening, when the DJ cranked up the oontz oontz oontz music).

Anitra and I went straight to the ROM, so we didn’t have dinner beforehand. We ate the food there: cuban sandwiches from Fidel Gastro, Jamie Kennedy’s frites with garlic aioli, and apple fritters and waffles. The only thing we didn’t try — by chance only, not by choice — were Corbin Tomaszeski’s c5 noodles. It was a bit of a carb-heavy dinner, but it was all tasty.

We arrived at around eight, so we did a quick tour of the ROM before settling into party mode. From the looks of it, the whole museum was open to attendees, making our visit — museum visit and clubbing — a lot of bang for nine bucks.

Marichka wants to do as many Friday nights as possible at the museum, and I think I’m going to be at Friday Night Live more often than not. Better still, Anitra’s going to be back in town in a couple of weeks, and there’s a good chance that we’ll be there on Friday, May 18th.

Here’s the schedule of upcoming Friday Night Live at the ROM events:

• Friday, May 4th: The theme is “Fashion”, featuring Toronto Fashion Incubator, Dare to Wear Love and Textile Museum, Eco Luxe and Harricana Fashion, with a performance by KwikFiks featuring ATYEO.
• Friday, May 11th: The theme is “Photography”, in partnership with Scotiabank’s CONTACT Photography Festival, with a performance by Düzi Featuring DJ Jay Sea.
• Friday, May 18th: The theme is “Out”, in partnership with the Inside Out Film Festival, with a DJ set by Young Empires featuring DJ Ella D vs. Augustas.
• Friday, June 1: The theme is “Oh Canada, Eh?” with an all-Canadian theme and performance by Conor Cutz.
• Friday, June 8: The theme is “Music” with Dr. Draw’s electric violin and a yoga rave by Iam Yoga and Lululemon and performance by DJ Lokei and Jay Sea.
• Friday, June 15: The theme is “Futalongnko-What?” and will feature the 110 foot long Futulognkosaurus and the signature foot-long hot dog. There will also be a special tickets-only dinner at C5, featuring Argentinian food and Saurus Wines. There’ll also be a performance by DJ Dave Allison.
• Friday, June 22nd: The final Friday Night Live’s theme is “Gondwana Beats” featuring the opening of the Ultimate Dinosaurs: Giants of Gondwana and performance by DiGGY the DJ and DJ Jay Sea.

Want to find out more? Take a look at the Friday Night Live at the ROM page and this writeup at The Grid.