Arts & Entertainment
"Brevard County lures in the creme de la creme, including heavy hitting headliners, like Bill Maher, Yanni, Penn & Teller..."
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THE SHOW MUST GO ON!
Brevard County lures in the creme de la creme, including heavy hitting headliners, like Bill Maher, Yanni, Penn & Teller... When it comes to arts and entertainment, the area is brimming with live performances to quench your cultural appetite. A burgeoning mecca of entertainment, there is a multitude of mediums - Broadway musicals, symphonies, comedy shows, ballet performances, concerts, and so much more, to attend. Maxwell C. King Center for Performing Arts, situated on Brevard Community College's campus in Melbourne, FL, hosts several artistic and cultural showcases year-round. Here you can listen to the masterful sounds of the Brevard Symphony Orchestra as well as view the beauty and grace of the Space Coast Ballet. A time honored tradition of the area is to attend their elaborate and enchanting production of "The Nutcracker" during the winter season, which is a delight for all ages.
Cocoa Village Playhouse gives residents and visitors the tasty treat of theater. As the oldest theater in Brevard County, Cocoa Village Playhouse is a historical landmark. The playhouse hosts a variety of shows, mostly musicals, and is patronized by over 60,000 attendees a year. The area is home to several other performing groups that can be viewed at the following venues: Titusville Playhouse, Emma Parrish Theater (Titusville), The Surfside Players (Cocoa Beach), Henegar Center for the Arts (Historic Downtown Melbourne), Gleason Auditorium (Florida Tech Campus, Melbourne), Brevard Theater Ensemble, Places Please! Theatre Company, EGAD! Art Lab (Eau Gallie Arts District).
Visit ArtsBrevard.org to find out what's playing near you.
ARTISTIC FLAIR
Brevard County boasts a myriad of artistic showcases - from galleries to museums, art venues to festivals. The community has a wealth of art to explore, enjoy and collect. Eau Gallie Arts District, known as EGAD, is inundated with galleries and art studios, including the notable Foosaner Art Museum - a 15,000-square-foot venue that boasts world-class exhibitions and the Renee Foosaner Education Center that offers classes in several mediums, including: painting, drawing, pottery, printmaking.. Every month, EGAD hosts an event called First Friday Art Walk, during which local venues stay open late to host art demonstrations and exhibitions.
Art-enthusiasts can also get their fill from the gallery-saturated Historic Downtown Melbourne area, which has the Henegar Center for the Arts, the Melbourne Civic Theatre and the Strawbridge Art League. All through the year various shows and events take place here. During the spring, the quaint area hosts the Melbourne Art Festival, as well as the Melbourne Main Street Fall Art Festival in September.
Historic Cocoa Village is another great area for artistic revelries. Their Arts & Craft Fairs are held four times a year and showcase over 150 local artists, while their biannual Gallery Walks highlight galleries and allow patrons to peruse local shops to sample wine and light bites whilst enjoying music and art under the moonlight. For more art walks, visit Historic Downtown Titusville, where they're held once a month.
ATTRACTION CENTRAL
Brevard County is brimming with a wide range of attractions to keep all entertained. If you wish to soar high above the Atlantic Ocean, learn about space or climb walls of staggering heights, you can find all that right here.
For those looking for an adrenaline rush, Titusville offers skydiving at the Skydive Space Center. This is the home of the world's highest jumps (18,000 feet). If that's a bit extreme for you, check out Zero-G for a truly unparalleled experience. Find out what it feels like to float around in space. While inside their specially modified Boeing 727, you can experience the sensation of weightlessness --flip, soar and float till your heart's content. Cocoa Beach Parasail and Big Toho Parasailing allow patrons to peacefully soar above the open ocean and see the scenic area from an exhilarating new perspective.
If outer space interests you, Brevard is the ideal place to find out more on the subject, as this is the home of the world renowned Kennedy Space Center. Though the shuttle launch program was discontinued in 2011, there is still an innumerable amount of reasons to visit. Its enormous models and complex exhibits make this center a treasure trove of entertainment. Check out the Astronaut Hall of Fame and visit launch areas. Guided tours and shows (on their five-story IMAX screen) enable visitors to learn about the past, present and future of space exploration. That's not all! Kennedy Space Center goes beyond site-seeing and permits patrons to experience what space is like. Space flight simulation is available with their pioneering Shuttle Launch Experience. They also offer the Astronaut Training Experience, a half-day program that enables participants to see what its like to gear up for space travel. And as a special treat, kids have the opportunity to meet with a real astronaut, in-person, during an Astronaut Encounter or Lunch with An Astronaut. It's an out-of-this world experience.
For family-friendly activities, visit Melbourne's Andretti Thrill Park, which boasts four racetracks, bumper boats, miniature golf and laser tag. Another fun-filled entertainment complex in the area is Fun Town Family Entertainment - Brevard's largest indoor family fun center. Play in their arcade, roller skate, or partake in a game of laser tag. Cocoa Beach's Dinosaur Store boasts rides as well as dinosaur fossils and minerals. On the Edge Rock Climbing Gym in Melbourne, offers 10,000 square-feet of indoor rock climbing space. Test your endurance and sharpen your climbing skills. And when you're in the mood to ice skate, stop by Rockledge's Space Coast Iceplex for its freestyle sessions or lessons on figure skating.
Ball games are another family-oriented entertainment alternative. Catch a home game at the Space Coast Stadium in Viera, where the Brevard County Manatees, the Minor League Baseball team, play and where various community events take place throughout the year. Major League Baseball's Washington Nationals train here during the spring.
The Brevard Zoo is a unique preservation site that features more than 550 animals, 165 species, from all over the world, including Central and South America, Africa, Asia, Australia and Florida. The zoo is special because it enables visitors to enjoy the wildlife, and come extremely close to the animals - allowing the hand feeding of giraffes, and is the only zoo in the United States that permits kayaking around a 10-acre exhibit, Expedition Africa and paddle boating around its Wild Florida Exhibit - a 22-acre restored wetland area. In addition to the many exhibits, there is an adventure area where patrons can glide over the zoo's wetlands by a 700-foot zip line. The Treetop Trek boasts three different exciting aerial obstacle courses set at different levels and heights: The Treetop Challenge, Canopy Walk, and Chutes & Ladders.
For entertainment that packs a little more of thrill, there is the Melbourne Greyhound Park, which hosts dog races and high-stakes poker tournaments. Place your bets and see if Lady Luck is on your side. The venue also houses Groucho's Comedy Club, where you can catch some of the "best comedy of the coast."
