B4B NYC: The 5 Best Bang-for-Your-Buck Adventures in New York City This Weekend

NEW YORK, NY — Here we are, somehow, already in October. The leaves are busting out their fall colors just as your summer melanin boost fades away. It's officially sweater weather, kids — and time for a crisp autumn jaunt about town.

That's where we come in: With so much to see and do around this time of year in the city, our weekly B4B NYC event roundup is your one-stop shop to find five of the best local bang-for-your-buck adventures from Friday through Sunday, in every taste and price range. You've got no excuse anymore — get out there and BE SOMEBODY! *Tush slap.*

But first, it's a...

WHAT-A-SPLENDID-WEEKEND-TO-GET-YOUR-ART-ON ALERT

MOMA: BRUCE CONNER, NAN GOLDIN, TEIJI FURUHASHI

Pictured: Teiji Furuhashi's Lovers (1995)

Where: Museum of Modern Art, Midtown [map]

When: Friday, 9/30, from 10:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.; Saturday, 10/1, and Sunday, 10/2, from 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

What: Step One: Pay the man the money. Step Two: See art. (Or, if you're strapped for cash and don't mind elbowing through the horde, show up to MoMA on Free Fridays and skip Step One entirely!) This weekend is an especially choice time to swing by the museum, as three excellent exhibits happen to be on display at the same damn time. And one of them — the first-ever retrospective of American post-war powerhouse Bruce Conner — ends this Sunday. Also on tap is Teiji Furahashi's tantalizing video installation Lovers and Nan Goldin's haunting The Ballad of Sexual Dependency, a series of nearly 700 snapshot-like portraits of love, lust, hurt and plenty of questionable behavior. (As the artist herself once called it, "a diary I let people read.") A triple-bill bargain, even at full price! More information and tickets here.

How much: Tickets are $25 (or FREE on Friday from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m.)

GRUB STREET FOOD FESTIVAL

Where: Seward Park, Lower East Side [map]

When: Saturday, 10/1, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.

What: Grub Street is back! For the seventh year running, the pay-as-you-go food fest takes over the Lower East Side — and this time, more than 50 vendors are already signed up. It's the perfect place to compile that death-row last meal you've fantasized about, a mix-and-match pile of everything wonderful. (Us? We'll be having a lobster, two tacos, a grilled-cheese sandwich and some yuzu-flavored ice cream.) There will also be live music and a biergarten at the park, and tons of football on TV — but the food's really what this day is all about. More information and a complete list of vendors here.

How much: FREE! (you just pay for what you eat)

THE MASTER: THE FILMS OF PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN

Where: Museum of the Moving Image [map]

When: Films will screen on Friday, 9/30, at 7 p.m.; Saturday, 10/1, at 2:30 p.m. and 6 p.m.; and Sunday, 10/2, at 2 p.m., 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

What: "To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die," wrote the great Glaswegian poet Thomas Campbell. In that spirit, the Museum of the Modern Image has, for the past month, been hosting a film festival celebrating the work of Philip Seymour Hoffman, who until his tragic and untimely death was perhaps Hollywood's premier character actor. The festival ends this weekend with screenings of Magnolia, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, Charlie Wilson's War, 25th Hour, A Most Wanted Man and The Talented Mr. Ripley. Come out and invite into your heart a man who mastered imagined worlds, as perhaps the real world was just a little too much for him. Tickets and complete screening schedule here.

How much: Tickets are $12

CHILE PEPPER FESTIVAL

Where: Brooklyn Botanic Garden [map]

When: Saturday, 10/1, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

What: If you pop jalapeños like candy and think pepperoncini is for babies, then you'll want to make a pilgrimage to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden this Saturday for the Chile Pepper Festival. Sixty-two purveyors offer capsaicin-laden sauces, dishes and desserts that push the Scoville meter into overload. Tons of internationally flavored live music and two sword-swallowing, fire-breathing masters of ceremony will keep things rocking. Think you can handle a bhut jolokia pepper or (gasp!) a world-record Carolina Reaper? Now's your chance to prove it. More information and tickets here.

How much: Tickets are $20 for adults (or $15 for students and seniors)

THE BIRD AND THE BEE

Where: Music Hall of Williamsburg, Brooklyn [map]

When: Friday, 9/30, 8 p.m.

What: Now for something a little less caliente. Clean the puke off your shoes and order a nice cold fizzy water, because Los Angeles-based duo The Bird and The Bee and their trademark dream-pop descend on — or, to be more accurate, float gently into — the Music Hall of Williamsburg Friday night. They'll likely draw from their most recent record, the soft-rocking, synth-driven Recreational Love. But if you're lucky, maybe they'll pull out "Fucking Boyfriend" or that odd Hall and Oates cover from the vaults. More information and tickets here.

How much: Tickets are $22

LAGUNITAS BEER CIRCUS

Where: MCU Stadium Parking Lot, Coney Island [map]

When: Saturday, 10/1, from noon to 5 p.m.

What: When your Pops warned you that drinking too much will make everything look like a crazy sideshow funhouse, he wasn't imagining the Lagunitas Beer Circus, where things start out that way. This Saturday afternoon, more than 100 local and visiting freak-show performers — sword-swallowers, fire-breathers, nail-eaters, glass-chompers, you get the idea — as well as live bands, carnival barkers and burlesque dancers shaking what their mommas gave 'em will turn the Coney Island waterfront into, well, the Coney Island waterfront. But this time, with an ocean's worth of Lagunitas and other craft beers on tap and food trucks at the ready. Pro tip: DO come in costume; DO NOT bring a baby or a dog (you will be turned away). Proceeds benefit the Alliance for Coney Island, a nonprofit dedicated to revitalizing America's zaniest beachfront. More information and tickets here.

How much: Tickets are $40 (absolutely no one under 21 permitted, INCLUDING BABIES AND PETS)

And finally, it's a ...

LAST-CHANCE-TO-BREAK-OUT-THE-LEDERHOSEN ALERT

OKTOBERFEST 2016

This is pretty much your final weekend to drink under a tent and ride a children's carousel like a Bavarian. Here are some links to Oktoberfest celebrations in and around NYC:

Munich on the East River (23rd Street and FDR Drive)

Oktoberfest New York (South Street Seaport)

Oktoberfest at Brooklyn Bavarian Biergarten (Park Slope)

Bear Mountain Oktoberfest Cruise (Hudson Valley)

Submit your event to arts@patch.com to be considered for the B4B NYC weekly roundup.