Best Bets: Friday 1/22

8 pm: Dance

India’s percussion master Zakir Hussain collaborates with Bay Area classical choreographer Alonzo King in “Who Dressed You Like a Foreigner?” (1998), to be given its local premiere by King’s Lines Contemporary Ballet at UCLA. Hussain, who composed the score, will perform it here. The award-winning 14-member ensemble is also scheduled to dance the local premiere of “Three Stops on the Way Home” (1997) to music composed by jazz great Pharoah Sanders.

* Alonzo King’s Lines Contemporary Ballet, Royce Hall, UCLA campus, Westwood. Friday and Saturday, 8 p.m. $10 (UCLA students) to $28. (310) 825-2101.

All day: Movies

Usually the New Beverly Cinema is strictly a revival theater, but this month it’s showcasing several new films that for various reasons don’t have full U.S. distribution. This week brings the premiere of “A Merry War,” which stars Richard E. Grant and Helena Bonham Carter and is based on George Orwell’s autobiographical novel “Keep the Aspidistra Flying.” It will play with another Grant film, the 1987 cult fave “Withnail and I.”

* “A Merry War” and “Withnail and I,” New Beverly Cinema, 7165 Beverly Blvd. Friday and Saturday. $3 to $6. (323) 938-4038.

8 pm: Theater

The national tour of the Stephen Sondheim-Burt Shevelove-Larry Gelbart musical romp “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” features Rip Taylor as Pseudolus.

* “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,” Haugh Performing Arts Center, Citrus College, 1000 W. Foothill Blvd., Glendora, Friday, 8 p.m. $28. (626) 963-9411; California Center for the Arts, 340 N. Escondido Blvd., Escondido, Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m. $27 to $47. (800) 988-4253.

8 pm: Theater

Jonathan Larson’s smash hit, the bittersweet musical “Rent,” returns for a six-week engagement in Century City. The Tony Award-winner for best musical and winner of the Pulitzer Prize for drama, inspired by Puccini’s “La Boheme,” is about a community of struggling young artists in New York.

* “Rent,” Shubert Theatre, 2020 Avenue of the Stars, Century City, Tuesdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturdays and Sundays, 2 p.m. Ends Feb. 28. $30 to $70. (800) 447-7400.

All day: Movies

“Like It Is,” a gritty look at the world of illegal bare-knuckle boxing from first-time director Paul Oremland, was the hit of the London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival. The film stars real-life UK featherweight boxing champ Steve Bell and former Who frontman Roger Daltrey.

* “Like It Is,” Nuart, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West Los Angeles. Friday through Jan. 28. $5 to $8. (310) 478-6379.

9 pm: Pop Music

As a side project for members of Soul Asylum, the Jayhawks, Run Westy Run, Wilco and now Big Star (new drummer Jody Stephens), Americana supergroup Golden Smog is a tough show to get on the road. But with the recent album “Weird Tales” earning glowing reviews, the comradely crew is undertaking its second concert tour, which includes dates at the House of Blues and the Galaxy Theatre.

* Golden Smog, with Hazeldine, House of Blues, 8430 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, 9 p.m. $16.50. (213) 848-5100. Also Sunday at the Galaxy Theatre, 3503 S. Harbor Blvd., Santa Ana, 8 p.m. $17.50. (714) 957-0600.

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Freebies: The Beach Cities Symphony performs Viennese music at the Marsee Auditorium of El Camino College, at Crenshaw and Redondo Beach boulevards, Torrance, 8:15 p.m. (310) 379-9725.

Pianist John Mayer’s trio plays jazz at LACMA, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., 5:30 p.m. (323) 857-6000.