Cool Cleveland (2)

Cleveland traditions die hard, especially around the holidays. It's the time when the town dresses up, folks come to visit (and need something to keep them occupied), but no one does much of anything different. Years ago, it was the Sterling-Lindner tree. For a time, it was Cleveland Ballet's "Nutcracker." But those mainstays of the season are long gone.

Sure, you can still revisit Great Lakes Theater Festival's "A Christmas Carol" (www.greatlakestheater.org) or maybe you'll get sucked into watching "A Christmas Story" once again. You can also find tradition in unexpected places, such as the Neck Center's presentation of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor DreamCoat" (www.lkwdpl.org/beck) or Near West Theatre's production of "The King and I" (www.nearwesttheatre.org).

But before allowing that sense of ennui to set in, we'd like to propose a change of pace this year.

Mrs. Bob Cratchit's Wild Christmas Binge You've heard of Christopher Durang and you've probably even seen some of his work: "Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You" and "The Marriage of Bette and Boo." This time, he lampoons many of the chestnuts just begging for a smart roasting: "OliAer Twist," "It's a Wonderful Life" and "The Old Curiosity Shop," not to mention the granddaddy of them all, "A Christmas Carol." The inside jokes should keep you smirking straight through, and isn't that what the holidays are for? Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m. through Dec. 20 at Cleveland Public Theatre, 6415 Detroit Ave., (216) 631-2727, www.cptonline.org.

Art/Tech/Dance Downtown Holiday Art Party In an effort to bring together Cleveland's disparate creative class (and, face it, to have a few drinks), Cool Cleveland hosts the sixth installment of its (admittedly) wildly successful after-work networking hooplas, this one at the ARTcade (formerly Euclid Arcade) running between Euclid and Prospect at East Sixth Street, on Friday, Dec. 12, from 4 to 8 p.m., with an after-party directly following. These soirees always feature an open bar, lots of local hors d'oeuvres and live Cleveland art. This time, there will be handmade art gifts for your last-minute holiday needs. ARTcade, 530 Euclid Ave. Register at www.CoolCleveland.com.

MOCA Mix: Tempo Move to a different beat this season when the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland offers a sensory barrage of manipulated video with acoustic and electronic music by Cleveland multimedia artists Paul Sydorenko (known as sanchpa), Jude Goergen (jugoe), Ryan Hisey and video guru Phase4, plus DJ sets by Ted Knight and No_Pan. Check out the experimental Space and Eggs, which takes an abstract view of the cycles of existence. How's that for holiday spirituality? Saturday, Dec. 13, 8 p.m. at MOCA, 8501 Carnegie Ave., (216) 421-8671, www.MOCAcleveland.org.