As we pass Thanksgiving, we move into Spooky Season of more ghostly fun and activities in the week’s picks
Frights: Until November 1, the family-friendly Halloween Spooktacular returns Canyon Frights at Capilano Suspension Bridge Park! Stoll spookily lit trails, experience playful scares and an eerie atmosphere as the park’s rainforest becomes a haunted wood – will you escape!?
Deadly: It’s Dinner to Die For at The Improv Centre! Celebrating its 45th anniversary season, Deadly Dinner Party invites audiences to an extravagant feast of deadly laughter at the mansion of an eccentric millionaire – Fridays and Saturdays at 7pm until October 30.
Witch: FLYOVER is scaring up some family fun for the Halloween season as HowlOver flies back to Vancouver’s favourite immersive theatre. Like the ghosts of hallows eve, the experience is fleeting, only visiting this realm for a limited run, October 15 to November 1.
Thieves: Until October 18, on the Stanley BFL CANADA stage, The Arts Club Theatre Company presents the brilliant BC Premiere of Arun Lakra’ Heist, a spectacular, cinematic-style, crime-thriller delivering a truly unique theatre experience to audiences that you won’t want to miss.
Stuff: Canadian comedy duo Matt Baram and Naomi Snieckus bring their acclaimed show, Big Stuff to the Arts Club Theatre Company’s Olympic Village Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre October 14th to November 1st
Romantic: For a record breaking five nights over the next week, Bruno Mars’ The Romantic Tour takes over BC Place, wrapping up the tours’ USA/Canada leg, with support from Andersen Paak – as DJ PeeWee – and Raye, October 14, 16, 17, 20, and 21, 2026
Demon: The Firehall Arts Centre opens its 2026-2027 season with the Canadian premiere of Hideki Noda’s Red Demon until October 18. Produced by rice & beans theatre and Gokko Creative Society, the darkly funny play highlights humanity’s behaviour in moments of intercultural conflict – when a Spanish speaking Red Demon washed up on the shore of a Japanese-speaking village.
Latin: Latincouver celebrates Latin American Heritage Month with a host of community programming around the Vancouver and Burnaby over the next 20-days from October 14 to November 2
Train: October 15-30, The Beaumont Studios presents Flushment Day, an immersive show taking the audience room to room to experience the 7 sins with Theatre, Burlesque, Cabaret, Music, Comedy as they look to escape on the Last Train to Utopia
Fright: Ride through the darkness, navigate fog-filled pathways, and discover what lurks around every corner of 7 haunted houses, 19 rides and attractions, roaming monsters, and immersive live entertainment, at PNE Fright Nights on until October 31
Trial: At The Cultch Historic Theatre, October 15-25, presented by Rumble Theatre and ITSAZOO Productions comes a love story as strange as it is seductive, The Effect – audiences go inside a clinical trial where the line between emotion and chemical manipulation begins to blur
Stand-up: The Vancouver Playhouse welcomes Monster by Gurleen Pannu. In Hindi and English, Pannu Yaar – A Stand-Up Comedy Special takes the audience into the whimsical Pannu-verse filled with the stand-up’s observational humour, and relatable personal stories.
Sounds: Friday, October 16, Shades of YVR presents Sounds of the City live music series, putting the spotlight Vancouver artists at the ANNEX for an intimate night of music featuring Dilly Cooner, OOAK., and Revay.
Tony: The Shadbolt Centre for Arts welcomes The Steve Maddock Quintet for a special evening honoring the centennial of the legendary Tony Bennett and the Great American Songbook on October 15
Pet: On stage until October 18 at the Waterfront Theatre on Granville Island, Dogfight: The Musical, the inaugural production from JBM Theatre the newly launched musical theatre co-operative is dedicated to showcasing the Lower Mainland’s exceptional artistic talents.
Hologram: October 15, Rogers Arena hosts a unique concert experience as the late Sidhu Moosewala’s Signed to God World Tour brings the Punjabi rapper to stage via hologram
Zombie: Witness the world premiere of Vascular Necrosis, by Jordyn Woods at The NEST Theatre until October 18. Five years after rising from the dead as a flesh-eating zombie, Penelope now, with the help of “de-necrotizers” – medication designed to suppress her zombie instincts — has been given a second chance to rejoin the living.
Time: Donald Margulies’ Time Stands Still presented by Curious Cats Theatre Collective, and directed by Curious Cats’ co-artistic directors Maryth Gilroy & Karen Hamm is playing October 14-25 at Jericho Arts Centre.
Axe: One night only, October 17, the Anvil Theatre Presents series gets underway with, Bury the Hatchet, a genre bending hit play from the UK, that re-examines the infamous 1892 Lizzie Borden murder case.
Local: Vancouver Farmers’ Markets continue to the end of October, bringing farm fresh bounty from local growers and makers, on Wednesdays Downtown at the Art Gallery, Thursdays at Olympic Village, Saturdays at Riley Park, Trout Lake & West End, and Sundays at Mount Pleasant & Kitsilano
Gallery: Opening October 17 with DJ sets by My!Gay!Husband! and The Ryze, at Grindhouse, a new contemporary art gallery and café-bar beside the Rio Theatre at Commercial Drive and Broadway, SCENES THAT STEAL THEMSELVES, is a group exhibition featuring over 25 artists responding to the disappearance of Vancouver’s cultural spaces, curated by Graeme Berglund and produced by Tyshaya Smith showing until November 15.
Sculpture: Until October 18, The Polygon Gallery shows James Harry: Eye Of The Ancestor – a
new sculpture by James Harry marking The Polygon Gallery’s seventh collaboration and co-commission with Burrard Arts Foundation. Eye of the Ancestor is a striking yellow cedar wooden sphere, carved with Coast Salish designs on the surface and holding a mirror-polished steel sphere inside.
Photography: Also at The Polygon Gallery, one of Canada’s most influential photographers, Greg Girard, is featured in the first-ever survey of his work, only on view until October 25.
Mouth: Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art presentsthe world premiere of Every River Has a Mouth: the visual languages that connect us, guest curated by Snuneymuxw artist Eliot White-Hill, Kwulasultun, on display until February 14, 2027
Climate: On display until March 20, 2027 at The Reach Gallery Museum in Abbotsford –Interglacial, is a stunning new exhibition from Vancouver-based environmental artist and activist Desirée Patterson. The exhibition examines the present moment as a critical point in history, as global climate change puts the future well-being of our planet at risk