BOOKS & TALKS Best-selling author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan talks about the industrialization of agriculture and shifting the focus back to “real food”—the kind our grandmas made. Benaroya Hall, Jan 15.

Seattle’s devoted say that yoga will change your life. But how? Bainbridge Island author Claire Dederer finds new meaning in the triangle pose in her memoir Poser; she reads at Elliott Bay Books. Jan 17.

HONORING MLK CD Forum and Seattle Center celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. on Saturday, with a dramatic reading of King’s speech “Beyond Vietnam” at 1pm in Center House. Jan 15.

OPERA Seattle Opera Young Artist alums star in Rossini’s sprightly comic work The Barber of Seville, led by rising tenor Lawrence Brownlee as the love-struck Count. McCaw Hall, Jan 15-29.

VISUAL ART Seattle Art Museum stays open until midnight for the final week of Picasso (thru Jan 17). Plus, it’s your last chance to see Image Transfer at the Henry (thru Jan 23) and BAM’s Biennial 2010: Clay Throwdown (thru Jan 16). Read about the final days of each exhibit here.

FILM In the documentary And Everything Is Going Fine, screening at SIFF, Steven Soderbergh stitches together footage of the late raconteur Spalding Gray’s performances for one final monologue. Jan 14-19.

VARIETE Local burlesque star the Swedish Housewife has taken over curatorial duties for Mezzo Lunatico, Teatro ZinZanni’s late-night cabaret show. She’s recruited a few new friends to join… Jan 15.

DANCE Recently installed as Intiman’s resident dance company, Whim W’Him by PNB principal Olivier Wevers—performs all new work in Shadows, Raincoats and Monsters. Jan 14-16.

THEATER And according to On the Board’s artistic director Lane Czaplinski, this weekend’s performance In the Solitude of Cotton Fields is “one of our flashiest shows of the year—with a live band, and this young, experimental director from Poland, Radoslaw Rychcik. He hasn’t been seen much in the U.S….but it’s that kind of a show that gets people around town talking.”

Twenty-nine-year-old Rychcik brings his Eastern European punk flair to a French play about an illegal deal between two skinny-tie, suited men: the Dealer and the Client. Band the Natural Born Chillers accompanies. Jan 13-16.