8 pm: Pop Music
With not one but two of its albums in the top 10 of the sales chart earlier this month, ‘N Sync is making a bid for the teen-pop throne that’s belonged to the Backstreet Boys for the past year. The Orlando, Fla.-based vocal outfit begins a series of Southland dates that’s an early prelude to a string of arena concerts in April.
* ‘N Sync, with Britney Spears and B*Witched, Sunday at Cox Arena, San Diego State University, 8 p.m. Sold out. (619) 594-6947. Tuesday and Jan. 8 at the Universal Amphitheatre, 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, 7:15 p.m. Sold out. (818) 622-4440.
all day: Movies
Avoid the crowds at the multiplexes and head to the New Beverly Cinema for a double dose of 1920s comedy. Charlie Chaplin is the floundering but plucky gentleman-tramp somehow cast into a roughhouse Klondike snowscape of miners, murderers, bears and louts in the 1925 treat “The Gold Rush.” Buster Keaton plays a Confederate soldier with two loves, a locomotive engine and his reluctant sweetheart (Marion Mack), in 1927’s “The General,” a film that many critics regard as Keaton’s best. Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin: Is there a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon?
* “The Gold Rush” and “The General,” New Beverly Cinema, 7165 Beverly Blvd.. Sunday through Tuesday. $3 to $5. (323) 938-4038.
7 pm: Comedy
Sure, Jay Leno has a regular gig on your TV five nights a week--but have you seen him in person? Nearly every Sunday, Leno entertains the crowd at the Comedy and Magic Club in Hermosa Beach.
* Comedy and Magic Club, 1018 Hermosa Ave., Hermosa Beach. $22 plus two-drink minimum. Full restaurant menu. (310) 372-1193.
All day: Culture
The California Aiseki Kai (Stone-Loving Club) brings its annual exhibition of traditional
suiseki and American viewing stones to the Huntington. Suiseki (pronounced: soo-ee sek-ee) is a tradition that comes out of China and Japan, where stones that are sculpted by wind, water or time are mounted on wood or in sand to be used as objects of contemplation or as accent pieces to bonsai trees. Most of the stones on display were found by members of the club, said organizer Jim Greaves. “We are trying to extend the art form into an American context by including desert stones and other things that the Japanese wouldn’t,” he said. “People just don’t think of stones as art until they’re confronted with this--but people who have ever picked up stones or collected them really connect with this.”
* “Suiseki Show” in Friends Hall at the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino. 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Ends Sunday. $8.50; $7, seniors; $5, students; free for children under 12. (626) 405-2141.
All day: Family
Almost as big a tradition as the parade itself is the viewing of the Rose Parade floats afterward. Up close you can see the intricate and time-consuming work that went into attaching all those flowers. Keep in mind that while it’s not quite the mob scene of the parade itself, generally there is a one-mile walk between the parking lot and the floats.
* Post-Rose Parade float viewing, on Sierra Madre Boulevard between Washington Boulevard and Sierra Madre Villa Avenue. Friday, 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. $2. (626) 449-ROSE.
All day: Miniatures
Some people just watch movies; Nick Infield rebuilds them. In boxes. At the Carole and Barry Kaye Museum of Miniatures, three of Infield’s dioramas are on view, including the final sword fight between Errol Flynn and Basil Rathbone in “The Adventures of Robin Hood” and the final scene from “Casablanca.” A professional focus-puller for movies by trade, Infield spends up to 2 1/2 years building a diorama from scratch.
* “Nick Infield’s Dioramas” at the Carole and Barry Kaye Museum of Miniatures, 5900 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles. Tuesdays through -Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Sundays, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. $7.50; $6.50, seniors; $5, students; $3, children 3 to 11. (323) 937-6464.
*
FREEBIES: “Cruisin’: The Art of the Lowrider Bicycle” and “Bicycles: History, Beauty, Fantasy” close Sunday at the UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History, 405 Hilgard Ave., Westwood, noon to 5 p.m. (310) 825-4361.
*
Soprano Jennifer Mathious and guitarist Felix Bullock perform at the L.A. County Museum of Art, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., 4 p.m. (213) 485-6873.