This fall, KC’s highlights include Jason Sudeikis, Sally Field, Carol Burnett

Billy Brimblecom and his longtime buddy, comedian and actor Jason Sudeikis, didn’t know what the first Thundergong! event was going to feature.

“We originally thought last year it was going to be a drum event,” Brimblecom recalled.

They just knew it would benefit the Steps of Faith Foundation, a local nonprofit Brimblecom runs that provides support for amputees.

“It was like, ‘Let’s just do what we want and get a bunch of friends playing music we like,” Brimblecom said.

The “friends” turned out to be musicians Wynonna Judd, Tech N9ne and others, joined Sudeikis and his former “Saturday Night Live” cohorts Will Forte and Fred Armisen. They sold out the show at Uptown Theater last November and raised $150,000 for Steps of Faith, matching its annual budget.

The second version of Thundergong! will take place Nov. 3, again at the Uptown, with tickets going on sale Sept. 7.

Sudeikis will again serve as host, and Forte will return. Other performers will be announced as the date nears. Brimblecom said they will be “a who’s who of people who make music.”

“First and foremost, it’s a concert,” he said. “It’s a benefit concert, with an asterisk that it’s hosted by a funny guy, and there’s a lot of fun stuff going on.”

In a press release, Sudeikis said: “Last year’s Thundergong! was a tasty bowl of feel-good soup for the rock ’n’ roll soul. But this year, we’re going to turn it up a notch and serve the good folks of Kansas City a full-fledged jambalaya.”

For Brimblecom, an amputee since 2005 when he had cancer in his left leg, the idea for an event such as Thundergong! took hold as soon as Steps of Faith began in 2013 and he became executive director. He said the foundation has helped nearly 200 amputees, almost exclusively those who are uninsured or whose insurance doesn’t cover prosthetic care.

Brimblecom, a former drummer and would-be comic, knows he couldn’t have done it without Sudeikis, who is from Overland Park. The pair met in 1995 at a comedy workshop at the former ComedySportz in the River Market area when both were still in their teens. They’ve been close friends ever since.

Sudeikis helped Brimblecom pay for a prosthetic with a fundraiser in 2006, so Thundergong! was a natural extension of their relationship. And of Sudeikis’ giving nature.

“Ever since he’s had an ounce of fame and the chance to do good, he’s done it,” Brimblecom said.

8 p.m. Nov. 3 at Uptown. Tickets ($45-$150) will go on sale to the public Sept. 7 at thundergong.org.

Here are some other highlights in the Kansas City arts scene this fall.

Unicorn Theatre will present a new, modern take on the traditional boy-meets-girl romance for the opening production of its 45th season. In “The Effect,” two young volunteers, Tristan and Connie, take part in a drug trial and proceed to have an illicit romance that forces the supervising doctors to deal with the ethical consequences of their work. The British drama by Lucy Prebble, who also wrote “Enron,” premiered in 2012 at the National Theater in London and won the Critics Circle Award for best new play. Runs through Sept. 30. 816-531-7529. Tickets are $33-$43 through unicorntheatre.org.

If there just aren’t enough movies to satisfy your superhero cravings, “Marvel Universe Live! Age of Heroes” will provide six opportunities for you (or your children) to see your favorite characters in person in an all-new stunt show. Spider-Man, Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Black Panther, Hulk, Black Widow, Doctor Who and the Guardians of the Galaxy will be on stage as they race against time to recover the Wand of Watoomb before it falls into the hands of the evil Loki. 816-949-7100. Tickets are $22-$81 through sprintcenter.com.

When the historic Folly Theater reopens in September after being closed two months for a $2.5 million renovation project, among its first events will be the stage version of one of television’s most popular reality shows. The most recent season of VH-1’s “RuPaul’s Drag Race” has been nominated for a staggering 12 Emmys (the awards show will be Sept. 17 on NBC), including one for outstanding host. RuPaul Charles has won that Emmy the past two years but won’t be at the Folly, where celebrity judge Michelle Visage will serve as host and Season 10 finalists Aquaria, Asia O’Hara, Eureka and Kameron Michaels, among others, will perform. 816-474-4444. Tickets are $39-$59 through follytheater.org.

Originally from Connecticut, Angela Dufresne grew up in Olathe, attended the Kansas City Art Institute and now is based in Brooklyn. Her “Making a Scene” is a major museum exhibition focusing on depictions of modern life, with more than 30 paintings and video works spanning nearly a decade. Dufresne, a 2016 Guggenheim Fellow, has shown her work in the United States and Europe since 1993. She has been the subject of more than 20 solo exhibitions, including at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles. 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday-Wednesday and Saturday-Sunday, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thursday-Friday. 816-753-5784. kemperart.org. Free.

If you know Sally Field from the 1960s TV shows “Gidget” and “The Flying Nun” or from the 1970s movies “Norma Rae” and “Smokey and the Bandit,” you’ve got some catching up to do. Her memoir, “In Pieces,” will tell her full story for the first time. The winner of two Academy Awards (most recently for “Lincoln” in 2013) and three Emmy Awards was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2012 and was honored by President Barack Obama with the National Medal of Arts in 2015. Field will discuss her life, career and new book, to be released Sept. 18, with Vivien Jennings, founder and president of Fairway’s Rainy Day Books. 913-384-3126. Tickets are $29 (for one or two) through rainydaybooks.com.

The entire family will be amazed by the dance troupe iLuminate, whose performers are covered in electroluminescent wire and LEDs while dancing on a darkened stage. It is a visual experience that could be compared to a vision of the Country Club Plaza’s Christmas lights displays coming to life. The performance will tell a story set to music and will feature a narrator and a hero with a magical paintbrush that enables him to turn his artistic imaginings into reality. iLuminate finished third in the sixth season of “America’s Got Talent.” Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. 816-994-7222. Tickets are $29-$49 through kauffmancenter.org.

Bram Stoker’s classic tale of obsession and desire will arrive just in time for the Halloween season as Kansas City Actors Theatre presents its first original production with this adaptation produced in partnership with UMKC Theatre. UMKC product Josh LeBrun will assume the role of Count Dracula, and veteran actor Kip Niven, a Prairie Village native who was a regular on network TV in the 1970s and ’80s before resettling in the Kansas City area, will play Van Helsing. Runs through Oct. 21. 816-235-6222. Tickets are $20-$40 through kcactors.org.

Fellow Hickman Mills High School alums and Kansas City Repertory Theatre regulars Jake Walker and Rusty Sneary will star in KC Rep’s production of John Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men.” Walker, who has appeared in local productions ranging from “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” at the Coterie to “Hamlet” for Kansas City Actors Theatre, will play George. Sneary, who has taken on several roles in KC Rep’s annual presentations of “A Christmas Carol,” will play simple-minded Lennie in the iconic story of two migrant workers in Depression-era California. Runs through Nov. 11. 816-235-2700. Tickets are $35-$63 through kcrep.org.

The Nelson-Atkins will visit France for its final featured exhibition of the year. More than 200 works of art, most of which have never been exhibited in North America, will explore the majesty of Napoleon’s imperial court from 1799 to 1814. The exhibition, organized and circulated by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, contains masterpieces from the likes of Jacques-Louis David, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and Paul Chaudet. It will come to Kansas City from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, where it was on display June 9-Sept. 3. Runs through March 10. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thursday-Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday-Sunday. 816-751-1278. nelson-atkins.org. $10-$18.

To simply call Carol Burnett a comedy legend seems inadequate. She has been making people laugh for more than six decades, and she’s still doing so at a hectic pace. Her current tour will bring her to Kansas City two days after she performs in El Paso. From here she will go to St. Louis (Nov. 8), Dallas (Nov. 11) and Houston (Nov. 13). Her signature claim to fame, “The Carol Burnett Show,” ran from 1967 to 1978 and won 23 Emmy Awards. Burnett has won six Emmys, and she is nominated again for “The Carol Burnett Show 50th Anniversary Special.” 816-283-9921. Tickets are $65-$175 through midlandkc.com.

Based on the 2003 Jack Black movie, “School of Rock: The Musical” was pretty much a can’t-miss project. With music by Andrew Lloyd Webber (“Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Cats,” “Evita” and “The Phantom of the Opera”) and a book by Julian Fellowes (“Downton Abbey”), you might have expected the story of a high school rock band to take Broadway by storm when it opened in 2015. Unfortunately, that was also the year of “Hamilton,” which won 11 Tony Awards to none for “School of Rock.” Its Broadway run is scheduled to close in January. Meanwhile, the touring version has been on the road for nearly a year and will open the 2018-19 Kansas City Broadway Series. Runs through Nov. 18. 816-421-7500. broadwayinkc.com. Ticket prices TBA.