Best Improv Comedy Troupe 2000 | Section 8 | Best of Dallas® 2020 | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Dallas | Dallas Observer
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Best Improv Comedy Troupe

Section 8

Are the guys in Section 8 the funniest? Depends on the show. A good audience can make the show come together as surely as a bad one can ruin it. The point is this: These guys are fast and ready to take what they're handed. They're crass; they have a crazy following. They have two weekly shows--Wednesdays at the Improv in Addison and Thursdays at Ozona on Greenville Avenue. But they do something that troupes can rarely do--pull young adults away from the TV screen or Deep Ellum bars and into a comedy club. Perhaps it's because Section 8 is primed for that target--kids who love gross-out humor, understand pop culture references, and like to hear parodies of popular songs.

Best local music fans

The Chomsky Army

OK, sure, they get a tad obsessive (that works better if you replace "a tad" with "extremely"). Yet you won't find any more dedicated fans than the group of people mouthing the words and awkwardly dancing at the foot of the stage during Chomsky shows. It doesn't matter if the shows are in Denton, Dallas, Fort Worth, or even Austin, they'll be there. They've been known to spread their affections to other bands that are somewhat Chomsky-related (such as The Deathray Davies), but Chomsky is still their main focus, the topic of countless Internet message board discussions and illicitly taped bootlegs. They're here, they're dorky--get used to it.

Best Band Name (Once You Know What It Means)

The Lucky Pierres

There are plenty of bands with dumb names floating around Deep Ellum, most of which only get dumber once someone explains what they mean. For instance, Alligator Dave & the Couch Band, Rubix Groove, Elm Fooy, Spoonfed Tribe, Plastic Tongue, Edgewater, Dolly Braid, Red Trucks & Chickens, and on and on and on. The Lucky Pierres' handle, at first, seems only marginally better. But consider this for a moment: "Lucky Pierre" is a term describing the central figure in what we believe the French call a mnage à trois. Maybe it's the 13-year-old boy in us talking, but that's pretty cool.

Best Dallas businessman

Lou Reese

The crafty Deep Ellum developer stands accused in civil court of bleeding several savings-and-loans in the '80s, ratting out a few bank presidents, doing some very short time in the federal slam, and returning a rich man, flush with zillions stashed in offshore banks. Why is Lou the best? Well, anyone can make a killing in Big D when times are good. Hanging onto it in tough times is the tricky part. In this regard, Reese is a Hall of Famer.

Best Online PR Stunt

dotcomguy

In January, a University Park man decided to do what no computer geek had done before: For one year, he would live his life online, his every movement--sleeping, eating, goofing off mostly--would be Webcast to a global audience 24-7. He would abstain from sex and travel (traveling was the hard part), never leaving his home, which was quickly labeled the dotcompound, and only venturing into his backyard for an occasional breath of fresh air. The Internet would satisfy all his needs. He would order food, furniture, and frivolity online in an attempt to prove that man can live by e-commerce alone. What seemed like an interesting social experiment quickly revealed itself as little more than a publicity stunt. Hordes of media types hungry for some millennial meaning stormed the dotcompound, interviewing the cyberbore 10 to 15 times a day. The mass exposure became its own phenomenon, driving hundreds of thousands to his Web site and turning him into one of the first global cyber-personalities, famous for nothing save a good gimmick. Which actually proves something after all: The virtual world isn't much different from the physical world.

Best new museum

The Women's Museum

Labeled "An Institute for the Future," this new institution will open this month in the former Coliseum in Fair Park. Using interactive media, the museum will tell the stories of American women, including those of Harriet Tubman, Dorothy Day, Jane Addams, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Maya Lin. Grab your girls and go...girl.

Best IMAX theater (tie)

Cinemark 17 & The Science Place

All right, you caught us. There are only two IMAX theaters in Dallas, but each one has its advantages, its charm, its je ne sais quoi. While The Science Place generally sticks to more, uh, duh, scientific films, the Cinemark goes for the flash and hype. It's The Magic of Flight vs. Cirque du Soleil's Journey of Man, or Wolves vs. Siegfried and Roy. (If only that last match-up were real.) The Science Place has the huge, domed screen whereas Cinemark has a flat, rectangular screen like regular theaters, only with 3-D capabilities. The Science Place has that neat film of a helicopter tour of Dallas. Cinemark has traditional movie theater snacks. Both will end the year with a second run of Fantasia 2000.

Best radio station

Magic 102.1-FM "Jammin' Oldies"

We can quibble with Magic 102's haphazard sense of history in its programming choices--does '80s Madonna, however much a dance-floor mainstay she was then, really deserve so much airplay alongside Donna Summer, one of the greatest pop singers of the past 25 years and one of the canniest, a woman whose endless string of Giorgio Moroder-produced hits enjoys much-deserved new life among the station's "Jammin' Oldies"? We're also sick of hearing Rick James' "Super Freak," among the most repeated oldies offered here. But overall, this expansive menu of '60s, '70s, and '80s soul, disco, and R&B comes up a winner every couple songs. You can't hear the Rev. Al Green's majestic love sermons with such frequency anywhere else on Dallas radio, nor the sweaty efforts of James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin (less "Respect," please, and more "Rock Steady"), Sly and the Family Stone, and Martha and the Vandellas. Although the corporate radio format forbids experimentation, we think Magic 102 FM would only gain listeners if its list expanded to fill the genre's under-respected genius outsiders--Etta James, Labelle (anything besides "Lady Marmalade"), Irma Thomas, Little Milton, Parliament Funkadelic, and Ann Peebles, to name just a few.

Best theater company

Wingspan Theatre

Wingspan Theatre

Best Gadfly/Activist

Anne Carlson, Dallas County chair, Common Cause Texas

She might look like your benevolent aunt, but Anne Carlson is a pit bull. Her quiet but determined approach to uncovering the sleaze of City Hall politics is a refreshing change from the E-histrionics of Sharon Boyd or the eco-tinged good government babble of the Green Party types. They are her allies, but she puts the best foot forward with a more professional approach. She knows the fight isn't about herself but her issues, and she sticks to them tenaciously. As a champion of electoral reform and government ethics, she seldom misses an important meeting and always has coherent material to back her positions. Combine that efficiency with her smarts and even temper (even when goaded), and you have a badass gadfly who could possibly drive real change in Dallas politics. The odds are stacked against her, but hell, we can dream, can't we?

Best Of Dallas®

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