In moving the hit film to the stage, with dozens of show tunes, the edgy humor of the DreamWorks flicks gets lost in a mountain of in-jokes about other Broadway shows. Now Shrek, Donkey and Fiona seem to exist in a sort of fairytale Shubert Alley, where every character knows…
On weekends hungry customers line up five-deep at the chaat counter at the back of Tajmahal grocery store (501 W. Belt Line Road, Richardson). Chaat, roughly translated, means snack or street food. On a recent visit to this friendly all-vegetarian spot in a shopping center lined with Indian cafes and…
Go on in. Don’t be shy. If you’re not sure what’s what inside Tajmahal Imports, the all-vegetarian Indian grocery at 501 W. Beltline in Richardson, ask for Mr. Shah. That’s Pramod Shah, the owner of this expansive food, spice, knickknack, religious statuary and cookware store on the southwest corner of…
If you haven’t visited the lovely Butterfly Garden outside the Bath House Cultural Center on the east side of White Rock Lake, drop by the Dallas Green Festival Butterfly Rally tomorrow morning for a free breakfast. Breakfasters and butterfly lovers will get a look at 30 electric smart cars as…
The bigger the show, the smaller the revival. Vintage American musicals keep getting make-unders on Broadway. The trend began with 2005’s Sweeney Todd, a shoestring affair imported from London that forced the cast to double as the onstage “orchestra.” Star Patti Lupone awkwardly blew into a tuba. And thus diminished,…
The Emmy-winning and highly rated Top Chef franchise on Bravo puts the icing on its cake with this week’s debut of Top Chef: Just Desserts (10 p.m., Wednesday, September 15, then moving to its regular slot at 9 p.m. the following week). Hosting the competition among 12 top-flight pastry chefs…
Could you eat a 5-pound grilled cheese sandwich? Should you? If there’s anyone who can and will, it’s Adam Richman, star of Travel Channel’s cross-country chow challenge series Man v. Food. On Monday’s episode (7 p.m., September 13, on the cable station), Richman attempts to conquer the Monster Grilled Cheese…
W Dallas’ Living Room Terrace bar in Victory Park is hosting “Vinyasa and Vino” nights for the next four Sundays. The hotel and the Lululemon Athletica yoga-wear store at NorthPark are teaming up to offer a free yoga class, 6 to 7 p.m., September 12, 19 and 26, and October…
Discovering a collection of old recipe booklets my late grandmother saved and used for decades has inspired me. Can I replicate some of those now-forgotten dishes the way they used to make them? First up: Prune Whip. It’s a chilled dessert, or at fancier tables way back when a palate…
Among the veggies in season right now at the downtown Dallas Farmers Market (1010 S. Pearl St.) are the adorable 8 Ball zucchini squash. About the size of a baseball, in yellow flecked with green or solid green like the typical zukes, 8 Ball squash are a new hybrid developed…
You’re either an okra person or you’re not. Mark Wootton is an okra guy. As a kid in Highland Park, Wootton grew okra in the back yard of the family home on Shenandoah Street. “And I had an okra stand instead of a lemonade stand,” he says. “Sold it on…
The season of farce is upon us. Two more big comedies have just opened for grins: Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps at Fort Worth’s Stage West and Unnecessary Farce at Pocket Sandwich Theatre. They join the still-running, lavishly funny Bach at Leipzig at Fort Worth’s Circle Theatre (through September 18)…
Reality TV just got a little sweeter. To celebrate the September 15 debut of Bravo’s Top Chef spinoff, Top Chef Just Desserts, OpenTable.com is offering free dessert with meals purchased at more than 30 restaurants in Dallas and Fort Worth. Make your reservation through the online service at one of…
Like so many of the plays produced at Contemporary Theatre of Dallas, the new one by Ed Graczyk called The Blue Moon Dancing is just Steel Magnolias by another name. Contemporary Theatre did Steel Magnolias earlier this year. It seems as if they do it every year. They put on…
Café Express has long been a fallback when I can’t get anyone to agree where to meet for a quick dinner. The menu is diverse, dishes are reasonably priced (most are under $10) and there are enough options to satisfy carnivore-befriending vegetarians. Also, the one in Uptown is next door…
Since January 17, Tonja Bigelow-Brown has died three times. She died first on an operating table at Medical City Dallas, where surgeons cut her open to find the source of an E.coli bacterial infection that caused her fallopian tubes to rupture. She was revived that night, waking briefly out of…
Second only to Christmas holidays for bringing in customers, the 15th annual Hatch Chile Festival at Central Market stores, going on now through August 31, creates shopping cart gridlock. What is it about the smoky vegetable from the nightshade family that earns such devotion from foodies? “It’s the flavor,” says…
My mom saves everything. When I helped her move last month, I begged her to jettison the trunks and boxes and tubs of old papers and letters she’d held onto for decades. She’s not a hoarder, more of an archivist. She reached into one box and fanned out 11 little…
What actor doesn’t love a free meal? But it never hurts to give theatergoers a nibble on opening nights, too. In theaters around here, there are some really toothsome reasons to buy tickets (for as little as $10 or $15, depending on the theater) for a production’s first performance. Some…
When they’re up and dancing, A Bollywood Lysistrata, a new piece by Level Ground Arts in their new home at KD Studio Theatre, feels as fresh and salty-sweet as the cool Indian yogurt drink known as lassi. If only they could have danced all night. It’s the standing-around-talking parts that…
Actors tend to know the ins and outs of food service. Table-waiting pays the bills for many a young thesp until that big break comes along. Edie Falco waited tables at a Manhattan steak joint even after making her film debut playing a waitress in Hal Hartley’s directorial debut The…
Sherlock Holmes as hottie? Theatre Three has him in actor Chuck Huber, starring as the title character in Sherlock Holmes in the Crucifer of Blood. With a seriously stylish steampunk-influenced production directed by Jeffrey Schmidt, Dallas’ oldest theater-in-the-round dares not to be square (for once). And at the center of…
