If you’re having trouble nailing down exactly what local playwright Brigham Mosley’s Vultures is about, you’re not alone. But the SMU grad and prolific dramatist seemingly wants it that way; the play is touted as a mysterious surprise. And who doesn’t like surprises? There are a few things you can…

So many art shows purport to be “immersive,” but they’re really just “engaging.” The art is all around you — you see it, you feel it, you hear it even, but largely the art doesn’t really involve you beyond your viewing of it. PrismCo’s PRISM, on the other hand, is…

Consider the Dallas Heritage Village the official ambassador of history in our dear city — an extended hand, offering to take you back in time to the Dallas of old. The historic buildings and other antiquities on-site are a throwback to the days when Big D was little more than…

It’s a glittery tale of two wild and crazy guys — a loud, funny and scattered flashback to a time when glamour and sexuality sold as many records as the music itself. Velvet Goldmine is director Todd Haynes’ paean to glam rock, Citizen Kane and Oscar Wilde, and it ping-pongs…

April is National Poetry Month, a celebration of the literary art form that — for many of us — filled our notebooks in high school, but has largely been absent from our everyday lives since. It’s not that we don’t like poetry, it’s that we’re mostly pretty terrible at it…

If walls could talk, the ones in the Continental Gin building would be the life of the party. The building itself goes way back, but for the past 26 years, it’s served as an artist community—housing studios where local sculptors, painters, jewelry-makers, and photographers hash out all their creative ideas…

This is the era of unapologetic barbecue worship. Ranking the purveyors of smoked meats is something of a national sport; it sells zillions of magazines and generates tons of blog hits. Taking personal time off to wait in line for an hour at lunchtime is not unheard of — and…

Kalachandji’s is one of Dallas’ most perfect little secrets. Anytime I have an out of town visitor to impress (who isn’t hell-bent on barbecue), that’s the first place I take them—it’s a little oasis with a gorgeous patio and some of the finest vegetarian cuisine in the city. It’s also…

The outdoor art festival is a thing that never gets old—and how could it? Even if you don’t consider yourself a hardcore art aficionado, the mix of artists with food vendors and entertainers is an irresistible draw for anyone looking to stretch their legs, broaden their horizons, and fill their…

There are few places in this world where high art mixes with high commerce as successfully as at NorthPark Mall. That’s part of the ongoing legacy of the Nasher family, who developed and own the mall, as well as the venerable Arts District sculpture museum that bears their name. The…

What the Dallas Arboretum does best is transport us. While we’re under no illusion that any expanse of land in the Lone Star State could naturally produce half a million blooming spring bulbs that burst with supernatural color, we can still dream. And to indulge those floral fantasies, the Arboretum…

If you’re a fan of Oscar Wilde, you know that he preferred to critique society on his own terms, and those terms generally focused on art, style and delightful turns of phrase, as opposed to deep thematic explorations and clunky metaphors. The Importance of Being Earnest is the best example…

As a metaphor for struggle, for searing tension, for societal discomfort and even for a revival, fire is a concept that frequently imbues imagery related to civil rights and race relations in the United States. The Burnin’ is a perfect example of the metaphor played to an extreme: Two nightclubs…

The beautiful thing about Charles Portis’ True Grit is how it represents so many different things to different people. If you want to think of it as a Bible-inspired tale of revenge and redemption, you can do that. If it’s a celebration of a spunky, feminist heroine, then yup. It…

There’s an all-too-brief little window between April and mid-May when the weather is largely our friend (barring occasional thunderstorms), encouraging us to emerge from behind closed doors and rejoice before it tries to kill us again in a few weeks. That’s why you’ve gotta have something pretty special going on…

The story behind Hot Mikado is, appropriately, an outlandish one — it’s a piece of musical theatre based on a jazz adaption of a Gilbert and Sullivan opera, which was itself one of the more over-the-top theatrical collaborations between the famed librettist and composer. The opera, The Mikado, was a…

The world of Rodgers and Hammerstein is not a complicated one: it’s a place where Nazi aggression can be defeated by song; where love conquers all, even in death; and where manslaughter trials can be folded into wedding receptions, no prob. It’s all so laughably improbable that you have to…

Think of Who’s Afraid of Chuck and George as a roast on canvas, where — rather than having insults hurled at them — two artists will be lovingly caricatured by friends and fellow artists. In fact, nearly a hundred contributions will line the walls of CentralTrak, the UT Dallas Artists…

This year’s iteration of The Pin Show has us on pins and needles for all the right reasons. The much-buzzed-about local fashion event is a must-see for trendsetters and followers alike, seamlessly mixing well-heeled debutantes with edgy artistic types for a show that would be right at home in NYC’s…

In modern American history, few tragedies have tied together human suffering with societal ills in the way that Hurricane Katrina did. It was an epic, heartbreaking shitshow of everything that was, and still is, wrong with our government, our infrastructure and our culture. The shockwaves continue to reverberate a decade…

Justice the pit bull puppy died nearly three years ago, succumbing to injuries sustained during a senseless attack by a group of young men. Since that time, a fund established in his honor at DFW Rescue Me, the charity that spearheaded efforts to save the dog, has assisted many other…

There’s no way to sugarcoat it: Medea ain’t pretty. The ancient Greek tale of domestic horror has never been for the faint of heart. It stunned playwright Euripides’ contemporaries when it was first produced in ancient Greece, and those people weren’t easy to shock. The passage of nearly 2,500 years…