Joan Didion’s essays on the culture of the 1960s and its aftermath in Slouching Towards Bethlehem and The White Album helped define what’s now widely known as literary journalism. She also showed how the personal and political can be wed in ways that transcend the famous feminist platitude. Her latest…
Thursday, October 13 Ophidiophobes beware. Quad C Theatre is taking on Robert Schenkkan’s Handler. The stage will play host to the story of a man released from prison, accepted back into his home and desperate for some sort of change. So desperate, in fact, that he decides it would be…
There are many good reasons to attend this weekend’s Dallas Comic Con & Sci-Fi Expo, and not one of them involves a pair of slip-on Spock ears or a light saber in your pocket. Attending, once more, will be Carrie Fisher, who is among the unexpected highlights of the summer’s…
Habitat for Humanity builds funds to build houses 10/15 Sing along: “If I had a hammer/I’d hammer some houses/Habitat for Humanity houses/All over this land.” Habitat for Humanity deserves more than a ditty. While there certainly is no shortage of worthy causes to champion, there’s much to be said for…
These lips aren’t sealed 10/17 Candace Bushnell’s Sex and the City introduced us to the New York world of really horny thirtysomething women. Refreshingly, they were smart, funny and independent. And of course, if they weren’t, they’d just be sluts. Bushnell has taken over the Jackie Collins helm for a…
Toast the satellite’s full frontal 10/17 Eastern culture is continually depicted–largely through cinematic imports or reinterpretations thereof–as a society steeped in dedication, dignity and respect of tradition and heritage. That’s not a bad thing, but Monday evening’s moon-viewing festival celebration (called otsukimi) at the Dallas Arboretum proves that our neighbors…
The original Phantom haunts the Meyerson 10/15 When the city of Dallas was planning out the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, I wish they’d been more dramatic. Look at the Paris Opera House: catacombs, a subterranean lake and a creepy phantom slinking around, obsessing over an opera diva. I.M. Pei…
Her name is Domino Harvey, and she is a bounty hunter. If you’ve seen even one TV spot or theatrical trailer for Domino, you’ve heard that message ground into your brain like an annoying jingle. What you may not know is that Domino Harvey was a real person, daughter of…
Ah, Wallace and Gromit. Who doesn’t get a little lift at the sound of those names? Who doesn’t feel the edges of her mouth begin to tickle toward a smile, her heart grow warmer with images of the love between a (plasticine) man and his (plasticine) dog? Perhaps you’re not…
Elijah Wood is not a believable tough guy. Probably this comes as no great revelation to you. There’s a reason that the Lord of the Rings video games tend to focus on Aragorn, Legolas and Gandalf–Wood’s Frodo is a wuss, and everybody knows it. So any movie that’s about him…
All the publicity for Waiting… has focused on the scene in which an annoying customer at the fictional chain restaurant ShenaniganZ sends her food back to the kitchen, where it meets with all sorts of nasty modifications, courtesy of some dandruff, pubic hair and mucus. The teaser posters depicted similarly…
One of the strongest–and sure to be controversial–films of the year, The War Within goes places that other films wouldn’t dare go. Thoughtfully written and nicely acted, it follows an Islamic suicide bomber who comes to New York City with a deadly plan. The film in no way endorses the…
Trenton Doyle Hancock St. Sesom and the Cult of Color Hancock has hit the mark with this multimedia installation, bringing together his talents as graphic artist, conceptualist, painter and, above all else, visionary storyteller. It is a show that, with its fantastic storyline and panoply of parts, could easily get…
Sailing to Byzantium Sandra Deer’s WWI-era drama invites a group of writer-friends to the home of Olivia Shakespear (Ellen Locy), a British romantic secretly in love with Irish poet William Butler Yeats (Bill Jenkins). He’s in love with spy Maud Gonne (Carolyn McCormick), but she’s in love with the idea…
Tommy, we can’t hear you. And it’s a shame. He still plays a mean pinball, that deaf, dumb and blind kid, but once he snaps out of his self-induced catatonic state, the young pinball wizard can’t make any points with the accursed acoustical problems in the Uptown Players’ production of…
What is so scary about horror movies? It’s not monsters–they’re all latex and makeup. It’s not the gore–so fake. It’s the startle. Dracula, Nightmare on Elm Street, The Ring and even The Exorcist scared the bejeezus out of most people. Today, the older films may seem campy, but each still…
Thursday, October 6 If you know that if you give a pig a pancake, it’s going to want some syrup (but definitely not a side of bacon), and if you give a mouse a cookie, then it’s gonna want some milk, then you should surmise that if you throw a…
Low and slow or hot and fast? Get your mind out of the gutter because that, my friend, is not a sexual reference but rather the difference between barbecuing and grilling. Didn’t know there was a difference? Neither did we, until we spoke with Judith Fertig of Kansas City’s BBQ…
One small step for man, one new art exhibit for mankind 10/6 Even though it’s our celestial next-door neighbor, the moon has been overlooked since the days of Buzz Aldrin, Tang mania and the race for space. Sexier projects, such as the Mars Rover and the International Space Station, have…
Chuck Norris’ fight night 10/8 If you believe that any venture that takes Chuck Norris away from playing a Texas Ranger on TV should be encouraged, then be sure to patronize the one-time action hero’s World Combat League, which will offer Dallas a preview of its 2006 season. Just think:…
Champagne, hors d’oeuvres and neurotoxin 10/8 ere’s a kick in our aging, destined-to-sag ass: Overactive muscles cause frown lines and wrinkles, or so says the Web site for the Advanced Facial Plastic Surgery Center, home of Dr. Benjamin Bassichis. That just figures. We have one set of overactive muscles in…
William Shatner, transformed man 10/8 William Shatner is hot. He pulled off the whole John Travolta comeback bit right under everyone’s noses with ABC’s slick Boston Legal, and he even won an Emmy for the show. And his shtick on the recent AFI tribute to George Lucas was, in a…
