It seems that for most classical music institutions the answer to the audience problem is to pander. To program music that’s familiar, safe. “Give them more Beethoven,” could very well be the marketing strategy. And it might work for a time. Then, if things go well the friendly music would…
A comedian without a dark side is a rare thing. “There’s not one that comes to mind,” Clint Werth admits. A local standup comic who skipped comedy classes and jumped right into open mics, he pauses and gives the topic further consideration. “Some are not necessarily dark, but still troubled.”…
If hometown performer Annie Clark has proven anything to Dallas in her flight to fame, it’s that she’s a veritable rock god. Sunday night in performance with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, she proved without misstep that she doesn’t just shred with the best of ’em, she also writes music that…
CANNES, France — “Je m’appelle Max.” Now that’s an opening line, so much better in French, and it’s just one reason I’m glad I waited to see Mad Max: Fury Road here in Cannes on the morning of the festival’s second day, Thursday, rather than at home in the States…
Thanks to the torrential rain over the past few weeks, many of us are experiencing some serious stir-craziness. Flash-flooding doesn’t exactly make you want to get out and enjoy the world around you, especially when you’ve got booze and a big TV at home. Fortunately (hopefully) the weather looks to…
Saturday evening, PDNB hosted the opening reception for France, its fourth solo exhibition for Michael Kenna, a master of modern landscape photography. Following the release of his latest book of the same name, the exhibit showcases work from the past four decades representing several different projects. Kenna now operates on…
When the Oak Cliff Film Festival announced their first wave of films screening next month at their fourth annual festival it was so banging it had the possibility of knocking you off your feet. Of those first five films announced, the one I’ve seen is Rick Alverson’s quietly wild Entertainment,…
Do you remember when Michelle Obama cut her bangs? Of course you do. This inane conversation topic was part of our national dialogue for weeks. Did she look better with or without? What did it say about her femininity? And more important, her blackness? Playwright Meridith Friedman finds this microscopic…
The last day at the Dallas Comedy House’s old Commerce Street location in March was also the final day of the 6th Annual Dallas Comedy Festival, a five-day showcase of local and national stand-up, sketch and improvisational talent. The gathering didn’t end when the festival’s headliners TJ & Dave took…
Renowned multi-medium artist Kevin Beasley’s CV reads like a solid career’s worth of exhibitions and achievements, complete with an exemplary eduction as its foundation. Except, Beasley’s only been at this thing for roughly nine years. His future is exceedingly bright, and gaping. This evening Beasley will debut a new, site-specific…
Pitch Perfect 2 hit a few wrong notes for the Village Voice’s Alan Scherstuhl and special guest Monica Castillo, but LA Weekly film critic Amy Nicholson interpreted the film’s humor a little differently. We circle back to Sofia Vergara’s performance in Hot Pursuit, before arriving in the desert for Mad…
This weekend the Dallas Museum of Art opens Inca: Conquests of the Andes. On the surface it’s one of those historical art exhibitions filled with antique knick-knacks of which you can buy knockoffs on that adventure vacation you’re planning with your super-rich-hipster-adventure husband. No, I’m not jealous of your imagined…
Hey, it’s good to see you again. It’s odd, isn’t it? To take advice from a total stranger on how to fill your days. I often wonder who you are. Who are the people clicking on our little weekly awesome things to do list? Do they use it to find…
Blues legend Bessie Smith was arguably America’s most powerful black woman during her heyday in the ’20s and ’30s. Her reign wasn’t just based on being the highest-paid African-American entertainer of her generation, but, according to the new HBO movie Bessie, on the freedoms she allowed herself after breaking with…
Some people complain about sequels to beloved movies, while others welcome the possibility that a part deux might be even better than the first. Sometimes that happens: While The Godfather is great, The Godfather: Part II expands on its dramatic intensity without repeating any of the same tricks, and The…
Iris Apfel isn’t exactly a household name, unless we’re talking about very stylish households. From 1950 to 1992 Apfel ran Old World Weavers, the business she co-founded with her husband, Carl, which faithfully re-created antique textiles for use in home decorating: From grand Park Avenue drapes to demure White House…
This doesn’t feel like a film that exists. How is George Miller’s bonkers, exhausting, no-future smash-’em-up Mad Max: Fury Road not one of those almost-was boondoggles mourned and dreamed of by fans, a revered director’s impossible vision that, thanks to the un-stout hearts of studio bean-counters, never actually vaulted from…
Last weekend the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders saw hundreds of women high kick their way through the preliminary auditions for one of the most coveted titles in the cheerleading industry. Love ’em or hate ’em, it wasn’t difficult to talk our clubs editor, Drew Blackburn, into spending an hour with the…
Last April on a Friday morning in the middle of the Dallas Art Fair, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra lured a number of journalists, artists and visiting gallerists into the Meyerson with the promise of coffee, pastries and an exciting announcement. A woman known only in social circles introduced herself to…
In this series of articles, Leslie Moody Castro takes on the role of journalist or interlocutor to explore the inequity in the creation, curation and exhibition of art. Read more here. By Leslie Moody Castro I have learned a lot in my time in Dallas. This is a beautiful and…
This weekend is packed with art to see in Dallas. It seems everyone on Dragon Street and beyond is opening an exhibition. Limiting this list to just five is impossible, so there are a few more than that here, plus additional shows to see when you’re out and about this…
For nearly a quarter century, Brent Kollock has been painting and drawing with a unique visual language that cannot be confused with anyone else. He is also an accomplished writer of short stories and poetry. But in the last few months, Kollock may have found his true calling as an…
