This past week may have marked the 50th anniversary of one of Dallas’ darker moments, but we didn’t have to spend the entire time in the shadow of maudlin JFK introspection, thanks to a more upbeat 50th anniversary: the beginning of the adventures of TV’s Doctor Who. Conventions across the…
Dallas has a burlesque troupe for every personality. Ruby Revue serves up old time glam, Viva Burlesque caters dolled-up routines to themes and those Lolli Bombs like to get a little freaky. But what if you’re into hot wax, barbed wire, machetes, broken glass and big top spectacle — all…
Whether delivering a tree house harangue as Dictator-for-Life of G.R.O.S.S. or getting sneak-jumped by his tiger sidekick, Calvin was our kid id. Operating on a combination of misunderstood genius and pranky mischief, he and Hobbes conquered the world, time travel, art, dumb girls and physics — one perfectly drawn frame…
While Dallas was fixated on one 50th anniversary, fans of Dr. Who were busy with another entirely over at WhoFest. The sold-out fan convention ran for three-days in Addison, giving local Whoheads a chance to rub costumed elbows and geek out together. Every iteration of the good Doctor was represented,…
The pop star who single-handedly made The Dukes of Hazzard much worse than it could have been, and her sister, will be our neck of the woods Saturday. Jessica and Ashlee Simpson will make a public appearance at NorthPark Center on North Central Expressway, according to a post on the…
When the West Texas town of Marfa saw that one of its major interstates had a giant, metal Playboy bunny logo trying to titillate anyone who drove by it, the town erupted into an angry orgy of outrage. They were shocked that New York artist Richard Phillips would dare to…
That battle for comedy dominance known as the Funniest Comic in Texas is about to get under way and the tributes have received their invitation to join the games. OK, so the annual comedy contest doesn’t have the excitement of a futuristic reality show in which teenagers slaughter each other…
This week it seems that everyone is struggling with how best to commemorate the assassination of John F. Kennedy. What if it was your job to create the right music for this weighty occasion? Which notes would you choose and how would you arrange them? How would you use sound…
Honor the Kennedy anniversary in whatever way you see fit. We’ve got a bunch of events tucked in this weekend’s list. (I’ll be drinking pink Champagne, toasting Jackie for 24 hours straight. Chance of weep-sobbing? A solid 30 percent. That number increases to a steadfast 60 percent by the second…
When Renzo Piano met Raymond Nasher 18 years ago, it was at a dinner. Seated together, the two men spent the first half of their evening bonding over the value of family. It wasn’t until later in the night when Nasher volunteered his idea. “I’d like to build a sculpture…
We’ve admired actress Allison Tolman since she debuted on a Dallas stage in 2004 in the comedy Anton in Show Business with Second Thought Theatre, the company she co-founded with other Baylor drama grads. Season after season, at STT and in shows at Kitchen Dog Theater and elsewhere, she kept…
Being walked through artist Loretta Gonzalez’s new series of paintings is like exchanging introductions at a dinner party for savages. “This is Dena Schlosser from Plano. She cut the arms off her baby,” says Gonzalez, expanding a photo of the painting on her iPad. Next we meet Gilberta from Hudson…
It had to happen: There’s so much voiceover narration in today’s movies, so much needless verbal play-by-play, that it was only a matter of time before somebody made a picture narrated by that life of the party himself, Death. The Grim Reaper delivers the opening monologue of The Book Thief,…
In 1997, 87-year-old Richard Lusk flew from California to Florida to claim an $11 million prize he believed he’d won in a sweepstakes. The day after he returned home empty-handed, he had a stroke. Four months later, he bought a second plane ticket to Florida and stubbornly knocked on their…
It says something that two of the biggest sensations in young adult literature over the past 10 years have featured heroines who keep more than one guy on the line at a time. No longer do the genre’s bright young women sit around waiting for one Mr. Right to notice…
David Mamet writes great arguments. He is, arguably, the current American theater master at constructing conflict among smart characters driven by greed, anger or envy. Mamet’s best plays — Glengarry Glen Ross, American Buffalo, Speed-The-Plow — are built around tense back-and-forth verbal battles among vicious, ambitious, often desperate men. And…
Imagine an alternate history for Vince Vaughn. What if, 18 years ago, instead of rehearsing Swingers during the day and sampling Los Angeles’ starlets at night, he channeled his sexual energy into masturbating for cash at a sperm bank? He could have become Delivery Man’s David Wozniak, father of 533…
Few men wear a dress as meaningfully as comedian Chris Lilley. Since 2005, he has sported the pinstriped schoolgirl uniforms of his native Australia to play Ja’mie King, a perfect little monster created by an ungodly mix of wealth, vapidity, and cheerful cruelty. Ja’mie returns to HBO on November 24…
”This movie has been written about in books — go figure — and there’s discussion about whether or not it’s actually a zombie movie. And I can tell you it’s not; it’s not a zombie movie.” So says director Thom Eberhardt about 20 minutes into the commentary for his low-budget…
Through the soaring windows of the Mandarin Oriental Miami, it’s hard not to notice the blue skies and matching azure water. Most people find Miami’s beachy, serene views relaxing. But for fans of The Hunger Games, the vacation vista could just as easily conjure images of blister-forming nerve gas, vicious…
Once, in the middle of the 2004 Tour de France bicycling race, the nine-man American team, led by Lance Armstrong, pretended that their bus had broken down en route to their hotel. As fans and the international press stood outside, cheering and taking pictures, the team, hidden behind high, tinted…
The state of the arts in North Texas is so dynamic, so fresh and so very exciting these days that you almost feel like you should be sporting a beret and practicing finger snaps. There’s sculpture strewn about town and Big Happenings almost every weekend in our so-not-quaint arts district…
