Best Phoenix Impersonation 2004 | Rosewood Center for Family Arts | Best of Dallas® 2020 | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Dallas | Dallas Observer
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Best Phoenix Impersonation

Rosewood Center for Family Arts

This chunk of concrete and steel on Skillman Street near Northwest Highway was a Don Carter's All Star Lanes, with peewee leagues where kids would win tiny trophies and learn the thrill of victory and the agony of an ill-timed gutter ball. Now--nearly $10 million and two and a half years of construction later--you'd barely recognize it. Renamed the Rosewood Center for Family Arts, it's the home of the Dallas Children's Theater, where kids take classes on being tiny Laurence Oliviers and learn the thrill of professionally produced drama starring adult actors, some of whom also teach at the facility, which houses two theaters (one seats 400; the other, 140), classrooms, DCT's offices, a scene shop, a prop studio and a costume warehouse. The fund raising has been mostly grassroots, donated by fans of children's theater--both individual and professional--and the renovations continue as money comes available. Gone are the Oscar Mayer hot dogs. It's time for some Oscar-aspiring performances.

Best Radio Talk Show

Mark Davis

While all the other talk jocks seem to be collapsing into a single personality and voice, Mark Davis gets more distinctive. First of all, he actually knows some stuff and appears to have a life, something beyond skimming the front page and then trying to channel Rush Limbaugh. Some of his tangents are arcane, like his passionate interest in the sport of curling, but at least you know he gets out of the sound booth once in a while. His callers are often an intriguing lot, like the woman who, while calling, was being attacked by a basset hound, a toy poodle and a dachshund/Chihuahua mix but wanted to keep talking to Davis anyway. That's animal magnetism! Generally speaking, Mark Davis provides a uniquely engaging perspective on the city's everyday life.

Readers' Pick

Russ Martin Show

Live 105.3

Best Radio Show With the Worst Reception

The Good Show, KTCU-FM (88.7)

Overheard at Best Buy last year: "I'm into all kinds of music. I listen to Nelly and Limp Bizkit." Right, buddy. Now, granted, everyone winds up claiming musical impartiality at some point in his life, but there's no way a person can like every single genre in the world. Do your tastes honestly jump from Tejano to punk rock, from mainstream rap to lo-fi folk, from electroclash to country? If so, you must be one of the five fortunate souls in Dallas who can actually hear KTCU 88.7's The Good Show on Sunday nights. Tom Urquhart's wholeheartedly anti-commercial blast of musical variety will test both your claims of musical appreciation and your radio's antenna, but if you can pick up an effin' signal without driving west on Interstate 30, you're in for a sonic range unavailable on any other frequency in town. Watch out for the DJ banter, though, because when Tom, Chris and Tony aren't interviewing local musicians, they're wasting precious minutes on debates as odd as, say, the superiority of Nelly over Limp Bizkit.

Best Radio Program

The Glenn Mitchell Show, KERA-FM (90.1)

Here's yet another reason to feel guilty about not pledging, or not paying your pledge, to public radio. Glenn Mitchell's noon-to-2 p.m. show on Dallas' public radio station, KERA-FM, is not only wildly entertaining, dastardly informative and harpooningly to the point, it's the local intelligentsia's preferred manner of intercourse. It's conveniently scheduled as well, while we're mad-dashing around town at lunchtime trying to find any parking space on Commerce or Elm. Content of the show defies categorization or even adequate description, but Mitchell's first hour is usually programmed for audience call-in or e-mail participation with a celebrity, notable, topical or otherwise interesting guest in the Dallas studio. The second hour is often one-on-one interviews he conducts with authors, poets, politicos, historians and others with something to share. The variety of the guests and topics makes Mitchell's show the best; and we like the soft, Jimmy Stewart-like Everyman quality of his voice, too.

Readers' Pick

Kidd Kraddick

Best Legal Cock Fight

9 O'Clock Cock Fight

Back-alley cockfighting is deplorable. Good can come from it only if it's out in the open, broadcast even. And without using roosters. In fact, the best cockfights involve no cock at all. We prefer head-to-head combat between two new songs, instead of poultry, and each weeknight at 9, 102.1 the Edge provides that battle and right on our FM dial. Now hosted by Ayo (he took over for Josh Venable in August), the competition is decided by phone-in and e-mail votes from listeners. No throwing down crumpled fivers, no feathers flying. It's good, clean radio fun inspiring rabid debate among listeners. And no cocks are harmed on any of the broadcasts.

Best Alternative Club

Black Forest Theater

Two words: Prince afterparty. Two more words: Snoop afterparty. Get the idea? When the baddest muthas come to Dallas, the real happening is at Erykah Badu's South Dallas club. A 1960s movie house that had fallen into disrepair, the Black Forest has been reimagined as a thriving cultural spot, with hand-painted murals, checkerboard floors, lush green walls, and good sound and lighting. This is all thanks to Ms. Badu, who uses the space as ground zero for a South Dallas revitalization project called Beautiful Love Incorporated Non Profit Development (or BLIND). Semi-regular entertainment comes from Mizz B herself, along with soul, R&B, hip-hop and rock acts from around the community. Notice that word: community. 'Cause even though Black Forest may host some of the biggest names in music, ain't no question whose home this really is. Prince may be on the marquee and Erykah Badu may be on the lease, but this place belongs to South Dallas.

Readers' Pick

Velvet Curtain

www.velvetcurtain.net

These Guns for Hire

Ask anyone in town for the name of the premier political consultant in Dallas and you'll get two names: Carol Reed and Rob Allyn. Since their offices are on separate floors of the same building on McKinney Avenue, and since they often find themselves in competition, you might assume that there's a war going on in the stairwell. Your assumption would prove false, at least most of the time.

We've all heard much about political consultants, but what do they actually do? "I consider myself a general contractor," Reed says. "I help design the blueprint and then take that blueprint and make sure that everything gets done on time and according to plan. I set the budget, hire the subcontractors and then make sure that they do their jobs well and according to budget.

"I may be the one who makes the trains run on time, but Rob's great gift is his ability to translate a plan into a message and then deliver that message in the most effective and motivating way."

The two may be competitors, but they often hire each other for big projects, and while their relationship stops well short of that of James Carville and Mary Matalin, there appears to be a genuine friendship behind the scheming, bare-knuckle intensity that attends big-time politics. There's also mutual respect, collegiality and, at times, just the faintest whiff of Oedipal drama between the one-time mentor and her former protégé.

"In politics, truth is always one of the alternatives," Allyn deadpans. "And one of the things that I admire most about Carol is that she tells the truth to her clients." Here's what Reed has to say about Allyn: "As gifted and creative a writer as Rob may be, his biggest strength is his focus, his ability to stay on message for his clients."

Most of these clients are Republicans, and the same can be said of most of Reed's clients as well. Two notable exceptions: Reed handled Democrat Ron Kirk's mayoral campaigns as well as his run for the U.S. Senate, while Allyn helped Laura Miller become and remain mayor, defeating Reed's client Tom Dunning in the race to complete Kirk's term. Allyn also helped the mayor best Mary Poss (not Reed's client) in the election for a full term in the nominally non-partisan office. Aside from these walks on the political wild side, the two consultants have, between them over the last 20 years, worked for virtually every major Republican office holder in the state, as well as the two Presidents Bush and President Reagan.

Reed and Allyn are now working together to help pass the bond issue that would move the Dallas Cowboys to Arlington, a campaign spearheaded by Allyn. "I fought as long and as hard as I could to bring the Cowboys to the Cotton Bowl," says Reed, a former president of Friends of Fair Park. "After we lost that fight, I decided that I might as well take the money." Both predictably but probably accurately express optimism that the bond issue will pass.

The Dallas Cowboys campaign is emblematic of the consultants' involvement with lucrative clients and causes that are political but only quasi-governmental in nature: bond issues. The two have worked together successfully on referendum campaigns for the American Airlines Center and DART. Reed's solo victories include the Trinity River project, the 2002 DISD bond campaign and many bond campaigns for Dallas County, while Allyn's résumé boasts of successful campaigns on behalf of the Dallas Center for the Performing Arts and the Houston Metro.

One distinction between the two is that while Reed does business in other cities, her heart seems to be in Dallas, while Allyn casts a broader net, with offices in Austin, Phoenix and Mexico City. Allyn's international clients have included Mexican President Vicente Fox and Prime Minister Perry Christie of the Bahamas, as well as political parties and causes in Asia and the Middle East. Reed, on the other hand, has been extremely active in Dallas civic affairs, serving, among many other offices, as chair of the Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau, president of the Dallas Rotary Club and on more than two dozen civic and charitable boards.

"A genuine difference between us is that while I certainly do work outside of Dallas, my community involvement keeps me focused here, while Rob actively seeks more national and international projects," Reed says.

Allyn, who sold his company in 2002 to Fleishman-Hillard, a public relations firm with offices in more than 100 countries, agrees. "We've always treated politics like a business," he says. "By definition, this approach also works for corporate clients. Our new affiliation gives us leverage and support to pursue business all over the world."

Meanwhile and for both, as long as there are elections, they plan to plan them.

"Corporate clients offer a challenge and pay the bills, but once politics is in your blood it remains your passion," Reed says. "You can go to rehab, but you're hooked forever."

Best Blues Club

Deep Ellum Blues

It wasn't so long ago that Dallas blues had fallen on hard times. Once the signature sound of Deep Ellum, back when Blind Lemon Jefferson busked the streets and the blues poured out of every bar and brothel, by early 2004 the blues had all but disappeared from the downtown area. That changed with the February opening of Deep Ellum Blues. With a central location (painted all in blue) and an expansive seating area, the club can accommodate both intimate local shows and national touring acts. In its six months, Deep Ellum Blues has played host to such acts as George Thorogood, hometown hero Hash Brown and Austin heartthrob Guy Forsyth. But the club's real coup is owner Jim Suhler, longtime guitarist for Thorogood and nominee for Best Blues in the 2004 Dallas Observer Music Awards for Jim Suhler & Monkey Beat. He not only knows the blues; he plays them just as well.

Readers' Pick

Deep Ellum Blues

Best Place to Smoke

Sambuca Uptown

We smoke cigars about twice a year or so. The last time was during a fancy birthday dinner for a friend at Sambuca Uptown (which is actually between Uptown and downtown). We retired to the smoking room there, which is a glass-walled patio complete with all manner of plush seating options. It was the middle of summer, but the area was cool, the stars were bright, and the rich, hot blasting pleasure of sweet cancerous tobacco filled our lungs. Couple this with a glass of vino or a fine cocktail from Sambuca, pipe in some of the best jazz in town (you can see the stage clearly while you smoke it up), and you have a fine place in which to pump your lungs full of the good stuff.

Best Kids Day Trip

Fossil Rim Wildlife Center

OK, the rabid sheep turned out not to be rabid, all right? Buy a bag of feed pellets and cruise through Fossil Rim Wildlife Center, where you're so close to the animals they drool on you. Or stare menacingly into your car window, occasionally tapping it with a huge beak, like the ostriches and emus. Everybody loves Fossil Rim Wildlife Center--even our friend from Nigeria, who talked on his cell phone the whole time (we didn't even know you could get a signal out here) but admitted he'd never seen any of these animals in his own country. At Fossil Rim, just south of Glen Rose--90 minutes southwest of Dallas down Highway 67--you drive in your own car through 10 miles of habitats that simulate the African savannah and other wildlife-rich regions. Along the way, you see gazelles boinging in the fields; seemingly every species of deer known to man; zebras; giraffes; cheetahs; rare black rhinos and much more. If it doesn't seem too weird to dine on animal flesh, have a delicious Black Angus burger at the cafe halfway through the safari drive and get a penny squished in the gift shop. You won't be out too many bucks, and what you do spend helps support Fossil Rim's internationally recognized breeding and wildlife preservation efforts.

Best Of Dallas®

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