Admit it. Your curiosity got the best of you last year, and you found yourself curled up with a really bad book, a book so very bad that it made Twilight look like a Steinbeck novel in comparison. You totally enjoyed 50 Shades of Grey and all of its sequels…
Have you heard about this thigh gap thing? Apparently, now — in addition to needing a shapely butt, toned abs, a perfect pout and perky breasts — young women are now expected to maintain a certain amount of space between their thighs. What trailblazing teenager first put down their smartphone…
Is it a good time to talk about race? It depends. Is it Thanksgiving dinner? Is Uncle Buddy rocking a fresh Confederate flag tattoo? Are you arguing in front of the Supreme Court? Then maybe not. But perhaps you think it’s important to acknowledge the ugliness of the past and…
Rarely is the appearance of May such a welcome thing in North Texas. It generally means the arrival of oppressive heat and car-murdering hailstorms. And it still might. But at least it marks what has to be the end of some straight-up weird wintry weather that still had us running…
Photography used to be such an intimidating art form — all darkrooms and pricey lenses and f-stops. Those things are all still an important part of the artistry, but now induction into the photo club is much more accessible than it was even a decade ago. Today, the most famous…
Whether you’re stocking up on rainwater in preparation for a climate apocalypse or denying global warming, you’ve got to admit — there’s no place like home. And our (relatively) little sphere of crazy — full of lurking volcanoes, shifting crusts and cell-signal dead zones — is an impressive residence, no…
As our old pal Bill Shakespeare once said: “The play’s the thing.” He would know — the play certainly was his thing, thus ensuring that it became “the thing” that every high school English student plowed through, CliffsNotes in one hand and forehead clutched with the other. For many, it…
Ever play the cinematic trope drinking game? That’s where you take a shot every time a Hollywood flick uses blunt editing to make a point, employs caricature to drive something home or leans mightily on a visual metaphor. Pick out a random sample of Oscar-winning films, and you’ll be guaranteed…
A few weeks ago, a lone scientist calculated that civilization as we know it is a mere 15 or so years from implosion. Thanks to our earth-destroyin’ ways, the end is fairly nigh according to him. If that’s the case, it’s a pretty sad showing for humanity, who will have…
Classical ballet can look pretty stern from the audience’s perspective. It’s all tightly pinned hair, feet that are ramrodded into impossible positions, and austere faces in the spotlight. Behind the scenes, things can look even worse — lots of body consciousness issues and, in some companies, backbiting to make it…
In a perfect world, Disney on Ice would be some nefarious mobster plot to silence stupid Ariel and her anti-female-empowerment nonsense by sending her to Antarctica where she could warble to the icebergs. Sadly for parents, it is actually a nefarious plot by Disney to dive into our wallets and…
Broadway brings us many wonders: soaring story lines, uplifting anthems, dazzling sets. It’s also chock full of annoying little idiosyncrasies: over-enunciation, stupid stunt casting and a propensity to burst into song as a lame plot device. But we love The Great White Way, despite the fact that it takes itself…
Hollywood’s awards season is over, and instead of being stuck watching an already self-obsessed industry lavish honors upon itself, we can finally get back to the business of watching that industry’s products. This is the perfect time of year to find a few cinematic gems ahead of the bloated summer…
Shakespeare starts getting pounded into your head somewhere early in your high school experience, so much so that you begin to take it for granted. Sure, there’s that initial thrill when you read Romeo and Juliet for the very first time — seeing the lyrical twists and turns that inspired…
Casablanca was an ordinary film by 1940s Hollywood standards — it wasn’t made to be a blockbuster, nor was it expected to be one. Its star, Humphrey Bogart, wasn’t seen as the kind of actor who could anchor a heavily romantic movie. It went through a series of screenwriters, was…
The true gift of the arts is that they inherently transcend language, even culture, and speak to each viewer or listener as though they share the same tongue, the same experience, the same space. Dance in particular seems to drill through differences, using movement to deftly break barriers and create…
There’s a passage in J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan that says something about how stars are really only observers, that they have been put in that role as punishment for assorted karmic misdeeds and that as such, they can’t really participate in the fun around them — they can only watch…
You tried so hard to keep those damn princesses out of your house: blanket Disney bans, female-empowerment board books, pretend lab coats instead of tiaras. But when your daughter leaves your house, she’s confronted with propaganda for the princess industrial complex at every turn. Her friends have princess sneakers, princess…
If you had to do a thesis for graduation, you probably spent months and months on minutiae — manipulating data, shedding tears and mining sources only to complete a document that nobody has looked at since it was filed in your graduation paperwork. Does anyone ever do a graduate thesis…
Avoid the restaurants like the plague on Valentine’s Day. Since the day itself falls on a Friday this year, it’ll be an unholy crush of lovers crowding the hostess stand and waiters rushing you through your attempts at romance. Make reservations for, like, Tuesday and spend Friday actually having some…
It’s true: There are so, so many fish in the sea. But you’ve managed to get one on the line — a real keeper, it seems — and now it’s time to celebrate your good fortune with the holy trinity of (printable) Valentine’s activities: chocolates, restaurant reservations and a little…
The silly time of year when love goes to our heads is upon us. We exit football season, wipe the wing sauce off our mouths and then ante up for all things romance as that most corporate of holidays bears down upon us, drowning us in artificially preserved candy hearts…
