Because Texas Observer managing editor David Pasztor asked so nicely — in an e-mail that begins, “Yo, dipshit” — we’re going to toss out a recommendation that you head immediately to the Lakewood Theater to check out readings from the Texas Observer by Lou Dubose, Wade Goodwyn and Jake Bernstein,…
Inquiring minds: Buzz keeps watching the video of reporter Rebecca Aguilar’s interview with James Walton, the West Dallas business owner who, in separate incidents in about the past four weeks, shot and killed two burglars breaking into his machine shop. We watch and watch and still don’t get it: Why…
KDFW-Channel 4’s Rebecca Aguilar In this week’s paper version of Unfair Park, which isn’t yet online, I write a defense of KDFW-Channel 4 reporter Rebecca Aguilar, who was suspended last week after her controversial interview with James Walton, a West Dallas businessman who shot and killed two men breaking into…
Holy crap: Man oh man oh man. Just met Dallas County Judge Jim Foster for the first time. Wow. In more than a decade of writing nasty things about public officials, we’ve never been speechless or felt a twinge of conscience, but writing an accurate description of a chat with…
One thing for sure, artist Sarah Maxwell English’s grandmother had way cooler taste than my grandma. For a joint exhibit with fellow Dallas artist Jennifer Gassiraro Nguyen at Magnolia Gallery, Maxwell says she is “layering fabric from my grandmothers home and my own home, thinking about how I define what…
So, if you want to score big with the women in Dallas these days, what’s the secret? Easy, you pretend to be impotent. Sounds a little counterintuitive, doesn’t it? Every day, roughly 87.5 percent of the Internet’s transmission capability (we made that number up, but we stand by it) is…
Ol’ man river: In our effort to decide how to vote on the Trinity toll road initiative, Buzz spent a fun day last week looking through databases we didn’t really understand and talking to unhelpful people at the EPA and Texas Commission on Environmental Quality seeking an answer to a…
Remember when your favorite black recording artists had huge ‘fros, wore funky hats and tuxes with velvet lapels? When groups consisted of three women or five men standing in a line, doing fancy spin dance moves? You do? Damn, man, you are old. We’re tempted to type in all capital…
Home to roost: First off, Buzz apologizes to U.S. Attorney Richard Roper and his cohorts for ever hinting in this space that the feds’ investigation into alleged corruption at City Hall was taking too long. As the release of indictments Monday accusing 16 people of various counts of bribery, extortion,…
Whew. We just spent a couple of hours reading the 166-page indictment from the feds’ investigation into alleged bribery and extortion at City Hall, charges concerning a federal low-income housing program and other tax-supported real-estate doings. Thought we’d try to spare all you people with real jobs the trouble or…
We see all: By the time you read this, the Great Trinity Toll Road Debate of 2007, Leppert vs. Hunt in a tag-team smack-down cage match, will be over. Unfortunately, Dallas Observer deadlines, which oddly coincide with happy hour at neighboring bars, prevent us from reporting on the outcome of…
Dream a little dream: Buzz just needs to stay away from some people. Grown-ups, mostly—guys like Michael Faenza, president and chief executive of the Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance, who is working hard on behalf of the city’s neediest people to make Dallas a better place. You spend a little time…
Huh, how about that? Slappy’s Puppet Playhouse is not another name for the confessional booth during youth services at your local Catholic church, but an actual puppet theater. OK. We knew that, but that Catholic pederast humor just never gets old, does it? You say it does? Well then, let’s…
Ahem. A few weeks ago, an item appeared in this section concerning a screening of the 2005 film version of Pride & Prejudice, in conjunction with the Dallas Theater Center’s ongoing production of a stage version of the Jane Austen novel, adapted by Catherine Sheehy. A certain writer may have…
Sigh…: Man, Buzz is so gonna regret saying this, but here goes: If you believe that the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center were not the feats of terrorists but a government conspiracy, you are—how do we put this diplomatically?—a moron. Or maybe Rosie O’Donnell. Hard to say,…
So imagine that Casablanca was not made in 1942, but today. Drunken dinner party conversation topics: In 2007, would Ilsa get on the plane with Victor or stay in the desert with Rick? How much bare Ilsa flesh would we see? During the slow sex scene between Rick and Ilsa…
We’re not sure why audiences roar when a jalapeño puppet says, in a thick, ersatz Mexican accent that his name is “José…Jalapeño…On a Steek.” That’s so…cruise ship. OK, maybe we laughed aloud when ventriloquist Jeff Dunham played straight man to the irascible old man puppet, Walter. (Walter: “Remember when you…
Witness for the Prosecution is the gripping tale of a Dallas crime victim, who with the aid of local cops, picks her alleged assailant out of a photo lineup in which the chief suspect was circled in red marker, with the words “Pick this guy, stupid!” printed in large, bold…
Forget the Johnny Depp vs. Gene Wilder question about who makes the better Willy Wonka. Call it a toss-up. Lets focus for now on the original movie version of the Roald Dahl creation; if you’re of a certain age and temperament—that is, you have taste and a heart—you remember being…
Excelsior!: Sometimes news comes that puts a spark of optimism even in the cold, bitter lump that is Buzz’s heart, reminding us that yes, indeedy, hope never dies. Sometimes that ray of light comes from the oddest corner—from former Dallas police Chief “Weepin'” Terrell Bolton, for instance. You remember Bolton,…
Quilting, the quintessential American craft. You can just picture them, can’t you? The Mennonite womenfolk gathered in the farmhouse parlor, peacefully stitching and chatting. Yeah…and where the hell you been, stuck in 1911? In small towns in the heart of the nation’s Craft Belt are shops at which one can…
“Listen to your imagination,” says the Web page for the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, which features a photo of a face-lifted Kenny “The Gambler” Rogers, who will perform with the orchestra 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Meyerson Symphony Center, 2301 Flora St. Okey-dokey then, let’s tune in and listen…Hmm. How odd,…
