Arts & Culture

I may be one of the few that didn’t discover Rent until the failed movie attempt last year. I had low expectations of the film, and they were soon being met with the eponymous opening number. Fast-forward to two hours later, and I’m bawling into my popcorn. Soon after, I…

The Theater Fire’s cinematic aura is more than just a dubious connection based on the band’s name; rather, the quartet’s dark, often picaresque tunes lend themselves to a visceral and visual substance and loping storytelling on par with anything celluloid has to offer. Fitting, then, that the songs from TTF’s…

The undead walk among us. From Joan Rivers to Michael Jackson, they’re everywhere. And the only way we’re getting rid of them is by bludgeoning their skulls or burning their corpses—but don’t do it. Farrah Fawcett will go ape-shit on you if you come at her with a lighter. She…

There’s only so much you can say about Heart—”Barracuda,” “Crazy on You,” Ann and Nancy Wilson, “These Dreams,” “Alone.” You either have an appreciation for the band’s soft to edgy classic-rock stylings or you don’t. But the cool thing about this particular Heart concert is that it’s at Billy Bob’s…

Verdi’s third opera Nabucco put him on the musical map—and brought him scandal—when performed in 1842 Italy. Based on the biblical story of King Nebuchadnezzar’s banishment of the Jews from Babylon in 543 B.C., passionate opera-goers demanded a then-illegal encore. The “Va, pensiero” chorus—when Hebrew slaves cry out for their…

The Lee Blessing play Two Rooms is set in the 1980s, but its story is happening, at least for someone, even today. This politically charged love story simultaneously documents and humanizes the experiences of a man taken hostage in Beirut and his grieving wife in America. The two rooms—one in…

Looking for a great date night this fall? Sick of the same old dinner and a movie? Tired of getting hammered with your special someone at the same five bars over and over again and coming home to have the same drunken almost-sex before passing out in the kitchen on…

Rusty, Trixie, Geoffrey, Sugar Bear and Sweetheart need your help and a home, so through the month of October (Adopt-a-Shelter-Dog Month), Operation Kindness, a no-kill animal shelter, is offering a tasty adoption special. Each adopted dog 40 pounds or larger will go home with 40 pounds of free Iams dog…

Woo! Woo! Juggalo! The clowns are coming. Insane clowns. A whole posse of them, clowning around with face paint that makes Gene Simmons think twice about the merits of one or two paternity suits. Who are the ICP? And what do they want from you? According to insaneclownposse.com, “They emerge…

If you could somehow cross The Daily Show with All the President’s Men and add a touch of A Chorus Line, you might end up with NEWSical, an inspired musical that satires current events and familiar targets such as Martha Stewart. This is the kind of high-concept production that will…

Cannelloni. Canteen. Canada. Cantankerous. Canoodle…there’s just a whole heck of a lot you can do with a can including canstruct a world without hunger. At least that’s what Canstruction Inc. hopes to do. Canstruction Inc. is a foundation of the Society for Design Administration. Competing teams made up of architects…

When I was a kid, nothing spiced up a school assembly quicker than a little Ballet Folklorico. Some hand claps, some stomping, some pretty dresses twirling, some cool embroidered pants, some sexually suggestive dances, some sombreros—all way more interesting than your average principal’s speech. Our high school even had its…

If the press announcement describes your upcoming book signing as an opportunity for you to “defend [your] position on issues,” you probably need to hire somebody else to start writing your press announcements. I mean, it sounds like you’re going in there looking for a fight. Like, there’s not enough…

Ah, Southern repression. From it we’ve gotten scads of Lifetime films and, before the theme had become trite, classic works by the great Tennessee Williams. Take Cat on a Hot Tin Roof for example. Secret wantings, lies to the self, big unexpected announcements…back in a time when such things were…

Visiting the Dallas Heritage Village at Old City Park gives visitors a glimpse into Dallas and North Texas life from 1840 to 1910. Kids especially love touring the 38 historic structures that have been moved to the park’s 13 acres. But buildings don’t reveal the struggles early residents had in…

Ballet fans love metal. The harder it rocks, the harder they pas de bourrée. Nothin’ says face-melting guitar solos like dudes in tight spandex with crotch bulges…wait. Um, actually, nothing does say face-melting guitar solos like dudes in tight spandex with crotch bulges. Rock out during the Contemporary Ballet of…

A lot of things come to mind when people think of the Manhattan Transfer. (I know because I’m psychic and I can read minds. Quit dwelling on that woman in the coffee shop this morning, Steve.) Some people think about trains, hopping from New York City borough to New York…

I’d like to believe that director/writer/Monty Python alum Terry Gilliam is a film genius. The guy was a co-writer of Life of Brian and animator for Monty Python’s Flying Circus; he clopped coconuts together in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. That’s gotta count for something, genius-wise. But then there’s…