Allen Salkin: From Scratch: Inside the Tumultuous Billion-Dollar World of the Food Network
Here’s the best Julia Child story we’ve ever heard: The superstar American cook, author and television show host, recognized for her landmark cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, once fell asleep in her chair as her makeup was being applied. Despite falling asleep, Child never lost her grip on…
Inon Barnatan
Some classical artists easily attract mainstream audiences. Pianist Lang Lang and violinist Joshua Bell are two examples. Pianist Inon Barnatan is also on that list. His 2012 album, Darkness Visible, was a smash hit with listeners of all types. Barnatan makes his Houston debut playing selections from the album. Of…
Disney on Ice: 100 Years of Magic
What do a genie, a lion cub, a superhero and a princess have in common? They all appear in the skating spectacular Disney on Ice: 100 Years of Magic. Aladdin, Simba, the Incredibles and Snow White aren’t the only Disney/Pixar stars on the bill, though. Altogether, 65 characters from 18…
Christopher Titus
Comedian and diagnosed schizophrenic Christopher Titus has a life story that reads like a Tarantino script. For starters, his mother, herself a manic-depressive schizophrenic who had a long history of institutionalization, killed her third husband and later committed suicide. His father was a mean alcoholic who targeted Titus for much…
18th Annual Children’s Festival
Get ready for Grammy Award nominee Justin Roberts and The Not Ready for Naptime Players, star performers at the 18th Annual Children’s Festival. There’s a slew of entertainment on the schedule for this year’s festival, including singer/actor Zendaya, Hobey Ford’s Golden Rod Puppets Tales for the Young, Gizmo Guys and…
5th Annual Houston Cinema Arts Festival
The documentary Shepard & Dark, a look at the unexpected friendship between Academy Award-nominated actor and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Sam Shepard and reclusive deli clerk Johnny Dark, is among the many offerings at the 5th Annual Houston Cinema Arts Festival. The 2012 American documentary by Treva Wurmfeld chronicles the surprising…
The Crucible
Arthur Miller’s The Crucible is set during the Salem Witch Trials, a time when superstition was stronger than science. The Crucible’s timeless story of a small town — which is about to be destroyed because its residents abandon their reason and humanity in favor of ignorance and prejudice — exposes…
Die Fledermaus
It’s Prince Orlovsky’s costume ball and everyone is in disguise and, according to mezzo–soprano Susan Graham, desperately trying to reinvent themselves. The upcoming Houston Grand Opera production of the comic operetta Die Fledermaus (The Bat) has been reset to the 1930s, which makes it more chic and more relevant, Graham…
Venus in Fur
Venus in Fur, currently onstage at the Alley Theatre, is a 95-minute, one-act, two-actor play based on the erotic novel Venus in Furs, which reportedly inspired an Austrian psychiatrist to coin the term “masochism” after its author’s last name (Leopold von Sacher-Masoch). In it, a young actress named Vanda (Nicole…
The English Beat, The Romantics
If you haven’t worn a skinny tie in a while, Friday might just be the time to take it out of your closet. Especially that one with the piano keys on it. Although separated by an ocean, the English Beat (known in their native UK as just the Beat) and…
Explosions in the Sky
In the space of a single song, Explosions in the Sky’s music can go from breathiest of whispers to a windswept sonic vista that makes a human being seem like a single insignificant speck in the infinitely vast cosmos. Almost immediately upon their arrival in the early ’00s, mainly with…
The Sword
It’s comforting to know that Texas now has another state metal band in Austin’s own The Sword. Since 2003, The Sword has been working hard on the forefront of beard-metal in the same smoky vein as Sleep, although they can spin out some textured Thin Lizzy-style jams when the time…
Noises Off!
If Michael Frayn’s peerless farce Noises Off! isn’t the funniest play ever written, I don’t know what is. And if this isn’t one of the Alley Theatre’s most satisfying productions, as witless character Garry Lejeune would say…you know… This whiplash, slapstick, out-of-control train is Frayn’s loving, heartfelt, silly valentine to…
Capsule Art Reviews: “Bo Joseph: Empire of Spoils,” “David Aylsworth: The Reverses Wiped Away,” “Endearing the Line,” “Jason Yates: All We Ever Wanted Was Everything,” “Lucas Johnson: Original Prints,” “reverse of volume RG,” “Tu Eres O No Tu Eres Mi Ba
“Bo Joseph: Empire of Spoils” In Bo Joseph’s first solo show at McClain Gallery, his paintings are hardly reproducible — they’re made through a complicated method involving layers of oil pastels, water-based tempera and acrylic-based ink on sheet paper that often damages the delicate paper in the process. Joseph works…
Capsule Stage Reviews: The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Extremities, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Romeo and Juliet
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas A revival of the 1978 rollicking Broadway musical about the famed Texas “Chicken Ranch” rides into town with flags unfurled and spirits high. Broad humor and one-dimensional characters strut their stuff, appealing to a nostalgic view of rural Texas, where a crusading Houston TV…
Hooked on La Fisheria
Take a tour through the vibrantly colored dining room and fish-filled kitchen at La Fisheria in our slideshow. The first and most important thing to know about La Fisheria is that there’s absolutely nothing else like it in Houston, and likely never has been. Walking into La Fisheria — with…
The Manichean Get Classy at the Alley
The Manichean is one of Houston’s best claims to pure experimental genius in the realm of music. Cory Sinclair and Justice Tirapelli-Jamail have left an unbroken trail of brilliant albums behind them, each one redrawing the line between pop and art. Now the band is upping the ante on their…
Texas Wines: Behind the Cellar Door
Check out our slideshow of Texas wineries and the Texas wine industry. Haak Vineyards and Winery lies off the beaten path of the flat coastal plains of Santa Fe, Texas — a far cry from the idyllic vineyards of France or Italy, and certainly not an area historically associated with…
Ask a Mexican: Taco Bell Goes High Class
Dear Mexican, I’m in this country illegally, but I have a current passport from the country I am from, and I have an international drivers license. I could not renew my California driver’s license after my travel visa expired. Occasionally, I fly commercially within the U.S., and these docs are…
Young love, Wes Anderson-style, in Moonrise Kingdom
It’s 1965, the rainy end of summer on the rocky coast of a fictional New England isle. Twelve-year-old Sam (Jared Gilman), a scrawny, bespectacled outcast with an unusual aptitude for cartography, disappears from the Khaki Scout camp, absconding with a couple of bedrolls and an air rifle, and leaving behind…
The Cult’s Weapon of Choice
Last month The Cult released the ninth album of their nearly 30-year career with Choice of Weapon, their first album since 2007’s Born into This. Lead singer Ian Astbury’s new batch of songs manages to marry the old-school Cult sound of singles like “Fire Woman” and “Rain,” which brought the…
Corporate Rock Still Sucks
Rock of Ages, a new star-clogged pop-musical diversion, is a cinematic event. It’s not every day, after all, that you get to see two great American traditions — guitar/bass/drums rock music and Tin Pan Alley musical theater — so thoroughly, mutually degraded. This mess originated as a stage production, first…
The Gourds
Even for a cantankerous band that has made it a special point across its two-decade career to do precisely whatever the hell it wants to, the Gourds reached a new high-water mark with their latest album. Released last year, Old Mad Joy (Vanguard) was recorded in an environment heavy with…
Burger Guys Bad-Ass Brunch Is Back
Long ago, The Burger Guys held routine Bad-Ass Brunches that would feature inventive breakfast dishes such as Shrimp and Oats, Steak Meets Eggs and Glass of Milk. But then the guys got busy with running a temporary second location downtown and just being crazy, creative burger guys in general —…
Jane Fonda Deserves Better
Three generations of fine actresses are squandered in Bruce Beresford’s Peace, Love & Misunderstanding, an incompetently structured film that pits hippies against squares with the usual wearying results. This head-hammering, clash-of-values family-healing dramedy makes sure to literalize all of its uplifting messages; gentle admonitions about “letting go” are immediately followed…
K. Flay
In recent months, 22-year-old Kreayshawn and her fluttering eyelashes have stood out as the symbol of modern-day white-girl rap. But now there’s a new Bay Area lady-spitter stirring up the convo. K. Flay (the stage name of Kristine Flaherty) is a native Chicagoan with a degree from, yes, Stanford University…
Tai Nguyen, 38, Bayou Body Count No. 83
A man going to work early this morning was shot to death in his driveway on the far west side of town, police say. Tai Nguyen, 38, walked to his car in the 12400 block of Shadowmist about 5:30 this morning when he was approached by “an unknown suspect or…
Jerry Sandusky Will Not Testify, Defense Rests In His Trial
BOB COSTAS: Are you sexually attracted to young boys, to underage boys? JERRY SANDUSKY: Am I sexually attracted to underage boys? BOB COSTAS: Yes. JERRY SANDUSKY: Sexually attracted, you know, I enjoy young people. I love to be around them. But no, I’m not sexually attracted to young boys. –…
100 Favorite Dishes 2012: No. 72, Esparragos Gratinados at Tintos
This year leading up to our annual Best of Houston® issue, we’re counting down our 100 favorite dishes in Houston. This list comprises our favorite dishes from the last year, dishes that are essential to Houston’s cultural landscape and/or dishes that any visitor (or resident) should try at least once…
National Dry Martini Day & My 21st Birthday
It’s ironic, but fitting, that National Dry Martini Day, June 19, coincided with my 21st birthday yesterday. In honor of this boozy holiday, I decided to order a dry martini during my birthday dinner and tell you all about my experience. Unfortunately, because I turned 21 yesterday, there was no…
6 Houston Bands That Should Release Video Games
Last week I told you about the Amphiletes and how they had released their new single “Where is the Light” as a basic video game. It wasn’t anything groundbreaking, but lately I’ve been finding more and more people interested in using simple games to showcase their songs rather than music…
Baby Delivered After Mom’s Death Is In Critical Condition
A baby born after her mother died in a Texas Medical Center traffic accident is in critical condition, police say. The Houston mom, 30, whose name was not released, was crossing the intersection of Main and Cambridge about 9:20 a.m. Tuesday when she was hit by a grey Acura MDX…
The Beach Boys Coming to Nutty Jerry’s In Winnie October 6
If you missed the reunited and augmented Beach Boys a few weeks back in the Woodlands, you will have a second chance to see the band on October 6 out at Nutty Jerry’s in Winnie. Yes, it’s a long drive, but this tour is worth seeing. As Rocks Off confirmed…
Chef Chat, Part 1: Chris Nemoto of Zushi, on Training with a Sushi Master
Chris Nemoto Zushi Japanese Cuisine 5900 Memorial Drive 713-861-5588 www.zushihouston.com This is the first part of a three-part chef chat series. Look for Part 2 and Part 3 in this space Thursday and Friday. Last month, I visited Zushi Japanese Cuisine for the first time, enjoying one of the best…
Cover Story: Preppers Ready Themselves for When the Shit Hits the Fan
Preparing for Doomsday is as venerably American as cherry pie. Mormonism, America’s most successful homegrown religion, even has hoarding food as one of its tenets. Some prep for a biblical Armageddon, while others do so for secular reasons. Maybe they just want to get out of the rat race and…
Would You Pay $19 for a Plate of Figs?
They’re lovely figs, to be sure. All two-and-a-half of them. But $19? For the plate you see on the left there, next to a $12 plate of tomatoes, yes. $19. But as lovely as they are, when my parents and I ordered the $19 fig plate at Roots Bistro (the…
Last Night: The Cult & Against Me! at House of Blues
The Cult, Against Me!, The Icarus Line House of Blues June 19, 2012 Before I begin this review, I must let you all know that someone took a dump on the floor of House of Blues’ balcony Tuesday night. That’s not really pertinent to the action onstage itself (Failed vision…
Taste Perversion: Artichokes and Wine
“Taste perversion” is what the scientists call it. The expression refers to the way that foods (or drugs) can affect taste after they have been consumed. In the wine world, artichokes are considered one of the greatest offenders. The issue is caused by a component called cynarin (after the Latin…
Comment of the Day: The Hazards Of Getting Financial Aid At Lone Star College
We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it’s time we paid some damn attention to them. So we’ll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning or afternoon from the previous day’s work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous…
Grand Prize Bar to Become Coolest New “Restaurant” in Town, Plans to Host Rotating Lineup of Chefs in Kitchen
Grand Prize Bar has been more than just a bar since it opened nearly two years ago — it’s had a culinary history of its own nearly since its birth. Only a few months after Grand Prize began shaking up its first cocktails in July 2010, chef Adam Dorris and…
A Houston Rap-Related Shooting Timeline
Most people will tell you that Houston rappers are overall a peaceful bunch, but people do carry guns. No less a beloved figure than Pimp C was caught after he got into an altercation at the Foot Locker in Sharpstown Mall; supposedly a policeman saw a gun under Pimp’s coat…
Look Out, Sheyla Hershey & Your 38KKK Rack: Lacey Wildd Thinks You’re A Member Of The Itty-Bitty Tittie Committee
It was bad enough when Florida beat us in crazy-ass crimes, but now they’re leaving us in the dust in breast enhancements? Texas, we don;t even know who you are anymore. For years, Lone Star residents have looked on proudly and in horror (well, mostly in horror — jaw-dropping, WTF…
Angelina Jolie Is Your Evil Witch In 2014’s Maleficent
It doesn’t hit theaters until March 14, 2014 — presuming there will be a March 14, 2014 — but the first still from Disney’s Maleficent has already leaked, featuring actress Angelina Jolie as Sleeping Beauty’s evil queen. The Maleficent film will tell that old familiar take from the perspective of…
My Five Favorite Works of Art Featuring Food
I generally enjoy museums even if I don’t always understand or fully appreciate what I’m (supposed to be) seeing. The problem comes when I start seeing repeated representations of food and drink. Even if I’ve just eaten a giant baguette slathered with pate (as was the case when I went…
Reality Bites: Gene Simmons Family Jewels
There are a million reality shows on the naked television. We’re going to watch them all, one at a time. Okay, I just got the title of this show. See, it’s about Kiss bassist Gene Simmons, and his family, only see Simmons was known as something of a “ladies man”…
Stephanie Dillard: Leaves Hurt Kids In Car After Crash In Order To Eat Ice Cream In The Nude
When you get in a traffic accident with a bus, what’s the first thing you want to do? Eat ice cream in the nude in a pharmacy, duh. And you’re not going to let a little thing like three shaken up and hurt kids stop you. Ice cream will be…
Return to Forever… Returns!
Return to Forever The Mothership Returns Eagle Rock (2-CD/1-DVD), $24.98. Combining the wordless instrumental dexterity of jazz and the loud, hi-energy performance of rock, jazz fusion bridged that musical gap during the genre’s ’70s heyday. And three groups led the way: Weather Report, the Mahavishnu Orchestra, and Return to Forever…
Dunkin Donuts Flatbread Breakfast Sandwich Falls…Flat
We had lived in Houston for many months before I realized there was, in fact, a Dunkin Donuts in this city. I love Dunkin Donuts — love, love, love it. You have to understand, I grew up in a town where cute little boutique coffee shops just don’t exist (or…
Whore Stories: “Whorestorian” Tyler Stoddard Smith Talks Marvin Zindler and Rasputin’s Penis
A friend of mine recently tweeted that it got pretty embarrassing pretty quick to read the infamous erotica novel 50 Shades of Grey on public transport. Imagine carrying around a book with the giant title WHORE STORIES on the cover, which is exactly what I’ve been doing for the last…
What To Eat After You Pump Some Iron: Best Post-Workout Foods
Summertime means swimsuits, which means many of us are realizing it is now time to dust off that gym membership and get ready to show a little more of ourselves than we usually do. Granted, in Houston, this season lasts about six months. But if anything, that is merely impetus…
To Our Great Disappointment, Dewhurst And Cruz Won’t Debate In Spanish This Friday
This Friday, Tea Party man-crush Ted Cruz, whose father emigrated from Cuba to the United States, and Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst, who speaks some mean Gringo Spanish, will not — to our great disappointment — speak in Spanish at their debate in Dallas. Or Spanglish. It’s going to be more…
Parents Sue School District for “Violently” Washing Stinky Son
Parents of an 8-year-old boy are suing a Fort Worth-area school district, saying a teacher and school nurse, ostensibly objecting to the child’s fetid stench, stripped him, gave him a whore’s bath with a washcloth and stuck cotton balls in his ears. Michael and Amber Tilley allege in federal court…
Reports: ABN’s Dinky D, Poppa C Shot Dead Outside Strip Club
See Rocks Off’s timeline of other Houston rap-related shootings. According to several Twitter updates including by Bun B, two members of Houston rap crew Assholes by Nature, Dinky D and Poppa C, were shot and killed outside the Diamond Club on Westpark around 3 a.m. Wednesday. One other person was…
This Week In Food Blogs: Torchy’s Second Spot in the Heights and Auto-Cannibalism
Arbitrary Criticism: Go ahead and start the Wednesday with a laugh: Catherine Martin visits Joe’s Crab Shack in Kemah, where she “immediately fell in love.” Why? “Do you know what they have in the middle of the tables there? Buckets for you to put your trash in. Just sunk into…
Baldwin VS Costner and 5 Other Silly Celebrity Law Suits
The trial of the year has finally come to a close. Two high-powered, businessmen have been battling it out in court over the loss of millions of dollars from a lucrative BP contract, and justice has been served. Normally, this lawsuit would get a mild mention on various news sources…
U.S. Open Rooster-Crow Guy Will NOT Face Charges (w/ VIDEO)
After a Monday that saw a few significant legal waves ripple throughout the sports world — a “not guilty” verdict for Roger Clemens in his federal perjury trial, continued disturbing testimony in the Jerry Sandusky child molestation trial, Roger Goodell cackling at the appeals of the suspended New Orleans Saints…
Spotify’s Houston Top 10 Singles Is, Uh, Yeah…
This past weekend I was at Academy near my house filling out paperwork to buy a shotgun and the One Direction single “What Makes You Beautiful” was playing over the store speaker system. Before that moment I had thought that One Direction only existed in emails from PR agents, my…
Houston Mother Allegedly Left Kids in Crashed Car to Eat Ice Cream, Get Naked
See our coverage of this story on Hair Balls. How hot does it have to get in Houston before someone’s brain gets completely fried? Apparently, it already happened last week. A Houston woman was found naked in a CVS after crashing her car into a METRO bus near South Post…
100 Creatives 2012: Jeremy Wells, Painter, Nature Geek
It’s not at all difficult to believe artist Jeremy Wells when he says he uses nature and the outdoors as the inspiration for his artwork — he even named his two children after geographical formations: Savannah and Canyon. His repertoire of talents ranges from canvas paintings to refinishing furniture to…
The 10 Best Places To Get Married In Houston
June is the month for weddings, because if there’s one situation you want to find yourself in, it’s at an outdoor wedding in a Houston summer. With the closing of longtime wedding fave Vargo’s, Houston has lost a go-to wedding destination. But there are plenty of other places that would…
4 Best Mistranslations in Final Fantasy
Final Fantasy isn’t a video game series, it’s a religion. And like all great religions there are some rather large issues of translating from the original language to a new one. It used to be a lot worse, as if the people tasked converting the Japanese dialogue to English didn’t…
Top 5 Acts to Catch at Pride Weekend
See many more events this weekend in the Houston Press’ 2012 Pride Guide. This Saturday, the streets around Westheimer and Montrose will be swamped with people for the 34th annual Houston LGBT Pride Celebration, one of the oldest and largest events of its kind in the South. Started to commemorate…
Picasso Defaced: Evidence Builds Against Alleged Menil Collection Vandal
Though the Houston Police Department tells Art Attack that its investigation is ongoing as of Tuesday afternoon, Uriel Hernandez Landeros seems to make it clear on social media that he’s the one responsible for defacing a Pablo Picasso painting at the Menil Collection. He even has some supporters of his…
Jesus Mora Flores: Father Won’t Be Charged For Killing Man Who Was Raping His Daughter
The father who killed Jesus Mora Flores because he was raping his daughter will not be charged with any crime, the Lavaca County district attorney has announced. A grand jury heard evidence in the case and declined to indict the father, who said he was acting to protect his child…
Montrose’s Half Price Books Strip Mall Has a Buyer
After just three months on the market, the block that contains Montrose’s Half Price Books has been sold Swamplot is reporting. Details are sketchy, as neither the buyer or seller is talking yet, but HFF, the company that had listed the property, now says the property is under contract. The…
Justin Bieber’s Believe: Dubstep, Dick Talk, Nicki Minaj & Exactly One Good Song
I listened to the new Justin Bieber album, Believe, twice this afternoon so I could write this. I am not looking for sympathy because I took it upon myself. I did this so you wouldn’t have to, though if you are cool enough to read our blog, the thought of…
Couture Yoga Clothes, Jewelry (and Awesome Classes) at Bayou Bliss Yoga
A friend of mine, who is well aware of my penchant for both fashion and yoga, recently mentioned that she wanted to bring me to a new yoga studio that recently opened up here in Houston, Bayou Bliss Yoga. My friend enthused over the small class sizes, the adorable bungalow-style…
100 Favorite Dishes 2012: No. 73, X-Tudo Burger at Friends Pizzeria
This year leading up to our annual Best of Houston® issue, we’re counting down our 100 favorite dishes in Houston. This list comprises our favorite dishes from the last year, dishes that are essential to Houston’s cultural landscape and/or dishes that any visitor (or resident) should try at least once…
Metro Board Gets Input On Whether To Keep Subsidizing City Budgets
The recent outbreak of hysterical excitement around the city can only mean one thing: the Metro board will soon decide on ballot language for the General Mobility Program referendum. With this fateful day closing in, the board convened last night to take in more public input on the issue. Speakers…
Half-off Tickets to the Houston Web Awards, Affordable (and Romantical) Date Night Dinner Deals Around Town
Today’s Houston Press Voice Daily Deal combines your love of social media and your love of delicious food, all in one package we like to call the Houston Web Awards. Fifteen gets you 30 (dollars) with this half-off admission ticket to the event. Join us on Thursday, June 28, at…
Upcoming: Fiona Apple, Jackson Browne, David Byrne, Chris Isaak, Etc.
The 71’s, Black Queen Speaks, Roomsounds: Sat., Aug. 18, 8 p.m., $10/$14. Fitzgerald’s, 2706 White Oak, Houston. Al Staehely: Fri., June 29, 8 p.m., $20. Old Quarter Acoustic Cafe (413 20th St., Galveston), 413 20th St., Galveston, Galveston. Bob Schneider: Sat., Aug. 4, 8 p.m., $22/$50. House of Blues, 1204…
Congress Gets Tougher On K2, “Spice” & Other Synthetic Pot
The Drug Enforcement Agency has announced that the House and Senate have reached a compromise that will make it tougher to get K2, “Spice” and other forms of synthetic marijuana. Twenty-six drugs, most of them used in creating synthetic pot, have been added to Schedule I, meaning they have been…
Rembrandt Portrait of the Artist, 1665 on Display at the MFA
Rembrandt van Rijn is considered one of the greatest masters in European art history, a genius who’s works have sold for a staggering $33.2 million at Christie’s (the lucky owner remains anonymous). Ironically, as is the case of many a great artist, the man himself died bankrupt, leaving behind a…
What’s Cooking on Pinterest: Snow Cone Cupcakes
The “Food & Drink” section of Pinterest always has recipes that make you think, “hmm, would this actually work? or actually taste good?” That’s why I am here — to answer these questions for you and bring you weird, wacky and fun recipes from Pinterest. This week, looking through the…
Parental Advisory! Another Look at the PMRC’s “Dirty 15”
In 1985, the Parental Music Resource Center was formed as basically a watchdog group over popular music. Essentially, their goal was censorship. However, there was one big problem: The group was made up of the likes of Tipper Gore (wife of then-Senator and future Vice President Al Gore), Susan Baker…
Sedric Johnson: Charged With Three Rapes In Two Weeks
Police have arrested a man and charged him with committing three rapes over the course of two weeks at two southwest-side apartment complex. Sedric Lynn Johnson, 20, is also charged with aggravated robbery in each of the incidents. Police say he would force women at gunpoint into a vacant apartment…
DVDs & Blu-rays: Does the The FP Live Up to the Hype?
The FP stars Jason Trost and Lee Valmassy; Jason Trost wrote and directed it. We want to answer the big question right up front: Is The FP worth your time and money. Our answer: a resounding maybe? The best description The FP came in The New York Times, which said…
Where Are We Drinking? Clue: I Can’t Drive…
The name of this brand-new bar in Rice Village incorporates both the name of the restaurant that used to be there as well as its physical street address. But that’s not what’s important: What’s important is that although it’s been dumbed down from its previous incarnation into a bar more…
5 Bands Abraham Lincoln Would Have Been Into
If he had not been assassinated 147 years ago, Abraham Lincoln would be having a pretty good year. In an already rancorous election campaign, our 16th president remains the ideal of statesmanship, common sense and decency in the Oval Office, virtues all but alien in modern-day Washington. This Friday, Honest…
Comment of the Day: Another Noise-Ordinance Victim
We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it’s time we paid some damn attention to them. So we’ll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning or afternoon from the previous day’s work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous…
$8.50 Lunch Special at the Swanky Vietopia
When my fiance and I met for lunch the other day, we’d planned to visit Chick-Fil-A. But right before we were about to make the turn, he remembered he’d been wanting me to try the Vietnamese place right by his office. I quickly switched lanes, cutting at least three people…
Theatre Suburbia’s The Psychic: Best Enjoyed by Mystery-Genre Lovers
The set-up: The ever-popular genre of humorous murder mysteries takes some strange twists and turns in The Psychic, from prolific playwright Sam Bobrick, as an impoverished writer seeks to finish a novel. The execution: Theatre Suburbia often provides a set detailed with wit, and the New York basement apartment of…
Smithsonian Magazine: Making History with First Annual Food Issue
Smithsonian Magazine, in its more than 40 years of existence, has rarely been of interest to us foodies. Sure it’s always full of nifty inventions, complicated science and fascinating history, but food was never on its front burner. That all changed this June. The first-ever Smithsonian Magazine Food Issue was…
5 Horrible Lessons Ender’s Game Teaches Kids
If you had told me five years ago that Orson Scott Card’s incredible novel Ender’s Game was finally going to be made into a big budget Hollywood blockbuster ensuring that children all over the world would bask in its brilliant story I would have gone to my knees in thanks…
The “Did Beat King Really Say That?” True or False Quiz
Beat King, the wonderful wonderful Beat King, is a beyond-effective club rapper who is really a thunderstorm who is really a refrigerator-sized obscene comedian. His latest song, “Bath Salts,” which references the street drug recently made famous when a man who’d eaten another person’s face was said to have been…
Lone Star College Students Say They’re Getting Screwed On Financial Aid
When a student who shall remain nameless started at Lone Star College last year, he heard rumors about problems in the financial aid office: botched paperwork, delayed disbursement, and even random cancelations of people’s financial aid. Then it happened to him. First, his application got held up when the lady…
Frank “The Tank” Stortini: Flashes Four Kids and Issues Weird Challenge, Police Claim
A College Station roofer has been charged with four counts of indecency with a child by exposure after police claimed that the man exposed his penis to four children at an apartment complex swimming pool on Saturday According to an arrest affidavit reported in the Bryan-College Station Eagle, a quartet…
Pop Rocks: The Real Reasons The New Tom Cruise And Adam Sandler Movies Tanked
If you’re one of the eight or so people on the planet who cares about such things, it was something of a big deal that two movies in their second week of release beat new efforts from Tom Cruise and Adam Sandler in the weekend box office: A couple of…
Open Letter to Revival Market: More Kolaches, Please!
Dear Revival Market, I love Kolache Saturday, and it’s all your fault. For inventing it. And for making the kolaches very, very delicious. Please make them every Saturday. Love, Christina Do you guys think that will work? Because I’m completely obsessed with Kolache Saturday, after Revival Market put on two…
Looking Back At The Genuine Texas Handbook, 30 Years Later
This past weekend I found a copy of Rosemary Kent’s 1981 book The Genuine Texas Handbook at a thrift store off Highway 290. The 224-page golden treasury of Texicana hails from a time when 1980’s Urban Cowboy and the oil boom was coloring the worldview of the Lone Star State,…
Dining on the Rails: A Guide to Light Rail Lunching in Houston
The Houston Press Guide to Lunch (or Dinner) on the Light Rail. When owner Staci Davis decided on a location for her restaurant, Radical Eats, one thing was extremely important to her above all: Davis wanted her vegan paradise to have access to the new Metro light rail North Line…
Changing Spaces: David Katz’s Systemic Expansion at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft
Systemic Expansion, David Katz’s on-site, large-scale installation, starts from a definite point of origin: a corner of the Artist’s Hall inside the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. From there, the clay-wrapped wire structure begins to extend chaotically throughout the hallway’s length, growing web-like branches and finally ending in an infinite…
Frog Eyes! The 10 Greatest Glasses-Wearing Musicians
If you were like me growing up, you had glasses. You got ridiculed for it with names like “frog eyes,” “nerd” (sadly children didn’t equate that with smart, just weird), “ugly” and “geek.” Even worse was the fact that, as a result of my wearing glasses, I couldn’t wear sunglasses…
Why Juneteenth Is The Coolest Holiday
Today is Juneteenth, a celebration that began in Texas but has spread across the country as a celebration of black culture. It is the coolest national holiday, for five reasons: 5. The name itself Thank God it’s not known as The 19th of June, or even the other proposed names,…
Your Guide To Pop-Culture Slurs
Most hipsters don’t claim to be hipsters, and most people couldn’t tell you exactly what a hipster is or does. Just like hipsters, you know a douchebag when you see one, just like pornography. Juggalos proudly call themselves Juggalos but when a non-Juggalo calls someone a Juggalo out of derision,…
Dear Bands: You Don’t Have to Pay For People to See Your Facebook Posts
If you have musicians on your friends list on Facebook, then it’s likely you’ve seen the above image or a variant thereof. Basically, bands are claiming that Facebook is only allowing their posts to be seen by some of the people who have liked their page, and is trying to…
Friday Night: The English Beat & the Romantics at Fitzgerald’s
The English Beat, The Romantics Fitzgerald’s June 15, 2012 I’ve often wondered if people who experienced the ’80s in adulthood had as much fun as the music still makes it sound today. Probably not, but try coming of age on the cusp of the ’90s and all these rain-clouded Seattle…
Kevin Saldana: Sends Ex-GF’s Nude Pic To Her Mom, Threatens To Put It On Web
Here’s a plan: You’re still pining for the girlfriend who broke up with you, so you take one of the topless cell phone pictures she sent you and you mail it to her mom, threatening to publish it and others on the web unless Mom let’s you take to her…
Roger Clemens: Not Guilty On All Counts
A federal jury has exonerated pitching legend Roger Clemens on all six perjury charges, ending an incredibly long saga. Clemens was charged with perjury for statements he made to a Congressional panel indicating he never, ever, ever used any performance-enhancing drugs, a statement believed only by the finalists in the…
Edward Montemayer Arrested For Murder Of Robert Gutierrez
Police have arrested a man in connection with last week’s murder of Robert Gutierrez, 25. Edward Montemayer, 22, is charged with murdering Gutierrez as the two got into an argument in Denver Harbor June 12. Police say he shot the victim several times in the 6900 block of Boyce. He…
Comin’ Up: Happy 70th Birthday, Paul McCartney
By now you all know that today is Sir Paul McCartney’s 70th birthday. Over on chron.com, there is a wire story on the milestone with a curious headline: “Say It Ain’t So: Mop Top Paul McCartney Turns 70.” Now does this mean that it’s a shame he made it seven…
Saturday: 93Q’s “A Day In the Country” at The Woodlands
93Q’s “A Day In the Country” Featuring Dierks Bentley, Chris Cagle, Jana Kramer, Wade Bowen, Ronnie Dunn, Thomas Rhett, Dustin Lynch and Lost Trailers Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion Saturday, June 16, 2012 For the most part, 93Q’s “A Day In the Country” was one Texas-sized pleasant surprise Saturday at the…
100 Favorite Dishes 2012: No. 74, Pheasant Dog at Sammy’s Wild Game Grill
This year leading up to our annual Best of Houston® issue, we’re counting down our 100 favorite dishes in Houston. This list comprises our favorite dishes from the last year, dishes that are essential to Houston’s cultural landscape and/or dishes that any visitor (or resident) should try at least once…
Armed Man Crawls Through Drive-Thru Window To Rob Fast-Food Place (w/VIDEO)
Imagine if Santa Claus was armed and wearing a bandanna across his face. Not a very Merry Christmas, to be sure, but Kris Kringle was apparently the inspiration for one robber. The Harris County Sheriff’s Office and Crime Stoppers have released surveillance video of the robbery, which features the dude…
The Saxophone: 8 Songs That Show Off Rock’s Underappreciated Horn
Bruce Springsteen is currently in the middle of a world tour with E Street Band, their first without saxophonist Clarence Clemons. “The Big Man” passed away one year ago today from complications resulting from an earlier stroke. His death was sad for many reasons, but the reasons most relevant to…
Eggs and Pinot Noir, a Guilty Pleasure
Omelette Of all French dishes, the omelette is perhaps the most thoroughly representative. The French omelette is known far and wide, by reputation, at all events, and various are the parodies of the great French dish that are to be met with in the different corners of the world. In…
New Arrivals from HGOco Captures a Houstonian’s Tale of Survival and Conquest
Read our interviews with librettist Catherine Filloux and Yani Rose Keo. The set-up: In its continuing Song of Houston: East + West, a series of original chamber operas that document Houston’s amazing diversity of world communities, HGOco (Houston Grand Opera’s second company devoted to education and outreach) presents New Arrivals,…
Borgias: The Sins of a Father
The second season of the Borgias came to a predictable end, I’ll grant you that. That Savonarola would burn for opposing the pope was without doubt. That the disposition on Lucretia’s hand in marriage would come to pass was equally a certainty. And that the confrontation between Cesare and his…
Noise Ordinance: Woman Arrested, Spends 30th Birthday in the Clink
Some people celebrate three decades of Earth existence at dinner or by going on an out-of-town adventure. Lauren Garcia spent her 30th birthday in the slammer. On June 9, Garcia threw a bash on her house, located just outside of downtown on the outskirts of the Heights. “I gave my…
Road Trip? Morrissey Coming To Beaumont, Not Houston, In December
Later this year Texas will once again be graced by the presence of former Smiths frontman and cult icon Morrissey, who is embarking on a shortish U.S. tour. The frequently controversial crooner and vegetarian hero is hitting all the major cities in the Lone Star State, like Pharr…and Wichita Falls…..
Uni Sushi: A Taste of Japan, and a First Taste of Raw Fish
Nestled between a movie theater and a boutique in The Woodlands Market Street lies a little piece of Japanese cuisine. Uni Sushi offers a great variety of sushi for all palates. Up until my visit to Uni, my experience never wavered from crab with cream cheese, avocado and cucumber –…
Falling Skies: “Life Hands You Lemons, You Blow Its Freakin’ Head Off.”
When last we left former professor Tom Mason (Noah Wyle), he was boarding an alien spacecraft because an alien-possessed Karen was telling him it was the only way to save his son Ben from whatever mutation his harness had caused. It was a tad surprising, but possibly no more so…
Kevin Schoolmeyer, 21: Dies After Downtown Rave Party
A 21-year-old man began acting bizarrely and then died after taking drugs at what police call “a rave party” early Saturday morning. Kevin Schoolmeyer was driving home to Friendswood with a friend about 6 a.m. Saturday when he began acting strangely, police say. As they were driving through the Denver…
Last Night: Explosions In the Sky at Warehouse Live
Explosions In The Sky, Zammuto Warehouse Live June 17, 2012 Our neighbors from just a few hours away, Explosions In The Sky, dropped in Sunday night to keep the Texas pride going and share more of their elaborate musical talents with not a single lyric spoken. Many may know, Explosions…
Where Are We Eating? Hint: All Pork, All the Time
Sometimes, you don’t want just one kind of pork on your com dia, or Vietnamese rice plate. You want all of the pork. In the case of this longtime Vietnamese standby, the com tam bi suon cha hot ga comes with shredded pork, a porkchop and a pork-filled quiche –…
Dynamo Win: At Least One Houston Team Is Defending Our Honor Against Dallas
Check out our photos of the Texas match-up between the Dynamo and FC Dallas. As it has been well documented on this blog, this site, and the history books, Houston and Dallas have an absolute hatred for each other. It’s an animosity that goes from the people to sports teams…
What’s Cooking This Week? Avocado, Tomato & Corn Salad, Grilled Lemon Chicken & More
I love homemade meals with my fiancé, but most of the time, cooking for two proves to be difficult. If I don’t have a game plan, I end up running around in circles at the grocery store and wasting half the ingredients I’ve bought (and I HATE wasting food). Enter…
5 Songs for Autistic Pride Day
It’s safe to say that you’ve probably heard of autism, the range of developmental disorders that makes life a challenge for millions of people across the world. Awareness of its existence and methods for helping those who suffer from it have made great strides forward over the past decade, with…
Camping with Gasoline: A Hilarious One-Man Show by a Texas Treasure
Read our interview with Jaston Williams. The set-up: Jaston Williams, acclaimed co-author and star of Greater Tuna, takes on the role of storyteller as he regales his audience with memories of his childhood, and of a memorable trip to Guatemala. The execution: The stage is almost bare, with a table…
Houston Kickstarter Round-Up: June
Once a month we’ll be bringing you a look at some of the best local Kickstarter campaigns in order to let you know what’s getting ready to be unleashed through the help of small investors. Know of a good Houston Kickstarter project? Drop Jef a line at jef_rouner at yahoo.com…
Top 10 Interesting Things From Ice-T’s The Art of Rap
Friday night, Ice-T’s new hip-hop documentary The Art of Rap opened in theaters nationwide. I went and watched it at the AMC Studio 30 at Westheimer and Dunvale. Here are ten things from the movie that are interesting and one thing that will be picked over: 10. Grandmaster Caz Is…
Victoria Beckham Launches Victoria, Victoria Beckham at Net-A-Porter
Remember when Victoria Beckham was a Spice Girl, went by “Posh Spice,” and wore brown lipstick? Ahh, the ’90s! I guess I’m just feeling a little nostalgic, after a friend turned me on to the Pandora ’90s Pop station. While as a group The Spice Girls never really represented the…
Comment of the Day: The Immigration Debate, With Some All-Caps Action
We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it’s time we paid some damn attention to them. So we’ll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning or afternoon from the previous day’s work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous…
Remembering Bill Wood: The Astros’ Best-Ever General Manager
There have been a lot of nice things written about new Astros GM Jeff Luhnow. And with good reason. He’s restored a sense of sanity to the front office. There’s a feeling that an adult’s now running things, and with the work he’s done so far this season, i.e. the…
Jeggings and 7 Other Phrases That Need To Go
Each year the Associated Press Stylebook, the bible for journalists and their editors, puts out an updated edition to evolve alongside the changing times. This year’s stylebook saw the inclusion of a lengthened fashion, broadcast and social media section. Similar to additions made to the dictionary, when the AP Stylebook…
Discovery: Weight Watchers Wine
When I wrote about five British foods and drink traditions I’d like to see more of in America, I did not include Weight Watchers wine, which I saw for the first time during a recent trip to London. I don’t know if Weight Watchers wine is available in the U.S…
True Blood: I Think White Wolf Is Gonna Sue Somebody
Alan Ball was known for his masterful use of music in Six Feet Under.He’s lost none of his touch when it comes to his current HBO series, True Blood — which happens to be set in the Louisiana swamps, not terribly far from Houston. The fifth season of True Blood…
French Fries: Not Just For Ketchup Anymore
My older brother moved to Holland a few years ago for a girl. Though they aren’t together anymore, she did visit us in Houston when they were still going out. Wanting to test the stereotype that the Dutch love to put mayo all over their fries, I took her to…
Valerie Trevino and Vanessa Morin: Lead Police on Chase With Five Preschoolers in Car
Well, it’s not quite Thelma and Louise Plus 8, but it’s close. According to the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, two women were arrested last week after leading police on a short car chase. Once 20-year-old Vanessa Morin pulled her gold Jeep Cherokee over, police found five kids inside, all of them…
First Look at 8th Wonder Brewery, the East End’s Own Craft Brewery
See more photos from the 8th Wonder Brewery in our slideshow. Aaron Corsi and Ryan Soroka first met at the University of Houston as beer-obsessed undergrads, where the pair quickly formed an underground brewing club. As graduates, the two are more driven to brew than ever: Corsi is a now…
The Friedman Brothers: Forerunners of SCTV, Release Comic Collection
The sons of writer/comic genius Bruce J. Friedman and model/writer/acting coach Ginger Howard, Josh Alan and Drew Friedman were raised in the artistic bowels of New York City. Josh Alan, a longtime contributor to the Dallas Observer, has a long and varied career as a writer and musician. He first…
Tiffany Anne Saint: Hooters Pageant Contestant Shares Her Inspiration
Here’s a touching story that begins, of all places, at a Hooters in Humble. It involves Tiffany Anne Saint, who vied against 18,000 Hooters waitresses to make the top ten for the16th annual Hooters International Swimsuit Pageant, which takes place in Miami on June 23. She says she decided to…
Buyi Zama Plays Rafiki, a Wise, Female Baboon in The Lion King
In the movie The Lion King, Rafiki was a male baboon. But when director Julie Taymor put her acclaimed version on Broadway, she decided Rafiki should be a strong female lead, actress Buyi Zama told Art Attack. “Rafiki is a person that takes care of everyone. Rafiki means friend,” said…
Comment of the Day: On the Chad Holley Arrest
We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it’s time we paid some damn attention to them. So we’ll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning or afternoon from the previous day’s work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous…
Antwone Betters: On the Run, Charged with Capital Murder in Weed-Sale Killing
A suspect has been named in the murder of Camille Ross, 24, who was shot to death while allegedly trying to buy marijuana, Houston police say. Antwone Jermaine Betters, 24, has been charged with capital murder in the case, police say. He is on the run and is believed to…
Fresh Off Red-Light Camera Win, the Kubosh Brothers Take on the New Feed-the-Homeless Law
The Kubosh Brothers are kind of like the Baldwin brothers, if the Baldwins were rotund, squinty-eyed and sweaty. That’s because it’s confusing just how many brothers actually exist. Two? Three? After a while, it doesn’t really matter: There’s always another Kubosh. And that Kubosh has always got things to say…
7 Cool & Cheap Weekenders: A Fistful of Soul, Waylon Tribute, Etc.
Houston’s favorite happenin’ soul/funk/R&B/rocksteady/ska DJ night, A Fistful of Soul, returns to the Big Top about 10 p.m. this evening. Free. Say happy birthday to DJ Wes Wallace, who has been named “Best Dance Club DJ” by this publication more than ten times, at “Classic Numbers” this evening…
Lindsay Lohan Doesn’t Die in Los Angeles at the Age of 25
Just like everyone who is blessed to be chained to a computer all day at work, I saw the news flash over the internets that an unconscious Lindsay Lohan was rushed to a Los Angeles-area hospital and was on death’s door and lived her life like a candle in the…
Obama’s Mini-DREAM Act: Who Wouldn’t Want These People As Citizens?
President Obama has thrown Republicans into a tizzy by having the Department of Homeland Security issue new guidelines, effective immediately, that put much of the defeated DREAM act into law. Obama announced that the following persons would be granted deportation waivers: People who came to the U.S. under the age…
This Week in Deliciousness: How the Hell Did We All Become Allergic to Food?
Welcome back to the weekly roundup here at Eating…Our Words, where we’re lobbying for Texas to move to a mimosa-based economy. Basically, 50 mimosas would be worth a dollar. Somebody better lock down this public transportation thing and soon. We started the week off right with a look at Oxheart,…
Last Night: The Gourds at Discovery Green
The Gourds Discovery Green June 14, 2012 I have lost count of how many Gourds shows I have seen over the years. I doubt I have seen any other band live more times than this one. But I never realized how much children loved the Gourds until Thursday at Discovery…
Cirque du Soleil’s KOOZA: We Have 3 Ways for You to Win Tickets
If you’ve ever wanted to see a Cirque du Soleil show but haven’t been able to handle the ticket price, if you’re willing to travel around town a bit, you have a chance to go for free. Check out the Houston Press microsite on which you’ll find three ways to…
HPD Releases Sketch of Woman Whose Skeletal Remains Were Found
Police are seeking help identifying a woman whose skeletal remains were discovered last November near the intersection of the Eastex Freeway and the North Loop. The bones were discovered by an outdoors cleaning crew on the afternoon of November 30. The Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences investigated and says…
100 Favorite Dishes 2012: No. 75, Pupusas at El Petate
This year leading up to our annual Best of Houston® issue, we’re counting down our 100 favorite dishes in Houston. This list comprises our favorite dishes from the last year, dishes that are essential to Houston’s cultural landscape and/or dishes that any visitor (or resident) should try at least once…
Yani Rose Keo: Losses and Gains in a Houston Grand Opera Story
Check out our interview with librettist Catherine Filloux. Twelve years ago, the Houston Press wrote a cover story on Yani Rose Keo, a fabled refugee in Houston who’d gone on to work with the Alliance Center and help the constant stream of refugees coming to Houston. Entitled “Cambodian Queen” and…
Explosions In the Sky: No Vocals Necessary
Known for elaborate guitar work, referred to as “cathartic mini-symphonies,” Explosions In the Sky put on emotional shows. Remaining completely devoid of vocals, three guitars and one drummer (a bass guitar is thrown in at times) Explosions combine to create a sound that seems to carry the crowd on a…
Main Street Theater’s Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins Showcases the Wit of a Texan Gadfly
Read our interview with Sara Gaston. The setup: The life and times of famed Texan journalist Molly Ivins are chronicled in a one-woman show at Main Street Theater, spiced by samples of invective aimed at the idiocy of elected officials. The execution: Sara Gaston plays Ivins — she looks a…
Roman Showers Throw Up Their Stomach Contents
Several weeks into June, there’s no escaping summer: the sweltering season’s here in all its flickering-horizon, bathed-in-sweat glory — filthy, glaring, suffocating. Which makes this the perfect time for psychopathic burr-stuck noise blurts like Roman Showers’ Show Me Your Stomach Contents. The joke, of course, isn’t so much that Roman…
Car Show: The Week in Photos
It’s time again to check out the Houston Press Flickr Pool and see what kinds of art shots our talented photographers have added. We love street art, unique perspectives and beautiful photos of Houston’s creative community. If you think you’ve got a good eye, drop your pictures in the pool…
Charles Lee Bergeron Sr.: 80-Year-Old Child Molester Said He Blew Boys Because He Needed Testosterone
The prosecutor in his case called Charles Lee Bergeron Sr. “the sickest of the sick,” a monster whose “fun house became a house of horror” for the many young boys he victimized, and from the details that follow, that’s not prosecutorial hyperbole. On Wednesday, in a Lake Charles court, before…
Forget the Boring Tie: 5 Wines for Father’s Day
Five years ago, it would have been unimaginable to give dad wine for Father’s Day. Back then, in the age before the millennial generation decided that it would make wine its favorite luxury beverage, we still bought our fathers ties, golf clubs, and Weber grills and smokers to celebrate their…
Curated Festivals and the Changing Face of Summer Entertainment
While most Texans are spending their Friday counting down to ACL or speculating about the Fun Fun Fun Fest line up, I find myself thinking about a festival north of our fair state. We’re halfway through June and that means that the 2012 Gathering of the Juggalos infomercial should be…
Week in Photos: Galveston Island Beach
Each week, we take a dip into the Houston Press Flickr pool and see what our talented photographers have been up to. We’re looking for pictures that represent the best of Houston, from food to art to events, to secret hidden spots of beauty. Just drop them in our Flickr…
The Top 5 Best TV Dads From This Year
To all the dads out there, thank you. You have spent tireless hours putting together Barbie Dream Houses for us, taught us how to ride a bike and not feel stupid when we fell over, pretended to be really bad at basketball to let us win, intimidated boyfriends just for…
Upcoming Events: Midsommar’s Night Eating and Free Frescas
It’s already scorching hot in Houston, and it’s only going to get hotter. So cool off by celebrating the first day of summer on Thursday, June 21, at Pollo Campero. The fresh-Mex joint will be offering patrons a free agua fresca with purchase of any entree all day Thursday, including:…
White Ghost Shivers’ Naughty Vaudeville Returns to the Duck
If the recently retired Asylum Street Spankers were “God’s Favorite Band,” their fellow Austinites White Ghost Shivers are more like friends of the devil. Or most likely to violate some Blue Law somewhere. They’re naughty, but nice. The seven-piece Shivers can’t be onstage without you looking around for some Snidely…
The Astros and the Brett Wallace Dilemma
Matt Downs started at first base for the Houston Astros yesterday. Brett Wallace is on the team, and he’s healthy, yet Matt Downs started at first base for the Houston Astros yesterday. Maybe it’s just me, but Matt Downs should never be starting over Brett Wallace. But in the end,…
Video Game High School: Room for Improvement
Up until this point, my opinion of Video Game High School is that it’s so awesome I have had to sew other words onto “awesome” against their will in order to create the appropriate hybrid needed to describe it. Episode 6 was certainly no slouch, but I think the time…
Health Department Roundup: Roman Delight, Droubi’s and a Troubled Taqueria on the North Side
We had an Italian professor who told our class that in Italy, if you eat at a restaurant and get sick, you don’t sue or make a fuss. It’s just part of the deal. Also, Italian barristas don’t clean coffee machines between each use, because that’s pointless. For some reason…
Last Night: 12th Planet At 4500 Washington Avenue
12th Planet 4500 Washington Avenue June 14, 2012 Let’s just say this wasn’t your average college night at 4500 Washington Avenue. Thursday, due to the Rich’s situation (still closed), the 12th Planet show was moved to 4500 Washington Avenue. No, not Stereo Live. As soon as I heard this news…
Reviews for the Easily Distracted: Rock of Ages
Title: Rock of Ages So Is It Cop Rock Bad? I don’t know. Was Cop Rock bad? Are You Kidding? Sue me, I didn’t watch it when it came out, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to add that to a DVR crammed full of tow-truck shows and duck…
Here Are Some Classic Houston Rap Lines as Memes
Early Wednesday evening, I was teaching my sons lines from SPM songs because being a cool dad is usually the same as being a shitty dad. Boy B had a question: “Daddy, why are we doing this?” It was simple and reasonable and direct. But I kind of didn’t have…
Houston Recipe House: Do Good and Have Fun
Katsuya Chefs David and Kenji were recently at Houston’s Recipe House for a June Chef Surprise. Guests were treated to a sushi and sashimi demonstration and tasting from Chef Kenji and a dinner served family-style from Chef David. Recipe House is part of Recipe for Success, a foundation dedicated to…
RIP Nolan Miller: Costume, Fashion and Jewelry Designer Passes at Age 79
Nolan Miller ruled the world of television costume design and fashion during its most golden age: the 1980s. As the costume designer for the hit show Dynasty, Miller wrote the book on shoulder pads, embellished satin day-gowns and bejeweled-to-the-bejesus women. When I learned that the famous designer had passed away…
Goat Graffiti Officially in the Running for World’s Lamest Tagging
In case you haven’t noticed the latest menace haunting Houston’s streets, someone keeps spray-painting the word “goat” on stuff along Washington Avenue and in a couple other areas around the city. This week they hit Kung Foo Saloon and the corner store by Blue Moose. This is annoying for a…
Suggested Baseball Fan Behavior: An Ode to Detroit’s Comerica Park
Last week, the Press’s Margaret Downing, in Detroit for the Association of Alternative Newsmedia convention, took in a Tigers game at Comerica Park. She brought a souvenir back to the office: A full-color, 60-page “A-Z Guest Guide,” which basically breaks down how to be a fan in verbose and silly…
Crisia of The Capitol at St. Germain Will Make You Anything You’d Like…Even If It’s Captain Morgan and Root Beer in a Wine Glass
St. Germain might be the patron saint of the abandoned, but you’ll feel very well attended to and cared for during dinner and a show at The Capitol at St. Germain. The Capitol may be a newish kid on the block, opening last November, but it’s got an old soul,…
Trailer Park: Magic Mike Gets Nude and Lewd in New Red Band Trailer (NSFW for Bare Man Butt)
So what if I wanna see Magic Mike, screw you for judging me. Something about it seems like Stripes but with naked dudes. The stripper comedy is directed by Steven Soderbergh, so I can always blame it needing my sweet Sodie action. And the prospect of seeing the sweaty and…
11 Great Apps for Dad This Father’s Day
My father loved his computer. I know because he used to call me for tech support almost every day. He was the kind of guy who loved to try out new gadgets. I think a lot of us guys are that way. I know I’m certainly a chip off the…
Openings & Closings: Courtesy of the Red, White & Blue Cheese
As Eater Houston reported earlier this week, West Oaks Mall is losing one of its biggest anchors — Alamo Drafthouse — as the chain expands into other areas of Houston, namely Midtown and Cypress. In its place, West Oaks Mall is getting a western-themed bar from country singer Toby Keith,…
100 Creatives 2012: George Brock, Episcopal High Theater Teacher
What He Does: George Brock teaches theater at Episcopal High School, was formerly involved with Actors Theatre of Houston and is Founding Artistic Director of Generations, a Theatre Company. EHS recently won its third Best Musical Tommy Tune Award in the last five years for its production of Dirty Rotten…
The Best Fathers Day Gift: 24 Hours Without Dubstep
This Sunday is a big day. For our dads, that is. It’s Fathers Day, and whether we have daddy issues or not, we have to admit that we children put their dads through a lot. They helped change our diapers (hopefully, if not poor mom), they killed spiders for us…
Father’s Day: Five Horrible Dads You’re Glad Aren’t Yours
On Father’s Day, we all take time out to tell the old man what a swell guy he is, and then on Monday, we all move on, and Dad has to wait another year to get some acknowledgment. But most of us with cool dads probably don’t realize how truly…
Swedish Band Amplifetes Releases “Where Is the Light” as a Video Game
Swedish psychedelic pop band the Amplifetes has taken an innovative approach to releasing a single — by making it available as a video game, and entering players in a contest to win a trip to the Arctic Circle. A while back we talked about Bjork releasing singles as apps, which…
4 Great Possibilities for the Wii U
I followed the various video game unveilings at the Electronic Entertainment Expo avidly, but I had to do so online as I have not yet unlocked the power to hypnotize the editors of the Houston Press into paying for me to fly to Los Angeles and play video games for…
Comment of the Day: Other Bad Singing Politicians
We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it’s time we paid some damn attention to them. So we’ll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning or afternoon from the previous day’s work. Maybe two comments, even. This will all be determined by a highly rigorous…
Youth Concussion Crisis: Big Changes Coming to Kids’ Football
On Wednesday, Pop Warner, the nation’s largest youth football organization, announced some rule changes that could significantly alter how the overall game is played. During Pop Warner practices, players are no longer permitted to line up more than three yards apart during blocking and tackling drills. Additionally, contact drills are…
Esther Baxter: From Urban Model to Actress
In the urban model scene, Esther Baxter was the queen. She modeled for urban magazines, starred in music videos and won the VIBE Award for Vixen of the year in 2005. But, as of 2007, she decided to stop urban modeling completely and transition into acting. Tonight, Baxter has arrived…
Allen Stanford Gets 110 Years, Despite Claiming Innocence
Why can’t a visionary huckster financial genius whose only aim is to help the little people lead better lives get a break? Cricket-loving Allen Stanford, Houston’s second-best scammer after Enron, had proclaimed his innocence through an ever-changing series of attorneys representing him, but for some reason a federal jury chose…
100 Favorite Dishes 2012: No. 76, Spinach Danish from Angela’s Oven
This year leading up to our annual Best of Houston® issue, we’re counting down our 100 favorite dishes in Houston. This list comprises our favorite dishes from the last year, dishes that are essential to Houston’s cultural landscape and/or dishes that any visitor (or resident) should try at least once…
CEP Readies for a Contract Extension, More Kids from HISD
When Terry Grier came in as the new superintendent of Houston ISD in September 2009, many critics of the alternative schools operated by Community Education Partners were encouraged when he started questioning why the district was farming out some of its kids. At board workshops, Grier made it clear he’d…
Eating Up San Antonio: La Gloria, The Monterey and The Esquire
Until this past Tuesday, I didn’t realize how easy a day trip to San Antonio could be. Thanks to the recently raised speed limit on I-10, you can speed to the Alamo in three easy hours (or less, if you set your cruise control just above the new 75-mile-per-hour speed…
Sing Me a Story: Five Rockers Whose Work We’d Like To See On Broadway
Rocks Off has had musicals on the brain lately. Between Once, featuring music by The Swell Season, dominating the Tony Awards and Rock of Ages, featuring music by the cream of the ’80s hair-metal crop, hitting theaters tomorrow it’s been a pretty good week for musicals that aren’t cut from…
Where the Chefs Eat: Grant Gordon, Matt Marcus, Kevin Naderi
This week, our Where the Chefs Eat series gets a pulse on where to go from three of Houston’s up-and-coming young guns: Grant Gordon (age 26), Kevin Naderi (age 26) and Matt Marcus (age 28). As you can see from their smiles, they are not only chefs, but friends. Naderi…
LaShonda Moye’s Presumed Killer Committed Suicide, Cops Say
The killer of LaShonda Moye — the boyfriend with whom she was found in her bathtub — has been found dead of a suicide, Houston police say. Nathan Miller, 39, was found with Moye by police responding to a 911 home-invasion call June 4. When they arrived at the address…
Free Radicals: “If There’s No Money Involved, That’s Fine”
Free Radicals have won an amazing nine Houston Press Music Awards for Best Jazz, but jazz really doesn’t even begin to cover the 16-year-old Houston group’s sound. It’s so all over the place that the only category that really fits is the oft-misunderstood “world music,” especially on the Radicals’ new…
Dallas: “Blood May Be Thicker Than Water, But Oil Is Thicker Than Both of ‘Em.”
It may be difficult for those under the age of…say, 35 to understand, but the original Dallas was a cultural phenomenon when that phrase actually meant something and wasn’t bandied around by everyone trying to describe the latest Kevin Smith podcast. The episode revealing who shot J.R. (“Who Done It?”)…
An Enthusiastic Chef and an Enterprising Menu at Mezzanotte
When I was invited to attend a press dinner featuring new dishes developed by Alberto Baffoni, Mezzanotte’s new chef, I was excited (a tasting menu of Italian food, who wouldn’t be?), but had a few reservations. I had never visited Mezzanotte and therefore would be unable to comment accurately on…
Is It a Perfect Game If It’s Against These Astros?
As you might have heard, San Francisco Giant Matt Cain threw a perfect game against the Astros last night on the West Coast, retiring all 27 hitters with no hits, no walks, no errors. To which we say, eh. Against these Astros? We’d say it was more of an accomplishment…
When Benadryl Won’t Cut It: Common Food Allergies
I have a friend who, for whatever reason, recently grew out of her lifelong food allergies to citrus, nuts, berries and shellfish. Realizing this, she immediately went to a Thai restaurant and had shrimp Pad Thai, something she’d previously been unable to eat due to life-threatening allergies to almost every…
Free for All: “Farewell to the Flesh,” Summer Symphony Nights and New Arrivals
Photographer Ray Traboulay was visiting relatives in Trinidad in 2010 when he realized that Carnival season was coming up. He decided to extend his stay and spend some time capturing the images of the colorful festival. He returned to the island in 2011 and shot more photographs. Those images became…
Ask A Rapper: D-Risha Discusses Sports’ Worst “Decisions”
The hip-hop world is a less than sensible place — lots of times, you’re even required to clarify when bad means bad and when bad means good — so once a week we’re going to get with a rapper and ask them to explain things. Something you always wanted to…
Chad Holley, Center of HPD Beating Trials, Arrested Again
Harris County Sheriff’s deputies arrested Chad Holley and three other men in connection with a burglary in the far northwest part of the county. Holley, 18, was the kid videotaped being taken down and possibly beaten by HPD officers after a burglary in 2010. Four HPD officers were fired, but…
Your Neighborhood Coffeehouse: Doshi House Cafe
The gentrification of the Wards has been an ongoing debate, but for those against it, it seems to be a losing battle, as expensive townhomes and gated communities have steadily overtaken the neighborhoods. Many historic buildings have been casualties. Deepak Doshi, a University of Houston alum, is hoping to preserve…
5 Plays We Really Don’t Want to See Next Season
The 2011-2012 theater season is winding down, just a few more productions left before everyone takes a few weeks off to regroup for the start of the new season in the fall. There are several shows we’re anxiously awaiting. There are also several shows we have our doubts about, but…
Free Radicals Examine Both Sides of The Freedom Fence
Free Radicals are, strangely enough, one of Houston’s most stable ensembles. Their music may vary wildly from song to song, from jazz and klezmer to ska and rap, but the band drummer Nick Cooper started in 1996 has had a steady core of members for most of those years. Baritone…
Frog and Toad the Movie: Five Kids Books We Want to See As Movies
It was recently announced that the Jim Henson Company would be bringing the beloved 1970s classic children’s series Frog and Toad to the big screen. The Jim Henson Company knows its frogs, that’s for sure. Craig Bartlett, the mastermind behind the popular PBS Kids cartoon Dinosaur Train, will manage the…
5 Recipes to Celebrate National Strawberry Shortcake Day
You can’t go wrong with a strawberry shortcake for dessert during the summertime. Fresh, juicy and sweet strawberries paired with a moist, fluffy biscuit cake and a massive heap of smooth whipped cream (I love whipped cream) just scream summer. Today is National Strawberry Shortcake Day, so I encourage you…
Exclusive Premiere: Jennifer Grassman’s “Haunting” Is Scary Good
The last time we visited the cinemaudio work of Houston’s own Jennifer Grassman it was because her and her filmmaker sister Kaitlin had cobbled together the suicidally fantastic music video “Bedroom Door.” The work showed off Jennifer’s penchant for vintage Americana as well as her angelic, ethereal voice and Kaitlin’s…
10 Best Modern Political Speeches
We’ll be hearing a lot of great speeches this election season, but let’s take a second to remember the true giants of political rhetoric. 10. Martin Luther King: I’ve Been to the Mountaintop King delivered this speech in Memphis, Tennessee, the day before he was assassinated. After talking for a…
RIP Javier Olivares, La Pura Sabrosura Vocalist/Drummer
Back when I was a skinny, innocent 13-year-old, and believe me that was a long time ago, I was given the option to choose band or theater as my fine-arts elective. At this point in my life, my music knowledge was limited to the boleros, rancheras and cumbias I had…
App of the Week: Use Your iPhone Camera to Scan Documents with TurboScan
App: TurboScan Platform: iPhone Website: Pixoft Support Cost: $1.99 I think I’ve said in this column 100 times that something every app should focus on when it came to features is simplicity. It’s one thing to have software filled with options and complications when it’s on a computer sitting on…
First (Date) Impression: What Your Restaurant Order Says About You
People can tell a lot about you in just one date. Especially if it’s a dinner date. How much do you care about your appearance? Are you capable of maintaining eye contact? Do you only like to talk about yourself? Do you smell? But it’s not just first appearances, dinner…
Pop Rocks: The (2nd) Greatest Summer of Movies Continues with Dragnet
1982 may have been the Greatest Summer of Movies Ever, according to the Alamo Drafthouse, but 1987 was a close second. It may be hard to believe, in this age of Bubba Gump Shrimp Companies on every corner, but Tom Hanks used to not be taken very seriously as an…
NBA Commish David Stern Asks Jim Rome, “Have You Stopped Beating Your Wife Yet?”
“Have you stopped beating your wife yet?” — NBA Commissioner David Stern in what I hope was a rhetorical question to Jim Rome, 6/13/12 Since the first NBA Draft Lottery in 1985 gift-wrapped Patrick Ewing to the downtrodden New York Knicks, there have been conspiracy theorists galore that have surmised…
Infographic: All You Ever Wanted to Know About Texas Wine and More
See our slideshow of Texas wines and wineries. In this week’s cover story, we take a peek behind the cellar door to investigate some of the Texas wine industry’s more frustrating secrets. Namely, that much of the wine bottled and sold in Texas is made from California grapes — and…
Rocks Off’s 2012 ACL Festival Houston Spillover Sweepstakes
This week has seen a temporary lull in festival season, after Bonnaroo and Electric Daisy Carnival this past weekend. Wait. Never mind. According to musicfestivaljunkies.com (who are these people?), three of them start today: BamaJam in Enterprise, Ala.; The Friendly Gathering in Windham, Vt.; and the Northside Festival in Brooklyn…
Perry House: 30 Years of Arresting Landscapes and Counting
Perry House is all about opposites — he strives to create images that are beautiful and disturbing, about construction and destruction, that walk the line between “horror and humor,” as he says, border realism and abstraction, and are elegant and violent. The latter, apparently, is the main dynamic in a…
For Flag Day: America’s 10 Best State Flags
As all you vexillologists out there know so well, it’s Flag Day again: the most wonderful day of the year. Last year’s drought and intense heat put us in a sour mood, so we raked ten of the worst state flags over the coals. This year, thanks to all the…
Best and Worst Flags for Flag Day
Happy Flag Day! June 14 officially marks the country’s celebration of the good old red, white and blue. On that day in 1777, the country adopted the flag, in a slightly altered form to what we now know, as a sign of our independence. In 1916 President Woodrow Wilson declared…
The World Needs Ten Gotye Remixes? Really? Aight.
Mitt Romney, bath salts, bacon sundaes, and celebrities from the ’80s dropping like flies. If you haven’t noticed by now, shit is rough in 2012. It could even be our very last year on this dirtball, if you listen to shoddy Mayan lore, late-night AM radio, and that one dude…
Gillian Flynn: Gone Girl
From the opening lines of her latest psychological thriller, Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn paints the picture of an unfortunate marriage. The mismatched couple includes underachiever Nick and dissatisfied Amy. When the story starts, it’s their anniversary. As she does every year, Amy will leave a trail of clues for him,…
Southern Summer Comfort Book Tour
Bands aren’t the only ones that can use Kickstarter to cobble together tour funds. Five independent authors used the popular crowd-sourcing site to gather enough money to hit bookstores and bars all over the South during the Southern Summer Comfort Book Tour. Among those appearing is Donora Hillard, author of…
Gail Collins
If you follow Texas politics, As Texas Goes…How the Lone Star State Hijacked the American Agenda by New York Times columnist Gail Collins should be of special interest. Collins, who’s coming to town today for a talk hosted by the Progressive Forum, argues that a lot of today’s political issues…
Of Water and Gasoline
Don’t expect to get the warm fuzzies at Of Water and Gasoline. Local playwright/poet/director Salvador Macias’s play is a look at the dark side of life, with forays into mental illness and addiction. “It starts off sad, and it ends terrible,” Macias tells us. “There is no happy ending; nobody…
Christopher Titus
Shrinks treat family dysfunction; Christopher Titus celebrates it. No stand-up comic alive today is better able to depict the absurdity of modern home life and turn it into a laugh-out-loud exploration of individuality and survival. You’d expect nothing less from a man who claims his parents’ divorce settlement involved a…
Smudge
What do you do when your baby isn’t a baby? When your baby is a disfigured, grotesque thing? Nick and Colby, the parents of an extremely deformed infant, struggle with those questions in Smudge, Rachel Axler’s provocative play. The two characters have very different reactions to their newborn. Nick tries…
The Night Watchman
Director Natalia Almada takes a fascinating look at contemporary Mexican culture with her documentary The Night Watchman, which screened at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival and is making its Houston premiere at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. The film focuses on the ordinary existence of a man named Martin…
Experimental Eye
Kelly Sears is a brilliant local animator whose collage-based short horror film Once It Started It Could Not End Otherwise was selected for Sundance. This week she curates a screening of some of the best animated shorts in the world for Experimental Eye. “I’m so very excited for this screening!”…
Katherine Howe: The House of Velvet and Glass
Former Houstonian Katherine Howe talks about her new book, The House of Velvet and Glass, at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston today, but it won’t be your usual book reading. Instead of just talking about the novel, which follows a young woman in Boston in the early 20th century,…
Lost Bohemia
It isn’t the camera work or direction that make Josef Astor’s documentary Lost Bohemia a wonderful film, it’s the subject matter. For more than 100 years, New York City’s Carnegie Hall Towers housed studio apartments where writers, painters, musicians, actors and dancers created art that changed the American cultural landscape…
Spitting Ether: A Reality Bending Dance
More so than any other art form, dance is grounded in the physical; dancers are, after all, made of flesh and bone. In collaboration with lighting artist David J Deveau, NobleMotion Dance presents Spitting Ether: A Reality Bending Dance at the Barnevelder Movement Arts Complex. As its name suggests, the…
Houston Fine Art Fair
Actor Cheech Marin, a well-known collector of Chicano art, is curating an exhibit of emerging Mexican-American artists for the Thomas Paul Gallery at the Houston Fine Art Fair. ”Chicano art is American art,” says Marin via press materials. ”My goal is to bring the term ‘Chicano’ to the forefront of…
Brazilian Festival
This year’s Houston Brazilian Festival, a fun-filled observation of Brazilian Independence Day (September 7) and already a popular event, should be bolstered by the Olympic Committee’s announcement that the country will host the 2016 Summer Games. There will be food, of course, along with musicians hailing from Houston, Austin and…
Yes Indeed Fest
Another festival in the Houston rock sweepstakes, Yes Indeed is set to invade Dean’s and Notsuoh Saturday afternoon and evening with acts like dUNETX, Alkari, The Gold Sounds, The Wrong Ones, The Fox Derby and Screwtape topping the bill. For the low price of $8 ($12 for you underagers) you…
It Takes Two
Canadian violinist Marc Destrubé, Dutch recorder virtuoso Paul Leenhouts and Baroque oboist Kathryn Montoya join Matthew Dirst at the harpsichord for It Takes Two, Ars Lyrica’s first concert of the season. The program includes Bach’s 4th “Brandenburg” Concerto and Haydn’s Concerto in F Major for violin and harpsichord. 7:30 p.m…
King’s Biergarten and Restaurant’s 2012 Oktoberfest Kick-Off
Johann Sitter, owner of King’s Biergarten and Restaurant (which is charmingly attached to Sitter’s car wash in Pearland), tells us that King’s Biergarten is currently at No. 1 in The Best German Restaurant in America contest. Yes, such a thing exists. To celebrate his No. 1 spot and to kick off the restaurant’s 2012…
Getting Sara Married
Sara Hastings is getting married; she just doesn’t know it yet. In Sam Bobrick’s comedy Getting Sara Married, Aunt Martha is determined to get her niece, a thirtysomething lawyer who’s too busy for romance, hitched. To that end, Aunt Martha forcibly brings Brandon to Sara’s apartment. The fact that Brandon’s…
Cassandra Wilson
Jazz vocalist Cassandra Wilson borrows a line from bridal lore, saying in press materials that her Houston show will include ”something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.” Wilson, who hasn’t performed in Houston for some 15 years, recently earned the top spot on the Down Beat Critics Poll for…
Barkitecture Houston
For most of us, doghouses are pretty simple things. Not so for the finest minds in Houston architecture during Barkitecture. Since 2009, professional builders, architects and design teams have constructed one-of-a-kind shelters to be auctioned off for charity. Last year FKP Architects, known for their award-winning hospitals, took home the…
International Quilt Festival/Houston
Once a year, Houston becomes Quilt City as the International Quilt Festival/Houston takes over the George R. Brown Convention Center. Artisans show off their latest efforts in fabric arts, vendors offer up the newest gadgets and teachers lead workshops in state-of-the-art techniques. 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday through Saturday,…
Liza Minnelli: Confessions
Before Lady Gaga, before Madonna, there was the legendary Liza with a Z! Vivacious and full of energy at the age of 66, Liza Minnelli promises to delight and entertain again and again. Her current Confessions tour takes audiences on a thrill-ride retrospective of her gloriously tumultuous career with performances…
Fleaven
It was American Falls that snagged actor/playwright Miki Johnson the Best Playwright nod at the Houston Press’s Houston Theater Awards last August. Falls is Johnson’s first-ever produced work, but Fleaven, produced here by Catastrophic Theatre, is actually her first playwriting effort. The show’s title is a mash-up of two characters’…
Michael Connelly: The Black Box
Michael Connelly’s new thriller The Black Box will have been on shelves for just one short day when he stops at Murder by the Book for a reading and signing session. Black Box starts on the third night of the L. A. riots, 1992, when police detective Harry Bosch came…
Food for Thought: Gustavo Arellano
Gustavo Arellano — a.k.a. ”Ask a Mexican!” himself — doesn’t shy away from having strong opinions or expressing them. It’s what has made Arellano into a popular columnist, author and public speaker over the years and what’s bringing him to Houston on November 15 to kick off the University of…
Scrooged
In our not so humble opinion, Bill Murray is undoubtedly the greatest comedic actor of the late 20th century. No other man alive is able to combine unlikable but hilarious traits with humanity and redemption as he did in films like Scrooged. The comedic take on the Dickens story follows…
It’s a Wonderful Life- A Live Radio Play
No, it’s not the Jimmy Stewart/Frank Capra film; yes, it’s the same holiday story of George Bailey’s loss of hope and his ultimate redemption. This time It’s a Wonderful Life is a stage play presented as a radio broadcast from the mythical station -WBFR’s Playhouse of the Air. Five actors…
The Ice at Discovery Green
Winter is kind of a myth here in Houston, where very few people have ever seen any significant snowfall. Still, we like to pretend to a winter wonderland whenever possible, and there’s no better way to do that than at the Ice on Discovery Green. The annual ice rink is…
”Soldier, at Ease”
Native Texan and photographer Erin Trieb was in her mid-twenties when she sold all of her furniture to fund a ticket to Afghanistan, where she started photographing soldiers in war. One of a trio of photographers with work in the exhibit ”Soldier, at Ease,” on view at the Houston Center…
Prize Poets
Fady Joudah and Katherine Larson appear at Prize Poets. Both are winners of the prestigious Yale Prize for Younger Poets (Joudah’s The Earth in the Attic won in 2007, and Larson’s Radial Symmetry in 2011). The two have something else in common: They are both scientists. Joudah is a practicing…
MFAH Film Premieres: Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters
What David Lynch did on film and H.P. Lovecraft did with prose, Gregory Crewdson does with photographs. Showing the hidden surreal side of small-town America, his works require massive sets, some outdoors in real locations, some on large soundstages. Director Ben Shapiro’s documentary look at just how Crewdson goes about…
Das Boot
There’s no war film more claustrophobically terrifying than Wolfgang Petersen’s Das Boot (1981). Seen from the German side, these guys, hardly the exemplars of the master race, are buried alive in their leaky, filthy U-boat as they’re buffeted by unseen depth charges fathoms below the north Atlantic. Under Petersen’s masterful,…
Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian: Convertibles and Polygons
The Islamic Golden Age gave us algebra and a host of other mathematical advancements, so it’s no surprise geometry often plays a part in Islamist art. Iranian artist Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian showcases the power of concise and repeating calcite figures in her installation Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian: Convertibles and Polygons. Mirrored…
ReWritten in Stone
Urban Souls Dance Company presents ReWritten in Stone in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation. Choreography by USDC Artistic Director Harrison Guy, Walter Hull and Courtney Jones will be featured in addition to performances by singer Barbara Johnson Tucker and poets Jem, Lyro and Seek. Hope Stone…
Dean ”Miranda” James and Joelle Charbonneau
Houston’s own master of cozy mysteries Dean James appears at Murder by the Book to sign the latest release in his Cat in the Stacks series, Out of Circulation. James writes Cat in the Stacks under the pseudonym Miranda James, but fans are in on the secret so no one’s…
ROCO Chamber Concert: Joseph Foley
The River Oaks Chamber Orchestra highlights the trumpet’s range with a performance featuring Joseph Foley. The principal trumpet for ROCO, Foley will be performing a diverse selection of works from Bach, Arban, Hansen and Strauss, with some jazz thrown in for good measure. The fifth of six events in the…
”Foley’s Department Store: Houston’s Community Partner, 1900-2005”
The building at 1100 Main Street might say Macy’s, but for a large number of Houstonians, it will always be Foley’s. The Heritage Society’s new exhibit ”Foley’s Department Store: Houston’s Community Partner, 1900 – 2005” details the store’s multifaceted history. Started in 1900, by Pat and James Foley, the store…
Savion Glover: SoLe Sanctuary
Savion Glover, the young artist who almost single-handedly revived tap dancing for the hip-hop generation, pays tribute to those who came before him in SoLe Sanctuary. Glover gives a nod to such dancers as Jimmy Slyde, Lon Chaney, Buster Brown, Gregory Hines, Sammy Davis Jr., Dianne Walker and Honey Coles,…
The Mystery Plays
According to fans, playwright, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, is a comic-book geek-slash-genius. The man behind The Mystery Plays, being presented here by the Rice Players, writes for Marvel comics, wrote for the HBO drama Big Love, was play doctor for Broadway’s Spiderman: Turn Off the Dark and writes/co-produces television’s Glee. He’s also…
Houston Center of Photography’s Print Auction
For the first time in its 32-year history, the Houston Center of Photography’s Print Auction will be auctioning off a video. Reflections 81717, a time-lapse video by Pablo Gimenez-Zapiola, will be among the more than 80 pieces up for grabs at the auction, which supports HCP’s exhibitions, educational initiatives and…
Broke-ology
Meet the King family of Kansas City. The Kings are experts in ”broke-ology” — that is, the unscientific science of making do on a limited income. Regardless, they live, they laugh, they love, they cry. (Think the Huxtables but without the cash.) The Ensemble Theatre’s artistic director, Eileen J. Morris,…
Cruzar la Cara de la Luna (To Cross the Face of the Moon)
In Cruzar la Cara de la Luna (To Cross the Face of the Moon), baritone Octavio Moreno goes from a young man in his early 20s to the same man in the 35-45 age range and then to his character Laurentino at 70-80 years old. And back again. Moreno, a…
Misha Penton and Divergence Vocal Theater: Selkie, a sea tale
The term ”staged concert” doesn’t quite cover what you’ll see at Selkie, a sea tale, by Misha Penton and Divergence Vocal Theater. It’s actually a multimedia music/dance/video sensory experiment with as little separating the performers and viewers as possible. ”I don’t like the word ‘audience,”’ says singer / performer /…
Great Expectations
Celebrate the 200th anniversary of Charles Dickens’s birth at a screening of Great Expectations. Director Graham MacClaren did what many thought was impossible — he brought the story to the stage. Filmed live on the play’s opening night less than two months ago in London’s West End at the Vaudeville…
Houston Jewish Film Festival: The Other Son
Switched-at-birth plots have been around for hundreds of years. Lorraine Levy’s 2012 film The Other Son takes that plotline and adds hefty doses of politics, war and ethnic conflict to the mix. It focuses on an Israeli couple and a Palestinian couple who discover that their 18-year-old sons were accidentally…
”Tony Feher: Free Fall”
DiverseWorks commissioned sculptor Tony Feher to create an interactive installation with a very specific purpose: consider how his work might relate to live performance. The resulting ”Tony Feher: Free Fall” combines art, dance, music and language with several area choreographers, composers and writers, each chosen by Feher, coming into the…
Folklore Mexicano featuring Leyenda Dance Company
Let Leyenda Dance Company whisk you away to Mexico during today’s family-friendly Cinco de Mayo at Miller celebration. Along with live music and a few short speeches from local bigwigs, the program includes Leyenda’s performance of Mexican folkloric dances. The group’s varied repertoire includes dances that were born in pre-Hispanic…
one-step promenade, please
Hope Stone Dance Company Artistic Director Jane Weiner has enthusiastically worked to bring contemporary dance to a wide audience. Her latest endeavor, one-step promenade, please, is perhaps her most ambitious effort yet. The show is set in and around the 19th Street boutiques and galleries in the Heights. Well, actually,…
Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series: Jonathan Lethem and John Jeremiah Sullivan
Authors Jonathan Lethem and John Jeremiah Sullivan share the spotlight at this installment of the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series. Lethem’s works in fiction have drawn comparisons to the very best in modern American literature and been called wildly inventive. Drawing on classic pulp genres like noir and western…
Sinbad
Sinbad is a misleading name for a comic who is best known for eschewing the sin of bad language. But that’s been the name of this big-and-small screen stand-up star since America first met him in 1985 as a contestant on Star Search (a 20th-century predecessor of The X Factor,…
The Wake of Jamey Foster
Fred White makes his Baytown Little Theater directorial debut with the uproarious comedy The Wake of Jamey Foster. In a not so bizarre accident (for him, anyway), Jamey dies after being kicked in the head by a cow while he was out on a drunken adventure in the middle of…
Spamalot
Actor Tom Hewitt (Billy Flynn in Chicago on Broadway) has been a Monty Python fan since his youth, which is standing him in good stead now that he’s signed on to play King Arthur in Theatre Under the Stars’ upcoming production of Spamalot, a musical that evolved from the movie…
”Jessica Dupuis: Miniature”
More than 100 exhibitions are being held around town as part of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts’ annual conference. Most are at places you’d expect, like the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. Some are on view in nontraditional spaces; ”Jessica Dupuis: Miniature” is on display inside…
Greenwich Village: The Music That Defined a Generation
First time director Laura Archibald crystallizes the Golden Era between 1961 and 1973 when musicians, poets, artists and other creative malcontents gave voice and melody to one of the most chaotic and inspiring periods of American history with her film Greenwich Village: The Music That Defined a Generation. ”We had…
”The Artist’s Palette: Primary Colors on Paper”
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston doesn’t usually arrange its exhibits according to color, but for ”The Artist’s Palette: Primary Colors on Paper,” it’s doing exactly that. Drawn from its holdings of prints, drawings and photographs, ”Palette” features works that emphasize one of the three primary colors: yellow, blue and…
”Keith J. Varadi: Maurice”
Keith J. Varadi’s oil paintings have something you can’t quite put your finger on. They seem unexpectedly muted and soft. Even the boldest colors have a quiet quality to them. That’s because these oil paintings are copies of oil paintings, the originals discarded in favor of this second life. It’s…
V/H/S 2
For horror-film fans, good anthologies are few and far between. Luckily, one of the best of that genre, V/H/S 2, is making its Houston debut at the River Oaks. A sequel, V/H/S 2 follows the formula of the hit first film, in which a group unwittingly stumbles across a collection…
Hey Bartender
Watching the documentary Hey Bartender is like spending a night at a good bar: It’s fun and easygoing and it lasts just a little longer than it should. And the conversation, while delightful in the moment, often seems banal the next morning. It’s clear that director Douglas Tirola is passionate…
QFest 2013
The wide splash of venues for Friday’s films speaks to the growth of QFest 2013, Houston’s LGBT film festival, since its establishment 17 years ago. No fewer than 30 events and screenings focusing on the queer experience take place in nine venues as far-flung as Galveston and Katy. On Friday…
“Pat Johnson: Artist Tries to Save the World”
Personal issues become political ones in Pat Johnson’s exhibition “Artist Tries to Save the World,” now on view at the Art Car Museum. With ceramic sculpture and satire, Johnson brings to the viewer’s attention some of the most polarizing sociopolitical matters of our time: racism, greed, international poverty and hunger…
Summer Chills: Agatha Christie’s The Hollow
Don’t bother looking for Hercule Poirot in the Alley Theatre’s production of Agatha Christie’s The Hollow, part of its Summer Chills series. While the Belgian detective appears in Christie’s novel of the same name, he was cut from the play (seems Christie wasn’t a particular fan of the fastidious, clever…
”Water’s Edge (Mizugiwa)”
In the traditional Japanese art of flower arrangement, mizugiwa means the point where the water and plant meet. In English, that’s better known as the shore or bank, which doesn’t seem nearly as poetic. In ”Water’s Edge (Mizugiwa)” at Catherine Couturier Gallery, Houston artist Libbie J. Masterson explores this intersection…
Re-Anitmator
H.P. Lovecraft never thought much of his short story ”Herbert West: Re-Animator,” but Re-Animator, Stuart Gordon’s 1985 film starring Jeffrey Combs, remains the most famous movie adaptation of any Lovecraft work as well as a cult horror classic. ”Re-Animator’s healthy life on cable and home video really helped introduce a…
”Byzantine Things in the World”
Glenn Peters, professor of early medieval and Byzantine art at the University of Texas at Austin, got to dig through The Menil Collection’s storage vaults as he put together ”Byzantine Things in the World.” The exhibition explores the relationship between ancient and contemporary art through iconography. Some 70 works spanning…
Shen Yun Symphony
Shen Yun’s regular performances, visual cornucopias of traditional Chinese dance, are a definite must-see. Now the group’s bringing something a little different, the Shen Yun Symphony. The current tour is a strictly symphonic outing that’s a unique meshing of Western and Eastern musical styles. While the music was simply the…
Amber Preston
When Fargo, North Dakota, native Amber Preston plays the Joke Joint Comedy Showcase this weekend, her crowd will understand that while, yes, she’s rocking that Tina Fey, “librarian sass” vibe, she’s got her own style of funny. Her résumé’s bullet points include winning awards at both the Great American Comedy…
Call Me Kuchu
It’s fair to compare Uganda’s David Kato to the United States’ Harvey Milk: Both were openly gay activists railing against a broken, discriminatory system, gaining fame as uncompromising advocates of LGBT equality. Milk addressed throngs at San Francisco’s City Hall and early gay pride marches, enjoining crowds to “[b]urst down…
The Cork-Screwed Revue
Corkscrew, an upscale piano bar in the Heights, presents The Cork-Screwed Revue. The star is Kiki Maroon, the head of Kiki’s Sordid Show (known as Houston’s very own stripping clown). She’s one of the most memorable practitioners of the debaucherous arts around, and Corkscrew is giving her a place with…
Houston LibroFEST
Local favorite novelist — and the city’s first poet laureate — Gwendolyn Zepeda joins Houston Police officer and author Sarah Cortez at this year’s Houston LibroFEST. Writers Guadalupe Garcia McCall, René Saldaña Jr. and Manuel Ramos are also set to take the mike during the afternoon-long celebration. Along with the…
Graveyard Shift: Friday the 13th Triple Feature, The Tommy Jarvis Trilogy
When we think of Jason Voorhees, the masked maniac star of the Friday the 13th films, we picture him as an undead, unstoppable monster. There is, however, one man who has repeatedly stopped Jason, one Tommy Jarvis. During today’s Graveyard Shift: Friday the 13th Triple Feature, The Tommy Jarvis Trilogy,…
Texas Contemporary Art Fair
The Texas Contemporary Art Fair, despite what its title might suggest, is not limited to visual artists from the Lone Star State. More than 70 contemporary galleries as far away as Japan are offering innovative and progressive art from masters and emerging artists alike. Installations and public talks will also…
All Girls
Three 13-year-old girls share the stage with a psychiatrist mother determined to make the best choices for her daughter in All Girls, about to undergo its regional premiere in Houston at Stark Naked Theatre. The best friends are about to enter high school in the play set in the ’90s…
The Rocking Dead Halloween Extravaganza featuring Here Come the Mummies
The Rocking Dead Halloween Extravaganza, Houston Press’ contribution to the haunting season, is a veritable House of Blues takeover. There’s a line-up of appropriately named entertainment including Here Come the Mummies, an R&B/funk band that perform in full mummy regalia; The Graceland Ninjaz, an indie band with a wildly diverse…
26th Annual Día de los Muertos Retablos and Student Exhibitions
The 26th Annual Día de los Muertos Retablos and Student Exhibitions are among the most democratic, free-for-all art shows in the city. Prior to the exhibit, the Lawndale Art Center gives out small pieces of sheet metal to anyone who asks for one. The only requirement is to create contemporary…
Chef Adam Perry Lang: Charred & Scruffed
If you think you know barbecue, think again. Chef Adam Perry Lang, barbecue master extraordinaire, comes to Central Market Houston to demonstrate his unique approach to barbecuing while creating some of his favorite recipes from his new cookbook, Charred & Scruffed. Highlights include a rib roast prepped like a steak,…
An Evening with Adam Carolla & Dennis Prager
An Evening with Adam Carolla and Dennis Prager features an unscripted Q&A session with the audience. We’re just guessing here, but we think Carolla’s recent remarks about men being funnier than women might come up. Known as a guy’s guy, Carolla’s been taking some heat for his comments to the…
Lady Terminator
The tagline “She Mates…Than She Terminates” tells you most of what you need to know about the Indonesian film Lady Terminator, this week’s installment in the Weird Wednesday series. The 1989 camp sexploitation film is a knockoff of James Cameron’s action flick The Terminator, with a heavy dose of the…
Brigitte Martin: Humor in Craft
If your morning cup of coffee brings a smile to your lips, pick up a Smug Mug by Houston artist Jason Kishell. His ceramic mugs smile back at you. One of Kishell’s creations is featured on the cover of Humor in Craft, a new coffee-table photo book that Brigitte Martin…
Yankee Doodle Dandy
James A. Rocco was lying on a beach in Cancun talking with friends about the origins of musical theater when it came to him that George M. Cohan, the man who wrote more than 500 songs and jump-started the American musical into being, was not getting his due. So Rocco…
H-Town Sneaker Summit
Sneakerheads are invited to gather at the H-Town Sneaker Summit, the world’s largest community-based sneaker event, which is held twice yearly. The summit features the buying, selling, trading and discussion of sneakers, turning Reliant Center into the ultimate shoe closet. In addition to the chance to browse an amazing selection…
Houston Young Playwrights Exchange 2012 Staged Readings
Now in its 16th year, the Alley Theatre’s program to recognize, encourage and develop young playwrights is in full swing with a reading of all six plays written by this year’s selected students, scheduled for the first weekend in August. For Houston Young Playwrights Exchange (HYPE) 2012 Staged Readings, high-schoolers…
2nd Annual ArCH Film Festival
Dozens of local groups have seen their passions portrayed cinematically this year. The Aurora Picture Show’s Extremely Shorts Film Festival made much ado about film shorts. QFest explored issues dear to the LGBTQ community. And the REDCAT International Children’s Film Festival, for children (or the child in you), has screened…
The 2012 Summer Israeli Film Series:Three Servings of Funny
Israel is an important player in the world-cinema arena. Case in point: An Israeli film has been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film four times out of the past five ceremonies. The nominees were all rich, thought-provoking pieces of cinema, but collectively they were short on…
Lemonade Stand 2012 WRECK-WE-UMMM
Don’t expect a straightforward plot in Lemonade Stand 2012 WRECK-WE-UMMM. The Hope Stone Dance Company doesn’t quite work that way. Instead of a story, the third annual summer show, which is set to Mozart’s Requiem, explores the relationship between movement and sound, style and emotion. Asked if the show has…
One Touch of Venus
Houston Theater Awards Best Actor winner Joe Kirkendall is making his first appearance with Bayou City Concert Musicals as Whitelaw Savory in One Touch of Venus. Savory is an art collector who owns a prized statue of Venus of Anatolia (Danica Dawn Johnston). A man (Rob Flebbe) comes along and,…
14th Annual Gulf Coast Film & Video Festival
Houston filmmaker Baldemar Rodriguez is screening his feature In Search of the American Dream at the 14th Annual Gulf Coast Film & Video Festival. The emotional story of a family torn apart when the parents, undocumented immigrants, are arrested in an ICE raid, American Dream focuses on the consequences to…
Dr. Pete: Feel the Power of the Dork Side
When the Curiosity descended onto the planet Mars, a crowd in Times Square watched it on the Jumbotron chanting, “SCI-ENCE! SCI-ENCE!” Even as we live in a world where people still try and put man and dinosaurs together, cohabiting, in the science books, you can see a new fervor for…
An Evening with Joel Grey
Few actors have the luck to originate a memorable role in a Broadway show; Joel Grey has done it twice. The first was in 1966, when he appeared as the Master of Ceremonies in the hit musical Cabaret. (He won a Tony Award for his stage performance and later earned…
Musiqa: Deep Sky Objects
A sweeping intergalactic romance is at the center of Deep Sky Objects, the new work by composer Sebastian Currier. Set to poetry by Sarah Mangus, Deep Sky Object is making its world premiere during today’s Musiqa concert. Soprano Karol Bennett appears as a soloist. Secret Alchemy by Pierre Jalbert and…
Tasteful Art
Celebrate 20 years of artist studios at Lawndale Art Center and five years of the Lawndale Artist Studio Program with Tasteful Art, a special tasting event featuring local contemporary artists and chefs at the historic and beautiful Hofheinz House (3900 Milam). Lawndale is bringing culinary artists onboard for this unique and collaborative event,…
”Tejiendo los restos del naufragio/Weaving the Remains of the Shipwreck — Photography by Linarejos Moreno”
Spanish artist Linarejos Moreno is interested in the ideas of loss and absence. In her new exhibit, ”Tejiendo los restos del naufragio/Weaving the Remains of the Shipwreck — Photography by Linarejos Moreno,” at De Santos Gallery, she explores those themes through a series of oversize photos printed on handmade burlap…
”Perspectives 179 — Alvin Baltrop: Dreams into Glass”
New York City during the 1970s was a different animal than it is today. Empty, dilapidated buildings dotted the city, including Manhattan’s West Side piers, where photographer Alvin Baltrop spent a lot of time capturing images of life on the street. ”Perspectives 179 — Alvin Baltrop: Dreams into Glass,” on…
Blier/Depardieu
Successful movie stars become part of the pop culture woodwork; it sometimes seems they’ve always been around, so once in a while it’s fun to look back and see how they got there. International French superstar Gérard Depardieu, who has his own Légion d’honneur medal, has a track record lasting…
”Jane Alexander: Surveys (from the Cape of Good Hope)”
There’s nothing ordinary about the exhibition ”Jane Alexander: Surveys (from the Cape of Good Hope),” currently at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. Johannesburg-born Alexander creates intriguing hybrid human/animal figures and places them in unexpected settings. In the installation African Adventure, for example, we see a creature with a bird’s head…
Children Who Chase Lost Voices
Hayao Miyazaki fans are quickly becoming Makoto Shinkai fans as well. In the anime master’s epic film Children Who Chase Lost Voices, a young girl reeling from the death of her father is left alone for much of the time by her mother, who’s working long shifts to make ends…
Mercury Baroque: Bach & Sons
For a man who’s focused on music from the baroque era, conductor Christophe Rousset has an unusual attitude, claiming to be ”a normal man with no special nostalgia for the past…” Rousset, a famed harpsichordist as well as a highly regarded conductor, joins Mercury (formerly Mercury Baroque) for the concert…
FOUND Magazine’s 10th Anniversary Tour
For a solid decade Davy and Peter Rothbart have been collecting odd and often hilarious random communications for the irregularly published FOUND Magazine. Their holdings include all kinds of short notes and letters, everything from discarded birthday cards to a lost list of Draconian dietary instructions for ballerinas, unwanted prison…
Lucie Smoker
The first murder in Lucie Smoker’s debut mystery novel, Distortion, takes place just three blocks from where she’ll be appearing today. Her heroine is artist Addie Proust, who stumbles into intrigue while trying to get over a failed relationship. Proust is at a local punk club when it unexpectedly catches…
Arthur Christmas
Have you ever wondered what a modern Santa Claus must use in his operation? In Sarah Smith’s holiday film Arthur Christmas, it’s a mile-long ultra-high-tech sleigh that uses the finest in military-level advancements to accomplish gift delivery with the kind of flawless execution usually reserved for taking out terrorist leaders…
Peter Pan
Cathy Rigby, the former world champion gymnast and Olympian who transformed herself into an actress and stage performer, has unretired from her role as the boy who would never grow up and is headed back to Houston to star in Peter Pan. ”If I can do it better and if…
The Houston Film Critics Society Awards: Best of 2012
Two of the year’s biggest films, Lincoln and Les Miserables, go head-to-head for best picture in the Houston Film Critics Society Awards: Best of 2012. Of course, there’s a chance Houston will buck the national trend and give the nod to Cloud Atlas. On the opposite end of the spectrum,…
”Constructed Dialogues: Concrete, Geometric, and Kinetic Art from the Latin American Art Collection”
The modern world is reflected in abstract shapes and color patterns in the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s new exhibit ”Constructed Dialogues: Concrete, Geometric, and Kinetic Art from the Latin American Art Collection.” Many Latin American artists of the 20th century embraced avant-garde styles as they worked to reflect their…
”Broadening the Texas Perspective: Rediscovered Paintings of Emma Richardson Cherry”
After spending some 50 years in storage, a large cache of paintings by Houstonian Emma Richardson Cherry will go on display at the William Reaves Fine Art gallery. A leading figure in Texas art from the time she moved to Houston in the early 1890s until her death in 1954,…
Brad Taylor: Enemy of Mine
When author Brad Taylor writes about espionage, terrorism and clandestine hit squads, he knows exactly what he’s talking about; Taylor spent more than 20 years in the Army before retiring as a Special Forces lieutenant colonel. His boots-on-the-ground insight into the situation in the Middle East and special skills in…
Django
Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino’s latest release, Django Unchained, might do for spaghetti westerns what his Kill Bill series did for samurai movies — that is, revive interest in them among a new generation of movie viewers. His hyper-violent western starring Jamie Foxx and Leonardo DiCaprio was inspired in part by Italian…
What Made Milwaukee Famous
What Made Milwaukee Famous have been plying their melodic, emotionally fraught brand of indie-rock for a decade now, appearing on Austin City Limits (the festival and the TV show) and releasing a pair of albums on Seattle indie Barsuk. The brand-new, self-released LP You Can’t Fall Off the Floor bolts…
Downtown Rodeo Parade
Get ready to unleash your inner cowboy at the Downtown Rodeo Parade. This year’s grand marshal is Texas A&M University’s head football coach Kevin Sumlin who’ll lead the procession along with the Fightin’ Texas Aggie Band. Hundreds of trail riders, dozens of marching bands and decorated floats, along with local…
Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks
A comedy with music and dance Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks by Richard Alfieri trots its way into Houston’s Theatre Suburbia. The straightforward plot follows an older woman (Jeanette Sebesta) and her private dance instructor (Dean Dicks) as they make their way through the Foxtrot, cha-cha and tango. Fridays,…
Paradise Hotel
The French love romping farces, so it’s no wonder Paradise Hotel by Georges Feydeau was an instant success in its 1894 premiere in Paris. In Paradise, middle-aged Monsieur Pinglet persuades the beautiful young wife of his business partner to join him in a notorious hotel for the night, but, inevitably,…
John Caparulo
Chelsea Handler’s E! chat show Chelsea Lately boasts a motley supporting cast of players, comics and foils. Prime among them is grumpy comedian John Caparulo, in town for a weekend stint of standup at the Improv Comedy Showcase. Caparulo has a particular beef with customer-service reps. ”My cable went out,…
Benjamin Grosvenor
Come see 20-year-old British pianist Benjamin Grosvenor perform an ambitious program of piano solos ranging from Bach to Chopin in his Houston debut. Grosvenor made his big splash at the ripe age of 11 when he won the keyboard section of the BBC’s prestigious Young Musician of the Year award…
2012 Academy Award Nominated Short Films (Documentary)
The documentary shorts nominated for the Academy Awards this year wrestle with hardship and mortality. Linked by their shared interest in struggles to survive, the docs are being screened as part of 2012 Academy Award Nominated Short Films (Documentary). These nonfiction shorts shine a light on universal issues of suffering,…
Tour de Houston
Mayor Annise Parker joins 5,000 of her closest friends for today’s Tour de Houston. The annual bike ride is sponsored by the Apache Corporation and features 20-, 40- or 70-mile circuits that begin and end at City Hall, with routes meandering through River Oaks, near Hobby Airport and the Air…
The ABCs of Death
Aside from animation, perhaps no genre embraces the power of the short film format like horror. One good scare can turn a few minutes into a concise masterpiece. Enter The ABCs of Death, 26 short films, each helmed by a different director and each dealing with one aspect of death…
Haute Wheels Houston
At Haute Wheels Houston, hungry customers have their choice of 20 different trucks, including Angie’s Cake, Bernie’s Burger Bus, Big Daddy Z’s (Cajun), Chi’lantro (Korean BBQ), Firehouse Tacos, Frosted Betty Bake Shop, H- Town StrEATS, It’s a Wrap, L’es-Car-Go (French), Monster PBJ, Soul Kat Cuisine and the Waffle Bus. In…
Dave Attell
Comedian Dave Attell is brash, loud, funny and oh so politically incorrect. While we laugh at his jokes, we almost never follow his advice. ”Women like lots and lots of attention,” he says in one standup bit. ”You might call it stalking, but they love it. They try to fool…
Lila Downs
Singer and composer Lila Downs was born in Mexico, but it would be inaccurate to describe her songs as Mexican music. She mixes traditional Latin rhythms with elements of jazz, blues, soul and African roots music to create something that is uniquely her own. Her latest album, Pecados y Milagros,…
Then and Now: Houston Heights Association’s 2013 Spring Home & Garden Tour
Indulge your voyeuristic tendencies at Then and Now: Houston Heights Association’s 2013 Spring Home & Garden Tour. Six notable Heights-area homes are open for public display and scrutiny, inside and out. ”All of the houses are special,” diplomatically insists HHA tour representative Janet Buchheit, but she admits that one particular…
”Tony Feher”
American sculptor Tony Feher gets his first comprehensive retrospective at ”Tony Feher,” a 20-year survey presented by Blaffer Art Museum. The exhibit includes 60 key works. His art, marked by a playful, even cheerful attitude, is made up of objects and materials that are ordinary and often disposable, such as…
The Elephant Man
Before Joseph Merrick employed his one useful arm, his left, to build a model of St. Phillip’s Church, he was an abused star performer in a freak show in Victorian England. His head was monstrously misshapen and he had to sleep upright at night so he was not asphyxiated in…
The 70th Anniversary of The Little Prince Celebration
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s 1943 classic Le Petit Prince hits an important milestone and to mark the occasion Brazos Bookstore is hosting the 70th Anniversary of The Little Prince Celebration. Much loved by both children and adults, the magical Little Prince has charmed readers for generations. The Brazos fête includes a…
Pam Ann: Cockpit
Thankfully ameliorating the perils of modern flight with her Mad Men-era attendant’s cap and saber-sharp punch lines, that gorgeous standup stew from Australia jets back into Houston this week with the appropriately titled Pam Ann: Cockpit! The title is appropriate in that you’ll see more gay men in her audience…
Dance Source Houston Barn Raising
Dance Source Houston’s taking over Barnevelder Theatre as its new base of operations. To break in the new digs, DSH’s presenting Dance Source Houston’s Barn Raising, a program featuring several local performers, choreographers and dance companies. ”It just seems like an obvious choice to have Dance Source Houston at Barnevelder,”…
Psophonia: Taking Flight
Like most people, Psophonia Dance Company co-founder and choreographer Sophia Torres sometimes dreams of flying through the air (à la Superman). Unlike most people, Torres used those dreams as inspiration for a set of new works. ”love that dream,” she tells us. ”I feel empowered when I’m soaring. Anything is…
The Kings of Summer Fest
There are two things you can do when you realize that if you don’t get away from your family, you will lose your mind: A) Leave. B) Buy some ”this is what I’m wearing to the insane asylum” shoes. (We have several pairs, in a variety of pastel colors.) Jordan…
Road Show
The musical Road Show tells the story of two brothers, Wilson (Tom Frey) and Addison (L. Jay Myer). Sons of a critical father, they’re both caught up in what seems to be a perpetual chase for success in its every guise, whether that’s the Alaska Gold Rush or bogus Florida…
Exit 27
The Landing Theatre Company presents the world premiere of a new play, Exit 27, with a gripping and timely story by playwright Aleks Merilo. The stakes are high here, since the Fundamental Church of Latter-Day Saints expels young men accused of transgressions into the achingly dry desert of Utah, to…
Carlos Mencia
The last time we laughed at Carlos Mencia, we were at his doomed Mexican food restaurant Maggie Rita’s. (The menu was truly giggle-worthy.) The eatery quickly went down in flames, but Mencia, who does a good job of dishing out plenty of abuse onstage, didn’t shy away from the hoopla…
The Sneed Quartet
Warren Sneed has a special reason for looking forward to performing with the Sneed Quartet today at Cezanne, one of Houston’s sexiest jazz closets. ”It’s a chance to perform with some of my favorite Houston musicians: pianist Joe LoCascio, bassist David Craig and, of course, my son (the drummer) Andrew,”…
Aries Spears
Welcome to Houston, specifically to Houston in July, Aries Spears. Asked about the heat, Spears (as one of his many colorful comedic characters) replies, “It is so hot, girl, I be peeing steam!” Yeah, we can relate. Onstage, Spears, a seven-year veteran of FOX TV’s MAD TV, spins from his…
Alessandra Gonzalez: Islamic Feminism in Kuwait: The Politics and Paradoxes
Dr. Alessandra Gonzalez, a native Houstonian and a Rice and Baylor University alumna, visits West University’s venerable Brazos Bookstore to introduce her most recent book, Islamic Feminism in Kuwait: The Politics and Paradoxes. Kuwaiti women finally received their political power in 2005; Gonzalez’s book discusses the evolution of that power,…
Houston is Hot
Air-conditioning was a draw for early movie houses. Before it was a commonplace aspect of homes and cars, movie theaters were places you could just sit for cheaply and be entertained in blessed, non-boiling comfort. Aurora is bringing that aspect back with Houston Is Hot, where they’ll be showing off…
Femme Fatales: The Women of Film Noir — Kiss Me Deadly
Ralph Meeker was a tough guy who had some tough luck in Hollywood. Meeker won accolades for his performance in the 1953 Broadway production of Picnic, but when it came time for the movie, William Holden was cast as the star. Meeker reportedly turned down the role because he didn’t…
Femme Fatales, The Women of Film Noir — Gilda
Ah, film noir, a genre where men are tough and most often monosyllabic while women are smart, strong and usually dangerous. They don’t get much more dangerous than Rita Hayworth’s Gilda, the sexy siren seen today in Femme Fatales, The Women of Film Noir — Gilda. Charles Vidor’s 1946 drama…
Improv at Station Theater
Improvisational theater, usually shortened to “improv”, is a theater performance where actors work without a prepared script, creating characters and situations spontaneously, often on themes suggested by the audience. The performances are almost always comedic, though some troupes use improv to create drama as well. Short-form improv consists of brief…
”The Big Show”
Sponsors for ”The Big Show” at Lawndale Art Center have been sweetly dubbed ”Red Hots,” ”Gobstoppers,” ”Lemon Drops” and other sugary confections. Have the show’s organizers succumbed to the addictive online phenomenon that is Candy Crush? ”Definitely not!” laughs Lawndale Executive Director Christine Jelson West. ”The colors…for ‘The Big Show’…
UniverSoul Circus
Expect a low-key but still highly exciting time at the UniverSoul Circus. Since 1993, this single-ring circus out of Atlanta has been touring the country offering more of a hip-hop take on traditional circus acts. The troupe’s music calls to mind urban beats that mesh well with the standard fare…
La Traviata
The opera La Traviata tops off the series Opera in the Heights has built around the 200th anniversary of composer Giuseppe Verdi’s birthday. The tragic but beautiful story of Violetta, a courtesan living in Paris in the 1800s, pairs heartrending sacrifice with deep, selfless love. Violetta, living a carefree life…
South Pacific
You may not know that the original production of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein’s South Pacific won ten Tony awards or that the 2008 Broadway revival won seven more Tonys, but you probably do know many of its songs, since they became standards: ”Bali Ha’i,” ”I’m Gonna Wash That Man…
”No Matter How Hard I Try I Can’t Look the Same as I Did Yesterday”
Singer Lisa Harris explores ”selfies” in the exhibit ”No Matter How Hard I Try I Can’t Look the Same As I Did Yesterday.” ”I had been thinking for a long time about doing a show around selfies, those self-portraits that people do now using all these devices that we have…
“Graphic Design: Now in Production”
It’s a challenge for curatorial associate Nancy O’Connor to identify a favorite, must-see inclusion in the “Graphic Design: Now In Production” exhibit now at Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. The major international exhibition exploring some of the “most vibrant graphic design work produced since 2000” is categorized into no fewer than…
Houston Moth StorySLAM
In 1997, George Dawes Green started a project he called The Moth. Meant to help people explore the art of storytelling, he patterned the project after sessions he spent on his front porch as a young man in Georgia, during which Green and his friends would reminisce about their real-life…
15th Annual Gulf Coast Film & Video Festival
Fans of humanity-destroying robots and father-figure bloodsuckers have reason to rejoice this week. The 15th Annual Gulf Coast Film & Video Festival’s opening-night reception features actor Robert Patrick, who was most recently seen as the self-resurrecting Jackson Herveaux on HBO’s addictive vampire series True Blood. (Terminator fans will also remember…
A Common Martyr
Running in repertory with Eye of the Storm: Tales from Hurricane Ike, is A Common Martyr. ”It’s about a group of people who just graduated college and who are going camping to celebrate,” Christine Weems, of Cone Man Running Productions, tells us. ”They drink and they say some very real…
Young Frankenstein the Musical
When Standing Room Only Productions executive producer Wayne Landon was a kid growing up in the 1960s, the world was black and white, he recalls. ”Or at least it appeared that way on my family’s 12-inch Motorola TV.” Landon’s affection — ”if not obsession,” he admits — for 1930s horror…
Phobia Haunted Houses
Phobia Haunted Houses is back with five haunted houses, all of which are staged in one convenient location. Darke Institute, Mind Control, Claustrophobia, Dawn of the Machine, Simon Fowler Woods are all ready and waiting every weekend in October, as well as on the Thursday before Halloween and the night…
The Liberated Accident, An Evening in Three Chapters
Choreographer Amanda K. Miller-Fasshauer has spent the past three decades living and working abroad, so it was a coup for the US-based CORE Performance Company to commission a new work from her to be set on American dancers. Miller-Fasshauer tells us that the work, The Liberated Accident, An Evening in…
Comedians from Chelsea Lately
The round table on late-night talk show Chelsea Lately remains one of the few places on television where you can get a really great group of comedians interacting at lightning speed. When the Comedians of Chelsea Lately go on tour, it’s like a stand-up all-star game of the finest young…
Mary Kay Andrews
Great summer books need plenty of romance, scandal and gossip. Mary Kay Andrews’s Spring Fever has all of that and more. The New York Times best-selling author of Summer Rental brings readers a tangled love story set in a small Southern town. Protagonist Annajane Hudgens thinks she’s over her ex-husband,…
Mariachi High
Mariachi legend Jose ”Pepe” Martinez makes an appearance in the documentary film Mariachi High, but it’s the kids of Zapata High School in Zapata, Texas, who are the real stars. The students are part of the high-school music ensemble Mariachi Halcon. The film shows the students as they prepare for…
ArtHouston 2012
ArtHouston 2012 provides art lovers with a full day of exhibition-hopping. With more than 30 galleries in the Museum District, the Heights and along Colquitt participating, enthusiasts will be able to view work ranging from mixed-media pieces to abstract paintings, sculpture to photography. Among those participating is Dean Day Gallery,…
The 35th Annual Reliant Park World Series of Dog Shows
Think your dog is the best pooch in the world? Of course you do. You can test that theory at this year’s My Dog Can Do That! event at the 35th Annual Reliant Park World Series of Dog Shows. Non-registered dogs can test their skills — while proud owners stand…
Kick@&$ Plays for Women
Strong female protagonists rule the day in Kick@&$ Plays for Women. The four short works by Jane Shepard are challenging, in-your-face plays. In the drama Friends of the Deceased, directed by Lisa Connolly, a widow (Roz Turner) finds a young woman (Johanna Fernandez) at her husband’s grave. Suspecting that the…
Top Shelf Shorts
Theater has the power not only to entertain, but to move the audience to a greater understanding of the world around them. That said, it doesn’t always take three acts and two intermissions to do it. NightCap Theatre presents Top Shelf Shorts, a collection of ten short plays by company…
Critter Wisdom
In addition to its annual showcase of short plays, Museum of Dysfunction, Mildred’s Umbrella Theater Company will stage Critter Wisdom, a children’s production featuring a variety of animal protagonists. The 45-minute set will include at least one of the company’s beloved renditions of Aesop’s fables, as well as a new…
Frenetic After Dark: A Glittered, Gutted, and Glorified Cabaret
The Frenetic After Dark: A Glittered, Gutted, and Glorified Cabaret has the reputation of being one hellacious performance and dance party. Hosted by jhon r. stronks, an established modern dancer, as his drag persona Miss Understood, the evening includes performances by the FrenetiCore dancers, Gendermyn (drag king performances), Dem Damn…
George Lopez: That’s the America I Live In
Comedian George Lopez credits golf with teaching him all the things his extremely dysfunctional family didn’t: temperament, patience, respect. Those traits, learned only after years of tossing clubs and walking off the course after missed shots, have helped him as he’s climbed to the top of the comedy game. He’s…
”Bodies Revealed”
It wasn’t all that long ago in the Western world that doctors and scientists were forced to buy stolen corpses to teach or study anatomy, a hang-able offense in some places. Now, thanks to Dr. Roy Glover, the public can witness the marvel of the human body at its most…
Madame Butterfly (plus Clear)
At the beginning of Madame Butterfly, the beautiful geisha Cio-Cio San is innocent and pure. After she has her heart broken by the dastardly Pinkerton, she’s no longer innocent, but according to Nao Kusuzaki, who’ll be dancing the title role in the Houston Ballet’s production of Stanton Welch’s two-act ballet,…
3rd Annual BrewMaster Craft Beer Festival
Our demographic research reveals that approximately 101 percent of the people who read the Houston Press enjoy beer, with a 1 percent margin of error. For three years, the Brewmasters Craft Beer Festival has offered such devoted drinkers a chance to celebrate everything that is wonderful about the substance. Attendees…
“Wait with Me”
Lillian Warren invites viewers to “Wait with Me” in her new installation at Lawndale Art Center. Warren’s paintings show people in a variety of poses, all of them seemingly waiting. One’s looking at his watch, another’s standing with his arms crossed, others are fiddling with their cell phones. All of…
Opera Vista: Houdini the Great
Magic and music join forces in Andy Pape’s eight-scene Houdini the Great. Bayou Bend’s beautiful Diana Garden serves as the lush background to this year’s Opera Under the Stars offering. Houdini the Great follows illusionist and escape artist Harry Houdini as he risks everything to earn a spot in the…
Big Bite Night
If you went to the recent LaB 5555 event at the Houston Museum of Natural Science (which featured our own mixology competition), you know how awesome the new paleontology hall is. What does that have to do with food? Big Bite Night is just around the corner, that’s what. And…
Life is a Dream
Pedro Calderón de La Barca’s play Life Is a Dream explores the ideas of fate and destiny. The allegorical work, making its regional premiere here, is the story of King Basillo and his son Segismundo. Omens predict that Segismundo will be a horrible tyrant if he ever takes the throne,…
Jekyll & Hyde
”They’ve cut some of the excess music and characters, toughened up the fiancée of Dr. Jekyll [and Mr. Hyde], done a lot of reorchestrating of the songs so they sound completely new,” according to Teal Wicks, the actress who’ll be playing Emma Carew, that fiancée, when the latest version of…
2 Pianos 4 Hands
In the performance history of 2 Pianos 4 Hands, about to start at Stages Repertory Theatre, only 22 actors have ever played either of the two parts, according to actor/director Tom Frey. That’s because to be in this play — and it’s a play, not a musical — you have…
”William Marsh Rice: The Man and His Legacy”
William Marsh Rice was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, but it wasn’t until his arrival in Texas — Galveston, to be exact — that he made his fortune. Eventually Rice moved to Houston, becoming the richest man in the city in 1857 with holdings of $200,000. He became a millionaire in…
The Italian Girl in Algiers
Italian mezzo-soprano Daniela Barcellona checks in at about five-foot-ten, and in Houston Grand Opera’s second offering of the season — The Italian Girl in Algiers — she is taller than Lawrence Brownlee, who plays her lover, Lindoro. Rather than being a drawback, this plays to her advantage as she makes…
Bill Cosby
For more than half a century, Bill Cosby has remained a powerful and relevant force in both comedy and social activism. The clean, fatherly figure has had generations of fans. He’s well-known as Cliff Huxtable, the head of The Cosby Show, as the creator of children’s shows, and for his…
Houston Symphony: Andrea Bocelli
Classical singers hoping for cross-over success, find the task a daunting challenge. Not so for Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli, who has easily earned legions of both classical and pop fans since bursting on the international scene when he won the Sanremo Music Festival in 1994. Bocelli, always popular with Houston…
Jim Mackenzie and ChinaCat Dance: Ignite — A Night of Dance, Comedy and Danger
Expect to see Jim Mackenzie crack whips, swallow swords, walk on ropes, ride a unicycle and juggle during Jim Mackenzie and ChinaCat Dance: Ignite — A Night of Dance, Comedy and Danger. Oh, and he’ll tell a few jokes. (That takes care of the comedy section of the show.) Joining…
Meerkats in 3D
Seen Meerkat Manor on Animal Planet lately? Wish you could just reach out and touch the adorable little scrappers? Well, you can’t, of course, but you can see similar action in Meerkats 3D at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. The Kalahari Meerkat Project has been studying the complex social…
Children’s Museum of Houston: Gullah Christmas
Kids can experience the holidays with a Sea Islands flavor at the Children’s Museum of Houston’s Gullah Christmas, part of the museum’s Season of Sharing series. Rooted in West African culture and located off the coast of South Carolina, the Gullah have preserved many of their centuries-old traditions. Kids can…
Michael Chabon: Telegraph Avenue
Pulitzer Prize-winning author Michael Chabon steps in for Zadie Smith at the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series. (Smith is pregnant and has been advised not to fly.) Chabon reads from and discusses his newest release, Telegraph Avenue, a comedic look at life set in Brokeland Records, a tiny record…
ROCO Chamber Concert featuring Sandor Ostlund
The River Oaks Chamber Orchestra principal string bass player Sandor Ostlund takes the spotlight for the upcoming ROCO Chamber Concert, part of a series featuring the group’s individual musicians. The afternoon concert features an eclectic blend of classic and contemporary music, including Edgar Meyer’s Good Beginnings and McGlynn’s Jigs, Frank…
Mercury Neighborhood Concert Series: Schubert’s Death and the Maiden
You’ll have three options to enjoy Mercury Neighborhood Concert Series: Schubert’s Death and the Maiden, with back-to-back performances in Clear Lake, downtown and The Woodlands. The program includes a string orchestra performance of Schubert’s String Quartet No. 14 in D Minor (Death and the Maiden) and Mendelssohn’s String Quartet Op…
A Sea Es
Austin Smith wowed us with his multilayered, kaleidoscopic sound on A Sea Es’ 11-track debut album. Fans of Animal Collective, Harry Nilsson, ELO, Frank Zappa, T. Rex and the Beach Boys will not be disappointed. Fri., Jan. 18, 8 p.m., 2013…
Manos: The Hand of Fate
There may be worse films than Manos: The Hands of Fate, but we doubt there are many. The horror film was made by a fertilizer salesman from El Paso who knew zip about filmmaking. The only thing that makes this movie (which Quentin Tarantino calls his favorite comedy of all…
Kip Cosson: Meece for Mayor of New York City
During our last election, there was a loud cry for an independent third candidate as an alternative to the entrenched positions of Democrats and Republicans. Such a candidate has arrived in the form of Meece the Mouse, who is seeking executive office in Kip Cosson’s new children’s book Meece for…
”5iveX – An Erotic Exhibition”
As its name indicates, ”5iveX: An Erotic Exhibition” is for mature audiences only. Houston artists Taft McWhorter and Morris Malakoff got the idea to have an erotic art show after collaborating recently on a project featuring a nude model. For ”5iveX” McWhorter, Malakoff, Tra Slaughter, Micah Simmons and Kelley Devine…
Mahler & Mendelssohn
No matter what the weather is outside, Jones Hall will be particularly stormy inside when the Houston Symphony presents Mahler & Mendelssohn. It’s a celebration of the youthful – and somewhat fiery – brilliance of these two 19th-century composers with a program that includes Mahler’s First Symphony along with Mendelssohn’s…
La Bayadère
The most dramatic scenes in Stanton Welch’s La Bayadère is the Kingdom of the Shades, when the women from the Houston Ballet’s corps de ballet, each dressed in a white tutu, enter one-by-one performing a simple walking-into-arabesque movement. The dancers form an undulating line, until the stage is filled with…
Macbeth
Greed meshes with madness in Verdi’s explosive Macbeth, presented here by Opera in the Heights, fresh from its Houston Press MasterMind award win. Baritones Gustavo Ahualli and Andrew Cummings share the title role, with sopranos Emily Newton and Rosa D’Imperio tackling the role of the ambitious Lady Macbeth. The action…
God of Carnage
Anyone who sits down to watch God of Carnage has to realize that what follows won’t exactly be realistic, says Kim Tobin, actress and co-artistic director of Stark Naked Theatre. Playwright Yasmina Reza’s tale of the two couples meeting to discuss their children’s playground fighting starts off ordinarily enough, but…
”Common Objects”
Artist Ted Gahl, Nathan Hayden and Lane Hagood each have very different styles and sensibilities, but, for purposes of the show ”Common Objects,” currently at David Shelton Gallery, they are united by their exploration of the ”idiosyncrasies of daily experience.” Organizing an art show around everyday, ordinary objects seems like…
The Rite of Spring
The Houston Ballet mounts a mixed repertory program filled with firsts in The Rite of Spring. Stanton Welch’s reinterpretation of the seminal work with the same title that was first performed in 1913 sees its world premiere. Wildly dramatic, the piece has been on Welch’s to-do list since he was…
”One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer — Guitar Art, No Strings Attached”
Artist/designer Pen Morrison brings her ”One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer — Guitar Art, No Strings Attached” series of sculptures to Cactus Music for a six-week-long exhibit. ”The guitars are very much my homage to the old-school blues guys,” Morrison told our reporter William Michael Smith after an encounter at…
”Inheritance: Stories of Memory and Discovery”
”Inheritance: Stories of Memory and Discovery,” currently on display at the Holocaust Museum Houston, is a collection of montages by photographer Leslie Starobin. Along with spending several years collecting stories from Holocaust survivors and their children, she was given access to many of the families’ keepsakes and items salvaged from…
Dance Salad Festival 2013
The world of dance comes to Houston with the 18th annual Dance Salad Festival, bringing with it a slew of premieres. There’s Annabelle Lopez Ochoa’s curated version of In Transit by the Compañía Nacional de Danza/National Ballet of Spain. Ochoa also contributes L’Effleure, a solo she created for dancer Rubi…
Spring Break Family Lab: Flight of the Butterflies 3D
Kids can spend the morning learning about monarch butterflies at the Spring Break Family Lab: Flight of the Butterflies 3D. They’ll start with a session in one of the museum’s classrooms where they’ll meet some of the live insects and arachnids found in the Cockrell Butterfly Center. Then they’ll catch…
Rigoletto
If you know nothing else about opera, chances are you’ll recognize the tune ”La donna è mobile” from Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto. An immediate hit at the time (1851), the song had a much easier initial passage than the opera itself, which at least one censor thought was disgracefully obscene. The…
Theatre Southwest’s 8th Annual Readers Theatre
Three Houston-based playwrights have had work accepted for Theatre Southwest’s 8th Annual Readers Theatre: Beverly Taylor Hutchison’s The Pepperoni Blooper, Michael Weems’s Why be Normal? and Steve Stewart’s Contrition on Death Row. The rest of the 13 scripts, which were selected from more than 200 entries, include Hoboken, New Jersey,…
Found Footage Film Festival
Sure, it’s hard to beat a three-year-old hitting her daddy in the junk with a Nerf bat. Or an overweight mother-of-the-bride having a ward-robe malfunction on the dance floor. But the Found Footage Film Festival isn’t looking for America’s Funniest Home Videos-type clips. Since 2004, comedy writers Joe Pickett and…
Menil Community Arts Festival and Indie Books
The entire Menil campus plays host to The Menil Community Arts Festival and Indie Book Fair. The all-day event features spoken-word performances; screenings of The Territory (SWAMP’s short film showcase); live music including Thomas Hulten’s Hot Viking Band playing a Dixieland concert; and select readings. The book fair, with national…
Rat Ranch
A staple on the Houston bar scene, the hard partying rock quartet plays a whopping 200 shows a year, covering everything from classic rock favorites to country ballads and current radio hits. They’ve gained quite the following over the years, with an audience that follows them from one Sherlocks location…
Where Were You in ’65
The sights and sounds of the mid-1960s come alive on stage during Thomas Meloncon’s musical Where Were You in ’65? The set up is simple: nineteen-year-old Bobby Lee finds himself transported from present-day Houston, where cell phones and rap music are the norm, back to 1965, when both the civil…
”Manik Nakra: The Tigering”
During the 19th century, a Bengal tiger known as the Champawat Tiger terrorized residents of Nepal and the Kumaon areas of India. She killed an estimated 436 people, and legend has it she was so fearless, she conducted all of her attacks in the light of day. Jim Corbett, the…
Little Fugitive
See the movie that François Truffaut claims paved the path for the French New Wave movement when the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston screens Little Fugitive (1953). Filmmakers used a concealed, custom-made 35mm camera to capture New York’s Coney Island, the setting for the poetic story of a seven-year-old boy…
Scooby Doo Live! Musical Mysteries
See why Scooby Doo and his friends in the Mystery Inc. Gang have been capturing audiences for more than 40 years at Scooby Doo Live! Musical Mysteries. Director Theresa Borg has crafted a spooky, ghost-filled mystery for the gang to tackle that features all new songs. All the earmarks are…
Snoball Fight for Charity
Brennan’s of Houston is having a Snoball Fight for Charity starting Friday, June 21, and lasting until Friday, July 5. Brennan’s has partnered with five local charities — SEARCH, Alley Theatre, YDC: Youth Development Center, Hermann Park Conservancy and Scout’s Honor Rescue — that have each chosen a snowball flavor…
Blue Man Group
The Blue Man Group uses music, video, movement and all sorts of multimedia magic to take a humorous look at what it calls ”2.5 D space.” Don’t know what 2.5 D space is? According to Blue Man Group Co-Founder Philip Stanton, e-mailing the person in the next office rather than…
Steve Burdniak: ”The Science of Surrealism”
The fact that film director Guillermo del Toro, master of the horror genre, is a fan of Steve Burdniak’s work tells you a lot about the Austin artist’s work. Burdniak’s assemblages use real human blood, mummified squirrels, octopus tentacles, centipedes and gyrating Mercedes hubcaps to create a mad scientist’s lair…
A Chorus Line
It’s a modern classic — the Tony- and Pulitzer Prize award-winning story of 17 dancers auditioning for an available eight spots in a chorus line, woven together with music by Marvin Hamlisch. Theatre Under the Stars is bringing A Chorus Line back to Houston, this time to Miller Outdoor Theatre…
Reel Pride: Breaking Through
There may be even more reason to celebrate LGBT pride this year: The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to hand down its decision regarding marriage equality for same-sex partners sometime this month, thanks in part to the efforts of many of the people featured in Reel Pride: Breaking Through. A…
Mark Gimenez: Con Law
Texas novelist Mark Gimenez wants to clear up one thing about his new book, Con Law: ”The views expressed by the characters are theirs, not mine,” he tells us. ”It’s fiction. I made it up. I am not preaching my personal views on fracking or art or politics. I promise.”…
”Faking It: Manipulated Photography before Photoshop”
Harry Shunk and Janos Kender’s Leap into the Void is among the 180 works seen in ”Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop.” Yasufumi Nakamori, curator for the show, says French artist Yves Klein, seen diving from the second story of a building into an empty street below, is known for…
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
In our opinion, the greatest film title of all time is Texas Chainsaw Massacre because it sums up the plot perfectly. The second-greatest film title is Guy Ritchie’s Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. You just know from the moment you hear it that it’s going to be bloody great…
Bollywood Blast 2013
The Bollywood Blast 2013, a performance extravaganza, is subtitled The Magic of Love, and appropriately so. ”For the first time, we are introducing magic into the show, and we mean real magic,” says Rathna Kumar, Indian Performing Arts Samskriti Houston’s artistic director. ”Indian Cinema is turning 100 this year, and…
Withnail and I
There are certain films about mindless headlong rushes into a vice-fueled artistic self-explosion that in some way serve to reaffirm our desire to live. Stuff like Johnny Depp’s performance in The Rum Diary, or the cult classic Dogs in Space starring Michael Hutchence. Withnail and I is the British equivalent…
Shunya Theatre: Partition
Shunya Theatre, the only South Asian-American troupe in Houston, presents Ira Hauptman’s drama Partition. Starring Taher Lokhandwala, John Kaiser and Anjana Menon, Partition chronicles the story of a young, self-taught mathematician who leaves India and travels to England to work with a Cambridge professor on a math problem in 1913…
Bayou City Art Festival
Houston’s homegrown celebration of all things creative, the Bayou City Arts Festival, returns this year with more than 300 local and national artists exhibiting in what’s part gallery, part shopping mall, part party plaza. It also celebrates the work of Houston’s Syd Moen, whose ”little planet” series of photographs features…
”Dining in VI”
You’ve heard the expression ”everything but the kitchen sink”? The art exhibit ”Dining in VI: An Artful Experience” at 18 Hands Gallery doesn’t go quite so far, but it does offer ”everything that you can find on the dining room table,” says Karen Skipper Cruce. Featuring works ranging from place…
FotoFest Discoveries
FotoFest is an internationally respected citywide exhibition of photography whose only shortcoming, some would say, can be found in the fact that it’s a biennial celebration. Two years is a long time to wait between the visual feast FotoFest famously offers its patrons. But here’s good news for those eager…
Hawks and Sparrows
Pier Paolo Pasolini fans will finally get a chance to see two of the Italian director’s greatest works unmarred by the signs of age and decay. Fully restored versions made from 35mm film prints from the archive of the legendary Cinecittà studio in Rome of both Il Vangelo Secondo Matteo…
Assistance
”High-octane satire” is how Black Lab Theatre’s Artistic Director, Jordan Jaffe, describes the group’s latest production, Leslye Headland’s Assistance. ”The play follows a group of assistants that are all twentysomething and very ambitious and driven, trying to please their hellacious boss and deal with everything that’s going on around them…
Cirq’ulation Locale
Just to be clear: Cirq’ulation Locale and Cirque du Soleil are completely different organizations, each with its own style and history. ”We are not related to Cirque du Soleil, although some of our acrobats work with them now,” says Cirq rep Andrew Delicata. ”It is not similar at all. We…
Thea Vidale
Parenthood is pretty simple, according to comedian/actor Thea Vidale. ”Teenagers come with this disease called ‘entitlement,”’ the former Houstonian quips onstage. ”They think they’re entitled to stuff. But I have an inoculation that you can buy from me. It’s a wooden spoon and some ads for a job.” Armed with…
Whitney Cummings
Funny woman Whitney Cummings, the former star of Whitney and the co-creator and writer of the successful comedy sitcom 2 Broke Girls, is making a return to the stand-up comedy scene, including a stop in our city as part of a tour she’s doing around the United States. Her one-night…
Haunted Trails and Nature’s Nightmare
Every weekend in October, as well as on the two Thursdays leading up to Halloween and all of Halloween week, thrill-seekers can experience the pleasure of facing their nightmares by visiting one of two locations, Haunted Trails or the more recently opened Nature’s Nightmare, where they will roam through constantly…
Street Art Cinema
As long as there are walls, there will be graffiti and street art. And as long as there’s graffiti and street art, there will be active and vocal proponents and opponents of both. The Orange Show features two films concerning this constant battle with its presentation of Street Art Cinema…
An American in Paris
Gene Kelly completely dominates An American in Paris, the story of a Yank painter living in the City of Light. With assistance from the wizards of the effects department, director Vincente Minnelli’s cinematic love letter to Paris was shot on the back lot of MGM, except for a half dozen…
Romeo & Juliet
The HITS Theatre production of Romeo & Juliet, currently running through Saturday, may be the only Houston performance of the Shakespeare classic this season where the cast is the same age as the characters. Director Matt Hune says that working with a young cast opened his eyes to new aspects…
Jodi Picoult and Samantha Van Leer
New York Times best-selling author Jodi Picoult and her daughter/co-writer, Samantha Van Leer, discuss and sign their novel Between the Lines today in an event sponsored by Blue Willow Book Shop. Between the Lines tells the story of a teenager, Delilah, who becomes so involved in a novel that her…
Martin Limón: The Joy Brigade
You don’t have to be a fan of mysteries and thrillers to enjoy Martin Limón’s new release, The Joy Brigade. Limón is first and foremost a storyteller; that his stories happen to include a few dead bodies and secret agents is incidental. Joy Brigade is Limón’s ninth installment in his…
Beehive
The jukebox musical Beehive: The ’60s Musical is a fun bit of musical fluff, according to Steven Fenley, artistic director for the Texas Repertory Theatre Company. “Our summer shows are kind of a gift to our patrons, and this is just a lot of fun,” he tells us. “Beehive’s got…
Iolanthe
Talk about staying power — musicals written by comedic duo W.S. Gilbert and Sir Arthur Sullivan in the 1800s still manage to bring the house down. The team’s comic operas feature worlds where logic and reason are thrown out the window in favor of whimsy and fantasy. In Iolanthe, currently…
Festival of Originals
Theatre Southwest’s annual Festival of Originals, known affectionately as the FOO, attracts submissions from all over the country. This year’s selected playwrights come from New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Texas. There’s no unifying theme among the five chosen works; rather, they represent an eclectic mix of comedy and pathos…
Downfall 2012
Downfall 2012 chose its name nearly 15 years ago, and this year has indeed turned out to be an important one for the Humble-based metalheads. The band has become a staple of sorts within the local metal scene, spending much of this year working on another album and occasionally appearing…
The Full Circle Tour: DJ Cheb i Sabbah & 1002 Nights featuring Mitch Hyare and Riffat Sultana & Party
As far as event names go, The Full Circle Tour: DJ Cheb i Sabbah & 1002 Nights featuring Mitch Hyare and Riffat Sultana & Party is one of the largest we’ve seen in a while, but that’s understandable — it’s a big, big event. To start with, there’s Riffat Sultana…
C. S. Lewis: Screwtape Letters
The devil is in the details, and in the play The Screwtape Letters, he’s onstage as well. Based on the C.S. Lewis novel of the same name, Screwtape is both provocative and funny. A chronicle of spiritual warfare told from a demon’s point of view, the show features Max McLean…
”Duncan Phyfe, Master Cabinetmaker in New York”
Elegant designs and superb craftsmanship mark Duncan Phyfe’s work in the exhibit ”Duncan Phyfe, Master Cabinetmaker in New York” organized by New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Some 100 pieces by Phyfe, who worked in New York City during the early 1800s, make…
2012 Metropolitan Cooking & Entertaining Show
Celebrity chefs Giada De Laurentiis, Jacques Pépin and Paula Deen are among the big names who’ll be at the 2012 Metropolitan Cooking & Entertaining Show. Local chefs Hugo Ortega, Michael Cordúa and Kiran Verma will be joining them for food demonstrations, workshops, tastings and cookbook signings. There are several ticket…
The Black Space
What does it mean to truly forgive? The answer is as complicated as the question, but Frame Dance Productions tackles the topic head-on in The Black Space, a multimedia installation that combines movement, dance-on-film and an original soundtrack. Staged at the Spacetaker Gallery at Fresh Arts, the piece investigates the…
Superior Donuts
Starbucks becomes a common enemy for the owner of a Chicago donut shop and his hired help in the comedy Superior Donuts, currently onstage at Theatre Southwest. Arthur (John Stevens) is an old hippie hold-out scrambling to keep his small neighborhood shop open. Franco (Sam Flash), the shop’s young clerk,…
Free Lunch from Dos Equis Mobile
Anyone who says there’s no such thing as a free lunch hasn’t met the Dos Equis Mobile Academy, which just arrived in Houston this week. In partnership with H-Town StrEATs, the “most interesting food truck in the world” will travel around town offering free lunches through September 22. The three dishes, developed by…
Hansel & Gretel
Sometime in the late 19th century, Engelbert Humperdinck’s sister went to him with a series of songs that she’d written for her children as a Christmas gift. The songs were based on a classic fairy tale. The result of the collaboration produced Hansel & Gretel, one of the most classic…
Life Could Be a Dream
Jukebox musicals, productions that string classic songs together with a loose plot, have long been theater mainstays. The latest jukebox musical from Stages Repertory Theatre, Life Could Be a Dream, features doo-wop standards from the 1960s, including “Earth Angel,” “Only You” and “Unchained Melody.” Roger Bean, the man behind The…
An Afternoon with Arturo Sandoval
One of the most important Cuban exports of the last century has got to be jazz trumpet master Arturo Sandoval. A protégé of Dizzy Gillespie (who was known for adding a Latin flavor to his own style of jazz), Sandoval defected to the United States in 1990. ”He’s one of…
Death of a Salesman
Alley Theatre Artistic Director Gregory Boyd calls it a role requiring the stamina of ”an athlete.” Veteran company actor James Black calls it ”a humbling monster of a role.” ”It” is playing Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s Tony Award- and Pulitzer Prize-winning Death of a Salesman, currently at the Alley…
When You Comin’ Back, Red Ryder?
It was Children of a Lesser God that established Mark Medoff as an important American playwright in 1980, but it was his thriller When You Comin’ Back, Red Ryder? that first captured the attention of New York critics in 1974. The setting is a quiet and low-key roadside diner in…
”Sarah Gish: Mod Mandalas: The Chakra Series”
Art openings are usually cool events with lots of hipsters enjoying free wine and schmoozing. The opening reception for ”Sarah Gish: Mod Mandalas: The Chakra Series” is going to be somewhat different. Okay, actually, very, very different. Yes, there will be artwork (more on that in a minute), hipsters and…
Beethoven & Liszt
The music of the late Danish composer Carl Nielsen is of special interest for conductor Thomas Dausgaard, a fellow Dane; the conductor’s piano teacher was a student of Nielsen. Today Dausgaard leads the Houston Symphony in Beethoven and Liszt, a program that includes not only works by those two notables…
Touring Taste of Dance Salad
For those of you who missed last spring’s remarkable get-together of international dance powerhouses at the 2012 Dance Salad Festival, DSF and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston are giving you a second chance with A Touring Taste of Dance Salad Festival. Touring Taste is made up of filmed excerpts…
”Eighth Annual Open Call Exhibition: GOD”
Getting your art shown in a museum is never easier than at the Art Car Museum’s annual open-call show. The museum sets a theme (this year it’s God) and selects a featured artist. Then the first 125 people offering pieces following the theme get to have their work presented in…
Houston Improv Festival Presents: The End of the World
According to the ancient Mayans, we’ll all be around only another week or so, and what better way to go out than laughing? And enjoying pizza and beer (or, as organizers call them, ”Italian pie and fermented wheat sodas”). It’s all part of Houston Improv Festival Presents: The End of…
Boxing Day/St. Stephen’s Day Mass
Celebrate Boxing Day/St. Stephen’s Day Mass and do a little good at McGonigel’s Mucky Duck. ”Boxing Day is the day [in England] that the servants received ‘boxes’ — or gifts — from the families that they worked for throughout the year,” explains Mucky Duck owner Rusty Andrews. ”But it’s now…
”Jerry Jeanmard: Collages”
Some of Jerry Jeanmard’s earliest artwork (the Blue Bell Ice Cream logo showing a silhouette of a little girl leading a cow for milking) is seen daily. Some of his latest work (untitled paper collages) is rarely on view. Jeanmard, who has worked as an interior designer for nearly 30…
Panto Mother Goose
The rhymes and stories from Mother Goose have delighted children for centuries, spawning many adaptations. Houston’s own Kenn McLaughlin, artistic director of Stages Repertory Theatre, keeps the magic going with his own version, Panto Mother Goose. Here, Mother Goose decides to divide the kingdom of Goose Island among her children,…
Venturing Out
The dance works seen in Venturing Out are at varying stages of the creative process. Some are complete and have already been performed elsewhere; others are little more than an idea. Dancemakers use the showcase as a testing ground for works without the pressure (and expense!) of a full production…
Delicatessen
Cannibalism is really, really funny. At least in director Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Delicatessen it is. The 1991 black comedy takes place in a postapocalyptic France where food is so rare that grain is used as a currency. The setting is an apartment building run by a butcher who lures in prospective…
The White Christmas Album: A Beatles Holiday
As a group, the Beatles always had a warm spot in their randy Liverpudlian hearts for Christmas. Each year, Paul, John, George and Ringo would record a special holiday message filled with goofy antics for fan club members. One Apple Records office party featured John and Yoko as Father and…
Love in the Time of Lasers
Lindsay Burleson and Andrew Keil have been collaborating for months to bring audiences Love in the Time of Lasers. It’s a science fiction puppet show about love, with dinosaurs and lasers. Burleson and Keil use tabletop puppets, stop-motion animation and, most of all, expert storytelling to guide us through this…
MountainFilm in Telluride on Tour
Since 2000, the MountainFilm in Telluride film festival has been going on tour around the country to bring its unique adventure and avant-garde showcases to a wider audience. This year’s MountainFilm in Telluride on Tour in Houston festival gives Houstonians the chance to see Tiffany Shlain’s Yelp (With Apologies to…
Ubi Roi
Alfred Jarry’s avant-garde play Ubu Roi may very well be the first ever piece in the Theatre of the Absurd movement. At its premiere in Paris in 1896, riots (yes, more than one) broke out. Centered on a man who, with his wife and friends, plans to kill the king…
The Artist’s Eye
Houston artist Jeremy De Prez has been boning up on French installation artist Jean-Pierre Raynaud’s work to lead a discussion as part of The Menil Collection’s The Artist’s Eye series — but don’t expect a straightforward lecture. ”The talk isn’t really going to be solely focused on Raynaud’s oeuvre. My…
Don Giovanni
First performed in Prague in 1787, Mozart’s Don Giovanni (Italian for Don Juan) is the story of a notorious womanizer who destroys marriages, uses and dumps the women he gets to go to bed with him and kills the father of a woman he is trying to seduce. This being…
An Evening with Attica Locke
Houston lost a major literary talent when author Attica Locke decided to relocate to Los Angeles, but we’re comforted by the fact that she often makes the trek home, as she has for today’s An Evening with Attica Locke. Hosted by the Houston Public Library, the program is more than…
A Wrinkle in Time
Why do we have three long-ass Hobbit films and only the nigh-unwatchable television-movie version of A Wrinkle in Time? Unless Disney follows through with its plans to take a shot, the best adaptation of the classic children’s novel by Madeleine L’Engle you’re likely to see is John Glore’s stage rendition…
St. Patrick’s Day Parade
Theoretically, everyone is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day, so it’s no stretch that the official theme for the 54th Annual St. Patrick’s Parade in downtown Houston is ”We are ALL Irish Texans.” (Real Irish Texans, for the curious, include firefighter Red Adair, golfer Ben Hogan, actor Matthew McConaughey and actors/brothers…
Owen Laukkanen
Novelist Owen Laukkanen made a big splash with his debut book, The Professionals. That story follows four college friends who, faced with a dreadful job market, turn to kidnapping mid-level business executives. With a state investigator and an FBI agent on their trail, they kidnap an executive who happens to…
A Few Good Men
It was the breakthrough moment for playwright Aaron Sorkin. His courtroom drama A Few Good Men ran for more than a year on Broadway when it debuted in 1989. A popular movie with Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson and Demi Moore followed. Now it’s back on stage in a revised version…
“John Cage: Prints, Drawings, and a Music Box”
John Cage relied on chance in the composition of both his music and his visual artwork, something he turned to mid-career with his first piece, Not Wanting to Say Anything About Marcel (A + B), which consists of two color lithographs, and explored up until his death in 1992. His…
Monster Energy AMA Supercross
Like fans of other sports that involve complex machinery thrusting forward at impossibly high rates of speed (think NASCAR, Formula One, Quidditch), fans of motorcycle competitions love the smell of the grease and the roar of the loud. At the Monster Energy AMA Supercross, riders from all over the world…
MFAH Turkish Film Festival: Gozetleme Kulesi (Watchtower)
Director Pelin Esmer’s 2012 Gozetleme Kulesi (Watchtower), part of the MFAH Turkish Film Festival, tells the story of two people who try to find love and solace while keeping their past at bay. Nihat (Olgun Şimşek) is a fire warden stationed in a remote tower; Seher (Nilay Erdönmez) is a…
¡Ritmo Latino! featuring Spanish Harlem Orchestra
It’s a mistake to call Spanish Harlem Orchestra’s music Latin jazz. Led by pianist, arranger and producer Oscar Hernández, SHO specializes in salsa dura (heavy salsa) — that is, old school Afro-Caribbean music played with all the flash and fury of the Latin big bands heard in New York during…
Katherine Center
Houston author Katherine Center gives her characters plenty of second chances in The Lost Husband, her latest novel, which she’s reading and signing at Brazos Bookstore today. In Husband, Libby Moran has suddenly become a widow. Overnight she loses everything and finds herself living with her hyper-critical mom and sleeping…
TeenBookCon 2013
If there’s any doubt about the red-hot state of the young-adult-fiction market these days, consider British teen Beth Reekles, the precocious author of The Kissing Booth who recently inked a $1 million deal with Random House. The TeenBookCon 2013 (the Fourth Annual Greater Houston Teen Book Convention) offers support to…
Houston Roller Derby
Maybe you have a legitimate reason for not having been to the Houston Roller Derby yet, but it’s time to quit messing around and check out one of the most exciting sporting events our very sport-centric city has to over. This week is an all-Houston couple of bouts, which is…
Planet Terror
Of the two films that made up 2007’s Grindhouse, Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof is the true gem. That said, Robert Rodriguez’s Planet Terror is still an incredible ride of an action film that everyone should see. The movie stars Rose McGowan and Freddy Rodriguez as a couple on the rocks…
2013 TRILL Comedy Festival
Station Theater, Houston’s home for improvisational arts, plays host to an ambitiously tight three-day schedule (which on the surface seems to go against the very nature of improv itself) with The TRILL Comedy Festival, a collection of sketches, structures and riffs. ”The TRILL Comedy Festival will have every kind of…
Walter Mosley: Little Green
Life isn’t so easy for Easy Rawlins. The private investigator was almost killed in his last outing (Blonde Faith), and now he’s tasked with finding a missing man in the Sunset Strip. All he has to do is sort through the various hippies, shady characters and beautiful women who cruise…
Houston Symphony, A Star Spangled Salute
Get a jump start on the Fourth of July with the Houston Symphony at CWMP, A Star Spangled Salute, set for the eve of the Fourth. The annual concert features a program of patriotic classics such as Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture (complete with live cannons). Principal Pops Conductor Michael Krajewski is…
Houston Symphony: Video Games Live
According to Tommy Tallarico, game music celebrity and host for the Houston Symphony’s Video Games Live concert, video game soundtrack sales now outnumber film score album sales three to one. ”When someone plays a video game they become that character…and the music becomes the soundtrack of their lives,” Tallarico tells…
Journey with the Masters
The Houston Ballet’s latest repertory program, Journey with the Masters, includes works from three acclaimed choreographers; there’s the company premieres of George Balanchine’s Ballet Imperial and Jiri Kylian’s Sinfonietta and the revival of Jerome Robbins’s The Concert. Ballet Imperial is the latest Balanchine work Houston Ballet Artistic Director Stanton Welch…
Picnic in the Park
Have a Father’s Day picnic in cool air-conditioning at the Astros first-ever Picnic in the Park. Visitors can run the bases or play a game of catch in the Minute Maid Park outfield. There’s also a buffet cookout, an hour-long autograph session with all of the Astros players and lots…
Daniel Silva: The English Girl
No one is what he or she seems to be in New York Times bestselling author Daniel Silva’s new novel The English Girl. Echoing real-life headlines, a married politician’s career is threatened when his aide and mistress goes missing. Desperate to keep the situation quiet, the politician calls on former…
Shake Hands with the Art Guys
So you think June 27 is just like any other ordinary day? Wrong. It happens to be National Handshake Day. The Art Guys aren’t ones to miss out on an off-the-wall holiday (they commemorated National Handwriting Day with an eight-hour public signing in January). So it should be no surprise…
The Oddball Comedy and Curiosity Festival
Headliners for The Oddball Comedy and Curiosity Festival, making a stop at the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion today, include the elusive Dave Chappelle, Flight of the Conchords, Chris D’elia, Hannibal Buress, Jim Jefferies and John Mulaney, with Jeff Ross acting as emcee/roastmaster. There’s also a big treat for fans of…
”Call It Street Art, Call It Fine Art, Call It What You Know”
Station Museum of Contemporary Art, a past Best Museum winner in the Houston Press Best of Houston® awards, built its reputation by showing provocative international artists. That’s changed recently. Not the provocative part, that’s still true. But instead of international artists, Station is currently focusing on local talent. ”Our show…
C.J. Box and Paul Doiron
Best-selling novelists C.J. Box and Paul Doiron, both with new titles being released by Minotaur, sign and discuss their latest books today at Murder by the Book. Box, the author of the popular Joe Pickett series, signs his new stand-alone thriller, The Highway, in which Cody Hoyt, a former police…
”Cathy Cunningham-Little: Reconstructing Visual Isomers”
There are few phrases in the English language more terrifying than ”going blind.” We’re a sight-based species. All of our interactions, including the one we’re having now, are based on sight. Cathy Cunningham-Little, an abstract multimedia artist from Virginia who has shown works all over the world, got interested in…
Salma
At age 13, Salma, a young Muslim girl living in a village in south India, was locked in a small room with one tiny window and not allowed to leave. Several years later, her parents married her off, and she moved to live with her husband’s family. They locked her…
Tea and Sympathy
Robert Anderson’s poignant drama Tea and Sympathy might have premiered on Broadway in 1953, but David Rainey, director of the current Back Porch production, says the issues it discusses are as fresh and relevant as ever. ”It’s the story of [Tom,] a young boy who’s going through an awkward time…
”LaToya Ruby Frazier: Witness”
The ”LaToya Ruby Frazier’s Witness” exhibit is ironically being held at a venue just yards away from Houston’s impressive Texas Medical Center. We say ironically because the Center is a stunning contrast to Frazier’s photographs chronicling the pathetic access to healthcare available to Pennsylvania’s poor. At the heart of Frazier’s…
Gulf Coast Classic Custom Car and Body Art Festival
”Everyone is welcome at the Gulf Coast Classic [Custom Car and Body Art Festival], from the hobbyist to the purist” states local entertainer and model Miss V Haven, who’s hosting the Pin-Up Girl contest at this year’s event. ”What makes Gulf Coast Classic stand out is that it brings folks…
Lemonade Stand: i scream
Hope Stone Dance’s Lemonade Stand: i scream was originally scheduled to be at the Photo Booth, the site of previous Drive By Dance performances. Those plans changed unexpectedly and the group scrambled to mount the show in another space. ”I was going to do a fishbowl dance originally,” says choreographer…
Only at the Alamo: Super Happy Fun Monkey Bash Sugoi
Alamo Drafthouse’s ninth Super Happy Fun Monkey Bash is 90 minutes of alternately amazing and baffling Japanese television and pop-culture content. Assembled from Alamo founder Tim League’s extensive collection of DVDs purchased while he was in Japan and coordinated by Tommy Swenson, the show features “cruel and inhumane game shows,…
Fiestas Patrias Celebration at the Children’s Museum of Houston
There’s plenty to do and see at the Fiestas Patrias Celebration at the Children’s Museum of Houston. Hands-on activities include making papel picado (cut paper banners), playing Loteria (a Mexican game similar to Bingo) and crafting paper versions of the green, white and red Mexican flag. Entertainment includes a special…
Deborah (The Mostly True Tale of a Revolutionary Woman)
It’s no surprise that Elizabeth A.M. Keel, an independent, adventurous woman, wrote Deborah (The Mostly True Tale of a Revolutionary Woman), a play about another independent, adventurous woman. ”Yes, there are shameless parallels,” Keel tells us laughing. Keel was in high school when she first found Deborah Sampson, a woman…
Elizabeth George: Just One Evil Act
Novelist Elizabeth George has done it again — her upcoming title, Just One Evil Act, is getting rave reviews from the critics and leaving readers counting down the days for its release. Evil Act is the 18th in George’s Inspector Lynley series. This time the action centers on a Lynley…
Dr. Seuss’ Cat in the Hat
There’s a bigger chance of you being hit by lighting than there is of you not having read — and loved — Dr. Seuss’ The Cat in the Hat as a child. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid even quoted it in a speech in 2007… proof positive it’s a seminal…
Blackheart Burlesque Tour
The Blackheart Burlesque Tour, at House of Blues for one night only, seeks to bring burlesque into the 21st century. The wink-and-smile from the past has been replaced with rock-star-caliber choreography from Manwe Sauls-Addison, who has worked with Beyoncé and JLo, and futuristic costumes inspired by the Steampunk aesthetic by…
Deadly Seven
A fresh batch of freaky move-masters has waltzed onto the Houston dance stage in the form of Compass Soul. The group’s new show, Deadly Seven, explores the classic seven deadly sins thematically. Director Marco A. Bernal Jr. began the group as an expansion of a rock band; the ideas eventually…
Director’s Cut: Films Created by Direct-Filmmaking
Len Lye, Steve Cossman, and the other filmmakers in Director’s Cuts: Films Created by Direct-Filmmaking Methods scratched, bleached, drew on and painted film to create images for the films screening today. “Direct-filmmaking has kinda flown under the radar and continues to fly under the radar somehow,” says Cossman, who curated…
A Couple of Stand-up Gals
The title A Couple of Stand-up Gals is a bit of a misnomer. It isn’t just a couple of female comedians who will be taking the stage, but five, including veteran Kristin Linder. (“Having kids is like eating ice cream; you have to know when to quit. There’s a very…
La Périchole
True love is hotly tested in the rollicking French operetta La Périchole, which hits the stage at Miller Outdoor Theatre today. Based on the life of singer Micaela Villegas, La Périchole follows a couple of young street singers in colonial Peru, La Périchole and Piquillo. They’re in love but too…
Maria Dueñas
The trade paperback edition of Maria Dueñas’s international bestseller The Time in Between checks in at a hefty 620-plus pages. Let’s just say Dueñas takes her time telling protagonist Sira’s story. Sira grows up in Madrid during the 1930s, playing in her mother’s dressmaker’s shop. She has no idea that…
Star Trek: The Next Generation Anniversary
It’s hard to believe that Star Trek: The Next Generation is 25 years old, but it really has been a quarter of a century since Captain Picard first said, “Make it so,” and launched a new crew out into space. Trek fans can celebrate this anniversary in unison all across…
Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson
Imagine Andrew Jackson (yes, that Andrew Jackson) as an emo rock star. Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson does just that. George Brock, artistic director for Generations: A Theatre Company, tells us, “It being an election year, we thought we’d do plays about America. We did Our Town, and we thought we’d…
22nd Annual Houston International Jazz Fest
Texans like their music, and they also like a good fight. This weekend we’ll get a chance to witness both at the same time at the Houston International Jazz Festival’s battle of the bands. In one corner is our own Texas Brass Band, which combines jazz, R&B and hip-hop in…
Museum of Dysfunction V: A Showcase of Shorts
“This might be the last year for Museum of Dysfunction,” Jennifer Decker, managing artistic director of Mildred’s Umbrella Company, tells us somberly. “It’s a lot of work, and we’re just about to start the season. Plus, there are lots of other companies that are doing this sort of shows now.”…
UpStage Theatre’s 3rd Annual Festival of Comedy
A quartet of funny one-acts make up the UpStage Theatre’s 3rd Annual Festival of Comedy. Super Salad Days by Sean K. Thompson follows a group of aging superheroes as they prepare for one last battle with their archenemies. Playwright Thompson turns director for Scene Change by Scott Tobin, a slapstick…
”The Big Show”
There were more than 900 submissions for this year’s open call for “The Big Show” at Lawndale Art Center; only 69 pieces made it into the final exhibit. “They told me this is the smallest show ever,” laughs Brooklyn-based juror Marco Antonini, gallery director for NURTUREart. “It was exciting to…
Linwood Barclay: Trust Your Eyes
Horror novelist Stephen King has some nice things to say about Linwood Barclay’s newest release, Trust Your Eyes. King says the book is Barclay’s best so far, calling it “a tale Hitchcock would have loved” and “great entertainment from a suspense master.” Trust Your Eyes, which involves politics and cyber-terrorism,…
Leading Ladies
A struggling actor will do just about anything for his next paying gig, but what if a good performance will net him more than a one-time paycheck? In Texas Repertory Theatre’s production of the madcap comedy Leading Ladies, Jack and Leo are two penniless Shakespearean actors relegated to performing on…
The Midtown Men
Fans of Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons will be thrilled to know that The Midtown Men are coming to town. Reuniting four stars from the original cast of Broadway’s Jersey Boys, which celebrated Valli’s life and work, Christian Hoff, Michael Longoria, Daniel Reichard and former Texan J. Robert Spencer…
Traders Village 6th Annual Fiestas Patrias
Catch Tejano legend and Grammy Award winner Sunny Ozuna at the Traders Village 6th Annual Fiestas Patrias celebration. He’ll be appearing with his group, the Sunliner Band, in a special show marking Mexican Independence Day. The program also includes folkloric ballet groups, more live music, food and family activities. Sun.,…
9th Annual Media Archeology Festival, Media Archeology 2012: Real Time
The 9th Annual Media Archeology Festival, Media Archeology 2012: Real Time, would need a much, much longer name in order to clearly state its scope. It would have to be the 9th Annual Music, Film, Art and Performance Artists That Meld Images and Sound Through Electronic Media Festival. That’s a…
”Daryl Thetford: Seven Questions”
Whether you’re reading this in print or online, you are surrounded by information. Look left, and you’ll see a graphic asking how you plan to spend your evening out. Look right, and another will question your feelings on starving children. This struggle with constant data is the theme of photographer…
Two Door Cinema Club
Contagious choruses are hardly anything new to the music industry; they’re almost the heart of it. Three-piece band Two Door Cinema Club makes climbing the charts look crazy easy even without straight pop hooks. Its genre-bending fusion of pop, indie rock, and dance makes it stand out from the rest…
Lang Lang Plays Beethoven
It’s a triple play with three piano concertos, three concerts and one brilliant pianist when Lang Lang Plays Beethoven with the Houston Symphony. The Chinese virtuoso tackles Beethoven’s spirited Piano Concerto No. 2, the dramatic 3 and the powerful 5. Each performance opens with Lindberg’s impetuous EXPO and closes with…
Jesus Christ Superstar
This event has been canceled. No new dates have been announced. Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s genre-bending musical based upon the last seven days of the life of Christ, Jesus Christ Superstar (1971), finally gets the staging and venue Webber always intended for it — the rock arena. And…
Intersection New Music Collective: Stories in Verse
Composer B.P. Herrington has used the Intersection New Music Collective to bring a wide range of new classical works to the Houston area since 2008. The group’s latest concert is Stories in Verse, which mixes poetry and music. The poetry will be provided by Dr. Paul Ruffin, the 2009 Texas…
Disney on Ice: Treasure Trove
Disney recently celebrated a major milestone with the release of the company’s 50th full-length animated feature, Tangled. That story of Rapunzel and Flynn is one of the main focuses of Disney’s latest skating spectacle, Treasure Trove. If you’re a Disney on Ice fan, you’ll recognize it as a reworked version…
Shawn and Marion Wayans
Two years ago, Marlon Wayans decided to try stand-up comedy to prepare for an upcoming role as the legendary Richard Pryor. Whether or not the film will ever be made remains murky, but the member of the famous comedy family seems to have found a new niche for himself. His…
”John Slaby: Inappropriate for a Public Space”
John Slaby’s The Prison shows the artist with a length of white fabric covering his eyes, ears, nose and mouth and also binding his hands together. The work is part of his ”Inappropriate for a Public Space” exhibit, currently showing at Archway Gallery. The show examines sex, violence, religion and…
Adam Tendler: Night Thoughts
Enjoy a program of meditative modern American music when the Rothko Chapel presents Adam Tendler: Night Thoughts. One of the highlights of the evening is sure to be Tendler’s performance of Ned Rorem’s complete published piano music composed for his late partner, James Holmes. On his blog, Tendler calls the…
MFAH Mixed Media Designed by IKEA
”I agree with Forbes,” DJ Ceeplus Bad Knives says. ”I think [Houston is] the coolest city.” And the coolest city deserves the coolest party possible, right? According to Ceeplus, the MFAH Mixed Media Designed by IKEA blowout fits the bill. This month the event landed on December 21, the day…
Comedy Sportz: Charlie Brown Christmas
Most of us have seen the holiday classic A Charlie Brown Christmas. ComedySportz gives the story an improv spin in A Charlie Brown Christmas: Unscripted. ”We hit the major plot points, improvising our way around them,” says producer Dianah Dulany. ”At the top of the show, we get multiple lines…
The Marriage of Figaro and Moscow, Cheryomushki
If you want a chance to see opera and musical theater stars in the making, then check out Moores Opera Center at the University of Houston, which starts its spring season traditionally and otherwise with The Marriage of Figaro and Moscow, Cheryomushki. The first is a romantic successor to The…
Sexy Baby CANCELLED
Please note, this screening has been CANCELLED. Filmmakers Jill Bauer and Ronna Gradus follow three women as they navigate the uncharted waters of the sexuality in the cyber age in the documentary Sexy Baby. There’s 12-year-old Winnifred, 22-year-old Laura and 32-year old Nichole, each with a different outlook and agenda…
Houston Symphony: Dvorák’s New World Symphony
Get your choice of format at Dvorák’s New World Symphony by the Houston Symphony. Friday’s performance has an earlier start time, a shorter program (Dvorák’s Symphony No. 9, From the New World and Copland’s Quiet City for English horn, trumpet and strings) and remarks from the stage regarding the works…
SPANK! The Fifty Shades Parody
Author E.L. James hasn’t authorized the new musical SPANK! The Fifty Shades Parody, but we’re guessing even she’d get a giggle or two out of it. Think Saturday Night Live meets Chippendales and you get an idea of the show’s tone. Written and directed by Jim Millan (Kids in the…
Victoria Laurie: What a Ghoul Wants
It’s a combination book launch/intuitive reading session/birthday party with Austin-based fantasy author Victoria Laurie on the release of her newest title, What a Ghoul Wants. The seventh in her Ghost Hunter mystery series, What a Ghoul Wants follows M.J. Holliday, Laurie’s psychic protagonist, and the crew of her television show…
The Dallas Asia Film Fest: Experimental Shorts
In an era of three-hour-plus screen times for films about hobbits and Civil War-era presidents, short films still have something to say — in a lot fewer turns of the clock hands. The Dallas Asian Film Festival: Experimental Shorts will feature nine short films from the festival that celebrates ”new…
Cobra Woman
Back in 1944, when Robert Siodmak shot Cobra Woman, there weren’t any CGI wizards. All he had were sarongs and Maria Montez — and by God, that’s all he needed! Montez made dozens of exotic adventure flicks for Universal by playing a fiery, exotic beauty, but none are better than…
”WAR/PHOTOGRAPHY”
Child soldiers, emotional homecomings and medical rescues are among the images seen in ”WAR/PHOTOGRAPHY: Images of Armed Conflict and Its Aftermath,” a large exhibition currently on view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Philip Jones Griffiths’s 1968 shot of a young Vietnamese boy wearing a seemingly oversize helmet and…
The Language Archive
Imagine a professional linguist, a man who speaks countless languages and specializes in preserving dying ones, but who is unable to talk with his wife, Mary. In The Language Archive (a Susan Smith Blackburn Prize winner), about to have its regional premiere at Stages Repertory Theatre, playwright Julia Cho tells…
Memory House
Several years ago, playwright and college professor Kathleen Tolan interviewed a woman who had adopted a six-year-old girl from a village in Russia and brought her to New York City. In Memory House, Tolan paired that adopted-from-Russia daughter idea — moving the character’s age to her late teens — with…
Cello Fury
Over the last decade, a few cellists have carved out a pretty nice niche in pop music. Rasputina, Zoe Keating and Apocalyptica are among them. You can add the Pittsburgh-based group Cello Fury to that list. Simon Cummings, Ben Muñoz, Nicole Myers and David Throckmorton craft a hard-rock sound that…
NBA All-Star Jam Session
When you’re a kid, stars of the basketball court can seem impossibly godlike. They move with superhuman speed, practically fly through the air and are rich and famous to boot. That’s why events like the NBA All-Star Jam Session can be so important. The Houston Rockets’ own Chandler Parsons credits…
The Dead Rabbits
Beloved Montrose sports bar Griff’s is known as a relatively low-key place to watch the Astros or Texans and grab a thick ‘n’ hearty steak on Tuesdays, and also for the most bacchanalian St. Patrick’s Day party this side of the Blarney Stone. From noon on Sunday, mostly local bands…
”kip fulbeck: part asian, 100% hapa”
It might be awhile before we see the term Hapa on Census forms. Popularly used to indicate a person of a mixed ethnic heritage that includes Asian roots, the word is visually illustrated in ”kip fulbeck: part asian, 100% hapa,” a new photographic exhibit at Asia Society Texas. Kip Fulbeck…
Five Funny French Films: Le Grand Amour
Cinema makes up an important part of the 2013 French Cultures Festival, including today’s Le Grand Amour, part of the Five Funny French Films series. Pierre Étaix’s 1969 comedy follows a newly married man (Étaix) who dreams of being a ladies’ man. Delightful and immensely imaginative, Le Grand Amour is…
Anime Matsuri: Anime & Japanese Pop Culture Convention
For five years Anime Matsuri, Houston’s anime and Japanese pop-culture convention, has grown bigger and better, bringing fans of anime, gaming and Japanese culture from all around the country to Houston. Convention-goers this year will have a chance to meet Kelly Hu, best known for her roles in The Scorpion…
Doug Stanhope’s Big Stink Comedy Tour
A careless DJ, preparing to interview the Sex Pistols’ John Lydon, made the mistake one early morning of misdialing the sleeping, self-described ”old- school” road comic Doug Stanhope. Twice. Rather than trying to reason with the DJ, Stanhope, whom both Variety and The Hollywood Reporter listed as one of their…
Company
The Texas Repertory Theatre mounts Stephen Sondheim’s musical look at married life, Company. Robert, a 35-year-old bachelor, is having trouble connecting to the many girls he dates, missing chance after chance to settle down. His married friends have plenty of advice, but no one can give him an easy solution…
First Friday Poetry Reading: Norma Koontz
No matter how she tried, Norma Koontz, the guest artist at today’s First Friday Poetry Reading, couldn’t completely avoid writing about discrimination. ”I have tried hard not to be identified as a black poet, so I’ve always avoided race topics,” she tells us, but she found she couldn’t avoid discussing…
Suzanne Rindell: The Other Typist
Suzanne Rindell, who’s done years of research about early 20th century American life in pursuit of a doctorate degree at Rice University, set her debut novel, The Other Typist in – can you guess? — the 1920s. In the darkly comic novel, prim and proper Rose, a typist for the…
Rosella Namok: ”Paint Up and Dance!”
Nearly ten years since her first Houston exhibition, Australian aboriginal artist Rosella Namok returns with her first solo show here, ”Paint Up and Dance!” The exhibit features large-scale paintings done in her signature style of strong lines and brilliant colors. Namok drags her fingers through thick, wet paint to create…
The 9th Annual Empty Bowls
The 9th Annual Empty Bowls Houston attempts to bridge the gap between good taste and something that actually tastes good. The altruistic collaboration among artists, organizations and festival-type participants aids the ”many people in our community who have ’empty bowls,”’ Tom Perry, Empty Bowls’ chair, says. In exchange for the…
”Lynn Lane & Melanie Loew: Cats, Bunnies, and the Surface Value of It All”
Some artists take themselves very, very seriously. Thankfully, photographer Lynn Lane and painter Melanie Loew aren’t among them. ”Lynn Lane & Melanie Loew: Cats, Bunnies, and the Surface Value of It All,” a new exhibit by the pair, is a showcase of portraits of people posing with either cats or…
C. C. Hunter: Chosen at Nightfall
Spring, Texas-based author C.C. Hunter (her real name is Christie Craig) signs and discusses her latest supernatural release, Chosen at Nightfall, the last in her Shadow Falls series. Protagonist Kylie Galen, a chameleon, returns to Shadow Falls, a camp for paranormal teens. She’s there to find the power she needs…
The Houston Symphony: Disney Live in Concert: Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
In hindsight, letting Johnny Depp portray a wacky pirate in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl seems like a no-brainer, but at the time success was anything but guaranteed. Steven Spielberg, Roman Polanski and even the Muppets accomplished nothing but box office failure with pirates in…
Annual AIA Sandcastle Competition
Area architects, designers, engineers and contractors gather their trowels, buckets and sunscreen as they get ready for the Houston Chapter of the American Institute of Architects’ 27th Annual AIA Sandcastle Competition. Representatives from more than 80 of Houston’s most prolific, distinguished and unabashedly gritty architectural/design firms take part in the…
Public Poetry: Michael Berryhill, Chris Carmona, Anis Shivani, Dulcie “Digh” Veluthukaran
Poet/novelist Anis Shivani, one of the writers reading from their work at today’s installment of Public Poetry, says he might not ever again write in as overtly political a style as he did in his 2012 release My Tranquil War and Other Poems. Written from 2001 to 2011, Tranquil War…
Scarface
”Say hello to my little friend!” It’s one of the most memorable lines in movie history. And it was uttered by Al Pacino in Brian De Palma’s gangster classic Scarface some 30 years ago, a milestone being celebrated by the Alamo Drafthouse Summer of ’83 series. Pacino’s Tony Montana, a…
Bruce Bruce
Comic Bruce Bruce is known for his double-sized XX girth and onstage antics. Starting out as a barbecue cook who would do shtick for customers while sizzling the meat, he later entertained co-workers at corporate meetings as a Frito-Lay salesman. Today, Bruce Bruce has become a hugely (no pun intended)…
Anne Rodgers: Kiss and Tell: Secrets of Sexual Desire from Women 15 to 97
Men have Viagra, women have…kissing? That’s what former journalist Anne Rodgers says in her new book Kiss and Tell: Secrets of Sexual Desire from Women 15 to 97. When Rodgers wanted to find out what women like sexually, when and how they like it, she went to the experts -…
James Rollins: The Eye of God
Author James Rollins has a new book out — uh-oh, must be time to save the world. With each of his books, Rollins thrills readers with a new menace that may end humanity. So far he’s crafted stories that feature threats from genetically modified food and super volcanoes. For his…
Pauly Shore
Continuing the Shore family’s stand-up comedy legacy, Pauly Shore might get a little nostalgic at Houston’s Improv this weekend. After all, Shore’s manic mentor was the late laff king Sam Kinison, who cut his comedy baby teeth on Houston’s revered stand-up stages. Shore is like Kinison in that you either…
Inprint: Margarett Root Brown Reading Series: Robert Boswell and James McBride
Houston author Robert Boswell has an unusual dedication in his latest book, Tumbledown. The novel is for ”all the clients who survived my tenure as a counselor and to the one who didn’t.” Boswell, who’s appearing in the Inprint: Margarett Root Brown Reading Series: Robert Boswell and James McBride presentation,…
MFAH Family Flicks: Best of the Chicago International Children’s Film Festival
Critic Roger Ebert called Facets Multi-Media one of Chicago’s greatest film treasures. The group has been creating quality film programs for kids since 1975 and organizing the Chicago International Children’s Film Festival since 1983. Today, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, presents recent highlights from the festival at MFAH Family…
Tommy Davidson
Tommy Davidson might have to be cajoled a bit in order to do his impression of the late Sammy Davis Jr. The famously honed impression became a staple on In Living Color, FOX’s answer to Saturday Night Live, but it’s not standard in Davidson stand-up routines. ”I used to do…
Ralphie May
A veteran of 19 USO tours, comedian Ralphie May not only supports the military men and women serving active duty, but he also has several strategic suggestions for them. ”Send gang-bangers to Afghanistan. Give them some guns, leave them over there; in six months, everybody wearing a turban and some…
Avenue Zoo
If you like talented performers, amusing animal encounters and hand puppets — and who doesn’t? — they can now be found twice a day Thursday through Sunday at the Houston Zoo. Avenue Zoo features animal puppetry, lively songs and music, and lots of familiar Houston references, and it follows the…
Houston Poetry Fest 2013
Houston physician and writer Fady Joudah (seen above) is the guest poet at the opening-night session of the Houston Poetry Fest 2013. Joudah presents poems from his latest book, the recently released Alight. His first book, The Earth in the Attic, chronicled the former emergency room doctor’s medical humanitarian missions…
7th Puerto Rican and Cuban Festival and 1st Carnaval Americas
Willie Colon. Gilberto Santa Rosa. Rey Ruiz. Each is a monster musician and entertainer in his own right. Together, the three headliners are sure to turn up the excitement factor at this year’s 7th Puerto Rican and Cuban Festival and 1st Carnaval Americas. In its seventh year, the event is…
Susi Brister: ”Fantastic Habitat”
Photographer Susi Brister is a landscape artist, but she says her work is influenced more by Jim Henson than by Ansel Adams. Her new exhibit, ”Fantastic Habitat,” now at Lawndale Art Center, displays her photographs of ambiguous forms covered in fur or fabric that are inserted into natural landscapes. ”My…
John Billheimer: A Player to be Maimed Later
Novelist John Billheimer’s new release, A Player to be Maimed Later, has a bit of a cautionary tone to it, a baseball version of the “be careful what you wish for” sense about it. Billheimer’s Player follows reporter Lloyd Keaton as he undertakes to write superstar pitcher Blaze Stender’s biography…
Houston Press Brewfest
Hops heads, suds sycophants and connoisseurs of craft brews come together at the Houston Press Brewfest. The returning beer-sampling event and festival features more than 110 beers from 45 breweries around the country including Saint Arnold, Killians, Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada. ”With Oktoberfest going on this month, it just…
”Gary Komarin: The Bowman Sixpence Has Got to Have Soul”
Into this art world of faux-philosophizing and ”deeper meaning” comes an exhibition that is just for fun: ”Gary Komarin: The Bowman Sixpence Has Got to Have Soul,” currently on view at Gremillion & Co. Fine Art. It might seem that there’s no theme to ”The Bowman Sixpence.” However, a little…
Houston SLAB Parade & Family Festival
Think you’ve got a cool car? You haven’t seen Kerry “Fleetking” Williams’s ride. Williams, a participant in the Houston SLAB Parade & Family Festival, drives a fully loaded 1996 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham with an LS1 engine. (SLAB cars, by the way, are hip-hop-influenced low rider/art cars popular in African-American communities…
Sara Paretsky: Critical Mass
“Physics is hard,” says author Sara Paretsky, creator of the V.I. Warshawski suspense series, via press materials. “But it’s also intensely interesting, even exciting. It lies at the heart of the 20th century’s technological leaps and its horrifying wars, and makes for a very engaging backstory for a book.” Paretsky’s…
Rednerrus Feil Dance Company: Into-Me-See
For the Rednerrus Feil Dance Company’s first evening-length performance since moving to Houston, Artistic Director Amy Llanes focused on intimacy. The show’s title, Into-Me-See, defines Llanes’s idea of the concept. “That’s what intimacy is, letting someone see into me,” she tells us. One of the program’s works, Goodbye, Grace, explores…
Aida
He’s a soldier, captain of the Egyptian guard, and his first loyalty is to his king. All that falls away in Aida when a beautiful Ethiopian slave walks through the door and Radamès falls in love. “He betrays his people by revealing very, very important military secrets. But even in…
Camping with Gasoline
In junior high, Jaston Williams was in a Boy Scout troop whose members smoked, drank and slept late. He’s included their most outrageous episodes in Camping with Gasoline, scheduled for the middle of June at Galveston’s The Grand 1894 Opera House. But don’t expect a searing teenage drama. The same…
Lord of Illusions
Clive Barker is known for penning some of the best weird horror tales ever put to paper, but occasionally he branches out as a film director, with amazing results. His movie Lord of Illusions follows the exploits of detective Harry D’Amour, a hardboiled sleuth with a penchant for the occult…
15th Annual Extremely Shorts Film Festival
Each of the films in the 15th Annual Extremely Shorts Film Festival is less than three minutes. The short screen time might seem to be a limitation for the filmmakers, but juror Andy Smith says it’s just the opposite. “The time constraint really forces filmmakers to experiment,” he tells us…
Large Animal Games
Hunting for love is the focus of Large Animal Games by playwright Steve Yockey. The dark comedy is set in a lingerie shop, where a wise clerk helps customers find what they need, not only in the shop but in life as well. “One character is a woman who wants…
”Out from Under the Bed: Drawings & Prints by Lance Bradley”
If you’ve driven on the East Side of Austin in the last four years, you’ve seen the work of Lance Bradley. His mural Demon Shrimp Fest is one of the more iconic landmarks of an already weird city, and with its bright colors and surreal lines, it tells you everything…
Ringling Bros. And Barnum & Baily: Fully Charged
No one does circus better than the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey. The current show, Fully Charged, features the return of the one and only Tabayara, whose ability to work with white tigers, horses and his newly added Asian elephants borders on the telepathic. His latest act, featuring his…
Scriptwriters/Houston 22nd Annual Ten by Ten Showcase
Ten is the magic number at Scriptwriters/Houston’s Ten by Ten Showcase. The annual production features ten ten-minute shorts by some of the finest playwrights in Houston. The plots range in tone from the emotionally dramatic to the amusingly absurd. In As We Knew It by L. Robert Westeen, the audience…
I’m Carolyn Parker: The Good, the Mad, and the Beautiful
Filmmaker Jonathan Demme (Silence of the Lambs) went to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina to make a film about the storm’s devastation of the city. He told that story by chronicling the life of one amazing, resilient woman in the film I’m Carolyn Parker: The Good, the Mad, and the…
Mr. Marmalade
Lucy and Larry, at the center of Mr. Marmalade, are an odd pair. She’s four years old and deeply involved with a rather sinister imaginary adult friend, Mr. Marmalade. Larry is five years old and has the distinction of being the youngest attempted suicide in the state. Equally innocent and…
Grandes Figuras de Cine Mexicano (Great Figures of Mexican Cinema)
The giants of the golden age of Mexican cinema hit the big screen once more at the Grandes Figuras de Cine Mexicano (Great Figures of Mexican Cinema). Presented by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs through the Consulate General of Mexico in Houston, the nine-hour festival includes four films. Our personal…
8
The message from the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit was clear. California’s Proposition 8 banning same-sex marriage was unconstitutional, it concluded, saying, ”The Constitution simply does not allow for laws of this sort.” Those 11 little words changed the course of American civil rights history. Playwright…
”American Made: 250 Years of American Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston”
It took two organizers to pull together the work seen in “American Made: 250 Years of American Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.” Emily Ballew Neff, MFAH curator for American Painting and Sculpture, and Christine Gervais, MFAH associate curator for Decorative Arts and Rienzi, pulled pieces from the…
John Cage: Happy 100th!
When someone speaks of avant-garde composer John Cage, you probably think of his most famous work, 4’33”. The piece is famous for being silent — or rather, for being three movements of the ambient sounds around you as it’s performed. There is simply no other figure in contemporary composition like…
Best of Brahms, Program A and B
Johannes Brahms is known for two things: being one of the most influential Romantic composers of all time, and having a beard so awesome that it could cause spontaneous pregnancies at a range of 20 feet [citation needed]. The Houston Symphony pays homage to the multitalented composer with Best of…
Lewis Black
The perpetually upset Lewis Black is headed back to Houston for his latest show, which he says is mostly about social issues, with more than a sprinkling of politics, and won’t be the same show as In God We Rust, now airing on Comedy Central and available on DVD. In…
”Silence”
”Silence,” The Menil Collection’s latest exhibit, examines the role that silence plays in a world ruled by ever-shifting media. From paintings and sculpture to film and dance, the works on display give insight into how silence affects the creative process and, more important, how one responds to this increasingly scarce…
”Katy Horan: Keep Your Arms from Going Astray”
”Katy Horan: Keep Your Arms from Going Astray” deals with old-fashioned notions of female behavior, dress and etiquette. The mixed-media artist produces pieces, often tissue, graphite and gouache on paper or ink on paper, that resemble Renaissance portraits or Victorian pictures. One image shows a ghostlike figure of a woman,…
Uzume, A World Premiere
You can expect toe shoes and taiko drums at today’s world premiere of Uzume, a new work presented by the Dominic Walsh Dance Theater. Uzume, a love letter from choreographer Walsh to the people of Japan, combines butoh-style dance/performance art with taiko drumming, along with Japanese paper art and design…
Salsipuedes: A Night of Love, War, and Anchovies
You can tell by its title that Daniel Catán’s Salsipuedes: A Night of Love, War, and Anchovies is not a typical night at the opera. Originally commissioned by Houston Grand Opera in 2004, the work is a comedy composed of infectious, dance-ready Caribbean music set on the exotic island of…
Election Eve Viewing Party
Jonathan Horowitz’s exhibit ”Your Land/My Land” has been updated from the ’08 election just in time for the big cage match between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. The Contemporary Arts Museum Houston’s gallery space is neatly divided by red and blue rugs, with each side bearing a monitor constantly broadcasting…
Celtic Thunder
If you don’t hear your favorite Celtic Thunder song during today’s concert, you can blame it on the thousands of fans who responded when the group asked for help in making up the set list for this latest tour. ”We’ve been touring since 2008,” CT vocalist Ryan Kelly tells us…
I Capuleti e i Montecchi
All of the main cast members in Opera in the Heights’ production of Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi (The Capulets and the Montagues) are making their debuts in their roles. Camille Zamora and Julia Ebner appear for the first time ever as Giulietta (Shakespeare’s Juliet), while Sarah Heltzel and…
Jubilee of Dance: A Tribute to Amy Fote
Houston Ballet’s principal dancer Amy Fote is hanging up her toeshoes, and to mark the occasion, the company is dedicating their ninth annual Jubilee of Dance: A Tribute to Amy Fote in her honor. Fote joined the Houston Ballet in 2005. It took her less than a year to be…
The Texas Tenors — Deep in the Heart of Christmas
If you want to spend Christmas with The Texas Tenors — Deep in the Heart of Christmas, you’d better buy your tickets now — the trio’s shows have a habit of selling out. The group got its start on America’s Got Talent in 2009 and has spent the last few…
Under the Streetlamp
The men from Under the Streetlamp might be Generation X’ers, but they have a real love for music more often associated with Baby Boomers. The quartet, made up of four lead singers from the popular Chicago cast of the Broadway musical Jersey Boys, have a set-list that’s an amalgamation of…
The Rat Pack Is Back
It was 1960, and the original Ocean’s 11 was filming in Las Vegas. For three legendary weeks, some of the film’s illustrious cast — that is, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. and Joey Bishop, collectively known as the Rat Pack — spent their evenings performing onstage together in…
”Gilad Efrat: Negev”
Gilad Efrat has a tendency to become fixated on a subject matter, as evidenced by previous shows dominated by monkey portraits or paintings of European cities destroyed by bombings. In ”Gilad Efrat: Negev,” his third exhibition at Inman Gallery, the Tel Aviv artist returns to a subject matter he has…
Universal Pictures: Celebrating 100 Years: The Birds
Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece The Birds is based on a short story by Rebecca author Daphne du Maurier. The 1963 horror classic follows socialite Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) and lawyer Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor); the two are in a budding romance. Suddenly and inexplicably, birds of all species begin attacking humans…
2013 Chevron Houston Marathon and Aramco Houston Half Marathon (& 2013 ABB 5K)
Two Ethiopians took home top honors (and new course records) during last year’s Chevron Houston Marathon, Tariku Jufar (2:06:51) and Alemitu Abera (2:23:14). Those times might be challenged during the 2013 Chevron Houston Marathon and Aramco Houston Half Marathon (& 2013 ABB 5K), when some of the world’s best marathoners…
Kozmic Pearl
Janis Joplin would have been 70 years old this weekend, but instead her October 1970 death at just age 27 left a legacy as one of rock’s first female superstars and a lot of unanswered questions. One of the biggest is what she would have done next, but Joplin had…
Sanders Family Christmas
It’s Christmas Eve, 1941, and young men across the country are being shipped out to WWII, including one from the Sanders family. Before he leaves, he’s going to enjoy one more Sanders Family Christmas, complete with carols and lots of holiday cheer. The yuletide family musical was conceived by Alan…
”Unpremeditated Natures: Russ Havard and David McClain”
The Museum District’s Gallery 1724 is actually a gallery-slash-salon which makes for some interesting choices of exhibition spaces. In the case of ”Unpremeditated Natures: Russ Havard and David McClain,” currently on exhibit at the gallery, that includes the bathroom walls. Houston artist David McClain has filled one room with art…
Paul Mooney
African-American comic Paul Mooney used to write for Good Times and Sanford and Son back in the day. Now the 71-year-old is the reigning godfather of politically incorrect, filter-free comedy. Translation: Mooney’s contemporary material is considerably more explosive than J.J. Evan’s ”Dyn-o-mite!” In one bit, Mooney’s Negrodamus character from Comedy…
”Claes Oldenburg: Strange Eggs”
Claes Oldenburg often incorporates images from everyday life into his artwork. ”Claes Oldenburg: Strange Eggs” at The Menil Collection features 18 collages the Swedish-born American artist completed at an important juncture in his career, when he moved from New York City to Chicago in 1956. Fragments of images from newspapers…
Lady Antebellum
Lady Antebellum may not be all that country, but musically and emotionally speaking, who could really argue with Fleetwood Mac in cowboy boots? I mean, really expensive cowboy boots of course. Tue., March 5, 5 p.m., 2013…
Catch Me if You Can
If you thought the 2002 movie version of Catch Me if You Can was exhausting with all those times con man Frank Abagnale Jr. was running like hell to escape his dedicated pursuer, Carl Hanratty, and then imagine a musical made from that movie where everyone is singing and dancing…
Foodie Floats’ Cupid Cruise
Here’s something different for Valentine’s Day – the Foodie Floats’ Cupid Cruise. The Buffalo Bayou Partnership provides bubbly and chocolate nibbles for you and your beloved during an hour-and-a-half long trip on the Spirit of the Bayou pontoon boat. Watch the sunset over the Houston skyline from the water. Reservations…
Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet
The passion of Shakespeare’s most famous star-crossed lovers comes alive when the Houston Symphony performs Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet. Written in 1935 and premiered in 1938, this work is considered one of Prokofiev’s most famous and takes the listener on an emotional journey through the tragic story of the two…
Gunilla Klingberg: Wheel of Everyday Life
For more than a decade, Swedish artist Gunilla Klingberg has been exploring the relationship between the commercial and the spiritual by borrowing designs from supermarket, big-box store and fast food restaurant logos to make large-scale cosmological diagrams and Buddhist mandalas. Installing these patterns across walls, floors and windows, she temporarily…
Some Like It Hot
We’re pretty sure that Marilyn Monroe was used to being the prettiest person in the room wherever she went. Then she got to the set of Some Like It Hot, where her co-stars included the beautiful (by his own account) Tony Curtis and the klutzy Jack Lemmon. Curtis and Lemmon…
Brilliant Lecture Series: Stephen Hawking
Past speakers in the Brilliant Lecture Series have included George Clooney and Betty White. Now the series presents world-famous physicist, cosmologist, author and Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Stephen Hawking. Stricken with Lou Gehrig’s disease (ALS) as a young man, Hawking has been confined to a wheelchair and forced to…
”Portrait of Spain: Masterpieces from the Prado”
Spain’s Prado has been called ”not so much a museum of paintings as it is a museum of painters.” Along with treasure troves of works by El Greco, Titian, Rubens and Velazquez, it holds 140 paintings by Goya as well as some 1,200 of his drawings and prints. For the…
Jo Koy
Comedian Jo Koy, who lives in California, doesn’t mind earthquakes, but tornadoes, well, that’s something else. Koy had just arrived at a Kentucky airport when one of the baggage handlers told him a tornado warning was in effect. ”Don’t worry, it’s not a tornado, it’s just a tornado warning.” ”What’s…
Houston Press Menu of Menus Extravaganza
Now celebrating 11 years, the Houston Press Menu of Menus Extravaganza is back once again and bringing the popular Iron Fork competition along for the ride. The annual Menu of Menus is our grand tasting event, with more than 45 restaurants on hand offering samples of their very best dishes…
Free Comic Book Day
Comic book enthusiasts can drop serious money on their collection, what with all the various series, their spin-offs and related merchandise. That’s why Free Comic Day is a welcome respite. Comic shops will be handing out free issues of new and exciting titles (not just the B-list rejects). And free…
Dracula, the Music and the Film with Philip Glass and the Philip Glass Ensemble
It’s hard to improve on a classic, but Philip Glass does exactly that in Dracula, the Music and the Film. When it was released in 1931, Tod Browning’s horror masterpiece had very few sound effects and no musical score at all. In 1998, Glass composed an original score for the…
”REady MADE”
Jeff Forster isn’t one to pass up a good pun. Take ”REady MADE,” the title of an exhibition currently at Lawndale Art Center. Forster curated works from six artists who repurpose discarded items in their pieces — essentially transforming the items from being ”ready-mades” to being remade. There’s also Forster’s…
A Graf Farewell
Acclaimed conductor Hans Graf makes his final appearance as music director of the Houston Symphony during today’s A Graf Farewell concert. Mahler’s massive and extremely dramatic Symphony No. 2, Resurrection is on the program. Beginning with a death march and concluding a hymn, Resurrection has the most uplifting ending of…
Christine Leche: Outside the Wire
Writing instructor Christine Leche taught at an American base near the Afghan-Pakistani border. Working with soldiers, she encouraged her students to write as a way to battle the pressure and trauma of their time on the front line. Thirty-nine of those writings became Outside the Wire, a collection of personal…
There is a Happiness That Morning Is
Catastrophic Theatre is staging a production of There is A Happiness That Morning Is, Mickie Maher’s comedic, rhyming ode to poet William Blake. Sound familiar? That may be because Catastrophic performed the devastatingly appealing show to sold-out houses just two years ago. Recommending the show to ”anyone that has ever…
Tracy Morgan: Excuse My French Tour
Hosting the recent Billboard Music Awards for ABC, the wildly unpredictable, normally unfiltered Tracy Morgan began with a standard shout-out to the lovely ladies in his Sin City audience: ”Somebody’s gonna get pregnant tonight!” Much to the surprise of his fans, but to the relief of network executives, it was…
Ghost World and Collectors Swap
Daniel Clowes’s comic Ghost World starring Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi follows two recent high school graduates with nothing to do except play pranks. One prank has unintended consequences as one of the girls (Birch) becomes infatuated with a middle-aged record collector (Buscemi). ”I think there’s something timeless about Ghost…
The Texas Tenors’ Let Freedom Sing
Texas can’t cram all its red-white-and-true blue devotion to America into one 24-hour period known as the 4th of July. Nope, in Texas the patriotism spills over, as with this post-Independence Day performance of The Texas Tenors’ Let Freedom Sing. The program features the handsome America’s Got Talent grads performing…
Taylor Stevens: The Doll
Vanessa Michael, the woman at the center of Taylor Stevens’s new mystery novel The Doll, is unique. Raised by missionaries in Africa, she learned knife and hunting skills and survival techniques not from tribesmen but from the gunrunners who took her in. She’s been tortured and beaten and has suffered…
Dixie’s Tupperware Party
There’s going to be a whole lot of burping going on at Hobby Center this week. No, it’s not the Blue Collar Comedy Tour, it’s Dixie’s Tupperware Party. You know how a Tupperware party goes. A bunch of people get together at one person’s home, enjoying wine coolers and munchies…
Creature from the Black Lagoon
The horror classic The Creature from the Black Lagoon is probably one of the most underrated Universal movie in the genre. Oh, the Gill-Man is always included in the lineup with Dracula and Frankenstein’s monsters, but few people ever really sit down and appreciate what a true cinematic masterpiece the…
Houston Web Awards
The Internet is like The Force in Star Wars. It surrounds us. It binds us together. It has a light side and a dark side … okay, it has a dark side and a less dark side, but the analogy really holds up in the fact that some people use…
Tamarie Cooper’s Old as Hell
It’s certainly true that Tamarie Cooper is older than she was back in 1996, when she first began this egocentric yet irresistible musical avant garde annual endeavor that’s become essential to Houston summer theatrics. Up this summer: The world premiere of Tamarie Cooper’s Old as Hell at Catastrophic Theatre. But…
Guilty Crown
There’s a reason that the weekly anime screenings at the Alamo Drafthouse have endured for years as a Houston staple: Coordinator Rommel Salandanan has a knack for getting the best A-List anime titles and sleeper hits. This week he’s got Guilty Crown, a 2011 series that follows high school student…
Sophie Hannah: Kind of Cruel
There would seem to be a major flaw with novelist Sophie Hannah’s newest release, Kind of Cruel. All the characters are irritating and/or obnoxious. Hannah somehow pulls off the impossible and manages to create irritating and/or obnoxious characters who are likable — or at least interesting. Leading the cast is…
Late Nite Catechism Las Vegas: Sister Rolls the Dice
“We’re pretty sure a fair number of Houston Press readers already are familiar with the business end of a nun’s ruler (and if not, they probably should be),” says Stages Repertory Theatre Director of Marketing Lise Bohn of the nondenominational comedy Late Nite Catechism Las Vegas: Sister Rolls the Dice…
Houston Shakespeare Festival
This year’s Houston Shakespeare Festival offerings of Antony and Cleopatra and As You Like It give a Booker T. Washington graduate, Brandon Dirden, his first chance to return to Houston in two years. A winner of an OBIE award last year for his star turn as Boy Willie in a…
Gregg Hurwitz: Tell No Lies
Writer Gregg Hurwitz has penned issues of Wolverine and Punisher for Marvel and Batman and Penguin for DC. Today, Hurwitz will be wearing his novelist hat as he reads from and signs his latest release, Tell No Lies. In Lies, Daniel Brasher accidentally receives a note that reads: ”Admit what…
The Confessions of Deacon Jim, A True Western Tale for the Stage
Jim Miller was a killer for hire at the turn of the 20th century. He worked in Texas and Oklahoma and reportedly executed more than 50 people. He was also a clean-living, churchgoing family man. (His regular church attendance and enthusiastic singing of hymns during services earned him the nickname…
Menus-Plaisirs
Ars Lyrica Houston’s Artistic Director, Matthew Dirst, created the group’s tenth-anniversary season with one goal in mind: to bring seldom-heard Baroque music to Houston fans. ”I love music that’s a bit outside the box, stuff that one doesn’t hear every day,” he tells us. ”These kinds of pieces have been…
”Texas Biennial Invitational: Christie Blizard, Marcelyn McNeil, Tom Orr and Brad Tucker”
In case you need a reason to head over to the Museum District, we’ve got a great one for you: the ”Texas Biennial Invitational: Christie Blizard, Marcelyn McNeil, Tom Orr and Brad Tucker” exhibit currently at Lawndale Art Center. A sort of ”best of” showcase for the Lone Star State,…
”The Beauty Box”
Local mixed-media artist Robert Hodge and his partner Philip Pyle, a sculptor and digital artist, have converted an open-air space in the Third Ward into ”The Beauty Box,” an art installation that’s a replica of a living room. The front door, located on Dowling Street, opens into a cozy home…
LitFuse: Reading Series
The LitFuse Reading Series at Kaboom Books kicks off its third season with a bit of an international bang. Fresh from a summer teaching creative writing at Cambridge University as part of the Oxbridge Academic Program, where he’s also Dean of Faculty, Michael Sofranko reads from his book American Sign…
Felipe Esparza
Comedian Gabriel Iglesias got his start in stand-up with the help of Felipe Esparza. In town for a one-day, three-show stint, Esparza tells us he was working at a comedy club several years ago and Iglesias sent word that he wanted to perform. ”He had some cholo friend of his…
Persistence of Vision
There’s only one way for things to go wrong at Persistence of Vision, a dance performance directed by dancer, choreographer, filmmaker, costume designer and artist Ashley Horn. “If you get bored, then it’s wrong…but that would be my fault.” Given Horn’s track record, there’s little chance anyone will get bored…
”Bitters, Brews and Beyond: Houston History in a Bottle”
Hamburgers come in paper boxes, toys are sealed in plastic that requires a freakin’ lightsaber to open and water is sold in more plastic still. The folks over at the Heritage Society remember a time when elegant bottles held our most needed items, and they’re displaying them as part of…
Houston Symphony: La Triste Historia
Conductor Carlos Miguel Prieto is reunited with the Houston Symphony for today’s La Triste Historia, a special Día de los Muertos presentation of work by Mexican composers. (Prieto, now music director of the Louisiana Philharmonic, was an audience favorite when he was an associate conductor with the Houston Symphony several…
Galveston’s Juneteenth
It took three years for news of President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation to reach Galveston Island, freeing the last of the American slaves. The date — June 19, 1865 — became known as Juneteenth and is celebrated throughout the country. This year, Galveston becomes Juneteenth Central with a week of festivities…
Houston LGBT Pride 2012 Parade
Join the throng when 300,000 spectators jam lower Westheimer to watch the Houston LGBT Pride Parade 2012. There are more than 125 entries in the parade, which will be led by Celebrity Pride Marshal Madison Hildebrand, from Bravo’s Million Dollar Listing. He’s joined by Female Pride Marshal Jenifer Rene Pool,…
Jeff Garcia
Fans might know comedian Jeff Garcia best for his distinctive voice work in animated films like Barnyard, Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius and Rio. But put Garcia on stage, and his stand-up roots start showing. Channeling his days as a Los Angeles street kid, he has a sharp, sarcastic edge that…
Feast of Saint Arnold
Saint Arnold Brewing Company’s annual Feast of Saint Arnold is a medieval shindig. It pays homage to the patron saint of brewers from whom they get their name. Arnold encouraged 11th-century Belgians to drink the beer he brewed in the Abbey of Saint Peter, saying that it was the gift…
Classic Bogart Movies at Miller: Casablanca
When Warner Brothers green-lighted the low-budget 1942 romance melodrama Casablanca, studio head Jack Warner thought producer Hal Wallis would want studio stalwarts Ronald Reagan and Ann Sheridan to star as cynical expat Rick and former lover Ilsa. Indeed, the two were announced in trade paper Box Office Barometer. But Wallis,…
The Wiggles
Say it ain’t so! One of today’s most beloved children’s acts is saying goodbye to three of its four founding members after 20 years onstage. Murray Cook, Greg Page and Jeff Fatt of The Wiggles are retiring, leaving Anthony Field to carry on with three new members. The group’s lovable…
Ali Wong
“Naked, I look like a kid. I look like a kid, okay!”exclaims comedian Ali Wong. She may be small in stature, but she’s got a grown-up sense of humor. In one bit, she complains about a gift her Harvard Law graduate boyfriend got her — a red divination bean from…
Word Around Town
For seven years, the Word Around Town Tour has offered the brightest and the best of Houston’s poets for free to the public. It’s the perfect chance for you to experience some local wordplay. The tour kicks off this week with one of our most famous wordsmiths, Marlon Lizama, at…
Tamarie Cooper’s Doomsday Revue (The Greatest Musical Ever!)
It’s the year 2012, supposedly the end of the world. You could go for a little doom and gloom, or for a lot of fun at the Tamarie Cooper’s Doomsday Revue (The Greatest Musical Ever!). Like all good, old-fashioned musicals, the show features a cast of thousands (well, actually 14…
Space City Con
This is the first year for Space City Con, a self-titled “geek festival with free parking.” The lineup of guests includes Nichelle Nichols of Star Trek fame and dozens of other sci-fi/fantasy and graphic novel authors and artists, along with lots of gaming stars . There are also writing workshops…
Amanda Auchter and Lacy M. Johnson
People who know about such things tell us that by the year 2050, whites will in the minority in America. Author Lacy Johnson decided to look at rural white culture as something that might be lost to generations to come. The result was the memoir Trespasses, remembrances from three decades…
”Because I Love You”
People have martyred themselves in the name of love since the beginning of time: Antony and Cleopatra, Héloïse and Abélard, and who could forget Romeo and Juliet? The Blue Dozen Collective, a crew of street artists, graphic designers, painters, printmakers, tattoo artists and installation artists, will put imagery to this…
PIG
The plot to PIG might seem far-fetched, but it’s actually based on a true story. Writer/director Henry Barrial read about a CIA case in which a German citizen of Lebanese descent was held in captivity for six months and, upon his release, sent to Albania. That scenario became the basis…
12th Annual Houston Hot Sauce Festival
Organizers for the 12th Annual Houston Hot Sauce Festival want to warn you: Eat at your own risk. The salsas, marinades, rubs, jellies and sauces you’ll find at the festival range from mild to triple-X in terms of heat. Along with plenty of food and cooking aids, pepper-themed clothes, jewelry…
”James Turrell: Holograms”
The Hiram Butler Gallery has scored a coup with its latest show, ”James Turrell: Holograms.” Not only is this the first time holograms by the famed artist will be shown in Texas, the exhibit is a preview of sorts to the retrospectives of his work being simultaneously mounted next April…
Second Lovers
Tiptoeing between Bob Dylan’s Nashville Skyline and Ryan Adams’ Heartbreaker, Second Lovers’ debut LP Wishers, Dreamers & Liars (released in June) backs up all the buzz that’s been building since their summer 2011 debut. With hooks and harmonies aplenty, they don’t need any Mumford & Sons comparisons to surefire singles…
Spontaneous Memorial: A Commemorative Installation
Spontaneous Memorial: A Commemorative Installation, by Houston native Frank McEntire, is a tribute to the victims of 9/11. The work combines photographs, news report clippings and found objects, as well as some 3,000 tags and additional pages from a ledger inscribed by viewers who shared their thoughts on the tragedy…
Missionary Position
Playwright Steven Fales’s one-person show Missionary Position is about sex. And it isn’t. A prequel of sorts to his hit play Confessions of a Mormon Boy, the autobiographical comedy explores Fales’s life as a young man, including not only his conflicts about his growing attraction to the same sex, but…
Backwards Broadway
The title Backwards Broadway — Celebration Cabaret isn’t exactly accurate. It’s more like ”Cross-dressing Broadway.” Staged in the trendy F Bar, the show is a collection of Broadway standards and hits. All of the required razzle-dazzle is here, but it comes with a gender-bending twist — men sing the female…
Via Colori
Each November for the past seven years, Via Colori has celebrated sidewalk chalk painting as an art form. This year’s lineup of some 200 artists includes the returning Anat Ronen. The self-taught muralist is responsible for works that stretch more than 90 feet on the Galveston Causeway, in addition to…
2012 Houston Cinema Arts Festival
Director Jorge Hinojosa doesn’t apologize for his documentary Iceberg Slim: Portrait of a Pimp, one of many films being screened as part of the 2012 Houston Cinema Arts Festival. Portrait of a Pimp hails Slim as the grandfather of blaxploitation films and gangster rap, and, according to his fans, one…
Timon of Athens
If any troupe can make Shakespeare’s most problematic play, Timon of Athens, less of a problem, it might be the National Theatre of London. The group is broadcasting a taped performance of the acclaimed Nicholas Hytner production across the United States. Simon Russell Beale, as Shakespeare’s most misanthropic character, gives…
”You Are Here”
Artist El Franco Lee II shows local hip-hop legend DJ Screw as he might be in an idyllic afterlife — with six arms scratching on multiple turntables, a posse of friends around him — in DJ Screw in Heaven. The painting is one of several Lee is contributing to the…
Best of New York International Children’s Film Festival
When talking about modern children’s classics, it always seems like The Gruffalo series gets left off the list. Expose your munchkin to this excellent series of well-done animated shorts based on the books by Julia Donaldson as part of the Best of New York International Children’s Film Festival. Celebrating the…
Ezra Washington
Houston comedian Ezra Washington has lost more than one gig because he works clean. ”The number one reason I decided to change my approach to comedy,” Washington says, ”was so that my mother could come and see me perform. But she’s an extremely devout Christian, and I knew she would…
Dance on Film Festival
Escape from reality at the Dance on Film Festival with short works by choreographers Rebecca French, Ashley Horn and others. French contributes The All Hands Meeting, a surreal piece that follows a woman as she attempts to escape from her sterile office environment. Mallory Horn appears in a stunning solo…
Zoo Lights
In an effort to put a little jingle in the jungle, this year the Houston Zoo debuts Zoo Lights. Colored twinkling lights, holiday music, 15-foot-tall projections and animated animal sculptures will dot the park after dark. Also on display is Holly Berry, a 1958 Cadillac art car fit for a…
Stuart Neville: Ratlines
There are some terms that so exactly convey their meaning that you wonder what we used before they were invented. Short eyes (meaning a pedophile) is one. Ratlines (meaning an escape route for the undeserving) is another. Author Stuart Neville is in town to read from and sign his latest…
MFAH Film Special Presentation: A Conversation with Author Nick Flynn
There will be two Guggenheim Fellows onstage during the MFAH Film Special Presentation: A Conversation with Author Nick Flynn. Both Flynn and his partner for the evening, author and neuroscientist David Eagleman, have won the prestigious fellowship for their previous works. The pair will be discussing Flynn’s newest release, The…
Metalachi
While all of you Metallica die-hards wait for James, Lars, Kirk and Robert to make actual new Metallica music (Lulu with Lou Reed didn’t count), why not catch Metalachi, who bill themselves as “The World’s First and Only Heavy Metal Mariachi Band”? The six-piece group covers some of the most…
Seeking Asian Female
Chinese-American director Debbie Lum broke the first rule of documentary filmmaking; she became an actor in her own film, Seeking Asian Female, screening at 14 Pews. Lum’s feature debut tackles the incendiary topic of yellow fever — that is, some white men’s obsession with marrying Asian women. Lum spent five…
Houston Press Artopia 2013
Join us as we celebrate the best in the city’s arts and culture scene at Houston Press Artopia® 2013. The party brings together our three MasterMind Award winners, Opera in the Heights, Karen Stokes Dance and the Stark Naked Theatre Company. Sponsored by Stella Artois, the MasterMind Awards acknowledge the…
Knock Me a Kiss
Houston favorites Detria Ward and Wayne DeHart head the cast of Charles Smith’s Knock Me a Kiss, now onstage at the Ensemble Theatre. The action is set in Harlem in the 1920s. Yolanda DuBois, the daughter of African American activist and author W.E.B. DuBois, is torn between two men. One…
The Mountaintop
When Katori Hall started pitching her play about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s last night on earth, no one in the United States was interested. But, says director Robert O’Hara, after Hall took her play to England and The Mountaintop made the West End and won the 2010 Olivier Award,…
Amber Benson: The Golden Age of Death
Actor/director/writer Amber Benson signs and discusses her latest book, The Golden Age of Death. The fifth installment in her Calliope Reaper-Jones series, Golden Age has heroine Callie Reaper-Jones, who happens to be Death’s daughter and the CEO of the family business, Death Inc., once again springing into action. This time…
Beer, Boobs, Babes, and Balls
Griff’s will be holding its 31st annual Irish open golf tournament, also known as Beer, Boobs, Babes and Balls. Tee time is noon with a shotgun start. There’ll be trophies and prizes for first, second and third places, as well as special prizes for Closest to Hole and Longest Drive…
“CRÓNICAS: Seven Contemporary Mexican Artists Confront the Drug War”
In “CRÓNICAS: Seven Contemporary Mexican Artists Confront the Drug War” which is a multi-media group show featuring seven Mexican artists, each of the artists’ work examines the culture of violence that has been so prevalent in Mexico over the past few years. While the mediums of the artists are very…
”HX8 [Houston Times Eight]”
The Station Museum of Contemporary Art’s latest group exhibition, ”HX8 [Houston Times Eight],” reflects the museum’s renewed commitment to displaying local artists. ”Our mission is to show artists who don’t normally get into museum shows, whether because their work is too controversial or won’t be accepted by everybody,” says Kari…
C J Box: Breaking Point
New York Times best-selling author C.J. Box stops off in Houston to sign copies of his latest thriller, Breaking Point. This is the 13th installment in Box’s Joe Pickett series. In Breaking Point, Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett is after his friend Butch Roberson, who’s on the run after two…
William Kent Krueger: Ordinary Grace
It’s Minnesota in 1961 and 13-year-old Frank Drum is surrounded by death. It comes in many forms — accident, nature, murder, suicide. Left to navigate a world that’s increasingly foreign and unknowable, Drum learns that admission to adulthood is the loss of innocence. William Kent Krueger’s novel Ordinary Grace is…
Scott Weiland
Recently relieved of his Stone Temple Pilots duties – at least as of this writing – singer Scott Weiland jumps on the road once again as a solo act playing songs from STP’s landmark pop-grunge albums Core and Purple, which, respectively, are and soon will be 20 years old. Frankly,…
”Gems of the Medici”
Today’s royal families pale in comparison to the Italian House of Medici in terms of both influence and wealth. The Florentine family amassed a fortune in the textile industry, ultimately opening the most prosperous bank in Europe in the 15th century. The family produced four popes and eventually established a…
Muse
The prospect of a new Muse album (The 2nd Law) was overshadowed by the band’s dalliance with dubstep, which was a shame but not surprising in the current musical climate. When one of the world’s biggest stadium-rock bands’ tinkering with electronics becomes a dealbreaker, it tells you something about their…
Lit Fuse: Yerra Sugarman, Layla Benitez-James and Elizabeth Winston
The reading series Lit Fuse celebrates National Poetry Month with a program of three remarkable poets. First is Yerra Sugarman, author of the collections Forms of Gone and The Bag of Broken Glass. There’s a good reason she was awarded a 2011 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Poetry…
Chris Tucker
Apparently, collecting a $25 million paycheck, as Chris Tucker did for Rush Hour 3 in 2005, has its down side. Such as getting in deep, deep hock to the Internal Revenue Service. ”That’s the last time I let Wesley Snipes help me out with my taxes,” Tucker says onstage, semi-explaining…
George Lopez: I’m Not Going to Lie
Comedian/actor/author George Lopez has made a career out of telling lies. He’s exaggerated, embellished and amplified his life experiences as fodder for his stand-up routines and former television series. Now, Lopez, who recently turned 50, says he’s determined to face the second half of his life sans falsehoods. And life…
WorldFest Houston: International Film and Video Festival
A previous Best Film Festival winner in our Best of Houston awards, WorldFest Houston: International Film and Video Festival is one of the highlights of the season for film buffs. Hundreds of indie films pour into the WorldFest offices throughout the year and a selection panel picks the entries and…
Pierre Étaix: French Comedy Master
After going years without being seen, works from one of France’s most gifted filmmakers are back on the big screen at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s series Pierre Étaix: French Comedy Master giving fans a chance to revel in his comedy genius once again. A former circus clown and…
NEEDTOBREATHE
Something like the midpoint between Kings of Leon and the Civil Wars, these South Carolina folk-rock dudes went above ground by opening arena shows for Taylor Swift. Now they’re out on their own, trying to turn famous-friend buzz into a real-deal fanbase. Fri., April 26, 8 p.m., 2013…
Henry V
After last season’s triumphant Richard III, fans have been eagerly awaiting the next production by the Prague Shakespeare Company, and here it is. Henry V, directed by and starring PSC Artistic Director Guy Roberts, follows a young king desperately trying to unite his people. The ensemble cast includes 14 actors…
”Book Illustration Exhibition by Igor Karash and Vladimir Zimakov”
The Russian Cultural Center Our Texas presents a different sort of art exhibit with ”Book Illustration Exhibition by Igor Karash and Vladimir Zimakov.” Originally from Azerbaijan, Karash is an illustrator and designer. He recently won the 2012 Book Illustration Competition at The House of Illustration and Folio Society in London…
B.L.K. Gurls ~n~ W.H.T. Boiz: Singin’ ’bout Gawd!
Choreographer jhon r. stronks is joined by former student Jasmine Hearn for B.L.K. Gurls ~n~ W.H.T. Boiz: Singin’ ’bout Gawd!, an evening-length program made up of solo and duet performances addressing spirituality and reconciliation. ”A lot of the girls that I grew up around were African-American,” stronks tells us. ”I…
Jeffery Deaver: The Kill Room
Best-selling author Jeffery Deaver keeps the surprises coming up to the very last page of his newest Lincoln Rhyme thriller, The Kill Room. Rhyme’s been assigned to track down a murderer. Well, two murderers, actually. There’s the highly skilled sniper who shot a man from over a mile away. And…
”Playback”
When you first walk into Fresh Arts and survey the TV screens scattered around the darkened gallery, a quick glance might give you the impression that the screens are stuck on frames of couples embracing or kissing. But upon closer inspection, it becomes steadily apparent that these are not frames,…
Close-up Space
In Close Up Space, father Paul Barrow is a book editor consumed by a need to set things straight grammatically, to eliminate all unnecessary words. That he does this to the expulsion notice sent to him by his daughter’s school points to the enormous chasm there is between the two…
WWE Smackdown
Money in the Bank, the high-stakes ladder match that allows one lucky wrestler to cash in on a WWE Smackdown World Title attempt whenever he wants to, is over. Randy Orton holds the briefcase, and we’re all wondering just when he’ll try to use his opportunity to wrest the belt…
Children’s Hilltop Festival
Express Children’s Theatre performs year-round in its 90-seat theater in Northwest Mall, and in other venues, but it also presents a special summer Children’s Hilltop Festival at Miller Outdoor Theatre, with a new play being performed at 11 a.m each day for four days in a row ending July 26…
MFAH Family Flicks: The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T
If you’re unfamiliar with the only feature film written by the one and only Dr. Seuss, you’re forgiven. He was never a fan of how The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T turned out and even omitted it from his autobiography. Nonetheless, the film has remained a cult classic thanks to…
Studio Movie Grill 2013 Summer Children’s Series: Shrek
Summer is a hard time with kids because they will eventually run out of your stuff to break, and sending them outside in this heat technically counts as torture. Movies are a good alternative, but they ain’t getting any cheaper. Except at Studio Movie Grill. Their Children’s Summer Series is…
Golden Dragon Acrobats
The Golden Dragon Acrobats, hosted by Miller Outdoor Theatre, led by impresario Danny Chang and choreographer Angela Chang, are considered one of the world’s premier Chinese acrobatic touring companies, their Broadway performances earning them New York Drama Desk Award nominations. Utilizing a combination of ”acrobatics, traditional dance, authentic costumes, ancient…
The Marvelous Wonderettes: Caps and Gowns
Young love will be on display in all its musical splendor in Roger Bean’s The Marvelous Wonderettes: Caps and Gowns at Stages Repertory Theatre. Houston audiences first met high school friends Cindy Lou, Missy, Betty Jean and Suzy in The Marvelous Wonderettes (2010), then saw them again in Winter Wonderettes…
Wicked
Kathy Fitzgerald, with several Broadway shows to her credit, says she has made a career of playing funny women. When she was offered the role of Madame Morrible in Wicked on Broadway, it gave her the first chance ”to play someone really horrible. She is horrible, but somebody has to…
Carol O’Connell: It Happens in the Dark
Opening night on Broadway can be murder. In novelist Carol O’Connell’s It Happens in the Dark, the latest in her series featuring detective Kathy Mallory, it is — literally. First a woman in the front row dies of a heart attack, prompting caustic critics to call the show ”a play…
Houston Friends of Chamber Music: Imani Winds
The chamber music quintet Imani Winds comes to Houston without longtime member flautist Valerie Coleman, who’s out on maternity leave. Mariam Adam, the group’s clarinetist, says, ”It’s such a rare thing for us to be without her because we’ve been together for 16 years. It’s strange for me to even…
Australia’s Strange Fruit: Swoon
”It’s a timeless, romantic story,” says Strange Fruit Manager on Tour Nami Hall, not mentioning at first that it’s done 15 feet in the air. Two women and two men take to the heights on fiberglass poles to perform Swoon, which combines the elements of dance and circus during the…
Dangerous Liaisons
Christopher Hampton’s Dangerous Liaisons is aptly titled. Being performed by Big Head Productions, Liaisons is the story of two French nobles, the Marquise de Merteuil (Lisa Wartenberg) and the Vicomte de Valmont (Tom Stell), who use love, sex and desire as well-aimed weapons. Director Ron Jones is emphasizing the show’s…
Martin Limón
For the past 20 years, mystery fans have followed Martin Limón’s tales of the adventures of Sergeant George Sueño in both novel and short-story form. Limón’s latest release, The Nightmare Range, is the first ever collection of his Sueño short stories in book form. Limón’s Sueño is an army detective…
The Shell and Pennzoil Grand Prix of Houston Presented by Greater Houston Honda Dealers
Yep, it’s a mouthful: the Shell and Pennzoil Grand Prix of Houston Presented by Greater Houston Honda Dealers. The three-day race rally might have a cumbersome name but it’s got a sleek, fun schedule of activities. For serious race fans, there are IndyCar races as well as the Pirelli World…
The Paul Taylor Dance Company
San Antonio native Francisco Graciano, a member of the Paul Taylor Dance Company, says he’s often asked to describe Taylor’s style of choreography. ”It can be a tricky question,” Graciano tells us, ”because what he’s creating can range from something very simple such as walking across the stage to something…
Lizzie the Musical
”She completely butchered her stepmother and father in 1892 and got away with it because she hired expensive attorneys,” says actress Carrie Cimma. Cimma is talking about the title character in Lizzie the Musical and by the end, she promises, you’ll find yourself rooting for the ax-wielder as the good…
Cool Brains: Katherine Applegate
The true story of a gorilla named Ivan who, after being captured in the jungles of the Congo, lived in a 14’x14’ public display in a Washington shopping mall for 30 years, inspired author Katherine Applegate’s novel The One and Only Ivan. “It was such a bizarre, heartbreaking, intriguing story;…
Siege of the Skeletons
From October 1 through November 3, The Health Museum will host its fifth annual Siege of the Skeletons, an art project that exhibits contributions from across the Houston community. This year’s theme for the papier-mâché skeleton display is ”Super Skeletons,” a very broad topic that allows for skeletons to be…
New Arrivals
When Yani Rose Keo fled Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge with her youngest child and husband in 1975, she flew out on a private plane with almost no one else aboard. For playwright Catherine Filloux, that haunting image underlines the fact that so many people wanted to flee Pol Pot’s…
Houston Symphony: ExxonMobil Summer Symphony Nights
The Houston Symphony has been bringing the masterpieces of the Western musical canon to the Miller Outdoor Theatre for more than 60 years, and it’s back for a two-week stand. In ExxonMobil Summer Symphony Nights, the work of Beethoven, Bizet, Brahms, Strauss, Stravinsky and others will be brought to life…
The Turin Horse
Seminal German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche went mad in 1899, remaining bedridden and speechless until his death in 1900. The exact cause of his breakdown continues to be a mystery, but according to eyewitness reports, Nietzsche saw the whipping of a horse in Turin, Italy, threw himself onto its neck to…
Gary Owen
When comedian Gary Owen tells his kids, “Hey, you didn’t get that from my side of the family,” he’s being literal. Owen, who happens to be white, married a lovely woman who happens to be black. When combing his daughter’s “nappy” hair (his term, not ours) turns into a struggle…
Bugs Bunny at the Symphony
Let’s be honest: If it weren’t for Bugs Bunny, a lot of us wouldn’t have a clue about The Barber of Seville. The soundtracks to Looney Tunes musical shorts introduced countless cartoon fans to classical music. The Houston Symphony brings the best of those shorts to the big screen accompanied…
Sanctified
The 35th-anniversary season of the Ensemble Theatre closes with Javon Johnson’s joyous gospel musical Sanctified, directed and choreographed by Patdro Harris, with musical direction by Carlton Leake. This isn’t the first time Harris and Leake have worked together to bring a rousing musical to the Ensemble stage; the pair has…
Black Coffee
Prolific novelist Agatha Christie so hated the first adaptation of one of her books, about famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, into a play that she decided to write the next play about Poirot herself, according to Gregory Boyd, artistic director of the Alley Theatre. The result was Black Coffee, which…
”Galveston Artist Residency (GAR) Exhibition”
It’s the inaugural year for the Galveston Artist Residency, which grants three artists space in a reimagined industrial complex on the edge of downtown Galveston, allowing them the freedom to create. This year’s lucky trio was Kelly Sears, Nsenga Knight and Nick Barbee. The public can view the fruits of…
”Multiple, Limited, Unique: Highlights from Permanent Collection of The Center for Book Arts”
We have to admit that we were a bit stumped as to how a man’s shoe qualifies as a book at the exhibit ”Multiple, Limited, Unique: Selections from the Permanent Collection of The Center for Book Arts,” featuring selections from a New York City organization and gallery dedicated to all…
The Adventures of Huanuman
The Hindu deity Hanuman is the focus of Shunya Theatre’s latest production, The Adventures of Hanuman, featuring a largely youth cast, along with local adult actors and composers. Staged at the Barnevelder Movement/Arts Complex, Aditi Kapil’s children’s musical tells the story of how the monkey god is done with being…
Randy Wayne White: Gone
Author Randy Wayne White has had an interesting life. He once stole one of General Manuel Noriega’s bar stools, he was stabbed in Peru and he spent some time transporting Cuban refugees. Oh, and he’s written more than 16 best-selling thrillers featuring his Doc Ford character. In his newest title,…
”Margaret Miller: Sky, Trees and Earth”
Artist Margaret Miller is the focus of Archway Gallery’s exhibit “Sky, Trees and Earth.” As the title suggests, landscapes are the central motif, but if Miller’s locales look familiar, that’s because they should. The North Carolina native has lived in Houston for more than 20 years and has a visual…
The Nonconformist: A Bernardo Bertolucci Retrospective
He began his career as a poet; some people would say that legendary Italian filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci never stopped being one. His work, spanning 1962 to 2003, is the focus of The Nonconformist: A Bernardo Bertolucci Retrospective. La commare secca (The Grim Reaper), about the aftermath of a prostitute’s murder,…
Third Coast Dance Film Festival
Think dance films are something new? Ah, no. In the mid-1890s, Thomas Edison captured Ruth Dennis dancing outdoors. One hundred and twenty-something years later, the Third Coast Dance Film Festival celebrates the marriage of these two art forms by screening 21 shorts over two nights. This year’s festival is curated by…
Autumn Concerto in Eight Courses
Since the first dinner that Triniti hosted along with local orchestra Mercury Baroque was such a success this past June, they’re doing it all over again. This time, however, the dishes and the accompanying music will be all different. Via a press release, organizers say: ”[The event will be] pairing…
Fire in My Belly with Kevin Gillespie
He was a chef-testant (that’s a word, right?) on Bravo’s 2009 Top Chef competition when he first came to our attention. In the three years since then, Kevin Gillespie’s gone on to become executive chef and co-owner of Woodfire Grill in Atlanta and co-write a cookbook called Fire in My…
”Tim Kerr”
Musician and artist Tim Kerr, born just south of Galveston, has made a name for himself as a brilliant artist in multiple mediums. He’ll be bringing Houston some of his pop-art portraits this week. Kerr works with cardboard, wood, old-school maps and chalkboards, painting over them with acrylics, pens and…
The Nacirema Society
It’s 1964, Montgomery, Alabama. The Civil Rights struggle is in full swing, but for the women in the Dunbar family, the only thing that matters is the Nacirema Society debutante ball. In the comedy The Nacirema Society, novelist/playwright Pearl Cleage sends up African-American snobbery. The Dunbars, who describe themselves as…
Shaun of the Dead
There is no zombie movie better suited to today’s viewers than Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead. In fact, we’re gonna go out on a limb here and say Shaun of the Dead may be the best zombie movie ever made. Okay, maybe not, but it is a good flick,…
”Tradition Redefined: The Larry and Brenda Thompson Collection of African American Art”
When Adrienne Childs set about putting together the exhibit ”Tradition Redefined: The Larry and Brenda Thompson Collection of African American Art,” she had no idea what a treasure trove she was opening. Larry and Brenda Thompson — he’s a former deputy Attorney General of the United States, and she’s a…
Les Misérables
So what if there’s a movie version coming out at Christmas starring Hugh Jackman? The 25th-anniversary production of Les Misérables coming to Houston courtesy of Gexa Energy Broadway offers a chance to see live theater and hear the show’s famous songs (”I Dreamed a Dream,” ”Master of the House” and…
Mediterranean Film Festival
Turkey, France, Israel, Italy, Egypt and Greece are all scheduled stops on the Mediterranean Film Festival’s cinematic tour. There’s Turkey’s comedy Ice Cream, I Scream, about an ice cream peddler whose shiny new truck is stolen by bad little boys, and France’s Khamsa by director Karim Dridi which follows a…
Elia Arce: First Woman on the Moon
Performance artist Elia Arce first conceived First Woman on the Moon more than ten years ago as a discussion of identity. ”Whether it is the color of our skin, our accents, our language, or how we dress or how we look,” Arce has said, ”what is the core, what actually…
A Tale of Two Santas
The holiday season gets a new stage play from comedian Andy Huggins, A Tale of Two Santas, making its world premiere at Company OnStage. (Think you’ve heard of Huggins before? You have, in addition to his own stand-up career, he’s written for Jay Leno and Billy Crystal on the Academy…
NSFW: The Office Plays
The collection of short plays in NSFW: The Office Plays tackle different aspects of cubicle life…most of which would make Dilbert blush. Leighza Walker of Big Head Productions, which is producing NSFW, notes that more than 100 play submissions were received from around the country for consideration. That was whittled…
Emerging Choreographers Showcase
Music by Bach, Danny Elfman, Nina Simone and Shakira accompanies the works performed in the annual Emerging Choreographers Showcase. Students from the University of Houston present original works, acting not only as choreographers and performers but often as lighting and set designers as well. In Alexandra Di Nunzio’s Cinq Cygnes…
Moody Gardens 11th Annual Festival of Lights
Moody Gardens has added a super new 100-foot ice slide to its lineup of holiday attractions this year. (The snow in previous years, it seemed, tended to get mushy and soggy in the warm Texas weather, so the festival went with an ice slide that will stay frozen no matter…
”Blast from the Past: Retro Toys Unwrapped”
The Children’s Museum of Houston celebrates playthings of yesteryear in the ”Blast from the Past: Retro Toys Unwrapped” exhibit. Some 100 toy pedal cars, replicas of actual automobiles produced from 1910 through the 1980s, make up the bulk of the exhibit. Child-powered, the cars were the ultimate in for-kid transportation…
”Henry Ossawa Tanner: Modern Spirit”
He got international attention for his landmark religious painting The Resurrection of Lazarus, but as seen in ”Henry Ossawa Tanner: Modern Spirit,” the African American artist’s canon includes a wide variety of subjects. ”Modern Spirit” consists of more than 100 works, including 12 paintings that have never been seen in…
What a Wonderful World: The Best of Louis Armstrong
Trumpeter and singer Byron Stripling joins the Houston Symphony for What a Wonderful World: The Best of Louis Armstrong. Classical trumpet was his original love, but Stripling felt drawn to jazz, eventually joining the Clark Terry and Lionel Hampton bands. And he’s got the Armstrong bit down pat by now,…
The Santaland Diaries
Popular humorist David Sedaris once worked as a Christmas elf at Macy’s in Manhattan, and the world of comedy has not been the same since. His insightful eye saw the seasonal Santa handle the demanding customers from an insider’s perspective and yielded The Santaland Diaries. In a one-man tour de…
”Joseph Havel: Hope and Desire”
In his solo show, ”Joseph Havel: Hope and Desire,” Houston artist and Glassell School of Art director Joseph Havel has just two pieces in the Hiram Butler Gallery’s main room. The more prominent, and colorful, even in its monochromatism, is Hope and Desire, which also gives the show its name…
Carl Fabergé, Imperial Jeweler to the Tsars
Caroline de Guitaut, curator of Decorative Arts at the Royal Collection Trust in London, presents Carl Fabergé, Imperial Jeweler to the Tsars, a lecture on the life of Peter Carl Fabergé and his remarkable House of Fabergé. While in his Russian homeland, Fabergé crafted exquisite jeweled creations that became the…
Bless the Orange Show
The Orange Show’s media and marketing guru, Jonathan Beitler, explains the annual Bless the Orange Show performance this way: ”It’s a way for the Orange Show to cleanse the stage after the last performances, renew the space and make sure we have a good season. We’re inviting a creative spirit…
Cara Black: Murder below Montparnasse
American novelist Cara Black gave her protagonist Aimée Leduc a very cosmopolitan hometown: Paris. In Murder Below Montparnasse, the latest installment in Black’s series featuring the France-based female private investigator, Leduc is hired to protect a painting and ends up fighting off several assassins in the effort. As the body…
2013 French Cultures Festival Concert
The 2013 French Cultures Festival, the sixth annual celebration of all things French across Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas, has a new way to kick off the fun — with a free outdoor concert downtown. The French indie group LYS will share the stage with local band The Tontons and the…
LitFuse
A trio of writers reflects on love at this month’s installment of the LitFuse reading series. A native of St. Petersburg, Russia, Olga Mexina has been in the United States since she was a teenager. She’s currently working toward her Master of Fine Arts in poetry at the University of…
”Perspectives 180 — Unfinished Country: New Video from China”
You’ll have to wait until after the new year to see all of ”Perspectives 180 — Unfinished Country: New Video from China.” That’s because while much of the work is on view at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (projections, sculpture and installations by 11 emerging artists), a separate component of…
Ann Arbor Film Festival 16mm Touring Program
Having hosted works by artists and filmmakers such as Andy Warhol, George Lucas and Gus Van Sant over the years, the Ann Arbor Film Festival is the premier avant garde film and new media showcase. This year’s festival is over, but experimental film fans can still enjoy some of the…
Houston Roller Derby Season Opener
Get ready for the 2013 season of the Houston Roller Derby, back and badder than ever before with intense flat-track action. The season starts off with a rematch from the 2012 championships, where the Bayou City Bosses trounced the debuting Valkyries 212 to 140. The Green Team will certainly be…
UH Goes to the Barn!
The click-clack of a typewriter, almost unheard in these days of computer tablets and inkjet printers, makes up the soundtrack to Marcela Acosta’s Blank Page, one of several works performed during UH Goes to the Barn! Student choreographers, dancers and producers mount an evening-length program. Along with Blank Page there’s…
”Maya 2012: Prophecy Becomes History”
You know that the world is gonna end, right? According to the Mayan calendar, the last day of life as we know it is scheduled for December 21. At ”Maya 2012: Prophecy Becomes History,” a new exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science, you’ll learn the real truth behind…
Brazil
One thing’s certain after watching Terry Gilliam’s phantasmagoric Brazil(1985): You will forever after reconsider cosmetic surgery. Once you see the ever-increasingly torturous procedures Katherine Helmond is put through in order to stay eternally young, especially when her skin is stretched like Silly Putty, you’ll have a lot more sympathy for…
Brad Tyer: Opportunity, Montana
Bill Clinton had Hope; Brad Tyer has Opportunity. As in Opportunity, Montana, the real-life town that’s the setting for former Texas journalist Tyer’s nonfiction debut. Part memoir, part exposé, Opportunity, Montana: Big Copper, Bad Water, and the Burial of an American Landscape chronicles the pollution, abandonment, half-hearted reclamation and repeated…
Paradise Misplaced: An Evening of Two New One Act Plays
Playwright/director Elizabeth A.M. Keel drew her inspiration for Paradise Misplaced: An Evening of Two New One Act Plays from real life. The first of the two short works is The Psychic Palace. It’s a comedy about a couple made up of two people who have psychic powers, not that that…
John Sandford: Silken Prey
Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times-bestselling author John Sandford comes to Houston to discuss and sign his latest novel, Silken Prey. Sandford’s latest installment in his popular Prey series centers on investigator Lucas Davenport’s race to uncover the truth behind some dirty politics. Child pornography has been found on…
Converse: Introspect, Live, Word
Presented by Freneticore and Neo-Klazzik Creations, Houston Fringe Festival awardee Outspoken Bean returns to his onstage roots with Converse: Introspect, Live, Word. Bean describes his one-act one-man presentation as personal, funny and true, combining poetry with audience dialogue interaction. ”What makes Converse unique is that no two shows are the…
Ravenscroft
For those who appreciated the Twilight saga but wish it had been played more for laughs — well, intentional laughs — the often-hysterical Mildred’s Umbrella Company offers the perfect show. With its mysterious setting, multiple characters with multiple secrets, and, of course, murder, Ravenscroft delivers all the elements expected of…
It Came from the Bayou
Burning Bones Press and AIGA Houston present the second annual It Came from the Bayou printmaking festival with demonstrations, sales and the chance to meet your favorite artists including printmakers from across the country: Tom Huck from Missouri, Sean Starwars from Mississippi and Dennis McNett from New York. Of course,…
” Where The Border of Water Meets The Air, Dragonflies Gather”
When you think of the dragonfly, however, do you think of exploration? I’m not sure that I do, but these two concepts make up the theme for the new exhibit at the Museum of Printing History. “Where the Border of Water Meets the Air, Dragonflies Gather” is the title of…
LOVERS
Audiences haven’t heard much avant garde rock music at the Alley Theatre. That changes when The Manichean returns to the stage with LOVERS, a concept concert based on the group’s album of the same name. ”People can expect a much grander spectacle this time around,” said singer Cory Sinclair. ”We’ve…
Extremely Shorts Film Festival
We can’t blame our short attention span entirely on Twitter. It started way before that, as the Aurora Picture Show’s Extremely Shorts Film Festival, now in its 16th year, proves. Each film being screened is less than three minutes long, and entries come in from all over the world. ”What…
Repticon Houston
Do you have a cold-blooded creature in your life? This weekend’s Repticon Houston is the place for you. Cindy Price and her iguana Gracy are the special guests of Repticon. Price has been everything from a naturalist to a NASA test subject, but this particular visit she’ll extolling the wonders…
”Anointed and Adorned: Indian Weddings in Houston”
Pat Jasper, a member of the Houston Arts Alliance’s Folklife + Traditional Arts Program, plays down her role in putting together ”Anointed and Adorned: Indian Weddings in Houston.” It wasn’t rocket science to figure out that we could do a pretty spectacular exhibition once we got a good look at…
Flashdance — the Musical
Alex, the dancer with big dreams from Pittsburgh, is coming to Houston in Flashdance — The Musical, the play derived from the hit movie defined as much by its infectious beats as its fashion sensibility (who could forget Alex’s shirt that left one shoulder exposed?). Oh, and the athleticism.DeQuina Moore,…
Sushi and Sake 101
For one hour on Saturday, June 22, from 11 a.m. until 12 p.m., RA Sushi in Highland Village will offer its Sushi and Sake 101 class where guests will learn about rolling sushi and what types of sake go well with certain sushi dishes. Guests will have the chance to…
Cocktails with Larry Miller and Friends
He’s one of those stand-up-comic-turned-comic-actor types, like Bill Murray but not quite as recognizable. So when audience members less familiar with him sit down to enjoy Cocktails with Larry Miller and Friends at The Grand 1894 Opera House, they’ll likely say, ”Oh yes, he was in…” and then fill in…
“What’s in Store”
Talk about a twofer. Combining the convenience of online catalog shopping with an up-close-and-personal visit to a gallery, Gallery Sonja Roesch and PrintHouston 2013 present “What’s in Store,” featuring items and works of art available through The UNIT Store website for the next year. “The UNIT Store was created as…
Discovery of the Cistern
Few Houstonians have seen the Cistern, the huge underground structure that was once used as the city’s underground drinking-water reservoir. Today, Buffalo Bayou Partnership (BBP) and the Architecture Center Houston present Guy Hagstette, a consultant and project manager for BBP, in a talk called Discovery of the Cistern. SmartGeoMetrics is…
Of Mice and Men
The Houston Theater Company tackles John Steinbeck’s Nobel Prize-winning classic Of Mice and Men. First-time director Mia Cooper leads the cast, which includes Louis Provenzano as George and Fulton Fry as Lennie, two downtrodden migrant workers drifting from place to place during the Great Depression. 8 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays,…
SWEAT (SoCal Writers’ Excellent Adventure in Texas!)
Young-adult authors are like rock stars to their young fans. Put four such writers together at one location, and it’s a mega-concert. Blue Willow Bookshop hosts the SWEAT (SoCal Writers’ Excellent Adventure in Texas!) tour with Debra Driza, Shannon Messenger, Amy Tintera and Kasie West. The group of novelists has…
The Chucho Valdés Quintet
Music fans were puzzled when they picked up the newest Chucho Valdés album, Border-Free; the cover art showed Valdés, a black Cuban, in a full American Indian feather headdress. The image references ”Afro-Comanche,” a song on the CD that was inspired by a bit of little-known American Indian history. In…
Men in Black I, II and III
Our favorite conspiracies seem to be those orchestrated by the government…or aliens…or both (yes!). The Men in Black film trilogy introduced audiences to shadowy spooks in suits who show up after an alien sighting and manipulate witnesses into forgetting what they’ve seen. Barry Sonnenfeld’s 1997 Men in Black and its…
Jessica Lang Dance
Fans can expect several highlights during the Jessica Lang Dance company’s Houston debut. One is i.n.k., a piece that incorporates video projections by visual artist Shinichi Maruyama. Another is The Calling, which features a solo dancer in a 20-foot-long white skirt. ”I got to know Shinichi really well,” Lang tells…
Apollo Chamber Players: Basque and Slavic Folkscapes
Houston has its fair share of classical music groups and orchestras. The Apollo Chamber Players, on their way to perform at Carnegie Hall in a few weeks, have managed to set themselves apart from the others. Not only because the members are extremely talented, but because of the group’s interest…
La Camioneta: The Journey of One American School Bus
Every year school buses are decommissioned and auctioned off to the highest bidder. Some of those buses become camionetas south of the border. The new life of such a bus is chronicled in Mark Kendall’s documentary La Camioneta: The Journey of One American School Bus. Taken from rural Pennsylvania to…
Jefferson Bass: Cut to the Bone
The Jon Jefferson half of the writing duo known as Jefferson Bass will be at Murder by the Book to discuss and sign Cut to the Bone. The Bill Bass half of the team will join the event via Skype (copies of the book pre-signed by Bass will be available…
Manhattan Short Film Festival
In museums, cinemas and cafes all over the world, some 100,000 people will help choose the best of the best in the Manhattan Short Film Festival. More than 300 cities participate in screenings, including Houston, with viewers voting on their favorites. The festival’s a great opportunity to see some truly…
The Pajama Game
The Tony Award-winning musical The Pajama Game gets a weekend revival by Bayou City Concert Musicals. Based on the novel 7½ Cents by Richard Bissell, The Pajama Game, performed here as a fully staged concert, features Beth Lazarou as Babe, a pajama factory employee who’s leading the fight for a…
Peter and the Starcatcher
It’s a tale more raucously comic and at the same time darker than the J.M. Barrie original, according to actor John Sanders, who plays Black Stache in Peter and the Starcatcher. The winner of five Tony Awards® in 2012, the play, coming to the Hobby Center for a short run…
Zoo Boo at the Houston Zoo
Zoo Boo at the Houston Zoo is back this Halloween. Children can dress up in their favorite costume and show it off in the costume parade, paint a jack-o-lantern at the pumpkin patch, trick-or-treat at candy booths and enjoy music from a children’s DJ. The event will be open on…
2nd Annual National Museum of Funeral History Halloween Haunted House
This month is, understandably, the busiest one for The National Museum of Funeral History, and it’s hosting a number of events throughout October. The first of these is a family-friendly haunted house designed to give goosebumps to young and old alike while providing a look at the very serious issue…
Payback
Jennifer Baichwal’s Payback is a documentary based on best-selling novelist Margaret Atwood’s nonfiction book Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth. It explores the idea of an individual’s debt to society, something that money alone can’t pay back. What is the effect of environmental debt, such as when the…
Cocaine & Ethel Merman: The New Homo Guide
It started off as a chance encounter with a drug-addicted female impersonator and turned into a personal anthem about being gay. Playwright and actor L. Robert Westeen’s one-man show Cocaine & Ethel Merman: The New Homo Guide, performed here for the first time ever, is highly autobiographical. The genesis of…
Independence Day Party at Spring Tavern
Karaoke, barbecue, and games are part of the plan for the Independence Day Party at Spring Tavern. Tequila Dale leads the musical portion of the evening. Hogie’s Pit Crew is handling the barbecue (chicken and brisket plates for $5). Shuffleboard, darts, Buzztime Trivia and poker are just some of the…
The Zoo Story
The Zoo Story is Edward Albee’s one-act play about isolation in a world of growing commercialism and consumerism. Originally staged in 1959, it was Albee’s first produced work, yet its themes of loneliness and the desire for human interaction are as relevant today as they were then. The play, Edge…
Looney Toons
Introduce your kids to some of the most significant works of children’s cinema at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s Reel Kids film series. This week’s screening is Looney Tunes, a showing of Bugs Bunny and Tweety Bird shorts. (The two should feel right at home in the museum; Bugs…
Cello Fury
The Pittsburgh-based quartet Cello Fury is making its Houston debut at Market Square Park today. (We hope someone warned the musicians about our hot weather.) The group is made up of three classically trained cellists (Simon Cummings, Ben Muñoz and Nicole Myers) and a rock drummer (David Throckmorton). It’s an…
Houston Press Music Awards Showcase
Every year when we have the Houston Press Music Awards, we get to see first-hand the astounding breadth and diversity of local talent that even the so-called “music cities” across the country would be hard-pressed to match. Just look at the talent on this year’s HPMA showcase schedule. That talent,…
Urinetown
What happens when a town faces a drought so severe that it renders even the most basic acts of human hygiene unaffordable luxuries? Such as, oh, let’s say, flushing a toilet. Baytown Little Theater’s production of Urinetown has the answer. In this jazz-infused musical, the water situation has gotten so…
”Oscar Muñoz”
The self-titled exhibit by Oscar Muñoz at Sicardi Gallery is made up of photographs, mixed-media works, videos and works on paper. Shown at the gallery’s new, expansive two-story digs, this is the third solo show for Sicardi, and the Colombian Muñoz, already popular, is becoming quite the favorite with Houston…
Houston Shakespeare Festival 2012
When guest actors Cindy Pickett (Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, St. Elsewhere) and Mark Metcalf (Maestro on Seinfeld, villainous Douglas Neidermeyer in Animal House) take to the stage at Miller Outdoor Theatre to do Comedy of Errors as part of the Houston Shakespeare Festival, they and everyone else will be speaking…
Your Environmental Road Trip
Environmental crises continue to threaten our blue planet, and if we don’t do something about it, nature might just come back to bite us in the ass. (We don’t really need to explain how man-made global warming combined with agricultural waste dumped in the ocean has resulted in massive explosions…
Houston Restaurant Weeks 2012
Have a great meal and do a good deed all at the same time during Houston Restaurant Weeks 2012. Here’s the deal: You select from a fixed-price menu at one of dozens of participating restaurants, and a portion of your bill is donated to the Houston Food Bank. Lunch is…
Fall for Dominic Walsh Dance Theater
Last year was a stellar season for the Dominic Walsh Dance Theater. It was the company’s tenth anniversary, and DWDT pulled out all the stops to celebrate, including the world premiere of Camille Claudel. The company kicks off the new season with Fall for Dominic Walsh Dance Theater, a concert…
Rice Science Cafe
Rice University Professor of Physics and Astronomy Dr. Randy Hulet discusses the coldest things in the universe at today’s Rice Science Cafe. Hulet and his research group investigate atoms at temperatures as low as a few nano-Kelvin. During today’s Science Cafe, he’ll discuss ultracold atom collisions, the pairing of atomic…
Rosa de Dos Aromas
The Spanish-language comedy Rosa de dos Aromas is an adults-only affair. Not because there’s any full-frontal nudity or anything like that, but because it wouldn’t be good for children to see grown-ups behaving so badly. Produced by the theater group Somos Todos, the show features two women visiting their respective…
Da Camera of Houston: Jerusalem String Quartet
Dmitri Shostakovich’s music reflects not only the man, but the time he lived in. ”Life between 1938 and 1974, in the Soviet Union was very [difficult],” says Ori Kam, violist for the Jerusalem String Quartet via press materials. ”The music really pulls us into that world.” Kam calls Shostakovich’s music…
Morbid Angel
Although David Vincent, the founding growler behind death-metal titans Morbid Angel, rejoined the group’s ranks in 2004, last year’s much touted big reunion record, Illud Divinum Insanus, was one big flop, with group reflecting its more industrial and arty influences over the meat-and-potatoes hyper-speed riffing it pioneered. Thu., Oct. 18,…
Texas Contemporary Art Fair
One thing the Texas Contemporary Art Fair has over every other similar event is its expert tour guides. Houston art collector Lester Marks, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston curator Dena Woodall and Galveston Arts Center curator Clint Willour all take turns leading art lovers through the exhibits. (Marks highlights his…
Nas, Ms. Lauryn Hill
Halloween night, Houston gets a visit from two icons of ’90s rap who have probably seen their share of drama for one lifetime. After debuting so precociously with his riveting account of life in New York’s Queensbridge housing projects, Illmatic — he was just 20 when the album was released…
Plan 9 from Outer Space
Ed Wood’s Plan 9 From Outer Space is the kind of film that inspires other filmmakers — not because it’s a hidden gem of genius, but because the tale of space aliens resurrecting the dead in order to conquer the Earth is proof positive that unless you’re James Nguyen and…
Some Girls: Live in Texas ’78
What if you could see the Rolling Stones for a fraction of the price of a concert ticket and at one of the peaks of their career to boot? Today you can. The Alamo Drafthouse is presenting Some Girls: Live in Texas ’78. Recorded in 1978 right here in Texas…
The 63rd Annual Holiday Parade Presented by H-E-B
Some of Houston’s best performing arts companies will be strutting in the 63rd Annual Holiday Parade Presented by H-E-B. Theatre Under the Stars has a moving stage with performers from The Magic of Peter Pan and Houston Ballet has a float topped with characters from The Nutcracker. Teen pop star…
The Beebo Brinker Chronicles
Ann Bannon’s series of groundbreaking lesbian novels from the 1950s revealed the struggle of finding true love. Those stories became The Beebo Brinker Chronicles, a stage play adapted from the novels by Kate Moira Ryan and Linda S. Champan. Celebration Theatre presents the Houston premiere of the touching comedy. The…
”Structural Impermanence: New Works by Renée Lotenero”
Both ”structural” and ”impermanence” are apt descriptions of ”Structural Impermanence: New Works by Renée Lotenero,” currently at Peveto Gallery. The exhibition, the second here for Los Angeles-based Lotenero, after her Houston debut five years ago at McClain Gallery, is chock full of new ideas and directions for the artist. Along…
Your Family Sucks
When Horse Head Theatre Company was scheduling its new season, local playwright (and frequent Houston Press contributor) Abby Koenig dusted off an idea that first came to her ten years ago, and she finished a script in three weeks. The resulting play, a black comedy entitled Your Family Sucks, has…
Mercury: A Baroque Christmas with Lauren Snouffer
Get a sneak peek at soprano Lauren Snouffer, scheduled to appear in Houston Grand Opera’s upcoming Show Boat, when she performs in A Baroque Christmas with Mercury in a joyful concert of seasonal treasures from the 17th and 18th century repertoire. The program includes Scarlatti’s Christmas Cantata, Corrette’s Noel Symphony…
”Peat Duggins: Wreaths”
In ”Wreaths,” his fourth solo exhibit at Art Palace, Peat Duggins presents his take on the domestication of nature. Gardens, press materials for the show say, have a dual existence, being natural and untamed while simultaneously structured and controlled. In the ink and watercolor work Untitled (Azaleas/Snake), Duggins shows viewers…
An Evening with Gwendolyn Zepeda
Houston author Gwendolyn Zepeda believes she’s the first Latina blogger ever. In 1997 she started Television without Pity, an ”online journal” – they weren’t called blogs way back then – and launched what has become a very prolific writing career. She’s got a collection of short stories, three novels and…
TUTS Film Series: Camelot at Sundance Cinemas
Right after he was Django, he was Lancelot. Franco Nero starred in Joshua Logan’s 1967 film based on The Once and Future King as the man who swept Guenevere (Vanessa Redgrave) off her feet and betrayed King Arthur (Richard Harris). The musical returns to the big screen in the TUTS…
Dominique
Before comedian Dominique was performing on Def Comedy Jam and Chappelle’s Show, she was a Washington, D.C., postal worker, though not a very scrupulous one. She admits she took 20 books of stamps as a perk when she quit to pursue comedy full-time, but she notes that Jesus has her…
The Nutcracker
Say good-bye to Houston Ballet principal dancer Amy Fote during The Nutcracker. Fote is retiring at the end of this season and her performance as the Sugar Plum Fairy in the annual holiday classic will mark her final appearance with the company. (Mireille Hassenboehler, Melody Mennite and Sara Webb will…
“Scandinavian Design”
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston has pulled out all the stops for its “Scandinavian Design” exhibit. Culled from the museum’s collection of decorative arts, the exhibit highlights the contributions of architects, designers and manufacturers from Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The glass, ceramics and furniture on display also reflect…
On Screen @ Blaffer: Vivan Sundaram and Daniel Eisenberg
The relationship between creation and refuse will be explored in films by Vivan Sundaram and Daniel Eisenberg for this installment of On Screen @ Blaffer. Sundaram’s two short subjects, Floatage: River Jamuna and Turning, follow him as he repurposes plastic bottles and other castoffs into works of art in his…
Camelot
In this production of Camelot for Theatre Under the Stars, director Richard Stafford has gone with lead actors who are younger than those typically seen in the classic tale of love, loss and high principles, with music by Frederick Loewe and book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner. ”We felt…
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni: Oleander Girl
Prolific Houston-based author Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni launches her latest book, Oleander Girl, at Asia Society’s Books in Conversation series. ”I am very excited that the national launch for this novel will be in Houston at Asia Society’s beautiful new center, itself a work of art,” Divakaruni says. The book centers…
Dr. Seuss-ical Celebration
sunday run dates: February 28 to March 8 The first children’s book Theodor Seuss Geisel, also known as Dr. Seuss, ever wrote, And to Think I Saw It on Mulberry Street, was rejected by 27 publishers. Seuss was so fed up with being denied that he almost burned the manuscript…
“Greg Miller: Over Time”
Greg Miller often gets grouped with the Shepard Faireys and Banksys of the art world, though what the post-pop artist does is quite the opposite of the famed street artists. Miller doesn’t go out and tag walls (he considers himself “something of an environmentalist” he says as way of explanation…
Lion in Winter
Steven Fenley and Pamela Vogel star as King Henry II and his wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine, in the Texas Repertory Theatre Company’s The Lion in Winter. Written by James Goldman, Lion follows the exploits of the royal couple as they face off to determine who’ll sit on the throne after…
Shifting Spaces: A Collaborative Dance Series
Teresa Chapman’s choreography, Lucinda Cobley’s art and Daniel McDaniel’s costumes come together for Shifting Spaces: A Collaborative Dance Series, selections from a work in progress. A quartet of dancers (Kristin Krankiewicz, Roberta Cortez, Catalina Molnari and Mallory Horn) wearing floor-length skirts move between pedestals scattered throughout the Wade Wilson Art…
Stuart Woods: Unintended Consequences
Attorney and investigator Stone Barrington crosses the pond for his latest adventure. Stuart Woods’s newest release, Unintended Consequences, follows Barrington as he travels across Europe, tripping over dead bodies, intrigue and danger everywhere he goes. 6:30 p.m. Murder by the Book, 2342 Bissonnet. For information, call 713-524-8597 or visit murderbooks.com…
Mercury: Spring Concerto
Mercury’s Spring Concerto takes the idea of wine pairing to a new level. In a unique combination of live music, food and wine, Antoine Plante, Mercury’s founder and artistic director, has collaborated with Triniti Restaurant’s Executive Chef Ryan Hildebrand to pair an eight-course meal with a series of concertos. This…
Jersey Boys
Here’s a test. Try reading the following song names without having at least one of them stick in your brain for the rest of today. ”Big Girls Don’t Cry,” ”Sherry,” ”December 1963 (Oh What a Night),” ”My Eyes Adored You,” ”Stay” and ”Can’t Take My Eyes Off You.” Jersey Boys,…
Paul Dorrell: Living the Artist’s Life
Well-known gallery owner, art consultant and writer Paul Dorrell presents a short workshop based on his recently revised book Living the Artist’s Life. Dorrell, who counts Steven Spielberg and Warner Brothers among his clients, guides both emerging and established artists through the pitfalls of building an art career. Workshop topics…
Hudson Moore
Frankly, Hudson Moore’s rising stock in the Texas country scene seems like a pure accident. Even apart from his quarterback good looks, the 22-year-old Fort Worth native’s music is much closer to pop troubadours like Jason Mraz than cowboy-hatted hunks Bart Crow or Josh Abbott. With an abundance of frisky…
Night of the Iguana
Tennessee Williams’s The Night of the Iguana has been called the ”last masterpiece by one of America’s greatest and most powerful playwrights.” Chronicling the struggles of Lawrence Shannon, a former Episcopal priest who’s been ousted from his church for inappropriate conduct, Iguana is set in the 1940s. Recently accused of…
Il trovatore (The Troubador)
The story is not a happy one. There’s poison, babies switched at birth, thwarted love and fratricide. ”But the music is fantastic,” says Italian tenor Marco Berti, who has sung Il trovatore (The Troubadour) so many times he wasn’t sure he needed the entire rehearsal schedule called for in Houston…
Guy Torry
Fans who have only seen comedian Guy Torry on talk shows such as The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson where he presents PG-rated material, might be in for a bit of a surprise at his live show where the N-word, B-word and scathing yo’ momma jokes abound. His jokes…
Houston Beer Festival 2013 – Brewfest
Abraham Lincoln (you know, that tall guy who was married to the Flying Nun) may have said it best: ”I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real…
It Was 20 Years Ago Today
If it weren’t for Jerry Brown’s failed bid at the presidency, Jason Nodler might not be celebrating 20 years of avant-garde theater in Houston. Nodler came to Houston after graduating from college to mount his musical play In the Thunderloo. That project was put on hold when he joined Jerry…
Dollhouse
In Dollhouse, the new play at Stages Repertory Theatre, the character Nora is ”constantly making bets, playing tactics, trying to weigh the stakes, and she has a very fluid feminine energy — ‘I’ll be for you what you need so that I’ll also get what I want,”’ says director Eva…
Houston LGBT Pride Parade
Follow up a full day at the Houston LGBT Pride Festival with the Houston LGBT Pride Parade, now in its 35th year. Join the 325,000 people who are expected to line the parade route as they cheer on the 100-plus organizations and businesses that have decorated floats and contributed entries…
Race
Race and rape. Individually, they’re each highly charged topics. Playwright David Mamet puts them together in the explosive play Race, being mounted here by Ensemble Theatre. A white man is accused of raping a black woman, leaving it to lawyers of both racial backgrounds to argue his fate. Mamet leaves…
Jazz on Film: Paris Blues
Local film curator Peter Lucas has put together Jazz on Film, a month-long series of both famous and little-known movies that examine jazz. One of our favorites is Paris Blues, with Paul Newman and Sidney Poitier as a couple of expat jazz musicians living in France. Things get complicated when…
David Caceres Quartet
We call David Caceres a jazz musician, but the label seems a little too small to encompass everything he does. He handles alto sax duties with a variety of his own groups, including the David Caceres Quartet, performing today at Cezanne. He sings; a fluke gig while he was at…
Sounds Like Fun!
Generations of kids grew up listening to classical music on Bugs Bunny cartoons (how else would any of us know Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, a.k.a. The Da-Da-Da-Dum song?). These days kids grow up listening to the symphonic sounds of sci-fi blockbuster films and video games (hummed the Legend of Zelda…
BOSK
Expect to do some heavy lifting at Suchu Dance’s BOSK. No, not the kind where you pick up dancers. (Although choreographer/company artistic director Jennifer Wood tells us one company dancer has the body mass index of Styrofoam and could be easily tossed around.) No, audience members are expected to fill…
Station Museum Summer Sound Series
As far as Houston music goes, what do people know? The rap scene is nationally recognized, of course. We’ve shipped out more and more country and indie rock acts over the years, but what about the more esoteric and bizarre selections? They’re here as well, and the Station Museum is…
Gary and Kathy Adams Clark: Enjoying Big Bend National Park. A Friendly Guide to Adventures for Everyone
A mere 600ish-miles’ drive from Houston, Big Bend National Park represents the natural visual feast that is Texas, with its ornate cacti and awe-inspiring vistas. If you haven’t the luxury of or patience for the nine-hour one-way drive, a ”small bites” version can be had at Gary and Kathy Adams…
”Bās: Rabe’a Ballin, Ann Johnson, Delita Martin and Lovie Olivia”
Experimental printmaker Ann Johnson’s work in the exhibit ”Bās: Rabéa Ballin, Ann Johnson, Delita Martin and Lovie Olivia” comes from a series she calls Nests. A university professor, Johnson says she often sees students ”nesting,” that is, creating emotionally private environments in public spaces (think of someone listening intently to…
Soo Sunny Park: Unwoven Light
Soo Sunny Park’s Unwoven Light installation at Rice Gallery is unapologetically pretty. It’s a glistening, iridescent canopy of shimmering pinks, purples, blues, greens and yellows that resembles anything from a fish’s scales to a spider’s web wet with raindrops. Despite the apt comparisons, this creation is anything but organic. Unwoven…
”CHOMP! The Science of Survival”
If you want to prepare your child for a future on the crocodile planet, Space Center Houston has you covered with ”CHOMP! The Science of Survival.” (A crocodile planet is just one of many alternative-reality futures that those of us in the know are preparing for.) The exhibit brings the…
Myths and Hymns
Bit of a Stretch Theatre Company, winner of Best New Theater Company at the 2012 Houston Theater Awards, presents Adam Guettel’s Myths and Hymns, a musical exploration of Greek mythology that’s part concert musical and part musical theater. Co-Artistic Director Erin Cressy says: ”There is no plot tying the songs…
Sinbad: Make Me Wanna Holla, A Night of Comedy and Funk
Known for his clean stand-up routines, Sinbad takes to the big screen for a one-night-only broadcast of Sinbad: Make Me Wanna Holla, A Night of Comedy and Funk. The comedy concert was recorded in Detroit, Sinbad’s hometown. Topics for his observational comedy include riffs on his parents (and the most…
Nijinsky’s Last Dance
Don’t expect actor Darnea Steve Olson to try any ballet moves during Nijinsky’s Last Dance, being presented by Edge Theatre. Olson plays a total of nine characters in the show, including Nijinsky at different ages, his friend Auguste Rodin, his wife, his sister and the ballet impresario Sergei Diaghilev, but…
Third Annual Houston Fine Art Fair
FotoFest founders Wendy Watriss and Fred Baldwin receive some well-earned recognition when they pick up the 2013 Lifetime Achievement Award at the Third Annual Houston Fine Art Fair. This year’s fair also honors Houston native Robert Pruitt — known for his drawings and sculptures about black identity — as the…
DockDogs
The fur will fly and pet-able bodies will float through the air with the greatest of ease (and maybe a little coaxing from a rubber ball) at DockDogs, which makes its annual stop at Discovery Green. The event is part of a nationwide competitive series in which canines compete in…
Submission
Multimedia performance artist Josh Urban Davis has some advice for audience members attending Submission, a durational performance art experience being presented today by Continuum: ”Move through the space,” he says. ”Examine the pieces individually and then take them in collectively.” Some 20 artists are taking over the Summer Street Artists…
6th Annual Houston Fringe Festival
The annual Houston Fringe Festival, now in its sixth year, is one of the most popular performing arts events every season. Top of the not-to-miss list this year is Red Rocket Burlesque’s Soul-Sucking Panties (October 3 and 4 at Frenetic Theater). A combination of traditional burlesque and vaudeville, Panties mocks…
Rabbit Hole
Rob Kimbro (Deborah at 14 Pews, Ravenscroft at Mildred’s Umbrella Theater) directs the Rice Players production of Rabbit Hole. Playwright David Lindsay-Abaire, winner of the 2007 Pulitzer Prize, delivers a heartbreaking story about Becca and Howie Corbett, a couple who seem to have it all. When their four-year-old son dies…
Immediate Family
It’s easy to think that Paul Oakley Stovall’s comedy Immediate Family is simply about a young gay man who comes out to his family, but it’s more than that. ”It’s a play about family,” director Eileen J. Morris tells us. ”It happens that someone in this family is gay, but…
”Penguins of the Antarctic: A Photographic Expedition”
Naturalist and photographer J. J. L’Heureux turned her lens on the ice and animals who call it home for her exhibit ”Penguins of the Antarctic: A Photographic Expedition.” During multiple trips to the region, L’Heureux traveled aboard a Russian icebreaker. The route was thought to be risky, but instead of…
”MOVING/STILL: Recent Photographic Work by Texas Artists”
Curator Kerry Inman put together a diverse group of images for the exhibit ”MOVING/STILL: Recent Photographic Work by Texas Artists.” Simultaneously presented at both FotoFest and the Houston Center for Photography, it features work by Houston-based Linarejos Moreno and Austin’s Hector Hernandez and Susi Brister. Originally from Madrid, Moreno is…
Ronnie Laws
Houston native and saxophonist/singer Ronnie Laws has worked with notable music greats during his career, including The Jazz Crusaders, Hugh Masekela and his famous brother, flautist Hubert. Laws has just recently moved back to Houston, and local jazz fans are excited to welcome him home during today’s concert at Dosey…
Phantom Museums: The Short Films of the Quay Brothers
There are some filmmakers only really cool people know about, auteurs like Alejandro Jodorowsky or Cory McAbee. The lords of these are the infamous Brothers Quay, who specialize in startling, macabre, stop-motion animation that has earned them comparisons to Jan Svankmajer and Ray Harryhausen. Phantom Museums: The Short Films of…
First Annual Curry Crawl
Taste outstanding curry creations from 10 Houston chefs, including John Sikhatanna of Straits, Shiva Patel of The Queen Vic and David Guerrero of Samba Grille, at the First Annual Curry Crawl. A panel of judges, including our very own Katharine Shilcutt, will award the top dish, while guests vote on…
Galveston Island’s 4th of July Celebration
Enjoy a parade and a 20-minute fireworks show at the Galveston Island 4th of July celebration. The parade starts at 7:30 p.m. and features decorated floats, a procession of military vehicles, marching bands and performers. Catch it along Seawall Boulevard, from 28th Street to 53rd Street. After that, it’s a…
Food & Film: Laguinats Beer Dinner – Boogie Nights
Paul Thomas Anderson thrust the pornographic film industry into the mainstream with his Academy Award-nominated 1997 film Boogie Nights. Starring Mark Wahlberg as Dirk Diggler, it chronicles the rise and fall of a man in the loose, drug-filled porno industry. You shouldn’t need any more reason to attend a screening…
QFest: The 16th Annual Houston GLBTQ International Film Festival
Oscar winner Olympia Dukakis was a sassy Southern belle in Steel Magnolias, a far cry from the elderly, cantankerous lesbian she plays in Cloudburst, the opening film for QFest: The 16th Annual Houston GLBTQ International Film Festival. The movie follows an older lesbian couple (Dukakis and Brenda Fricker) who, faced…
Kathryn Casey
Houston crime author Kathryn Casey tells a twisted tale about a 2006 murder in her latest true crime book, Deadly Little Secrets: The Minister, His Mistress, and a Heartless Texas Murder. The minister in the title is Matt Baker. The mistress is Vanessa Bulls. Eleven years younger than Baker, she…
WWE Smackdown
Daniel Bryan won his first WWE Championship through the underhanded trick of cashing in his Money in the Bank title shot against an exhausted Big Show. Though he held onto it for a while, Sheamus managed to take the belt in an 18-second match at Wrestlemania -XXVIII, courtesy of a…
Steel Magnolias
Before it was an Academy Award-nominated film, Steel Magnolias was an off-Broadway play. The six-woman drama about a mother, her diabetic newlywed daughter and their beauty parlor friends tackles marriage, children, widowhood and everything in between. Perfect for the intimacy of smaller theaters, Steel Magnolias’ heartfelt ending is made all…
19th Annual Theater District Day
When it comes to the fine arts, Houston audiences have it good. This is one of only five cities in the country with standing professional companies in opera, dance, theater and music, and the only city to boast an open house that includes all of those groups and all of…
Red Velvet Cake War
Here in the South we all seem to have two things in common — a relative with an incredible dessert recipe that is kept super top-secret and another relative who has snapped while doing something very ill-advised to a romantic rival. These staples of Southern family life come together in…
Andrew Porter: In Between Days
Houston serves as the setting for In Between Days by Texas author Andrew Porter. The book, his first novel, chronicles the domestic tribulations of the Harding family. Parents Elson and Cadence have just divorced. Meanwhile, their two grown children, Richard and Chole, have come home to lick their wounds after…
“Larry Bob Phillips: Salon Style”
New Mexico artist Larry Bob Phillips brings his oversize, irregularly shaped paintings to Art League Houston in an exhibit called “Salon Style.” The black-and-white creations are reinterpretations of premodern paintings. Press materials tell us the works blend traditional imagery with contemporary graphic trends. Translation: While the subject matter might be…
Iron Sky
What’s worse than Nazis? Space Nazis with no good intentions, duh, like the ones in the new flick Iron Sky. The film has been a long time in the making — the first amazing teaser trailer went online in 2008 — thankfully, the idea of a Nazi regime that had…
Dan Parsons: New and Selected Poems
You can think of Dan Parsons as the Clark Kent of poetry. By day, he’s a mild-mannered creative writing teacher at Lone Star College-Montgomery. By night, he’s a daring poet. His latest book, New and Selected Poems, collects several of his award-winning pieces and previous favorites. Critic Ange Mlinko wrote…
Frankenstein: The New Musical
Not to be confused with Mel Brooks’s irreverent tuner, also from 2007, Frankenstein, A New Musical — also about you-know-who and what he reanimates using a bolt of lightning and various dead body parts — is an earnest retelling of Mary Shelley’s 1818 gothic shocker, with plenty of singing but…
Companhia de Dança
Brazilian choreographer Deborah Colker didn’t take the usual route to dance, but her detours are what make Companhia de Dança Deborah Colker all the more intriguing. Incorporating her athleticism (volleyball), years of studying piano, and a psychology degree with a different way of looking at things, Colker assembled a troupe…
Back Porch Players: Election Day
Playwright Josh Tobiessen does what we all want to do just about now: He pokes fun at the elections. His satire Election Day gets a staged reading by the Back Porch Players today. In the play, Adam is trying to get to the polls to vote — something he has…
Rudy Ch. Garcia: The Closet of Discarded Dreams
Colorado writer Rudy Ch. Garcia makes it a point of skipping dream sequences in literature, often finding them unsatisfying. This habit led him to imagine a world full of nothing but illusions and eventually became the genesis of his novel The Closet of Discarded Dreams. In it, a young Chicano…
Shift
There’s a good reason why CORE Performance Company, with 32 seasons to its credit, is one of the city’s longest-running contemporary dance troupes — each of the company’s members has a passion for innovative movement. The group’s latest evening-length pro-gram, SHIFT, is built on that passion. SHIFT consists of three…
Daniel Handler/Lemony Snicket
Author Daniel Handler, better known to the world as Lemony Snicket, stands alongside Edward Gorey and Roald Dahl as a modern master of Gothic-flavored youngster literature. His award-winning children’s A Series of Unfortunate Events was a 13-novel series that explored witty wordplay, loss, evil, and adventure so perfectly that each…
The Chucho Valdés Quintet
The New York Times called Cuban musician/bandleader Chucho Valdés ”one of the world’s great virtuosic pianists”; Jazziz magazine dubbed him ”the most complete pianist in the world.” The four Grammy Awards sitting on his mantel seem to indicate the praise is well-deserved. The son of Bebo Valdés, the stylish pianist…
Bill O’Reilly & Dennis Miller: Bolder and Fresher
Dennis Miller and Bill O’Reilly aren’t hitting a whole lot of cities on their Bolder and Fresher tour, but thankfully they are stopping off in Houston. Whether you agree with Miller’s politics these days or not, the 58-year-old rant king with the lightning fast delivery, rapier wit and ready cache…
39th Annual Dickens on the Strand Victorian Holiday Festival
Author Charles Dickens was definitely a rock star in his era. The 39th Annual Dickens on the Strand Victorian Holiday Festival celebrates both the writer and the Victorian era with a street festival, costumed characters (both Victorian and steampunk), handbell and choir concerts, food and gift vendors, entertainment, Steampunk Square…
Kimberly Akimbo
The biting satire Kimberly Akimbo makes its Houston premiere in a production by Mildred’s Umbrella Theatre Company. Directed by Ron Jones, Kimberly is a dark comedy about a teenaged girl who has a rare disease that makes her rapidly age. She’s 16 years old, but she looks and feels like…
Four Maps to Bethlehem
In Four Maps to Bethlehem by Marion Arthur Kirby, ten-year-old Joseph has no desire to be cast in the Christmas play. He certainly does not want to be a wise man — he’s too busy saving the universe as Space Captain of the Galaxy Starship! But, when his imaginary exploits…
Jingle Bell Run
The YMCA’s annual Jingle Bell Run is not just your typical 5 or 10k. The Jingle Bell Run is a highlight of the holiday season in which more than 5,000 runners, volunteers, sponsors, individuals, children and families — at all fitness levels and most in holiday costumes — run through…
One Night Stand
How long do you think it takes a group of professional actors, directors and musicians to get a Broadway musical from the point of creation to opening night? Years? Well, normally that’s true, but it’s perfectly possible to do it in 24 hours as shown by One Night Stand. Fathom…
James Rollins and Rebecca Cantrell: The Blood Gospel
Think of The Blood Gospel, written by James Rollins and Rebecca Cantrell, as the new Da Vinci Code. The two authors are in town for a signing and discussion session with fans. Written by the pair in their first-ever collaboration, The Blood Gospel mixes history, science, religion and the supernatural…
JoJo Moyes: Me Before You
English novelist Jojo Moyes has written a different kind of love story in her latest title, Me Before You; it’s about letting go. Moyes, in town for a signing and discussion, weaves a tale about twentysomething Lou. She’s lost her waitress job, and, desperate to keep money flowing to her…
Martin Luther King Jr Day Peace Rally
The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. remains a towering civil rights figure even 45 years after his assassination. Dr. King led an American revolution in race relations through nonviolent protests that eventually culminated in the end of legal segregation. No other figure in our country’s history is like him,…
”Craft Texas 2012”
The push and pull of art versus craft is front and center at ”CraftTexas 2012,” currently on display at the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. ”Some people might think of craft as always being functional; we don’t take that stance,” says Anna Walker, curator for HCCC. She points to two…
Lavell Crawford
Blues singer Howlin’ Wolf once referred to himself as ”300 Pounds of Heavenly Joy.” Similarly sizable is big-boned comedian (and Breaking Bad regular) Lavell Crawford. ”I used to work at McDonald’s, but I got fired,” he explains in one bit. ”People would order double cheeseburgers, and I’d say, ‘We’re fresh…
Rubén Martínez: Desert America: Boom and Bust in the New ”New West”
Los Angeles writer Rubén Martínez traveled through the American West looking for the Garden of Eden; what he found was ”Eden with poverty, Eden with drugs, Eden with class warfare.” A mixture of reportage and memoir, Martínez’s latest book, Desert America: Boom and Bust in the New ”New West,” covers…
Ally Carter: Perfect Scoundrels
It’s love versus business in Ally Carter’s new young adult novel, Perfect Scoundrels. Sassy and sexy Katarina, from a long line of criminals, sets out to save her uber-rich boyfriend Hale when somebody tries to steal the billion dollar corporation he just inherited. Katarina’s family has the know-how to pull…
The Beyond
Depending on who you ask, Lucio Fulci’s The Beyond is either one of the greatest, most artistic horror films ever made, or an interconnected series of mindless gore and pointless pretentious imagery. Those who say the latter are what we call ”wrong.” Fulci set his surrealist haunted house film atop…
“The uncontrollable nature of grief and forgiveness (or lack of)”
There’s a lot going on in Kathryn Kelley’s installation at Art League Houston. For starter’s, there’s the title — “The uncontrollable nature of grief and forgiveness (or lack of)” — which is accompanied by several stanzas of a poem on the gallery wall. Beyond text, in her exploration of grief…
My Filthy Valentine: Pink Flamingos
John Waters was the Alfred Hitchcock to Divine’s Tippi Hedren. The Cukor to his (or should we say her?) Hepburn, the Henson to his Piggy. What better holiday than Valentine’s Day to revisit the enduring love affair between one of Hollywood’s most camp directors and his personal muse? Visual artist…
Wittenberg
Even before Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the gloomy Danish prince haunted by the ghost of his murdered father, couldn’t make up his mind back at the castle, he was something of a ditherer while at university. At least that’s according to the premise of Wittenberg, a comic play by David Davalos that…
People
You won’t confuse the crumbling heap that takes center stage in Alan Bennett’s prickly new comedy People with the high polish of ITV’s Downton Abbey. This South Yorkshire mansion, much like its dowager owner Lady Stacpool (Frances de la Tour), has fallen on hard times and needs refurbishing. We’re in…
Evil in Justiceberg
Playwright/actor Crash Buist isn’t afraid of a little silliness. His play Evil in Justiceberg, making its world premiere here during a Big Head Productions run, is definitely what we would call theater of the absurd. The plot follows Captain Justice, a do-gooding superhero, and Justice Lad, his sidekick. The two…
Trumbo: Red, White and Blacklisted</i.
Houston Theater Awards Best Supporting Actor nominee Carl Masterson stars as Dalton Trumbo in Trumbo: Red, White and Blacklisted. The legendary screenwriter behind Spartacus, Exodus and Roman Holiday, Trumbo was a member of the Communist Party during World War II. He was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee in…
Houston Rockets vs Orlando Magic
April Fool’s Day seems a good day for a match between the Houston Rockets and the Orlando Magic. Yes, the Magic have the second-worst record in the NBA, but the Rockets still needed a late rally to defeat them last month and there’s no guarantee that Orlando won’t manage an…
Houston Press: Burger Bracket
Since we all know the NCAA bracket race has been seriously compromised by Florida Gulf Coast University, it’s time to pay attention to a competition of another sort, the Houston Press Burger Bracket. Conceived in 2011, the contest pits some of Houston’s best burgers against each other in culinary combat…
Grupo Corpo
In 1988, choreographer Rodrigo Pederneiras had a career-defining moment: ”I started thinking about what it would be like to make a dance that would be more inside our body.” Grupo Corpo, now making its Houston debut courtesy of the Society for the Performing Arts, has been exploring that idea ever…
”International Discoveries IV”
Work by more than a dozen photographers from Argentina, Denmark, Korea, France and Russia makes up ”International Discoveries IV,” the latest exhibit at FotoFest. The group’s curators travel the world in search of new and undiscovered talents, hand-picking several photographers to showcase during the ongoing ”Discoveries” series. Among them is…
Pop Shop Houston
Celebrate local craft and art at Pop Shop Houston. Over 70 vendors will be on hand offering clothing, jewelry, terrariums and all kinds of works in all kinds of mediums. There’s literally something for everyone at Pop Shop Houston, no matter how odd. ”The weirdest thing that I have seen…
Vertigo
Kim Novak, one of Hitchcock’s coolest icy blonds, plays two roles in Vertigo, screening today at the Alamo Drafthouse. How much you like the film’s ending depends on which of the two characters you like more. There’s Madeleine Elster, a possibly mentally ill young married woman. Blond, tailored, and well…
Darkman
There may be no more underrated superhero film than Sam Raimi’s Darkman. Unable to secure the rights to Batman or The Shadow as he wanted, Raimi instead crafted a new hero that nonetheless paid homage to the mystery men and horror franchises of the 1930s. Raimi created Peyton Westlake (played…
Glimpse: Documentary Shorts
Admit it, when the Best Short Documentary portion of the Academy Awards rolls around, you don’t have a clue about any of the films. Even in the age of YouTube, finding good short subject non-fiction films is still difficult. Kelly Pike is hoping to change that with Glimpse: Documentary Shorts…
Word Around Town Poet Draft
Next August, Houston hosts a weeklong citywide poetry tour. But before then, the final seven performer slots will be decided during the Word Around Town Poet Draft. According to Lupe Mendez, WAT co-coordinator, the tour is the brainchild of local poet Zelene Pineda, who sought to showcase all the poets…
ExxonMobil Summer Symphony Nights
While it won’t be mentioned by Willard Scott in his regular birthday greetings segment on The Today Show, the Houston Symphony is putting on its own celebration concert and recognition of its 100th anniversary. The program will feature a grab bag of well-known classical works from famous composers (Beethoven, Bizet,…
”full circle”
Artists working with repurposed materials take things some would consider to be at the end of their usefulness and create something new. That’s the premise behind the ”full circle” exhibit at the Art Car Museum, which features new works created from recycled and reappropriated items, from newspapers to garbage, by…
Night Across the Street (La noche de enfrente)
Pegged “a playful supernatural fever dream” by The New York Times, the 2012 Night Across the Street (La noche de enfrente) is Chilean director Raul Ruiz’s last film and a fitting finale given Ruiz’s tendency toward breezy fugues between themes of fantasy and reality. Here Ruiz’s experimental approach to his…
Festival of Chariots
First a disclaimer: The proper religious path is a personal choice we all must make based on how a particular faith best suits our unique quest for spiritual betterment. Okay, that said, everybody knows the Hindus have some of the coolest gods around. You’ll be able to see them in…
French Country Wines Tasting
What’s better than a wine tasting? A free wine tasting. French Country Wines is hosting a free tasting on Wednesday, June 19, from 5 to 7 p.m. at the winery. Guests will have the opportunity to sample four French Rose wines not normally found in the United States. Enjoy wines…
Macbeth
Actor Philip Lehl says, ”It’s one of those challenges that any actor can measure themselves by. It’s a great play and if you can do it well, then you’ve done something.” What he’s talking about is Macbeth, the final offering of this season by Stark Naked Theatre. Theater co-founders Lehl…
Summer in the City 2013: Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons
With the jukebox musical of the Four Seasons story, Jersey Boys, a runaway success, interest has been renewed in the vocal group who delivered a bevy of hits in the ’60s such as ”Sherry,” ”Big Girls Don’t Cry” and ”Walk Like a Man.” Now 79, the sweet lead falsetto behind…
Augustine
Before there was Sigmund Freud, there was Jean-Martin Charcot, a 19th-century doctor researching women’s hysteria. His star patient — or rather his star guinea pig — was a young maid who suffered from unexplained seizures. Filmmaker Alice Winocour’s moody Augustine tells the story of their entangled, complex relationship. He pokes…
Mary Testa: On Broadway…And a Little Off
Mary Testa twice received Tony Award nominations for her performances on Broadway (for On the Town in 1998 and 42nd Street in 2001). She received a Drama Desk Award nomination for her role in Xanadu in 2007 and won a special Drama Desk award in 2012 — and a resounding…
Hot Import Nights Houston 2013
You have to read between the lines to get a clear picture of Hot Import Nights Houston 2013. The automotive festival tours the country presenting the best in new cars with a heavy dose of music and (here’s the important part) lots of beautiful models in skimpy bikinis. Attractions are…
Black Radical Imagination: An Afrofuturist Short Film Showcase
Black Radical Imagination: An Afrofuturist Short Film Showcase at Art League Houston offers “black people in science-fiction roles as well as in artistic and avant-garde depictions — a refreshing divergence from Hollywood and media stereotypes,” says Marc Newsome, co-executive director of Our Image Film & Arts, which is partnering with…
Summer Sounds Concert Series
”Summer Sounds [Concert Series] presents relaxed, family-friendly outdoor concerts where you can hear great music from Houston’s diverse musical community in an incredibly beautiful setting,” says Emilee Dawn Whitehurst, executive director of Rothko Chapel. ”There is nothing quite like seeing live music on a summer evening in front of Barnett…
Frederick Forsyth: The Kill List
The fact that elements of Frederick Forsyth’s The Kill List are true makes the novel all the more chilling. The plot centers on a government agency known as Technical Operations Support Activity, or TOSA. It has one mission — to track, find and kill people who threaten the United States…
”Feral”
Artist Buster Graybill grew up in Conroe, so it’s no surprise he’s familiar with Texas wildlife. Using sculpture, photography and video, Graybill’s ”Feral” exhibit at Art League Houston captures that natural splendor and gives it a twist. Graybill created several minimalist geometric sculptures that also function as wild-animal feeders. He…
Houston Symphony: Joshua Bell Returns
Conductor and former Houston Symphony music director Lawrence Foster will be at the podium to welcome violinist Joshua Bell during a Houston Symphony concert titled simply Joshua Bell Returns. Bell, young and dynamic, is a Houston favorite. He’ll be performing Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto and other familiar works. 8 p.m. Friday…
Les Misérables
Expect a stripped-down set and minimalist costumes at the Bayou City Theatrics production of Les Misérables. ”When you look at Les Mis, there’s definitely a sense of grandeur, of spectacle,” Colton Berry, the group’s artistic director, tells us. ”As we do with every show we [produce], we try to bring…
Kevin James
Comic actor Kevin James is largely famous for two things: The first is his portrayal of the loveable yet clunky guys in films such as I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry and on the sitcom The King of Queens. The second is his Oprah-like up-and-down battle with his weight…
Arsenic & Old Lace
Poor Mortimer Brewster. In Joseph Kesselring’s black comedy Arsenic and Old Lace, Mortimer (played by Kevin Dean in this A.D. Players production) is the much put-upon nice guy who has to juggle two old-maid aunts (Patty Tuel Bailey and Stephanie Bradow); an odd uncle who thinks he’s Teddy Roosevelt (Stephen…
The Book of Mormon
Matt Stone and Trey Parker, creators of South Park, took their relentless irreverence to Broadway and although some may have been praying for them to get their comeuppance, that didn’t happen. Instead, The Book of Mormon, co-created by lyricist Robert Lopez (Tony-award winner for Avenue Q) was a hit right…
You Can’t Take It with You
Frank Capra made a movie out of it starring James Stewart back in the 1930s that to this day has a 96 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. So it’s hard to argue with the Alley Theatre’s Artistic Director, Gregory Boyd, who decided there was no better way to start…
Movies Houstonians Love: Gwen Goffe presents Fitzcarraldo
The popular film series at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Movies Houstonians Love, welcomes the return of one of the institution’s own when Gwen Goffe, former MFAH associate director of investment and finance, hosts Fitzcarraldo. The fanciful effort by director Werner Herzog follows a big-dreaming, opera-loving South American rubber…
International Quilt Festival Houston 2013
They call themselves fabric-istas: artisans who painstakingly balance weave and weight, color and contrast, texture and tacking, to create a work of art that’s often as practical as it is beautiful. As many as 55,000 fabric artists and fans of the genre gather in appreciation of the art form this…
BooTown’s Best of Grown-up Storytime
BooTown’s Best of Grown-up Storytime features a lineup of stories that are a triple threat: they were well-written, well-presented and well-received by audiences their first go-round. The program includes Sims Hardin reading Puke Fan from Storytime in February. “Puke Fan is about a guy who got drunk at a bar…
Tell Me on a Sunday
First there was Evita, then there was Emma. After writing the epic Evita, Andrew Lloyd Webber changed gears a bit. He teamed up with Don Black, the Academy Award-winning lyricist of “Born Free,” to put together the light-hearted romantic comedy Tell Me on a Sunday. It’s the story of an…
Dock Dogs
The competitors in Dock Dogs will be literally leaping for joy (and prize-winning bragging rights) for the fifth year in Houston. The fun of this event is seeing all the different breeds — from steely-eyed trained jumpers to those mutts who need a little, um, extra push — go airborne…
Children’s Museum of Houston’s Kidpendence Day
We’re not sure what exploding toothpaste has to do with the 4th of July, but at the Children’s Museum of Houston’s Kidpendence Day celebration, the Elephant Toothpaste Patriotic Foam Eruption, with a humongous burst of red, white, and blue foam, is one of the most popular events (we’re guessing it’s…
Gwendolyn Zepeda: Better with You Here
You might know Gwendolyn Zepeda from her chica-lit titles Houston, We Have a Problema and Lone Star Legend. But while those books featured young women facing relationship and career troubles, Zepeda’s latest release, Better with You Here, has a main character facing a very grown-up problem. Protagonist Natasha Davila’s life…
Stand-Up Stand-Off
There were some 100 Houston-area amateur and professional comedians at the start of the Stand-Up Stand-Off. Now there are only seven. See who’s got what it takes to be called the funniest person in H-Town. At stake are bragging rights, a paid gig at the Houston Improv, automatic entry in…
The Big Slide Show
Find out what Houston-area artists such as John Adelman, Tamara Kontrimas, Donna E. Perkins and Carey Reeder were thinking when they created their entries for this year’s “The Big Show” exhibit when they step up at The Big Slide Show. The juried work of 61 local artists is currently on…
2012 Summer of Fun: Celebrate Mindfest
The Houston Children’s Museum takes having fun extremely seriously, which is why for seven days a week during the summer, the museum is open for the Summer of Fun. This week brings Celebrate Mindfest, a specially designed exhibit from the MIT Media Laboratory that explores how new technologies change the…
Alice in Wonderland
Red Door Theatre’s own Josh Jordan brings us a brand-new adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, the timeless tale of the girl who fell down the rabbit hole into a make-believe world where only madness makes sense. Taking cues from Japanese kabuki theater practices, the show will feature startling…
Dan Fesperman
British novelist and ex-spy John Le Carré was the inspiration for Dan Fesperman’s newest thriller, Double Game. Fesperman was doing research for another project when he stumbled on a newspaper interview in which Le Carré seemed to imply he had once toyed with the idea of being a double agent…
The Lion King
When singer Buyi Zama decided to accompany a friend to an audition for the musical version of The Lion King, she had no acting experience and was taken aback when the director, after explaining the story to her, asked her to “walk like Rafiki.” Somehow, she stumbled through what followed…
Lit Fuse: Sarah Cortez, Miah Arnold and Marc Phillips
Local writer Sarah Cortez reads from her memoir Walking Home: Growing up Hispanic in Houston at today’s installment of the Lit Fuse reading series. Cortez, who grew up in the South MacGregor area and now resides in Montrose, is a winner of the PEN Texas literary award in poetry. ”What…
Shampoo Horns: A Reading with Aaron Teel and Mary Miller
Aaron Teel beat out 104 other applicants to get his book Shampoo Horns published by Rose Metal Press for its sixth annual chapbook contest. You should be very glad that he did. Shampoo Horns is an amazing narrative about the adventure that is growing up in a tornado-bait trailer park…
Da Camera 25th Anniversary Celebration
Da Camera of Houston connects its past and future during today’s Opening Night: 25th Anniversary Celebration. Performers include violinist Kenneth Goldsmith, who appeared with Da Camera during its first season, and members of the Da Camera Young Artist Program. The evening includes a world premiere of Pierre Jalbert’s Fanfare Da…
Hugo Ortega: Hugo Ortega’s Street Foods of Mexico
Local celebrity chef Hugo Ortega signs copies of his new book Street Food of Mexico today at Brazos Bookstore. The book is a hefty volume filled with spectacular color photography of street vendors, sidewalk cafes, open-air markets and lots of delicious-looking food. More importantly, it’s filled with Ortega’s tried-and-tested recipes…
November
The Alley Theatre is getting an early start on its 2012-13 season with November by well-known playwright David Mamet, who takes apart his targets — in this case, politicians — with more humor and a bit less roughness than in most of his other work. Sanford Robbins has been brought…
Keren Cytter: Show Real Drama
The real-life experiences of two actors, Susie Meyer and Fabian Stumm, inspired Keren Cytter’s 2011 mixed-media play, Show Real Drama, which explores the lives of a pair of actors after they graduate from the University of Acting in Salzburg, Germany. Meyer and Stumm appear as out-of-work actors, who are completely…
Mega Baile con Bombón
The Houston International Festival is still a few months away, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get the party started a little early with Mega Baile con Bombón. The event’s tag line is ”Houston’s ultimate tropical dance party supersized!” It’s all that; it’s also a fund-raiser benefiting both the HIF,…
Captain’s Costume & Murder Mystery Dinner Cruise
On October 15 and 26 at 8 p.m., head out on the sea for a little dose of murder. Audience members can participate as characters in the solution of a live-action murder-mystery show. Fri., Oct. 5, 8 p.m.; Fri., Oct. 12, 8 p.m.; Fri., Oct. 26, 8 p.m., 2012…
Polish Film Festival: Dzie Kobiet (Women’s Day)
From start to finish, the Polish Film Festival has a stellar lineup. On Saturday, there’s Dzie Kobiet (Women’s Day) by Maria Sadowska. The drama centers on a single mother (Katarzyna Kwiatkowska) raising a teenage daughter. When she’s offered a promotion at the supermarket where she works, she finds out the…
HGOco: Song of Houston: From My Mother’s Mother
In From My Mother’s Mother, the latest effort from Houston Grand Opera’s HGOco, a young Korean-American woman goes into the hospital to give birth and is confronted by not only her mother and grandmother but their traditions calling for her to eat seaweed soup. A lot of it. According to…
”NeoPopStreetFunk 4”
Artists from as far away as Indonesia and the Czech Republic are participating in ”NeoPopStreetFunk 4,” this year’s mixed-media exhibit of outsider, pop and street art. Co-founders Nicky Davis and Kevin Sechelski started the annual showing as a way to highlight art that isn’t often seen in regular commercial galleries…
Trae and Z-Ro
The original Assholes by Nature, cousins Trae and Z-Ro remain two of Houston’s most durable rap heavyweights. A gruff but oddly mellow rhymesmith, Trae tha Truth has recovered from a gunshot wound suffered outside a southwest Houston cabaret in June, and this is first his first headlining show in town…
Barrymore
John Barrymore was perhaps the most famous of all American actors before WWII and was certainly among the best Shakespearean actors ever. He had it all — an illustrious stage career, fame as a film actor since the silent days and, just like all real movie stars, plenty of marital…
Viv! (The Story Behind the Legend)
Vivien Leigh was one of the most talented and beautiful women of her time. She gave two legendary performances on film, Scarlett O’Hara and Blanche DuBois, winning an Oscar for both, but her real talent was for the stage, where she spent 30 years as the undisputed queen of English…
A Little House Christmas
Bad weather threatens the Ingalls family’s holiday fun in the family stage play A Little House Christmas. The family wakes up on Christmas morning to find themselves stranded because of the weather. If they can’t get out, does that mean Santa Claus can’t get in? It will take all their…
LitFuse Reading Series
Musician Chance Hunter is no stranger to combining art forms to create unique experiences. He plays in the Psychedelic Blues Collective, which is a potent mix of blues and funk jamming and … belly dancing. Starting with today’s performance, he also works with author Patrick Stockwell in SHORT FICTION SOUNDTRACK…
Richard Lewis
Comedian Richard Lewis has some advice for young comics: ”Put on a flak jacket and dive in head first.” Lewis, who was named to GQ magazine’s list of the 20th Century’s Most Influential Humorists, says, ”There are lots more opportunities to be a comedian these days than when I started…
The Room
Audiences and critics alike consider Tommy Wiseau’s The Room one of the worst movies ever made due to its plot holes and bad acting, which is the very reason the indie love drama has become such a hit on the midnight-screening circuit. Wiseau, who is director, writer, producer and star,…
Tom Abrahams: Sedition
You already know his name, but this is the first time you’ll get to hear his fiction. Tom Abrahams, a reporter and television anchor, signs and discusses his debut novel, Sedition, at Murder by the Book. Sedition is a political thriller. As the action starts, the President of the United…
Jeff Mangum
For indie-rock fans, particularly aficionados of ’90s lo-fi, an in-the-flesh audience with Jeff Mangum is something akin to a chance to pet a unicorn. With a loose collection of associates known as Neutral Milk Hotel, the Louisiana native made two albums, 1996’s Avery Island and 1998’s In the Aeroplane Over…
Winter Wonderettes
You can’t keep a great all-girl quartet down, and Stages Repertory Theatre has no intention of trying, as it brings back last season’s hit musical, Winter Wonderettes. With its innate nostalgic appeal, the story is set in 1968 and, without unduly taxing the brain with complicated plot shenanigans, a talented…
Houston Choreographers X6
The local dancemakers featured in Houston Choreographers X6 run the gamut in style and experience. There’s Kristen Frankiewicz, a dancer/choreographer with international performance credits under her belt; Laura Gutierrez, a native Houstonian currently on the adjunct faculty at the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts; Lydia Hance, the…
Arturo’s Ravioli Festival
During the entire month of February, Arturo’s Uptown Italiano is celebrating its seventh year in business with the second annual Arturo’s Ravioli Festival. Ravioli is one of the dishes Arturo’s does best, and the festival will feature some old favorites such as the chicken-and-mushroom-stuffed Ravioli di Arturo’s alongside some new…
Itzhak Perlman
He may be the most famous violinist in the world. He is, without doubt, one of the most talented. Itzhak Perlman, a longtime favorite of local audiences, returns to Houston for a recital concert with pianist Rohan De Silva. Perlman’s performances have been described as dynamic and technically eloquent, marked…
Phillip Lopate
Former University of Houston writing teacher Phillip Lopate has one of the most varied resumes of any writer we’ve seen. He’s written essays, novels, poetry, memoirs, novellas, biographies, film and architectural criticism. He’s appearing at Brazos Bookstore to discuss and sign his two latest releases, Portrait Inside My Head, a…
Marissa Meyer: Scarlet
Marissa Meyer’s Cinder, the first book in her Lunar Chronicles sci-fi series for young adults, debuted on the New York Times bestseller list. Now she’s back with the second installment in the series, Scarlet. Scarlet Benoit is searching for her missing grandmother. She’s getting a little help from Wolf, a…
“Mie Olise: Crystal Bites of Dust”
The Gowanus Canal is barely two miles long and yet the Brooklyn waterway is renowned. Decades of pollution from chemical plants and coal yards on its shores has made it one of the most contaminated bodies of water in the nation. At one point, it was even diagnosed with gonorrhea…
Clybourne Park
It’s ”us” against ”them” in Houston native Bruce Norris’s 2011 Pulitzer Prize-winning play Clybourne Park, but the ”us” and the ”them”change with the times. Set in the same Chicago locale as the 1959 play A Raisin in the Sun, Clybourne Park follows two generations and their reaction to a change…
Waiting for Godot
Samuel Beckett’s most famous work, Waiting for Godot, opens in The Catastrophic Theatre’s new space, following the group’s acclaimed production of Beckett’s End Game last year. Godot is directed by Jason Nodler, artistic director of the Catastrophic, who tells us, ”Waiting for Godot was the first and remains the best…
Les Ballet Trockadero de Monte Carlo
Known by some as Ballet for the Easily Bored, Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo returns to Houston for an evening of high art and even higher hilarity. The group is made up of male dancers prancing in tutus parodying the sometimes lugubrious work of stiff master choreographers. Bulky yet…
Eric Harland and Voyager
Native Houstonian Eric Harland brings his latest project, Voyager, to the Wortham Theater Center for a night of fiery jazz. The world-class drummer, who graduated from Houston’s own High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, leads an all-star group of musicians including fellow Houstonian and saxophonist Walter Smith III…
Progressive Forum Houston: Rachel Maddow
Of all the left-wing pundits on MSNBC, Rachel Maddow is arguably the best. Her segments are in-depth and well-researched and stand up -better to fact-checking than those of her colleagues on either side of the spectrum. She’s not afraid to go out, even into war zones, and talk to people…
Randy Wayne White: Night Moves
Secrets can be deadly, as we see in Randy Wayne White’s latest thriller, Night Moves. The 20th installment in White’s popular Doc Ford series, Night Moves has Ford and his friends becoming the targets of an unknown assassin. Ford accepts a job tracking down Flight 19, an airplane that left…
”Comics: Works from the Collection of Robert Boyd”
Houstonian Robert Boyd has been comic editor for Dark Horse, Kitchen Sink Press and Fantagraphics Books. He also writes the popular arts blog ”The Great God Pan Is Dead.” For ”Comics: Works from the Collection of Robert Boyd,” Rice University’s Emergency Room venture hosts an exhibit of his vintage and…
”Emma Richardson Cherry: Houston’s First Modern Artist”
Art curator Randy Tibbits is on a mission: to give late Texas painter Emma Richardson Cherry the attention she deserves. ”We’re trying to have people see her in a different light, and actually, to have people see in Houston in a different light,” Tibbits tells us. ”The idea that most…
Whitest Kids U Know
Comedy troupe Whitest Kids U’ Know built up legions of fans as they reigned supreme on Fuse and IFC for five seasons starting in 2005. Whitest Kids’ founder Trevor Moore and company provided some of the freshest and most extreme sketch comedy ever thrown onto television. Some of our favorite…
Houston Improv Festival
Now in its second year, Houston Improv Festival goes beyond the predictable set-ups of the Whose Line Is It, Anyway? improvisation franchise, showcasing the deeper spontaneity of the craft from13 troupes. ”Whose Line is a highly structured form of improv,” explains festival founder and producer Todd Boring. ”The games they…
Palestine Film Festival
This year’s Houston Palestinian Film Festival’s screening schedule is filled with outstanding offerings. There’s Annemarie Jacir’s When I Saw You, a fictional account of a young boy taken in by young freedom fighters determined to liberate Palestine. ”As the film highlights the conditions of Palestinian refugees in Jordan in 1967,…
Kimberly Akimbo
Aimee Small directs Country Playhouse’s production of the poignant David Lindsay-Abaire comedy Kimberly Akimbo. Suffering from a rare disease that causes her to age rapidly, Kimberly is a teenager with the body of an old woman. Faced with the certainty of her impending death, Kimberly tries to live as normal…
Pink Martini
The band Pink Martini has a reputation for being wild, jazzy and hip. When it takes the stage with the Houston Symphony, the group will be joined by The Von Trapps. It seems The Von Trapps, made up of the great-grandchildren of Captain and Maria von Trapp (yes, from The…
Turtle Turtle
True story: Thirty years ago, a family’s pet turtle suddenly went missing. The family looked everywhere but eventually gave up searching. Earlier this year, they finally found her…in their garden shed. She had lived there for three decades. The strange tale inspired puppeteer Emily Hynds to create the shadow play…
Warrior Class
The latest offering from the Alley Theatre’s New Play Initiative, Warrior Class by Kenneth Lin, makes its way to the stage. Alley audiences saw the world premiere of Lin’s Intelligence-Slave in 2010 and are anxious to see his new effort. Warrior Class is a political thriller. In it Julius Weishan…
Señorita Cinema Opening Night
Texas’s first all-Latina film festival, Señorita Cinema, returns this week with a variety of short and long flicks, all illuminating the female experience. Past installments in the festival have all been short films, founder Stephanie Saint Saenz says, but this year, past SC winners return with their first full-length feature…
Cohen & Tate with Eric Red Live
In the 1980s and ’90s, Eric Red was hands down the best writer/director of horror and thriller fare. He’s the man behind Near Dark, also known as the best vampire movie ever made, period. Among his less well-known films is Cohen & Tate, a 1989 kidnapping thriller starring Roy Scheider…
SplatterFest: The Director’s Cut
Filmmakers get a scant 54 hours to write, shoot and edit a horror for the annual Splatter-Fest competition. (Each film must include a randomly selected murder weapon, character type and line of dialogue.) Last year’s event saw some absolutely incredible entries, such as the tale of the vengeful blow-up doll…
ApolloCon 2013
It’s time to get science fiction-y once again as some of the best authors and artists in the speculative fiction genre return to ApolloCon 2013. It’s a much more laid-back affair than the increasingly massive event that is Comicpalooza, which most Houston geeks are probably still recovering from. ”We’ve got…
Andrew Lippa’s The Wild Party
Bayou City Theatrics closes its inaugural season with the “red-hot summer musical” The Wild Party by Andrew Lippa. “Though the musical handles some very intense subject matter and has one of the more challenging modern musical theater scores we’ve ever worked on, it is truly a beautiful work of art…
The Big Slide Show
As part of its mission to help develop contemporary art and artists, each year the Lawndale Art Center invites creative types living within 100 miles of Houston to submit works for the annual exhibit, ”The Big Show.” But art lovers also have a chance to hear from the artists themselves…
MFAH’s Mixed Media Designed by IKEA
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, is keeping things cool at MFAH’s Mixed Media Designed by IKEA, where attendees gather in the museum’s Sculpture Garden for schmoozing amid the Reverend Butter’s ice carvings, noshing on snow cones from the Kona Ice food truck, imbibing with the ice luge (an IKEA…
”Extra, Extra”
Kallinen Contemporary, an outpost of art in Houston’s East End, takes on the art of news media in ”Extra! Extra!” More than 40 artists will join investigative journalist Wayne Dolcefino in an exploration of the nature of modern reporting through art. Among the featured artists is Nicole Gavin, who is…
Museum Hours
Jem Cohen’s 2012 feature film Museum Hours focuses on the burgeoning relationship between Johann, a guard at Vienna’s Kunsthistorisches Art Museum, and Anne, an American denizen of the museum. Formerly a road manager for rock bands, Johann has a discerning eye for both the artwork and the visitors to the…
Adult LEGO Animation Happy Hour
Aurora Picture Show makes sure kids aren’t the only ones to have all the fun with LEGOs with their Adult LEGO Animation Happy Hour. It started last fall when Aurora invited kids to a LEGO stop-animation workshop and the staff was faced with the sad task of informing adults that…
Museum Experience, Zone 3
Houston’s Museum District is home to a whopping 19 institutions running the gamut from collections dedicated to art and animals to Czech culture and psychiatrist Carl Jung. For The Museum Experience, several of those grouped closely together will be open free and with special programming. ”In our previous program, Museum…
Manhattan Transfer
Most of us can’t afford to sit on the front row at our favorite group’s concerts (ticket prices can run near $1,000 for prime seats). The Northwoods Concert Series is helping to change all that by bringing high-profile artists to the 500‑seat Northwoods Presbyterian Church. Up next in the series…
The Nerd
Ever had a party ruined by a boorish guest? If, like us, you have, you will especially appreciate Texas Repertory Theatre’s production of The Nerd by the gifted playwright Larry Shue (The Foreigner). In the comedy, architect Willum Cubbert is having friends over for dinner, plus an important client. The…
Classical Theatre Company: Hamlet
Plans for the Classical Theatre Company production of Hamlet have been in the works for some three years now. Executive Artistic Director John Johnston was rehearsing a scene for Ghosts with actors Matthew Keenan and Christianne Mays when he realized Keenan and Mays were perfect for Hamlet. ”I stopped taking…
The Invisible War
Filmmaker Kirby Dick examines a sensitive subject in his Oscar-nominated documentary, The Invisible War. The film explores the damage done to the more than 100,000 known men and women who have been screened for Military Sexual Trauma, and the oft-times apathetic system that they encounter when reporting the crime. Featured…
The Real Thing
Main Street Theater returns to favorite playwright Tom Stoppard (its 17th production of one of his works) with The Real Thing, a Tony Award-winning comedy (Best Play in 1984, Best Revival in 2000) set in the late 1970s/early ’80s. Directed by Rebecca Greene Udden, the play takes place in five…
Going Bare
Despite its name, Houston playwright Mary Jane Taegel’s comedy Going Bare is about medical malpractice insurance, not nudity. Jack (played by Phillip Murrell) is an obstetrician who has dropped his outrageously priced malpractice insurance (what insiders call ”going bare”). When he gets hit by a frivolous lawsuit, he concocts a…
Riff Trax: Night of the Living Dead
Talking during a film screening is usually considered a bad thing, but when Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbett do it, it’s a new and hilarious form of performance art. With their RiffTrax Live series, the group hasn’t let the timeless art of mocking bad movies die. Today’s…
26th Annual Día de los Muertos – Musical and Literary Ofrenda
Composers from Musiqa, musicians from the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra and writers from Inprint come together for a special Día de los Muertos Musical and Literary Ofrenda at the Lawndale Art Center. Composer Karim Al-Zand, recently profiled in the 100 Creatives series on our Art Attack blog, contributes That Cuckoo…
Veronica’s Room
It’s 1973 and a young couple on a date goes out to dinner, where an older man and woman talk them into following them home to meet the family. Well, the family is missing a few members, actually. Conrad died in WWII and sister Veronica passed away of tuberculosis. Trouble…
Haute Cuisine, Texas Style
Taste the culinary creations from a James Beard Award finalist when Executive Chef Bruno Davaillon of Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek in Dallas demonstrates some of his favorite recipes. Davaillon will pay tribute to classic Texas dishes but put a sophisticated twist on each of them. For example, cantaloupe may…
The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of the Goddess
There are simply no words to describe what it was like to buy The Legend of Zelda for Nintendo in 1986. Everything, from the golden cartridge to the epic waterfall title screen to the first notes of one of the most iconic adventure theme songs of all time, screamed to…
ApolloCon 2012
Assuming you’ve recovered from geek overload at Comicpalooza, you might want to shine up your Steampunk duds and bone up on your Doctor Who quotes as you get ready for ApolloCon 2012. It’s one of the most excellent science fiction, fantasy and horror gatherings on the Gulf Coast. Check out…
Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens 4th of July Celebration
There’s a live reading of the Declaration of Independence at Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens 4th of July Celebration. The fun kicks off the fun at 1 p.m. with performances, crafts, and a puppet show. At 3 p.m. there’s a reading of the Declaration of Independence with costumed historical re-enactors…
AFA World Premieres Concert
See the stars of tomorrow at the AFA World Premieres Concert. Part of the 2012 American Festival for the Arts Summer Concert Series, the performance will feature up-and-coming dancers from Houston Ballet’s Ben Stevenson Academy working in collaboration with some of the region’s best student musicians. Two thousand twelve marks…
Orbit: Odyssey Plus Star Wars
Last February, the Houston Symphony had a hit with Orbit: An HD Odyssey, featuring Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra and Holst’s The Planets accompanied by new, crystal-clear images of our planet released by NASA. Produced and directed by Duncan Copp, the Houston Symphony show went on to have a spectacularly successful…
WAS-H: Emerging Artists Exhibition
A pair of big brown eyes stare at you from the winning entry in this year’s “Emerging Artists” exhibition by the Watercolor Art Society — Houston. Juror Kermit Eisenhut awarded the top prize to Robin Avery for Leaving Again, an up-close portrait of a yellow, shaggy dog on a vivid…
Lunge Dance Collective
One of the great byproducts of talent-based reality shows is that previously unknown performers gain a platform to begin their own creative projects, even if they don’t come out the big winner. Billy Bell, a contestant on the seventh season of So You Think You Can Dance, is a primary…
Bill Maher
No person represents the liberal, nonreligious, sarcastic political left better than Bill Maher, host of Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO and the maker of the film Religulous. What’s easy to forget sometimes, though, is that Maher is still a regularly performing and talented stand-up comedian. His stand-up shows…
Cirque du Soleil: KOOZA
Cirque du Soleil comes back to Houston, this time with KOOZA, focusing on acrobats and clowns. It’s a perfect fit with Colin Heath, a trained acrobat and clown from Canada, who readily admits he was always “good at goofing off.” Heath was with Cirque in the early years and left…
Returning: The Art of Samuel Bak
It helps if you know the background to the paintings in “Returning: The Art of Samuel Bak,” currently at the Holocaust Museum Houston. But even if you don’t, the soft-edged, vibrantly colored imagery is captivating. In 1941, Bak was nine years old and already a budding artist when Nazis forced…
Silent Film Concert Series: Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans with MY EDUCATION
The Houston Public Media Silent Film Concert Series continues with F.W. Murnau’s Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927). Adapted from Hermann Sudermann’s short story ”A Trip to Tilsit,” Sunrise tells the story of a simple country man (George O’Brien) involved with a devious mistress (Margaret Livingston). At her urging,…
“Faces, Places & Spaces”
One thing is obvious at the exhibit “Faces, Places & Spaces.” Houston women at the turn of the 20th century wore far too much clothing. Despite the city’s mild winters and sticky, steamy summers, local women frequently donned heavy furs and multi-layered frocks that kept them covered from neck to…
3rd Annual Houston Wine Festival
There’ll be 100 wines for you to choose from at the 3rd Annual Houston Wine Festival. In addition to the vino and food, two stages with continuous entertainment will vie for your attention. Festival-goers get a tasting cup and ten tasting tickets (non-drinking designated drivers get discounted tickets). We suggest…
“The Art of Exaggeration”
Caricature, satire and grotesque distortions mark the works seen in “The Art of Exaggeration,” now on display at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Drawn mostly from the collections of the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation and the MFAH, these socially and politically conscious works range from the ridiculous to the…
Obert Skye: Potterwookie
What do you get when you cross Harry Potter with a Wookie from Star Wars? You get Potterwookie, or ”Hairy” for short. Now Houstonians are getting the chance to meet Hairy’s creator and illustrator, Obert Skye — author of the popular Leven Thumps series, the Pillage trilogy, the Beyond Foo…
Lit Fuse: Greg Oaks, Kristin Kostick and Dead Girl Songs
Well-known writer/teacher/arts organizer Greg Oaks takes the mike during today’s Lit Fuse Reading Series. A creative writing teacher at Lone Star College, Oaks is also co-founder of the popular Poison Pen Reading Series at Poison Girl in Montrose; he’s called the series “sweaty, beer-filtered, id-based art.” Oaks, who has a…
Louis C.K.
Louis C.K. is one of the sharpest and most talented American comedians. He has a straight, unfiltered delivery, and when he’s onstage, you get everything from pointed observations on race to rants about his kids getting him up at ”six-fart-on-a-kitten’s-twat-in-the-morning.” Along with his performances, Louis has become a fan favorite…
Ghostland Observatory
Austin’s laser-drenched big-beat gods Ghostland Observatory are so popular that they have to play two nights in a row here to pack in all the party people. The duo, producer Thomas Turner and singer Aaron Behrens, have been at it since the mid-’00s, making foggy memories for rock revelers and…
Día de los Muertos
People who happen to be driving down Heights Boulevard today will see a surprising sight — Aztec dancers in full costume, including tall, feathered headdresses, leading the Día de los Muertos procession hosted by Casa Ramirez FOLKART Gallery. Participants will be carrying a giant skull (no, a really giant skull)…
squared dancer
When two of Houston’s most loved dance troupes join forces for one concert, it’s a party that’s not to be missed. That’s the case with squared dancer, a collaboration between Houston Metropolitan Dance Company and Hope Stone Dance Company staged at the Wortham Center’s Cullen Theater. The concert’s title takes…
Tartuffe
The more things change, the more they stay the same — that’s the perfect description of Molière’s 1664 classic black comedy Tartuffe; the age of Sun King Louis XIV looks suspiciously like our own. The ultimate theater depiction of hypocrisy masquerading as piety, Moliere’s tale follows the former criminal Tartuffe…
Geoff Tate
Not-quite-shocking Queensryche fans all over the world, lead singer Geoff Tate exited that band this past spring after a month-long row with his bandmates that included shouting, punching, and spitting matches at even intervals. Tate’s wife and daughter had been relieved of their managerial and fan-club duties, with turmoil lurking…
Peter James: Not Dead Yet
In the thriller Not Dead Yet, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace of Sussex CID has problems. A dead body’s been found on a local farm. Well, actually a part of a dead body; it’s just a torso, no arms or legs, no head. On top of that, Gaia, an American rock…
Love Goes to Press
Martha Gellhorn and Virginia Cowles were two of the best war correspondents of their era. Between them, they covered every major world conflict during their highly respected careers, from the Spanish Civil War to the blitz of London, the D-Day invasion and the liberation of Dachau concentration camp to the…
Houston Symphony: Handel’s Messiah
Renowned conductor Matthew Halls promises us that this year’s performance of Handel’s Messiah with the Houston Symphony and Houston Symphony Chorus ”is positively bursting with drama from the first note until the last.” A holiday classic, Messiah includes the much-loved ”Hallelujah Chorus” and popular ”Rejoice Greatly.” Halls tells us he…
STOMP !
Andres ”Pooh” Fernandez (he got his nickname because he often wore Winnie-the-Pooh regalia) has been a member of STOMP! for 16 years now. The performer and rehearsal director describes the percussion unit as ”kind of dancing, but you’re stomping and you’re moving rhythmically.” Started in Great Britain about 22 years…
Ian Rankin: Standing in Another Man’s Grave
It’s been 25 years since readers were introduced to Ian Rankin’s John Rebus, a Scottish detective inspector with his own way of doing things. The protagonist of 18 novels and more than a dozen short stories, Rebus was last seen in the 2007 release Exit Music. The novel ended with…
Lawrence of Arabia
It’s impossible to overstate the importance of the 1962 film Lawrence of Arabia. The biopic has influenced legions of filmmakers since its release. Without Lawrence there would be no Star Wars, no Dollars Trilogy. Steven Spielberg might never have gone into moviemaking. A newly digitally restored version of the epic…
Manu Joseph: The Illicit Happiness of Other People
Journalist and novelist Manu Joseph, considered by some to be the best voice in contemporary Indian fiction, is in Houston for a signing and discussion session with his newest effort, The Illicit Happiness of Other People. The dark comedy is the story of a Christian family living in a gossipy…
Sonia Sotomayor
The first Hispanic to be named to the Supreme Court, Sonia Sotomayor is not only an exceptional jurist but a woman with an incredible life story. Her memoir, My Beloved World, the focus of her talk today at the Progressive Forum, lays bare a life that has had as much…
John Witherspoon
Though probably best known for his role as Pops in the 1990s show The Wayans Brothers, John Witherspoon has been performing often hilariously profane standup since the 1970s. (One of the young comics he befriended in those days, the now famous David Letterman, is godfather to Witherspoon’s kids.) Witherspoon embraces…
Trinity Jazz Festival
The hosannas will be swinging at Trinity Episcopal Church’s annual Trinity Jazz Festival when a jazz mass with music by Paul English tops off a weekend of concerts, master classes and appearances. ”Though jazz in the sacred context may be rare, it is a pairing that makes much sense —…
The 5 Browns in Hollywood
Five Juilliard-trained pianists take the stage in The 5 Browns in Hollywood but they won’t all be named Brown. One of the Brown sisters, Desirae, is being replaced by fellow Juilliard alum Steven Beus for this concert due to the impending arrival of her first child. The program includes arrangements…
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
The Broadway show Monty Python’s Spamalot is on the way to Houston in May, so this is the perfect time to reconnect with the show’s inspiration, Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It’s arguably one of the funniest movies ever made. Don’t misunderstand us, there’s nothing wrong with a big-budget…
Lily Tomlin
Check our arts blog Art Attack for a chance to win two free tickets to Lily Tomlin. Comedian/actor/writer/producer Lily Tomlin first created her signature characters Ernestine, a condescending telephone operator with a snort for a laugh, and Edith Ann, a five-and-a-half-year-old philosopher, some 44 years ago when she was appearing…
Improvised Music and Dance with Nicole Bindler & Leslie Scates
Two of Houston’s best-known improvisational musicians team up with two accomplished improvisational dancers for Improvised Music and Dance with Nicole Bindler & Leslie Scates, the latest entry in They, Who Sound, a series of experimental music performances. The show features two duets. The first pairs local trombonist David Dove with…
A Valentine for Bert
On February 1, beloved Houston artist Bert Long died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 72. He was known for his great talent and outsized personality, and news of his passing sparked warm remembrances of the Fifth Ward native by his fans and fellow artists. Ironically, A Valentine for…
Cthulhu: A Puppet Play
Betting on the appeal of puppet actors that are full of stuffing, rather than human actors who are merely full of themselves, The Ornery Theatre is mounting Cthulhu: A Puppet Play. A far cry from Muppets Take Manhattan, this mature-viewers-only, musical stage/video production is based on the slumber-disturbing works of…
Midtown Art in the Park
The 7th Annual Midtown Art in the Park has some really amazing things happening this year that you won’t want to miss. First off, in celebration of the newly established Midtown Cultural Arts & Entertainment District, Midtown Houston is commissioning a 4,000-foot mural by Sebastien Boileau showing the history of…
Thread
It was an either/or proposition for Amy Ell. Sleek and unique as it is, The Photobooth on Montrose is small. There’s just not enough room for Ell’s VauLT dance company to perform Thread suspended from the ceiling by her signature silks (think Cirque du Soleil) and to accommodate an audience…
The Sacred Harp
First seen ten years ago, The Sacred Harp is being revived by FrenetiCore for its evening-length debut at Miller Outdoor Theatre. Set in the early 20th century, Sacred Harp is the story of a young interracial couple and the violent response of intolerant townsfolk to the relationship. A traveling preacher,…
Laura
The title character in the magnificently crafted film noir classic Laura is a beautiful, highly sought-after socialite played by Gene Tierney, who’s been murdered. (In a very indelicate manner, we might add — with a shotgun blast to the face.) Only Laura’s stunning portrait remains as testament to her beauty,…
Broadway at The Box
During Broadway at The Box, one of the cast members, Luke Wrobel, has been handed a large section of the evening, and he more than rises to the occasion. He commands the stage early, as Tevye singing “I Wish I Were a Rich Man” and again toward the evening’s end…
D.L. Hughley
Comedian and actor D.L. Hughley was once a member of the L.A. gang The Bloods. When his cousin was murdered, Hughley left the street life, but not his street smarts, behind. ”In some cultures, if something saves your life, you’re indebted to it forever,” Hughley recently shared with CBS This…
Latin Wave 8
We’re gonna go lowbrow and admit that Juan of the Dead is among our favorite films being screened as part of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s Latin Wave 8 film festival. The political satire that director Alejandro Brugués infuses in this over-the-top comedy is absolutely delicious. Unemployed Juan (wonderfully…
The Sound of Music Mother’s Day Brunch Feast
Show mom how much you love her at The Sound of Music Mother’s Day Brunch Feast. Julie Andrews and a troupe of talented kids sing classics like ”Do-Re-Mi,” ”My Favorite Things” and of course, ”The Sound of Music,” while Christopher Plummer does his best to avoid being inducted into the…
Taboo – Yardies
Filmmaker Selena Blake introduces her documentary Taboo … Yardies, an exploration of homophobia in Jamaica, at a screening presented by the Houston Museum of African American Culture. Gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transsexual Jamaicans comment on the intolerance they face while other islanders on both sides of the issue discuss the…
Janis Stout: The Selected Letters of Willa Cather
At the time of her death, writer Willa Cather clearly instructed that her letters not be published, as a way to let her work speak for itself. That was more than 65 years ago and now the letters have become available. Today author and editor Janis Stout signs and discusses…
””Jonathan Leach: Time Does Not Exist Here”
The year 2012 was a pretty good one for Jonathan Leach. The artist’s work was in nearly a dozen shows from Portland to San Antonio, including several here in Houston. Now, 2013 is looking pretty good, too, as Leach kicks it off with “Jonathan Leach: Time Does Not Exist Here,”…
The Joy Formidable
A dark modern-rock group with echoes of Editors, Interpol and White Lies, the Joy Formidable adds a gothic touch thanks to singer/bassist Ritzy Bryan’s whispery but piercing Siouxsie-like croon. Swapping one remote, forbidding locale for another, the trio from Northern Wales adjourned to the northeastern tip of the U.S. –…
Summer of Epic Adventure — Save the Super Surprise Epic Adventure
We’ve conducted a very scientific survey of the upcoming summer blockbuster films and have concluded that some 246 percent of all summer movies now involve superheroes. The Children’s Museum is celebrating the reign of the hero with its Summer of Epic Adventure. ”Superheroes embody the qualities we want kids to…
Sister Act
Ta’Rea Campbell, appearing as Deloris in the musical Sister Act, says she and Deloris are both a little ”sassy,” but while Deloris still pretty much says anything that’s on her mind, Campbell says she learned awhile back that isn’t always the best strategy. Sister Act, running for a week at…
R. Kelly: Trapped in the Closet
R. Kelly: To the casual music fan, the name brings up either an inspirational song that propelled Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny to basketball success or an unfortunate legal incident involving urine. That’s too bad, because his video hip-hop opera Trapped in the Closet is so good it deserves to…
Bugs Bunny at the Symphony II
That rascally rabbit gets his musical due during the new Bugs Bunny at the Symphony II family concert. Conducted by show creator George Daugherty, Bugs Bunny II features the Houston Symphony performing the scores of several Looney Tunes cartoons live as the shorts screen on a giant monitor above the…
Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg: The Heist
Kate O’Hare is a dedicated FBI agent, completely sure of herself in the performance of her 18-hour-a-day duties. Crafty Nick Fox serves the role of hunk, nemesis and sometime partner. In Heist, best-selling author Janet Evanovich (of the Stephanie Plum series) pairs with Lee Goldberg, writer of the Monk series…
Houston International Boat, Sport & Travel Show
The Houston International Boat, Sport & Travel Show five-day event is intended to showcase the latest and greatest in boating, with information for both the experienced buyer and the novice who just wants to know what’s what. It will present hundreds of powerboats, personal watercraft and fishing gear, as well…
From My Hometown
The Ensemble Theatre’s new show, From My Hometown, isn’t exactly a jukebox musical; it includes original music. It’s also not an original musical; it uses classic soul songs from the Motown era. ”It’s a celebration of classic R&B songs,” Robert Ross, who handles audience development and public relations for the…
Only at the Alamo: Rewind This!
There’s something about VHS tape that just cannot be conveyed by any other video medium. The kind of ’80s/almost steampunk mechanical aspects of it, the big, bulky packaging that showed off the box art are enticing. Josh Johnson takes us down to the corner of Memory Lane and Nostalgia Boulevard…
“Jay Giroux: Ideas Are Free”
One glib yet effective way of describing the work of Jay Giroux – an artist with a background in skate and street culture who holds an MFA in painting from the University of Houston – is to call it “highbrow meets lowbrow.” The Brooklyn artist’s first solo show at Devin…
Mercury: 8 Seasons
The guest artist at the Mercury — The Orchestra Redefined’s 8 Seasons concert has a familiar name: Plante. Mercury’s Antoine Plante is conducting the orchestra as they perform a combination of classical composer Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and tango master Astor Piazzoll’s Four Seasons of Buenos Aires. Plante’s brother, Denis…
”Submerged: Origins of a Species”
The art duo VILD, composed of artists Vinita Israni, 22, and Linh Tran Do, 21, attempts to find the space between science and art in the new exhibition ”Submerged: Origins of a Species.” The exhibit consists of stacks of spiraling test tubes that twist around as they climb toward the…
”Forrest Bess: Seeing Things Invisible”
Artist Forrest Bess was as troubled as he was talented. The Bay City native battled both alcoholism and schizophrenia. He lived in isolation for much of his adult life and famously mutilated his own genitals in an attempt to become a hermaphrodite. At the same time, he received considerable recognition…
Whodunnit
Tony award-winning playwright Anthony Shaffer’s 1982 play Whodunnit had a rocky tryout. Two cast members died and another was replaced before the show made it to Broadway. Thankfully Anita Sampson, who’s directing this highly original work for Company OnStage, has had a decidedly less difficult time mounting this production of…
Fuga
Ana Ilveton Scuseria says she can’t tell us much about Fuga, the newest production by Gente de Teatro. ”I don’t want to give away the plot because there are lots of surprises. I can say it’s very fast with witty dialogue. It’s basically a comedy of errors, a modern satire…
”James Turrell: The Light Inside”
For 13 years, visitors to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston have enjoyed James Turrell’s The Light Inside, a commissioned light tunnel that connects the two buildings on the MFAH campus. Now they can see more of the light artist’s mind-bending works in the landmark retrospective ”James Turrell: The Light…
Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays
All together, the writers behind Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays have two Pulitzer Prizes, four Obies, two Tony Award nominations and one Emmy. That’s quite a cache for just eight writers. Standing on Ceremony, a collection of short plays being presented by Celebration Theatre , features My Husband…
The Apocalypse Ball
Once a year, every year, the world ends at the Frenetic Theater, but that’s okay because the Armageddons held there are awesome. There’s plenty going on at this year’s The Apocalypse Ball. The focus this time around is zombies. Freneticore and The Houston Zombie Walk have teamed up to bring…
The Original Greek Festival
Event co-chair Dana Kantalis hopes visitors to the Original Greek Festival learn one Greek word: philoxenia. ”That directly translates to ‘love of strangers,”’ Kantalis offers. ”Our culture as a whole is a loving, endearing environment filled with passion, delicious homemade fare and great pleasure in good wines and dear friends…and…
Four Premieres
A former member of the Houston Ballet, Garrett Smith is coming back to the city where he launched his professional career as a dancer. This time he’s here as a choreographer. His new work, part of the Four Premieres concert by Houston Ballet, is an appropriately named work, Return. ”Did…
“Exile”
Some artists hope to show viewers beauty. Others aim to explore erosion and decay. “Exile,” a multidisciplinary one-night exhibit, seeks to showcase the frayed edges of our society. On display will be a massive photographic work by David Salinas that features a man named Ed whom Salinas saw collecting cans…
War of the Worlds
It was 75 years ago that actor/director Orson Welles caused panic across America with the radio broadcast of Howard Koch’s The War of the Worlds. The show chronicled, in an apparently much too realistic style, an attack on earth from outer space. Listeners across the country mistook the radio play…
Shanghai Ballet
The Society for the Performing Arts brings dance fans a treat with the Shanghai Ballet. Since 1979, this award-winning troupe has wandered the globe performing all the Western masterpieces you would expect, along with works based on Chinese folk tales. During its Houston stop, the company is presenting The Butterfly…
The Poets: A Play in 2 Acts
The psychological damage of bullying is the focus of Eleazar Catter’s play The Poets: A Play in 2 Acts. The play follows two teenage boys: Santiago, a suicidal poet, and Tommy, a super-human boy who lives in Santiago’s closet. Together they navigate an awkward and hostile adolescence. “I read about…
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
On the surface, Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, by director/writer Nuri Bilge Ceylan, is a police procedural. A man from a village has been murdered, and the police and a small group of others troop through the countryside, suspect in tow, searching for the buried body. Trouble is, the…
Red, Hot, and Blue
Celebrate the Fourth of July with a bang at the 15th annual Red, Hot & Blue Festival. The fun is spread over two sites, the Town Green Park and Waterway Square. Each location features live music from local Houston bands, hosted by Sunny 99.1 FM. Families can also enjoy street…
Houston Symphony: Wizard of Oz
When you think of the music of The Wizard of Oz, you probably think of Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg’s Oscar-winning “Over the Rainbow.” (The performance by a teenage Judy Garland is wonderful, isn’t it?) It’s easy to forget that the orchestral score by Herbert Stothart also picked up an…
”Texas Emerging Artists”
The “Texas Emerging Artists” exhibition, hosted by the Clay Arts Museum, is a showcase for the ceramic works of students and instructors from Texas colleges and universities. Seventy artists contributed 135 ceramic pieces to the show, which was curated by Rosalind Speed. It includes both functional pieces, such as Angela…
“When We Ruled H-Town DVD Release” With DeadHorse, Manhole, Taste of Garlic, Wishbone Bush, Tread, Humungus
Although the concept hasn’t died completely, these days the idea of a city having a “music scene” seems a little quaint. At least it does in the sense of a group of like-minded musicians whose bands play the same clubs, hang out at each other’s shows and the same record…
Tyler Stoddard Smith: Whore Stories
As proof that there is indeed someone out there for everyone, take the story of 19th century French courtesan Blanche Dumas (a woman with two vaginas), who reportedly had a torrid affair with Juan Baptista dos Santos (a man with two penises). Their story is among the many tidbits found…
Beer and Seed
With a nod to John Belushi’s “Bluto” Blutarsky character in the 1978 comedy Animal House, filmmaker Bill Cox offers his own take on the smoker-dude-in-college experience in his new film Beer and Seed. It follows an older, though definitely not wiser, college student, Bill Cook (played by Cox), as he…
Jason Mraz
Dig your feet into the sand, er, lawn of the pavilion up in The Woodlands for a night of cutesy rock jams from one of the dearest singer-songwriters to hit the industry since at least Tiny Tim. Jason Mraz is like catnip for girls, and usually makes boys shrug in…
Hausu (House)
Seven little girls with names like Gorgeous, Sweet and Fantasy meet a grisly end in the classic Japanese horror film Hausu (House). Filmmaker Nobuhiko Obayashi produced and directed Hausu, which was reportedly meant to be a Japanese answer to the mega-successful Jaws. For inspiration, Obayashi went to his preteen daughter…
”Rita Bernstein: Out of Place”
Rita Bernstein gave up a career as a civil rights lawyer to spend time with her family. Somewhere along the way, she picked up a camera and began photographing domestic life. It seems the change was a good move, because some of her images have become part of the permanent…
Wayward Son: The Jordan Richter Story
If you were into skateboarding 15 years ago, then you probably remember Jordan Richter. Maybe you saw videos of the absurdly talented young man as he nailed flawless and difficult tricks on the half pipe. Then one day, he was gone. That sudden disappearance and the years that followed are…
Tokyo String Quartet
The Tokyo String Quartet makes its 40th and final appearance in Houston this week; the group will retire at the end of this season. Formed by a group of friends in 1969 at the Juilliard School of Music, the group has enjoyed a spectacular career with seven Grammy Award nominations…
Sinister
How terrifying would it be to watch a scary movie, only to realize it was watching you right back? In Sinister, a writer named Ellison (played by Ethan Hawke) and his family have just moved into a new home. Ellison is hoping for some peace and quiet so he can…
Bayou City Art Festival
The Bayou City Art Festival takes over a big chunk of downtown real estate this weekend, and Charlie Hardwick’s Pop Art paintings take over the festival. Hardwick, known to many of his fans as ”Uncle Charlie,” has built a career creating colorful concert posters for such groups as The Who,…
Texas Tease-a-Thon
What’s better than a sexy woman doing a burlesque act? A whole lot of sexy women doing a burlesque act, of course. The Texas Tease-A-Thon aims to be the first of many annual Houston festivals celebrating the art of tasteful taking it off, and features some of the biggest names…
2nd Annual Gulf Coast Reads Closing Celebration: Jonathan Safran Foer
Author Jonathan Safran Foer never set out to write Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, the story of a nine-year-old boy whose father dies in the 9/11 attacks on New York City. Foer had been working on a novel about a writer in Eastern Europe in the 1920s, but somehow that…
[title of show]
Like most musicals, [title of show] is a love story; it’s just not the usual boy-meets-girl sort of love story. In the case of [title of show], it’s a two-boys-meet-the-stage sort of love story. The musical, with book by Hunter Bell and music and lyrics by Jeff Bowen, is about…
Revolve Dance: Nexus
Revolve Dance Company’s signature explosive movement will be on full display in the fall concert Nexus. The evening-length repertory program includes work by New York-based choreographer Wes Veldink, company co-directors Amy Cain and Dawn Dippel, and company member Matt Dippel. One of the most anticipated pieces of the evening is…
Vine Leaf Dances
”There are some choreographers who work very quickly; I happen not to be one of those,” Karen Stokes tells us. ”I build works over a long period of time. It sometimes takes me five years to produce an evening-length work. As I’m working, I’m actually creating shorter works.” And it’s…
Bond and Beyond
Vocalist Debbie Gravitte, a Broadway favorite and Tony Award winner, joins the Houston Symphony for Bond and Beyond. A program of signature tunes from the James Bond film franchise, Bond and Beyond features Adele’s chart topping single from Skyfall, the latest film in the now 50-year-old spy series. Also on…
Flight of the Butterflies 3D
You might think Flight of the Butterflies 3D is a nature film; actually, it’s also a detective story. Dr. Fred Urquhart spent almost 30 years searching for the secrets to the Monarch butterflies’ annual migration. Every fall some half billion butterflies take to the skies, making a three-thousand-mile trek from…
Christmas with Cantare
You’ll hear new compositions by Ola Gjeilo and a tenth-anniversary commissioned work by David Ashley White along with traditional holiday carols at the concert A Fragrance Tender: Christmas with CANTARE. The annual concert series, a popular holiday celebration, features elegant, seasonal music. Catch A Fragrance Tender: Christmas with CANTARE on…
God Bless You, Every One
Former company member John Feltch, returning to the Alley Theatre for the first time in 12 years to play Jacob Marley’s ghost (and Mrs. Dilber) in the Alley’s production of A Christmas Carol – A Ghost Story of Christmas promises to scare the bejesus out of the kids in the…
The Submission
The Black Lab Theatre’s current production, The Submission by Jeff Talbott, shows that prejudice isn’t all black and white; it comes in a multitude of grays. Directed by Jordan Jaffe, the show chronicles the adventures of a struggling playwright who pens an uplifting drama about an African-American family trying to…
Macbeth
William Shakespeare’s acclaimed tragedy of ambition and regicide Macbeth is given new treatment by the Eklektix Theatre Company and launched a thousand years into the future. Set in the year 3013, the story centers on the ruthless Macbeth and his equally evil wife, Lady Macbeth. Determined to be king, Macbeth…
Stephen Petronio Company: Underland
With so many stories to tell, American dancer/choreographer Stephen Petronio chose a darker journey when the Sydney Dance Company commissioned him to write what became Underland in 2003. In 2011, Petronio was able to buy the rights to the modern dance work set to the music of Australian pop musician…
HoustonPBS Community Cinema: Soul Food Junkies
If you are what you eat, what does that say about soul food lovers who eat pickled pigs feet and chitterlings on a regular basis? Filmmaker Byron Hurt’s documentary Soul Food Junkies looks at what a soul food diet has done to African Americans. Screening as part of the HoustonPBS…
Science Cafe — Science and Religion: Angels and Demons?
This installment of the Science Cafe discussion series has a very provocative topic, Science and Religion: Angels and Demons? Speaker Dr. Henry Strobel, PhD (hang on for this; he’s got a l-o-n-g title), Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Associate Dean of Faculty Affairs, and Assistant Dean of Student Affairs…
New Year’s Eve Bash
You’ll have lots of choices at the Houston Press New Year’s Eve Bash at the House of Blues. It’s actually several parties under one roof. Starting at 6 p.m. in the Foundation Room, you can enjoy an all-you-can-eat buffet and then stick around for the Ruby Revue Burlesque Show. At…
30th Annual Houston Auto Show
Get your hands on a Maserati or Lamborghini at the 30th Annual Houston Auto Show. ”All 700,000 square feet of the Reliant Center will be transformed into an automotive wonderland,” says Wyatt Wainwright, president of Houston Automobile Dealers Association, via press materials. The show will include a high-end luxury car…
Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal
The last time Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal visited Houston it was 2008 and contemporary dance lovers have anxiously been awaiting its return ever since. The Houston Ballet presents the company here as part of the Cullen Series. Under Artistic Director Gradimir Pankov, the company is set to perform…
Gabriel Iglesias
Comedian Gabriel Iglesias narrowly missed being arrested in Arizona. As Iglesias tells it, it wasn’t entirely his fault. Iglesias’s tour bus got stopped at an immigration checkpoint and while an officer was talking with the bus driver, one of the officer’s search dogs started barking. ”Hold on there,” the officer…
33rd Annual Dance Month at the Kaplan Theatre: Company E – NEXT: An Evening of Choreography of Israel and Spain
Company E has a small roster (just five dancers led by artistic directors Kathryn Sydell Pilkington and Paul Gordon Emerson), but it deals with big ideas. Making its Texas debut with NEXT: An Evening of Choreography of Israel and Spain, the Washington, D. C. based group presents six pieces concocted…
”Quattro”
The Montrose Art Society’s appropriately titled first exhibition and sale of the year, ”Quattro,” presents the work of the four artists in the group, which was founded in 2010. Tony Paraná, Eduardo Portillo, Nico Whitaker and Kylene Vasquez will be exhibiting a full body of modern/contemporary art with individual efforts…
The Chieftains: 50th Anniversary Tour
Paddy Moloney, founder of the Irish folk group The Chieftains, has a special place in his heart for Houston; Moloney spent lots of time visiting his rocket scientist son who worked at NASA and lived in the area for several years and the group performed frequent concerts in the area,…
Jerome Kern in Hollywood
The music of Show Boat composer Jerome Kern gets the spotlight in the Bayou City Concert Musicals’ cabaret presentation Jerome Kern in Hollywood. In 1935 Kern moved to Hollywood, where his success with film scores rivaled his Broadway achievements. His hits, including ”The Last Time I Saw Paris,” ”The Way…
Houston Symphony presents Debussy’s La Mer
The Houston Symphony goes underseas with a performance of Debussy’s La Mer. This 1905 composition, one of Debussy’s most famous symphonic works, explores the depths of the ocean with subtle harmonies that create tonal colors representing the wind, waves and vast sea. He called this piece ”Three symphonic sketches for…
A Touch of Danger
The whodunit A Touch of Danger takes the stage at Theatre Suburbia. Francis Durbridge’s thriller, directed here by Doris Merten, follows best-selling author Max Telligan. Max comes home to his London apartment after a business trip to Munich to find the newspapers filled with reports of his death. Of course,…
Roscoe Mitchell Quartet
Avant-garde woodwind player and Art Ensemble of Chicago member Roscoe Mitchell, now 72 years old, is known for his circular breathing technique. The late Rahsaan Roland Kirk introduced the skill — which allows a musician to play his or her wind instrument via a continuous and uninterrupted stream of air…
Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique
Hans Graf takes the podium for Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique with the Houston Symphony. ”Pathétique” means passionate in French, and the composition is indeed passionate and sweeping. Joining Graf will be his friend violinist Leonidas Kavakos, who performs Shostakovich’s 1st Violin Concerto. Kavakos has been on the world stage since he was…
Citizen Hearst
Hearst the man dies a half hour into Leslie Iwerks’s Citizen Hearst the film, a biographic doc true to the letter of its title, if not the spirit: The citizen here is the company, whose past and present are toasted in an energetic, star-aided bustle. Oprah, Ralph Lauren, Donna Karan…
The ABCs of Death
Aside from animation, perhaps no genre embraces the power of the short film format like horror. One good scare can turn a few minutes into a concise masterpiece. Enter The ABCs of Death, 26 short films, each helmed by a different director and each dealing with one aspect of death…
Mozart’s Symphony No. 40
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart may have lived for only 35 years, but he was one of the most prolific composers the classical music world has ever seen. The Houston Symphony performs two of his symphonies from two very different stages of his life. The program will open with Mozart’s Symphony No…
Houston Ballet: Madam Butterfly
Stanton Welch’s internationally acclaimed Madame Butterfly gets a weekend run at Miller Outdoor Theatre by the Houston Ballet. The tragic story of Cio-Cio San, an innocent and beautiful geisha who turns her back on her family and religion in order to marry an American naval lieutenant, Madame Butterfly is set…
Disney on Ice: Rockin’ Ever After
Disney on Ice returns to Houston with a brand-new show, Rockin’ Ever After. The performance focuses on four modern princesses, Ariel, Rapunzel, Merida and Belle, with Mickey and Goofy wowing the crowd between scenes. This is the first time the heroine of Brave is appearing in a Disney on Ice…
Texas All-star Wrestling
Texas All-Star Wrestling, the oldest independent professional wrestling promoter in the state, has helped launch the careers of people like Necro Butcher (Seen in The Wrestler). It’s hosted champions like Booker T and Samoa Joe, and legends like ”Hacksaw” Jim Duggan and Abdullah the Butcher. (There seem to be lots…
Anjelah Johnson
Congratulations, Houston, comedian Anjelah Johnson thinks you’re the smartest city in the world. It could have something to do with the fact that H-town embraced Johnson early in her career. ”Even before my hometown, San Jose, got behind me, Houston was already on board. I get love from all over…
Chinglish
Lots of folks in Houston don’t find anything funny about the Enron scandal; Tony Award® winner and Pulitzer Prize finalist David Henry Hwang, however, found a way to weave it into his comedy Chinglish. The Broadway hit follows Daniel Cavanaugh, an American businessman to China where he hopes to snag…
”Degenerate Art”
Artists under the Nazi regime were a creative bunch. Not just because of the work they produced, but because of how they kept some of that work from being destroyed. The Nazis ruthlessly obliterated thousands of pieces they deemed socially unacceptable (some because of content, others because of style). Hundreds…
Conversations with the Director: Dr. Ruth Westheimer Talks with MFAH Director Gary Tinterow
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston describes its new triennial Conversations with the Director series as ”an eclectic mix of cultural figures.” That has never been truer than at this month’s Conversations with the Director: Dr. Ruth Westheimer Talks with MFAH Director Gary Tinterow. Dr. Ruth, expert on all things…
2013 Hot Undies Run
Summer’s here, and heralding our communal urge to start stripping off stifling layers of clothing is the 2013 Hot Undies Run, where the briefs are briefer. Every body type in any attire — or lack thereof — is welcome to join Brian O’Neill’s Traditional Irish Pub’s two-mile pub trot (with…
A Cat in Paris
You don’t hear the likes of Billie Holiday on the soundtracks of many animated films, but that’s part of what makes A Cat in Paris so special. An homage to American gangster flicks that’s done in a captivating noir style, Cat follows feline charmer Dino. During the day, he lives…
Club Morocco – a Swing Music Musical
UpStage Theatre re-creates the swing era with Club Morocco — a Swing Music Musical. The musical’s B-movie “film noir” roots couldn’t be more evident, with characters named Chick Valentine, Bobby LaRue, Velvet St. Regis, Butch and Slick Wannabe. There’s also Torch Tangier, Nugget Rialto and Frank McCann, the hardboiled dick…
Peter Pan
Houston Ballet principal dancer Sara Webb has spent the last few years getting ready to return to her role as Wendy in Trey McIntyre’s Peter Pan. Not only did Webb originate the role when it was first performed by the company in 2002, but she has a young son who…
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® Circus: Dragon
Talented Shaolin Warriors, daring Cossack riders, gravity-defying trapeze artists, clever clowns and brilliant acrobatic troupes do their best to lure a mythical beast from his lair during Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey® Circus: Dragons. The show features several new show-stopping feats including a full twisting double bar-to-bar somersault by…
Linda Fairstein: Death Angel
We don’t envy Linda Fairstein the 20-plus years she spent as the chief of the sex crimes unit in the Manhattan district attorney’s office. We can only imagine the atrocities she must have seen during her time there. On the positive side, the experience has given her writing an authenticity…
Annual Festival of Originals
Every year Theatre Southwest Artistic Director Mimi Holloway reads up to 600 submissions for the company’s Annual Festival of Originals. She says: “We receive submissions from farmers, prisoners, professors, elementary students, Hollywood producers and many more.” This year, lots of those entries were from Houston, and five of the seven…
The Rite of Summer
Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring gets chopped and screwed for FrenetiCore’s The Rite of Summer. Rebecca French, the group’s artistic director, worked with laptop musician Chris Becker to reimagine the famous score. ”This music is 100 years old,” French tells us. ”It was groundbreaking at the time it came…
”Animals Assembled: A Safari Built with LEGO® Bricks”
Everyone expects to see animals at a zoo, but the Houston Zoo has kicked it up a notch with ”Animals Assembled,” an exhibition of life-size animal sculptures made entirely of LEGO® building blocks. The sculptures were assembled by certified Master Builders (we consider it a serious transgression that our high…
The Screwtape Letters
Get a glimpse of hell in The Screwtape Letters, based on the novel by C.S. Lewis. Brent Harris appears as His Abysmal Sublimity Screwtape, Satan’s head psychiatrist. Marissa Molnar and Tamala Bakkensen share the role of Toadpipe, Screwtape’s deliciously flexible demon assistant. The two are the only characters that appear…
The Great American Trailer Park Musical
Given the popularity of Honey Boo Boo, we have to agree with Standing Room Only Production Company’s Executive Director, Wayne Landon, who says, ”There is a little ‘trailer folk’ in all of us.” The group is presenting The Great American Trailer Park Musical, ”a laugh-a-minute comedy and spoof” that follows…
Joe Rogan
Actor/stand-up comedian/reality game-show host Joe Rogan knows disgusting when he sees it. He’s perhaps best known for Fear Factor, the supremely disgusting yet wildly successful gross-out reality game show. In what some would say was an unexpected flurry of good taste and decorum, NBC canceled Fear Factor in 2012 after…
Khaled Hosseini
Author Khaled Hosseini, this month’s guest for the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series, knows a little something about having a best-selling book. His first release, The Kite Runner, spent more than 100 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list. His second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, debuted at…
”In Residence: Work by 2012 Resident Artists”
Each year, the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft selects a small number of artists to participate in its residency program. Houston artist and high school teacher Tarina Frank was among this year’s participants. Work she created during her residency is part of the group exhibit ”In Residence: Work by 2012…
Houston Symphony Opening Night with Renée Fleming
The Houston Symphony’s centennial season starts off on a high note with Opening Night with Renée Fleming. The soprano, a three-time Grammy-award winner, performs a mixed program of opera arias, Broadway tunes and selections from Dark Hope, her indie-rock crossover album. Spain’s Juanjo Mena, currently Chief Conductor of the BBC…
Houston Symphony: Classic Soul
A couple of hundred years from now, will people of the future consider the rock and pop of the 1960s to be ”classical” music? The Houston Symphony gets a jump start on the concept with Classic Soul. ”Many of the great soul songs are very romantic and lyrical,” says the…
Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, The Musical
It’s a road show for the modern ages set to the pop music in which two drag queens and a transsexual board a battered old bus for a journey through the Australian Outback. Their goals: love, friendship and a father’s desire to meet his son. The musical is said to…
Kathleen Madigan
Next time you hear someone saying that women comedians aren’t as funny as their male counterparts , you can happily refute the claim with two words: Kathleen Madigan. She just released her newest special, Madigan Again, on Netflix, and it’s one more entry in a consistently hilarious output that marks…
2nd Annual Boneyard Boo Bash
The Boneyard Drinkery is hosting the 2nd Annual Boneyard Boo Bash, an event created to benefit Corridor Rescue Inc., an organization dedicated to rescuing dogs from cruelty and abandonment. All money raised at the event will go to Corridor Rescue. Animals and their humans are invited to participate in a…
Jay Mohr
Early-week comedy club stages are traditionally reserved for open-mike sessions at which fledgling comedians hone their skills. That’s not the case for this non-weekend appearance by Jay Mohr. As much an actor (Jerry Maguire, Pay It Forward) as he is a comedian (Saturday Night Live, Last Comic Standing), perhaps the…
Brick Fiesta
Legos are the hallmark of a childhood well-spent, but fascination with them by no means has to cease when you reach adulthood. On the contrary, teens and adults are responsible for some truly amazing artistic feats using nothing more than the plastic bricks. Brick Fiesta serves as a perfect showcase…
John T. Edge: The Truck Food Cookbook: 150 Recipes and Ramblings from America’s Best Restaurants on Wheels
Join food writer and cookbook author John T. Edge for an intimate three-course dinner and conversation about the Houston street-food scene. Edge’s new book, The Truck Food Cookbook: 150 Recipes and Ramblings from America’s Best Restaurants on Wheels, features several Houston food trucks and their recipes, including a killer Frito…
A Star-Spangled Salute
The Houston Symphony goes all-American for A Star-Spangled Salute at the Miller Outdoor Theatre. Principal Pops Conductor Michael Krajewski conducts a repertoire of rousing American standards, and Simon and Garfunkel tribute artists Jonathan Beedle and A.J. Swearing perform a selection of pop hits. A saxophone quartet made up of Mitchell…
MEMORIAM
Think of FrenetiCore’s MEMORIAM as a dark, dancing version of Groundhog Day. The show centers on a woman who lives through the death of a friend, only to go on and repeatedly experience the trauma. “She lives through the experience the first time, and when she sees that it’s repeating,…
”Standard Deviation”
Remember grading on the curve, in which teachers gave out grades based not on how well students did in comparison to a perfect score but in comparison to each other? That principle will be at play in “Standard Deviation,” a group show with Jim Nolan, Katy Heinlein, Mick Johnson and…
Aurora POPCORN Kids Boot Camp World Premiere
The fourth annual Aurora POPCORN Kids Boot Camp World Premiere film festival includes a variety of shorts that were written, rehearsed, filmed and edited by kids ages nine to 17, students at the Aurora Picture Show filmmaker camp. Meet the next generation of filmmakers at today’s screening. Sat., Aug. 4,…
REDCAT Film Festival: Fire and Ice: New Animation from Russia
The fantastical conflicts of Sea Battle and zipper-train riding buttons of Caution! The Doors are Opening! are among the on-screen delights to be seen during the REDCAT Film Festival: Fire and Ice: New Animations from Russia, a presentation of ten short, animated films. Other films on the line-up include the…
David McGlynn: The Door in the Ocean
Gen-X author David McGlynn (End of the Straight and Narrow) has an obsession with water reminiscent of the way William Faulkner loves Mississippi — it inspires admiration and a little fear. Swimming is his metaphor for youth, life, sex and loss. It’s his calling card, small and personal but elegantly…
Janice Lee and Anna Joy Springer
Janice Lee’s experimental novel Daughter is more of a poem than it is a linear story. “It’s written in prose, but it’s written in prose fragments,” Lee tells us. “On some of the pages there’ll be paragraphs of text, but there will be a lot of white space. There is…
16th Annual Museum District Day
Touring the Houston Museum of Natural Science’s new Hall of Paleontology with its absolutely mind-boggling displays of more than 60 skeleton mounts is worth every cent of the $15 price, but sometimes it’s simply not in the budget. Ditto the blockbuster shows at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and…
Blazing Baroque
Throwback orchestra Mercury has a unique but dedicated approach to performance in that it seeks not only to bring period pieces to an ever-expanding audience, but to try to play period-specific instruments to more fully realize the composer’s original vision. Blazing Baroque is an appropriately titled celebration of one of…
Aspen Santa Fe Ballet
Choreographer Jiri Kylián’s Stamping Ground is the centerpiece of Aspen Santa Fe Ballet’s performance today. The 1983 work explores the Aboriginal culture, and like most of the works in the Aspen Santa Fe Ballet repertoire, it makes good use of the dancers’ classical training while remaining firmly in the contemporary…
Burgers and Beer at The Counter
Try something new at The Counter next week and enjoy a flight of four custom mini-burgers along with four beer pairings from local brewer Karbach — all for only $13. Custom burger and beer pairings include a beef mini-burger with herbed goat cheese, roasted apples, prosciutto and a balsamic reduction paired with…
Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series: Junot Diaz
With a Pulitzer Prize to his credit and a new novel on the shelves, author Junot Diaz is a happy man. ”I’m happiest of all that the damn thing is done,” he laughingly tells us. The book, This Is How You Lose Her, chronicles the loves and losses of a…
Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series: T.C. Boyle
He’s been called ”America’s most imaginative contemporary novelist.” And T. C. Boyle’s latest effort, San Miguel, firmly cements the label. A sweeping, multi-generational saga, the novel explores the inner lives of three women. The action is set on San Miguel, a desolate island off the coast of California, and begins…
Our Image Film & Arts Festival
The Third Annual Our Image Film and Arts Festival has a two-day schedule of short and feature-length films. The highlight is Terence Nance’s An Oversimplification of Her Beauty. The stylistic love story centers on the life of a broke, lonely young man on the cusp of discovering true love with…
Frankenstein/Evil Dead Double Bill
Serious horror is followed by over-the-top musical farce in Country Playhouse’s October double feature. First, Mary Shelley’s monster comes to life — well, as much as a dead creature can come to life — in Frankenstein. The action, which follows the original novel more closely than any of the film…
ScreamWorld
Top your Halloween celebrations with a visit to one of Houston’s best purveyors of horror, ScreamWorld. The fright factory has three haunted houses and an outdoor maze and cemetery. Among the attractions are the Maze of Maniacs; the Edge of Darkness; the Skull Cave, with its own Voodoo Swamp; the…
Body Awareness
In Body Awareness, a lesbian couple, raising a son who may or may not have Asperger’s syndrome, see their home life upended with the arrival of a guest photographer during a special college seminar week. Playwright Annie Baker (Circle Mirror Transformation, The Aliens) lays out her one-act comedy in 90…
Hitchcock-Fest
The Houston Film Critics Society gloriously celebrates cinema master Alfred Hitchcock with Hitchcock-Fest, an entire day of movie mayhem. To top it off, it’s all free! First on the schedule is 1954’s Rear Window, Hitch’s sleekly sly look at voyeurism in which a convalescing photographer (James Stewart) suspects his apartment…
MFAH Film Premieres: The Well-Digger’s Daughter (La fille du puisatier)
In The Well-Digger’s Daughter, his 2011 remake of Marcel Pagnol’s 1940 rustic romancer, French superstar actor Daniel Auteuil turns director. Playwright, filmmaker and novelist, Pagnol is venerated in France as patron saint of small town life (plays and films Marius, Fanny, Cesar, known collectively as the ”Marseilles Trilogy” are holy…
The Inprint Brown Reading Series presents Emma Donoghue and Hari Kunzru
Author Emma Donoghue’s latest book, Astray, is doing something that collections of short stories rarely do: getting lots of critical praise and selling lots of copies. Its success has surprised even Donoghue. ”I never imagined that a book of short stories would be getting me big fat reviews in USA…
Holiday Light Tour with the Houston WAVE
See some of the city’s best Christmas decorations on the Holiday Lights Tours on The WAVE. The fun starts at the Corkscrew, with groups and individuals enjoying drink specials before boarding the WAVE’s comfortable buses. The first stop on the tour is Woodland Heights, home of the popular Lights in…
Cinderella
There’s a new holiday theater tradition brewing at the Ensemble Theatre. Due to popular request, the company is staging its rendition of Cinderella for the third year in a row. Don’t expect the familiar tale of the girl who left her glass slipper at the ball — at least not…
”Flying Solo”
Panoramic photographer Chuy Benitez had a ”right place/right time” moment when he stumbled onto an Occupy Wall Street protest in New York City recently. As police unexpectedly began to arrest and remove the peaceful protestors, Benitez looked for a way to get above the crowd and get some shots. Three…
”Carlos Hernandez: Day of the Dead Rock Stars”
Artist Carlos Hernandez sees dead people. Well, to be completely accurate, he sees — and paints — dead musicians. He depicts the musicians, all of them among his favorite performers, in traditional Día de los Muertos style, as skulls. He adds lyrics, dates, names of locations and other significant phrases…
Sebastian Maniscalco
Have you ever wondered what the hell’s wrong with people? Comedian Sebastian Maniscalco has, and often. And he’s come up with a few answers. On stage and in his Showtime comedy special, coincidentally called What’s Wrong with People?, Maniscalco lets loose on subjects like $29.95 strippers-for-hire and women who dump…
Melissa de la Cruz: Gates of Paradise
Author Melissa de la Cruz is already hard at work on her next series of young-adult novels, The Court of the Last Princess, but before she launches Princess, she’s finishing up her acclaimed Blue Bloods series with Gates of Paradise and making a stop in Houston for a reading and…
Hayes Carll’s Burlesque Circus and Sideshow Freakout
Singer-songwriter Hayes Carll’s songs are populated by widescreen people of oddity and quirk, so it makes total sense for him to put his own special twist on the holidays. At Friday’s House of Blues free-for-all, Carll will be joined by good friends Corb Lund and Houston’s Craig Kinsey, along with…
Funeral Party
Emily Sloan saw some unusual things at the last Funeral Party she hosted, especially when it came to the party’s funeral pyre. One man read a seven-page discourse on the destructive role drugs played in his life, then threw his remaining drug paraphernalia into the fire. Another man, who had…
A Cruel Romance
One of the city’s hidden jewels is the Russian Cultural Center Our Texas. With an active art gallery, frequent music concerts and film screenings, RCCOT does a great job of bringing a bit of Russia to Houston. The center’s newest offering is the film series Russian Classics on the Big…
Hit-Lit
Actor/writer/director Robert Wuhl (Good Morning, Vietnam; Bull Durham; and HBO’s Arli$$) has come back to the University of Houston — his alma mater — to workshop the first play he’s ever written, Hit-Lit, before it premieres in March at a New York City theater. ”Hit-Lit had started out as a…
C. Robert Cargill: Dreams & Shadows
For those of you who are counting, yes, this is C. Robert Cargill’s third very successful career. He was a film critic (he wrote for Ain’t It Cool News, Film.com and Hollywood.com for more than a decade). He gave up that gig to become a screenwriter (he co-wrote the recent…
National Theatre of London Live on the Big Screen: The Magistrate
Catch John Lithgow (3rd Rock from the Sun, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) in a broadcast of The Magistrate from the National Theatre of London. A Victorian farce, Magistrate follows the escapades of Agatha and her son Cis. When Agatha married the easy-going Posket, she took five years off her age. But…
Mardi Gras! Galveston
Mardi Gras! Galveston is the largest such celebration in Texas (parties, parades and performances are spread out over the entire island). With a rich history reaching back all the way to the mid-19th century, it’s the ultimate party, the last blast of decadence and debauchery before the Lenten season starts…
Love Songs with Ana María Martínez
She counts Placido Domingo and Andrea Bocelli among her fans. She has a glittering resume with a Juilliard School of Music education, a stint at Houston Grand Opera Studio, and turns in the Abu Dhabi Festival (she sang the role of Mimi in La Boheme, the city’s first ever fully…
Joe Lansdale: Edge of Dark Water
Nacogdoches is home to one of today’s most talented mystery novelists, Joe Lansdale. Since he lives just up the way, Landsdale gets to Houston often, but it’s still always a thrill for his local fans when he comes to town. This time Lansdale is here for a discussion and signing…
Japan Festival 2013
Explore Eastern culture at the Japan Festival 2013 with two days of performances, music, martial arts demonstrations, cosplay, games and food. Taiko drummers, classical dancers, JPOP stars and martial arts experts fill multiple stages while vendors, community organizations and food booths circle the Hermann Park reflection pool. The Houston Press…
Harlan Coben: Six Years
Nothing is what it seems to be in Harlan Coben’s latest novel, Six Years. The story starts with Coben’s protagonist, Jake Fisher, in the back of a church watching the love of his life, Natalie, marry someone else. He’s an emotional mess after the ceremony, but he manages to keep…
Okay, Better, Best
Sam Martinez directs the world premiere of Okay, Better, Best, a feisty comedy by Michael Weems. A battle of the sexes set in a New York bar, Okay follows a group of women who, offended by the treatment they’ve received at the hands of callous men, are out for a…
Misery
It’s a one-way relationship in Misery, the stage play based on the Stephen King book of the same name. Paul Sheldon is a romance writer who has the bad luck to get into a car wreck in snowstorm. (That’s not the bad luck part.) He’s rescued by Annie Wilkes, his…
Houston Children’s Festival
Touted as ”the largest children’s festival in the United States,” and with an expected total attendance of 50,000 (most of those kids), the Houston Children’s Festival deserves its notation as one of ”The World’s 300 Unmissable Events” from Frommer’s Travel Guide. We just named it one of Houston’s Top 10…
Buffalo Bayou Regatta
Here’s another feather in Houston’s cap: The Buffalo Bayou Regatta ranks among the top five such races in the country. Some 500 canoeists, kayakers and paddlers are expected for this year’s race, which just happens to be the 41st annual regatta. Spectators are expected to line the banks of the…
”Architects of Air: Exxopolis”
In keeping with its ambitiously sensory tagline, ”See Touch Taste Hear Explore,” Discovery Green celebrates its fifth anniversary with an equally ambitious sensory experience: ”Architects of Air’s Exxopolis,” a series of giant, mushroom-like, inflatable domes measuring 30 feet high and as long as half a football field. When guests walk…
26th Annual Houston Art Car Parade
A quartet of Houston art scene royalty will be the grand marshals for the 26th Annual Houston Art Car Parade. Mixed-media metal artist and longtime political activist Gertrude Barnstone, painter John Alexander and conceptual collaborators The Art Guys share the honor. Marilyn Oshman, Orange Show Center for Visionary Art founder…
David Morrell: Murder as a Fine Art
The action in David Morrell’s Murder as a Fine Art might not be as explosive as his debut novel, First Blood (the genesis for the Rambo film series), but it’s every bit as thrilling. Murder as a Fine Art is set in Victorian England and follows Thomas De Quincey, the…
LEGO KidsFest
Question: what’s cooler than LEGO? Answer: absolutely nothing. Celebrate the wondrous plastic brick at LEGO KidsFest. Tour the LEGO museum full of amazing builds, enroll in the Master Building Academy to improve your skills, climb a literal mountain of loose bricks, add to dioramas, craft your own amazing project, the…
The Gate
If you’re a fan of rampant paranoia regarding Satanism slyly infiltrating children’s minds — and honestly, who isn’t? — then you’d be hard-pressed to find a better film than 1987’s The Gate, directed by Tibor Takács. An adorably teenaged Stephen Dorff accidentally unlocks the power of Hell in his house…
Augusten Burroughs
Augusten Burroughs has a one-step self-help plan that should work for anybody in any situation: Be honest with yourself. Burroughs is in Houston as part of his tour with his newly released paperback book This Is How: Surviving What You Think You Can’t (the hardcover version was called This Is…
Jazz on Film: Ornette: Made in America
In 1983, legendary saxophonist Ornette Coleman returned to his hometown, Fort Worth, for a concert. Filmmaker Shirley Clarke was there to capture the free-jazz pioneer’s performance. It became the nucleus of her documentary Ornette: Made in America, screening today as part of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s Jazz on…
Alamo Drafthouse Rolling Roadshow: Bernie
Shirley MacLaine, Jack Black and Matthew McConaughey take Texas eccentricity just about as far as it can go in Bernie, part of the Big Movie Classics series at Market Square. MacLaine is Marjorie, a needy, greedy grump who also happens to be the richest person in town. Black is Bernie,…
Ridley Pearson: Choke Point
Author Ridley Pearson has quite a twisted plot for his latest release, Choke Point. Investigators John Knox and Grace Chu have been hired to locate and shut down an underground sweat shop that uses young girls as slave labor. Knox and Chu know it won’t be easy; they expect push-back…
Kevin Kwan: Crazy Rich Asians
Author Kevin Kwan’s newest title, Crazy Rich Asians, has been described as ”an English-manor-house novel” but told from an Asian point of view. We’d add ”with a take-no-prisoners sense of humor.” Kwan, who was born in Singapore, crafts a comedic multigenerational saga about über-rich Asians that he admits is loosely…
Marcia Clark and Jeff Abbott
Two best-selling authors, Marcia Clark and Jeff Abbott, discuss and sign their newest thrillers today at Murder by the Book. Clark, the lead prosecutor in the infamous O.J. Simpson trial, brings her newest courtroom procedural, Killer Ambition. Set in Hollywood, a town Clark is quite familiar with, Killer Ambition follows…
The 25th Anniversary of Always…Patsy Cline
A tragic plane crash cut short country singer Patsy Cline’s brilliant career in 1963. She was just 30 years old. Cline went on to become a legend and was the first female solo artist elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame. The musical Always…Patsy Cline, now making its 25th…
GodSpell
For its Summer Add-On Musical this year, the Texas Repertory Theatre has chosen GodSpell, with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz. The show demonstrates parables from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke set to modern musical numbers. General admission is $30. The production begins at 7:30 p.m. on weeknights, 8…
”Citywide African American Artists Exhibition”
The MFAH’s ”Citywide African American Artists -Exhibition” has been showcasing the works of local African-American artists for 17 years. In the past, you had to drive all over town since the works were spread out among galleries, hotel lobbies and other venues, but this year we’ll see the whole shebang…
23rd Annual Houston International Jazz Festival
Good news, bad news. Bad news first: Percussionist Shelia E won’t be among the headliners at the 23rd Annual Houston International Jazz Festival as originally planned. (Grumble, grumble, whine, whine.) And now the good news: Guitarist Jonathan Butler and saxophonist Elan Trotman (performing together as the Soul of Summer) as…
Foxfinder
Remember that ominous ad from the 2004 presidential election that featured a snarling wolf roaming the countryside, terrorizing unsuspecting country folk? Mildred’s Umbrella Theater Company’s Foxfinder substitutes a threatening hoard of terrorizing foxes for the wolf. The danger prompts a visit from an official Foxfinder to a family farm. But…
Fly in the Windshield
Playwright and director S. Denise O’Neal has been having a busy year. In June, she originated and co-produced the hugely successful Fade to Black project, a national playwriting contest celebrating African-American playwrights, the first of its kind to be produced in Houston. Now she debuts Fly in the Windshield, a…
3rd Annual Architecture Center Houston Film Festival: Landscapes of Excess and Crisis
Don’t expect to find any easy answers to today’s housing problems at the 3rd Annual Architecture Center Houston Film Festival: Landscapes of Excess and Crisis. Ned Dodington, design director of the visual communications team at local architecture firm PDR and part of the festival’s curatorial team, says it’s questions and…
”The Texas Aesthetic VI: Lone Star Heritage in Contemporary Texas Painting”
We’d expect to find images of cactus, rugged landscapes and ranch hands in an art exhibit called ”The Texas Aesthetic VI: Lone Star Heritage in Contemporary Texas Painting” Currently on display at Williams Reaves Fine Art gallery, ”Texas Aesthetic” has plenty of those. It also has a few surprises. There’s…
Houston Roller Derby 2013 Championship Bout
It’s that time again, when we see which of the women of the Houston Roller Derby league are queens of the track, and which are mere scrubs. It’s the 2013 Championship Bout. There’s no telling who will take the brass ring this year. The Bayou City Bosses and the Valkyries…
What’s Opera, Duck
Party tunes and showstoppers are on the program for What’s Opera, Duck?, the annual informal showcase for University of Houston’s Moores Opera Center students. ”We’re doing a sort of greatest hits of opera and musical theater, along with some specialty numbers,” says Buck Ross, director and founder of the center…
”Self, Model, and Self as Other”
Each image in ”Self, Model, and Self as Other,” an exhibit of 50 self-shot photos from the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s photography collection, reveals a facet of the psychological structure that Sigmund Freud defined as superego, id and ego. ”Self as Other” correlates with the superego’s job of restraining…
HGO Co.: Strega Nona
Big Anthony has some lessons to learn in the Houston Grand Opera’s HGOco’s production of the children’s show Strega Nona. Big Anthony is Strega Nona’s assistant. He helps her in the kitchen where she cooks magical pasta dinners. When Strega Nona leaves town, Big Anthony can’t help but try the…
Nameless Sound: Keiji Haino
PLEASE NOTE: This event is not being held at The Barn as originally announced. The new location is MECA, 1900 Kane. There are underground musicians who shape the world we know more than we could ever know. Folks like Edward Kaspel, The Residents, and definitely Japanese icon and genius Keiji…
”Universe Is Flux: The Art of Tawara Yusaku”
One of the pieces at Asia Society’s ”Universe Is Flux: The Art of Tawara Yusaku” exhibit measures a mere 2×3.5 inches. Despite its diminutive size, it packs an emotional wallop. ”It looks monumental, but it’s so tiny,” marvels Asia Society Texas Center curatorial consultant Hoa Sheng. ”The fact that such…
Luis Bravo’s Forever Tango
It may take two to tango, but to tango like this globally acclaimed dance company takes 26 — the number of performers in Luis Bravo’s Forever Tango, onstage at Miller Outdoor Theatre. Now touring after several runs on Broadway, Forever Tango offers dancers swirling and twirling to the accompaniment of…
Station Theater’s annual Halloween Show
Guests can enjoy a spooky night of improv at Station Theater’s annual Halloween Show featuring three Halloween-themed performances: “Youngbloods”, a costumed student-run performance; “Are You Afraid of the Tales from the Dark Zone?”, including improvised ghost stories from students and alumni alike; and “This Infinite Closet”, an improvisation performed completely…
Radiolab Live: Apocalyptical
Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich started something wonderful with their public radio show Radiolab a decade ago. The popular series, syndicated all over the country, explores science and the world around us. Now fans can experience the show in person at Radiolab Live: Apocalyptical. Joined onstage by British comedian Simon…
The Little Prince 3D
Join the Little Prince as he travels from universe to universe in search of a cure for his loneliness in The Little Prince 3D, a family-friendly animated adaption of the classic 1943 French novella by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. With each journey, he encounters adventure and plenty of interesting characters. Various…
48 Hour Film Project Screenings
You’ll need some determination if you want to see all the entries at this year’s 48 Hour Film Project Screenings. Organizers had to add a fifth night in order to accommodate the almost nine hours of cinematic creations expected to be turned in by the participating Houston teams. The international…
One Hot Summer Night/Houston Improv Fest
Three improv troupes come together for One Hot Summer Night, hosted by Houston Improv Fest. Each group will use audience suggestions as the basis for its performance. Participants include Ophelia’s Rope (a duo of actresses), Baby Knuckle (a four-man group made up of veterans of Massive Improv and Rogue Improv…
Avenue Q
At the 2004 Tony Awards, most pundits predicted Wicked would walk away with the trophy for Best Musical. But the big winner that night was Avenue Q, a musical comedy by newcomers Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx about a group of New Yorkers — some human, some puppet — facing…
Pulp Fiction
The River Oaks Theatre screens Quentin Tarantino’s cult hit Pulp Fiction this weekend. This wildly irreverent black comedy weaves together three vivid, sometimes shocking plots involving petty Hollywood criminals. Drawing inspiration from popular (or pulp) crime fiction of the ’30s and ’40s, Tarantino introduces audiences to two dense, low-rent hit…
The Policeman
Ephraim Kishon’s 1971 comedy The Policeman is considered a classic of Israeli cinema. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and won the Golden Globe in the same category. The film stars Shaike Ophir as Avraham Azoulay, a naive policeman who compensates for his lack…
The Day I Saw Your Heart
Mélanie Laurent has a face that was made for the screen. Her wistful eyes, sharpened cheekbones and glowing ivory pallor were designed to emote the struggles of a tormented French ingenue. Laurent provided the note of redemption in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds and played the soulful love interest in Mike…
”Raul Gonzalez: Farewell Show”
Houston’s art scene is about to lose a popular talent. Raul Gonzalez is leaving us to move to San Antonio and begin fine art graduate studies. The Houston-born painter and mixed-media master has created works here since 2007, and he’s a founder of the artist collective The Montrose Art Society…
Next Fall
Geoffrey Nauffts’s play Next Fall focuses on two people in love, one deeply religious, the other a staunch atheist. That might seem a difficult enough situation, but there’s an added twist: both parties are men. The play chronicles their five-year relationship with unflinching honesty and candid humor. Luke is a…
”Interstitial Spaces: Julia Barello and Beverly Penn”
The two nationally known artists of “Interstitial Spaces: Julia Barello and Beverly Penn” have several things in common. Both use unusual materials; Barello uses X-ray and MRI films while Penn works with bronze castings. Both create large, elaborate wall installations from small, seemingly fragile forms. Both investigate life cycles and…
Evil Dead 2
There’s a very specific type of film fan that we’re addressing in this entry, so the rest of you can hang back…Look, we know you haven’t seen Evil Dead 2 yet. You’re busy, we understand, and there’s no judgment. That being said, it’s time to take care of this gap…
Nikki Palomino: Dazed
Sex, drugs, and rock and roll. At one point that was a battle cry for hip young people everywhere, but as the glitter of the 1980s was swept up by the grunge movement of the 1990s, the rock music world could no longer endure the weight of its own facade…
The Sounds of Silence — Three Evenings of Film
In these days of big-budget superhero slug-fests, films are usually loud, noisy affairs. The Menil Collection aims to celebrate quiet films with its new cinema series The Sounds of Silence. Each short work uses either no sound or sparse occasional sound in odd or arbitrary ways. The series opens with…
Miss Julie
Classical Theatre Company begins its 2012-2013 season with a production of Miss Julie, a landmark play by August Strindberg. This year marks the centennial of the acclaimed Swedish playwright’s death, but the themes of his naturalist works are as provocative now as they were when originally staged. (Think of Strindberg…
RUCKUS: A Cirque Spectacular
For some, a circus is all about animal tricks, clowns and calliope music. At Cirque Imagination’s RUCKUS, it’s all about aerial silk routines and acrobatics. The group normally show-cases spectacles for private corporate events, but this weekend at the Stafford Center they’ll be going in front of John Q. Public…
6th Annual Montrose Crawl
Sponsored by the Houston Press, the Montrose Crawl has come back for its sixth year. This event infuses a traditional pub crawl with the spirit of trick-or-treating as several hundred people dress in costume and visit bars and pubs on Westheimer in Montrose. This year’s event will encompass 11 separate…
Korean Festival 2012
K-pop star Psy’s single ”Gangnam Style” has been recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the most ”liked” music video in YouTube history — and it’s only been out since July of this year. Get a taste of K-pop, which is the music of South Korea, at the…
La bohème
Imagine you’re dying. You’re tired, worn; disease is sapping your last bit of strength. At the same time, however, you have to sing out about this, in a voice that will carry through Wortham Theater Center. That’s the task ahead for Katie Van Kooten as she sings Mimi in Puccini’s…
Damn the Man
BooTown’s Emily Hynds says the company’s latest show, Damn the Man, is an effort to set the record straight. A Benshi-style reworking of the coming-of-age film Empire Records that follows a group of young people working in a record store, Damn the Man throws out the movie’s idealistic tone and…
Texas Renaissance Festival
The annual Texas Renaissance Festival makes life without electricity, personal hygiene or penicillin seem like fun. Stepping back in time is made much easier by the buxom wenches, jousting matches and giant-ass turkey legs that have become the Ren Fest’s trademarks. Each weekend features plenty of entertainment and family activities,…
Passions and Meditations: Alexei Lubimov
When it’s art vs. politics, it’s usually politics that wins — at first. Russian pianist Alexei Lubimov, making his Da Camera debut, ”Passions and Meditations: Alexei Lubimov,” is a prime example of art winning in the end. Lubimov lived the first 40-something years of his life under strict Soviet rule…
Holiday Home Tour at Rienzi
Get a taste of eggnog made from the special Masterson family recipe at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s Holiday Home Tour at Rienzi. The former residence of philanthropists Carroll Sterling Masterson and Harris Masterson III, Rienzi was designed by famed Houston architect John Staub in the middle of the…
”In Residence 2011”
Art exhibits don’t usually include pieces made from pulled-sugar, but the artists in the group show ”In Residence 2011” aren’t interested in what’s usual; they’re interested in what’s new, what’s next. And what’s next is them. The show’s eight participants, each of whom began residence at the Houston Center for…
”Staged: Ana Fernandez, Leigh Merrill”
The Texas landscape gets a twist in ”Staged: Ana Fernandez, Leigh Merrill,” currently on exhibit at G Gallery. The two women present visions of everyday life that are slightly off-kilter. Fernandez collects images of her native San Antonio, reconstituting them into oil paintings. Merrill, who lives in Dallas, combines hundreds…
Dial M for Murder 3D
Heading to the multiplex to see the latest blockbuster in glorious 3D isn’t new. The Natural Vision format was developed in the early 1950s to draw audiences away from their televisions sets. The result is a host of classics filmed in 3D, including Alfred Hitchcock’s Dial M for Murder, which…
”Sacred Spaces of Texas”
The exhibit ”Sacred Spaces of Texas,” currently on display at Architecture Center Houston, features 36 photographs of religious structures throughout the state. Images from Jim Reisch, Craig D. Blackmon and Charles Davis Smith showcase Spanish missions, Central Texas painted churches, urban mega-churches, small-town chapels, and a variety of mosques and…
Houston Press Artopia Preview Party
Get a sneak peek at one of the year’s biggest local art happenings at the official 2013 Houston Press Artopia Preview Party. Eleven local artists will have their works on display, including photographers, visual artists, graphic designers and painters. One of the artists, Matthew Gantt, works in ”constellationism,” a technique…
Met Opera Live in HD: Berloiz’s Les Troyens
The famed giant horse is just the beginning of the story of the Trojan war in the Met Opera Live in HD: Berlioz’s Les Troyens. An encore broadcast to theaters across the United States, the Met production features performances by Deborah Voigt as Cassandra, the prophetess who predicts the doom…
Shen Yun Performing Arts
A Shen Yun Performing Arts Chinese dance and music concert is both grand and delicate. One minute a group of bold and exuberant warriors is brandishing weapons as they tumble across the stage, and the next, a group of maidens is elegantly and gracefully re-enacting an age-old legend. Shen Yun,…
Motionhouse: Scattered: A Meteor Shower of Unlikely Moments
One of the most cutting-edge dance theater companies in Europe, Motionhouse makes its Houston debut with Scattered: A Meteor Shower of Unlikely Moments. Presented by Society for the Performing Arts, Scattered incorporates dance, film, aerial technology and acrobatics to create a show that’s equal parts theater, circus and fairy tale…
Fishing
Playwright Leighza Walker’s drama Fishing focuses on the friendship between Grant (Michael Weems) and Meg (Mischa Hutchings). The trouble is that Grant’s wife, Dana (Margaret Lewis), isn’t quite buying the ”we’re just friends” bit. Issues of trust and commitment, and the rewards and perils of intimacy, are explored from a…
2013 Houston Lebowski Bash
Dress as your favorite character from the film The Big Lebowski for the 2013 Houston Lebowski Bash. Visitors will play games (so get your trivia cheat sheet ready) and enjoy Lebowski-inspired revelry. The Lebowski Bash is co-sponsored by The Orange Show Center for Visionary Art, Saint Arnold Brewery and the…
Q for a Cause
Don’t have the time or gas money to burn driving out to legendary barbecue spots like Smitty’s, Kreuz, Franklin, Snow’s or Louie Mueller, but have a hankering for classic Central Texas-style ‘cue? You’re in luck, then, because highly-regarded pitmaster John Mueller is headed to Houston for a one-day-only charity event…
Kerouac Fest 2013: Go!Go!Go!
Author Jack Kerouac, who lived fast, died young and spawned the Beat Generation in his wake, is among the most romantic literary figures in contemporary times. The Orange Show showcases Kerouac’s contributions to the world of art in its Kerouac Fest 2013 Go!Go!Go! The triple G’s are a quote from…
”Heartbreakers and Life Takers”
We’re not exactly sure how curator and studio co-owner Noah Quiles came up with the title ”Heartbreakers and Life Takers;” something to do with the relationship between love and death according to press materials. While the title is a bit of a puzzler, the art in the one-day pop-up show,…
Deborah Crombie Launch Party: The Sound of Breaking Glass
A long-ago relationship between a young widow and the 13-year-old boy who lived next door to her triggers a killing spree years later in Deborah Crombie’s The Sound of Breaking Glass. Detective Inspector Gemma James finds a link between that friendship-gone-awry and the current murder of two barristers, both found…
Bobby Lee
Bobby Lee, our favorite queer Korean–American stand-up comedian who isn’t Margaret Cho, hits Houston this week. Proudly teasing on Twitter recently that he’s ”a koi fish farmer and a sexual deviant,” the veteran of an eight-year hitch on Mad TV as well as the Harold and Kumar film franchise, Pineapple…
West Side Story
When it debuted on Broadway in 1957, West Side Story was a groundbreaking musical. A loose retelling of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, the play was transported to the gritty streets of New York’s upper west side and featured thuggish gangs of Italians, Irish and Puerto Ricans. It was an instant…
Driving to Zigzigland
Director Nicole Ballivian introduces today’s screening of her film Driving to Zigzigland. The 2006 comedy was the darling of the festival circuit and is presented here by the Houston Palestine Film Festival and the Arab-American Cultural & Community Center. Shot on location in the Middle East and the United States,…
Cirque du Soleil: Quidam
It’s Alice in Wonderland meets Salvador Dalí in Cirque du Soleil: Quidam, in Houston for a five-day run. Zoé, an inquisitive little girl who’s ignored by her busy parents, wanders into a fantasy world where she meets acrobats, trapeze flyers, clowns, jugglers, and other weird and wonderful characters. Our favorite…
”Made in Iran”
Aerosol Warfare plays host to Iranian street artists ICY and SOT for a one-day Houston stop. The brothers are displaying new stencil works and installing site-specific pieces from their ”Made in Iran” exhibition, which has already been seen in San Francisco and Los Angeles. (The duo visits Chicago next.) The…
Critic’s Choice
Malinda L. Beckham directs the Theatre Southwest production of Ira Levin’s Critic’s Choice. The clever comedy starts when novice writer Angela Ballantine writes a play against the advice of her theater critic husband Parker. As Parker suspected it would, the play stinks, but Angela manages to get it produced on…
Falstaff
Baritone Guido LeBrón makes his debut as Verdi’s most popular rotund, womanizing drunkard in Opera in the Heights’ production of Falstaff. He’s excited about adding the comedic role to his repertoire. ”Falstaff is a pretty simple guy. There’s three things he loves: he loves to drink, to eat and to…
Wordsmyth: Autonomy
Dr. Marlene Rampart has set a gargantuan task for herself: to prove that God does not exist. The Noble Prize-winning physicist is an open and vocal atheist so her expected findings should be no surprise to anyone, except, perhaps, herself. Jayme McGhan’s play Autonomy gets a staged reading today by…
Modern Market Film Festival
Fans of mid-century American architecture and design have their choice of several events during Houston Modern Market Week, including The Modern Market Film Festival. The series of five films focuses on a single theme, Palm Springs Modern Architecture. They examine the mid-century works — often called Desert Modernism — of…
2nd Annual Curry Crawl Competition
”Keep calm and curry on” might be an appropriate welcoming line for restaurant’s Chef John Sikhattana as he hosts the 2nd Annual Curry Crawl on his home turf, Straits Asian Bistro. Sikhattana once again introduces fellow chefs from at least 11 top Houston restaurants, each eager to snatch the 2012…
As You Like It
The University of Houston’s School of Theatre & Dance proves that ”all the world’s a stage” with its production of Shakespeare’s comedy As You Like It. The rollicking adventure follows Rosalind and Celia as the two escape Rosalind’s uncle’s treacherous court and take a court fool along for company, making…
Comicpalooza 2013
Houston’s quickly becoming a capital of geek culture in America, as evidenced by Comicpalooza 2013, the ever-growing convention. The show attracts vendors and stars from around the globe to H-Town for a feast of cutting-edge geekdom. Star Trek/X-Men star Patrick Stewart is in town, as are bad girl Michelle Rodriguez,…
An Evening with Cesar Millan: Dog Whisperer
Learn how you can become the leader of your pack at today’s An Evening with Cesar Millan: Dog Whisperer. Star of a hit television show and an in-demand trainer in the United States and Europe, Millan dispenses plenty of tried-and-tested advice for getting your canine companion under control. His most…
Summer Symphony Nights: A Star Spangled Salute
Principal Pops Conductor Michael Krajewski batons the Houston Symphony into a patriotic frenzy for the annual ExxonMobil Summer Symphony Nights: A Star Spangled Salute 4th of July concert. The program includes rousing renditions of ”America the Beautiful,” ”God Bless America” and ”The Star Spangled Banner.” American Idol finalists LaKisha Jones…
Joy Preble: The Sweet Dead Life
Texas-based author Joy Preble signs and discusses her newest young-adult title, The Sweet Dead Life. The paranormal story follows Jenna, who is having a really rough time of it. Her father is gone. Her mother is so depressed she can’t get out of bed. And her older brother, Casey, is…
Scooter Brown Band
Born out of a love for country music, a lone guitar, and a couple of Texas boys on a Marine tour in Iraq, the Scooter Brown Band has grown from a couple of friends pickin’ away to pass the time in the barracks, and has become a full-fledged staple on…
”James Surls: American Institute of Architects Houston 2012 Artist of the Year Exhibit”
James Surls, iconic Texas expressionist sculptor and the father of Lawndale Alternative Arts Space, is without question a part of Houston’s cultural landscape. His tender Standing Vase with Five Flowers metal sculpture appears to sway in the breeze at the southeast side’s Gragg Park. His 25-foot spiky yet flowery Points…
Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Suicide Club
Robert Louis Stevenson and Arthur Conan Doyle never met — although they attended the same university a year apart and were fans of each other’s stories — but thanks to playwright Jeffrey Hatcher, their work is joined in Sherlock Holmes and the Adventure of the Suicide Club. Co-director Mark Shanahan…
I Declare War at Tank’s Paintball
Get your aggression out under the guise of entertainment at I Declare War at Tank’s Paintball. First on the schedule is a two-hour session of paintball war (the price of a ticket conveniently includes 100 rounds of ammunition). Then it’s an outdoor screening of indie flick and festival darling I…
”Dinos Alive!”
Participate in a rescue mission sent in to retrieve survivors of a plane crash in the jungle filled with dinosaurs in ”Dinos Alive!” (It’s all very Jurassic Park 3.) Those who brave the exhibit will be treated to dinosaurs that are life-size, extremely accurate and — best of all —…
John Witherspoon
Most comedians have T-shirts and CDs; John Witherspoon has greeting cards. There’s Watch the Throne, drawn by Reuben Cheatem, showing Witherspoon in his infamous pants-around-the-ankles pose on a toilet, referencing his appearance in the Friday film series with co-star Ice Cube. We don’t see Ice Cube in Watch the Throne;…
The Aliens
Horse Head Theatre Company is well known for mounting its progressive and edgy theatrical productions in unexpected venues. Boheme’s Cafe and Wine Bar’s back lot is the site of the troupe’s presentation of Obie Award winner Annie Baker’s The Aliens, a show that follows two friends talking in a coffee…
”Backyard Monsters: The World of Insects”
Giant bugs are such a terrifying idea that they actually have their own apocalyptic film subgenre. Throw ”robotics” into the mix and you have ”Backyard Monsters: The World of Insects” (the educational exhibit for the whole family, not a 1950s sci-fi flick). The bugs are the products of Garner Holt…
Eddie Griffin
Two months after Eddie Griffin hit his first stand-up stage in 1990, he was opening for Andrew Dice Clay at Madison Square Garden. We don’t hear much from the Dice Man anymore, but 24 years later, Griffin, who’s playing at the Houston Improv this weekend, has accrued major cred as…
H-Town Sneaker Summit 2013
Nike and Reebok and Adidas, oh my! The 2013 summer edition of the H-Town Sneaker Summit returns to Reliant Center for an event that Complex magazine calls one of the ”50 moments that changed sneaker culture forever.” Attracting avid sneakerheads from all over the country, this twice-yearly showcase of footwear,…
2013 Houston Zombie Walk and Halloween Party
If you’re heading out to the Theater District on Saturday, watch out for the zombies. No, really. “Every year, we run into people in their tuxedos and [formal dresses] leaving the symphony or the theater. They never know quite what to make of us,” laughs Darren Tompkins, organizer of the…
Bike, Bats, and Brews
Houston boasts the only year-round bat colony in Texas. Some 300,000 Mexican free-tailed bats make their home under the Waugh Drive Bridge, emerging each evening at dusk to fly into the night and devour around two and a half tons of insects. You want to see that at least once,…
Maz Jobrani
Maz Jobrani, a stand-up comedian of Middle Eastern descent, often discusses during his show the angst that goes along with his heritage, but not in that whiny, Reza Aslan, FOX News-y kind of way. ”Being Iranian American presents its own set of problems,” Jobrani explained during a TED talk. ”I…
MFAH Premiere: Houston
German filmmaker Bastian Günther found Houston’s hellacious summer weather to be useful, if extremely uncomfortable, while shooting his latest feature. The city and its oppressive heat and humidity play a significant role in Günther’s Houston, making its local premiere this weekend at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. The film…
LitFuse: Coert Vorhees, Andrew Kozma and Michelle Oakes
One of the most appealing aspects of the ongoing LitFuse reading series at Kaboom Books is its intentional propensity to present authors unfamiliar to its audiences. It’s never the same old, same old familiar faces month after month. ”None of these readers has appeared at LitFuse before,” says LitFuse coordinator…
Mummies, Magic and Medicine in Ancient Egypt
The new Hall of Ancient Egypt at the Houston Museum of Natural Science is simply amazing. Helping to bring the story of the pharaohs to life is Dr. Bob Brier, who presents a talk on Mummies, Magic and Medicine in Ancient Egypt. Brier is one of the world’s leading Egyptologists,…
Our Image Film & Arts Festival
The Our Image Film and Arts Festival has a simple goal — to promote works by underrepresented minorities with honesty rather than sensationalism. That said, the fourth annual Our Image Film and Arts Festival will definitely be sporting some of the most awesome sensationalism ever put on the screen. The…
The Fierce Reads Tour
The Fierce Reads Tour makes a stop at the Blue Willow Bookshop today with young-adult writers Leigh Bardugo, Jessica Brody, Gennifer Alvin and Ann Aguirre. Bardugo’s latest novel, Shadow and Bone, was described by The New York Times as “mesmerizing…Bardugo’s set-up is shiver-inducing, of the delicious variety. This is what…
Ballet Shri Ram
Don’t worry if you aren’t familiar with the epic story Ramayan, the basis for today’s performance by Ballet Shri Ram. Organizers have you covered: English scene descriptions appear on screens on both sides of the stage during the show. “From scene to scene the music, lighting, dance and colors of…
Rate Your Risk, Maybe
Highlights from Hair Balls SPACED CITY Rate Your Risk, Maybe By Richard Connelly The City of Houston and Rice University have produced a risk calculator that tells you your chances of getting flood or wind damage from a direct-hit hurricane. The Storm Risk Calculator isn’t the fastest thing around, but…
Linda Fairstein: Night Watch
Novelist Linda Fairstein starts her latest thriller, Night Watch, with a stark scene; on her way home from dinner, protagonist Alexandra Cooper finds a stack of human bones near her door. As she rushes back to the restaurant for help, she runs into a similar stack of skulls. And that’s…
Cultural Feast — First Class Dining on the Titanic
Have dinner à la the Titanic — without the drowning afterward — at the Cultural Feast — First Class Dining on the Titanic. Chef Johann Schuster of Charivari took the Titanic’s first-class dinner menu for April 11, 1912, as his inspiration for the night’s multicourse dinner, but he’s made sure…
Legacy Fighting Championship
Anderson Silva may be one of the greatest mixed martial arts fighters of all time. He holds the record for both the longest winning streak and the longest title defense in UFC history, something he accomplished with a fair ground game and unbelievable Muay Thai strikes. At the Legacy Fighting…
Daniel Silva
Spymaster Daniel Silva’s latest release, The Fallen Angel, features former Israeli agent and assassin Gabriel Allon. (Allon was called “one of the most intriguing heroes of any thriller series” by The Philadelphia Inquirer.) The story starts in Vatican City, where Allon is restoring a Caravaggio masterpiece for the church. But…
Private Lives: A Late Night Cabaret
It’ll be just you and 59 of your closest friends at Private Lives: A Late Night Cabaret, presented by Country Playhouse and Standing Room Only Productions. At just a shade more than an hour long, the intimate black box musical revue features tunes in a variety of styles, from torch…
Apocalypse Ball
Funny thing about the apocalypse — a lot of the time, it looks pretty awesome. That’s the idea behind FrenetiCore and the Houston Zombie Walk’s upcoming Apocalypse Ball. In the name of raising funds for the annual Fringe Festival, which showcases all the cutting-edge performance art the city has to…
”Once There Was, Once There Wasn’t: Two Tales from the Minds of Lisa Chow & Y.E. Torres”
Spacetaker + Fresh Arts Coalition showcases the magical realist dreamscapes of two local artists in ”Once There Was, Once There Wasn’t: Two Tales from the Minds of Lisa Chow & Y.E. Torres.” The exhibition begins with Chow’s lighthearted and evanescent artwork, and then builds into Torres’s dark and mystical performance…
CAMH Video Jam: Prince Varughese Thomas/Patrick Bresnan and Ivete Lucas
We’ve heard of Civil War re-enactments, but Vietnam War re-enactments? Those are new to us. Patrick Bresnan, a self-taught photographer and one of the video artists appearing at today’s CAMH Video Jam: Prince Varughese Thomas/Patrick Bresnan and Ivete Lucas, made a feature-length documentary called Vietnam Appreciation Day that explores the…
Mayan Prophecies
On December 21 of this year, the fabled Mayan calendar comes to the end of a 5,125-year cycle. There are a host of theories that surround this date. Some believe that it represents the end of the world through astronomic collisions, while more positive folks predict it will mark the…
Houston Symphony Opening Night: Bolero
It’s going to be an evening of amazing music at the Houston Symphony Opening Night: Boléro concert. The program includes a performance of Ravel’s famous, smoldering ode to sensuality, led by HS Music Director Hans Graf. The orchestra’s Principal Flutist, Aralee Dorough, and Acting Associate Principal Flutist, Judith Dines, will…
5th Annual Houston Fringe Festival
There’s one thing you can expect at the 5th Annual Houston Fringe Festival — the unexpected. The multidiscipline festival brings together cutting-edge dance, theater, film, burlesque, puppetry and music performances over three weekends. Among those scheduled is the dance piece Can’t Get Next to You, directed by FrenetiCore’s Rebecca French…
Children of Paradise (Les enfants du paradis)
Director Marcel Carné and scriptwriter Jacques Prévert, whose previous collaborations were the classics Port of Shadows and Daybreak, outdid themselves — and most of French cinema — with Children of Paradise (Les enfants du paradis), a sumptuous costumer set backstage in the theater world of mid-19th-century Paris. Outwardly, it’s about…
Boom
A Craigslist ad promising ”sex to change the course of the world” might not be appealing for some of us, but for Jo, an inquisitive journalism student, it’s irresistible. Peter Sinn Nachtrieb’s comedy Boom, presented by Black Lab Theatre, follows both Jo and Jules, a marine biology grad student who’s…
Texas Johnny Brown
Immaculate. Tasteful. Classy as a bespoke suit with matching tie and handkerchief, and smooth as iced and aged Cuban rum. That’s Texas Johnny Brown, a true hero of blues, vintage R&B and a pioneering early rock and roller. Brown’s career spans the decades down from Spotify to 78s — that’s…
History of Oktoberfest
In 1810, Crown Prince Ludwig I of Bavaria invited all the citizens of Munich to drink beer and party with him for 16 days on the occasion of his marriage to Princess Therese. The event gave birth to an annual celebration that has endured more than two centuries. The goodwill…
”Vivian Maier: Out of the Shadows”
Vivian Maier may have worked as a nanny, but her true vocation was as a photographer. Starting in the 1950s, Maier shot street scenes in New York and Chicago. The images she captured were insightful, frank and largely unseen during her lifetime. In 2010, Jeffrey Goldstein began to collect Maier’s…
”G.T. Pellizzi and Ray Smith: Border Paintings”
The artist duo of G.T. Pellizzi and Ray Smith created a different type of landscape seen in their new exhibit ”Border Paintings.” Instead of painting representations of the terrain found at the Yturria Ranch, the two put the soil, plants and debris directly on the canvases. To create the works,…
Regifting Lions
Three choreographers explore why some people are more adept at processing trauma than others in Regifting Lions. Lynn Lane, Catalina Molnari and Toni Valle also investigate the relationships and social networks that are so essential to the recovery process. The survival of trauma, whether it’s cancer or addiction or unhealthy…
Tchaikovsky’s 5th
Please note: Due to weather conditions in the northeast, violinist Augustin Hadelich is unable to travel to Houston for this performance. Houston Symphony concertmaster Frank Huang will step in and perform the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto, instead of the Bartok Violin Concerto No. 2 originally scheduled. Violinist Augustin Hadelich not only…
Good vs. Evil: An Evening with Anthony Bourdain and Eric Ripert
The celebrity chef, author and television personality Anthony Bourdain is coming to Houston for a one-night-only show with Eric Ripert, the French chef who often plays the angel to Bourdain’s devil on television and in real life — the two have been friends for years. Appropriately enough, the Jones Hall…
The Oldest Profession
It’s a pre-AIDS world that playwright Paula Vogel writes about in the stage comedy The Oldest Profession, currently being produced by Theatre Southwest. The title refers, of course, to prostitution, and the show’s five characters are aging hookers. The women are not tawdry streetwalkers; they’re conservatively dressed whores who just…
Movies Houstonians Love: Moneyball
Astros rookie General Manager Jeff Luhnow gets his turn at bat in the continuing film series Movies Houstonians Love at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. And, surprise, he’s picked a baseball movie, Bennett Miller’s techo-geek Moneyball (2011). Based on the Michael Lewis bestseller — and a holy grail to…
Hugo Ortega: Street Food of Mexico
Local celebrity chef Hugo Ortega of namesake restaurant Hugo’s, a 2012 James Beard Award finalist, signs copies of his new book Street Food of Mexico today at Blue Willow Bookshop. It’s a hefty volume filled with spectacular color photography of street vendors, sidewalk cafes, open-air markets and lots of delicious-looking…
Navidad Latina: An Evening of Spanish and Latin Carols and Dance
There’s a plan behind the Navidad Latina: An Evening of Spanish and Latin Carols and Dance concert — organizers want to get people in the holiday mood à la Latin American style. ”What we want to show is the spontaneity that exists in the Latin American celebrations,” says Raúl Orlando…
”The Heart of Mary/El Corazón de Maria”
Multimedia artist Richard Soler explores the iconography of the Virgin Mary in ”The Heart of Mary/El Corazón de Maria.” Mediums include drypoint (a type of engraving), paintings, papier-mâché and textiles. One piece seen in the show is Comforter of the Afflicted, an oil painting that shows Mary in a red…
Ice Carving Competition
Artists will be working with chainsaws, blow torches and razor sharp chisels at the fifth annual Ice Carving Competition. Ice artists from across the country will spend five hours crafting sculptures from giant ice slabs made of over a thousand gallons of recycled rainwater. Last year the Snowflake Sculptors outcarved…
Shatner’s World: We Just Live in It
William Shatner’s spent more than half a century as an entertainer and geek pop culture icon playing such roles as Captain Kirk, T. J. Hooker and most recently Denny Crane. But it’s arguable that his biggest role to date has been as William Shatner. In his confessional show Shatner’s World:…
They Live
John Carpenter’s horror film They Live is an underrated masterpiece. The film stars the one and only Roddy Piper as a drifter named John Nada who accidentally discovers a pair of high-tech sunglasses that allow him to see through the disguises aliens wear. Come to Earth to take over the…
”Jon Read”
Better known for his work in the noise band The Wiggins, local musician Jon Read is also a passionate and dedicated artist. In addition to larger pieces, he’s done all the illustrations for his own albums. His current plan is to build a self-propelled dark ride similar to Disney’s It’s…
Loco Comedy Jam
Comedian Mike Robles and friends will undoubtedly offer plenty of other relationship advice during the Houston stop of the Loco Comedy Jam. Robles, who isn’t afraid to be crude, rude or obnoxious in pursuit of a punch line, has some pointed advice for men who want to cheat: You will…
Robert Crais: Suspect
Two broken spirits search for redemption in Robert Crais’s new crime thriller Suspect. One is Scott James, a Los Angeles cop who’s been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder since he and his partner were attacked several months earlier. The nighttime blitz left James angry and humiliated. Even so, he got…
Rebelution
For a clue on just how much Rebelution must love ganja, beyond even the exquisitely explicit “So High” on its 2012 release Peace of Mind, consider that the Santa Barbara reggae-pop crew also issued acoustic and dub versions of the same album. That’s three hits of Peace of Mind in…
20th Annual Iranian Film Festival
The Annual Iranian Film Festival, now in its 20th year, brings some of the best in recent Middle Eastern cinema to Houston for a two-week stint. Till Schauder’s The Iran Job screens on January 20. The documentary follows Kevin Sheppard, an American basketball player who joins an Iranian team in…
”Present Tense”
The fact that all the artists in ”Present Tense” are women isn’t the point, according to exhibition curator and participating artist Sapphire Williams. The point is the fact that all of the artists are producing exciting work. ”I don’t want people to confine their work to being women’s work. I…
Show Boat
Canadian tenor Joseph Kaiser says he’d always wanted to come sing in Houston and now he’s gotten his wish; he’ll be playing the role of the good-looking riverboat gambler Gaylord Ravenal in Show Boat this month as the Houston Grand Opera under Artistic and Music Director Patrick Summers expands its…
Jennifer Koh: Bach for Solo Violin, Part 1
Acclaimed American violinist Jennifer Koh is widely known for her unique approach to Bach’s works for solo violin with her ”Bach and Beyond” albums. Following her 2012 performance of Bach’s three partitas organized by Houston’s Da Camera, Koh returns to perform Bach’s three sonatas for solo violin, impressively completing the…
Bad Ass Weekend
The first annual Badass Weekend is spread out over two days and three stages at Walters, Houston House of Creeps, and the adjoining Ballistic Skate House, and is sure to give you lonely and wild hearts something to do over Valentine’s Day weekend. Not to mention, it will be a…
Mike Tyson: Undisputed Truth
UPDATE: Undisputed Truth has been canceled and has not been rescheduled. Mike Tyson has always been slightly unreal. As a fighter he wasn’t just dominating, he was unstoppable. As a person he’s both intimidating and strangely comical; he’s witty, yet crude. The very idea that he would attempt a one-man…
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston: The Shining
Some consider filmmaker Stanley Kubrick a genius; others consider him a lunatic. That duality was never more apparent than with his production of the horror classic The Shining. Decades later, fans are still discussing the film’s artistic value and theorizing over its supposed hidden messages about genocide, government conspiracies and…
Bayou City Art Festival – Memorial Park
Known as ”The Art Couple,” Signe and Genna Grushovenko are the featured artists for this year’s 42nd Annual Bayou City Art Festival Memorial Park. The Grushovenkos, from South Carolina, create intricate and multicolored mixed-media works using oil paint and vintage photos. More than 300 other juried artists join the Grushovenkos…
Foundation for Modern Music: Premieres
The Foundation for Modern Music is featuring never-heard-before works from two contemporary composers in the next installment of the Premieres concert series. Harpist Jacqueline Pollauf and saxophonist Noah Getz, of Washington, DC’s duo Pictures on Silence, perform as soloists for Andrian Pertout’s new composition for harp, saxophone and string ensemble…
Wordsmyth Reading Theater: Reading of The One with Olives by Sam Havens
Playwright Sam Havens isn’t being coy when he says his play The One with Olives isn’t easily defined as a comedy or a drama. ”There’s a lot of comedy in it, but there’s a lot of drama, too. It’s the story of [Danny], a young artist who’s granted a summer…
RDA Architecture Tour
Houston’s architectural design is a lot like its weather. Don’t like it? Wait ten minutes. Or ten years, as in the case of the appropriately titled Centennial Tour, Rice Design Alliance’s 2013 Architecture Tour. Ten mostly Inner Loop stops — each designed by grads of Rice University’s esteemed Rice School…
”Tre Impasto: Hans de Bruijn, Justin Garcia and Tomas Glass”
Wade Wilson Gallery’s latest exhibition is all about the paint. In ”Tre Impasto: Hans de Bruijn, Justin Garcia and Tomas Glass,” the Montrose gallery brings together three longtime artists who have unique painting techniques. ”We chose these artists because of the dynamic conversation between them, not necessarily for similarities,” Wade…
Tristan and Isolde
Never mind that the plot is convoluted and dense, and filled with potions and metaphors. It’s the incredible music, the layered emotions that have made Richard Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde such a great, enduring work, says American bass-baritone Ryan McKinny, who’ll make his debut in the role of Kurwenal, the…
Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel
Very few women have contributed to fashion the way Diana Vreeland did during her tenure at Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue and the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute. She launched supermodel Twiggy. She gave Jackie O fashion advice. Called the ”Empress of Fashion,” her 50-year career left an indelible mark on…
T. Jefferson Parker: The Famous and the Dead
Twice the winner of the Edgar Award for Best Novel, T. Jefferson Parker brings his Charlie Hood series to an end with The Famous and the Dead. Parker discusses and signs the newly released book today at Murder by the Book. Hood, an undercover ATF agent, is battling gun trafficking…
Chasing Ice
Environmental photographer James Balog didn’t believe in global warming in 2005. Then he undertook an assignment for National Geographic and spent several years documenting the unexpectedly rapid disappearance of centuries-old glaciers. Using time-lapse cameras and revolutionary new techniques, Balog captured eerily beautiful images of the changing frozen landscape which became…
KiKi Maroon’s BurlyQ Lounge
Burlesque clown princess and producer KiKi Maroon describes the KiKi Maroon’s BurlyQ Lounge show as ”classy and sexy, dirty and funny.” Okay, we’re in. Maroon found burlesque shows a rarity when she started performing here two years ago. ”At the time there was no burlesque scene or regular shows in…
”Picasso: Black & White”
Throughout his career, Spanish artist Pablo Picasso experimented with wildly divergent styles, techniques, subject matter, and mediums. But over the decades, he would continually return to creating works in the most simple – and often striking – hues of black and white. ”Picasso in Black and White,” currently on exhibit…
”Parallel Practices: Joan Jonas & Gina Pane”
Multidisciplinary art, including performance art, is the focus of ”Parallel Practices: Joan Jonas & Gina Pane.” Both proto-feminist artists, Jonas and Pane worked on opposite sides of the Atlantic, with Jonas based in New York and Pane in Paris. The exhibit explores the characteristics their art shares and highlights the…
Steel Lounge Underground
The Contemporary Arts Museum Houston kicks its cool factor into overdrive during Steel Lounge Underground, an evening of music, drinks and video art. ”It’s really a fun party, but we hope more than that,” Connie McAllister, director of community engagement tells us via email. ”Every year, we see an incredibly…
UpStage Theatre: Wait Until Dark
David Hymel directs UpStage Theatre’s Wait Until Dark. Frederick Knott’s thrilling drama is set in a cramped New York apartment in the 1960s. It chronicles the story of Susy Hendrix, a blind woman, as she copes with a trio of con men who are convinced she’s in possession of a…
Daniel Vaughn: The Prophets of Smoked Meat: a Journey Through Texas Barbecue
The Daniel Vaughn: The Prophets of Smoked Meat: a Journey through Texas Barbecue signing party at Liebman’s Wine & Fine Foods today is peppered with firsts. Daniel Vaughn has just been named the first Barbecue Editor of Texas Monthly. This is his first book. And this is the first book…
Pixar in Concert
When it comes to music, Pixar films are not in any way messing around. Since Toy Story was released in 1995, the studio’s films have garnered three Academy Awards and nine more nominations for their scores or original songs. That’s why it’s such a treat to hear the Houston Symphony…
Cooking Therapy with Monica Pope
How many times do you get to learn cooking skills and techniques from an outstanding chef? Here’s an opportunity you definitely don’t want to miss. Monday, June 24, at 6:30 p.m., chef Monica Pope of Sparrow Bar + Cookshop will teach you everything you need to know about veggies in…
”Andy Coolquitt: Attainable Excellence”
If one looks with an appropriately observant and objective eye, he will discover streets filled with art, or at least, artistic assemblages, that somebody ”made” in the discarding. Mesquite-born artist Andy Coolquitt transforms these cast-off eye-catchers for ”Andy Coolquitt: Attainable Excellence” at Blaffer Art Gallery. ”Andy Coolquitt scavenges the streets…
20th Annual Theater District Open House
Melissa Fitzgerald of the Houston Downtown Alliance points out two especially attractive things about the 20th Annual Theater District Open House: ”It’s free and everyone is invited,” she tells us. The Open House, now in its 20th year, is a showcase for the city’s nine major performing arts companies (the…
Space City Con 2013
Houston is rapidly becoming a geek paradise thanks to the parade of consistently improving pop-culture conventions, among them this weekend’s Space City Con. ”We’re just trying to make sure that our hometown, a larger city, a broad geographical city, has the ‘galactic’ reach of con events,” said founder George Comits…
Little Shop of Horrors
The musical Little Shop of Horrors gets such frequent runs in Houston, it’s almost as though Audrey, the carnivorous plant that grows ever larger with each act, never leaves town — she just moves from stage to stage. Music Box Theater gives us the latest incarnation of the popular show…
Word Around Town (W.A.T.) Poetry Tour 2013
Poet Outspoken Bean is among the featured performers at this year’s Word Around Town (W.A.T.) Poetry Tour 2013. As an invited featured artist, Bean was able to bypass the tour’s rigorous draft process. ”There were more than 150 poets at the draft this year,” Bean tells us. ”It was ridiculous;…
”George Krause: A Night in Summer White”
With his signature light-box technique, photographer and retired University of Houston faculty member George Krause is best known for his ”Sfumato” series of shots. In them, primary light comes from behind the subject, thus putting principal features in shadows and highlighting secondary facial features. Laura Rathe Fine Art will feature…
Mario Alberto Zambrando: Loteria
Haven’t heard of Mario Alberto Zambrano yet? Well, get ready to because if his debut novel Lotería is any indication, he’s about to be the next big thing in literary circles. Lotería follows Luz Castillo, a girl who recounts the death of her family using a pack of lotería cards…
Eye of the Storm: Tales from Hurricane Ike
Former Houston Chronicle assistant managing editor for international coverage turned playwright Fernando Dovalina focuses on the aftermath of one of the most devastating natural disasters ever to hit the Gulf Coast in Eye of the Storm: Tales from Hurricane Ike. Some of the short plays and monologues have been produced…
Kerrelyn Sparks: Less Than a Gentleman
One of Houston’s most popular authors, Kerrelyn Sparks, signs and discusses her latest release, Less Than a Gentleman. Sparks, who is well known as a paranormal writer (she does lots of romantic comedy with vampires), began her career writing historical romance novels such as Less Than a Gentleman, which follows…
The Merry Widow
It’s a role once performed by Dame Margot Fonteyn — Hanna, the woman also known as The Merry Widow. For this production of the witty comedy by Houston Ballet, principal dancer Mireille Hassenboehler and former principal dancer Amy Fote share the role. (This is the last time Hassenboehler performs the…
Alice Rahon: The Black Bee (Alice Rahon: L’abeile noire)
Isolated as a child, artist/poet Alice Rahon faced a number of spirit-crushing challenges as an adult, including the death of her infant child and political repression during WWII. Little wonder Rahon, who emigrated from Europe to Mexico, found a friend in the similarly tortured, south-of-the-border surrealist, Frida Kahlo. While Kahlo…
Gulf Coast Magazine’s Reading Series
Gulf Coast Magazine’s Reading Series Poet Katie Condon has a busy weekend. She’s reading at LitFuse at Kaboom Books on Thursday, and on Friday she hits the mike at the Gulf Coast Magazine’s Reading Series at Rudyard’s British Pub. Condon is joined by poet J.S. (Jennifer) Lowe and Will Wilkinson,…
The Miro Quartet
Violinist William Fedkenheuer will be on a familiar stage when he performs with the Miro Quartet at Rice University’s Stude Concert Hall. Fedkenheuer studied at Rice’s acclaimed Shepherd School of Music. ”It’s such a privilege and pleasure to return to Houston, and especially to return to Stude Hall,” he tells…
7th Annual Russian Documentary Showcase in Texas: Images of Russia
Director Andrey Gryazev introduces the screening of his documentary Tomorrow during the 7th Annual Russian Documentary Showcase in Texas: Images of Russia film festival. Tomorrow follows Oleg “Thief” Vorotnikov and Natalia “Goat” Sokol, members of Voina (War), a provocative performance-art group in Russia. Gryazev captured the couple, famous for drawing…
Percival Everett: Percival Everett by Virgil Russell
Writer Percival Everett’s latest novel, Percival Everett by Virgil Russell, is a story inside a story inside a story. Among the intertwined characters is a man visiting his elderly father in a nursing home. The father writes the novel he imagines his son would write, if the son were to…
Harry Connick, Jr.
With three Grammy and two Emmy awards, along with two Tony nominations, to his credit, Harry Connick Jr. is equal parts serious musician, smooth showman and natural actor. He added philanthropist to his résumé with his efforts to help his hometown, New Orleans, after Hurricane Katrina. Connick’s latest album, Every…
