Another Summer Rerun
Magnolia Ellis is downright bored with widowhood. She has buried two husbands and is living quite well, thank you very much, off their insurance money. Still, Magnolia wants a man. To reach this lofty goal, she decides to throw a cozy little shindig for four of the town’s richest bachelors…
The Durian Dare
The waitress puts a Heineken and a tall pilsner glass full of ice in front of me, and I pour the beer over the rocks. My brother Scott rolls his eyes. “Since when do you drink beer on the rocks?” he wants to know. I explain that the first time…
Down ‘n’ Dirty
It’s a wonder Jennifer Wood ever choreographs anything. According to her own press release, she’s constantly battling her fears that the audience will think she’s boring, conventional, tasteless, dumb, flippant, self-serious and not well rehearsed. In reality, Wood is none of these things, and if that needed proving, her latest…
Rock and Ruin
In its day, Westbury Square was more than a strip center, it was an attraction. In the late ’60s and early ’70s, it was the kind of place where Houstonians would bring visiting relatives to stroll amid the fountains and piazzas and faux-Italian Renaissance splendor. Today, what little is left…
The War Within
Houston police Captain Mark Aguirre fights his battles on many fronts.From a battered office in the aging depths of the South Central Division’s headquarters, under the large “Don’t Tread on Me” flag that dominates one cheaply paneled wall, the stocky 45-year-old oversees 18 square miles of the city. About 90,000…
Smoke and Steel
There’s a certain truism that every fifth-grader knows: If you have talent and work hard, you’ll be a great success in your chosen field. But just like other myths (Washington chopped down a cherry tree, the Civil War was about only slavery, J. Edgar Hoover wore nothing but business suits),…
The Last Stand
Employees of Globe News were used to a colorful crowd slipping inside the small one-story building on the edge of downtown, right by the Pierce Elevated and not far from the Greyhound bus station. Everyone from well-heeled professionals on lunch breaks to homeless people getting out of the rain browsed…
Smoke Damage
Yes, there was a small fire at No tsu oH late on the night of June 12. And yes, the Houston Fire Department has shut down the king-hell funky coffee shop/chess club/music venue/art gallery/playhouse and cut off its electricity. That much of the word on the street is true. What’s…
Poodle Pact
The past few years, 19th Street Association merchants had prided themselves on their unique promotional events. They hosted a New Orleans-style street party to draw people to their “anti-strip center,” an eclectic combination of decades-old antique stores, hip art galleries and ethnocentric gift shops. Previous festivals had brought art cars,…
Prague-nosis: Terminal
John Yeager has the best memories.The former Prague general manager remembers the time when a crowd of people gathered around a stall in the club’s infamous unisex restrooms (“blow-job bays,” they were often called) to feast their eyes on a pair of butt cheeks pressed up against the glass door…
From the Grass Roots Up
During the hard-fought Houston mayoral contest last year, Craig Varoga, campaign manager for incumbent Lee P. Brown, took several pages from a New York Times analysis of the 2000 census and pinned them to his office wall. They displayed maps and figures that contained a pointed political reminder for the…
Usher
If success were defined by sheer arrogance, then pop/soul superstar Usher Raymond would be as famous as Michael Jackson, the artist he emulates. This boy must’ve come out the womb struttin’ and swaggerin’. And how could he not think he’s the shit with the backup he’s had over the years?…
Million-Dollar Babies
The Houston Independent School District has been keeping children in the alternative schools run by a private company months, even years, after they should have been returned to their home schools, according to a Texas Education Agency investigation. They have been retained in the program operated by Community Education Partners…
Superjoint Ritual
Heavy metal titans Pantera may be on hiatus, but Superjoint Ritual is further proof that singer Philip Anselmo is beyond driven. As the leader of eight lesser-known bands, Pantera’s Anselmo keeps a punishing pace. Not waiting to exhale after taking his underground supergroup Down through select clubs on the way…
Gay Ride
Missed San Antonio’s Fiesta? Didn’t make it to Galveston’s Mardi Gras? No problem. But make sure you’re ready to stake your lawn chair on Westheimer and catch the biggest nighttime Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual & Transgender Pride Parade this side of Australia. “We were the first nighttime pride parade in the…
Popsy
The success of Limp Bizkit, SoCal rap-metallurgists P.O.D. and schlock-hopper Kid Rock has spawned a horde of fledgling bands that aspire to make in a month’s worth of gigging what Fred Durst spends every week on room service. A Metroplex entrant in this race is Popsy, a sextet that includes…
Fair Play
“Houston is a big-league-ball city,” says Gene Elston, baseball historian and author of A Stitch in Time: A Baseball Chronology. “But it’s not a St. Louis…The best franchises in the game today are Boston, St. Louis and Los Angeles.” Elston knows whereof he speaks. He’s a former broadcaster for the…
Vans Warped Tour
Punk, the soundtrack of American suburbia. From Broward County, Florida, to Orange County, California, two-car garages next to manicured lawns shake with the distorted guitars, screamed vocals and smashed cymbals of a genre that so long ago was reserved for the piss-reeking urban blights of London and New York. And…
South Park Shocker
South Park Shocker What about the priests? The account of Carlos Coy, the “South Park Monster” [by John Nova Lomax, June 6] and his sexual abuse of young girls was superbly written. The sad, sordid story was objectively presented. It is also a dramatic contrast to the scandal of the…
Joe McPhee’s Trio X
Joe McPhee might not turn up alongside John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders and Ornette Coleman on the average jazz fan’s top ten list, but then he’s not your average player. A multi-instrumentalist improviser who’s best known for his tenor sax and trumpet work, McPhee took the avant-garde to new, more respectable…
Chip Off the Old Block
When it comes to food, there are three things any self-respecting Englishman will search for no matter where in the world he finds himself: a good curry, a pint of bitter and a plate of fish and chips. While Baker St. Pub & Grill (5510 Morningside, 713-942-9900) doesn’t serve curry,…
De La Soul
Although their future as signed, sealed and delivered recording artists is up in the air (the shutdown of Tommy Boy last February left them free agents), it’s still a kick to see the first hip-hoppers who proved you could flow on samples from Steely Dan, the Turtles and Hall &…
Mary J. Blige
Well, she’s not doing press interviews to promote her upcoming stop in Houston — the second one this year — but we won’t hold that against her. Besides, the gal is still such an incendiary and talented performer (remember her performance at this year’s Grammys?) that we wouldn’t mind if…
Dirty Deeds
Talk about trading down: Adam Sandler stands in for Gary Cooper, Winona Ryder for Jean Arthur, screenwriter Tim Herlihy (The Waterboy, Billy Madison) for Robert Riskin (It Happened One Night, Meet John Doe) and director Steven Brill (Little Nicky) for the immortal Frank Capra. The mind reels at the possibilities…
Language Lessons
To call a movie the most accessible Dogme 95 film ever made is not merely damning with faint praise. It also threatens to alienate the two segments of the population that might consider going to see such a film in the first place: fans of the back-to-basics, no-frills-of-any-kind Danish filmmaking…
The Scavengers
Job perks are the primary reason artists are willing to endure penury as employees of the Museum of Fine Arts. They aren’t perks in the traditional sense: Nobody is getting a company car, but fuel for ideas is abundant. Scott Calhoun’s eclectic collaged paintings grow directly out of his day…