Although ostensibly a film, Carrington, about painter Dora Carrington (Emma Thompson) and her decades-long platonic love affair with writer Lytton Strachey (Jonathan Pryce), is pregnant with literary conceits: the nature of true love as spiritual, not physical; the interdependence of strong creative personalities; the anti-Victorian ethic of early bohemianism. The…
Nick of Time begins with the type of set-up that should be the makings of high drama: The young daughter of drab businessman Gene Watson (Johnny Depp) is kidnaped, and will be killed unless he assassinates the governor (Marsha Mason). The difference from any other movie is that this one…
thursday november 30 Webb Gallery: For anyone who finds the New York-based visual art establishment something of a well-organized scam, the proliferation of institutions like Waxahachie’s Webb Gallery is not only a relief, but a rescue from artificial, trend-driven ideas of creativity. This weekend, the Webb Gallery hosts a pair…
Goethe is one of those heavyweight writers (mostly Russian or German) who everyone admires but who no one reads. In fact, in these post-literate times, you can now get into Mensa just by being able to pronounce Goethe’s name correctly. You no longer have to study Cliffs Notes on Faust,…
Remember last year when Time and Newsweek both decided to put Marriage on the cover? Marriage Is Back! Marriage Is Groovy! People are Getting Married! And then you read through these articles to try to figure out what the heck they were talkin’ about, and they said things like, “Lewis…
For a film critic to react negatively to the beloved renaissance of Walt Disney animation is something akin to a Catholic priest criticizing Jesus’ personal hygiene–it just ain’t done. Indeed, it’s almost a waste of time (and since we all may be working for that corporate juggernaut in the next…
What can you say about James Bond that hasn’t already been said about Ted Bundy? He’s charming and reckless, well-traveled and intelligent, but half the women he sleeps with end up dead. Sure, Bundy doesn’t have the same beach-boy good looks, but a fast car and $3,000 tux tend to…
In Milton’s Paradise Lost, as God casts him out of paradise, Lucifer declares, “Better to reign in hell than serve in heav’n,” a sentiment not unlike ones expressed by the vicious lowlifes that infest Martin Scorsese’s brilliant new film, Casino. The idea of going legitimate–at least the way normal people…
thursday november 23 Save the Turkey: Stop complaining about all the fat calories in delicious food and do something about it, if you must–removing animal flesh from your diet will go a long way toward improving your health. This is true, based on all available medical data, but it’s not…
The commissioner of the NFL, Paul Tagliabue, was holding a formal press conference downstairs. The pain in the butt of the NFL was holding an impromptu press conference upstairs–in a hallway at the D-FW Airport Hilton. Only about seven reporters were in attendance. But some worked for very big and…
With Ohio Tip-Off, the Dallas Theater Center takes aim at the merry dance of dreams and commerce that is professional sports. Unfortunately, it puts up an air ball. The play takes for its subject the Ohio Shakers, a team mired in the recesses of the downscale Continental Basketball Association. The…
The 41-year-old Taiwanese-born director Ang Lee has been granted a rare international honor–unanimous box-office approval from audiences who don’t often mix. His second feature, 1993’s The Wedding Banquet, became one of the highest-grossing indie films ever made, and also became a beloved cult treasure that crossed gender, sexual, and ethnic…
The first time I saw Annette Bening was in Valmont, Milos Forman’s adaptation of Les Liaisons Dangereuses. She played Madame de Merteuil, a part portrayed the previous year by Glenn Close in Dangerous Liaisons. Both actresses gave terrific performances, although they couldn’t have interpreted the role more differently: where Close’s…
How do you spot the people in the office who are indulging in Happy-Hour Nookie? Of course, we all know the answer to that one: The ones who never speak to each other in the office. The reason you can’t talk in the office if you’re in the middle of…
thursday november 16 Birthday Benefit Bash For The Word: If you have any doubt that Dallas has a spoken-word it can be proud of, just attend the Birthday Benefit Bash for The Word, the locally published monthly guide to performance venues in Dallas. To celebrate the first birthday of The…
“Back in the old days,” Chuck Carson, MC of the first annual Leon Rabin Awards was saying to a well-coiffed crowd, “Dallasites used to show their displeasure with a play by torching the theater. Now, we just don’t go.” Carson, a Dallas native and professional wiseacre, put his thumb on…
Why do all the famous museum nudes lack female genitalia? No matter how meticulously drawn the breasts, the elbow, the little toe, each nude coyly protects her external reproductive organs with tightly crossed legs, a hand or a strategically draped sheet, or perhaps a swatch of long hair. Even Edouard…
If you aren’t already familiar with the sound a Theremin makes, I’m not sure I can describe it to you. The Theremin was the first electronic musical instrument, and its eerie, plaintive squeal approximates a tone somewhere between a violin, a kazoo, and controlled microphone feedback. Because it has one…
The voice that comes across the phone line from New York City is fearlessly confident and authoritative–except when it becomes agitated or passionate about a certain point. At that moment, Agnieszka Holland’s language begins to speed up and she’s wont to stutter or repeat herself. Either way, her elegant Eastern…
Is it my imagination, or are there a whole lot of little kids gettin’ medicated every day? I hear about this drug Ritalin all the time. “Yeah, my kid’s on Ritalin. He was so hyperactive we had to give it to him to calm him down.” And you go: “Wow!…
thursday november 9 David Hume Kennerly: Photojournalism gets closer to being an art form than almost any other discipline in the wide field of journalism, if you define “art” as an expression that goes straight for your emotions and doesn’t let go. You’d have to hold most professional writers at…
There are as many ways of looking at death as there are ways to die, and eventually we all have to pick the way that suits us best. Spanish playwright Alejandro Casona tinkers with this idea in The Lady of the Dawn, a spooky drama that fits the crepe and…
