Headline: Situation Wanted by Evan SmithThe revolving door between politics and the media is swinging furiously in New York and Washington, D.C., so why should it be any different in Austin? In this year’s race for attorney general, for instance, the major party candidates have hired journalists as their spokespersons:
Reviewing Texas movies; saluting our flag.
An Austinite’s aquatic adventure.
A filmmaker’s long view of Longview
A widower’s search for justice
If the Dallas Cowboys thought last season was unpleasant, wait until they open training camp in Wichita Falls.
BASEBALL’S ROGERS HORNSBY was a success right off the bat. In 1916, at age twenty, he became the leading hitter for the St. Louis Cardinals. His 1924 batting average of .424 is still the best of the modern era (and his lifetime .358 is second only to Ty Cobb’s .367).
Borgnine: The word itself is barrel-chested, glaring, grotesque. And has a name ever been so suggestive of a face? Known for cinematic classics like From Here to Eternity and Marty (for which he won an Academy award in 1955), Ernest Borgnine last worked in Texas in the mid-fifties, when he
His mentor, Sam Cooke, is long dead, but Dallas’ Johnnie Taylor is alive and well and still living at the top of the charts.
Gary Mauro’s bad spell.
In ten years as a professional photographer for publications like the New York Times, Vanity Fair, and Texas Monthly, Danny Turner has shot his share of heavyweight politicians, from Al Gore to Ann Richards, and they have often been tough to shoot. “Sometimes you can only take as good a
Hot CDsInevitable baggage accompanies an album whose sessions splintered a great band, ousted three producers, and outlasted a record company. But if ex-Austinite Lucinda Williams is a paragon of self-doubt, she’s also a gifted writer who gets to the core of a character in the course of a three-minute tune.
These twelve Texas artisans herald the victory of man over machine, carefully crafting wood, metal, or stone into items for your home and hearth that are tomorrow’s heirlooms today.
Since I started taking Viagra, I have had the time of my life. You can too—but there’s more to romance than a little blue pill.
In the suddenly trendy world of World War II wannabes, these Texans are big guns.
The East Texas native was the most prolific drug dealer of his generation. Now he’s in jail for life, but he says he’s freer than ever.
He’s the front-runner even before he has officially entered the race, but sky-high expectations are the least of the obstacles George W. Bush faces in his quest for the White House.
They could be Texas’ own Spice Girls—if that’s what they wanted. Destiny’s Child, the vocal quartet from Houston, clearly has what it takes to make hit records: This spring, their song “No, No, No” reached number one on Billboard’s Hot 100 Singles chart. But unlike the “Prefab Five,” as wags
When I was five, my family got a television, and it was like a meteorite had landed on the farm. That’s when I knew I wanted to be in show business, but I had to keep it a secret because you couldn’t tell people that. My school had this talent
Houston’s J.P. Bryan is remaking a West Texas town into what could be the next Taos—and for some locals, that’s a mixed blessing.
The Honorable Lee P. Brown Mayor of HoustonHouston, TexasDear Mayor Brown,THANKS AGAIN FOR SEEING ME the other day. I’m always happy to have a reason to go to Houston City Hall. It’s not much to look at from the outside, but inside it’s one of my favorite
Texas is filled with giants in the science-fiction field these days, but none loom larger than Bruce Sterling and Michael Moorcock.
Houston goes to the dogs—and we mean that in a good way. Plus: Jerry Seinfeld (perhaps you’ve heard of him) in San Antonio; pride of a country legend in Fort Worth; nature on display in Dallas; crossed swords in Austin.THE MAIN EVENTBow Wow The dog days are coming to Houston—and
In suburban Fort Worth the frail psyche of a football prodigy collided with the crazed ambition of his dad, who himself had been a high school football star way back when. The consequences were deadly.
AS IF TEXAS Democrats didn’t have enough trouble, the state party is losing one chairman (incumbent Bill White) and not getting another (uncandidate Cecile Richards, daughter of Ann) because both wanted to spend more time with their families. White, who describes himself as “not all that partisan—I prefer to find
When Austinite Paul Carrozza says he doesn’t like a running shoe, the shoe companies listen- and so do hordes of running enthusiasts in Texas and around the country, who know him to be the sport’s newest guru.
Singing Willie Nelson's praises; neddling a former drug user.
Things get woolly for the state’s mohair producers.
UT’s writing program achieves Texas-size success.
A River Oaks bookie is tried for murder.
The poor quality of health care in the state’s penal system is enough to make you sick. Plus: Inside Tex Moncrief’s IRS mess; a River Oaks bookie is tried for murder; UT’s writing program achieves Texas-size success; and things get woolly for thestate’s mohair producers.
Why was the former governor Pa Ferguson nicknamed Farmer Jim?
Inside Tex Moncrief’s IRS mess.
BILL WITTLIFF IS A RENAISSANCE hombre. An author, a publisher, a film producer, and an arts patron, the longtime Austinite is best known for his screenplays, including The Black Stallion, Raggedy Man, Legends of the Fall, and Lonesome Dove; his adaptation of the latter revived both the miniseries and the
Hot CDs and Hot Books
The first commandment of fiction writing is: Show, don’t tell. Rick Bass knows it well, though he still struggled through many drafts before finishing his first novel, Where the Sea Used to Be (Houghton Mifflin, $25), which will be published this month. “Paint the images and trust the readers to
Even by South Texas standards, the undoing of Starr County sheriff Eugenio Falcón, Jr., was one for the books.
To say he’s the strong, silent type is something of an understatement. Unlike most baseball stars, Texas Ranger Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez is all action and no talk—and that makes him one of the game’s real gems.
Ten years after the filming of the miniseries Lonesome Dove, screenwriter Bill Wittliff shares his photographic memories of life on the set.
The birds of High Island. The wilderness of Matagorda Island. The untamed beach of Boca Chica. These and other hidden treasures await you-if you know where to look.
Can a wunderkind pitcher—the youngest player in the majors this season—lead long-suffering Chicago Cubs fans to the World Series? Maybe, but if 21-year-old Kerry Wood is flattered by the hope, he’s weary of the hype. “I wasn’t expecting to be moved up so quickly,” says the Irving native, who was
I THINK I GOT interested in writing when I was in the fifth grade. I started writing short stories, and I remember wanting to get them published in the Saturday Evening Post. In high school I wrote a lot of poetry, but I wasn’t a good student; I think I
The man who runs Continental Airlines is a rough-and-tumble Navy ex who talks more like a maintenance man than a corporate chief-but Gordon Bethune knows what he’s doing, and he gets results.
Crime in Mexico hits home.
SUNBURNED AND HUNGRY after a day of tubing down the Guadalupe, you head back to Austin for dinner at one of your favorite Tex-Mex restaurants—a garish, festive joint called Chuy’s. You are seated and slurping on a margarita when you spot a striking man in a nearby booth. A little
What a hall! The Houston Museum of Natural Science’s new wing has a mask of a pre-Inca lord, a re-creation of a Mayan temple, and more. Plus: An international opera star takes the stage in Fort Worth; boxer Oscar De La Hoya goes round and round in El Paso; the
I wanted to see lightning strike the steel rods that artist Walter De Maria installed in a New Mexico field. I didn’t, but the trip was still illuminating.
Flag Poll Which state has the best—and best-known—banner? Texas, of course.
Plano’s Steve Harvey has been a successful comedian for years. Now he’s a sitcom star too.
How serious is the fight by suburbs to limit the annexation power of cities? It’s become a matter of life and death. In Kingwood, which was recently swallowed by Houston, opponents of annexation are blaming several deaths in the area on slow response time by Houston ambulances. Annexation is also
