Which means she's an expert at reading bovine body language, and that makes her, at the absurdly young age of thirteen—only four years after overcoming her fear of horses—one of the world's best practitioners of the art of cutting.
POW! Funny that during the winter, when Austin’s famous colony of Mexican free-tailed bats has migrated to Mexico, allusions to the chiropterans take wing. On January 8, the Alamo Drafthouse, in Austin, will screen the original 1966 Batman movie, starring Adam West and Burt Ward. The Alamo hopes to show
Joe Moore reflects upon truth, justice, and Tulia.
YOU DON’T KNOW DIDDLEY Seventy-four-year-old Bo Diddley, whose innovative rhythms have inspired generations of rockers, will be performing December 27 at Gilley’s in Dallas.What are you doing these days?I’m working. Doing my good old clean rock and roll. I’m putting together this song now with one of my granddaughters called
DON’T STOP BELIEVING Usually everyone is so busy trying to avoid the crowds during the holidays that we forget to sit back and enjoy the season. This time around, we invite you to embrace the clichés—see the lights, drink eggnog, listen to “Jingle Bells” over and over again. And one
YOUNG BUCK Satirist Christopher Buckley will be speaking November 3 at the Celebration of Reading in Dallas.First of all, I hear your power is out in Washington. Are all the phones working? We have phones but no electricity, so we’re essentially back to the days before answering machines, which may
BRIGHT WEITZ With his brother, Chris, 38-year-old Paul Weitz has co-directed or co-written such Hollywood blockbusters as American Pie, Antz, and About a Boy. The two will be panelists at the Austin Film Festival, which runs October 9-12.You have an extensive filmography for your age. Are you a workaholic or
THINK SMALL Edward Hopper is known for his lonely scenes of the American cityscape, not his Impressionistic images of France. So when “Edward Hopper: The Paris Years” opens on October 16, the location may strike you as fittingly incongruous: the Tyler Museum of Art (it isn’t every day that a
SUPER MODEL Jerry Hall will be performing the role of Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate September 1721 in Austin and September 23October 5 in Houston. Was modeling your first job? Did you ever have to sell shoes or anything like that? Yeah, I worked at the Dairy Queen and Wyatt’s
TAKE IT OUTSIDE There’s almost no substitute for an Austin City Limits taping. For starters, it’s free. Throw in the gratis drinks, the intimate setting, and the impressive acts, and it can’t be beat as a night on the town, even if the show is recorded on a studio set
If you've ever thought of donating your body to science, read what happened at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galvestonand then ask yourself if a good, old-fashioned burial might not be a better idea.
Photographer Kenny Braun has been surfing the Gulf Coast for about thirty years. So naturally, when the water's just right, he grabs his . . . camera.
FOR THE GOOD TIMES Singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson will be inducted by Willie Nelson into the Texas Country Music Hall of Fame in Carthage on August 16. I’ve always thought that Hawaii has a lot in common with Texas. My old friends always say I’ve gone back home. Oh, yeah?
IT’S NOT THE HEAT, IT’S THE ECCENTRICITY If you’re the type of person who gets tired of festivals in which the highlight is a parade of Shriners in small cars, mark the weekend of July 25, when a few events around the state promise to be a little different. Take
AQUI ESTAMOS Latino culture flits on and off the general public’s radar screen, but in Texas, it’s a constant, with a highly visible arts scene. This month there are a few noteworthy events that you won’t want to miss. July 15—September 21: San Antonio’s McNay Art Museum opens “Fantastic Zoology:
FREE FOR ALL On June 19 Texans will be celebrating the end of slavery in our state. It was on that day, back in 1865, that Union major general Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston and pronounced that the institution of slavery was dead. Ever since, various Juneteenth festivities—from historical to
REVELATIONS For more than thirty years the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center has stood on a corner of the UT-Austin campus like a colossal intellectual tease. You could go into the center and ask to see a specific item—say, Charles Baudelaire’s original proof sheets of Les Litanies de Satan (with
Unless otherwise noted, all places take credit cards.ABILENE: Harold’s Pit Bar-B-Q We didn’t catch pitmaster Harold Christian singing gospel songs to his customers, but we’re told that isn’t an unusual occurrence. This cozy little room, packed with nine picnic tables, seven booths, and a congregation of athletic trophies, is where
EASY RIDERS Bulletin: Lance Armstrong’s Ride for the Roses has been moved from April to October (the Sports Illustrated 2002 sportsman of the year wanted more time to train for the Tour de France). But don’t think that means you have a license to lounge around for a little while
THREE-DAY PASS This month the “most promising weekend” award belongs to Dallas March 21 through 23. On Friday, stop by the sixteenth annual Dallas Video Festival, which, over the course of the weekend, will premiere playwright Octavio Solis’ Prospect Avenue, showcase a juried compilation of short films and videos by
LADIES ONLY Recently, Ruby Nelda Perez, a locally popular San Antonio performance artist, tried to describe Rosita, the Latina restaurant owner who is the sole character in Perez’s one-woman show, Doña Rosita’s Jalapeño Kitchen. “I think she’s a combination of women I’d like to be, women I am, women I
Edited by Katy Vine and Eileen Schwartz
How I got from the Fifth Ward to the Ivy League.
They're ready for their close-up; are we? Our writer prejudges the thousands of celebrity wannabes at Austin's American Idol tryouts.
PLANE TO SEE Despite claims from folks in East Texas that a Pittsburg preacher named Burrell Cannon created the first operational aircraft in 1902 (see “Two Wings and a Prayer”), Austin’s Centennial of Flight Celebration observes the Wright brothers’ December 1903 takeoff. Even so, the commemorative event, held on January
GIMME SHELTER This month, as various towns across the state stage Las Posadas processions, in which actors portraying Mary and Joseph reenact the biblical couple’s search for shelter, directors will be challenged with the question of casting. This year McAllen, which hosts the largest production in the state, marks its
TELL IT LIKE IT IS Aaron Neville will be the featured performer at the Mayor’s Official Houston Holiday Celebration in the Bayou City December 6. His newest record, Believe, will be released in January. What is the most dramatic change you have seen in music over the years? I guess
ATTENTION, SHOPPERS No doubt, holiday consumers who turn a sickly green upon hearing the word “mall” will search desperately this month for alternatives to the slew of chain stores. Some people will test their artistic capacities by creating their offerings; some will purchase presents online. Still others—thousands, we are told—will
THE HARD CELL Beaumont has the Texas Energy Museum and Kingsville has the King Ranch Museum. Likewise, Huntsville promotes its industry—incarceration—with the Texas Prison Museum. Since 1989 museum visitors have surveyed exhibits dedicated to prison art, contraband, and capital punishment, gawking at the decommissioned electric chair Old Sparky along the
COMING ATTRACTIONS For thirty years El Pasoan Willie Varela has been best known for his avant-garde super 8 films. This month, however, the 52-year-old debuts his other artistic undertakings. On October 31 the El Paso Museum of Art and the UT-El Paso Fox Fine Arts Center open a two-part exhibit,
WORD FOR WORD Ogden Nash once wrote, “I’m so full/Of Holy Texas/I’ll be hallowed ground/When they annex us.” Nash never lived in Texas, but his papers are permanent residents at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at UT-Austin. You can examine the comic poet’s original manuscripts, letters, drawings, and photographs
Children of all ages! Step right up and get to know a South Texas clan whose nomadic way of life is a link to the past.
THE GREAT INDOORS Kids’ late-summer doldrums usually leave them particularly restless. They become prone to manic behavior—fads flourish, fixations blossom, expectations intensify. But as any well-informed individual between the ages of five and ten knows, nothing is more anticipated this month than the premiere of Spy Kids 2: The Island
LORDS OF THE RINGS Remarkably, you’ll be able to witness a ringmaster get eaten by a lion this month. M. C. Bot, a mechanical master of ceremonies, will meet his fate via mechanical lion Max Fang in the Space Center Houston’s latest exhibit, “Robot Circus,” which features a choreographed catastrophic
Having Their Say The 2000 U.S. census indicated that Hispanics make up 12.5 percent of the population, yet Hispanics make up only 2 percent of prime-time television characters, with stories spotlighting contemporary Mexican American families and neighborhoods remaining dreadfully few and far between. More and more, though, Texas audiences are
Rare books, blueberry pie, a faith healer's shrineand one deep hole.
The Awakening Unlike Houston, whose thriving art market allows its artists to live in the Bayou City and sell globally, Austin has always had a tough time cultivating a reputation with dealers as a serious visual-art town. Before the high-tech economic boom, Austin artists complained that nobody bought art in
