News Roundup: June 11, 2015

R.I.P., Ornette Coleman
From New York comes the sad news that jazz legend and Fort Worth native Ornette Coleman has died at the age of 85. The saxophonist attended Terrell High School and blazed trails in the bebop movement with his experimental approach to chords and harmonies. The title of his 1960 album Free Jazz coined a term for a whole new musical genre. In later life, he premiered the complete version of his work Skies of America with Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra in 1983 and won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for music with his album Sound Grammar. The musical giant surely helped determine the shape of jazz to come, so here’s a track from his early album by that name.

Upcoming Theater News
Summer means it’s time for our theater troupes to announce their seasons for the fall, so Jubilee Theatre put out their 2015-16 calendar yesterday. The schedule includes old favorite God’s Trombones, August Wilson’s Seven Guitars, and the Leiber-Stoller jukebox musical Smokey Joe’s Café, but it also includes a brand new musical for Christmas entitled Do You Hear What I Hear? Also, Casa Mañana announced its new season of childrens’ shows, which includes Stiles & Drewe’s showbiz take on The Three Little Pigs and culminates in a production of Seussical Jr. in April.

United Passions in Dallas
The international soccer scandal found its way to a movie theater in Frisco this past week when United Passions opened at the AMC Stonebriar, one of only 10 theaters in America that played the film. Produced by FIFA and released at a spectacularly bad time, the movie details the great works of now-disgraced FIFA president Sepp Blatter. The film has been roundly panned by critics as a piece of hagiographic propaganda, but it made headlines anyway when it grossed a grand total of $607 nationwide during its opening weekend. That’s somewhere between 50 and 100 people in the entire country paying their way in. That would be bad for a movie with a $2,900 budget, never mind the $29 million that FIFA sunk into it. Looks like schadenfreude or morbid fascination alone can’t generate an audience. Despite the movie playing in the town that FC Dallas calls home, a manager at the theater reported last night that the film had sold all of 9 tickets since last Friday. If you’re curious, the movie has what are sure to be its last shows at 3:45 and 8:00 today. Catch it before FIFA buries the thing out of embarrassment.

No Chocolate on This Menu
Dog-friendly restaurants seem to be on the rise, and now Bravo Cucina Italiana is joining the trend starting on June 20, when they offer a new menu just for dogs. The promotion is being launched in concert with a dog food drive. The Fort Worth restaurant is part of a Midwest-based chain of eateries, but the location on Hulen Street will be the only one offering a menu for our canine friends. Saturday middays, you can order salmon and vegetables, chicken and farro, or peanut butter and banana ice cream for your pooch.

“I Am Not Jessica Chastain…”
Bryce Dallas Howard takes her middle name from the fact that she was conceived in North Texas. She’s one of the stars of Jurassic World, which you can see at your local theater starting tonight. You’d expect endlessly likable co-star Chris Pratt to dominate the publicity run-up to the movie’s release, but Howard and fellow slender, red-haired, pale-skinned, 30-ish actress Jessica Chastain have stolen the show. First, Chastain tweeted this picture to clarify that she was not, in fact, starring in Jurassic World. Then yesterday, an Instagram video clip dropped of Howard lip-syncing a song lyric proclaiming that she is not Chastain. The audio is from a humorous YouTube song. The fact that the clip was put out by Chastain, who co-starred with Howard in The Help, makes the joke even funnier. We need to get these two a comedy where they play two sets of identical twins, and massive hijinks ensue.

And Finally…
While the Women’s World Cup is going on, USA’s men’s team has had a big week, recording first-ever road victories over Netherlands and Germany in friendly matches. Both games were decided by late goals from Bobby Wood. The striker currently plays for Erzgebirge Aue, a team that got relegated to the third tier of German soccer, but with his audition reel this week, look for him to move up. Here’s his cracker of a match-winner against the World Cup champions.