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Theater Critic Picks

These are the 6 can't-miss shows in Dallas-Fort Worth theater for May

Lindsey Wilson
May 7, 2021 | 11:56 am
Ghosts in the Kitchen: Idle Spirit
Idle Spirit, written by and starring Justin Locklear, is the next installment of Ochre House Theater's Ghosts in the Kitchen.
Photo courtesy of Ochre House Theater

From site-specific to on your TV screen, there's lots of new work to be enjoyed this month. But if you're feeling nostalgic, there are also two more familiar titles — though they are polar opposites in terms of content (witches versus Jesus).

Here are six local shows to watch this month:

DESmodernidad
Teatro Dallas, May 7
Christian Cruz's site-specific performance is inspired by Mexican Consul Francisco de la Torre’s quote, “We will build bridges, not walls.” Featuring her “Grito de Orgullo Choir,” Cruz will create a modern day ceremony to celebrate one another. The performance takes place in the parking lot of the Mexican Consulate (1210 River Bend Dr. in Dallas).

Odes for a World In Search of Joy
Amphibian Stage, streaming now
Inspired by Pablo Neruda’s Odes to Common Things, Amphibian Stage has commissioned Texas artists of all disciplines to create performance works that celebrate simple, human-made objects. These short films include music, movement, animation, and more as the creators rediscover the beauty of not-so-ordinary trinkets, baubles, and tools.

Ghosts in the Kitchen: Idle Spirit
Ochre House Theatre, streaming May 6-16
The avant garde Deep Ellum troupe has created a new series of storytelling through virtual theater, as written and told by core company members Carla Parker, Justin Locklear, Kevin Grammer, and Matthew Posey, filmed and directed by Josh Jordan, and with music by Locklear and Sarah Rubio-Rogerson. Next up is Idle Spirit, written and performed by Locklear, an engaging story of a man in a kitchen full of telephones, seeking voices of affirmation and understanding to end his surreal crisis of identity.

Cotton Patch Gospel
The Firehouse Theatre, May 7-23
Based on the book The Cotton Patch Version of Matthew and John by Clarence Jordan, Cotton Patch Gospel is presented in a setting of rural Georgia with country music songs, the final and perhaps best work of Harry Chapin. As this Gospel begins, they sing that "Somethin's a-brewin' in Gainesville." Herod is the mayor of Atlanta and, inevitably, Christ is killed by locals only to rise again. The production will be held outdoors in The Firehouse Theatre backlot.

Bell, Book, and Candle
Mainstage Irving-Las Colinas, streaming May 7-22
In a world where witches can’t fall in love, Gillian Holroyd complicates her situation by casting a spell over Shepherd Henderson out of spite. When he falls head over heels in love with her, Gillian must choose whether to love a mortal, or lose him entirely. This successful play from the 1950s inspired the popular television show Bewitched.

The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria
Fort Worth Community Arts Center, May 7-28
This play by Fernando Arrabal challenges the audience's notion that ethics and justice are undermined by human weakness, as the main character imparts the notion of morality in an attempt to "civilize" the sole inhabitant of a desert island. The production will take place outdoors in the shaded circle drive in front of the Fort Worth Community Arts Center.

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GIFTED AND TALENTED

SMU historian Ariel Ron wins prestigious $800k MacArthur genius grant

Brandon Watson
Oct 2, 2026 | 10:36 am
Ariel Ron
Photo courtesy of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
SMU historian Ariel Ron will receive $800,000 — no strings attached.

Three Texans have been named 2026 MacArthur Fellows, one of the most prestigious honors in the U.S. for artists, scientists, and scholars. Among them is Dallas historian and author Ariel Ron, who directs the Clements Center for Southwest Studies at Southern Methodist University.

San Antonio's Vincent Valdez and San Marcos-based anthropologist Kate Spradley were also on the 2026 list of 20 recipients of the “genius grants” given by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Each fellow will receive $800,000 over five years, with no strings attached.

Individuals do not apply for the honor. The grants are awarded via a confidential, multi-step process managed by the foundation, and many recipients express surprise that they were considered for the fellowship.

“While individuals will have a track record of significant achievement, the fellowship is not a lifetime achievement award — it is an investment in a person's originality, insight, and potential,” wrote MacArthur on its website. “The Fellows Program is proactively working to foster and enable innovative, imaginative, and ground-breaking ideas, thinking, and strategies.”

Ron's research focuses on how Northern agriculture shaped economic growth and federal power in 19th-century America. Grassroots Leviathan: Agricultural Reform and the Rural North in the Slaveholding Republic, his 2020 book, challenges the notion of an industrial North versus an agrarian South.

"My approach is to identify and look carefully at things that everyone knows to be important but are somehow too obvious-seeming to look at closely," Ron says in a video on the MacArthur Foundation's website. "If you scratch the surface a little bit, you discover that there are a lot of interesting things that might change the way we think about bigger questions."

Valdez, who splits his time between San Antonio and Houston, is known for large, hyperrealistic drawings and paintings of Mexican American life. More recently, he has turned his focus to broader sociopolitical issues in works like The Strangest Fruit, a series of paintings confronting the lynching of Latinos.

At Texas State University in San Marcos, forensic anthropologist Spradley founded Operation Identification in 2013 — a program that identifies and repatriates the remains of migrants who died along the Texas-Mexico border. She is also a cofounder of the Forensic Border Coalition, which pushes for policy changes at the local and national levels. Spradley is the school’s first MacArthur Fellow.

A full list of the 2026 MacArthur Fellows can be found online.

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