The Walt Disney Company plans to open a advertising research lab in Austin by the end of the year....

They Might Be Giants have been making music as a band since 1982. Their odd but endearing mix of accordian, saxophone, and guitars coupled with witty lyrics earned them a huge college radio following from the mid-80's on. Songs like "Don't Let's Start" and "Birdhouse In Your Soul" even became hits, and the duo toured and recorded ad infinitum. A second chapter of their story is quite unusual: TMBG are now famous in children's circles. In 2002, the group released "No!", a kids record they had recorded years earlier for fun. The record was a surprise smash, leading to deals with both Disney for a series of children's music CD's and Simon and Schuster for the CD + book Bed, Bed, Bed (which also features a pre-Juno Kimya Dawson). Having conquered the grownups and the kids, They Might Be Giants have also become in-demand composers for TV, doing the themes for "Malcolm In The Middle", "The Daily Show", and even some Dunkin' Donuts ads. We're unsure when the group sleeps, because they seem to be awfully prolific. ...

While this presentation of the show— put on by Zach Scott Theater Center and directed by Dave Steakley (also the Artistic Director of ZSTC)— features sets, language and costumes true to the original show, there is heartbreaking scene during which, without actually speaking to a change in time and geography, Steakley evokes Katrina-battered New Orleans. He manages this by stranding those characters that survive a brutal storm on rooftops, clinging to each other and praying for help while a dry-ice fog rolls out into the spacious music hall, enveloping the audience and breaking down the fourth wall....

Photo by Aubrey Edwards The Octopus Project with Horse+Donkey and Cue at Emo’sFriday, November 16Emos (603 Red River St)Outside, Doors at 8 p.m., Show at 10 p.m., [info]The Octopus Project have recently been galloping across the country, showing off the material from their new album, Hello, Avalance, out on Peek-a-Boo records. Tonight, however, the gang's back in Austin to wrap up the tour with a hometown show at Emo's. The new album sounds a bit......

Photo by Lex in the City on FlickrSouth south Austin (we're talking Brodie and 290 South) is home to big box stores and mega-outlets, so when we heard about a new chain restaurant going in called BJ's Brewhouse, we weren't exactly vibrating with excitement. But the thing is, the food is surprisingly good, and if you can ignore the Cheesecake Factory vibe and the Disney-fication of America (and that's a BIG if), you can enjoy......

Just hours before venerable Hoboken indie rock institution Yo La Tengo descend upon The Parish on September 17th, they'll be all up in your Alamo as part of the Alamo's Cinema Under the Influence Series. In a dazzlingly cross-referency evening, Yo La Tengo will present Four Flies on Grey Velvet, the Dario Argento flick that most influenced them as a band. Also on the bill is Cockaboody, an animated film drawn by YLT drummer......

The Senate stayed up all night to debate the troop withdrawal, and all we got was this lousy no-vote. Some killjoy put the Harry Potter ending up on the Web. In Wisconsin, it took fifty rescuers to pull a 500-lb man out of a river. What was he doing there? Tubing. Obviously. Springfield, VT gets ready for its closeup. Proof that Disney makes you crazy. (The Teacup Ride? Was that really worth it?)......

Absolutely nothing, but they're all part of a Halloween-style flash mob being planned for this Saturday, May 5th, in Georgetown. Equal parts bizarre spectacle and fodder for a film to be submitted to AFF next year, the Cinco de Mayo flash mob will take place at a youth championship soccer game. Thus far, they've already convinced a pair of unicyclists, "some" local media, and a mariachi band to come. They're hoping to get at least......

You may not know it, but you've loved Fred MacMurray since childhood. Like the early careers of Kurt Russell and Jodie Foster, MacMurray was perhaps best known as a Disney contract player for his work in films like "The Absent-Minded Professor" and "The Shaggy Dog." But there's an impressive darker side to MacMurray's acting that can only be seen in his films with auteur Billy Wilder. Last year, Fred's daughter Kate MacMurray presented the noir......

We had a chance to check out The Lion King at Bass Concert Hall this past weekend, and we're pleased to admit that it exceeded even the high expectations our friends and colleagues had set for us. The musical adaptation of Disney's 1994 animated hit follows the same storyline and brings back most, if not all, of the original soundtrack, with a smattering of new songs inserted throughout. While most of the cast held......

Less than two weeks remain before UT Performing Arts Center officially begins its limited run of Lion King, and crews at Bass Concert Hall are working feverishly to complete the interior renovations. Two hundred seats have been removed from the venue, which normally holds nearly 3,000 people, to make room for the grand opening processional, putting the audience right in the middle of the action. The critically acclaimed, Tony award winning Broadway adaptation of......

Overheard at Austin High: Like, holy crap, guys. OMG! LYLAS! Listen up! Jenny told Tommy that Marcy told Lucy that Genie let Sally read Susie Tanner’s notebook, in which it is totally written that some kids in the cafeteria are performing High School Musical and that Will Andastaphonopolus is big time G-A-Y. G…A…whoa. Wait. What? Did you say High School Musical? Fer sure, biz-natch. Totally fer sure. I’ve already friend-requested the show on Myspace.......

Let's take a look back at a week that raised this Zen koan: if Kevin Federline got into a wrestling ring with a wrestler, who would you root for? Austinist was in an entertainment state of mind as they covered the dickens out of the Austin Film Festival, depicted all the Big 12 football coaches as South Park characters, and interviewed Jose Gonzalez. Chicagoist talked about the passion as they bid adieu to Bell......

No place is off limits for some good old-fashioned Russian sex. American children are slacking...or not slacking enough. Bring on the video games and Cheetos! We're tired of looking at all y'all's nasty, funky, Disney-character underwear, too. Liberal Vermont is frowning at the naked teens hanging out in the parking lot just exercising their rights. Entrepreneurs are generally considered to be overconfident, hence their willingness to take risks.......

Okay, we must take a quick moment here to talk about Pirates of the Caribbean Part Deux, which we should have talked about sooner but didn’t because, well, quite frankly, we kinda forgot we’d seen it until two hours ago, when yet another preview came on TV and we said to ourselves, “Hey, didn’t that scene come after that other scene and hey, how do we know that? Oh right, we saw that movie......

That bitch that cut you off almost swiping the side of your shiny car wasn't drunk. She was gossiping on her cell phone. But she might as well have been drunk. Check out some proposals for Austin's largest public art project and tell the developer what you think. Who knew that Disney World was such a dangerous place? A judge in Oklahoma, was insecure about his own sexual performance behind the bench. He was......

As smart as we think we are, we can barely remember the names of the people were introduced to yesterday. Dolphins have us beat, damn brilliant creatures. The energy-producing windmills that are supposed to be uber-environmentally-friendly have some bird lovers in a tizzy. Is anyone else eerily bothered by the Grackles? We're thinking we need some of those windmills scattered around town. Incidentally- Grackles are known for imitating human speech better than parrots. C.R.E.E.P.Y.......

It's Tuesday, which means that your local DVD shop has several shiny new titles on the shelf. This week's biggest entry is James Mangold's Walk The Line, a Johnny Cash biopic in the mold of Ray that is up for five Oscars this weekend. The film wisely steers clear of a wide-scope biography, and instead concentrates on Cash's romance with second wife June Carter, his early music career at Sun Records, and his struggles......

This week at the movies there’s a little bit of everything. You got your Disney, your international, your race relations, and your Other. And by Other, we mean crap. Eight Below Man, Disney just keeps trudging along. Stories about cute animals overcoming immeasurable odds always work. Do what you know. Be sure to hire Paul Walker, because apparently he’ll take anything. *Cache A French mystery-thriller with political overtones about a man who receives anonymous......

[The following is an editorial column by contributor Alison Coffey and does not necessarily reflect the views of the Austinist staff. --The Editors] I know I've told you before of my daughterly love for Project Runway's Tim Gunn (if I had a gay fashion designing New Yorker for a father instead of a golfing, loafer wearing retired midwestern school superintendent), but he never ceases to impress me with his infinte wisdom and his stern......

Hurrah, it’s Friday! There’s plenty of stuff going on around town this weekend, but perhaps you can find the time to slip into a cool, dark theatre and enjoy one of this week’s new movie releases. *The New World Another take on the story of Pocahontas, this time by director Terrence Malick. Colin Farrell, Christopher Plummer, and our future husband, Christian Bale, star in a film certain to at least be more historically authentic......

You've just won the Big XII Championship and a chance to play in the biggest game of your lives: What are you gonna do now? Go to Disney World? Nah, how about go to annual football banquet, head from there down to 6th street to be revered by drunks, have people buy you drinks and get your party on? Still not good enough? OK, you can (allegedly) assault some folks and demand money, as......

When we were kids, "A Night on Bald Mountain" from Disney's Fantasia scared the bejeezus out of us. Yeah, we know, we're total pansies. But there is no more appropriate day to be scared than Halloween, which is why we're passing on the following information to you. From a press release sent to us by Austin’s own Invincible Czars: AUSTIN'S INVINCIBLE CZARS DEBUT ROCK VERSION OF "A NIGHT ON BALD MOUNTAIN" HALLOWEEN WEEKEND. Austin's......

: : FRIDAY : : [music] The Zippo Hot Tour Semi-Finals featuring Fractious, 9pm @ The Backroom - FREE! [film] A Bunch of New Movies Open! @ your local theater [film] QT6, 7pm & 9:30pm @ Drafthouse Downtown: Grindhouse Triple Feature also Saturday [music] Mike Graff, 8pm @ End of an Ear [dance] Refraction Arts presents "Shish-ka-bob! An Inventory of Works by Amy Cone," 8pm @ The Blue Theatre [music] Palaxy Tracks, The Glass......

Tony the Tiger is dead. To be more specific, Thurl Ravenscroft of Fullerton, California, whose voice was known worldwide as the Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes spokesman passed away Sunday of prostate cancer. He was 91. Aside from being the voice of Tony the Tiger, Ravenscroft also did voices for many Disney animated films films, including "Cinderella," "The Jungle Book," "Mary Poppins," "Alice in Wonderland," "Lady and the Tramp" and many others. You might be surprised......