Here are Dallas' 2025 James Beard Award finalists
Five Dallas-Fort Worth chefs, bars and restaurants are finalists for a prestigious James Beard award.
Why it matters: Being named a finalist for an award from the James Beard Foundation is an honor in the culinary industry, whether you win or not.
The Dallas-area culinary scene has received more James Beard recognition in the past few years. The region had three finalists last year though none won.
Zoom in: Café Momentum founder Chad Houser will receive $20,000 for the humanitarian award, which recognizes organizations in the culinary world that work to improve society.
Nonprofit restaurant Café Momentum employs at-risk teens, many of whom have been in the criminal justice system.
The Dallas-based nonprofit has opened restaurants in Atlanta and Pittsburgh and plans to open a fourth in Denver.
Zoom out: Dallas has four national finalists, the most of any Texas city. Houston has two finalists in the national categories, San Antonio has one and Austin has one.
The awards created a best chef in Texas category in 2019.
Here are the Dallas-area finalists:
🧑🍳 Emerging chef: RJ Yoakum at Georgie is one of five chefs nationwide named as someone to watch.
🥢 Best new restaurant: Mābo, an eight-seat omakase restaurant in Preston Hollow, continues to catch national attention for its yakitori and sushi.
🥯 Outstanding bakery: Starship Bagel, with locations in Dallas and Lewisville, is showing that New York City isn't the only place to get a bagel.
🍸 Best new bar: Bar Colette, a cozy West Village cocktail joint, will compete with four other bars for the newest James Beard award.
⭐️ Best chef in Texas: Regino Rojas is up for the regional chef award for Purépecha, the tasting menu dining experience at Revolver Taco Lounge.
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New York Post
an hour ago
- New York Post
Brooklyn Mirage ticket holders left in dark after rescheduled shows as status of venue is in limbo
It's unclear when The Brooklyn Mirage will reopen as frustrated ticket holders are left without answers from the venue and a slate of scheduled concerts is fast approaching. The East Williamsburg open-air concert hall — which has been haunted by the deaths of two ravers — hasn't been given the OK from the city to reopen after it closed for extensive renovations and blew past its planned relaunch on May 1. But the venue suddenly announced it had cancelled its summer reopening after failing to secure the proper city permits, even cancelling a sold-out show just before a DJ was set to hit the stage. Advertisement The last update the venue provided announced shows through Memorial Day weekend would be cancelled and rescheduled for July and August, according to an Instagram post. 5 Brooklyn Mirage ticket holders have grown frustrated at the venue's radio silence since its last Memorial Day announcement about cancelled shows. NY Post 'We apologize to our incredible community of fans, artists, crew members, and staff for the delay. Though the Brooklyn Mirage is opening later than anticipated, we are making great progress towards opening our doors… We are working diligently with the City of New York to make sure we meet all regulations and requirements,' the May 20 announcement said. Advertisement 'If you cannot attend rescheduled shows, you will be given a full refund,' the venue wrote. A month later, ticket holders and rave-goers are still left without answers — even losing out on plane fare to make it to shows that were rescheduled last minute in June. Commenters have flocked to the recent announcement to nag the venue for the reopening limbo. 5 There has been no official update from the Brooklyn Mirage since the venue announced shows through Memorial Day weekend would be cancelled. Advertisement 'Did y'all die?' one commenter wrote. Temple Barros, 47, from the Bronx, has been an 'avid concert goer' at Brooklyn Mirage since 2016 — but said his beloved venue's handling of the reopening has been a 'disappointment.' 'I'm not here to bash it because I've been going to Brooklyn Mirage since 2016. I'm an avid goer every other week … I've been going since they just had the white wall and the umbrella over the DJ booth,' Barros said. 'This year has probably been the biggest disappointment. I had a friend flying from Florida to go see Excision, which they said they would be open that week, and they were not. So he had tickets, flights, and hotels, and I felt bad,' he said. Advertisement Barros had also planned to attend a DJ set by Sara Landry, a Netherlands-based techno artist, on May 1 — which was rescheduled at Knockdown Center that evening. 5 The DJ set of Netherlands-based techno artist Sara Landry was also cancelled at the Brooklyn Mirage due to the failed reopening weekend. instagram/saralandryd 'My friend still complains to this day that she had one eyelash on. We were getting ready to walk out the door, and we all got the text message an hour before we were supposed to go to the show, and that was crazy.' Christina P, from Long Island, also had her cousin fly out from Georgia so they could attend a concert for the American DJ/producer duo 'Two Friends' on June 13 together. After seeing the Memorial Day announcement, Christina grew skeptical that the show would go on. 'I called the venue and asked them what was up so my cousin could cancel her flights. They told me that they didn't have any information, though, that they'd post something on social media and to call back the next week,' she said. 5 A Temporary Place of Assembly certificate, which allows 75 or more people to gather indoors or 200 or more people to gather outdoors, has been requested for the venue's outdoor area. Instagram Just three days before the show, the artist announced the event would be rescheduled for Sept. 12 at Summerstage in Central Park. Advertisement The Brooklyn Mirage eventually reposted the artist's announcement on their Instagram story, according to Christina. 'My cousin was not able to cancel her flight. We were still able to hang out, but now she was out the money for her plane ticket,' she said. 'We just want transparency. The venue could've been more open about what they were doing. They knew they had problems with permits. They could've been more explicit. They didn't have to waste anybody's time,' Christina said. The venue is still undergoing permit problems despite shows on the calendar for the remainder of June. Advertisement 5 The venue is still not permitted to operate, according to the Department of Buildings. Gregory P. Mango The Brooklyn Mirage 'is currently not permitted to operate as they submitted job filing applications that remain under audit,' the Department of Buildings said in a statement. A Temporary Place of Assembly certificate, which allows 75 or more people to gather indoors or 200 or more people to gather outdoors, has been requested for the venue's outdoor area and is still under review, the DOB said. The venue has been awarded the TPA certificate for The Great Hall, an eating and drinking establishment on The Brooklyn Mirage's property, according to the department. Advertisement The venue's operator, Avant Gardner, did not respond to requests for comment. Avant Gardner's CEO, Josh Wyatt, was also fired amid the Memorial Day reopening snafu, BK Mag reported. Wyatt had previously assured people the venue would be '100 percent' ready for the May 1 reopening in an interview with the outlet just days before. Advertisement 'At the end of the day, you can't do that [cancel] to people that are coming from all miles out of the way,' Barros said. 'This [the Brooklyn Mirage] is our safe space, this is our out … What hurts the most is that the safe space that we thought we had is not here this year.'
Los Angeles Times
an hour ago
- Los Angeles Times
Hollywood is in bad shape. You wouldn't know it from CEO pay
Warner Bros. Discovery is in poor shape — so much so that Chief Executive David Zaslav has decided to unwind the 2022 merger he orchestrated by splitting the company in two. But Zaslav himself is doing just fine, to the chagrin of shareholders. In a rare searing rebuke, investors recently cast a symbolic vote disapproving of Zaslav's 2024 compensation package, which rose 4% to $51.9 million compared with the year before. The package, approved by the company's board of directors, ensured that Zaslav remained one of the nation's highest-paid corporate leaders. Proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services, known as ISS, described the company's executive compensation packages as 'an unmitigated pay-for-performance misalignment.' The situation renewed scrutiny of the compensation levels for leaders of the top entertainment companies, which remain high compared with peers in other industries. Although 2024 was a bad year for Hollywood, it was a very good year for some of the industry's top executives, according to a survey of data by Equilar, which studies executive pay, for The Times. The median compensation for those executives for 2024 was $33.9 million, up 7% from 2023, Equilar said. That's about double the median compensation of CEOs at S&P 500 companies, which was $17.1 million last year. The compensation data include stock options, base salaries, bonuses and other perks for CEOs from Netflix, Fox Corp., Roku, Lions Gate Entertainment Corp., AMC Networks, Comcast, Warner Bros. Discovery and the Walt Disney Co. Paramount was excluded from the median data because of a change from one CEO to three in April 2024. 'The compensation packages remain somewhat out of whack based on the good old days where the margins were substantially higher,' said Evan Shapiro, a former NBCUniversal executive who now runs his own company. 'The Hollywood era got used to very specific — some would argue irrational — pay packages and never readjusted itself when the business went haywire.' Pay packages increased for Netflix co-CEOs Ted Sarandos and Greg Peters, reflecting the streaming giant's strong performance. The value of Sarandos' pay package went up 24% to $61.9 million, while Peters' went up 50% to $60.3 million. Other executives whose compensation increased included Bob Bakish, who was ousted as CEO of Paramount in April 2024. He had a package worth $86.96 million in 2024 (which included his roughly $69 million severance), up 178% from $31.3 million a year earlier. Disney chief Bob Iger, who spent 2024 mounting a turnaround for the Burbank-based company, earned $41.1 million, up 30% from the previous year. During the year, Disney had renewed strength at the box office and achieved streaming profitability after years of losses. Fox Corp.'s CEO Lachlan Murdoch's total pay rose 9% to $23.8 million, while Roku CEO Anthony Wood got a bump of 37% to $27.7 million. Others got a pay cut. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts' 2024 compensation declined 5% to $33.9 million, primarily due to a lower cash bonus. AMC Networks CEO Kristin Dolan had a 40% drop to $8.7 million last year related to a $6.8-million equity award she received in 2023 tied to her promotion to CEO. Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer earned $18.2 million in the company's fiscal 2024 year, down 15% compared with $21.5 million from fiscal 2023. For 2024, the highest-paid chief executives among publicly traded media and entertainment companies compiled by Equilar for The Times were Bakish, Zaslav, Sarandos, Peters and Iger. Most of the companies declined to comment or referred The Times to proxy statements filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Fox Corp. did not return a request for comment. The increase in pay reflects a broader trend at publicly traded companies. Compensation is increasing as companies try to align pay with performance by handing out large stock awards, said Amit Batish, senior director of content for Equilar. Certain awards such as stock options typically benefit executives only if the stock goes up. Some executives are also adding security perks after the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson last year, he said. Several Hollywood executives had pay packages last year that were worth substantially more than the median, Equilar said. With so much change and disruption happening in the entertainment business and plenty of competition for skilled leadership, companies believe they need to pay up to hold on to executive talent. 'Especially in the entertainment industry that's constantly evolving, with streaming services taking over, there's constant fluctuations in the market, so companies are looking to find ways to keep their executives on board and motivated,' Batish said. Sky-high executive compensation has resurfaced debate about a subject that has been simmering since even before the 2023 strikes led by writers and actors — the widening pay gap between executives and workers. Many entertainment workers have left Southern California due to the lack of work, as more productions are moving out of the area due to increased costs. Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, NBCUniversal and Paramount have continued to lay off employees. Some entertainment workers struggling to find jobs have adopted the saying 'Persist to '26,' replacing last year's 'Survive 'til '25.' 'Any survey of executive pay, generally there's a disconnect between what people see in their own checking accounts and when they see what executives, particularly for top Fortune 500 companies, earned,' said David Smith, a professor of economics at the Pepperdine Graziadio Business School. 'There's often discontent with the chasm between the rank and file and CEOs.' Zaslav became a symbol of that ire in 2021 when his compensation package was valued at $246.6 million, which included stock options tied to the merger. The value of his 2024 compensation was much lower at $51.9 million, but still higher than other executives such as Disney's Iger. Following the nonbinding shareholder 'say on pay' vote, Warner Bros. Discovery pledged to address shareholder concerns. Those changes are expected to lower Zaslav's future payouts. Similarly, Disney and Netflix in recent years have been hit with negative shareholder votes on the pay, leading to adjustments. Zaslav's target annual cash bonus opportunity will shrink from $22 million to $6 million after splitting Warner Bros. Discovery in two, separating studios and streaming services from linear cable networks, the company said. Zaslav's base salary would remain $3 million. 'We structured the new compensation packages to address shareholders' feedback by fostering pay-for-performance alignment,' Warner Bros. Discovery board chair Samuel A. Di Piazza Jr. said in a statement. While Warner Bros. Discovery worked on retiring $4.4 billion in debt through cost-cutting and launched its streaming service Max (which is being rebranded back to HBO Max) in 70 markets last year, the company also had some fumbles, including losing the NBA on its TV networks. 'It appears the board may have been out-negotiated,' said Lloyd Greif, chief executive of Los Angeles investment bank Greif & Co. 'They created incentives that did not directly translate into a higher stock price, or higher revenue and EBITDA growth' — referring to earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. 'So,' he added, 'you have to look at the results and say, the board blew the call.' The company's compensation committee said it took into account Zaslav's performance across different goals including revenue, cash flow, enhancing the motion picture slate, cost controls, launching Max globally and securing talent. Warner Bros. Discovery's revenue in 2024 fell 5% to $39.3 billion, compared with 2023. Adjusted earnings excluding certain items fell 11% during that same time period. The stock price declined about 7% in 2024. 'It just sends a very bad message to your teams,' said Paul Verna, vice president of content at research firm Emarketer, adding that leaders should inspire their teams amid challenges facing the industry. 'It's very hard to do that when you're firing thousands of people but not really absorbing any pain yourself in your own compensation.' The committee saw the loss of the NBA U.S. TV rights as a positive, saying it resulted in a 'more efficient long-term relationship with the league,' according to the company's proxy filing. When the compensation committee evaluated those figures, it took out costs related to a joint venture called Venu Sports that was meant to launch in 2024 but was scrapped, as well as new sports rights programming and packages. That irked some groups, including ISS, though some executive compensation experts said it is not uncommon for companies to factor out some costs deemed to be out of the executive's control. The reverberations of the shareholder vote continue. It could cause the board to put pressure on the compensation committee to improve its performance or activist shareholders to target the company for a proxy contest, Lawrence Cunningham, director of the University of Delaware's Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, wrote in an email to The Times. 'Shareholder votes on pay, even when non-binding, send a signal that can be important,' Cunningham wrote. 'A 60% no vote is huge.'
Yahoo
6 hours ago
- Yahoo
2 must-watch Netflix documentaries to stream this month
If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, BGR may receive an affiliate commission. If your Netflix queue could use a dose of real-life drama, this month delivers two very different but equally binge-worthy documentary releases that might just keep you glued to your couch. One follows high-stakes dreams on the NFL sidelines, while the other is about a literal nightmare at sea. While Netflix's biggest releases are generally its original dramas like Squid Game and Wednesday, its series and movies based on real-life events are quite frequently just as compelling — and hit just as hard. That's definitely the case with these two new June releases we're going to spotlight in this post, one of which debuted today. Today's Top Deals Best deals: Tech, laptops, TVs, and more sales Best Ring Video Doorbell deals Memorial Day security camera deals: Reolink's unbeatable sale has prices from $29.98 If Netflix documentaries are your thing, don't miss this deep dive I put together recapping some of the standout releases I watched last year. And, as always, you can stay on top of the regular lineup of new titles arriving on the streaming giant by following our monthly new release rundown. For now, though, we're going to take a closer look at the docuseries America's Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders (Season 2) and the documentary film Trainwreck: Poop Cruise. High kicks, million-dollar smiles, and AC/DC's 'Thunderstruck' blasting through AT&T Stadium can only mean one thing: It's time for cheerleader auditions again in Dallas. From Emmy-winning director Greg Whiteley comes the second season of this behind-the-scenes look at the most iconic cheerleading team in professional football. The new season picks up with open tryouts, as hopefuls from around the country compete for a spot on the Dallas Cowboys cheer squad. Mind you, making the squad is so competitive that even returning stars like Reece and Kelly V aren't guaranteed anything. The veterans have to prove themselves every year to earn their spot, just like the newcomers. 'I have the ability to make a dream come true — or not,' longtime DCC director Kelli Finglass says in the season opener. While the glittering game day routines are still a draw, the real power of America's Sweethearts lies in how the show digs into the personal lives of the cheerleaders — juggling second jobs, battling body image pressure, navigating social media, and, in some cases, confronting serious trauma. Season 2 also revisits the hot-button issue of pay, offering a candid look at the ongoing tension between performance, perception, and compensation. As for this next Netflix documentary release, Trainwreck: Poop Cruise revisits the now-infamous 2013 Carnival cruise that spiraled into disaster after an engine room fire left the ship stranded without power. For four harrowing days, more than 4,000 passengers were trapped onboard with no air conditioning, dwindling food, and non-functioning toilets. Raw sewage leaked throughout the ship, tempers flared — and the media, particularly cable news, had a field day. 'Just on our deck alone, there were the biohazard bags lined up across the floor,' passenger Bettina Rodriguez told CNN at the time. 'We're talking about raw sewage at just the end of our deck alone. It was repulsive.' This documentary uses first-person accounts and archival footage to piece together what really happened, how Carnival scrambled to contain the fallout, and how the incident became a pop-culture punchline almost overnight. It's part horror story, part corporate case study, and 100% unforgettable. Don't Miss: Today's deals: Nintendo Switch games, $5 smart plugs, $150 Vizio soundbar, $100 Beats Pill speaker, more More Top Deals Amazon gift card deals, offers & coupons 2025: Get $2,000+ free See the
