Biting Back: Drunk Dracula Returns to Houston for a Third Boozy Season

The chaos begins when the one of the actors takes five shots.

By Jeff Gremillion

Drunk Dracula is back in Houston, and the count is still drinking on the job.

The Drunk Shakespeare Society opens its third local season of the boozy retelling Tuesday, Sept. 22, at The Emerald Theatre, with performances through Nov. 8.

The setup is the same kind of controlled chaos that built the brand: one actor takes five shots before leading the rest of the company through Bram Stoker’s vampire tale, pop-culture detours included. The sober cast tries to stay on script. The night usually has other plans.

“There’s no better way to kick off the Halloween season than with history’s most famous vampire,” says co-creator and producer David Hudson. “We are excited to pay homage to the original drinker and continue bringing our brand of mayhem back to spooky season here in Houston.”

The show is staged in a hidden-library setting, with craft cocktails and snacks available throughout. Guests who want a guaranteed hand in the plot can book The Royal Throne for $504, which comes with a throne, crowns, a bottle of Moët & Chandon, caviar and handmade chocolates, two signature cocktails and decision-making power during the play.

Hudson says the company knows the bit by now and is ready for both first-timers and returning fans. “Whether you’re looking for a unique date night or an immersive experience with friends, we invite you to join us for a memorable night like no other.”

Lori Wolter Hudson wrote the piece. Zac Kelty directs. The Drunk Shakespeare Society, a New York Times Critics’ Pick for its original Bard-under-the-influence format, also produces “Drunk Romeo & Juliet,” “Drunk Christmas Carol” and “Drunk Pirates.

The show is 21 and older and includes strong language, sexual humor, audience interaction and the possibility of nudity. The company says performers follow set drinking guidelines, are monitored during and after performances, and are given safe rides home. Tickets start at $53 at drunkdracula.com.

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Texas Cocktail Week Has Returned, With Four Seasons at the Center of the Party

Four Seasons Houston is awash in world-class cocktails all week.

By Jeff Gremillion

Texas Cocktail Week is back in Houston this week, and Four Seasons Hotel Houston is once again HQ. The host hotel of the second annual celebration, presented by Michter’s, the property is filling Sept. 20-24 with guest shifts, pop-ups and late-night last calls at Bayou & Bottle and Bandista. 

Programming is open to the public, and beverage manager Johnathan Jones and both bar teams will stay open until midnight each night, giving visiting bartenders and local regulars a place to land after the official events wrap.

“We’re so happy to welcome back Texas Cocktail Week,” says General Manager Tom Segesta. “This incredible celebration of connection and cocktails is what great bars are all about.”

The week opens tonight, Sunday, from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at Bayou & Bottle with a drop-in party that pulls in some of the state’s best-known bars: Austin’s The Roosevelt Room and Bar Fino & Bar Hacienda, Dallas’ Bar Collette, and San Antonio’s Sternewirth and Mixtli. Florence’s Locale Firenze, ranked No. 22 on the World’s 50 Best Bars list, joins the lineup, with live country DJ sets from Lindsay Rae of Two Headed Dog and light bites built around Houston’s mix of flavors. Bandista, ranked the No. 1 bar in Texas and among North America’s 50 Best Bars, will pop up during the party with one of its signature drinks.

Monday turns more formal. Punch Room Tampa brings its tableside punch service to Bayou & Bottle from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m., with beverage director Nihat Cam walking guests through how punch became the modern cocktail. Reservations are in one-hour seatings. Across the hotel, Vancouver’s Botanist Bar takes over Bandista from 7 to 10 p.m., with beverage director Grant Sceney and head bartender Justin Powell pouring five signatures, including the Botanist Martini and the Raincouver. Botanist has landed on the North America’s 50 Best Bars list four years running.

Tuesday belongs to two very different guests. Bartending veteran Toby Maloney holds a drop-in happy hour at Bayou & Bottle from 5 to 8 p.m., pouring classics and signing copies of his book with Emma Janzen, “The Classic Cocktail Sessions.” Later, Nassau’s Bon Vivants — another North America’s 50 Best Bars name — moves behind Bandista’s bookcase from 7 to 10 p.m., with Niko Imbert and Devante Knowles pouring four island-leaning signatures.

Wednesday and Thursday stay at Bandista. Milan’s Moebius, No. 7 on the World’s 50 Best Bars list and a Michelin-starred room, arrives Wednesday from 7 to 10 p.m. with owner Lorenzo Querci and head bartender Alessandro Merlini, including the bar’s popular Pesto Martini. Thursday, Valentino Longo of ViceVersa and ViceVersa, A Fort Lauderdale Residency closes the week with five drinks built around aperitivo and reworked hotel-bar classics.

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Veteran Editor Jeff Gremillion Launches New Digital Platform for Houston Storytelling

Jeff Gremillion has returned to society and cultural journalism. (Gremillion portrait by Al Torres)

After more than 30 years as a prominent voice in journalism and media leadership, veteran editor and publisher Jeff Gremillion is embarking on his next venture: JeffGremillion.com, a digital destination focused on Houston society, local culture and compelling personal profiles.

The platform debut marks a unique next chapter of Gremillion’s career. Over three decades, he led major regional publications — founding and editing both Houston magazine (Modern Luxury) and, most recently, Houston CityBook — in addition to having previously held editorial positions at major titles like Time Out New York, Entertainment Weekly and Columbia Journalism Review.

“After decades of managing full production schedules and print runs, I realized what I missed most was the pure joy of writing a great piece,” says Gremillion. “This site gives me an open, direct venue to highlight the remarkable personalities and social scene that make Houston so dynamic.”

Designed as an agile space for high-impact feature writing and event reporting, JeffGremillion.com will also be supported by a robust presence across social media channels. Additionally, readers can expect regular email newsletters packed with fresh updates and insights, rolling out soon.

“Houston has always been a city driven by big ideas, bigger personalities and relentless energy,” Gremillion adds. “I wanted to create a space where readers can get engaging, thoughtful pieces about what’s happening right now, written with a familiar voice.”

The new platform is live now.

Gremillion says he created Jeff Gremillion’s VIP Houston as “a space where readers can get engaging, thoughtful pieces about what’s happening right now, written with a familiar voice.” (Photo by Al Torres)

Bespoke Boots, Custom Hats and Original Grit Tequila Arrive at Hotel Granduca

Kemo Sabe hats are coming to Hotel Granduca.

By Jeff Gremillion

Hotel Granduca is bringing a little Aspen swagger — and some fabulous top-shelf tequila — to Houston.

The Uptown luxury hotel has expanded its relationship with Kemo Sabe, the iconic Western atelier, into a lineup of exclusive experiences built around custom hats and boots, private celebrations, corporate gatherings and a new cocktail program that puts trendy and tasty Original Grit Tequila behind the bar at Remi and Bar Remi. The collaboration gives Houston guests something they could previously only find in places like Aspen, Vail and Jackson Hole: trunk shows, custom boot bars and other immersive Kemo Sabe activations, all staged through the hotel.

Hotel Granduca says the programming will be available exclusively there. “Hotel Granduca and Kemo Sabe share a belief that the most memorable luxury experiences are rooted in exceptional hospitality, authentic craftsmanship and meaningful personal connections,” said Thomas Duncan, managing director of Transwestern Hospitality Group. “That common philosophy makes this a natural alignment and allows us to offer our guests an entirely new collection of bespoke experiences unlike anything else available in Houston.”

Wendy Kunkle, president and owner of Kemo Sabe, called the pairing an obvious one. “There has always been such a natural connection between Aspen and Houston, and we love the opportunity to bring more of the Kemo Sabe experience to a community that already knows and loves the brand,” she said. “Hotel Granduca gives us an incredible home for those experiences in Houston.”

Original Grit, the Western-inspired tequila tied to the brand, is now available exclusively at the hotel. Crafted in El Arenal, Jalisco, by the fifth-generation Partida family from 100 percent Blue Weber agave with no additives, it is poured in Blanco, Reposado and Añejo expressions. Guests can already find it in three house cocktails: the Kemo Sabe Margarita, with Original Grit Blanco, fresh lime, agave and cucumber bergamot foam; Crystal Frontier, a clarified mix of Reposado, apricot liqueur, pineapple and lime finished with brûléed orange; and Wrangler’s Reserve, a richer pour with Amaro Montenegro, turbinado, chocolate and walnut bitters and a smoked aromatic finish.

The partnership’s next moment is the Original Grit Tequila Experience on Thursday, Sept. 10, an intimate multi-course dinner by Executive Chef Maurizio Ferrarese with pairings for each expression. Tickets are $195 and on sale now. Hotel Granduca is at 1080 Uptown Park Blvd. Details and reservations are at granducahouston.com.

Original Grit tequila

Bar Remi at Hotel Granduca

Tulum Vibes in the Heights: Obsidian Flow Yoga Brings Luxe, Retreat-Like Studio to Houston

Obsidion Flow Yoga

By Patrick Magee

CHECK OUT THIS slice of Tulum in the Houston Heights. Designed to channel the peaceful, rejuvenating energy of the famed Mexican destination, this new boutique yoga studio is setting a new standard for modern wellness spaces — without the need for a passport!

Obsidian blends boho-luxe aesthetics, lush greenery and warm textures to offer an immersive retreat experience to yogis. From infrared-heated vinyasa flows to restorative, prenatal and family yoga, the studio is designed to meet students at every stage of their journey.

Owners Alfonso Moguel and Carolina Simon, inspired by international wellness destinations, envisioned Obsidian Flow as a community-rooted sanctuary. “We wanted to create a space that feels like a retreat, one that organically grows within Houston but also evokes that grounding, soulful energy of Tulum,” they shared. The studio is committed to community giving and has already partnered with Southern Kindness Gallery and the American Cancer Society.

Obsidian also offers access to the Ember Suite, a luxury, bookable spa-shower experience, as well as onsite Cold Plunge sessions— ideal for recovery and rejuvenation. And the Obsidian Shake Bar features organic smoothies. Cheers to that!

Mickey Gilley, Superstar Musician and Impresario Whose Honkytonk Launched ’80s Country Craze, Dies

Mickey Gilley

By Jeff Gremillion

COUNTRY MUSIC SUPERSTAR Mickey Gilley, whose eponymous Houston area mega-honkytonk was the backdrop ofUrban Cowboyand at the center of the global blue-jeans-and-mechanical-bull phenom of the 1980s, has died at age 86, according to news reports. The blues-tinged crooner and ivory tickler had 39 top-ten country hits, 17 of which were number-ones such as “Don’t the Girls All Get Prettier at Closing Time” and his cover of Ben E. King’s “Stand by Me.”

Gilley, who spoke in the past with CityBook and the CityBook & Co. podcast, first came to the Houston area in the early ’50s, to work for his then father-in-law in construction. It was only a few years later when one of his cousins — eventual Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Jerry Lee Lewis, with whom he grew up “banging at the piano” in the tiny town of Ferriday, La., he said — hit big with “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On.”

“I was making $1.25 an hour, and he comes in flashing all that money in his hands,” Gilley said, “and I started thinking, ‘Gee, if there’s that much money in the music industry, I’m in the wrong business.’” Gilley and Lewis grew up with yet another future celeb in Ferriday, the reverend Jimmy Swaggart, also a cousin and an accomplished musician and best-selling gospel artist.

His journey to stardom really began in the Heights, with the never-expected-to-be-a-hit, “throwaway” flipside track, 1974’s “Room Full of Roses,” which became his first smash. “I went in to record the song ‘She Called Me Baby All Night Long’ in a little recording studio in the Heights, called Jonestown Recording Studio,” he said. The song was meant to be a promotional ditty, to help market Gilley’s then new Pasadena bar, with placement on local radio and hundreds of jukeboxes in Houston.

“When we finished [the recording],” Gilley continued, “the bass guitar player looked over at me and said, ‘What are you going to do for the second song?’” Without forethought, Gilley recommended “Room Full of Roses,” which his studio musicians had never heard of. He recalled listening to George Morgan’s 1949 version of the song as a kid. The group quickly worked up an arrangement with Gilley leading the instrumentals with his distinctive, Delta-bluesy, gospel-tinged piano, which he learned as a child playing music with his talented kinfolks.

Just a few seconds into the first attempt at recording “Room Full of Roses,” Gilley stopped cold, prompting confusion in the studio. “The bass guitar player — same guy — said, ‘What'd you stop for?’ I said, ‘It’s going to sound too much like my cousin Jerry Lee Lewis.’ He said, ‘Who cares. Nobody's ever gonna hear it!’”

When Gilley started shopping the 45 around to radio DJs in Houston, he found that folks gravitated to the B-side. “I kinda like the flower song,” the country crooner recalls a disc jockey saying. “I thought, ‘Are you kidding me?’ He put in on, and it shot up the charts and outsold anything I’d ever recorded.

“When I listen to it now, and I look back on my career,” Gilley said, “I realize why it had a little something that I didn’t realize at the time. It was an honest recording. It was off the top of head, and I sang it like I’d sing it to an audience. It was believable.”

With “Roses” in the mid-1970s, Gilley’s career had finally taken off — and did it ever. Besides becoming quite familiar with making the Top Ten, Gilley would go on to win the Academy of Country Music’s highest honor, “Entertainer of the Year,” in 1976, and later become one of the top draws in Branson, Mo., for a good 20 years.

But for Houstonians, his greatest hit must have been running a honkytonk.

“I was very fortunate with the fact that my business partner installed a mechanical bull in Gilley’s,” he told the magazine, referencing the club he opened in Pasadena in 1971, and which became world-famous thanks to the 1980 John Travolta movie and the beer-drinking, boot-scooting gestalt it spawned. Ironically, Gilley hated the 1978Esquirearticle by Aaron Latham, “The Ballad of the Urban Cowboy,” that inspired the film, because he felt it “put down” country music.Gilley almost told Latham off, but a business partner cautioned him against it. “He said, ‘Don’t say anything bad about that article, because we might get a movie out of it, and they’re looking at John Travolta to play the part,’” Gilley said. “When he said John Travolta, something snapped. He was just coming offSaturday Night Fever. I said we’re going to haveCountry Night Fever.”

Oh, and about that bull: Gilley thought installing a “rodeo training device” in a bar was a mistake at first but is happy enough that it “caught on.” He regretted not expanding the Gilley’s brand internationally at the time, although spin-offs still operate in Las Vegas, Dallas and two locations in Oklahoma. The O.G. shuttered in 1989 and was gutted in a fire the following year; the Pasadena Independent School District now owns the land.

Asked what he hoped his legacy would be, Gilley was the consummate performer, prioritizing giving his audience their money’s worth above all. “I hope the people that have followed my career will say that I give everything I’ve got to make the music sound as close to my recordings as I possibly can,” he said. “I hope they’ll say that when I walk out on stage, I give 100 percent.”