SELLING GUTENBERG: If there’s one thing we’ve learned this year, it’s that Amphibian Stage Productions can bring the funny. We laughed out loud at its series of videos calling for increased support of the arts. And now a new video has emerged, this time promoting its upcoming show, Gutenberg the Musical! The two-man show spoofs the sometimes degrading process of securing a producer for your play. The above video should whet your appetite.

SING, SING, SING: The folks at American Idol must think North Texas is a fertile breeding ground for pop-music hopefuls. The show auditioned here before Season 1 and bagged eventual chamption Kelly Clarkson from Burleson. The producers came back in the summer of 2007 and listened to more than 12,000 singers at Texas Stadium. And now they’ll be back again on Friday at the new Cowboys Stadium listening to the good, the bad and the ugly. If you’re thinking about auditioning, the queen of all things Idol, Darla Atlas, has a handy guide over on dallasnews.com.

ART IN THE O.C.: If you haven’t been to Oak Cliff in a while, you’re missing out on an explosion of visual art. JR Compton and Anna Palmer took the temperature of the art scene in the Cliff during their SpeedBump 2009 tour for dallasartsrevue.com and found a selection that ranged, “from strange to wonderful and back, and back again.” For a taste of what they saw, head to the site for dozens of photos from the galleries.