BACK IN THE CULTURE PAGES: The Texas governor’s race is getting national attention — and Kinky Friedman isn’t even in it (although he is running for agricultural commissioner). Instead, as the Morning News reports, he’s back doing a public reading from his book, Heroes of a Texas Childhood, and performing a concert tonight at the Granada.

STAGE SURVIVOR: Peter Sinn Nachtrieb is a buzzy new playwright these days, although I wasn’t wild about his Hunter Gatherers, given its area premiere by Second Thought Theatre last month. His Darwinian-anthropological, man-is-an-animal ideas were pretty facile, although, admittedly, the play started as a comedy sketch. But now Kitchen Dog has given Nachtrieb’s more substantial boom its Texas debut. Lawson Taitte found this romantic comedy about the last couple on Earth “good, weird fun.” David Novinski at FrontRow dismissed it as just a glib, Twilight Zone episode, while Mark Lowry at Theater Jones found the strong similarities with Hunter Gatherers (survival, adaptation) and split the difference: Not great but better than the earlier play.

EX-PATS AND IN-PATS: Former Haltom City citizen John Frum is now a member of Seattle-based Transient Songs and it’s released a new CD, Cave Syndrome — the review’s here … The FWWeekly also has a feature about Gasland, a documentary by Pennsylvania filmmaker Josh Fox (Memorial Day) about the environmental costs of our drill-it-here, drill-it-now natural gas, um, boom. Practically before he could say, “Barnett Shale,” Fox was in North Texas, interviewing people about air-quality issues. It seems his film is not a complete downer or earnest lecture: It won a special jury prize for docs at Sundance and makes its Texas debut this week at Denton’s Thin Line Film Fest … Some sort of “major Dallas event” that will “ROCK Fair Park” is supposed to be announced today. Unfair Park encourages unfounded speculations. Favorite ones include an exciting new geology museum! —  get it? rocks? — and the Worldwide Spinal Tap Reunion Tour for One Night Only but Extended to Two Nights.