People

08:59 AM CDT on Friday, April 28, 2006

Expect designer Stella McCartney to generate plenty of heat among the fashion-savvy crowd when she comes here next week – a mania almost.

Wednesday, Stella will be at an oh-so-exclusive cocktail party at the NorthPark Neiman Marcus to launch her fall 2006 collection.

After leaving her post as creative director of Chloé in 2001, she launched her own fashion house in partnership with Gucci.

Still can't place her?

She's the cute one.

If you were lucky enough to receive an invite to the Stella McCartney party, perhaps you noticed the time: "9-11."

Those of us with small children immediately asked, "a.m.?"

Our significantly more sophisticated friends informed us that we were "supposed to know" that meant p.m.

To watch Greater Tuna creators Jaston Williams and Joe Sears play Vera Carp and Pearl Burras onstage is one thing. To have them pass through the fourth wall and mingle with you in character is quite another.

But people who attend the Turtle Creek Chorale's May 14 party at Eddie Deen's downtown Ranch will get a chance to do just that. At "Vera and Pearl's Big Night Out," the most famous residents of fictional Tuna, Texas, will rub elbows, eat barbecue and even dance with the guests to drum up buzz for the world premiere of Turtles and Tuna , their June show with the Turtle Creek Chorale.

For the VIP party, Dallas City Council member Ed Oakley will get a one-night promotion to honorary mayor of Tuna. Sheriff Lupe Valdez will get a lateral transfer and become honorary sheriff.

General admission to the May 14 party is $35. But to get up close and personal with Vera and Pearl, spring for the $100 VIP tickets. Get either by calling Monique Moore at 214-526-3214, ext. 102.

One might wonder how chicken mogul John Tyson came to be in Highland Park United Methodist Church on Monday. As chairman and CEO of Tyson Foods, the world's largest poultry company, John had come to pay his respects at the memorial service for Miles Woodall, the chairman emeritus of Vent-A-Hood, the Richardson kitchen ventilation company run by the late Mr. Woodall and his sons. A lot of those Tyson chickens are fried, and the fumes have to go somewhere. John's college pal Blake Woodall would be pleased if the fumes all went into Vent-A-Hoods and nothing but. John flew to Dallas from Springdale, Ark., to be with the family.

E-mail apeppard@dallasnews.com