5 things to do over Labor Day weekend in Memphis
Labor Day.
Does that concept even have meaning in the work-from-home environment of this era of pandemic?
Does the boundary between labor and leisure still exist when you can attend Zoom business meetings in pajama bottoms and yoga pants?
Traditionally observed on the first Monday in September (which means that Labor Day 2020 is as late as it can be), Labor Day was made a federal holiday by Congress and President Grover Cleveland in 1894. A celebration of what was once called “the laboring classes,” the holiday offered evidence of the increased influence of organized labor that sometimes resulted in violent union clashes between demonstrating workers and law enforcement.
Labor Day’s political origins aren’t recognized by most people today, however. The holiday is generally welcomed (or dreaded) as marking the unofficial end of summer — and surely no summer in memory has been in need of ending as the coronavirus summer of 2020.
In a normal year, the Labor Day weekend bursts like a fireworks display with organized public activities — so many that many years The Commercial Appeal would have to expand its regular community “calendar” listings to include them all. This year, however, those places that have reopened to the public are mostly skipping the special events; they’re happy just to be back to a semblance of “normal.”
So what to do? Here’s a short guide to five possibilities. These are not hidden gems but mainstream attractions that are hoping the shelter-at-home public hasn’t forgotten about them during their months of shuttered doors.
1. The Memphis Zoo works to enable the survival of animal species with breeding programs that increase the populations of such creatures as meerkats, jaguars, bat-eared foxes and the striped African antelope known as bongos. But through Oct. 31, the zoo also will be a showplace for animals that have been extinct for millions of years. The “Dinosaurs” exhibit features animatronic re-creations of representatives from 16 prehistoric species, several of which will be familiar from the “Jurassic Park” movies, including raptors, a thickskulled Pachycephalosaurus, and a Tyrannosaurus rex, the “king of tyrant
lizards” whose Greek-latin appellation has been rather disrespectfully (to my mind) popularized as “T-rex” since the 1993 release of the Spielberg film. Details: Memphiszoo.org
2. Organized by Arkansas’ remarkable Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, the exhibition “Native Voices, 1950 to Now: Art for a New Understanding” at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art originally was supposed to close May 17, but its run was extended to Sept. 27 to make up for time lost due to the pandemic shutdown. Definitely pertinent at this time of increased discussion of race and identity, the show goes beyond cliche notions of “American Indian” art with a display of more than 70 pieces — paintings, sculptures, photographs, videos and more — created by Indigenous artists from the U.S. and Canada. According to Afar Magazine, the show is “one of the 10 U.S. art shows you have to see.”
Details: Brooksmuseum.org
3. Ready to go back to the movies? Not ready? Whatever you decide, the movie theaters are back open, and this weekend they’ve booked into almost every available auditorium a much-delayed and eagerly awaited science-fiction-action-spy spectacle titled “Tenet,” from blockbuster king Christopher Nolan, director of “Inception,” “Dunkirk” and the “Dark Knight” trilogy. Scheduled, pre-pandemic, to open July 17, the release was reset and postponed two more times before Warner Bros. concluded enough cinemas would be back in operation by Sept. 4 to justify letting the movie loose in North America. John David Washington (son of Denzel, last seen in “Blackkklansman”) stars, cast as a secret agent who learns to control time in hopes of preventing World War III.
4. On July 29, Graceland sent out a news release announcing the addition of 10 “interactive experiences” to the Elvis Presley’s Memphiscomplex of museums and exhibits that is across the street from the late singer’s mansion. “These state-of-the-art activities invite guests to become the King or Queen of their social media with dozens of interactive, shareable moments that allow them to get closer to Elvis than ever before via virtual and augmented reality technology,” the news release boasted, but it was hard for the reader to visualize what this meant. In fact, these “interactive
experiences” — a “Virtual Dress-up Experience,” an “Interactive Golf Car Ride,” an “Interactive LED Dance Floor Quiz” and so on — are much more fun and dare we say “cool” than one might expect. For example, if you play the “Dress-up” game, you face a full-sizemirror-sized screen that uses digital technology to place your image within a jumpsuit or “‘68 Comeback Special” leather suit or some other such Elvis gear; you can then digitally adjust the image, tailoring the outfit to better fit your possibly non-elvis-esque physique. In any event, these “experiences,” scattered throughout several of the exhibit halls, are a welcome addition to the Elvis tourist experience, perhaps especially for kids for whom a visit to Graceland is as un-hip as a visit to Mount Vernon.
Details: graceland.com
5. We’re told the aerosol threat of lingering coronavirus droplets is more worrisome indoors than out, so this may be a good time to reacquaint yourself and your family with such meanderfriendly open-air attractions as Shelby Forest, Shelby Farms, the Memphis Botanic Garden and the Dixon Gallery and Gardens. Perhaps the least familiar of these, to most Memphians, is the
Lichterman Nature Center, described on its website as 65 acres of “lake, meadow and forest” that is home to “a wide variety of plants, birds, reptiles, amphibians and mammals,” located at 5992 Quince Road “in the heart of metropolitan Memphis ... an urban nature center, easily accessible to the people who need it the most, the people who live in the city.” Part of the Memphis
Museums Inc. system that also includes the Memphis Pink Palace Museum, the Sharpe Planetarium and a pair of stillclosed Adams Avenue historic homes, the center hosts guided trail walks, “urban nature” exhibits and other activities and attractions that are, as the saying goes, fun for kids of all ages.
Details: Memphismuseums.org