There was one thing Bill Ganus promised himself for 2018: no new projects. But … an opportunity arose that he couldn’t pass up. “I had the chance to tell important stories about connecting people with food systems,” he says. The conduit for those stories was Edible Memphis, which was shut down a year ago by founder Melissa Petersen after 10 years in print.
Ganus, who is partner in such businesses as Flow Cryotherapy and the Rec Room, admits he has no background in media, but he plans to call upon his skills in leveraging and team-building. For the team, he recruited as his editor in chief Brian Halweil of Edible Manhattan and Edible Brooklyn. Halweil will work on Edible Memphis from New York.
“I’m ready to see potential Edible ideas, community-building ideas, in another area,” says Halweil. He sees a bit of Brooklyn in Memphis. But it’s a Brooklyn that no longer exists. He sees it in the breweries and coffee shops, in the logos. He finds the city’s energy exciting.
Justin Fox Burks
Bill Ganus (left) and Stacey Greenberg
Another key member is Stacey Greenberg, who will act as managing editor. “She lives and breathes Memphis food,” Ganus says, pointing out that Greenberg is about as an authentic foodie as they come. “Memphians demand authenticity,” he says.
“My vision for the magazine is that it really represents Memphis. All of Memphis,” says Greenberg. “I’ve tried really hard to find a variety of writers and photographers to help us create something special. I reached out to the MABJ [Memphis Association of Black Journalists] and the internet at large to find some new voices, and I’m really excited with who I found. They’re people I’d love to get all in one room someday — until then the magazine is that room.”
Petersen, for her part, says giving the keys to Ganus made sense to her. “We had several people who were interested in taking over the magazine, but several were only interested in one or two pieces of the process. There are not-as-fun parts of creating a magazine — selling ads, doing the bookkeeping, delivering hundreds of boxes in July — but they have to be done,” she says. “Bill Ganus really did the legwork to come up with a plan for the entire process. And he’s assembled a team of people to share the work and grow things exponentially.”
Part of that growth is upping Edible Memphis‘ online game — create a usable website and posting on Instagram and other social media. What was never in consideration, however, was to make Edible Memphis online only. Ganus says that there is no substitute for opening a magazine, turning the pages, and seeing a beautiful spread of food photography. “It works best in paper,” he says.
Another part of the plan is to introduce up to five food festivals to complement Memphis’ lineup of other food festivals.
Edible Memphis will be on a quarterly release schedule, and Halweil imagines profiling local farmers and highlighting locally made products. They will not do restaurant reviews. They will not break news. He defines the editorial approach as akin to boosterism. “It will be celebratory and educational, a little bit rah-rah,” he says.
Ganus sees Edible Memphis as an invaluable source to Memphians who care about food. (We all care.) He says, “Edible Memphis will be the go-to local outlet for food and agriculture-related news. I’m committed to doing it well.”
Edible Memphis will relaunch in early November.
One byline you can expect to see in the new Edible Memphis is that of Justin Fox Burks and Amy Lawrence, aka the Chubby Vegetarian. Burks and Lawrence are the author of two cookbooks. They’ve cooked at the James Beard House and contributed their vegetarian recipes to several local restaurants.
Amy Lawrence and Justin Fox Burks, aka the Chubby Vegetarian
Their latest venture is a partnership with PeachDish, a meal kit delivery service.
According to Burks, PeachDish followed them on Instagram and became fans of the Chubby Vegetarian. Amy reached out to them and suggested a collaboration.
PeachDish suggested they veganize their recipe for Fried Green Tomatoes Po’boy with their Cold Oven Sweet Potato Fries.
Fried Green Tomatoes Po’boy
Burks says what sets PeachDish apart from other meal-kit services is their commitment to use only local produce. The company also keeps packaging waste to minimum.
Ultimately, Burks says, he’s for anything that gets people in the kitchen and cooking.
The Chubby Vegetarian meal kit will be available September 10th, peachdish.com.
Sixteen-thousand words. That’s how many words, on average, most people speak in a day. Sixteen-thousand chances to say “I love you,” “I’m sorry,” or “Make your own damn sandwich.” Language, the ability to express oneself, is agency. So what do we become when language, our most human of characteristics, is taken away?
Such are the questions posed by the linguist and author Christine Dalcher, whose first novel, Vox (Penguin Random House), is set in a near-future America governed by the few for the few. In Vox‘s America, women have lost most of their rights. They can’t vote or carry passports, and they can speak no more than 100 words a day. All American women and girls have been fitted with a counter worn around the wrist, not unlike a Fitbit, that keeps track of the words they speak in a day. The counter resets at midnight. And if a woman uses more than her allotted 100 words, the counter administers a small electric shock. If she continues to speak, the shocks intensify.
The new measures were put into play as a part of the “Pure Movement,” a religious movement that advocates a return to a time when the country was “untroubled” by the political and social turmoil of recent years. That such a reading of history is dramatically flawed doesn’t stop the Pure Movement from gaining followers, primarily from the middle section of the country, mostly from people who feel overlooked and forgotten by an increasingly globalized economy and diversified workforce.
The narrative follows Dr. Jean McClellan, a scientist who was working on a cure for fluent aphasia, a condition leading to the deterioration of the speech centers in the brain. That is, she used to be called “Dr.” and she used to be working on a cure for fluent aphasia. She used to have her own lab. But that was before Reverend Carl Corbin and his Pure Movement began to gain ground. Before Corbin gave his blessing to presidential hopeful Sam Meyers, who won the presidency. Now Jean spends time at home, trying to occupy a mind used to wrestling with complex chemical equations. Now she doesn’t speak during the day, just turns over her thoughts, trying to dull the edge of her worry about her family. How can she teach her daughter to be strong and independent when she must also teach her to be silent at all costs? How can she teach her son fairness in a country that has chosen to hobble half its population?
That moral dilemma is at the center of Vox. It’s clear that, though the Pure Movement is buttressed by return-to-morals rhetoric, the movement is eroding whatever morality there is left in the country. Neighbors spy on neighbors, like something out of a Red Scare-era sci-fi flick. And Jean’s son, Steven, is being steadily seduced by the movement. What worries Jean even more, though, is her daughter Sonia, who hasn’t spoken in days and is proud to be a frontrunner in a Silent Game competition among the girls at her elementary school.
Patrick, Jean’s husband, is little help. He works in government, in D.C., and he’s got his hands full trying to scale back the extremity of new legislation. Alone in a bubble of silence, Jean thinks back to her undergraduate years, when she would decline her friend Jackie Juarez’s attempts to drag her to protests, when she first gave up her voice by choosing not to use it. Jackie warned Jean that history has a way of repeating itself — especially when your nose is buried too deeply in your own business to smell change on the wind.
And things may change, for the worse or the better, when President Meyers’ brother and trusted advisor takes a brutal fall while skiing, fracturing his skull and hurting his brain. Jean is offered a chance to get the counter off her wrist — and her daughter’s — if she will finish her work on her aphasia cure. Jean is torn, unsure whether the good she might do Sonia justifies any help she could give to a legitimately evil regime.
With a dash of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and a pinch of Ira Levin’s The Stepford Wives,Vox sits well among the ranks of feminist speculative fiction. It’s a literary contemplation of an America hijacked by fundamentalists who want to turn back the clock by 60 years. More than anything, Vox is a novel about the price of staying silent.
When you can’t turn on the nightly news without hearing yourself utter, “What fresh hell is this?” it just may be time to go back to the basics and find some common ground on which we can all agree. It’s time for that universal American comfort food of bar-flies, sports fans, soccer moms, and tortured undergraduates alike. I speak, of course, of buffalo wings and beer.
Buffalo wings were invented, so the story goes, in 1964 by one Teressa Belissimo — and who knows how the Republic got that far without them. While the details are fuzzy, they seem to revolve around a college-aged son, Dominic, and the late-night tomfoolery of either his drinking buddies or some hungry Catholics. Accounts vary.
Sergii Koval | Dreamstime.com
There was a time when I was someone’s college age son, sitting on the Tuscaloosa strip, sweating profusely over a basket of “nuclear” buffalo wings at Wings N’ Things and washing the little buggers down with a frosty Miller Lite. It was the first time I’d ever had buffalo wings, and I remember distinctly a sign that read, “Please clear tables in lieu of tipping.” It was the first time I’d ever seen the word “lieu.” College really is a place to learn.
I’m fairly sure that a steady diet of beer (warding off infection), as well as vinegar-based cayenne pepper sauce (cauterizing my insides) kept me out of the Student Health Center. We could all use some therapeutic sweats to get our heads right.
So I was at Huey’s the other day, contemplating the right brew to accompany an order of wings. The truth is that it doesn’t really matter, other than a vague instinctual directive to “keep it light.” That can mean anything from a Michelob Ultra to some crafty IPA — although I’d steer clear of the really hoppy ones until you’ve cleaned your basket. That combo is an awful lot to have going on with one’s taste buds. And in my experience, the hoppy brews tend to get more so as they warm up.
On the other hand, this might not be a problem if you order your wings extra hot, because you’d be quaffing the stuff down double-quick. Borrowing yet another hand, if you suck down three double IPAs with an order of extra-hot buffalo wings, I’d advise rolling the windows down on the way home. (This is the sort of dialectical masturbation a fella gets into with a top-notch college degree.)
Still, I wanted the perfect buffalo wing beer. My eye went to the Wiseacre tap — a great Memphis stand-by — but it wasn’t the Ananda IPA or Tiny Bomb Pilsner, though either would have been winners with a basket of wings. It was Gotta Get up to Get Down — a coffee stout. I just couldn’t convince myself this would be a good idea with wings. For some reason, the Deepwater Horizon disaster keeps leaping to mind. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a good coffee stout. I was at the lake about a year ago, and (I’m not proud of this) I had it for breakfast, where it really hit the spot. Somebody was frying a mess of eggs and bacon, but that wasn’t for me. I was being alert and heart healthy. We went skiing after this.
The Scottish Ale seems a bit toasty for hot sauces — like trying to fry ribs after you smoke them. Then, of course, there are the classic domestic mass-produced pilsners. I’m not a big enough snob to say those would be wrong. Just maybe not perfect.
In the end, I went with a Bell’s Two Hearted Ale out of Kalamazoo. It’s light, but you know its there. There is enough hop to appreciate it without thinking, “My, what a cavalcade of hops!”
And here’s that college education again — I like a brewery that would name a beer after a Hemingway short story.
Marcella & Her Lovers play this year’s Blues on the Bluff, WEVL’s largest annual fundraiser.
A new group is hoping for changes at WEVL, the city’s volunteer radio station.
Friends of WEVL began posting to Facebook (publicly anyways) Tuesday. Its website already has more than 150 “Friends of WEVL,” a group of supporters who have signed up through the site. Look for a guest column in this week’s Memphis Flyer from Friends of WEVL co-founder, Robby Grant.
The group called WEVL ”a Memphis institution” and says it’s a “source of great pride for music lovers and musicians in Memphis and beyond.” WEVL/Facebook
”But with the changing landscape of the way people listen to music and the growing collaborative music and arts scene in Memphis, we feel WEVL can do better (can’t we all, really?)” reads the Friends of WEVL website. “At the base level, we’re trying to make WEVL financially, operationally, and culturally stronger — celebrating its incredible heritage, but also working toward solidifying its future.”
The group wants more local programmers on WEVL. The station has 40 local on-air programmers but used to have 80. It says more than 25 percent of WEVL’s broadcast lineup is comprised of syndicated programs or are replays of old shows.
Friends of WEVL
Of those 40 programmers, only Joyce Cobb is African American, the group says, and she’s the station board’s only person of color. The group suggests the station diversify both its board and line-up of programmers.
The group wants WEVL to broadcast 24 hours per day, wants an easier process for new programmers to get a show, and for the station to pursue new funding opportunities like donations from charitable foundations, event sponsorships, and underwriting.
Also, Friends of WEVL suggests either renovating its current space or finding new space, perhaps in Crosstown Concourse.
“The building on South Main that WEVL currently rents was renovated almost 30 years ago, with no significant improvements done since then,” reads the group’s website. “It is in serious need of refurbishment and modernization.
”The management of Crosstown Concourse has expressed interest in having WEVL move to an 1,800-square-foot space on the ground floor.”
WEVL/Facebook
Kenny Brown plays this year’s Blues on the Bluff, WEVL’s largest annual fundraiser.
These suggestions and more originated from a group called the Development Exploratory Committee. That group was ”comprised of three WEVL fans who are driven to securing a healthy financial, operational and cultural future for the station” and three WEVL board members. Friends of WEVL
“The (WEVL) board approved this committee at their March meeting,” the site says. “The WEVL board later voted to dissolve the committee during their July 30 board meeting.” Facebook
The list of Friends of WEVL includes 15 anonymous WEVL programmers.
“On August 20th the management of WEVL informed the programmers that allowing their name to be listed on this website will subject them to disciplinary action, which could include loss of their radio program,” reads the site.
“We are immediately removing the names of all programmers from the Friends list, and replacing them with an entry titled ‘Anonymous WEVL Programmer.’ We would encourage programmers to continue to sign up as a Friend of WEVL.”
Memphis Police Department (MPD) director Michael Rallings wrapped up his testimony Wednesday morning in the federal trial on Memphis police surveillance.
Rallings said before this litigation began, he had “vague knowledge” of the 1978 consent decree, the issue at the center of the lawsuit. The decree, saying that the city would not gather political intelligence on non-criminals, was entered by the city with local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
When one of the lawyers from the ACLU-TN asked if the consent decree is covered in training material for officers, Rallings said he wasn’t sure, as there are “hundreds and hundreds of pages of policies and procedures.” But the decree is posted on the department’s kiosk, which is accessible by all officers.
“We didn’t care about that or spend a lot of time talking about it,” Rallings said of the consent decree. “Because we didn’t do that.”
Rallings emphasized throughout his testimony that the department’s motivation for monitoring social media and protests was to maintain public safety.
After the incident in Ferguson, Missouri in 2014, Rallings said he “saw things ramping up” here and the department took a detailed look at how to allow citizens to exercise free speech lawfully.
“We respect the right to protest,” Rallings said. “We just want it done in a law-abiding way.”
Since then, Rallings said MPD’s intentions have been to assist protesters, but never to deter a demonstration. On the stand, Rallings testified that he can’t remember an incident where officers attempted to end a protest, whether it was permitted or not.
In monitoring social media for potential protests, Rallings said the content of the event or the associations of the organizers never played a role in determining the type of police response necessary. Instead, Rallings said the department monitored social media to ensure they could prepare and have enough resources ready to respond.
[pullquote-1]
Following the MPD shooting of Darius Stewart in 2015, Rallings said “things were getting heated” and the department was “extremely strained.”
Managing all of the events related to Stewart’s death with MPD’s limited resources was one of the key reasons for closely monitoring social media, Rallings said.
“We have to know what’s going on, so we can deploy resources,” Rallings said. “We’re not concerned with anyone’s beliefs. We’re concerned with protecting the public.”
On the stand, Rallings was asked to recall the day of the Hernando de Soto bridge protest in 2016, one he says “I’ll never forget.” He said he had an “aha moment” that day, as he realized the high potential for citizens and officers to get hurt.
He estimated there were about 1000 protesters on the bridge that day, and although the department would have been authorized to use tear gas or other means to disperse the crowd, MPD tried to use a minimal amount of force.
He said the officers showed an “enormous amount of restraint.” The event “was out of control,” Rallings said, and it could have easily turned “catastrophic.”
[pullquote-2]
“I thought that situation could have made Selma, Alabama look like a day in the park,” he said.
Following the bridge protest, Rallings said the department started looking at how to better manage protests to avoid future threats to infrastructure and public safety.
After his testimony, Rallings told the media that he “looks forward to working with the court in regards to the consent decree and moving on.”
“I never cared for the typical; I kind of like being difficult,” sings James Godwin of James and the Ultrasounds on “None of the Above,” the opening track of the new album of the same name. As a statement of ethos, it’s a fitting introduction to an album that won’t sit still long enough to be easily categorized. Still, the song kicks off the record with a flurry of electric guitars; there’s a hint of surf rock in the drums, a little bit of slap-back somewhere in the mix.
Godwin sounds soulful as hell and just shy of coming completely unwound. I can almost see his wide shirt collar and the sheen of sweat plastering hair to his forehead as David Johnson, the band’s gangly bassist, bops around onstage, feeling the bounce in the groove. The song sounds like rock-and-roll should, like it’s blasting out of a glowing jukebox in a crowded, smoky room, even though it’s just my computer and my headphones, played at a reasonable volume. It sounds like the same James and the Ultrasounds I’ve seen in at least half a dozen dives. But the Ultrasounds have done some growing, and as None of the Above keeps playing, it shows.
None of the Above, released by Madjack Records, is the Ultrasounds’ second full-length album, the follow-up to 2014’s excellent Bad to Be Here. Recorded at Electraphonic Recording and produced by Memphis songwriting and guitar-picking heavyweight John Paul Keith (whose Memphis Circa 3 a.m. is a personal favorite), None of the Above spools out a quick succession of tight tracks, seemingly effortlessly. There’s a definite swagger to the songs on the Ultrasounds’ newest release.
But added attitude isn’t the only difference. The band has undergone some lineup changes, with the departure of guitarist and backing vocalist Luke White. “I’m grateful for all of the musicians in my life,” Godwin says. “I’ve learned a lot from all of them.” To help flesh out the sound for the album, Godwin recruited Flyer music editor Alex Greene, a bandmate from a previous combo, to contribute organ and piano and some rhythm guitar. The organ riffs, plaintive and soul-drenched, would be right at home on a soul song cut over at Royal Studios. The instrument adds a layer to the Ultrasounds’ sound, especially on tracks like “Nowhere to Go” and “Drop the Act.”
None of the Above shows off a side of the Ultrasounds that’s sometimes eclipsed by the ferocity of their rock-and-roll cool. And the band is cool, cool as a Ramones movie or sweat on a bottle of beer, but they can be tender, too. At first glance, they’re all suit jackets and sunglasses at night, telecasters and stories of hard-partying Serbian concert promoters, but great performers know when to take off the shades and show a little vulnerability. James and the Ultrasounds’ second album slows down long enough to show off some Southern soul and old-school country that’s always been a part of the band’s musical make-up.
Godwin traces his tastes back to quiet moments in childhood, times when his grandmother would, if only for a little peace and quiet, tell him to sit still and just listen. “My earliest musical memories are sitting in my grandmother’s house when I was four or five. I would get into stuff, and she would tell me to sit there and be quiet and listen to her music,” Godwin remembers. “She was always playing Patsy Cline or Charlie Pride, always sad stuff. Day after day, I would hear it.
“The country influence has always been there,” Godwin says. “Touring with J.P. [Keith], we’d always listen to old country stuff in his van.” A veteran of a slew of Memphis bands, Godwin used to play bass for Keith. Bad to Be Here’s rollicking “Party Dracula” was inspired by a promoter Godwin met while on tour oversees with Keith’s bad. And perhaps some of the cohesion of None of the Above is a result of so many hours already spent together, a shared set of musical references. “John Paul told me one time ‘There’s one band in Memphis, and we’re all in it,’” Godwin laughs.
“I was his go-to bass player for a good handful of years. I’ve still to this day probably played more shows with him on stage than with anyone else,” says Godwin. “We’ve covered a lot of ground together, from Memphis to Serbia and everywhere in between.” Whatever the reason, there’s a confidence on display on None of the Above that hints at an easy connection between everyone involved. These songs are tight enough to make the listener suspect the musicians and producer shared a telepathic connection.
“I’ve got 27 different jobs, but I still don’t like my odds of getting my money back,” Godwin sings on “New Subtraction.” Drummer John Argroves’ tight tom work on and the doubled guitar lines during the song’s instrumental turnaround evoke a frantic energy that feels like being out of luck and out of gas on the baking asphalt of a Memphis street corner. “New Subtraction” is the Ultrasounds at their unrestrained best, but the band somehow manages to turn up the heat still more a little later in the record.
Keith brought in the award-winning Billy Gibson, aka the Mississippi Saxophone, to contribute his much-lauded harmonica skills to “Am I Crazy.” Gibson channels the mood of the song, ripping riffs from his harmonica that sound fearlessly deranged. Gibson’s wailing harmonica sits on a bed of bumping bass and crunchy guitars. There’s plenty on display here for any fans of Bad to Be Here’s reckless rock-and-roll energy. For all the added subtlety of the new record, the Ultrasounds still know how to crank up the amps and wake up the crowd. Now they just know how to do it with harmonica, too.
“Drop the Act” is a soulful, heart-wrenching song, with Godwin pleading for honesty over warbling organs in 6/8 time. A motif runs through the lyrics on None of the Above, and it’s on full display on this track. Lovers leave, lies are told, money is in short supply, and there are sleepless nights to spare. Tires go flat and need to be repaired. But if Godwin sounds like someone who knows how it feels to be locked out, shaken up, and shaken down, he seems to know when to laugh off his bad luck and when to shoot straight with the listener, to admit “I suppose that much of the blame is mine.” As a result, no matter how dark it gets on None of the Above, the problems never appear insurmountable, and Godwin never shades into the maudlin.
If Bad to Be Here is the Ultrasounds’ punk-tinged rock-and-roll record, then None of the Above is the band plunging deep into the country and soul that were rock’s first influences, its grandfathers. For all the instrumental energy on display, the band puts the 11 songs on None of the Above through their paces with cool grace, almost making it look easy. And the addition of organ adds a frequency to the Ultrasounds’ sonic spectrum, opening up new spaces for the band to explore. The result is a matured sound that feels like an evolution for a mainstay of the Memphis music scene.
James and the Ultrasounds play an album release show for None of the Above at Bar DKDC, Friday, August 24th, at 10 p.m.
Writer/director/actor Jim Cummings and Kendal Farr in Thunder Road
The movie week starts off with a bang tonight, as Indie Memphis presents the Grand Jury Prize winner from this year’s South By Southwest film festival. Thunder Road is an expansion of an acclaimed short film by writer/director Jim Cummings about parenthood in the wake of loss. It’s at Malco Ridgeway tonight, and you can buy tickets here.
This Week At The Cinema: Outflix Kicks Off and Rifftrax Conquers Krull.
Ouflix season officially begins tonight with a preview party at Crosstown Arts’ 430 N. Cleveland space. They’ll be previewing this year’s lineup and presenting three works for their new short film competition. One of the shorts, “Conway Pride”, is by filmmaker Stephen Stanley, who made his first films in Memphis before embarking on a career that has taken him to Hollywood and, currently, France. He made “Conway Pride” while teaching film at the University of Central Arkansas. It tells the history of a colorful LBGT couple who organized the first gay pride march in the rural college town, and the fight to save their house after they passed away. The free party begins at 6:30 PM tonight, but bring your dollars to buy passes for the main Outflix festival September 7-13.
This Week At The Cinema: Outflix Kicks Off and Rifftrax Conquers Krull. (5)
On Wednesday, Indie Memphis screens a second South By Southwest winner, this time in the documentary category. The Work takes audiences inside Folsom Prison, where inmates in a group therapy session delve deeply into their past. This moving documentary is sponsored by Just City Memphis, and will include a Q&A with Memphis activist Josh Spickler. Tix here.
This Week At The Cinema: Outflix Kicks Off and Rifftrax Conquers Krull. (2)
Wednesday at the Paradiso, an anime comedy take on After Hours. Director Masaaki Yuasa’s Night Is Short, Walk On Girl is a romantic farce centered around an epic night on the town in Kyoto, Japan. Check out this amazing trailer:
This Week At The Cinema: Outflix Kicks Off and Rifftrax Conquers Krull. (4)
In case you didn’t get your fill last Saturday at the Time Warp Drive-In, Thursday night offers a so-bad-it’s-good film experience. Krull dropped in 1982, during the height of the post-Star Wars sci fi fantasy boom. It’s got some really fantastic pre-CGI effects, and…well, the effects are nice. And the production design is kinda interesting in places. Then there’s the scene with the giant spiders, which is pretty cool…
OK, fine. It’s awful. A total crap pageant. The point is, the Rifftrax guys are going to tear Krull a new Glaive-hole, 7 PM at the Paradiso.
Also, it’s usually a bad idea to revisit obscure sci fi fantasy movies you liked as a kid, unless you enjoy disappointment.
This Week At The Cinema: Outflix Kicks Off and Rifftrax Conquers Krull. (3)
Day one of the federal trial over Memphis’ police surveillance wrapped up Monday with Sgt. Timothy Reynolds of the Memphis Police Department (MPD) on the stand.
Reynolds, who works in MPD’s Office of Homeland Security, was one of the key personnel responsible for creating and using the undercover social media accounts of Bob Smith.
On the stand, Reynolds admitted to adding more than 200 friends who he said were in connection to protests and other gatherings that could become unlawful.
First created in 2009, the Bob Smith account was intitially used solely for investigations and gang-related crimes, but its use changed over time, Reynolds said. A different and more specific type of intelligence gathering started after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, as “we didn’t want a copycat shooter,” he said.
Other evidence revealed the undercover account actively sharing links, commenting on and liking posts, joining and posting in groups, and responding to event requests.
The information gathered through the Bob Smith accounts was then used to monitor the organizers of protests and other community events that MPD thought could be a threat to safety. Many of the events were centered around 19-year-old Darius Stewart, who was killed by an MPD officer in July 2017. Gatherings associated with the Black Lives Matter movement were also closely followed.
However, gatherings like town hall meetings and concerts were also monitored, Reynolds said.
In one email presented to the court, Reynolds’ boss, then-Major Eddie Bass, made Reynolds aware of the “potential for another adverse gathering” planned by organizers of a vigil that Reynolds had previously referred to as “peaceful.”
On another occasion, Reynolds said protesters were trying to “circumvent the permit process,” by planning events in public spaces like libraries where permits aren’t needed.
The plaintiff’s counsel also brought forth emails showing that on multiple occasions MPD shared intelligence on individuals and planned events with organizations outside law enforcement, like Fedex, AutoZone, and Memphis Light, Gas & Water. The information was shared via daily Joint Intelligence Briefing memos.
The plaintiff will resume questioning Reynolds Tuesday morning before the defense begins its cross-examination. After Reynolds, the next witnesses slated to take the stand are Mike Cody, Bruce Kramer, Major Stephen Chandler, and MPD director Michael Rallings.
You know what? As long as John Maness wins something, I don’t care about anything else this year. If the Ostrander committee misses all the rest by miles and miles, I’ll be satisfied for the ounce of justice done. Because … holy crap! After this season, the O-committee should consider a “John Maness hardest-working-person in Memphis Theater” trophy. With a roll-up-your-sleeves work ethic married to the soul of a magician and escape artist, he hammers out one unique character after another and vanishes inside them. I mean, who the hell does this guy think he is, Erin Shelton?
Nevertheless, the time has come, once again, for shade to be cast and predictions made in regard to this year’s crop of nominees and nominees that might have been if only the universe wasn’t so frequently unfair. It’s the season when the Intermission Impossible team wonders what it is our tireless, too human Ostrander judges might be smoking. When we ask the one question on every right-thinking thespian’s mind — “WHO GOT ROBBED?”
I want to see J. David Galloway take home the set design for New Moon’s lovely, immersive, and necessarily inventive design for Eurydice. I’ve been frustrated in the past by designers who quote or wink at surrealism when what’s needed is something approaching the real thing. Not every aspect of Galloway’s design was as dreamy as it might have been, but the microbudget masterpiece engaged imaginations, enabling the kind of stage magic money can’t buy.
[pullquote-1] That said, bigger, better-funded companies still have advantages in design categories and I suspect the judges may prefer Jack Yates’ outstanding work on The Drowsy Chaperone or the ordinary otherworldliness of Tim McMath’s design for Fun Home at Playhouse on the Square.
But what about the eye-candy that was An Act of God (also Yates)? What about 12 Angry Jurors, an environment so real yet another confounded patron tried to use the onstage bathroom (also Yates)? If it sounds like I’m arguing for more Jack Yates nominations, maybe I am. But I’m also making a case that there’s been some good design this season, and given a different set of sensibilities, this category might have swung another direction entirely. There might have been nods for the elegant emptiness of Bryce Cutler’s Once, at Playhouse on the Square, or the grubby, unfussy realism of Phillip Hughen’s design for The Flick at Circuit Playhouse. I look forward to seeing how this category evolves as New Moon continues to mature, and smaller Memphis’ companies leverage thoughtfulness against more tangible resources.
Falsettos.
It’s wrong that Mandy Heath wasn’t nominated for lighting Falsettos but I can live with the slight as long as she wins the prize for Eurydice. That’s really all I have to say about that.
Once is a stunt musical — and what a terrific stunt! It’s part concert, part narrative drama, with the actors doubling down as their own orchestra. The three-chord score’s not Sondheim but casting players who are also, well… players isn’t easy. And pulling off a piece musical theater where the songs feel more like barroom romps than show tunes, requires a different kind of sophistication. I suspect the thrice-nominated Nathan McHenry will take this prize. He should take it for Once.
Who got robbed? Maybe nobody this year.
For excellence in sound design there are a few nominees, but really only one choice. Joe Johnson’s dreamy original score for Eurydice didn’t enhance the designed environment. It completed it.
I was happy to see choreographers Ellen Inghram and Jared Johnson nominated for the wit and wisdom permeating their work on Falsettos. It would be nice to see them win over the flashier entries in this category. No robberies here.
When it comes to the non-musicals, best female lead and supporting roles are almost always the toughest category to call because year after year they are overstuffed with contenders. While Kim Sanders was her usual perfect self in both A Perfect ArrangementandLaughter on the 23rd Floor, the double nomination in the supporting category may not double her odds against commanding, emotionally wrenching turns by Jessica “Jai” Johnson inRuined and Erin Shelton in All Saints in the Old Colony. Kell Christie was the best Emelia I’ve ever seen and a perfect match for John Maness’ woman-hating Iago in New Moon’s Othello.Any other year Christie would be my #1 pick. She’s a longshot compared to Shelton and Johnson and I’m hard pressed to say who’s more deserving of the honor.
Opera 901 Showcase
Who got robbed? Although FEMMEemphis’ productions aren’t under consideration, basically the entire cast of Collective Rage. Quark’s similarly out of the running but in the young company’s very adult production of The Nether, young Molly McFarland stood shoulder to shoulder with grownup co-stars and delivered a brave, polished performance. As the youngest of the Weston daughters in Theatre Memphis’ tepid August: Osage County, Emily F. Chateau was damn near perfect — as fragile as Laura Wingfield’s glass unicorn and as likely to cut you if broken. ROBBED AS HELL!
Anne Marie Caskey does consistently professional work but she seemed miscast in Theatre Memphis’ not altogether successful production of August: Osage County. Ostrander loves Caskey (as do I) and her inclusion here might seem less bewildering if not for the absence of Michelle Miklosey’s pitch perfect Eurydice Tracy Hansom’s good old fashioned curtain chew inStage Kiss. Were I one of these two ladies, I’d take The Oblivains strong advice and call the police. Because, ROBBED! OMG ROBBED!
Some of the best female leads this season did their thing just outside Ostrander’s natural reach. Jillian Baron and Julia Baltz were equally badass in FEMMEmphis’ Desdemona: A Play About a Handkerchief. But let’s be real. All this talk of robbery is purely academic because each of these fantastic performances paled next to to Maya Geri Robinson’s larger-than-life depiction of a Congolese Mother Courage in Ruined at Hattiloo. And Robinson’s performance may have only been the season’s second best. I can’t say with any confidence that I’ve ever seen an actor own a show like Morgan Watson owned Sunset Baby, also at Hattiloo.
Emily F. Chateau. The F stands for F-ing ROBBED!
The list for Best Supporting Actor is strong. It’s so strong I’m picking Bertram Williams for Ruined even though I started this column cheering for John Maness in anything. The list of nominees might also have included nods to Jeff Kirwan for his performances in New Moon’s Buried Child, Eurydice or both. It’s worth noting (yet again) that every performance in All Saints in the Old Colony approached a personal best and Marques Brown was ROBBED!
I don’t know what the theater judges had against Buried Child but James Dale Green’s Dodge is a glaring best actor omission. So is Emmanuel McKinney, who gave a knockout performance as Muhammad Ali in the uneven Fetch Clay, Make Man. Both of these men should post on Nextdoor.com right away to let everybody know they were ROBBED! Once that’s been done, can we please all agree to give this year’s prize to John Maness? And can we go ahead make it for everything he touched this season? I say this with deep appreciation for and apologies to All Saints’ Greg Boller and Jitney’s Lawrence Blackwell who both delivered special, award-worthy performances in a season where the competition happened to be a little stiffer than usual.
I take it from the sheer number of nominations in the category of Best Supporting Actress in a Musical, the Ostrander judges liked Fun Home. Me too. But maybe not enough to give any category a near sweep. Especially when it might be appropriate to co-nominate Fun Home’s small and medium Alison in order to make room for Falsettos’ Jaclyn Suffel and/or Christina Hernandez who were both ROBBED!
Ostranders 2018: Picks, Pans, and ‘Who Got ROBBED?!?!’
A taste of Once‘s pre-show jam. Like I said, Ostrander very clearly likes Fun Home this year with the odd exception of adult Alison, Joy Brooke-Fairfield. So, individual nominations aside, I’m predicting a joint win for the two Alisons. Of course Annie Freres was a force of nature as the title character in The Drowsy Chaperone. All else being equal, she was probably the most outstanding nominee in a field of outstanding nominees.
Best Female Lead in a Musical is a heartbreaker category because everybody nominated is ridiculously talented. Nobody in town has pipes like Dreamgirls’ Breyannah Tillman, who’s also proving to be a formidable actor. But Emily F. Chateau also had an amazing year and may have been better in Falsettos than she was in August: Osage County. Gia Welch is a precocious powerhouse. She was great in Chaperone, but might also have been nominated for work on 42nd Street or Heathers. Meanwhile, Once’s Lizzy Hinton and Shrek’s Lynden Lewis occupy opposite corners of this playing field. The former helped build a complete world out of song and mirrors.The later was almost buried in spectacle but made heart and soul so much more important than green makeup and ogre costumes.
Let me let you in on a secret: Like Lena Younger’s striving son Walter, Patricia Smith was ROBBED! She should have gotten a nod for her work in the musical adaptation of A Raisin in the Sun. I’m gonna talk about Raisin later on in this seemingly endless column, but frankly, that whole cast might want to call a personal injury attorney because they were dealt a disservice up front then ripped off by out appraisers!
Given all of Fun Home’s nominations in other categories, the omission of Joy Brooke-Fairfield feels oddly pointed. Fun Home’s a show that might challenge traditional gender divisions in these kinds of awards and when I didn’t see the older Alison included in this category, I so I double checked the whole list to make sure I wasn’t missing anything. But there was no Joy to be found anywhere, and that sentence is every bit as sad as it sounds. ROBBED!
I’d like to see Joshua Pierce win the Best Supporting Actor in a Musical category for Theatre Memphis’ superlative take on Falsettos. But I missed First Date and Dreamgirls this season and, truth be told, I don’t understand Shrek’s appeal. Too disoriented by this category to make a fair call. That almost never happens. Y’all tell me.
Best Leading Actor in a Musical is yet another heartbreaker category. Shrek’s never going to be my thing, but it’s very clearly Justin Asher’s, and he was a mighty fine ogre, loving every second of big green stage time. Stephen Huff was so at home in Fun Home it’s now almost impossible for me to imagine anybody else in his role. And I kinda feel the same about Jason Spitzer’s near definitive take on The Drowsy Chaperone’s Man in Chair. But I’ve gotta say, having been underwhelmed by his pitchy turn in Heathers, I was most impressed by Conor Finnerty-Esmonde’s take on the hard-luck musician in Once. But when I filter out personal taste in music and storytelling and just let myself focus on the difficulty and potency of the performances represented here, one actor’s work really stands out. Villains are fun to play but nothing’s harder than a complex character who’s hard-to-like but can’t be allowed to become a villain. Cary Vaughn, in his finest of many fine performances, plowed through Falsettos like a steamroller. Still standing. Still applauding this entire cast.
Eurydice — Awfully good looking.
But what about Kortland Whalum? Where is his name? I’ll be the first to admit, Raisin was tragically underproduced. The scenic environment felt unfinished, and in an intimate space like Hattiloo, nothing sucks the soul from musical performances like warm bodies performing to cold tracks. But somehow, in spite of everything the actors had working against them, Raisin’s cast collectively overcame. I can’t blame the Ostrander for not rewarding the production, but when you factor in the odds against, no cast was more ROBBED than this one. I’ll brook zero argument: No actor deserves to this category half as much as Whalum. Folks are welcome to disagree on this point, but folks who do are flat wrong. ROBBED!
If Jamel “JS” Tate doesn’t win Best Featured Performer in a Drama for Jittny I’m personally calling in the FBI. Annie Freres is likely to win Best Featured in a musical for her flashy roll-on as the Dragon in Shrek. Or maybe it will go to Breyannah Tillman, who stuck the landing in her role as The Drowsy Chaperone’s show-stopping aviatrix. But James Dale Green stopped time with nothing but his weatherbeaten tenor, a strummed mandolin, and a compelling story to tell. That sounds like a winner to me. Who got Robbed? Once’s Chris Cotton, that’s who.
I’m totally happy if the Ensemble award goes to All Saints in the Old Colony, Falsettos, Fun Home, Jitney, or A Perfect Arrangement. All are deserving, though Jitney may be just a little bit more deserving than all the rest. But how in the blankety-blankblanblank did Once not make this list? The cast doesn’t just act together, they also make music together — acoustic music. Music largely unaided by electronics and amplification. Music so thoroughly human it connects past and future like a time machine made of skin, bone, wood and string. I’m happy if the award goes to any of the fantastic nominees, but no matter who wins the judges lose on this account. Once was the season’s ultimate ensemble show, and POTS’s ensemble crushed it. The pre-show hoedown was worth the price of admission. BOO!
As long as I’m complaining about the judges, OMG! Why is Tony Isbell nominated for excellence in direction of a drama for Death of a Streetcar Named Virginia Woolf? Don’t misunderstand, I come to praise this year’s lifetime achievement honoree, not to dis him. Isbell absolutely should have been nominated in this category, but for his work on The Nether (not eligible). Or his work on Years to the Day (also not eligible). Or maybe even his work on Stage Kiss (eligible and solid but fuck-you ignored). I’d go so far as to say he got ROBBED! in spite of bing nominated. This insubstantial work is a jarring inclusion next to Dr. Shondrika Moss-Bouldin’s unflinching approach to Ruined and the inventiveness of Jamie Boller’s Eurydice. Not to mention the hyper-detailed character development, and ensemble work Jeff Posson oversaw for All Saints in the Old Colony and the flawless world-building of Steve Broadnax’s Jitney. I’m calling this one for Posson, but it could go in almost any direction.
Best production of a drama? I like Jitney, though I’ve not pegged it as a winner in many other categories. Sometimes the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and that’s the case here, though the parts were also quite good. Should All Saints in the Old Colony win, it’s every bit as deserving and, being a new script and the underdog here, maybe even more deserving.
I’m betting the darkhorse for excellence in Direction of a Musical and calling this one for Jerry Chipman and Falsettos. Everything else was bigger or flashier or more current in some way or another, even the stripped down Once. But life’s about balance, and Chipman’s production had nary a hair out of place that wasn’t supposed to be out of place.
Ostranders 2018: Picks, Pans, and ‘Who Got ROBBED?!?!’ (2)
Looking at the nominee spread, my gut tells me Fun Home was the judges’ favorite musical this season, and why wouldn’t it be? It was flawlessly cast, and beautifully performed. But this wasn’t the best work I’ve seen from director Dave Landis. I saw the performance with two companions. One wept openly, responding to the story and the characters. The other complained all the way home about the musical’s almost complete lack of action and visual/physical dynamics. I became the most unpopular person in the car when I said I thought they were both 100-percent right to feel the way they felt. Up to this point I’ve been #TeamFalsettos but I’m calling this one for Once. The other shows were great, but they were shows. Once was an event.
“Theaters not actively engaged in creating new material are passively engaged in their own obsolescence.” — Me.
Yeah, I totally quoted myself, but there’s not much I believe more than that. It’s one of the reasons I think the Ostrander Awards for Best Original Script and Best Production of an Original Script, may be more important than nice. In the future, judges might even consider beating the bushes a little on this front, and looking beyond the usual qualifying companies. All Saints in the Old Colony is a fantastic new script. It will win these categories, and it will know productions and awards beyond Memphis. But now would be a good time for all the folks who contributed words and music to Opera Memphis’ all-original 901 Opera Festival to cancel their credit cards because they have been ROBBED! OM might not be under consideration, but if we’re looking for superlatives, I can’t recall a more impressive example of new musical theater in the 901. Not
Tony Isbell in ‘Red’
since OM’s 2014 production of Ghosts of Crosstown heralded the rebirth of a neighborhood.
That may not cover every category, but it’s all I’ve got for now. Who did I forget?
Also, stay tuned for a Q&A with lifetime achievement honoree Tony Isbell.
Memphians, tourists, and all-around fans of Aretha Franklin made a pilgrimage to the singer’s birthplace, leaving flowers, posters, tiaras, and written tributes on the home.
Franklin died on Thursday. She was 76.
She was born at 406 Lucy in South Memphis. Preservationists have been working to save the home for the past two years.
Justin Fox Burks 
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