Month: January 2020

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News News Blog

Forrest Bust Sparks Fiery Debate in House

CREDIT: Nathan Bedford Forrest Boyhood Home/Facebook

Nathan Bedford Forrest Boyhood Home/Facebook

Fiery debate sparked among members and guests of the Tennessee House Naming, Designating, and Private Acts committee Tuesday as they reviewed the possible removal of a bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest from the State Capitol Building.

Rep. Rick Staples (D-Knoxville) brought a resolution to the committee to remove the bust, “replacing it with tribute to a more deserving Tennessean.” Staples suggested replacing it with busts of Anne Davis, a Knoxville woman instrumental in winning federal designation for Smokey Mountains National Park, and of William Yardley, the first African American to run for Tennessee governor.

“There are a number of divisive topics on the Nathan Bedford Forrest bust,” Staples said. “My idea is to move past the conversations that divide us and have conversations about what could bring us together.”

Kristie Allen, general counsel for the Tennessee Capitol Commission, laid out the two-step process for the bust’s removal. The removal would first go to the Capitol Commission, a board comprised of several cabinet members, like the Secretary of State, comptroller, and Commissioner of Finance, for example.

If that board approves of the removal, it would, then, request a waiver from the Tennessee Historical Commission to step around the Tennessee Heritage Protection Act. That law says no statue or monument can be removed from public grounds without the commission’s approval. Memphis sidestepped this process in 2017 and removed the statue of Forrest from what is now called Health Sciences Park.

Minutes before Nathan Bedford Forrest’s statue was removed from Health Sciences Park

Staples’ resolution would not change much substantively. It would simply tell members of the deciding bodies of the House’s opinion on the bust and, perhaps, inform their decisions.

Rep. Mark Windle (D- Livingston) chaired the meeting Tuesday and noted that he asked members of the Tennessee Historical Commission to attend but “they declined to appear. They were invited and decided not to come.”
[pullquote-1] Without the board’s historical expertise, the committee heard, instead, from James Patterson, a Civil War re-enactor and state commander of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. The Forrest bust should stay, he said, to help us remember the history of our past.”

“Monuments have not been a problem until about three years ago,” Patterson said. “(Attacks on the monuments) are now based on a false narrative and fake history, agitated by those with a radical agenda about the destruction of American history.”

Sons of Confederate Veterans state commander testifies to the House committee.

Patterson said members of the “Murfreesboro antifa” recently “doxxed” him, and made his personal information like his home address, phone number, and more public. The group called him and others “white supremacists” and it seemed some were trying “to get someone to attack us just because we like Tennessee history because it comes in through our blood.” Also, he recently received a letter saying, “leave town racist.” He said removing the bust would be “approving their bad behavior.”

Rep. John Ray Clemmons (D-Nashville) said protests around the Forrest bust go back to at least 1978 and have continued since then. Patterson said those protests probably weren’t as rowdy as they have been recently. Clemmons said bullwhips were used and that there have been “overwhelming objection to the bust since 1978.”

The committee also heard from historian and former history professor Michael Bradley, who urged the committee to “apply the standard practices of history to the issues at hand.” That meant looking at evidence and proof.

In several instances, Bradley provided several accounts of where, he said, legend about Forrest had overshadowed facts. While Forrest was a slave trader, Bradley said a news story at the time that painted him as an abusive slave owner was likely “wartime propaganda” conceived by Abraham Lincoln’s administration.

Michael Bradley testifies to the House committee.

On founding the Ku Klux Klan, Bradley said no one has ever produced evidence that Forrest formed the group. He said a federal inquiry proved this and that legislators at the time “congratulated him on his efforts to suppress the Klan.”

On Fort Pillow, Bradley said there were some violations of the rules of war. However, he said the numbers were exaggerated. The midpoint of casualties, Bradley said, was about 185, not the 277 listed in state historical documents or in encyclopedias.

On this discrepancy, Rep. Jason Hodges (D-Clarksville) asked “how many people can you massacre and still be honored?” Bradley told him massacre was a “loaded” word and recalled that many called Forrest “the Butcher of Fort Pillow.”

“Oh, OK. How many people can I butcher before I’m honored by the state of Tennessee?” Hodges asked.

Bradley replied, “probably a large number” and pointed to Andrew Jackson’s removal and slaughter of Native Americans.

While many committee members debated Forrest’s merit and place of honor in the capitol building, Rep. Bo Mitchell (D-Nashville) was having none of it.

Crowds gathered in Health Sciences Park to support the removal of the Nathan Bedford Forrest statue.

“I don’t want to honor anyone in this state that is guilty of something like,” Mitchell said. “Take me to Germany and show me anyone responsible for the atrocities of World War II and if there’s a state of them in Germany honoring them, I’ll shut up and say we should leave that bust up,” Mitchell said. “Things were done wrong in our history and we need to learn from them and move on, but let’s not act like nothing happened at Fort Pillow.”

The committee ultimately held the resolution for one week. Rep. Glen Casada (R-Franklin) said he had an amendment to the legislation that rotates busts of Tennesseans in and out of the capitol building. At the end of Tuesday’s debate, though, Staples had the last word.

“It is serendipitous and a thing of beauty that after such a hearty and controversial debate, that a descendant of slavery is now speaking,” Staples said. “An individual who was never thought to be here today, walked across the assembly floor of the House.

“(Tennsseans) are seeing us fight and be divisive and debate. I’m telling you today, this is not who we are. I know you. You know me. We know our families. We laugh. We talk. We make fun of one another. We know how to be respectful of one another.”
[pullquote-2] At the same committee meeting, Staples offered the committee a bill to designate August 8th as “Emancipation Day.“ The bill would would change the day from one of observance to a legal holiday. The distinction would allow some state employees to take the day off from work.

This, according to the legislature’s fiscal review committee, could cost the state up to $647,400 in the next fiscal year and each year afterward.

Staples said he’ll amend the bill to designate the day to the first Sunday before August 8th, removing any financial hit to the state budget.

Categories
We Recommend We Saw You

Science of Beer, Homebrewer’s Dinner, Carnival Memphis, Jewish Chinese Culinary Mashup, Iris Orchestra

CREDIT: Jason Viera

Jason Viera

This beer has quite a head on (in) it.

Usually, when you go out to grab a cold one at your favorite drinking hole, you don’t get a lecture. Until maybe after you get home.

The seventh-annual Science of Beer, which was held January 17th at the Pink Palace Museum, featured mini-lectures, as well as talks with brewers and other beer-themed activities, along with more than 20 beer stations and almost the same number of food stations.

Each guest received a 16-ounce glass along with other items you don’t get at your local pub: a tasting card and a map of the event.

The combination beer tasting and education workshop raises money for the Pink Palace’s Education Department.

About 500 people attended and $30,000 was raised, says Pink Palace manager of marketing Bill Walsh.

Michael Donahue

Brandon Closson, Doyle Schaeffer, and Amanda Rast at Science of Beer.

Michael Donahue

Science of Beer

Michael Donahue

Bridgett Hauer and Clinton Ward at Science of Beer

Michael Donahue

Nate Oliva, Spencer Coplan, Gerald Darling, Spencer McMillin, and Conrad Phillips at the Homebrewer’s Dinner.

And speaking of beer…

If measured in karats, Caritas Community Center & Cafe dinners would be way up there. Take the Homebrewer’s Dinner, which was held January 17th. Former Caritas chef de cuisine Spencer McMillin was at the helm.

“I created this dinner with Michael Lee of Midsouth Malts (a home brewers supply store) to honor the underdog heroes of the Memphis brewing scene,” McMillin says. “The big boys – Wiseacre, High Cotton, Memphis Made, etc. – get all the credit – and they produce amazing beers – but there are people in the background making good stuff, too.

“The hit of the night was the 22-year-old barley wine aged for six months in a Jack Daniels barrel served with my dessert.”

That dessert was a parfait of coconut-caramel custard, almond toffee, white chocolate mousse, and candied bacon beer.

Also in the kitchen were Caritas chef de cuisine Conrad Phillips, Spencer Coplan and Gerald Darling from Wok’n in Memphis, and Nate Oliva.

Meet the 2020 Carnival Memphis king and queen: Ray Gill and Carter Stovall.

Ray Gill is king and Carter Stovall is queen of Carnival Memphis 2020.

Carnival Memphis will celebrate the commercial real estate development industry. The Business and Industry Salute will be held February 13th at Hilton Memphis.

Gill, founder of Gill Properties, and his wife, Betha, are the parents of three children, Brown, York, and Lizzie, who were members of the Carnival Memphis Royal Court.

Stovall, daughter of Baylor and Howard Stovall IV, is a junior at Cornell University, where she is studying pre-med.

The queen comes from a long line of Carnival Memphis lineage. William Howard Stovall II, her great-grandfather, was king in 1948; her grandfather, William Howard Stovall III, was king in 1976; and her father was king in 1976. Her mother was queen in 1993.

Carter and her brother, Quint, were Royal Pages in 2008. She served as the University Club of Memphis princess in the 2018 Royal Court.

Gill and Stovall will be presented at the Crown & Sceptre Ball, which will be held May 29th at the Hilton Memphis.

Hugh Mallory is Carnival Memphis’ president.

Boy Scouts Scouting Deserts Program, Red Zone Ministries, and Thrive Memphis are the recipients of this year’s Carnival Children’s Charity Initiative.

Michael Donahue

Spencer Coplan and Cara Greenstein at the Jewish Chinese Culinary Mashup dinner.

If you were lucky enough to attend the Jewish Chinese Culinary Mashup dinner, which was held January 19th at Puck Food Hall, you would have tasted matzo ball wonton soup and matzo encrusted amberjack fish, among other delicacies.

Spencer Coplan, chef/owner of Wok’n in Memphis, and Cara Greenstein joined forces for the dinner, Coplan says: “I’m Jewish. She’s Jewish. Jews love Chinese food.”

Chinese restaurants are “open on Christmas. It’s always been a thing. So, we talked about doing this for a couple of months now.”

They figured January was the first time to do the dinner, which is the inaugural event for Coplan’s Culinary Artisans Dinner Series. “Each month we’re going to do a collaboration with a chef, blogger, or someone who is involved in the food scene. We’re going to do a dinner with them.”

He and Greenstein met two weeks ago “and went over some fun ideas for the menu – bringing Chinese food and Israeli food together. This is what we came up with. It was mainly my food ideas.”

The next Culinary Artisans Dinner Series will be held February 24th at SoLa restaurant in Oxford, Mississippi. Coplan will team with SoLa chef/owner Erika Lipe. “It’s going to be more of an la carte. Guests can order what they want. She and I are collaborating on the menu. We both do Asian-inspired food with Southern twists, so we’re going to come up with some fun food ideas together and both our teams will execute the dinner.”

For information on the SoLo dinner, call (662)-238-3500.

Michael Donahue

Ashley Phoummavong, Amaia Johnson, Spencer Coplan, Gerald Darling, Omar Hernandez, and Ben Curtis at the Jewish Chinese Culinary Mashup dinner.

MIchael Donahue

Nick Manlavi and Zach Jennings at the Jewish Chinese Culinary Mashup dinner.

Michael Donahue

Melissa Peeler and Nancy Bogatin at Irish Orchestra party.

January 26th was a great day for the Iris. That night, members of Iris Orchestra were guests at a party at the home of Milton Schaeffer. They got to carry wine and food instead of musical instruments.

“Milton has thrown numerous parties for Iris over the years, and they are all over-the-top fabulous,” says Marcia Kaufmann, Iris Orchestra executive director.

The recent party was “a thank you for donors who had stepped up for the Iris 2020 Vision challenge – to increase their giving by 20 percent in honor of our 20th season and for the musicians who make it all worthwhile.”

About 115 people attended.


                 

                                        WE SAW YOU AROUND TOWN

Michael Donahue

Joshua and Janina Cosby at Antique Warehouse.

MIchael Donahue

Daniel Bonds, David Bonds, and Jansen Swift at Gibson’s Donuts.

Categories
Film/TV Film/TV/Etc. Blog

Oscar Contenders, Hitchcock, and the International Jewish Film Festival Kickoff This Week At The Movies

Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint pause for refreshment in North By Northwest.

We’ve got some good stuff on Memphis screens this week, if you’re looking for fare beyond the multiplex.

On Wednesday, January 29th, at Studio on the Square, Indie Memphis is getting warmed up for the new cinema with Pedro Almodóvar’s Pain and Glory. The 70-year-old Spanish filmmaker’s latest earned Antonio Banderas a Best Actor award when it debuted at Cannes. Banderas, who starred alongside the great but perpetually underutilized Penelope Cruz, is up for Best Actor at next weekend’s Academy Awards, and the film is in contention for Best International Feature. It’s also Spain’s biggest box office hit in a decade.

Oscar Contenders, Hitchcock, and the International Jewish Film Festival Kickoff This Week At The Movies

On Thursday, January 30th, the annual Morris and Mollye Fogelman International Jewish Film Festival kicks off with a gala screening at the Malco Paradiso. The Keeper tells the true story of Bert Trautmann, a German soldier during World War II who relocated to the UK after spending time in a POW camp. Trautmann became the goalie for Manchester United and led the storied football team to victory in the 1956 FA Cup. His love for a Jewish woman causes controversy and calls into question everyone’s assumptions. The screening starts at 7 p.m., and you can find more details about the month-long festival at the JCC Memphis website.

Oscar Contenders, Hitchcock, and the International Jewish Film Festival Kickoff This Week At The Movies (2)

Back at Studio on the Square on Thursday night, one of the best films from a GOAT. Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest re-teamed him with Cary Grant, whom he first worked with in 1941’s Suspicion. Grant plays Roger Thornhill, a caddish ad executive who inadvertently gets caught up in Cold War spy-jinx while he romances possible secret agent Eva Marie Saint. The blockbuster hit of 1959 has inspired countless imitators through the decades and remains the commercial pinnacle of Hitch’s career. One of these days, I’ll get the opportunity to use my favorite line from the film: When a train station clerk notices Grant’s sunglasses and asks if there’s something wrong with his eyes, Grant responds, “Yes, they’re sensitive to questions.” The film screens at 7 and 9:45 p.m. Here’s the original trailer:

Oscar Contenders, Hitchcock, and the International Jewish Film Festival Kickoff This Week At The Movies (3)

See you at the movies! 

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

You Have Arrived: Cocktails, Coffee, and Carbs at Arrive Hotel

I’m a total baby about cold weather. If it dips below 50 degrees, I’ll easily opt for Uber Eats over a trip into the cold to get food. This is one reason I think places like the Arrive Hotel are so cool: Once you’re there, everything you need is in one place.

Arrive is home to Longshot restaurant, bakery Hustle & Dough, coffeeshop Vice & Virtue, and the lobby bar, Bar Hustle. Each has its own look, feel, and menu, so you can spend the afternoon wandering from one to the other without ever really leaving the building.

Ali Rohrbacher, formerly the head baker at the cafe at Crosstown Arts and at The Liquor Store, runs the boutique bakery Hustle & Dough and shares the lobby with Tim and Teri Perkins of Vice & Virtue.

Photos by Lorna Field

Pablo Mata, lead bartender at Arrive’s Bar Hustle

The bakery serves up homemade breads like sourdoughs and baguettes, as well as special pastries and treats. Snacks for Bar Hustle are also cooked up in the Hustle & Dough kitchen, like the mushroom toast on porridge sourdough with basil pesto, wild mushrooms, ricotta, and parmesan; or Grandma Alice’s Pecan Pie, served with an all-butter pie crust and dark chocolate ganache “black bottom” — the Rohrbacher family recipe.

Erik Hmiel, beverage director for the hotel, says that fermentation is one thing the drinks and food have in common.

“One of the parallels that Ali [Rohrbacher], as a chef and baker, and I share is a mutual interest and appreciation for fermentation,” Hmiel says. “Obviously, that’s a big part of bread-making. She’s really obsessed in a great way with fermentation, and I’ve sort of jumped on that bandwagon and learned a lot from her.”

For example, Bar Hustle serves a cocktail with fermented blueberries, as well as a seasonal kombucha.

Like fermentation, a focus on flavor is another commonality between the food and drink menus at Arrive. Bar Hustle offers a selection of specialty cocktails dreamt up by Hmiel, each with their own unique ingredients and presentation. The Bird Graveyard is prepared with aquavit, Scotch, banana, carrot verjus, and marjoram and served in a tumbler glass with one large ice cube. It tastes slightly sweet and earthy. The deep purple Fabio’s Roller Coaster is made with rye, lemon, fermented blueberry, pastis, dry vermouth, and black sesame and served in a delicate coupe glass.

The cocktail menu is just as whimsical as the decor. The lobby is filled with velvet couches, plants, and oriental rugs. It’s easy to feel like you’re in a speakeasy or in Europe or in an eccentric aristocrat’s penthouse. It certainly doesn’t feel like a hotel lobby.

And that’s, in part, because Bar Hustle is for locals as much as it is for hotel guests.

“We put a lot of time, effort, and thought into what we’re putting out there,” Hmiel says. “We also have a service industry night on Sunday. At the end of the day, we just wanted to be a fun and inviting space for everyone.

“One of the things we might do in the future is a series of pop-ups every month, or every two months. That’s something we’re thinking about right now, going into the new year,” Hmiel continues. Bar Hustle also hosts musicians on Friday nights and is looking to expand their entertainment offerings in the coming year.

So if, like me, you hate going out into the cold, but you also don’t want to feel too stir-crazy at home all winter, take a trip to Arrive. You can start your day with coffee at Vice & Virtue, have lunch at Hustle & Dough, then grab a cocktail and a show at Bar Hustle — all without leaving the hotel. And, hey, if it’s too cold to go home, you can always rent a room for the night.

The Arrive Hotel is located at 477 S. Main.

Categories
Opinion Viewpoint

Make It Manual! Voting by Hand is Safer and More Accurate.

Steve Mulroy

Shelby County is getting ready to replace its aging, unsecure voting machines with new voting equipment. When we did this 15 years ago, we opted for the more expensive, shiny, new high-tech touchscreen system over the more reliable low-tech paper ballot system, causing years of election problems.  

Steve Mulroy

We’re about to make the same mistake again.  

Hand-Marked Paper Ballots vs. Touchscreens: Local election reform advocates argue for a hand-marked paper ballot system. A voter would fill out a paper ballot by hand, filling in the bubbles on a scantron sheet like we’ve been doing for half a century with the high school ACT test. The voter would then feed the paper into a scanner, which would record the vote and retain the paper ballots securely so they could be used as a check against the computer record.  

This system is used in 38 states. Hamilton County (Chattanooga) has used it successfully for over 20 years. 

Instead, the Shelby County Election Commission is considering the latest shiny, new system, the Ballot Marking Device (BMD). With BMDs, voters would press touchscreens as before, and the touchscreen computer would print out a paper receipt which the voter can then inspect for accuracy before feeding it into a machine. The BMD system is twice as expensive and half as secure. 

Expense: Both BMD and hand-marked paper ballots require a scanner at each voting precinct. But BMDs additionally require at least three to four expensive BMD touchscreen machines at each precinct. Gilford County, North Carolina, recently reported saving $5 million by opting for hand-marked paper ballots over BMDs. Since their population is smaller, it’s reasonable to expect about an $8 million savings here in Shelby. 

Security: The security problem is in letting a computer mark the paper receipt rather than having each voter do it himself. Any computer can be hacked. Human beings can’t. Election security experts have already demonstrated how BMD machines can be hacked to make the computer print out bogus candidate selections. And even absent fraud, like with all computers, glitches are possible. 

BMD advocates say, not to fear: Before the voter feeds the paper receipt into the scanner, she can spot any error and alert an election official. But that may not work in the real world, with a sophisticated hack or a non-obvious glitch. A recent University of Michigan study showed that over 90 percent of the time, voters failed to report such errors when they were present. In a close race, the study concluded, these computer errors could easily change an election outcome. 

Even worse, most BMD scanners actually read a bar code on the paper receipt, like the kind used at a grocery checkout line, instead of the human-readable parts of the paper showing which candidates were selected. Since human beings can’t read a bar code, even the most diligent and eagle-eyed voter won’t be able to tell if her vote’s being stolen. Colorado recently banned bar codes in its elections. 

For these reasons, most election security experts recommend hand-marked paper ballots over BMDs. Since the scanners common to both systems are also not perfect, they also recommend Risk Limiting Audits (RLAs), where election officials manually examine a statistical sample of paper ballots to make sure they match up with the computer-recorded vote totals. Four states now require RLAs, with more expected. 

The Other Side: BMD advocates object, saying that voters will screw up marking their paper ballots, introducing unacceptable levels of voter error. It’s also harder for some disabled voters, they argue. Finally, they say it’s unworkable during early voting in a big county like Shelby, which has over 100 different types of ballot faces (depending on which state/county/city/school board district a particular voting precinct is in). But Hamilton County, the third-largest county in the state, with over 135 different ballot faces, has managed all these issues successfully for over 20 years. They report low voter-error rates, smooth early voting sailing, and accommodations for disabled voters in each precinct. If they can make it work, why can’t we? 

The Shelby County Commission, which has to authorize most of the $10 to $12 million in tax dollars for this voting machine purchase, is this week and next considering a resolution supporting hand-marked paper ballots and not BMDs.  The resolution would put the Election Commission on notice that they should move toward hand-marked ballots if they want county funding. There’s still time to get this right. Contact the County Commission this week at 222-1000 and tell them you want hand-marked paper ballots with Risk Limiting Audits. 

Or, be prepared for another 15 years of unreliable elections. 

Steven Mulroy, a former Shelby County Commissioner who teaches election law at the University of Memphis law school, is author of the book Rethinking US Election Law: Unskewing the System.

Categories
Film Features Film/TV

Bad Boys for Life

The thing you need to know about Bad Boys for Life is that Michael Bay didn’t direct it.

It’s probably unseemly for a critic to carry such a grudge against a specific director, but in my defense, Bay did waste a lot of my time. And it’s not as if my low opinion of Mr. Bay’s abilities is a controversial stance. The intro to his Wikipedia page contains the line: “Despite his commercial success at the box office, Bay’s work is generally held in low esteem by film critics.”

Yeah, you could say that. The last Michael Bay movie I had to sit through was Transformers: The Last Knight, which was considered a failure because it only made $604 million. I considered it a failure because it didn’t make a damn lick of sense. Bay recently convinced Netflix to pony up for $150 million worth of ‘splody stuff for 6 Underground, but I’m not going to watch it due to my current self-care regimen.

Martin Lawrence (left) and Will Smith are in it for life in Bad Boys for Life.

Bay directed both the original 1995 Bad Boys and the 2003 sequel, which cast a pair of sitcom stars, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence, in a kind of Miami Vice scenario, except they’re both Tubbs. The first film made the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air a bonafide movie star. It was that very peculiar ’80s sub-genre, the buddy cop action comedy. They were once ubiquitous, but the pitch seems weird now: What if Death Wish was funny? What if Dirty Harry had a wisecracking sidekick? The buddy cop thing was pioneered by Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte in 48 Hours, and then aped endlessly for 20 years. There were so many bad ones, but there was the occasional fun one, like Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines in Running Scared.

I said earlier that both Smith and Lawrence were Tubbs archetypes. That’s not entirely true. Smith’s Mike “Bulletproof” Lowrey is definitely Tubbs-like. He dresses, as Lawrence’s Marcus Burnett says late in Bad Boys for Life, like a drug dealer. He tears around Miami in a Porsche, and that’s where we meet him and Marcus for the first time in 17 years. Marcus is more like Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon, perpetually getting too old for this shit. Now, he really is getting too old for it. The reason they’re speeding through Miami with cops in hot pursuit is to get to the birth of Marcus’ grandson.

The opening chase is a pretty impressive piece of action filmmaking. Bad Boys was the creation of one of the most toxic duos in film history, Bay and super-producer Jerry Bruckheimer. The new directors, the Belgian duo Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah seem to have been given instructions by Bruckheimer to “make it like Mike.” This looks like a Bay movie, only better. I get the impression that Arbi and Fallah would shoot the entire thing in 1,000 fps slo-mo if they could, like when they pause the action for a loving, extended close-up of a molotov cocktail hitting a car. They’re not afraid to put a klieg light behind a slowly turning fan like it’s 1989 and this is a Madonna video. Bay’s signature wrap-around steadicam move appears a couple of times — the directors even use it to shoot Michael Bay’s cameo.

In Bay’s later career, what was even worse than his accidental chaos cinema was the contempt for the audience that dripped from his every putrid frame. It wasn’t just misogyny — although there was no shortage of that — it was the hatred that all of his characters had for each other, and the films had for them. Bad Boys for Life is still extremely violent (“Violence is what we do!” shouts Mike as he tries to get Marcus to break a vow of peace he made to God and mow some people down with a machine gun) and plenty misogynistic (the villain, Isabel Aretas [Kate del Castillo], is both a literal witch and Mike’s ex-girlfriend), but that bottomless pit of bile is thankfully missing.

It’s Smith and Lawrence that redeem this film, to the extent that it is redeemed. They’re both miraculously well-preserved, their chemistry is great, and Smith’s movie-star charisma is set to stun. Sure, they’re copping licks from John Wick, Mission Impossible, Fast & Furious, and Fury Road left and right, but they’re having a good time doing it. I guess it just goes to show you, everything’s better without Bay on it.

Categories
Beyond the Arc Sports

Grizzlies Beat the Suns; NBA Mourns Kobe Bryant

CREDIT: Larry Kuzniewski

The Memphis Grizzlies defeated the Phoenix Suns 114–109 on Sunday night. But basketball was the furthest thing from most minds after the tragic death of NBA great Kobe Bryant, his daughter Gianna Bryant, John Altobelli, Keri Altobelli Alyssa Altobelli,Christina Mauser, Sarah Chester, Payton Chester, and pilot Ara Zobayan in a helicopter crash in California.

Grizzlies head coach Taylor Jenkins really didn’t want to talk about the game that had transpired before 17, 214 fans. All he wanted to talk about was the loss of Bryant. “Gutsy win by our guys, but I’m not really in the mood to talk about the game as much,” he said. “Obviously, today is a very tough one for a lot of people  —  the NBA community, the basketball world, the Bryant family, the families of those who have lost family members in a horrific crash today. I said it before the game, it’s obviously something that you don’t wish you were talking about.” 

Jenkins continued with his praise of Bryant, “Basketball-wise, to lose a legend, to lose an individual who made a profound impact on the court and off the court not only in the Los Angeles community, but globally. Kobe stood for so many great things  —  greatness, competitiveness, drive, commitment, inspired generations. So many of our young guys have been touched by what he paved the way for. There are really no words.” 

No words is really what many in the NBA community and fans around the world are feeling at this moment. It hit hard. 

Jenkins went on to say, “I’m fortunate to be up here today to be able to speak on behalf of our organization, our players. Words only mean so much. It is going to be tough to overcome, but hopefully everyone rallies around not just the families and the organizations, but everyone that has been touched by Kobe and his legacy. He’s carved an unbelievable path. As I said, I wish we weren’t talking about this today but we do have to find a way to celebrate. It’s very raw and emotional right now. Today’s game pales in comparison to the new reality we face without one of the best in the game.”

It was a raw emotional day after the news broke of Bryant’s demise. NBA games were still played and private grief became public. 

Larry Kuzniewski

Ja Morant

Prior to tip off, the Grizzlies and the Suns honored Bryant with a moment of silence. After the Grizzlies won the opening tip, Ja Morant dribbled the ball for 24 seconds for a shot-clock violation, then the Suns’ Ricky Rubio held the ball for eight seconds for a backcourt violation to show respect to Bryant. Bryant wore numbers 8 and 24 during his 20-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers. Everyone was on their feet chanting, Kobe! Kobe! Kobe! A very emotional moment in FedExForum. 

Grizzlies Beat the Suns; NBA Mourns Kobe Bryant

After the game, Jenkins explained the tributes to the fallen star. “When the news broke, you’re shocked  —  you don’t know what words to say, Jenkins explained. “My mind went immediately to those who had relationships with him, coached against him, coached with him, played with him, played against him. Finally, we got around to we have to be able to honor him at some point in our small part. A lot of credit goes to our head video guy, T.C. Swirsky. He talked about jersey 24. Can we somehow take a shot clock violation?”

Jenkins went on to say, “I contacted Monty [Williams] and he was thinking the exact same thing. I went over there and talked about how we could, in our small part, pay tribute. Unbelievable by our fans. Obviously, our organization doing a moment of silence, but the fans to chant his name. The players on the court to recognize the impact that those two possessions could have to bring, hopefully, a celebration in a very, very tough time. As I said, I think other teams are doing the same thing. It’s our small part. Now it’s on us to continue to celebrate this beautiful legacy gone way too soon.”

The Grizzlies won the season series against the Suns 3–1 after Sunday’s victory and improved to 22–24 on the year. 

Morant scored 14 of his 23 points in the fourth quarter, to go with eight assists and five rebounds. Dillon Brooks added 20 points, five rebounds, and four assists. In 34 minutes, Jaren Jackson Jr. also tallied 20 points while going 7-of-12 from the field and 3-of-6 from the 3-point line, along with three rebounds and two blocks before fouling out late in the final period. Brandon Clarke chipped in 10 points and seven rebounds as a reserve. 

With the loss, the Suns dropped to 19–27 for the season. Devin Booker led all scorers with 36 points, five assists, and two rebounds. Kelly Oubre Jr. tallied 27 points, nine rebounds, and three assists while going 8-of-19 from the field. Deandre Ayton posted his 11th double-double of the season with 17 points, 15 rebounds and two assists. Former Grizzlies player Jevon Carter added eight points, two assists, and three steals off the bench.  

Quotables
Jaren Jackson, Jr.

On playing today after hearing of Kobe Bryant’s passing:

“To be honest, I didn’t feel like doing it, to keep it 100. You’ve got to be a pro. That’s what 2–4 (Kobe Bryant) stood for and there’s no better way to go out there and honor him than to play pro basketball and do what you love, so that’s what we did today. Both teams.”

On what Kobe Bryant means to him:

“Just for the game of basketball and in general and in life, he’s an icon and someone who we all saw growing up. Through all his runs, through everything, he was able to teach and to bring back to the younger playing through camps and Nike, just being able to do a lot. His impact is something that you can’t really fathom because it’s just so great. It definitely hurts.”

On whether playing the game helped him cope and forget about the loss of Kobe Bryant:

“No, it didn’t to be honest. It still hasn’t helped me forget. You ever just know you have to do something so you just try to figure it out and you find a way? That’s what we call it every day. You find a way o go out there and put your best effort out there, and thank God we got a win today. Despite the circumstances, I’m glad we came together as a team and got the job done.”

Who Got Next

The Grizzlies will host the Denver Nuggets on Tuesday, January 28, at 7 p.m.

Categories
Film/TV Film/TV/Etc. Blog

Music Video Monday: Toy Trucks

In Music Video Monday, hit song hits on you!

I probably shouldn’t be springing a Russian Reversal on you so early in the work week. But the character played by Taylor Barrett Moore in “Don’t Be So Easy” would really like to know what a girl like you is doing in a place like this.

Director Tony Manard’s video for Toy Trucks’ first garage rock blast from their Black and Wyatt Records release Rocket Bells and Poetry features Moore hitting on all the women in sight. Yeah, you know the type. Even a psychedelicized shirt can’t save this guy’s game. Take a look:

Music Video Monday: Toy Trucks

If you would like to see your music video featured on Music Video Monday, email cmccoy@memphisflyer.com. 

Categories
Sports Tiger Blue

SMU 74, #20 Tigers 70

CREDIT: Larry Kuzniewski

The Tigers played 40 minutes of basketball in recovery mode Saturday afternoon at FedExForum. Three days after one of the ugliest losses in program history — a 40-point dismantling at Tulsa — the Tigers led SMU for 36:12 of those 40 minutes . . . and lost.

Mustang guard Isiaha Mike connected on two key field goals (one a three-pointer) during a 15-0 scoring run over the game’s final six minutes to steal the victory for SMU. The Tigers failed to score a point after a D.J. Jeffries dunk gave them a 70-59 lead with 6:01 to play. Turnovers on three consecutive possessions contributed to the collapse, and a three-point attempt to tie the game by Precious Achiuwa — following a steal with 11 seconds left — didn’t reach the rim. The Tigers fell to 14-5 with the loss and are now break-even (3-3) in American Athletic Conference play. SMU improved to 15-4 (5-2).
Larry Kuzniewski

Boogie Ellis

“In the last seven minutes,” said Tiger coach Penny Hardaway, “we went from a team that was not turning the ball over and playing pretty good defense to a team that started turning the ball over and playing poor defense. Simple switches . . . we aren’t communicating, and gave up threes. It’s a tough game we should have won here at home. You cannot lose conference games at home. Especially when you have a 12-point lead with seven minutes to go.”

Memphis played a focused, efficient first half, piling up 12 assists (on 15 field goals) and only committing two turnovers to take a 41-32 lead at the break. But the Mustangs came back — twice — in the second half, pulling within point, falling behind again by 12, then finishing on that 15-point surge.

“They made shots,” emphasized Hardaway. “Give them credit. The game’s never over until the zeroes go up. We usually handle our business with the lead. These last two games have been gut-wrenching. We’re not gonna cave in. We’re gonna keep working. Hopefully these are lessons learned, and guys will understand. You never know when your turnover might lose the game.”

Boogie Ellis provided a spark off the bench, playing his best game in two months. The freshman from San Diego scored 14 points and hit three of his four attempts from long range, one of them a bank shot from almost 30 feet as the shot-clock expired to give the Tigers a 10-point cushion with just under eight minutes to play. But the Mustangs hit 62 percent of their shots in the second half (15 for 24) after being held to 32 percent (10 for 31) in the first.

“We’re a young team,” said Ellis. “I feel like we’ll be okay, trusting each other and playing for each other. Coach [Hardways] says it all the time, these are self-inflicted wounds. If we focus on the little things, I feel like we’ll be okay.”

Kendric Davis led SMU with 20 points. Emmanuel Bandoumel added 14 and Mike 13. Jeffries paced the Tigers with 18 points (6 for 11 from the field) and Achiuwa added 15 (7 for 10). The Tigers had the edge in points from the paint (30-24), points off turnovers (20-10), and points from the bench (23-13), but sill dropped their fourth game in the last six played.

When asked about his team’s back-to-back struggles, Hardaway said, “I expected it, but it still hurts. I’m such a competitor. These last two games have been the worst.” As for solutions, Hardaway emphasized the need to get to the foul line to end a scoring drought, and to communicate, all the time, every game. “Stay in the moment and value every possession.”

The Tigers travel to UCF for their next game Wednesday night. They’ll then play three straight home games (against UConn, Temple, and USF). A team originally considered among the top 15 in the country must likely win each of its next four just to regain footing in the pecking order for an NCAA tournament bid. “There’s a lot of basketball to play,” noted Hardaway. Recovery mode continues.

Categories
Politics Politics Beat Blog

Thompson Endorsement Could Affect Democrats’ District 97 Race

CREDIT: JB

JB

Rep. Dwayne Thompson making his endorsement at a fund-raiser for House District 97 candidate Allan Creasy.

One of the facts of life for Democrats, in Shelby County as elsewhere in Republican-dominated Tennessee, is that their primaries for state-government offices have tended to be lonely affairs, usually with only a single significant candidate, if any at all. Oh, Democrats may vie in an occasional intra-party contest for U.S. senator or governor, but most of the real competition, certainly in legislative races, has generally taken place on the other side, in GOP primaries. Once upon a time, that was the Democrats; now, unmistakably, it’s the Republicans.

Except that, more and more often, there is a bona fide Democratic contest — as there was, for example, in 2018 between David Witherspoon and Gabby Salinas, a scientific researcher and former St. Jude patient, for the right to oppose Republican incumbent Brian Kelsey in a much-watched state Senate race. Salinas won that primary and went on to give Kelsey a serious challenge.

The same year, Allan Creasy, a manager and bartender at the Celtic Crossing Restaurant, ran a spirited race against GOP incumbent Jim Coley in state House District 97. Coley is retiring, and Creasy is taking another shot at the seat this year. But he has a primary opponent — the demonstrably formidable Salinas.

The showdown between two strong Democratic candidates from 2018 races makes the District 97 primary one of the most intriguing races in the state in 2020. To compound the watchability, two Republicans, Brandon Weise and John Gillespie, will simultaneously be competing in the GOP primary.

The intensity of the competition made it all the more interesting Thursday night when an established Democratic legislator, state Representative Dwayne Thompson, decided to cast his lot with one of his party’s two entries. Appearing at a Creasy fund-raiser at the Starlight Event Center in East Memphis, Thompson stood alongside the candidate onstage and extended his endorsement.

Such intra-party endorsements are relatively uncommon, especially in primary races deemed as competitive as this one (although Shelby County Commissioner Reginald Milton is methodically racking up endorsements from fellow Democrats in his primary race for General Sessions Court Clerk).