Weekend Event Planner

These are the 13 best things to do in Dallas on Thanksgiving weekend

While many events in and around Dallas have either been postponed or canceled during the coronavirus pandemic, some organizations have pivoted to virtual or socially-distanced events to continue offering the masses some entertainment while we need it the most.

Below are the best ways to spend your free time this Thanksgiving weekend. While not every event is out of the house, they all promise to provide a nice distraction from the everyday life.

Wednesday, November 25

Browne Family Holiday Light Show
There are lots of holiday light shows to be found in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, but there's something kind of nice about a family turning their home into a destination. The Browne Family Holiday Light Show in Parker is a full light show synchronized with music taking place throughout the Christmas season. While the show is free, it is an official drop-off point for Toys For Tots; visitors are encouraged to bring a new, unwrapped toy to donate.

Thursday, November 26

Venardos Circus
The Venardos Circus, a touring Broadway-style animal-free production, will present a brand-new livestream production on Thanksgiving Day. It will feature performers like Guinness World Record holder Brad Weston (golf juggling and sword walking), Derileisy Ramos (aerialist), Manuel and Ilenay Acosta (duo rola bola and duo straps), Chase Culp (comedy) and Rachel Bell (foot juggling and Roman rings). There will be two performances, one at 11 am and one at 6 pm.

Grand Prairie Parks, Arts and Recreation presents Prairie Lights
Located along the shores of Joe Pool Lake at Lynn Creek Park in Grand Prairie, Prairie Lights is a two-mile, drive-thru holiday park experience that showcases a display of more than 5 million lights arranged in hundreds of festive holiday scenes throughout the park. There will be no Holiday Village this year due to pandemic considerations, but the event will feature a new drive-through concession option. Pre-purchase of online tickets is highly recommended for the event, which runs through December 31.

Friday, November 27

Texas Christkindl Market
The Texas Christkindl Market, normally one of the largest open air holiday markets in the Southwest, will continue the 10-year tradition by moving to an all-online format for 2020. Visitors will discover holiday cheer, decorations, recipes, and one-of-a-kind finds and gifts from favorite vendors through the vendor listings. Online experiences will include video demonstrations, live performances, and more. The market takes place through December 23.

iHeartRadio presents Candy Cane Lane
Candy Cane Lane is a new multi-level visual Christmas attraction that will allow guests to celebrate the holidays in a touchless environment from the safety of their cars. Each level of Candy Cane Lane combines all the wonderful outdoor experiences of Christmas, including a vast array of holiday lights, classic holiday lantern characters, and wonderland surprises around every corner. There is a special upgrade available for attendees to get a photo opportunity with Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus. The event will take place on select dates through December 26 at the American Airlines Center in the Silver Garage.

Vitruvian Lights
Addison's Vitruvian Park transforms into one of North Texas' most spectacular holiday destinations during Vitruvian Lights, an annual celebration in which 1.5 million sparkling LED lights are wrapped around more than 550 trees to create a blazing wonderland. The lights will remain on every evening from 5-11 pm through January 1, 2021. There will be no special events in conjunction with Vitruvian Lights this year. However, visitors are encouraged to walk through the park in a socially distanced manner or drive through on surrounding streets.

WaterTower Theatre presents Ella’s Swinging Christmas: A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald
Ella’s Swinging Christmas: A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald is a one-woman show featuring singer and actress Feleceia Wilson. The virtual production is a reimagined experience of jazz vocalist and scat virtuoso Ella Fitzgerald’s Swinging Christmas album. Wilson will perform 17 of Fitzgerald’s arrangements of Christmas classics, including “Jingle Bells,” “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” The production will be available to stream at any time through January 3.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents The Nutcracker
Audiences can get into the festive holiday spirit early with Tchaikovsky’s joyous score from his most famous ballet, The Nutcracker. The miniature overtures, triumphant marches, Russian, Arabian and Chinese dances, and the Waltz of the Flowers will showcase the brilliant sound of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. There will be three concerts through Sunday at Meyerson Symphony Center.

Improv Addison presents Bassem Youssef
Comedian Bassem Youssef, dubbed the Jon Stewart of the Arab World, was the host of popular TV show Al-Bernameg, which was the first of its kind political satire show in the Middle East. Named one of Time magazine’s “100 Most Influential People in the World” in 2013, the physician-turned-comedian will perform five times through Sunday at Improv Addison.

Saturday, November 28

Christmas at the Anatole
This season’s Christmas at the Anatole celebration will feature Breakfast with Santa, which will be served family-style at each table. During breakfast, Santa will make an entrance and interact with the children in a socially-distanced format, including the reading of a Texas-themed Christmas story and letters from the children in the audience mailed from the North Pole mailbox situated in the lobby. There will also be holiday-themed activities throughout the hotel; Peppermint Park will not be part of the activities this year. The event goes on every weekend through December 23.

For King & Country in concert
On the Christian music scene, there are few groups bigger than pop duo For King & Country. Each of their three studio albums has gone higher on the Billboard Christian charts than the one before, with their 2018 album Burn the Ships coming in at No. 1. They recently released their first Christmas album, A Drummer Boy Christmas, which will be highlighted in two concerts at Globe Life Field in Arlington.

Sunday, November 29

Dallas Museum of Art presents "Wearable Raffia" closing day
Sunday will be the final day to take in the exhibition "Wearable Raffia" at the Dallas Museum of Art. Drawn mainly from the Museum’s acclaimed collection of African art, the exhibition features garments and textiles made from the woven fibers of Raffia Palm trees from West and Central Africa and the island of Madagascar. Also on display are raffia and textile samples that visitors are allowed to feel.

CultureMap and Frost Bank presents Donation Drop-off
CultureMap and Frost Bank will present a donation drop-off at Pacific Plaza Park, benefiting Genesis Women's Shelter & Support. Visitors are asked to bring items like disinfectant spray wipes, antibacterial hand soap, cloth face masks, sports bras in size adult large and medium, new gloves and hat in all sizes and ages, and new coats of all sizes for women and children ages 0-18. Anyone who brings five or more items will receive a $10 Frost It Forward card (while supplies last).

WaterTower Theatre presents Ella’s Swinging Christmas: A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, available for streaming at any time, November 27-January 3.

$WaterTower Theatre presents Ella\u2019s Swinging Christmas: A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald$

Photo by Evan Michael Woods

WaterTower Theatre presents Ella’s Swinging Christmas: A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, available for streaming at any time, November 27-January 3.

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Movie Review

Film sequel Avatar: Fire and Ash is a technical and visual feast

Photo courtesy of 20th Century Studios

Oona Chaplin in Avatar: Fire and Ash.

For a series whose first two films made over $5 billion combined worldwide, Avatar has a curious lack of widespread cultural impact. The films seem to exist in a sort of vacuum, popping up for their run in theaters and then almost as quickly disappearing from the larger movie landscape. The third of five planned movies, Avatar: Fire and Ash, is finally being released three years after its predecessor, Avatar: The Way of Water.

The new film finds the main duo, human-turned-Na’vi Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and his native Na’vi wife, Neytiri (Zoë Saldaña), still living with the water-loving Metkayina clan led by Ronal (Kate Winslet) and Tonowari (Cliff Curtis). While Jake and Neytiri still play a big part, the focus shifts significantly to their two surviving children, Lo’ak (Britain Dalton) and Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss), as well as two they’ve essentially adopted, Kiri (Sigourney Weaver) and Spider (Jack Champion).

Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), who lives on in a fabricated Na’vi body, is still looking for revenge on Jake, and he finds help in the form of the Mangkwan Clan (aka the Ash People), led by Varang (Oona Chaplin). Quaritch’s access to human weapons and the Mangkwan’s desire for more power on the moon known as Pandora make them a nice match, and they team up to try to dominate the other tribes.

Aside from the story, the main point of making the films for writer/director James Cameron is showing off his considerable technical filmmaking prowess, and that is on full display right from the start. The characters zoom around both the air and sea on various creatures with which they’ve bonded, providing Cameron and his team with plenty of opportunities to put the audience right there with them. Cameron’s preferred viewing method of 3D makes the experience even more immersive, even if the high frame rate he uses makes some scenes look too realistic for their own good.

The story, as it has been in the first two films, is a mixed bag. Cameron and co-writers Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver start off well, having Jake, Neytiri, and their kids continue mourning the death of Neteyam (Jamie Flatters) in the previous film. The struggle for power provides an interesting setup, but Cameron and his team seem to drag out the conflict for much too long. This is the longest Avatar film yet, and you really start to feel it in the back half as the filmmakers add on a bunch of unnecessary elements.

Worse than the elongated story, though, is the hackneyed dialogue that Cameron, Jaffa, and Silver have come up with. Almost every main character is forced to spout lines that diminish the importance of the events around them. The writers seemingly couldn’t resist trying to throw in jokes despite them clashing with the tone of the scenes in which they’re said. Combined with the somewhat goofy nature of the Na’vi themselves (not to mention talking whales), the eye-rolling words detract from any excitement or emotion the story builds up.

A pre-movie behind-the-scenes short film shows how the actors act out every scene in performance capture suits, lending an authenticity to their performances. Still, some performers are better than others, with Saldaña, Worthington, and Lang standing out. It’s more than a little weird having Weaver play a 14-year-old girl, but it works relatively well. Those who actually get to show their real faces are collectively fine, but none of them elevate the film overall.

There are undoubtedly some Avatar superfans for which Fire and Ash will move the larger story forward in significant ways. For anyone else, though, the film is a demonstration of both the good and bad sides of Cameron. As he’s proven for 40 years, his visuals are (almost) beyond reproach, but the lack of a story that sticks with you long after you’ve left the theater keeps the film from being truly memorable.

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Avatar: Fire and Ash opens in theaters on December 19.

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