Weekend Event Planner

These are the 9 best things to do in Dallas this Labor Day weekend

The weekend before Labor Day is a little slower than normal for events in and around Dallas, but there are still some fun things to do and see. They include a great comedian, a Harry Potter film backed by a live symphony, a music festival, a concert featuring a hot country duo, two local theater productions, a dinosaur exhibition, a big plant conference, and a violinist who plays way more than classical music.

Below are the best ways to spend your free time this weekend. Want more options? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city's best events.

Thursday, August 29

Addison Improv presents Maria Bamford
Maria Bamford is revered for her deeply personal and experimental comedy about mental illness. She starred in the Netflix series, Lady Dynamite, about a comedian who suffers a nervous breakdown, and is the star of three unconventional hour-long stand-up specials. She also created and starred in the cult hit web series, The Maria Bamford Show, in which she plays all the characters. She'll perform the second of a two-night stay at The Addison Improv.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in Concert
Harry Potter is having a moment in Dallas. The Triwizard Tournament comes to Hogwarts in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in Concert. Audiences can relive the magic of Potter soaring across the big screen in high-definition and experience the music of a live symphony orchestra performing Patrick Doyle’s score. There will be four performances through Sunday at the Meyerson Symphony Center.

Friday, August 30

The Black Academy of Arts and Letters presents 7th Riverfront Jazz Festival
The 7th Annual Riverfront Jazz Festival will feature a lineup of performers spanning the gamut from jazz to pop, soul, R&B, blues, and neo-soul music. Performers on the two main stages will include CeeLo Green, Jeffrey Osborne, Cassandra Wilson, Ginuwine, Sheila E., Ruben Studdard, Patrice Rushen, and more. There will also be a stage featuring promising young artists. The festival will take place through Sunday at The Black Academy of Arts and Letters.

Dan + Shay in concert
Since their debut album came out in 2014, country duo Dan + Shay have been consistent chart toppers with both their albums and songs. All five of their albums made it to the top 10 on the Billboard Country chart, and among their many top 10 hits have been three that went to No. 1, most recently "Speechless" in 2018. After recently serving as coaches on NBC's The Voice, they'll play at Dos Equis Pavilion, joined by Jake Owen and Dylan Marlowe.

North Texas Performing Arts presents The Mystery of Edwin Drood
Based on Charles Dickens’ final unfinished novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood is a hilarious whodunit that invites the audience to solve its mystery by choosing the identity of the murderer. The tale is presented as a show-within-a-show, as the Music Hall Royale, a loony Victorian theatre company, presents Dickens’ brooding mystery. The production runs through September 7 at Courtyard Theater in Plano.

Richardson Theatre Centre presents Nobody's Perfect
Harriet is a feminist publisher with a penchant for unsuitable men friends. Leonard is a stuttering statistician whose wife has walked out on him. Their lives become intertwined when Leonard submits his manuscript to Harriet's publishing house under the nom de plume of Myrtle Banbury. She offers Myrtle £15,000 to publish the book, and in order to get his hands on the cash Leonard has to keep up the pretense of being a woman. The stage is thus set for a series of comic encounters and misunderstandings. The production runs through September 15 at Richardson Theatre Centre.

Saturday, August 31

Photo courtesy of Dan + Shay

Dan + Shay will play at Dos Equis Pavilion on August 30.

Heard Natural Science Museum & Wildlife Sanctuary presents Dinosaurs Live! opening day
Dinosaurs Live! is an annual exhibit that brings the ancient creatures back to life, allowing visitors to travel back in time along a half-mile nature trail with 10 life-size animatronic dinosaurs. The exhibit offers interesting facts about both herbivorous and carnivorous dinosaurs, and children can play on stationary baby dinosaurs or participate in an outdoor fossil dig. The exhibition will remain on display at Heard Natural Science Museum in McKinney through February 19, 2025.

PlantCon International Dallas
PlantCon Dallas is an all-inclusive plant experience where visitors can experience workshops, presentations, community building, and more. Guests can purchase products from internationally known plant exhibitors, and partake in workshops from field experts from around the globe. The event takes place through Sunday at Marriott Dallas Allen Hotel & Convention Center.

AT&T Performing Arts Center presents Omari Dillard: Soul Violinist
Classically trained and culturally inspired, Omari Dillard has over 30 years experience making the violin "speak," covering artists like Prince, Mary J. Blige, Luther Vandross, SWV, Lauryn Hill, Maxwell, and more. The soul violinist will play at Wyly Theatre in support of his new album, Sincerely, Omari.

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Movie Review

Daniel Craig searches for elusive new bond in audacious film Queer

Photo courtesy of A24

Drew Starkey and Daniel Craig in Queer.

As recently as the late 2010s, if a movie was made about an LGBTQ+ character, it was more than likely about their coming out experience. Romance, if it existed, was typically chaste, and actual sex was almost completely out of the question. Things have changed dramatically in the 2020s, to the point that a major movie star has no issue starring in a film called Queer.

Based on the 1985 novella by William S. Burroughs, the film features William Lee (Daniel Craig), whom everyone calls just Lee, a writer living in 1950s-era Mexico City who spends most of his time haunting local bars with friends like fellow writer Joe Guidry (Jason Schwartzman) and hitting on younger men. His early interactions in the film seem to indicate that Lee has a bad reputation within the local gay community, as multiple people avoid him or give him odd looks.

Lee senses an opportunity when he encounters a newcomer, Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey). Despite some awkward interactions, the two of them start spending time together, although Lee has much more invested in the relationship than Eugene does. Their hit-and-miss bond continues until Lee, who’s starting to get into drugs in addition to the booze, convinces Eugene to accompany him on a trip to South America.

Directed by Luca Guadagnino and written by Justin Kuritzkes (making their second straight film together after Challengers), early on the film seems to be mostly about the divide between an older person who’s grown comfortable in his ways and a younger person who’s living a relatively carefree life. The introduction of drugs into the plot changes things, though, with Lee searching out more ways to open his eyes to what the world has to offer.

Guadagnino and his team use some interesting visual storytelling techniques to introduce ideas that may not be present in the actual script. The most successful, demonstrated in multiple scenes, is the superimposition of movements by Lee over what’s actually taking place in the scene. The subtle overlay gives the audience insight into Lee’s true feelings, showing what he can’t or won’t say out loud.

Music also plays a big part in how the plot is perceived, with the use of anachronistic songs from Nirvana and Prince serving to heighten certain moments. The score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is not as in-your-face as the one they did for Challengers, but it complements the film well, especially when the plot starts to get trippy in its final half hour.

Craig, who appears sweaty and disheveled for much of the film, is about as far from the suaveness of James Bond as you can get in this role. He takes multiple risks with his performance and almost all of them pay off. Starkey’s character is subdued by comparison, but still comes off well. Schwartzman and Lesley Manville are given showy roles, with both using altered appearances that make them nearly unrecognizable to deliver memorable performances.

Queer is not as accessible as Challengers was storytelling-wise, but the fact that it tells a story about gay men living their lives as they see fit with no interference or questions shows how far the film world has come in a short period of time. It also continues Guadagnino’s streak of making audacious films in a way that few other filmmakers are willing or able to approach.

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Queer is now playing in theaters.

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