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LET US MARRY PLAINTIFFS IN TWO CASES WANT ARKANSAS TO FOLLOW HIGH COURT’S LEAD ON DOMA. BY LESLIE NEWELL PEACOCK

AUGUST 1, 2013

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VOLUME 39, NUMBER 48 ARKANSAS TIMES (ISSN 0164-6273) is published each week by Arkansas Times Limited Partnership, 201 East Markham Street, Suite 200, Little Rock, Arkansas, 72201, phone (501) 375-2985. Periodical postage paid at Little Rock, Arkansas, and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to ARKANSAS TIMES, EAST MARKHAM STREET, SUITE 200, Little Rock, AR, 72201. Subscription prices are $42 for one year, $78 for two years. Subscriptions outside Arkansas are $49 for one year, $88 for two years. Foreign (including Canadian) subscriptions are $168 a year. For subscriber service call (501) 375-2985. Current single-copy price is 75¢, free in Pulaski County. Single issues are available by mail at $2.50 each, postage paid. Payment must accompany all single-copy orders. Reproduction or use in whole or in part of the contents without the written consent of the publishers is prohibited. Manuscripts and artwork will not be returned or acknowledged unless sufficient return postage and a self-addressed stamped envelope are included. All materials are handled with due care; however, the publisher assumes no responsibility for care and safe return of unsolicited materials. All letters sent to ARKANSAS TIMES will be treated as intended for publication and are subject to ARKANSAS TIMES’ unrestricted right to edit or to comment editorially.

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COMMENT

Readers respond to introduction of digital membership Our announcement that the four Arkansas Times blogs will move behind a metered paywall beginning Thursday, Aug. 1, drew more than a hundred comments on the Arkansas Blog. Among them: I happily support public radio with a monthly bank draft, and I’ll happily do the same with the Times. I currently pay for Sunday-only delivery of the Democrat, which includes web access. I do this for (1) the crossword puzzles in the paper paper, and (2) the obituaries online. I remember taking your survey a while back. In the open comments section I said something to the effect of “if I could get the obituaries from somewhere else, I’d cancel my subscription to the Democrat.” Well guess what? My office happens to be in a library. Monday through Friday I can go to the first floor and read the obits in the paper down there. In light of the AT’s new subscription service, I can no longer justify my subscription to the Democrat. Buh-bye, Walt. P.S., it wouldn’t hurt my feelings any if you put the crossword puzzle back in your paper version. hugh mann I can see paying $5 a month for a product that doesn’t actually need to be printed, but $10 is too steep. Especially since the print edition is free. I also refuse to pay the online price for the Demozette. I would be happy to have an online only subscription with them, but it is ridiculous that they charge the same for online only as for home delivery. I am an independent and like to get viewpoints from many sources, and have very much enjoyed the Times coverage of a variety of issues. I may not always agree with their point of view, but I like to know about others’ opinions and views. Kristen Parsons I’m in already. Note that those of us in the boondocks don’t have DSL and lose the connection many times during the day because of the long lines. It is also faster on this dial-up to go out and come back in than to wait for the screen to reload. I may be in and out a dozen times a day, a few times in a single seating, but I do that for other news sites also. And about concern about the $9.99, the payment allows you to pay more so I rounded it up to $10. I donate to KUAR, local foodbanks, and my hobby organization monthly, why not my news source? couldn’t be better 4

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

Some of those of us who have remained faithful annual members back since the slick-paper monthly days, even when you were giving away for free in town what we were paying money for out in the country, who thought of the blog as a morning and evening family coffee shop, will have to stop and think about limited resources before commiting to $120 per year. Silverback66 There is no substitute for the local information I get from ARTimes, and not a day goes by that I don’t visit the blog. I probably spend an average of

45 minutes per day reading the blog. I have also enjoyed the paper edition for many years, never paid a dime for it. I’m several years ahead in benefit per dollar when it comes to the ARTimes, probably a decade. So, for the first 10 years, I’ll just consider it $5/month for the current edition, and $5/month toward a past month. It’s money well spent for me. Hogger I’m in. Plus a little extra. And I will not miss the trolls. Pavel Korchagin

Feller just can’t get ahead these days. Walked away from Harlow’s in Greenville $130 richer Friday night and now the Arkansas Times is fixin’ to get every dime of it. But, hey, it’ll be winnings well-spent. Durango Max has to pay for all those vacations some way. It’s either greed or the loss of Arkansas Autobuyer has forced the Times to do this. Liberals taxing Liberals! I like it! arhogfan501 I think you are digging your own grave here, but I understand the business nature of things. I will need some time to think about it here, as I subscribe to the AR Dem Gaz (sunday only), Nat Geo, The Drake, Dirt Rag Mag, and the Arkansas Game and Fish periodical. I will probably just go back to reading the weekly paper in the sauna. arkansas panic fan Although I know you are only extending your tradition of being the predominate progressive voice in Arkansas, I don’t understand why any news outlet would cast itself as the “progressive voice” or “conservative voice” for any segment of our society. I believe that when you do that, you are announcing to a significant number of your potential readers, “Hey, nothing for you to see here. Move along.” I primarily visit the Arkansas Blog to see what my liberal neighbors are thinking, and I opine when I want to say something, even though I and other conservatives are not welcome there by the majority of the other contributors. When I visit the blog, I often divert my attention to features I see teased at the top of the page, and I’ll read those as well. The coverage the other day of the police shooting which caused quite a stir was fantastic. My wish would be for an Arkansas Times that would continue with the great news reporting, but which would have at least one conservative editor to contribute items to the Arkansas Blog just like Max does. Ideally the conservative blogger would opine to Max’s writings, and Max would opine to the conservative blogger’s writings, with the ton of paying readers I believe you would soon have, chiming in. Real debate and lively conversation will increase your readership. In summary, I think you’re setting the Times up to wilt away, but what I think about it will have no bearing on what actually happens. In all sincerity, I wish you guys the best, and I hope you have loads of people subscribe. Drackman

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AUGUST 1, 2013

EDITORIAL

EYE ON ARKANSAS

Freedom rings

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

BRIAN CHILSON

ne of the scary things about the proposed merger of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and St. Vincent Health System was that it would have forced Arkansas defenders of religious freedom to fight on two fronts. To the ongoing and bitter battle over diverting public-school funds to church schools would have been added an unwholesome alliance between the state’s only public teaching hospital and a Catholic institution that could have used taxpayers’ money to advance sectarian beliefs. It was with great relief we learned over the weekend that the UAMS-St. Vincent merger will not come about, UAMS officials announcing that discussions had ended without an agreement. St. Vincent had proposed the “alliance,” as the parties preferred to call it, and UAMS officials seemed at first eager to barter away Arkansans’ freedoms for budgetary gain. Both hospitals contended they would experience significant savings by combining certain clinical services and sharing management functions. But helping a Catholic hospital save money is no part of the mission of UAMS, and we doubt the Catholic hierarchy, whose approval would have been required for any alliance, would be greatly moved by the idea of saving money for a nonCatholic institution. Certainly the bishops would not be nearly so interested in that as in advancing Catholic beliefs. Those beliefs in regard to abortion, contraception, end-oflife care and other clinical services are not shared by all taxpayers. How a hospital divided on these matters could stand was never adequately explained, being impossible. (While abortion and contraception have long been contentious, even as they’ve become more widely accepted, end-of-life care is gaining ground. Four states — Vermont, Oregon, Washington and Montana — now have “death with dignity” laws, allowing terminally ill patients to request medication they can use to die peacefully. More states will follow.) We don’t know exactly what factors caused UAMS leaders to change their minds. We’d like to think that freedom of religion was involved. Church and state are separate entities in America, by careful design. It’s a bedrock principle of this country that no American can be taxed to support someone else’s religion. A UAMSSt. Vincent merger would have been challenged in court immediately. If the hospital question is resolved, efforts to circumvent the First Amendment in another way will continue and likely intensify. Some states have already approved voucher programs, taking money from underfunded public schools and giving it to students who attend private schools, mostly church-related. Voucher programs have been most eagerly embraced in states that have big Catholic populations, and therefore big parochial-school systems, unlike Arkansas. But voucherism has spread even to states like North Carolina. The Republican Party loves vouchers; they’re pretty much the signature issue of the current speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. And where Catholic bishops once were by far the biggest lobby for vouchers, the bishops have been joined by influential allies — big-money critics of public schools and teacher unions, and fundamentalist Protestants who want their own schools. Arkansas has plenty of these, and a new Republican majority in the General Assembly. Arkansans who cherish the public schools and religious freedom need gird their loins even tighter.

WHERE IN ARKANSAS?: Know where this slice of life in Arkansas is? Send along the answer to Times photographer Brian Chilson and win a prize. Once a month in this space, we’ll post a shot from a relatively obscure spot in Arkansas for Times readers to identify. We also invite photographers to contribute submissions to our eyeonarkansas Flickr group. Write to brianchilson@arktimes.com to guess this week’s photo or for more information. Holly Hope correctly guessed last month’s photo, which was on Highway 65 north of Marshall close to Bear Creek.

A good week for Mike Ross

said two weeks ago that fund-raising told the story of the Democratic primary race for governor. Former Congressman Mike Ross reported he’d raised almost $2 million. Former Lt. Gov. Bill Halter raised about $100,000, and save a cluster of gifts from the Bailey family who worked with him on the Arkansas Lottery, precious little came from Arkansas. Plus, Halter himself had loaned his campaign $640,000, or the majority, of the money he had on hand. Halter had been quiet for weeks as national Democrats lobbied him to clear the gubernatorial primary field for Ross and run instead for 2nd District Congress against Republican U.S. Rep. Tim Griffin. National Democratic sources say they are very happy with Halter’s decision to drop out and believe national money would follow him into a race for Congress. At this writing, he’s not let his future plans be known. He might prefer a race for Senate against John Boozman in 2016. But so, too, might Attorney General Dustin McDaniel, taking a political redshirt year this year after a personal sexual scandal upended his planned race for governor. I’d counsel anyone against putting off for two years what they can do today. The Democratic scenario making the rounds that Hillary Clinton will be the party’s presidential nominee in 2016 and sweep Democrats at every level to victory in Arkansas is flawed in many ways. I’d begin simply with a reminder of Hillary’s sure-thing nomination as the party’s presidential candidate in 2008. The 2014 race is critical for Democrats. The race for partisan control of the state House is the most important race on the ballot. It’s more important than extremist Republican Rep. Tom Cotton’s challenge of U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor. Control of the Senate is a legitimate national issue, but day-to-day matters in a gridlocked Congress aren’t so vital. Of course, there is the fact that Cotton might vote against disaster aid for the state the next time a tornado hit.

The state House is just as important as the likely matchup between Ross, now unopposed for the Democratic nomination, and Asa Hutchinson, who still has a couple of Republicans to deal MAX with in the primary. Arkansas’s BRANTLEY maxbrantley@arktimes.com governor can only do so much. As the last session proved, even the ablest of government technocrats, Mike Beebe, was limited in dealing with a majority Republican legislature. A simple majority overrides vetoes, after all. Democrats have a shot at retaking the House, where Republicans eked out 51 of 100 seats. But they need money, an organization and candidates. Ross appeals to strategically minded Democrats — if not always on philosophical grounds — because he’s raising a lot of money; he’s working on recruitment and he understands a coordinated campaign from the legislative district up helps all Democrats. Lose the House again in 2014 and Republicans solidify gains, plus promote party switches, as has happened elsewhere in Dixie. Democratic victory requires unity and goodwill among a group not much known for either. Already, the diehard liberals say they’ll never vote for Mike Ross given his resistance to Obamacare (Republicans are nonetheless still salivating to tag him with it on a committee vote), and his conservative position on abortion, gay rights and guns. We’ve been down this road before. Remember Florida in 2000. Al Gore really won Florida, but in the only count that mattered, Ralph Nader votes likely cost Gore Florida and the U.S. election. In Arkansas, Asa Hutchinson starts with a good 45 percent of the vote despite being a three-time statewide election loser. If disaffected Democrats go Green, Libertarian or don’t show, that could be enough to win.

OPINION

GOP tells NFL it can’t endorse Obamacare

aron Rodgers, the all-pro quarterback of the Green Bay Packers, will hawk casualty insurance for State Farm in funny TV spots again this fall, but neither he nor any other National Football League star will sell health insurance. Congressional Republicans said it would be unseemly for sports stars to help President Obama insure families against medical catastrophes and demanded that the NFL commissioner, the good Republican Roger Goodell, prevent it. Goodell seemed to accede, although only a few months ago he stood up for the right of a Baltimore Ravens linebacker to promote same-sex marriage. The threat to the sports organizations is part of the full-court press by congressional Republicans to screw up Obamacare before the final piece of it, the private insurance market, takes effect in October. They threaten to plunge the nation into bankruptcy and destroy its credit this winter if the president starts educating people about the importance of having health insurance. Who knows how much sports heroes could wise people up on buying health insurance, but some of these jock commercials are pretty good. I confess I would like to see Troy Polamalu, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ fierce all-pro safety, tackle an actor stand-

in for Sen. Mitch McConnell, rip his white shirt off and toss the souvenir to a little boy of uninsured parents. PolERNEST amalu, you know, DUMAS does it now to the guy who grabbed a frosty Coke from the boy’s hand and tried to flee down the stadium tunnel — a funny reprise of the famous Coke commercials of Mean Joe Greene in 1979. Upon hearing that the Department of Health and Human Services might enlist NFL stars in the campaign to enroll uninsured people in private health plans, McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, and Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the GOP whip, sent Goodell and the heads of the other professional sports associations letters saying that they had better not let the athletes do that. They said the Affordable Care Act — a.k.a. Obamacare — is a bad deal. It is dangerous, they warned, for professional sports, to be involved in partisan stuff. The House speaker joined them. The educational campaign to explain the new state insurance markets and how to enroll is overdue, the administration having abandoned the field to Republicans and foes

Could Hillary win Arkansas?

rkansas Democrats, battered and built for Clinton to bruised from the Obama era, are “hit play” and launch giddy at the possibility of a Hill- a second presidenary Clinton presidential candidacy in 2016, tial candidacy. The which they see as a key component of the provincial question party’s political turnaround in the state. is whether her presJAY In the 2014 cycle, party elites are increas- ence at the top of the BARTH ingly hopeful that direct pressure can be ballot would have applied to the bleeding that began in 2008, the impact Arkansas Democrats assume. both through Mike Ross maintaining the There are several key reasons Arkansas governorship and through narrowly re- Democrats are excited about the possibilcovering control of the state House. It is ity of a Clinton candidacy. First, although it 2016, however, that state Democrats are took her a while to get there, Clinton passes focused on as the point at which the party the “she’s one of us” test that Arkansas can emerge from the Republicans’ use of politicians know is the first step towards President Obama as key means to win votes. electoral success here. While Clinton has In 2016, the party hopes to move decisively spent relatively little time in Arkansas since back in the direction of its historic majority her mother moved from Little Rock, her status, even as it recognizes that Arkansas high profile appearances in recent months will remain a competitive two-party state. for the dedications of the city’s airport and Monday’s private White House lunch new children’s library reassert her conbetween the president and former first lady, nections to the state’s capital city. She also senator and secretary of state Hillary Clin- has proven vote-getting ability in the state ton only heightens hopes that she is prepar- based on the 70 percent she received in ing to take advantage of a presumptive posi- the 2008 primary. As a result of her ties to tion for her party’s nomination. Although Arkansas and to her still-popular husband, clearly not a done deal, the structure is being Arkansas Democrats would be comfortable

of universal insurance for four years, since taken to help Americans. Nearly every major Congress began work on the reforms. Peo- undertaking in the history of the repubple still know little about the law except the lic was accomplished after a hard political GOP’s slogans, which were based on phrases fight, but afterward the losers never tried that struck a nerve with focus groups in early to undermine its implementation. It didn’t 2009: Everyone’s taxes will go up, insurance happen with Social Security or the other will be more expensive, the government and Great Depression reforms, Medicare and not doctors and their patients will make Medicaid in 1965, President Reagan’s milimedical decisions, Medicare benefits will tary buildup, George W. Bush’s wars or his be slashed, treatment will be withheld from Medicare drug program, even though it was old folks, and on and on. Not one is true, but enacted by deception after Bush and Sen. that is what half the people believe. Ted Kennedy had worked out what DemoMost of Obamacare has already been crats thought was a compromise. implemented and nearly everyone is happy Lots of people, including conservative with it, to the extent they know Obamacare columnists, have written about the effort, had anything to do with it: lower drug costs but Norm Ornstein of the conservative think for seniors, free preventive care, youngsters tank American Enterprise Institute said it remaining on their parents’ policies, rebates best in The Atlantic. To try to change flawed from insurance companies for excess prof- laws — every law is flawed in some respect its, the end of annual and lifetime caps on — is laudable and expected, Ornstein said. “But to do everything possible to undercoverage. Here in Arkansas, Republicans are praising big parts of it, like big savings from cut and destroy its implementation — which bundled payments and Medicaid expansion, in this case means finding ways to deny covbecause everyone agrees not to whisper that erage to many who lack any health insurthey are Obamacare. ance; to keep millions who might be able to The tempest over sports stars’ partici- get better and cheaper coverage in the dark pation in the education campaign for the about their new options; to create disruption insurance markets (most people who are for the health providers who are trying to not insured are expected to buy an insur- implement the law, including insurers, hosance plan, with government assistance if pitals, and physicians; to threaten the even their incomes are less than 400 percent greater disruption via a government shutof the federal poverty line) is really trivial. down or breach of the debt limit in order to But it represents something unprece- blackmail the president into abandoning the dented. That is the all-out effort by one party law; and to hope to benefit politically from to scuttle a valid act of Congress, to see that all the resulting turmoil — is simply unacthe government fails in a program under- ceptable, even contemptible.” appearing with and speaking the name of Hillary Clinton in the state that has a history of personal relationships trumping party as a mover of votes. Clinton also would contest Arkansas in a manner that has not taken place since Al Gore’s 2000 campaign. The large margins of defeat in the last three presidential elections are partly due to the absence of a legitimate campaign operation in the state. It is unimaginable that Hillary (and Bill) Clinton would cede the state entirely in the general election even if it were ultimately an uphill climb. These dynamics are certainly advantageous to the party. Indeed, in certain parts of Arkansas, Clinton would expand the electorate, aiding statewide Democratic candidates and perhaps local House and Senate races. What is more dubious is whether a Clinton candidacy is the gamechanger that Arkansas Democrats now believe it to be. There is much data suggesting that the Arkansas electorate has changed permanently in recent years in a way that makes the state an incredible challenge for any national Democrat, even a candidate with such deep ties to the state. The electorate shifted in its partisan leanings towards the

GOP, with “independents” now increasingly “leaning” Republican in polling. Similarly, the recent dramatic shift of rural white voters in Arkansas counties that had traditionally been up for grabs seems more cemented than in the past, with those voters more thoroughly polarized and less susceptible to personal appeals. And despite the recent appearances, the Clintons’ ties to the state are weakening simply because of time — no Arkansan under age 39 was part of the 1992 electorate that sent Bill Clinton to the White House, and those who led the Clinton Arkansas operation, while still dedicated, are an aging crew. Make no mistake, a Clinton at the top of the ticket rather than an Obama represents a major psychological difference for the state’s Democrats. However, Arkansas Democrats are a bit too bullish about the positive impact of a Clinton campaign on Arkansas political dynamics. For a real turnaround in its fortunes to take place, the party needs much more than a change in the national face of the party. It needs better candidates throughout the state, modernized campaign operations and a sharper message to communicate with those voters still willing to listen. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

W O RDS Share the Road

For Cyclists Share the road Tips for SAFE cycling on the road.

• Bicycles are vehicles on the road, just like cars and motorcycles. Cyclists must obey all traffic laws. Arkansas Uniform Vehicle Code #27-49-111 • Cyclists must signal, ride on the right side of the road and yield to traffic normally. Bicycles are vehicles on the road, Code #27-51-301/403 just like must cars have andamotorcycles. • Bicycles white headlight and a red tail light visible fromall 500traffic feet and have a Cyclist should obey laws. bell or warning device for pedestrians. Arkansas Uniform Vehicle Code #27Code #27-36-220 49-111 • Make eye contact with motorists. Be visible. Be predictable. Head up, think ahead. Cyclists should signal, ride on the • On the Big Dam Bridge... go slow. right side of the road, and yield to Represent! traffic other • As younormally pass, say “Onlike yourany left... thankroad you.” • On the River vehicle. CodeTrail... #27-51-301/403 use a safe speed, don’t Share the Road intimidate or scare others. Watch for dogs Give 3 feet ofCyclists clear space when and For leashes.

Tips for PREVENTING injury or death.

EDGE GALLERY THE

Arkansas Children’s Hospital Fundraising Event Portion of the proceeds from select items goes to Children’s Hospital Featuring artwork from: Avila (Fernando Gomez) Eric Leon Freeman James Hayes Jerry Colburn S. Joseph Thomason Stephen Drive

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cars andLeague motorcycles. Cyclists must obey of American Bicyclists

allwww.bikeleague.org/programs/education trafficby laws. Uniform Code Cyclist lawArkansas can not rideVehicle on the #27-49-111 sidewalk in some areas, some bikes • Cyclists must signal, ride on the right side can roads of theonly roadhandle and yieldsmooth to traffic normally. Code cracks, #27-51-301/403 (no potholes, trolley tracks). • Bicycles must have a white headlight and a LR Ord.#32-494

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Please ghost bikes. • On the prevent Big Dam Bridge... go slow. www.ghostbikes.org Represent!

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League American Bicyclists BicycleofAdvocacy of Arkansas www.bacar.org www.bikeleague.org/programs/ League of American Bicyclists www.bikeleague.org/programs/education education

Me or my An Arkansas Times editorial said “Regardless of your personal belief, I would hope that you shutting up about your personal belief and letting me decide these things is something we can all agree to.” Richard W. Chapman finds fault. “The gerund ‘shutting up ... letting me decide these things’ is treated as a noun and thus requires the possessive form of the preceding pronoun,” Chapman writes. “The sentence should read ‘I would hope that YOUR shutting up ...’ .” A shade-tree grammarian at best, I usually try to stay out of the minefield of gerunds, genitives and fused participles. But if we must, we must. We’ll eschew technical terms as much as possible. There is indeed an old rule that requires the use of the possessive in sentences such as the one from the editorial. Some people take the rule seriously; some less so. One prominent grammarian has said “It’s a niggling point, but one on which many people niggle.” My attitude is the same as my attitude toward the old rules about not splitting infinitives and not ending sentences with prepositions. I don’t go looking for occasions to break the rules, but if I think a sentence sounds and reads better with the infinitive split and the preposition at the end, that’s the way

I do it. Jane Austen was a great writer, and a grammatically correct one, but who today would write, as DOUG she did, “Elinor SMITH dougsmith@arktimes.com was prevented from making any reply to this ... by the door’s being thrown open, the servant’s announcing Mr. Ferrars, and Edward’s immediately walking in”? This, on the other hand, sounds right, even if ungrammatical: “The rage and uproar over me becoming a Muslim was still at a fever pitch.” That’s from “The Greatest,” by Muhammad Ali. If I have to fight, I’d rather fight Jane Austen than Muhammad Ali. Maybe the Times editorialist shares my view. Maybe he didn’t want to put two “your”s so close together. Maybe he dozed off while writing. Editorials can do that. People who want more on this subject should check the “Fused Participles” entry in Garner’s Modern American Usage. More respectful of the old rule than I, and knowing far more about it, Garner says, in part, “Especially in formal prose, the possessive ought to be used whenever it is not unidiomatic or unnatural.”

WEEK THAT WAS

It was a good week for ...

TRACY STEELE The former legislator was named to head the Arkansas Division of Youth Services. He’ll be paid $100,077.

ACXIOM The company announced that it would open the landscaped park behind a fence next to its Little Rock headquarters to the public. The city approved a $36 million municipal bond issue to finance the Acxiom building in 2000. Acxiom was given a total exemption from property taxes on the building for 30 years as well as the preferred city financing. Since then, many in the community have grumbled about the inability to use either the park or (in non-business hours) the building parking deck. MIKE ROSS He’s raised a massive amount of money and now doesn’t have to spend any of it in a Democratic primary. Meanwhile, his presumptive Republican opponent, Asa Hutchinson, has significantly less cash on hand and two primary opponents.

It was a bad week for ...

BILL HALTER He withdrew from the Democratic primary for governor. He cited “another strong candidate” and avoiding a “divisive primary” as reasons for his exit. No word on whether he’ll seek other offices, like, say, Rep. Tim Griffin’s 2nd District seat. 8

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

A MERGER After months of consideration, UAMS and St. Vincent Health System announced they would no longer negotiate towards an alliance between the hospitals. The talks were spurred in large part by each institution’s financial difficulties. EXXONMOBIL The company began contacting residents displaced by the rupture of the Pegasus pipeline to tell them it would cease paying for housing assistance on Sept. 1. After much outcry from residents and politicians, the company reversed its decisions. Now, it says it will continue paying expenses for as long as residents need. CENTRAL ARKANSAS WATER The ExxonMobil Pipeline Company told the utility and stakeholders, including both of Arkansas’s U.S. senators and Rep. Tim Griffin, that it couldn’t release data the utility has requested to ensure the Pegasus pipeline doesn’t pose a threat to the Lake Maumelle watershed because that federal regulatory agency the oversees pipelines, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), determined what information should be released and to whom. PHMSA has said that ExxonMobil has requested that the information not be released.

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Al Augulst!

NOTES ON THE PASSING SCENE

Grains of sand STROLLING BACK TO THE FORTRESS OF EMPLOYMENT from the Little Rock Farmerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Market this morning (The Observerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s haul: two tiny watermelons and a loaf of tomato/herb/cheese bread from the Old Mill), Yours Truly was standing at the red light at the end of President Clinton Avenue waiting to cross when we heard our dead father call our name. Turning, we saw our Uncle Gene, our fatherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s youngest brother, leaning out the passenger-side window of a pickup truck festooned with ladders. The Observer hasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seen him in maybe five or six years. Heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s grayer and balder than he used to be, no longer the strapping young man who used to lift weights in the dirt yard of Grandmaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s house down in Higgins Switch. His face, however, is the same: a round, soft, jovial mug so like our fatherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s that it gave us a little start until we realized who he was. Uncle Gene, like virtually every other member of The Observerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s prodigious paternal clan, is still out there on the roof, like The Observerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s father was until virtually the day he died, and his fatherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s father. It rained in Little Rock on Monday, and rain means leaks. Uncle Gene extended his hand, and after a second of juggling in which The Observer managed to drop our bread in the gutter, we shook. The light turned green. Uncle Gene said his goodbye in a voice so like The Observerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s dad, and then the man at the wheel turned right and motored away down Cantrell, the truck soon disappearing back into the life we seemed destined to as a child. The Observer stared after him until he was gone, and a while after that. Then we walked back to the office, where we sit now under fluorescent lights, typing this, and pensively eating a slice of bread. SOME OF OUR TENDENCY TO DRIFT OFF in introspection may have something to do with the fact that The Observer just got back from vacation: a week-long sojourn that took us to the sugar-sand beaches of Pensacola. We donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t like the feeling of sand sticking to our pasty white flesh, so itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s been 10 years since The Observer has been to the beach. After a long, cold, winter however, Spouse finally put her pedicured, be-sandaled foot down. We soon found ourselves booking

a hotel, buying an ice chest and sunscreen and an extra-sturdy Big Tex beach chair (weight capacity: mucho!) and all the other various accoutrements needed to survive and thrive on the desert coast of Florida. Back in 2010, when BP took a leak all over those beaches, with videos surfacing daily of the white sands looking like black Evil was emerging from the sea to claim Florida, we worried that place was spoiled for a generation. We look at the Internets, so we know the situation in the Gulf isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t â&#x20AC;&#x153;back to normalâ&#x20AC;? by a long shot, but we were surprised at how life goes on in Pensacola: beautiful beach full of fishbelly white tourists in their new swimsuits, the ocean lapping, the sunrises and sunsets still lovely. There is something about the ocean that weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll never get over, something that is part of the reason The Observer is happy to keep a reverent distance here in Arkansas. There is an immensity to the sea in fact and philosophy â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the knowledge that the day you were born, the waves on that beach were lapping, as they will be tomorrow, and the next day, and the day you die, and probably the day the sun burns out. That, along with the line at the horizon where the sky meets the water â&#x20AC;&#x201D; so like the gutter between two pages in a book â&#x20AC;&#x201D; is enough to make anybody feel small. The Observer is from Hill Folk. It makes us uneasy to be able to see the knife edge where the world falls away. The Observer often found himself squinting for dragons, poking their scaly heads over the edge of the world. Still, existential questions aside, it was lovely. That first night, behind sore from 10 hours of driving and the sun melting into the half-water-half-earth horizon to the west, Spouse and her Dearest walked down to the edge of the land and stared at the waves, lapping, lapping, lapping, lapping. It had stormed that day, and there were dark clouds and lighting skittering along the book-gutter horizon. Where the waves come up, there is a berm of sand, and we sat in that sand together, The Observer leaning back so that the sand conformed perfectly to our body, cradling us. And we closed our eyes. And our cares drained away. And then we listened to the sound of the waves, which will still be casting their treasures there on the day we die.

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AUGUST 1, 2013

Arkansas Reporter

THE

IN S IDE R

Museum of Discovery out of Argenta project A campaign to create the Argenta Innovation Center, which will include a collaborative work space for digital business startups and a makers space, was announced Tuesday with an impressive speaker lineup that included business and community leaders from both sides of the river. They predicted that new jobs developed in Argenta would benefit Little Rock as well, and indeed the entire state. State Rep. Warwick Sabin of Little Rock commented in his remarks that most people don’t even know that Little Rock and North Little Rock aren’t one city. “If we’re going to achieve the potential here, we have to work cooperatively and collaboratively.” But absent from the press conference was representation from the Museum of Discovery, which until recently was going to run the makers space, now called the Fab Lab, where members of the community can experiment and try out engineering ideas. That’s because Mayor Mark Stodola had directed MOD Director Kelley Bass’ attention to the fact that the city of Little Rock has been providing the museum $400,000 a year since the penny sales tax increase and $2.6 million, he said, over the past six years as a match to the millions of dollars the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation has poured into the museum. The mayor also noted the museum has made a request for $56,000 in repairs. Stodola says he did not tell Bass that the city would yank its annual funding for the museum should it expand into North Little Rock, though it was widely rumored that he had. (Besides, Stodola said, it’s up to the city board, not him, to decide on city funding for the museum.) Stodola said he did express the idea “that people in the city of Little Rock, having been the foundation for this museum for lo these many years, would be disappointed” should the museum expand into North Little Rock rather than Little Rock. So much for cooperation and collaboration. Stodola said he’d like to locate a maker space in downtown Little Rock, ideally next to a business incubator like the Iceberg in Fayetteville — or like the Silver Mine, the collaborative space that will part of the Argenta Innovation Center. Bass said the museum is embarking on some capital projects and that, on CONTINUED ON PAGE 11 10

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

Business owner pleads guilty in shooting Victim was his employee. BY DAVID KOON

hristopher Reynolds, 35, who stood accused of manslaughter for shooting his employee Ernest Hoskins during a November 2012 business meeting at Reynolds’ home in Ward, accepted a plea deal on July 24 and was sentenced in Lonoke County Circuit Court to the 10-year maximum with no possibility of appeal. The Arkansas Times published a cover story about the Hoskins case in April. The special prosecutor in the case said the defense told him that Reynolds’ guilt over “the death of someone he considered a friend” pushed Reynolds to accept the deal rather than go ahead with the trial, scheduled for Aug. 7-8. (A call to Reynolds’ attorney, Hubert Alexander, to confirm was unreturned at press time.) Prosecutor Jack McQuary said that with time off for good behavior, Reynolds will be eligible for parole in two and a half years. Hoskins’ mother isn’t happy with the plea, and says she is currently exploring the possibility of suing Reynolds for wrongful death. Ernest Hoskins, 21, was a newlywed and soon-to-be father when Reynolds shot him in the head on Nov. 9. At the time, Hoskins was a salesman for Reynolds’ company, which sold mileage boosters. According to accounts by other employees in attendance and a statement made by Reynolds to the Arkansas State Police, during that meeting, Reynolds and Hoskins were discussing why Hoskins’ sales figures were low when Reynolds pulled out a .44 Magnum Desert Eagle pistol and pointed it at Hoskins’ head. After pulling the trigger once and having it not go off, Reynolds told police, he chambered a round, pointed it at Hoskins again, and fired. Hoskins was killed instantly. Special prosecutor Jack McQuary said

REYNOLDS

his interviews with witnesses found that there was a reckless disregard for basic firearm safety at Reynolds’ house, saying Reynolds was “swinging around” guns that he believed to be unloaded. That, combined with what McQuary said was a lack of motive, led to the charge of manslaughter. In the Times’ story in April, McQuary was quoted saying that “The Supreme Court has held that manslaughter must be more than an accident. It’s recklessness. To me, this is elementary about it, but it’s an accident plus incredible stupidity.” Ernest Hoskins’ mother, Monica Hoskins, is not happy with the plea deal, even though Reynolds was sentenced to the maximum he could have received had he lost at trial. Hoskins said she wasn’t consulted about the deal, and was only told about it the day before it happened. She said she hoped to get answers about the shooting at trial. “[I wanted] someone to seriously sit down,” she said, “and analyze that entire story from day one. ... I wanted those witnesses to be able to stand in front of a jury and tell what they saw. Why did it take place? If you look at the affidavit and his story, he’s admitted to what he’s done, but at the end of the day: Why did you do it? What made you pull out a gun and even point it at my son in the first place?

What was the reason? I want you to tell everybody your reason for doing that.” Hoskins said she is convinced Reynolds will never serve the 10-year sentence. Asked if she’d be willing to correspond with Reynolds or reach out to him for his account of what happened that day, Hoskins said that while prosecutor McQuary suggested that, she doesn’t know if she can. “I don’t know if I can sit in a room with Mr. Reynolds,” she said. “They mentioned that to us, and I was shocked to hear that. ... He never reached out to us in the first place. Why do we need to go and talk to him personally now? Let him stand up and tell everyone why he did it.” Hoskins said her attorney is working on a civil case against Reynolds. “ We’re actually going to meet with [the attorney] in August, and he’s going to go over a few things with us.” Attempts to contact Ernest Hoskins’ wife, Nikki, for this story were unsuccessful at press time; the phone number she’d previously given us has been changed or disconnected. McQuary said he still believes that the shooting of Ernest Hoskins was unintentional, but informed the defense early on that he wouldn’t accept any plea deal that included less than the maximum sentence of 10 years. While preparing for trial, McQuary contacted Reynolds’ attorney, Alexander, and told him that if Reynolds wanted to plead guilty, he’d have to do it by Aug. 1. Alexander “called me back and said his client wanted to plead because he does feel responsible and guilty for the death of someone he considered a friend,” McQuary said. “I contacted the court as to what day and the court said tomorrow.” McQuary said that Reynolds asked for no special conditions in accepting the plea. McQuary said he could have gone for a “firearm enhancement” that could have CONTINUED ON PAGE 16

LISTEN UP

LITIG8: A dirty vanity plate word search

BIG PICTURE

INSIDER, CONT. second thought, now was not the time to run the Fab Lab in North Little Rock. He said he’d “welcome the chance” to talk to the mayor on finding a building in Little Rock in which to put a maker space. The news followed by four days the filing of “emergency” ordinances by the city of Little Rock to clean up its long-flawed and unconstitutional effort to subsidize the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce. The ordinances include $100,000 for a regional alliance aimed at job creation throughout the metropolitan area. That ordinance said: “It was determined that while a particular business may not wish to locate within the corporate limits of the City, that the City benefits from its location in Central Arkansas.” Not if the business development enterprise is in North Little Rock, apparently.

Clarksville arms schools The Clarksville School District got a round of national attention this week from media outlets about its decision to train more than 20 staff members of the 2,400-student district to carry concealed weapons in the event a shooter came on campus and opened fire. Superintendent David Hopkins elaborated to the Arkansas Times on some of the details. The district paid $50,000 to Nighthawk Custom Training of Bentonville for 53 hours of training, well in excess of the 10 necessary to be a certified private security guard in Arkansas and thus able to carry a gun to work. (The security officer training is being used to justify armed staff on campus because no specific state law or rule addresses the issue of arming staff at grade schools.) Each of those qualified gets a $1,100 one-time stipend to purchase weapons, ammunition and related gear. Hopkins said Walther Arms of Fort Smith had made a special deal on its PPS and PPQ 9-millimeter semi-automatic models, which will carry seven- and eight-round magazines. Teachers and staff also got practice ammo and “carry” loads to place in the weapons.

INSIDER, CONT.

ANSWERS: QUEER1, FUKSTK, DARNIT

THE

Last week, after hearing that a court in Georgia overturned the state’s denial of a motorist’s request for a personalized “GAY PWR” license plate, state Rep. Jonathan Barnett, Republican of Siloam Springs, asked the state Department of Finance and Administration to review the list of words that are verboten on the state’s personalized license plates. Naturally, the Arkansas Times felt compelled to file a Freedom of Information request for the list, which includes more than 11,000 combinations of letters and numbers, some obviously offensive, others only vulgar if you’re in kindergarten. Incidentally, “GAY PWR” is not on the list, but “BLKPWR” is, if anyone’s feeling litigious. Below we’ve mixed in a few license plate combos the censors missed (or don’t care about) with others that are straight from the list. See if you can pick the row or column of plates that we made up, and let us know how it goes for you at the revenue office.

Tune in to the Times’ “Week In Review” podcast each Friday. Available on iTunes & arktimes.com

In Alan Leveritt’s letter in the Big Picture last week announcing digital membership, he mistakenly wrote that the Arkansas Gazette closed in 1992. It published its final edition Oct. 18, 1991. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

BANKER, TEACHER, PASTOR, GAY Only state law makes same-sex couples different. BY LESLIE NEWELL PEACOCK

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

state court to be friendlier than federal court. The high court’s DOMA ruling came in a case in which a woman legally married to another woman in New York was denied the federal marital tax exemption that extends to survivors who inherit when a spouse dies. That is just one way DOMA made same-sex marriages unequal to heterosexual marriages under federal law. The Arkansas plaintiffs are suing on behalf of their children — to keep their family together should a birth mother die, for example. They want their partners to share in their benefits, their insurance, their rights under bankruptcy, family medical leave and any of the thousand-plus rights that the Human Rights Campaign

they go to church, they raise children, they pay bills. They love each other. They don’t identify first as gay and secondly as people. Their lives — with the exception of the rights they are denied — are even humdrum, one woman told this reporter. “We’re sorry we’re so boring,” she said after their interview. Plaintiffs in the federal case are Rita and Pam Jernigan, Becca and Tara Austin and Randy and Gary EddyMcCain. Plaintiffs in the circuit court case are Kendall and Julia Wright; Rhonda Eddy and Treba Leath; Carol Owens and Ranee Harp; Natalie and Tommie Wartick; Kimberly Kidwell and Kathryn Short; James Boone and Wesley Givens; Kimberly and Felicity Robinson; Linda Meyers and Angela Shelby; Gregory Bruce and Wil-

BRIAN CHILSON

s of last Friday, 25 couples from all over Arkansas had joined two lawsuits to challenge Arkansas’s Amendment 83, which makes it illegal for persons of the same gender to enter into a marriage contract. Some of them are already legally married in other states; one couple was married in Canada. Some have had commitment ceremonies in Arkansas. All want to be married in the state they live in, to enjoy at home the same rights that the marriage contract conveys to heterosexual couples. Some have been eager to challenge the law before now, but were encouraged to wait until the U.S. Supreme Court passed judgment on the federal law that defines marriage as between a man and a woman. On June 26, the wait was over. The court, ruling in United States v. Windsor, held that a section of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), enacted during the Clinton administration, was unconstitutional because it deprived same-sex couples of equal protection and due process. In the majority opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote that the “principal purpose” of the federal law, which even former President Clinton now believes was misguided and unjust, was “to impose inequality.” The law “places same-sex couples in an unstable position of being in a second-tier marriage,” Kennedy wrote, which “demeans the couple, whose moral and sexual choices the Constitution protects.” He also wrote that the law “humiliates tens of thousands of children now being raised by same-sex couples.” The court also declined to take up an appeal of a lower court ruling that held California’s ban on same sex marriage, Proposition 8, unconstitutional. There were celebrations across the country, and shortly thereafter, the director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission stood with gay rights advocates at the State Capitol and said the time had come for Arkansas to legalize gay marriage as a business-friendly move. Kennedy’s words stirred the Arkansas couples to action. The overturning of DOMA and Proposition 8 also ignited referenda attempts by two groups, Arkansans for Equality and Arkansas Initiative for Marriage Equality. AFE seeks to put a repeal of Amendment 83 on the 2014 ballot. AIME seeks a vote in 2016 — a presidential election year — on an amendment to guarantee that the state could not abridge the right to marry on the basis of sexual orientation or sex. Attorney General Dustin McDaniel has rejected ballot titles for both, and both organizations were to have resubmitted new drafts this week. Six of the Arkansas plaintiffs have filed in federal district court. Should there be an appeal, the case would go to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, which has not been friendly to same-sex marriage. The 8th circuit court ruled Nebraska’s DOMA-styled law restricting marriage to heterosexuals constitutional in 2006. But Jack Wagoner, who announced on his Facebook page the day the DOMA ruling came down that he would represent anyone seeking to challenge Arkansas’s ban, believes the June ruling should give new guidance to the federal court. The case was assigned to Judge Kristine Baker after Judge Leon Holmes recused, citing his personal and professional ties to those who drafted Amendment 83. Cheryl Maples of Searcy has filed suit in Pulaski County Circuit Court on behalf of 19 couples, expecting

AT THE COURTHOUSE: Pam and Rita Jernigan tried to get a marriage license before suing in federal court.

has identified that heterosexual couples alone now enjoy and many of which are enumerated in Justice Kennedy’s ruling in Windsor. The state’s ban on marriage between people of the same gender is based on the belief that these are deviant members of society unworthy of state recognition and unable to properly raise children. The former is based on particular religious tenets not shared by all and the latter has no basis in fact. It discriminates against a broad spectrum of people that includes our brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers. Teachers and students. Nurses, policemen, bankers. Social workers. Secretaries. Farmers. Veterans. Pastors. Neighbors. The plaintiffs are not outside the norm. They work,

liam D. Smith; Monica Loyd and Jennifer Lochridge; Jonathan Gober and Mark Norwine; Andra Alsbury and Amber Gardner-Alsbury; Angela Spears-Gullette and Livicie Gullette; Shannon Havens and Rachel Whittenburg; Cody Renegar and Thomas Staed; Katherine Henson and Angela Buford; Christopher Horton and Michael Potts, and John Schenck and Robert Loyd. They are being represented by Cheryl Maples of Searcy. Many of the plaintiffs have the same last name. They have done the one thing legally available to them as heterosexual couples: They may share their surnames. The Times talked to several of the couples about why they want Arkansas to recognize their unions as legal. CONTINUED ON PAGE 14 www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

RITA AND PAM JERNIGAN

BECCA AND TARA AUSTIN

ecca Austin, 32, a nurse practitioner, and Tara Austin, 37, an executive assistant, are the mothers of 4-yearold twins, one girl and one boy. They met in 2004 and exchanged marriage vows in 2005. Perhaps because the young couple grew up in a slightly different world, they have not experienced the kind of roadblocks that Rita Jernigan faced in beginning her career. They have found acceptance among family — described as “awesome” by Becca — and 14

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

BRIAN CHILSON

FIRST STEP: Attorney Jack Wagoner accompanied Becca and Tara Austin to the county office to ask for a license.

friends. “I feel like there’s this bubble around us … . Everyone has been so great.” But she got a jolt of reality, she said, when she discovered that the Family Medical Leave Act didn’t apply to her after the birth of the couple’s twins. “I feel like I’m married,” Becca said. “But that doesn’t give me the right to put my name on the [twins’] birth certificate, or put Tara on my insurance. Or make medical decisions” for her family. A number of their friends have gotten married out of state. But, Tara said, “It would be nice to get married where we’re from. … Our family’s here.” Tara said they are a quiet couple, “not big activists.” “We’re just normal people and [people] need to see that.” They’ve explained to their twins that sometimes women marry women and men marry men. Their daughter’s response: “I want to marry a boy.” Who says folks aren’t born with their sexual proclivities hard-wired? The lawsuit, the Austins said, is “not just about the conclusion but maybe changes” in the way people feel. “Maybe,” Tara said, “we’ll play a little, small part” in that change.

RANDY AND GARY EDDY-MCCAIN

andy McCain and Gary Eddy, both raised in fundamentalist Christian homes, met in 1974 at the Assemblies of God-sponsored college Evangel in Missouri. Both are followers of Jesus. Both suffered from guilt and tried to become heterosexual. No dice. Randy was from Walnut Ridge, Gary from Rapid City, S.D. After Randy left Evangel, he got a letter from Gary. “He told me he was in love with me,” Randy said. Part of Randy was affronted, part of him was interested. He had not “accepted” that he was gay, he said. But six years later, he came out, and wrote Gary a letter at his mother’s address in South Dakota, and then a second. No response. The letters didn’t reach him. Meanwhile, Gary had married a woman to try to shed

BRIAN CHILSON

am Jernigan is a vivacious, outgoing sort, so when she saw Wagoner’s Facebook post, she sent him “fun facts” about herself and her partner of five and a half years, Rita, by way of introduction. For example: They volunteer weekly at Our House in the Adult Learning Center. They are Senior Olympic athletes (Pam a swimmer and cyclist, Rita a basketball player). They were president and treasurer of the Cedar Hill Terrace Neighborhood Association 2009-2010. Pam, a breast cancer survivor, founded “Paddle for the Cure,” a non-sanctioned kayak event held in conjunction with the “Race for the Cure.” They are avid tennis players. They have their own small business, Hillcrest Pet Sitting. They are regulars at The Rep and the Arkansas Symphony. They refer to each other as wife. “Until 2006, I had all my rights,” Pam, 53, said in an interview at the restaurant 42, where she and Rita were lunching after their request for a marriage license was turned down at the Pulaski County Courthouse. In 2006, Pam was divorced from her husband of 20 years. They have a daughter, a college student, who is also gay. But Rita, 60, a “gold star,” Pam explained, a lesbian who has never dated a man, had to lie about her sexuality to get and keep her first job out of college, as a basketball coach at Trumann. The superintendent at Trumann had asked her advisor at Arkansas State University if there was “anything wrong” with her before hiring her (such discrimination is legal in Arkansas). Naturally reticent, Rita said she was a “nervous wreck” when Pam took her hand in a public place for the first time — at an Arkansas Travelers baseball game. “I was so outside of my comfort zone.” But it was also “freeing,” she said — a mixture of joy and terror all at once. Pam kept telling her, Rita, people are smiling at us. “I’m not going in to a closet,” Pam told her. Pam and Rita were among the protestors at Pleasant Plains after a school board member there posted a barely literate status on his Facebook page condemning “fags” and saying he “enjoyed” the fact that they “often give each other aids and die.” They also were part of a silent protest at Chick-fil-A, and in telling about that Pam began to cry. She’d run into a couple she knew there, people she considered friends and who she believed had come to support her. But after hellos were exchanged, the couple announced they were going into the restaurant to signify their support for Chick-fil-A’s announced opposition to same-sex marriage and told Pam they’d pray for her. Among their many reasons for wanting to be legally married in Arkansas is that Rita would like Pam to be able to benefit from Rita’s teacher retirement if Pam survives her. Rita has listed Pam as a beneficiary, which would provide a lump sum. But as a survivor, she would continue to receive a percentage of Pam’s retirement.

MARRIED IN NEW YORK: But Gary and Randy EddyMcCain want to be wed here.

his homosexuality. The marriage failed. He moved to his mother’s home during the divorce. A third letter came, and this time he got it. He decided to visit Randy in Arkansas. That was 1985. But the upshot of the visit was that Randy decided to “do the ‘ex-gay’ thing,” a Christian “therapy” movement to help men reject homosexuality. No luck. Gary visited Arkansas again in 1991 and within five

TAKING IT TO THE PUBLIC Two groups seek votes on same-sex marriage.

months had moved in with Randy. They now live in a large home in the Overbrook neighborhood of North Little Rock, where they tend a vast garden in their back yard. Their neighbors, Randy said, welcomed them with open arms and they party together once or twice a year. The men were married last August in Central Park and took the name Eddy-McCain. The officiant was Jay Bakker, the son of the late televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker, who some time ago had been invited to the church Randy leads, Open Door Community Church in Sherwood. There, Randy said, the scales fell from Bakker’s eyes and he decided he would no longer preach against homosexuality. Bakker affiliated with a progressive church in Atlanta and then New York, and has endorsed gay marriage. Randy was a plaintiff in Picado v. Jegley, the 2001 suit that overturned Arkansas’s sodomy law that made sex between homosexuals a crime. When he and Gary heard the Supreme Court’s ruling on DOMA, “we were ecstatic. We celebrated all day long.” With the language that Justice Kennedy used, he reasoned, how could Arkansas’s ban on same-sex marriage stand? “I love this state,” Randy said. “A lot of my friends want to move.” He doesn’t think they should have to.

CODY RENEGAR AND THOMAS STAED

hen Cody Renegar was 17, he left the orphanage he lived in and at 18 he joined the Army Reserves, working as a mechanic in South Carolina and Maryland. At 20 he and his wife, a young woman he’d lived

BRIAN CHILSON

n the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling overturning the federal ban on same-sex marriage, two groups filed ballot language with the state attorney general’s office that would put the issue to a vote in Arkansas. Arkansans for Equality seeks a 2014 vote to repeal Amendment 83, the state law that bans marriage between persons of the same sex and says such marriages made official in other states will not be recognized here. The Arkansas Initiative for Marriage Equality, a non-partisan group that formed in 2012, would put on the 2016 ballot an amendment to prohibit the state from banning marriage on the basis of sex or sexual preference. Neither of the groups’ proposed ballot language has passed muster with state Attorney General Dustin McDaniel. McDaniel found AFE’s language deficient in failing to mention the effect of repeal of Amendment 83 and because it was not impartial, and said that the AIME ballot language on “the right to marry” was ambiguous. On Monday, the AFE filed amended ballot language with the AG’s office. AIME plans to file a new draft next week. Judd Mann, a high school art teacher and co-chair

AIME TARGETS STATE LAW: Jennifer Pierce and others seeking vote on same-sex marriage.

of the non-partisan AFE with Christina Harrison, said the group has filed for a non-profit status that would allow them to take contributions. To get a ballot spot, AFE will have to get 78,000 names representing voters across the state on their petition. Mann said the cost of training persons to collect names is $250 a head. The group has had “scores of people who have stepped up” to help with the petition drive, he said.

with in the orphanage, had their son, Levi. The marriage didn’t last. Renegar is gay. Last summer, Renegar, 36, and Thomas Staed, 30, held a marriage ceremony on their farm in Elkins, where they raise rabbits and pheasants and fainting goats (a “heavy petting zoo,” Renegar laughed.) They moved to their three acres on a river after the son — now 17 — rode his motorcycle through the living room of their house on the square in Fayetteville. “He needed to spread his wings,” Renegar said. Renegar and his ex-wife are close friends and son Levi moves back and forth between their homes. Renegar is an artist — a painter of horses — and part-time hair stylist. Staed is a loan analyst at Arvest Bank. Renegar said he captured Staed’s attention when the math-minded man saw Renegar trying to help Levi with his math homework. That was four years ago. In 2011, the two decided to marry, though it would not be a legal ceremony. When they asked the Northwest Arkansas Times to run an engagement notice, the newspaper turned them down. That news — that they couldn’t announce their engagement in their hometown paper — was on Yahoo News within days. Groups that fight for equality took up the cause, and Renegar said “we’re changing over 50 different newspapers across the U.S.” The Yahoo story was the second on Renegar. The first was about an interview Renegar gave in the documentary “Hollywood to Dollywood,” in which he tearfully tells the story of how he told his son that he was gay. Though Levi took some guff when he started school in Elkins, a change in personnel and the fact that he’s

Mann, who said he was raised in a charismatic fundamentalist Christian home, no longer believes that “being homosexual is something that needs to be fixed or healed. … It’s an abomination as much as eating shellfish.” He said the group is encouraged that according to a bipartisan poll commissioned by the Human Rights Campaign, 60 percent of Arkansans age 30 and younger believe in marriage equality. “Maybe we’ll get lucky,” he said, “and it will all be taken care of with one sweeping decision” in federal court. While focused now on repeal of Amendment 83, the group’s mission is to take on discrimination however it occurs. Arkansas Initiative for Marriage Equality was founded by Trey Weir and Jennifer Pierce, both of whom were members of Occupy Little Rock. They had worked with Regnat Populus, a group that sought campaign finance reform, and so were familiar with the ballot process. Pierce, a history teacher, acknowledged that “a lot of people have said it’s too soon” to ask voters to approve of same-sex marriage. “I don’t see it happening anytime soon in the Southern states,” she said. But she said the public dialogue that a petition drive will engender will be important, and, as a history teacher, “it’s important to stand up and fight for equality.” Both groups have Facebook pages where they publish meeting notices, updates on their work, links to pertinent news articles and wry photographs such as the one from St. Mary Magdalene Episcopal Church: “We truly regret that gay marriage attacks the sanctity of your fourth marriage.”

“extremely good looking and dating the popular girls,” his dad said, has taken care of any friction he had. Despite the fact that they had held a marriage ceremony, the couple looked forward to the DOMA ruling so they could make their wedding official. Renegar said they felt a “responsibility to continue on the path we started” toward marriage equality. A friend sent them Cheryl Maples’ contact information. “We were looking for some sort of avenue of getting this going in Arkansas.” Staed, Renegar said, “is extremely passionate” about getting Arkansas’s same-sex marriage ban overturned. “We’re doing this for everyone else. We want to represent them.” Renegar said opposition to gay marriage “blows my mind. What does your religion have to do with my rights? … It’s really no one’s business.”

ANDRA ALSBURY AND AMBER GARDNER-ALSBURY

ndra Alsbury, whose father was retired from the Army, was commissioned as a first lieutenant in the Army Reserves at her father’s gravesite. He had wanted her to join, but died before she could. Her mother pinned her at the ceremony. “That’s how close I am to my family,” she said. Her mother still believes that it’s wrong that her daughter married another woman, Amber Gardner. “My mother loves my wife,” she said. “But … I know and she’ll tell me, ‘you know I don’t think this is right.’ … but she absolutely CONTINUED ON PAGE 16 www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

KENDALL AND JULIA WRIGHT

he Wrights live in El Paso with their four children, two from Kendall Wright’s first marriage. Kendall and Julia were married by Randy Eddy-McCain at the Open Door church in Sherwood. “I was three months pregnant and barefoot and I did that on purpose,” Kendall said. They were legally married in Iowa in 2012 (where Kendall again took off her shoes, telling the judge, “Don’t ask.”). Julia is an assistant manager at a Kroger store in Cabot. “Kroger is really good.” Kendall said. “The foodworkers union [the UFCW], they recognize me as her wife, call me Mrs. Wright.”

Kendall is a full-time student and money is tight. The children are on Medicaid. If the couple’s marriage was recognized in Arkansas, Kendall said, they could be covered by private health insurance. “What if someone happened to me?” Kendall asked. “The state could take my kids. Or [Julia]? I’d need help.”

THE ALSBURY WEDDING: Legal in Massachusetts.

BRIAN CHILSON

loves Amber.” Out of respect for Andra’s mother and Amber’s father, the couple stay in separate rooms when they visit. “You pick your battles,” she said. Like many persons attracted only to their own gender but raised in a conservative religious denomination, Andra “jumped back into the church scene” after coming out, and causing hurt, to her family. “I was trying to tell myself I’m wrong. … I tried doing that for a little over a year and I got to the point where it was time for me to be happy. I had prayed and asked God to change me.” But eventually, she came to realize “this is who I am.” Andra, a registered nurse in the cardiovascular OR at Washington Regional Hospital, and Amber, who works at the University of Arkansas in the Counseling and Psychology Center and is a singer/songwriter, were married last October on the beach in Provincetown, Mass., accompanied by a music group from Fayetteville. A friend took a photograph of the couple on the beach, Amber in a lovely white wedding dress, Andra in a tailored tan suit, with their friends lifting signs that said “Get” and “over” and “it.” The Gardner-Alsburys did not stay in Massachusetts, though they would be recognized in that state as married, and would have to endure none of the problems that they will encounter here — such as parentage status for their future children. “We have family” in Northwest Arkansas, Andra said. “We have established jobs, friendships. … We are willing to stay here and fight for the right that other states have been able to [provide].” It wouldn’t be right, she said, to leave. “I’m always hoping that in the next few months it would be great if [Arkansas law] was overturned and we could be legally recognized, but I really believe in the state of Arkansas … we’re in for the long haul. I believe it will take a while.” But however long it takes, she said, she and her wife will stick with the battle for marriage equality in Arkansas.

SEEN STONEWALL AND VIETNAM: Still fighting for their rights are Robert Loyd and John Schenck.

Kendall was afraid her father would “hang me from a tree” when she told him she was gay. But he told her he already knew. She was also afraid to tell her 96-year-old grandmother that she was marrying a woman. “Do you love her?” her grandmother asked. Yes, Kendall told her. “By God you better marry her then,” her grandmother advised. Kendall is the birth mother of the couple’s two shared children, “and we want Julie on the birth certificate, too. She would take any spot. Write it on the bottom, she doesn’t care.”

JOHN SCHENCK AND ROBERT LOYD

chenck and Loyd are perhaps the most famous gay couple in Arkansas thanks in part to their organization of the Gay Pride parade in Conway in 2004. The thousand protesters outnumbered marchers 10 to one the first year, though the 100-strong parade grew to 250 by the time it reached its destination in Simon Park. Protesters dumped manure in the couple’s yard and across the parade route. This year, the 10th parade, more than 1,100 people, a third of them straight allies, marched. Conway’s Lantern Theater screened “The Laramie Project,” about the Wyoming college student tortured and beaten to death for being gay, over the parade weekend. Proceeds from the film went to Lucie’s House, a shelter for gay kids. Schenck and Loyd have also been featured in three documentaries, including one still in production by a Chicago filmmaker. They were shown on the cover of the Arkansas Times in 2004 dressed in the matching tuxedos they wore during the celebration on the steps of the State Capitol of their then-29-year relationship. Their salon in Conway is painted bright pink and has a sign that says “Teach Tolerance” over the door. The couple have given talks at colleges, including the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and the University of Central Arkansas, about human sexuality. You can’t be more out than that. But Schenck and Loyd’s bravery has its precedent in earlier struggles: Schenck worked the bar during the “four hellacious days” of the Stonewall riots, the police raid on a gay bar that is seen as a trigger of the gay rights movement. Loyd is a veteran of Vietnam. They’ve suffered death threats in Conway. The couple fostered children from 1978 until 2008, when Arkansas voters passed Act One prohibiting homosexual couples from fostering. That law was overturned in 2010. Schenck has legal guardianship still of three. Schenck and Loyd were legally married in Canada nine years ago. But they don’t live in Canada. The couple want to be married here, for the sake of their kids and to honor a union that began in 1975.

BUSINESS OWNER PLEADS GUILT Y, CONT. potentially added more time to Reynolds’ sentence, but decided against it because “I felt the enhancement is meant more for the cases where the intent is purposeful.” McQuary said that the morning Hoskins entered his guilty plea, Nikki was “fine” with the deal, though Monica had reservations. McQuary said that when Reynolds was brought forward to make his plea, Judge Barbara Elmore was careful to make sure Reynolds understood his rights and pled guilty because he believed 16

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

himself to be guilty. “At one point during the plea,” McQuary said, “the defendant did not hear her question correctly and did not answer to the satisfaction of the Court, and [the judge] stated she would not accept the plea until the question was asked again and he answered correctly.” McQuary said that while he respects Monica Hoskins’ desire to get answers about her son’s death at trial, “I can’t say that I have ever had a case where the victim’s family is satisfied with any

explanation or alibi that ‘satisfies’ the loss of a loved one.” McQuary said that while no prison sentence could ever equate to the death of Ernest Hoskins, he had to choose the correct charge in the case. “In manslaughter cases, you have one family who has lost a loved one completely out of the blue,” McQuary said. “They don’t understand how their loved one can be killed and the perpetrator not be sentenced to death or life behind bars. On the other hand, the defendant’s family

doesn’t understand how you as the prosecutor can bring charges and seek sending their loved one to prison for what they consider to be an accident. ... Ernest Hoskins was a great man. A young man who loved his wife and family very much. Who was always striving to make a better life for his family. In the several jobs that he had, I did not meet a single person who did not care a great deal about him. No penalty would ever correspond to the loss of Ernest.”

It’s the party to the party

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Kenny Smith Band with Bob Margolin Christone “Kingfish” Ingram Dr. Feelgood Potts Peterson Brothers Bill Perry Larry McCray Zakk Knight David Kimbrough, Jr. Band Big Momma’s Gang (West Helena, AR) Phillips County Quartet (Phillips County, AR) Jaimoe’s Jasssz Band Blind Mississippi Morris Young & Ready (Marvcell, AR) Dedications (West Helena, AR) Dixie Wonders (West Helena, AR) James Cotton Joe Louis Walker Majestic Wonders (Palestine, AR) Blessedfull 7 (Moro, AR) Bobby Rush Gregg Allman Band Wells Brothers (Earle, AR)

Arts Entertainment AND

CATCHING UP WITH NATE POWELL NLR native talks ‘March,’ missing Arkansas. BY ROBERT BELL

orth Little Rock native Nate Powell started out drawing comics that were printed (at times surreptitiously) at Kinko’s, and were distributed at punk rock shows, on tours with his band Soophie Nun Squad and via other DIY means. Fast forward a few years and Powell has earned wide acclaim and has won some of the top honors in his field, including the Eisner and Ignatz awards. His publisher, Top Shelf, recently published “March,” the first graphic novel in a trilogy that tells the story of U.S. Rep. John Lewis, a Civil Rights icon. Powell illustrated the book and worked closely with Lewis and coauthor Andrew Aydin. First off, how was Comic Con [the annual San Diego get-together of graphic artists]? I’m just now recovering from it. It’s always truly an intense experience. This is my fifth year to go, and it’s an enjoyable job requirement. But the first day, every time, you’re like, “Why is life is so terrible?” And you just forget every time what an awful adjustment period it is. But this year we were taking a big risk in that we sent way more copies of “March” than we’d ever sent of a debut 18

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

book to be signed. It’s not in stores yet, and we weren’t sure if people would be super stoked or moderately stoked or not at all. But it was wildly beyond any of our expectations. The three of us did a panel together that was in one of the larger rooms and it was standing room only. John Lewis got a standing ovation one sentence into his introduction, and everyone had a powerful emotional and personal reaction both to his story and really to his presence. I’ve gotten to hang out with him several times in the last year or so, and each time it’s awesome how people go out of their way to make sure they say hey but also let him know of any personal or historical relevance that his struggle might have had in their lives or in relation to their childhood. And what’s so awesome about him is that he’s so much the genuine article that he disarms any celebrity or famousness he might have around him, and he’ll go jumping in asking questions about people. He’s a solid dude to be around. This year was off the chain, we did great and everyone had a great response to everything and there was lots of press coverage. How did you first become involved in the “March” project?

I’ve been working with Top Shelf since 2005. They’re great folks and we have a good relationship and everything. It was early in 2011. I’d just finished working on these books “Any Empire” and “The Silence of Our Friends” that I’d been doing at the time, and I saw a press release from Top Shelf that this book had just been signed sans artist. And I was like, “Oh, interesting.” I had stuff that I was doing at the time. So about a month later my publisher Chris Staros gave me a call and basically, he was like, “Nate, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but we’re doing Congressman John Lewis’s memoir graphic novel and I think you’re the artist for the project.”

So basically he was like, “You should pull some pages from the script and do some demo pages of them, send them off to John Lewis and [coauthor] Andrew [Aydin] and see if the whole thing will work out.” And after a little bit of back and forth — I redid one of the pages and tried a couple different styles — but we almost immediately fell into step. And from then on it’s been full steam ahead. What was it like working with Rep. Lewis? Andrew and John Lewis work in the office together, so in addition to being cowriters, Andrew is the head of CONTINUED ON PAGE 28

ROCK CANDY Check out the Times’ A&E blog arktimes.com

A&E NEWS FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE 1993, BON JOVI will perform in Central Arkansas. The band’s booked a gig at Verizon Arena on Oct. 18. Tickets, which range from $34 to $159.50, go on sale at 10 a.m. Aug. 5. The band comes to town on its “Because We Can” tour, which, according to Pollstar, is the top grossing tour of the year so far.

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Astronaut and all-around American hero Dr. Buzz Aldrin — the second human being to set foot on the moon — is coming to the Clinton Presidential Center on Aug. 14 for a free talk about his new book, “Mission to Mars: My Vision for Space Exploration.” Aldrin will share the podium with Leonard David, the co-author of the book. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. with the lecture at 6 p.m. Afterwards, Aldrin will sign books. Seats are limited, and will go fast. If you’re interested, RSVP to publicprograms@clintonschool.uasys. edu or call 501.683.5239. BLACK OAK ARKANSAS, the early 1970s hillbilly blues-rock combo that fell on hard times but never quit rocking, announced on its Facebook page yesterday that it’s signed a deal with Atlantic/Atco Records, and will release a new album called “Back Thar n’ Over Yonder” on Oct. 15 after a mini-tour with eight stops (none of which, unfortunately, is here in Arkansas). WHITE WATER TAVERN announced that it will host a local film night on the first Wednesday of every month beginning in August (it screened “The Identity Theft of Mitch Mustain” on July 31). On Aug. 7, the bar will show “Last Summer,” directed by Mark Theideman, who won Best Director for an Arkansas film at the Little Rock Film Festival for his work on “Last Summer.” The film screens at 9 p.m. From 7 to 9 p.m., White Water will serve boozefilled milkshakes featuring ice cream from Loblolly. Thiedeman will be in attendance. DANA FALCONBERRY, who went to Hendrix College and played music in Central Arkansas during her time there, recently gave a “Tiny Desk Concert” for NPR. The concert, which you can see at arktimes.com/falconberry, features songs from her latest album, “Leelanau,” an ode to the Michigan peninsula of the same name. The album is also inspired by “the prints of artist Gwen Frostic, the books of Willa Cather, and the stark, childs-eye beauty of the Swedish film ‘Let The Right One In,’ “ according to Falconberry’s website.

www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

IT’S BACK!

1620 SAVOY 1620 Market St 501-221-1620 www.1620savoy.com Free Soufﬂé (Chocolate Jamaican Rum or Grand Marnier) with purchase of entrée.

American Pie Pizza 10912 Colonel Glenn Rd #7000 501-225-1900 www.americanpiepizza.net $5 off any purchase over $20 (not including alcohol) – Colonel Glenn location only.

4square Cafe and Gifts 405 President Clinton Ave 501-244-2622 www.4squaregifts.com Buy any sandwich or wrap and get water/bottle drink 50% off.

B-Side 11121 N. Rodney Parham 501-716-2700 www.lillysdimsum.com 1/2 Order Beignets with house made fruit coulis $3.

A.W. Lin’s Asian Cuisine 17717 Chenal Pkwy 501-821-5398 www.awlins.com Happy Hour Sunday - Thursday 3-7pm $2 draft beer, $2 special drinks, $3 house Sake. Half price selected appetizers and sushi. Monday - Thursday: Sushi special: buy one get one half off 3-7pm Sunday and Monday: Kid’s eat free (12 and under) Thursday is Ladies Night: Sangria $4 glass & $18 pitcher (ladies only) Half price appetizer

Baseline Pit Stop Bar & Grill 5506 Baseline Rd 501-562-9635 www.pitstopbarandgrill.com Two eggs any style and your choice of meat with hash browns, toast and a cup of coffee or soda for $6 from 8am to 10am. Ask about our daily lunch specials.

Acadia Restaurant 3000 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-603-9630 www.acadiahillcrest.com 20 oz Blackened Porter House steak, served with a Crawﬁsh Risotto and Roasted Garlic Compound Butter. $37.75 for Prix Fixe Entrée only or $41.75 for three courses.

Black Angus 10907 N Rodney Parham Rd 501-228-7800 www.blackanguscafe.com $1 off two hamburger steak dinners (includes hb steak, choice of baked potato or fries, a side salad, and bread).

Afterthought Bistro & Bar (formerly Vieux Carré) 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-663-1196 www.afterthoughtbar.com Three Course Prix Fixe Menu $25 – Select from a range of options. Not valid with any other discount or coupon. Alcohol and gratuity not included. All Aboard Restaurant & Grill 6813 Cantrell Road 501-975-7401 www.all-aboardrestaurant.com Buy a meal, get a “Lil” engineers meal for half off.

Big Whiskey’s American Bar & Grill 225 E Markham St 501-324-2449 www.bigwhiskeys.com 50% off appetizer with the purchase of an entrée.

Bobbie Jean’s Soul Food 3201 W. 56th St 501-570-8585 $1 off all dinner plates. Bookends Cafe 120 River Market Ave 501-918-3091 www.cals.org Turkey, Cheese, and Avocado Sandwich with Potato Salad $5. Boscos Restaurant & Brewing Co. 500 President Clinton Ave 501-907-1881 www.boscosbeer.com Happy Hour Monday thru Friday 3:30-6:30. Enjoy our Happy Hour Menu featuring Appetizer and Drink Specials as well as $1 off pints and $5 glasses of Domino wine.

Brave New Restaurant 2300 Cottondale Ln #105 501-663-2677 www.bravenewrestaurant.com Heirloom BLT Sandwich – Heirloom tomatoes, bacon, and lettuce on toasted Sourdough bread with fresh basil mayo, garnished with fresh fruit, and house-made fries. $10.50. Bray Gourmet 323 Center Street 501-353-1045 www.braygourmet.com Bray’s Smoked Turkey Spread: Your choice of original, Cajun, jalapeno, or dill spread. Served with lettuce and tomato on choice of sourdough, marble rye, white, or wheat for $5.29. Bravo! Cucina Italiana 17815 Chenal Pkwy 501-821-2485 www.bravoitalian.com

Lunch specials- Three entrées to choose from for only $7.95, MondayThursday. Browning’s Mexican Grill 5805 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-663-9956 www.browningsmexicangrill.com Lunch Special – Quesadillas $6.99. Buffalo Grill 1611 Rebsamen Park Rd 501-296-9535 400 N Bowman Rd #9 501-224-0012 www.buffalogrilllr.com Mahi Mahi Salad $8.99. Butcher Shop 10825 Hermitage Road 501-312-2748 www.thebutchershop.com/littlerock Half price drinks and appetizers from 5-7pm Mon thru Fri. Bar area only. Cafe Bossa Nova 2701 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-614-668 cafebossanova.com Moqueca (regularly priced at $24) for $21.19 during the month of August. $1 off Fejoida on Saturdays. Cafe Prego 5510 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-663-5355 10% off your entire tab or 20% off bottles of wine.

Cajun’s Wharf 2400 Cantrell Rd 501-375-5351 www.cajunswharf.com $35 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month dinner menu.

Camp David Interstate 30 & 6th Inside Holiday Inn Presidential Conference Center 501-975-CAMP(2267) $2 Miller Lt Draft, $3 house wines, $4 house liquors from 4:30 to 6:30 daily. Canon Grill 2811 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-664-2068 www.canongrill.com Free Cheese Dip with purchase of two Entrées, one per table. Cantina Cinco de Mayo 23 Rahling Road, Suite A1 501-821-2740 Sun-Thurs: $3.49 Margaritas, 99¢ Draft Beer - Dos Equis & Blue Moon Fri & Sat: $2.99 Margaritas, Small Draft Beer 99¢ . Cantina Laredo 207 N University Ave #300 501-280-0407 www.facebook.com/ cantinalaredolittlerock Wednesday Special – Half price any wine by the glass, 4pm-close Thursday Special – Half price house Margarita for Ladies night, 4pm-close. Capers 14502 Cantrell Rd 501-868-7600 www.capersrestaurant.com $30 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month dinner menu. Casa Mañana 6820 Cantrell Rd 501-280-9888 18321 Cantrell Rd. Little Rock AR 72223 501-868-8822 400 President Clinton Ave, D Little Rock AR 72201 501-372-6637 www.casamananamexicanfood.com 15% off your order. Excluding alcohol.

China Wok 10402 Stagecoach Road, Ste. G 501-407-0833 Monday-Saturday 10:30-3pm Lunch Special includes choice of entrée, pork fried rice and soup or can of soda for $5.25. Excludes egg foo young, special lo mein and Mongolian beef. Cheers in the Heights 2010 N Van Buren St 501-663-5937 www.cheersith.com A complimentary piece of carrot cake with the purchase of two entrées (Cheers in the Heights location only). Chi’s Too 5110 W. Markham 501-604-7777 One free appetizer ($6 value) of your choice with purchase of 2 complete dinner entrées (dine-in only). Ciao Baci 605 Beechwood 501-603-0238 www.ciaobaci.org 20% off all full and half bottles of wine. Community Bakery 1200 Main St 501-375-7105 www.communitybakery.com $1 off Iced coffee, iced Latte, Espresso Frappe, Espresso milkshake, fruit smoothie. Community Bakery • WLR 270 S Shackleford Rd 501-224-1656 Free cookie of your choice with any purchase. Copper Grill 300 E 3rd St # 101 501-375-3333 www.coppergrilllr.com $13 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month lunch menu. $30 Prix Fixe 3-course restaurant month dinner menu. Corky’s Ribs & BBQ 12005 Westhaven Dr 501-954-7427 www.corkysbbq.com $1 off all Phil’s sandwiches.

Your favorite Little Rock chefs have put together a variety of specials for the month of August that are great values on the city’s most delicious dining. Attention - You Must Ask Your Server about these specials throughout August DineLR.com Curry in a Hurry 11121 N Rodney Parham Rd 501-224-4567 www.facebook.com/curryhurry Free butter Naan with purchase of two entrées. Damgoode Pies 6706 Cantrell Rd 501-664-2239 2701 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-664-2274 10720 N Rodney Parham Rd 501-664-2239 www.damgoodepies.com $2 off a Large BBQ Chicken pizza. August is the last month for our BBQ Chicken pizza made with our own special blend of Whole Hog Café’s BBQ Sauces. Topped with grilled chicken, Petit Jean bacon, red onions, and roasted garlic. Dempsey Bakery 323 S Cross St 501-375-2257 www.dempseybakery.com Free Sugar Cookie with lunch purchase. Doe’s Eat Place 1023 W Markham St 501-376-1195 www.doeseatplace.net 8 oz. Filet with Arkansas toast, potatoes & soaked salad $35.

so El Porton Mexican Restaurant 12111 W Markham St #450 501-223-8588 5507 Ranch Dr 501-868-7333 www.elportonmexicanrestaurants. com Happy Hour Mon-Fri 2-5 – Regular Margarita $2.95, 25 oz. Draft Beer $2.95 Lunch Special $5.99 Mon-Fri Entrée with Soft Drink Famous Dave’s 225 N Shackleford Rd 501-221-3283 www.famousdaves.com $5 off purchase of $20.

Far East Asian Cuisine & Bar 11610 Pleasant Ridge Rd #100 Pleasant Ridge West Shopping Center 501-219-9399 www.fareastasiancuisine.com House wine and beer 50% off. Appetizers 30% off from 4:00 to 6:00, dine in only. Forbidden Garden 14810 Cantrell Rd 501-868-8149 www.facebook.com/ ForbiddenGardenAR $1 off a glass of wine. The Fold Botanas & Bar 3501 Old Cantrell Road 501-916-9706 www.thefoldlr.com Free Arkansas Habanero queso per table with the purchase of a taco plate during lunch. $3.50 Finch’s Stout all of August. Genghis Grill 12318 Chenal Pkwy 501-223-2695 www.genghisgrill.com Buy one bowl at regular price and get one for half price. Graffiti’s Italian Restaurant 7811 Cantrell Rd 501-224-9079 www.littlerockgraffitis.net One free appetizer with the purchase of two full entrées. Green Corner Store & Soda Fountain 1423 Main St 501-374-1111 www.thegreencornerstore.com Beat the August heat with $1 off anything at the Soda Fountain. Gusano’s Chicago Style Pizzeria 313 President Clinton Ave 501-374-1441 www.gusanospizza.com $7.49 Lunch Special – 8” One Topping Pizza, Side Salad and Soft Drink. Happy Hour 3-6pm - $2 domestic drafts 12oz. $3 well drinks.

Hillcrest Artisan Meats 2807 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-671-6328 www.hillcrestartisanmeats.com “Olli-Day” Every Friday! 20% off Virginia’s Olli Salami. Also featuring daily sandwich and soup specials.

Larry’s Pizza Downtown 1122 S. Center Street 501-372-6004 www.larryspizzaofarkansas.com FREE 20 oz. tea or fountain drink with purchase of any specialty pizza, any size, take out only.

The Hop Diner 201 E. Markham 501-224-0975 $1 Off A Combo Meal (comes with fries & drink).

Las Palmas III 10402 Stagecoach Road 501-455-8500 www.laspalmasarkansas.com Combination Plate #1-15 $6.99 $2 off Steak & Shrimp Palmas (reg. $13.49) 99¢ small draft beer MondayWednesday

Iriana’s Pizza 201 E. Markham 501-374-3656 www.irianaspizza.com 15% Off any whole pizza. J. Gumbo’s 12911 Cantrell Rd, Ste 18 501-916-9635 www.jgumbos.com Any (1) entrée, chips and a drink $8 + tax. Jimmy’s Serious Sandwiches 5116 West Markham 501-666-3354 www.jimmysserioussandwiches. com From 4-8pm Only, dine in or carry out. Purchase a sandwich or salad and get one of the following for free: House Made Dessert, Serious Size A Sandwich, Extra Side Order, Soft Drink Or Iced Tea. Jordan’s BarBQ 8912 Stagecoach Road 501-455-2800 2 piece fish dinner with fries, slaw, hushpuppies & a drink for $6.50. Regular size BBQ sandwich, pork or beef, with 2 select sides (beans, slaw, potato salad, corn or chips) & a drink for $6.50. La Casa Real 11121 Rodney Parham #9-10A 501-219-4689 Free Cheese Dip or Guacamole Dip with purchase of two entrées. La Hacienda 3024 Cantrell Road 501-661-0600 $2.99 Margaritas on Wednesday and Thursday

Layla’s Gyros And Pizzeria 9501 N. Rodney Parham Rd. 501-227-7272 www.laylasgyro.com Lunch only: Gyro Sandwich, fries & drink $6.65. Lilly’s Dim Sum Then Some 11121 N. Rodney Parham, Ste. 35B 501-716-2700 www.lillysdimsum.com Sunday: 50% off all wine bottles. Loca Luna 3519 Old Cantrell Road 501-663-4666 www.localuna.com Mon: Wine Night- ½ off all wine under $28 Tues: $9 large pizza, $2 draft. Wed: Lady’s Special happy hour- $2. Domestic Beer, $4 Margaritas, Wine, Martinis, Cozmo. Thurs: Men’s special happy hour- $2 Domestic Beer, $4 Margaritas, Wine, Martinis, Cozmo. Mellow Mushroom 16103 Chenal Parkway, Ste. 900 501-379-9157 www.mellowmushroom.com/ westlittlerock 1/2 priced appetizers during late night happy hour 9-close. Mexico Chiquito 13924 Cantrell Road 501-217-0700 www.mexicochiquito.net All you can eat taco dinners $9.99.

Montego Cafe 315 Main Street 501-372-1555 www.montegocafe.com Monday-Friday 4-7pm: 1/2 off any appetizer & all specialty drinks $5. The Oyster Bar 3003 W. Markham 501.666.7100 www.LRoysterbar.com $2 Off a Lb Of Shrimp $1 Off Half a Lb Of Shrimp Packet House Grill 1406 Cantrell Road 501-372-1578 www.packethousegrill.com 15% discount on Blackened Red Fish with a roasted corn and red pepper risotto on Friday & Saturday. Pancetta Regional Kitchen & Wine Bar 3 Statehouse Plaza • In the Marriott 501-399-8000 www.marriott.com/litpb Lunch: Gulf shrimp, pancetta, garlic, parsley, crushed red pepper + zucchini $12.50 per person(includes soft beverage but not tax & tip) Dinner: Falling Sky Farms fried chicken, buttermilk biscuits + mustard slaw $25 per person (includes dinner & dessert, but not tax & tip) Complimentary valet parking up to 2-1/2 hrs. The Pantry Restaurant 11401 N. Rodney Parham 501-353-1875 www.littlerockpantry.com Enjoy bacon wrapped dates (one per table, dinner only). Pho Thanh My Restaurant 302 N Shackleford 501-312-7498 ½ OFF An order of eggrolls with a purchase of $20 or more. Pizza Café 1517 Rebsamen Park 501-664-6133 www.pizzacafelr.com $2 Domestics all day Monday and Tuesday.

Your favorite Little Rock chefs have put together a variety of specials for the month of August that are great values on the city’s most delicious dining. Attention - You Must Ask Your Server about these specials throughout August DineLR.com The Pizza Joint 6100 Stone Road 501-868-9108 www.thepizzajoint.org $5 Off any purchase over $20 (not including alcohol). Planet Smoothie 102A Markham Park Drive 501-227-6399 www.facebook.com/ PlanetSmoothieMarkham Combo Special: half wrap, 16 oz. smoothie and bag of chips $5. Plaza Grille (Doubletree Hotel) 424 West Markham St 501-372-4371 www.DoubletreeLR.com Tortilla Crusted Tilapia with mashed potatoes and asparagus $11.95. Prose Garden Cafe 100 Rock Street Main Library, 5th Floor 501-918-3023 www.cals.org Turkey, cheese & avocado sandwich with potato salad $5. Prost 120 Ottenheimer (River Market) 501-244-9550 www.willydspianobar.com Half-Priced appetizers 4-7pm when you mention restaurant month. The Purple Cow 8026 Cantrell Road 501-221-3555 11602 Chenal Parkway 501-224-4433 www.purplecowlr.com Free scoop of ice cream with purchase of entrée (Limit one per table). RJ Tao 5501 Kavanaugh Blvd. #G 501-603-0080/0082 Two can dine for $60. One sharing appetizer, 2 entrées (seafood or steak) and bottle of wine.

Red Door Restaurant 3701 Cantrell Road 501-666-8482 www.reddoorrestaurant.net Mon: Apps ½ Price With Entrée Tues: Wine Night- ½ off all wine under $28 a bottle. Wed: Filet Night- 7oz. Angus Tenderloin Filet $16.95 . Thurs: Ladies Special Happy Hour$2 domestic beer, $4 margaritas, martinis, wine & cozmo. Revolution Restaurant 300 President Clinton Avenue 501-823-0091 www.rumbarevolution.com Lunch Special: choice of seasoned beef, shredded chicken or fish tacos (grilled, blackened or fried), chips & salsa and soft drink $7.99. The Root Café 1500 S. Main Street 501-414-0423 www.therootcafe.com Weekday Breakfast Special: Try our award-winning weekday breakfast and take 20% off of your breakfast entrée (available Tues-Fri 7-11am). Also featuring Saturday and Sunday brunch and full lunch menu TuesdaySaturday. Rosalia’s Family Bakery 2701 Kavanaugh Blvd 501-319-7035 www.facebook.com/RosaliasFam ilyBakery Free small brewed coffee with purchase of specialty coffee drink. Salut Bistro 1501 N. University (In The Prospect Bldg.) 501-660-4200 www.salut-bistro.com Free dessert with purchase of 2 entrées. Santo Coyote 11610 Pleasant Ridge Dr., Ste. 110 501-658-0140 www.santo-coyote.com $1.99 Margaritas on Wednesday. Free flan with purchase of $15 or more.

Sky Modern Japanese 11525 Cantrell Road 501-224-4300 www.skylittlerock.com Sunday-Thursday 5-7pm: $4 house wine, $4.50 house rolls, $4 Drafts, $2 Domestics, $3 Imports. SO Restaurant-Bar 3610 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1464 www.sorestaurantbar.com Three-course prix fixe menu - $65 Star Of India 301 N. Shackleford #C4 501-227-9900 www.lrstarofindia.com 15% Off dinner entrée. Stickyz Rock ‘N’ Roll Chicken Shack 107 River Market Avenue 501-372-7707 www.stickyz.com Lunch Special: 4 of our famous hand-cut chicken fingers in 12 different varieties, choice of baked potato soup or chicken & sausage gumbo, 2 dipping sauces and soft drink $7.99. Sushi Cafe 5823 Kavanaugh Boulevard 501-663-9888 www.sushicaferocks.com Sunday-Thursday: Chef’s special, 2 adults for $50 (Sushi Only).

Thirst N’ Howl Bar & Grill 14710 Cantrell Road 501-379-8189 www.thirst-n-howl.com Free cheese dip Tuesday-Thursday with purchase of lunch. Tracy Cakes 10301 N. Rodney Parham 501-227-4243 www.tracycakesar.com Buy 3 cupcakes get 1 free. Trio’s Restaurant 8201 Cantrell Road #100 501-221-3330 www.triosrestaurant.com Half off any appetizer with purchase of an entrée. Offer good at lunch, dinner and brunch. Dine In Only. Dog Days Of Summer – Trio’s partners with Hollywood Feed across the street on Cantrell. All month, doggies dining on our patio receive a free doggy bag. Tropical Smoothie 12911 Cantrell Rd. #19 501-224-1113 11900 Kanis Rd. • 501-221-6773 10221 N. Rodney Parham 501-224-2233 524 S. Broadway St. • 501-246-3145 410 S. University Ave. Ste. 140 501-240-1021 www.tropicalsmoothie.com 99¢ Lemonade smoothie with the purchase of any wrap, sandwich or salad.

West End Smokehouse 215 N. Shackleford 501-224-7665 www.westendsmokehouse.net Every Friday: All sandwiches $5.99 from 11am-3pm. Free pool with purchase of $8.99 Or more. Willy D’s Piano Bar 322 President Clinton Avenue 501-244-9550 www.willydspianobar.com Half priced appetizers 7-9 pm when you mention restaurant month. WT Bubba’s 500 President Clinton Avenue #40 501-244-2528 www.wtbubbas.com Free appetizer with any food purchase. Zin Urban Wine & Beer Bar 300 River Market Avenue #1 501-246-4876 www.zinlr.com Mention the Savor the City promo and receive 15% off all bottles of wine

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THE TO-DO

LIST

THURSDAY 8/1

THE MUSIC FACTORY PRESENTS: TRES DIVAS

8:30 p.m. Revolution. $20.

Here’s a sure bet for fans of female vocalists. As you might have surmised from the title, Tres Divas features three vocalists — Heather Smith, Stephanie Smittle and Charlotte Taylor — performing with The Music Factory, a crack backing band with Ray Wittenberg on drums and vocals, Bill McCumber on bass and Wythe Walker handling lead guitar, vocals and keyboard. Those players are also members of The Smittle Band, with Smittle, who’s just back from Arezzo in northern Italy where she took part in the Oberlin in Italy summer music program. Also singing with The Music Factory will be jazz stylist and actress Smith and blues virtuoso Taylor, who has performed with Gypsy Rain among others.

THURSDAY 8/1SATURDAY 8/3

A WORK OF ART

Various times, venues and cover prices.

Earlier this week, the third annual A Work of Art celebration kicked off. The weeklong event honors the lives and musical contributions of Little Rock natives and jazz musicians and educators Art Porter Sr. and Art Porter Jr., while also helping to raise money for the scholarship program awarded annually by the nonprofit Art Porter Music Education. This year’s scholar is clarinetist Jordan Ladyman of Searcy. Performing Thursday at Sway will be Dallas singer Martha Burks (7:30 p.m., $25-$40). The Porter Players play a free concert Friday at The Afterthought (8 p.m.). Saturday is the APME scholarship program at Clear Channel Metroplex. The evening will include a performances from Porter heir Lexington Porter, Teen Jeopardy champ Leonard Cooper, emcees Pamela Smith and former Miss Arkansas Alyse Eady, and a headlining performance from longtime Philly R&B and jazz ensemble Pieces of a Dream (8 p.m., $35-$50). 24

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

NORTH MISSISSIPPI ALLSTARS

There is nothing else that can touch the hypnotic, almost otherworldly sound of Mississippi Hill Country blues — pioneered by Mississippi Fred McDowell, R.L. Burnside, Junior Kimbrough, Otha Turner and Jessie Mae Hemphill, among others. There are folks carrying on that tradition, notably Cedric Burnside and Lightnin’ Malcolm. If you dig that sound, get ready to get excited about the forthcoming album from The North Mississippi Allstars, the long-running project of brothers Luther and Cody Dickinson, who grew up in that area. The record is called “World Boogie is Coming,” named after a phrase their legendary dad, the late Jim Dickinson, would use as a sign-off and all-around motto. The Dickinson brothers decided they really needed to get back to the basics. In a trailer for the album, Cody Dickinson says the album was “recorded at our home base, The Barn, Jim Dickinson’s Zebra Ranch. We bought new computer gear and a one-inch 8-track tape machine. Instead of locking the doors and getting into a personal secretive creative trip of new songs and experimental directions, we invited everyone from home and did what we do best — turned it up to 10 and threw down some nasty Mississippi rock ’n’ roll.” Sounds awesome. Opening up the show with some grimy Memphis blues is the Patrick Dodd Trio.

WORLD BOOGIE: The North Mississippi Allstars perform at Revolution Thursday night.

FRIDAY 8/2

KEVIN GORDON, ISAAC ALEXANDER

9:30 p.m. White Water Tavern.

White Water Tavern’s been on a tear the last many many months with heavyhitter singer/songwriters. They’ve had Mary Gauthier, David Olney (who’ll return next week), Malcolm Holcombe and probably a bunch more I can’t remember. This week sees a return from Louisiana native Kevin Gordon. Critics like to toss around words like “literary” and “bleak” and “Southern gothic” when describing Gordon’s music, and I suppose that’s fine as all those terms probably apply. But there are rays of sunshine peeking through his stories of the rough times of boozy deadbeats. Check out the triumphant sounding “24 Diamonds” from his 2005 album “O Come Look at the Burning.” Dude ain’t exactly hyperprolific, as the follow-up to

BRIAN CHILSON

8 p.m. The Joint. $10.

BY ROBERT BELL

GLORYLAND: Kevin Gordon plays at White Water Tavern Friday.

that album was last year’s “Gloryland,” but hell, you’ll need a minute or several to unpack his songs, especially the thrilling, sprawling 10-minute-plus story/song

“Colfax.” Very good stuff, but also check out the live version on Gordon’s ReverbNation page — it’s just relentless. Also on this bill: One of Arkansas’s finest, Isaac Alexander.

IN BRIEF

THURSDAY 8/1 It’s the first Thursday of the month, which means it’s time for the Hillcrest Shop & Sip, with music, drinks, discounts and all that fun stuff, Hillcrest, 5 p.m. The Arkansas Travelers take on the Springfield Cardinals in a four-game series, Dickey-Stephens Park, 7:10 p.m. Thursday and Friday, 6:10 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, $4-$12. Comedian B.T. is at The Loony Bin with opener Charles Michael, 7:30 p.m. Thursday and 7:30 p.m. and 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

FRIDAY 8/2

FERTLE GROUND: The Main Thing’s new play “Arkansanity” starts Friday at The Joint.

FRIDAY 8/2

THE MAIN THING’S ‘ARKANSANITY’ 8 p.m. The Joint. $20.

The in-house funny folks over at The Joint — a trio known as The Main Thing — are back with another original two-act comedy poking a little good-natured fun at The Natural State through the cracked

lens that is The Fertle Family of the charming, fictional hamlet known as Dumpster, Ark. The Fertles starred in the recent Main Thing productions “Last Night at Orabella’s” and the follow-up “Weiner Day at the Rollercade.” Their latest creation, “Arkansanity,” is a collection of sketches and songs, at least one of which will feature the Fertles. I’ve got to cop to the fact that I haven’t yet

made it over to see The Main Thing yet, but everyone I’ve spoken with has told me that it’s truly, side-splittingly hilarious while also being appropriate for all ages and levels of uptightness. So you can bring your kids or your parents or your Republican Missionary Baptist mother-in-law or your wacky vegan liberal great aunt and they’ll all get some chuckles.

ater. OK, perhaps that’s a bit of a stretch. Whatever. Anyways, that sort-of trend continues at Timberwood Amphitheater this weekend with ’90s sort-of-stars Everclear. The band is basically one of those Mark E. Smith/The Fall kind of deals where as long as Art Alexakis is singing and playing guitar, it’s Everclear no matter who’s backing him up. But you know, that’s just fine, because it was

always mostly his band anyway — mostly his songs, mostly his glossy pop hooks, mostly his genuinely affecting dad issues (if “Father of Mine” doesn’t bum you out, you have no soul). Anyways, if you know Everclear and want to hear the hits you know and love — “Santa Monica,” “Everything to Everyone,” “I Will Buy You a New Life” — you can do that this weekend and ride some rollercoasters too.

those things are all terrible and make me hate fundraisers. But you know what does sound appealing? A picnic, that’s what. And you know who’s throwing a picnic fundraiser? KABF 88.3-FM, that’s who. This Saturday from noon until 7 p.m. or so, you can chill, relax or do some kind of hybrid of chilling and relaxing at Bernice Garden while enjoying food from a variety of food trucks and vendors (including Southern

Gourmasian, LePops Ice Lollies, Loblolly Creamery and Roxie’s Hot Dogs) and live tunes from the likes of Isaac Alexander, Mandy McBryde, Midwest Caravan, The Smokes and good ol’ Sulac. Filmmaker Mike Poe and Gossip guitarist Nathan Howdeshell are going to be “on the 1s and 2s” as they say. Good times and you can support community radio. Oh, there’ll be beer for sale too, just so you know.

SATURDAY 8/3

EVERCLEAR

8 p.m. Magic Springs’ Timberwood Amphitheater. $50-$60.

It’s been the summer of bubble-grunge here in Arkansas, what with Bush and Daughtry headlining at Riverfest; Live, Sponge, Filter and Everclear at the Arkansas Music Pavilion, and Collective Soul at Magic Springs’ Timberwood Amphithe-

SATURDAY 8/3

KABF 2013 SUMMER PLEDGE DRIVE PICNIC

Noon. The Bernice Garden. Make a donation.

I don’t know about you, but when it comes to fundraisers, if it doesn’t involve interminable pledge testimonials, “Celtic Women” DVDs as premiums or endless repeats of weird infomercials, count me out! Just kidding,

Fort Worth, Texas, rockers Quaker City Night Hawks play an 18-and-older show at Stickyz with the blistering blues-rock of Stephen Neeper and The Wild Hearts, 9:30 p.m., $7. Maxine’s has a wild night with hillbilly hellraisers Mountain Sprout, as well as RK Ellis and Dan Tedesco, 9 p.m. Downtown Music Hall hosts Oceano, Within the Ruins, Reflections, Betrayal and All is at an End, 7 p.m., $15. Tragikly White, Arkansas’s premiere good-time party cover band, plays at Denton’s Trotline, 9 p.m. $10. Prediction: Shots of tequila will be taken. If you’re up in Eureka Springs, they’ve got Yards and Yards of Yard Sales going on all over town.

SATURDAY 8/3 Northwest Arkansas-based electrorockers Fossils of Ancient Robots play at Bear’s Den Pizza in Conway, 8:30 p.m., free. Jet 420 brings the good times to Thirst n’ Howl 8:30 p.m., free. Shutterbugs take note: PhotoExpo is the trade show for all things photo. Entry is free, though there is a small charge for classes, Embassy Suites, 8 a.m.-6:45 p.m.

SUNDAY 8/4 Heavy instrumental post-rock outfit Mainland Divide plays an albumrelease show at Vino’s, with Enchiridion, Deras Krig and God City Destroyers, 8 p.m., $5. Poor Young Things bring the upbeat, hook-filled pop-rock to Juanita’s, with Chris Alan Craig Band, 8 p.m., $8 adv., $10 day of. Red Dirt favorite Cody Canada rolls through town for a show at Stickyz with Trey Hawkins, 8 p.m., $10 adv., $12 day of.

TUESDAY 8/6 American Idol season 9 runner-up Crystal Bowersox plays at Juanita’s, 7 p.m., $15. Austin garage-pop duo Major Major Major plays an all-ages throwdown at Stickyz, with Whale Fire and Bombay Harambee, 9 p.m., $5. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

AFTER DARK Quaker City Night Hawks, Stephen Neeper & The Wild Hearts. 18-and-older. Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 9:30 p.m., $7. 107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz.com. Synergy, DJ Sleepy Genius. Montego Cafe, 8:30 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com. Ted Ludwig Trio. Capital Bar and Grill, 9 p.m., free. 111 Markham St. 501-374-7474. www.capitalhotel.com/CBG. Tragikly White. Denton’s Trotline, 9 p.m., $10. 2150 Congo Road, Benton. 501-315-1717. A Work of Art: Porter Players. The Afterthought, 8 p.m., free. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www.afterthoughtbar.com. “YOLO.” Featuring four DJs and beach volleyball, 18-and-older. Flying DD, $5. 4601 S. University. 501-773-9990. flyingdd.com.

All events are in the Greater Little Rock area unless otherwise noted. To place an event in the Arkansas Times calendar, please e-mail the listing and all pertinent information, including date, time, location, price and contact information, to calendar@arktimes.com.

THURSDAY, AUGUST 1

MUSIC

Chris DeClerk. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m.; Aug. 29, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www.thetavernsportsgrill.com. Christopher the Conquered. Maxine’s, 8:30 p.m. 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs. www.maxinespub.com. Dee Dee Jones. Ladies night, $5 after 9 p.m., free before. Montego Cafe, 8 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com. “Inferno.” DJs play pop, electro, house and more, plus drink specials and $1 cover before 11 p.m. Sway, 9 p.m. 412 Louisiana. 501-907-2582. Jim Dickerson. Sonny Williams’ Steak Room, 7 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-324-2999. www.sonnywilliamssteakroom.com. Jocko Deal. Denton’s Trotline, 8 p.m.; Aug. 8, 8 p.m.; Aug. 22, 8 p.m.; Aug. 29, 8 p.m., free. 2150 Congo Road, Benton. 501-315-1717. Karaoke. Zack’s Place, 8 p.m. 1400 S. University Ave. 501-664-6444. Karaoke. The Afterthought, 8 p.m., free. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www.afterthoughtbar.com. Karaoke and line dancing lessons. W.T. Bubba’s Country Tavern, first Thursday of every month, 9 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-244-2528. Karaoke with Kevin & Cara. MacDaddy’s Bar and Grill, 9 p.m., free. 314 N. Maple St., NLR. Krush Thursdays with DJ Kavaleer. Club Climax, free before 11 p.m. 824 W. Capitol. 501-554-3437. Little Rock Irish Song Session. Dugan’s Pub, first Thursday of every month, 7 p.m., free. 401 E. 3rd St. 501-920-8534. www.celladawnmusic.com. Michael Eubanks. Newk’s Express Cafe, 6:30 p.m. 4317 Warden Road, NLR. 501-753-8826. newks.com. The Music Factory presents: Tres Divas. Featuring Heather Smith, Stephanie Smittle and Charlotte Taylor performing with The Music Factory. The Joint, 8 p.m., $10. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com. North MIssissippi Allstars, Patrick Dodd Trio. Revolution, 8:30 p.m., $20. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom.com. Open jam with The Port Arthur Band. Parrot Beach Cafe, 9 p.m. 9611 MacArthur Drive, NLR. 771-2994. RockUsaurus. Senor Tequila, 7-9 p.m. 10300 N Rodney Parham Road. 501-224-5505. www. senor-tequila.com. Ted Ludwig Trio. Capital Bar and Grill, 5 p.m., free. 111 Markham St. 501-374-7474. www.capitalhotel.com/CBG. A Work of Art: Martha Burks. Sway, 7:30 p.m., $25-$40. 412 Louisiana. 501-907-2582.

COMEDY

B.T., Charles Michael. The Loony Bin, 7:30 p.m., $7-$10. 10301 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-2285555. www.loonybincomedy.com.

EVENTS

27th Annual Community Development Institute. Hosted at the Brewer-Hegeman Conference Center, with keynote address by 26

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

COMEDY

MIDWEST TROUBADOUR: Austin Lucas returns to the White Water Tavern Saturday night with John Moreland, 9:30 p.m. Milan Wall, co-director of The Heartland Center for Leadership Development. University of Central Arkansas, through Aug. 2. 201 Donaghey Ave., Conway. 501-852-2930. uca.edu/cdi. Hillcrest Shop & Sip. Shops and restaurants offer discounts, later hours, and live music. Hillcrest, first Thursday of every month, 5 p.m. P.O.Box 251522. 501-666-3600. www.hillcrestmerchants.com. Woodlawn Farmer’s Market. Shoppes on Woodlawn, 4:30 p.m. 4523 Woodlawn. 501666-3600. woodlawnshoppes.blogspot.com.

SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Springfield Cardinals. Dickey-Stephens Park, 7:10 p.m.; Aug. 3, 6:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501664-1555. www.travs.com.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 2

MUSIC

30-Something Party Fridays. Twelve Modern Lounge, first Friday of every month, free before 10 p.m., $5 after 10 p.m. 1900 W. Third St. 501301-1200. Club Nights at 1620 Savoy. Dance night, with DJs, drink specials and bar menu, until 2 a.m.

1620 Savoy, 10 p.m. 1620 Market St. 501-2211620. www.1620savoy.com. Dwight Smith, Julia Lucille. Vino’s. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www.vinosbrewpub.com. Friday night at Sway. Sway, 9 p.m. 412 Louisiana. 501-907-2582. Jeff Coleman. Sonny Williams’ Steak Room, Aug. 2-3, 7 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-3242999. www.sonnywilliamssteakroom.com. Joe Pitts. Thirst n’ Howl, 8:30 p.m., free. 14710 Cantrell Road. 501-379-8189. www.thirst-nhowl.com. Kevin Gordon, Isaac Alexander. White Water Tavern, 9:30 p.m. 2500 W 7th St. 501-375-8400. www.whitewatertavern.com. Linwood. Cregeen’s Irish Pub, 8 p.m. 301 Main St., NLR. 501-376-7468. www.cregeens.com. Mountain Sprout, RK Ellis, Dan Tedesco. Maxine’s, 9 p.m. 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs. www.maxinespub.com. Oceano, Within the Ruins, Reflections, Betrayal, All is at an End. Downtown Music Hall, 7 p.m., $15. 211 W. Capitol. 501-376-1819. downtownmusichall.com. Olio. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www.thetavernsportsgrill.com.

B.T., Charles Michael. The Loony Bin, 7:30 and 10 p.m., $7-$10. 10301 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-228-5555. www.loonybincomedy.com. The Main Thing presents “Arkansanity.” Original two-act comedy play lampooning life in Arkansas. The Joint, 8 p.m., $20. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com.

DANCE

Ballroom Dancing. Free lessons begin at 7 p.m. Bess Chisum Stephens Community Center, 8-11 p.m., $7-$13. 12th & Cleveland streets. 501-2217568. www.blsdance.org. Salsa Night. Begins with a one-hour salsa lesson. Juanita’s, 9 p.m., $8. 614 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-1228. www.littlerocksalsa.com.

EVENTS

27th Annual Community Development Institute. See Aug. 1. LGBTQ/SGL Youth and Young Adult Group. Diverse Youth for Social Change is a group for LGBTQ/SGL and straight ally youth and young adults age 14 to 23. For more information, call 244-9690 or search “DYSC” on Facebook. 800 Scott St., 6:30 p.m. 800 Scott St. Table for Two: Shrimp Scampi. Includes handson cooking demonstration, meal and overnight stay with continental breakfast. Winthrop Rockefeller Institute, 5 p.m., $200 (couple). 1 Rockefeller Drive, Morrilton. 501-727-5435. www. uawri.org. Yards and Yards of Yard Sales. Citywide yard sale. Downtown Eureka Springs, 7 a.m.-3 p.m. Downtown Eureka Springs, Eureka Springs. 479-253-8737.

SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Springfield Cardinals. Dickey-Stephens Park, 7:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs. com.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 3

MUSIC

Abandon the Artifice, Fear the Aftermath, Moment of Fierce Determination, Bound for Lyra, The Black Hand. Downtown Music Hall, 7 p.m., $5. 211 W. Capitol. 501-376-1819. downtownmusichall.com. Austin Lucas, John Moreland. White Water Tavern, 9:30 p.m. 2500 W 7th St. 501-375-8400. www.whitewatertavern.com.

Brent Stroud, Adam Nelsen. Cregeen’s Irish Pub, 8 p.m. 301 Main St., NLR. 501-376-7468. www.cregeens.com. Club Nights at 1620 Savoy. See Aug. 2. Everclear. Magic Springs’ Timberwood Amphitheater, 8 p.m., $50-$60. 1701 E. Grand Ave., Hot Springs. Fossils of Ancient Robots. Bear’s Den Pizza, 8:30 p.m. 235 Farris Road, Conway. 501-328-5556. www.bearsdenpizza.com. Jam Rock Saturday. Twelve Modern Lounge, first Saturday of every month, 9 p.m. 1900 W. Third St. 501-301-1200. Jeff Coleman. Sonny Williams’ Steak Room, 7 p.m. 500 President Clinton Ave. 501-324-2999. www.sonnywilliamssteakroom.com. Jet 420. Thirst n’ Howl, 8:30 p.m., free. 14710 Cantrell Road. 501-379-8189. www.thirst-n-howl. com. Jon Dunn Stuart, Chase Cole, Aaron Watkins. Vino’s. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www.vinosbrewpub.com. Karaoke at Khalil’s. Khalil’s Pub, 7 p.m. 110 S. Shackleford Road. 501-224-0224. www.khalilspub.com. Karaoke. Casa Mexicana, 7 p.m. 6929 JFK Blvd., NLR. 501-835-7876. Karaoke with Kevin & Cara. All-ages, on the restaurant side. Revolution, 9 p.m.-12:45 a.m., free. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom.com. Kingsdown, Spoken, Stereo Down. All-ages. Revolution, 9 p.m., $8 adv., $10 day of. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-823-0090. revroom. com. K.I.S.S. Saturdays. Featuring DJ Silky Slim. Dress code enforced. Sway, 10 p.m. 412 Louisiana. 501-492-9802. Larissa Gudino. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www. thetavernsportsgrill.com. New Era Saturdays. 21-and-older. Twelve Modern Lounge, first Saturday of every month, 9 p.m., $5 cover until 11 p.m. 1900 W. Third St. 501-301-1200. Pickin’ Porch. Bring your instrument. All ages welcome. Faulkner County Library, 9:30 a.m. 1900 Tyler St., Conway. 501-327-7482. www.fcl.org. Saturday night at Discovery. Featuring DJs, dancers and more. Discovery Nightclub, 9 p.m., $10. 1021 Jessie Road. 501-664-4784. www.latenightdisco.com. Singer/Songwriters Showcase. Parrot Beach Cafe, 2-7 p.m., free. 9611 MacArthur Drive, NLR. 771-2994. Ted Ludwig Trio. Capital Bar and Grill, 9 p.m., free. 111 Markham St. 501-374-7474. www.capitalhotel.com/CBG. A Work of Art: 2013 Scholarship Award Program. Featuring 2013 APME Scholar Jordan Ladyman, Pamela Smith, Alyse Eady, Lexington Porter, Leonard Cooper and Pieces of a Dream. Clear Channel Metroplex, 8 p.m., $35-$50. 10800 Col. Glenn Road. 501-217-5113. www.clearchannelmetroplex.com.

COMEDY

DANCE

Little Rock West Coast Dance Club. Dance lessons. Singles welcome. Ernie Biggs, 7 p.m., $2. 307 Clinton Ave. 501-247-5240. www. arstreetswing.com.

EVERY NIGHT HAS POTENTIAL

EVENTS

Argenta Farmers Market. Argenta, 7 a.m.-noon. Main Street, NLR. Back to School Kids Expo. Includes health demonstrations and screenings, activities, materials, games information, free food and immunizations, live entertainment and more. Awareness Center International, 9 a.m.-2 p.m. 900 Pine St. 501-251-9503. www.xtraordinaryminds.org/. CALS Job Skills Workshop: Networking and Preparedness. Call 501-918-3003 to register. Main Library, 1:30 p.m. 100 S. Rock St. www. cals.lib.ar.us. Falun Gong meditation. Allsopp Park, 9 a.m., free. Cantrell & Cedar Hill Roads. Hillcrest Farmers Market. Pulaski Heights Baptist Church, 7 a.m.-2 p.m. 2200 Kavanaugh Blvd. Hogs for a Cause Bike Show and Poker Run. Sam’s Club, 9 a.m. 1368 Higdon Ferry Road, Hot Springs. Hot Spring Co. Volunteer Council Annual Golf Tournament. Four-person scramble at DeGray Golf Course. Entry fee includes green fees, cart and meal. DeGray Lake State Park, 8 a.m., $180 per team. Hwy. 7. 501-332-1800. KABF 2013 Summer Pledge Drive Picnic. Fundraiser for KABF 88.3-FM includes live music, DJs, food vendors. The Bernice Garden, Noon-7 p.m. 1401 S. Main St. www.thebernicegarden.org. Little Rock Farmers Market. River Market Pavilions, 7 a.m. 400 President Clinton Ave. 3752552. www.rivermarket.info. PhotoExpo. Trade show entry is free; there is a small charge for classes. Embassy Suites, 8 a.m.6:45 p.m. 11301 Financial Centre. 501-224-2020. www.bedfords.com/. Rummage Sale for SOAR Network for Homeless Outreach. First United Methodist Church, 9 a.m.-1 p.m. 723 Center St. Yards and Yards of Yard Sales. Citywide yard sale. Downtown Eureka Springs, 7 a.m.-3 p.m. Downtown Eureka Springs, Eureka Springs. 479-253-8737.

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SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Springfield Cardinals. Dickey-Stephens Park, 6:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs. com.

SUNDAY, AUGUST 4

MUSIC

Cody Canada, Trey Hawkins. Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 8 p.m., $10 adv., $12 day of. 107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz.com. Karaoke with DJ Sara. Hardrider Bar & Grill, 7 p.m., free. 6613 John Harden Drive, Cabot. 501-982-1939. Mainland Divide (album release), Enchiridion, Deras Krig, God City Destroyers. Vino’s, 8 p.m., $5. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www. vinosbrewpub.com. Michael Eubanks. Lone Star Steakhouse and Saloon, 7 p.m. 10901 N Rodney Parham Road. 501-227-8898. www.lonestarsteakhouse.com. CONTINUED ON PAGE 28

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AUGUST 1, 2013

AFTER DARK, CONT. Open Fields. Faulkner County Library, 2 p.m., free. 1900 Tyler St., Conway. 501-327-7482. www. fcl.org. Poor Young Things, Chris Alan Craig Band. Juanita’s, 8 p.m., $8 adv., $10 day of. 614 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-1228. www. juanitas.com. Successful Sunday. Featuring live music and DJs. Montego Cafe, 7 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com. Sunday Jazz Brunch with Ted Ludwig. The Afterthought Cafe, 11 a.m. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www.vieuxcarrecafe.com.

EVENTS

Bernice Garden Farmers Market. The Bernice Garden, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. 1401 S. Main St. www. thebernicegarden.org. “Live from the Back Room.” Spoken word event. Vino’s, 7 p.m. 923 W. 7th St. 501-375-8466. www. vinosbrewpub.com.

SPORTS

Arkansas Travelers vs. Springfield Cardinals. Dickey-Stephens Park, 6:10 p.m., $4-$12. 400 W. Broadway St., NLR. 501-664-1555. www.travs. com.

MONDAY, AUGUST 5

MUSIC

Hot Springs Concert Band 2013 Concert Series. Whittington Park, Aug. 5, 6 p.m., free. Whittington Ave., Hot Springs. 501-984-1678. Irish Traditional Music Session. “SloPlay” begins at 6 p.m. Public session begins at 7 p.m. Hibernia Irish Tavern, first and third Monday of every month. 9700 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-2464340. www.hiberniairishtavern.com.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 6

MUSIC

Arkansas River Blues Society Blues Jam. Thirst n’ Howl, 7:30 p.m., free. 14710 Cantrell Road. 501-379-8189. www.thirst-n-howl.com. Crystal Bowersox. Juanita’s, 7 p.m., $15. 614 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-1228. www. juanitas.com. Defeater, I Was Afraid, Lifer, Raw Head. Downtown Music Hall, 7 p.m., $10 adv., $12 day of. 211 W. Capitol. 501-376-1819. downtownmusichall.com. Gil Franklin & Friends. Holiday Inn, North Little Rock, first Tuesday, Wednesday of every month. 120 W. Pershing Blvd., NLR. Karaoke Night. Cornerstone Pub & Grill, 8 p.m. 314 Main St., NLR. 501-374-1782. cstonepub. com. Karaoke Tuesday. Prost, 8 p.m., free. 322 President Clinton Blvd. 501-244-9550. Lucious Spiller Band. Copeland’s Restaurant of Little Rock, 6-9 p.m. 2602 S. Shackleford Road. 501-312-1616. www.copelandsrestaurantlittlerock.com. Major Major Major, Whale Fire, Bombay Harambee. All-ages. Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 9 p.m., $5. 107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www.stickyz.com. Open Music Jam. The Joint, 8 p.m., free. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com. Ricky David Tripp. Rocket Twenty One, 5:30 p.m. 2601 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-603-9208. www.ferneaurestaurant.com. Tsar Bomba, The God City Destroyers. White Water Tavern, 10 p.m. 2500 W 7th St. 501-3758400. www.whitewatertavern.com. CONTINUED ON PAGE 30 28

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

NATE POWELL, CONT. new technology and media relations for him, so pretty much every day or every couple of days I have to double check something or go back and forth, because obviously there’s a lot of daily research that goes into the nuts and bolts of transferring a script to a visual format. But John Lewis is eager to answer questions and since they both have professional obligations on Capitol Hill, Andrew will run it through and get me the answers quickly. But usually every couple of months or few months I manage to spend a weekend hanging out with John Lewis, and never have I gotten the feeling that there’s any sort of creative division or removal from the project. It’s very much a three-way, hands-on experience. One of the challenges for this book is, I’ve worked with a couple different script writers and everyone has a different way of writing, but as I was working through this script, first I read his memoir, “Walking with the Wind,” which is an incredible book. But once I was working through the script trying to figure out what to keep and what might be redundant if I was also doing the visual component, so much of the text in the script — whether it’s captions or balloons or just the description — comes from John Lewis telling some of these tales orally for like 45 or 50 years. So initially I’d be reading his memoir and I was like, “Man, it just feels like I’m doing an adaptation of this memoir in places.” But then I had to respect that the memoir is not the primary source, the primary source is that he’s been talking about this stuff for 50 years, thousands and thousands of times. Interesting. For once the primary source for the text doesn’t actually exist in a written form, it’s like a living craft that John Lewis has been telling these stories for half a century. Does telling someone else’s story change the actual creative process for you? Yeah it does. Previous to this, I did this book called “The Silence of Our Friends,” which was just a little bit fictionalized in terms of making the story a bit tighter, but for all intents and purposes it was an autobiographical story of this guy’s life as a kid in Texas in ’67 and ’68. That had its own challenges, and I learned to adapt and grow from it. But with this book, not only is it John Lewis’ story, but it’s also the story of this massive social upheaval, which involved millions of people. So in the same way that his script is seeking to find the balance between having it be

NATE POWELL, CONT.

Tell me about some of the other folks you’ve collaborated with recently. Another thing I’m doing for hire right now is I’m drawing the graphic novel adaptation of a “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” spinoff series. I was not aware that this was such a phenomenon until I signed up for the book. This guy Rick Riordan has a hugely successful sort of young-people-meetsswords-’n’-sorcery-meets-The-X-Men adventure series. And my friend Rob, his bread and butter has been writing these graphic novel adaptation series for several years. So I’m doing that.

Are you writing and illustrating as a fulltime gig now? Yes. Since early 2009 I’ve managed to do it. In general there is no money in comics, and I’ve been able to creep by. I’ve been able to afford the hospital bills for the birth of my child, but in general the only way I’ve been able to do it is by doing double duty, drawing a graphic novel for hire and while writing and drawing my own book. And I’ve got a couple of friends and peers of mine who are one further step up, who do a lot of writing for DC Comics or whoever, so occasionally I’ll get a nice big paycheck to draw just an issue of a friend’s comic that Vertigo is doing or something.

What are some of the ones you’ve worked on? The major one is a book called “Sweet Tooth” that my friend Jeff Lemire writes and draws. He kind of blew up as a DC writer in the last year or so. And he started a re-launch of “Animal Man” and started writing stuff for “Justice League” and “Superboy” or “The Atom” and a bunch of different books. But it’s been a real lifesaver every once in a while to switch gears. There’s a whole lot of constant hustling as a cartoon artist, and really I credit DIY punk as far as shaping the way that I navigate the world to allow me to still tap into the constant hustling necessary to keep my head above water. Hopefully it doesn’t involve as much chicanery at Kinko’s and that kind of thing. No joke man! What’s funny is, now I feel like the statute of limitations has gone long enough that, whenever I have to explain it, if I’m doing any kind of a talk or anything, I’m like “OK, here’s this thing that happened in the ’90s...” In the tours that Soophie went on in the late ’90s, Kinko’s existed in our lives in such a way ... that was one of the primary ways I was able to get so many copies out to so many people at the time. Otherwise I don’t know how it would have gone on. Do you get back to Arkansas very often? Since my daughter was born a year and a half ago I’ve only been back once. And I should have come back a second time because now she’s in this window where after two hours in the car she’s like, “Oh hell no.” So I did swing by for a few hours to clear out a storage space in Sherwood back in March. But my plan is to hopefully be there in November or December and really just work through this new parenthood challenge as far as, how do I get a small, impatient child to a different state nine hours away? How can that be done? Millions of people do it. I need to start getting back more and it really puts me in a way sometimes when I realize that life is so chaotic right now that I’m like, “Well I guess that’s another three months that I’ll go without being home.” And really, no place has ever felt like home to me except Arkansas and that becomes more pronounced every day. I love the town where I live and I have a family, but no place I don’t think will ever be home to me except Little Rock and Arkansas.

With this first book I’ll be finished next February. And in a lot of ways it lets me check in with my 12- to 14-year-old self, because it’s very similar to drawing X-Men or the New Mutants, and in contrast to “March,” the script is also pretty tight and everything, but it has much tighter limitations. The panels and page numbers are completely set and broken down. It’s a finished script. And one thing I like about drawing comics, especially with different writers, is that each script has different limitations that are imposed upon you and I sort of like knowing your limitations and confines, because then you get an idea of how much room you have to move around and get weird and where that room is. Strangely that’s been the most challenging thing I’ve done because it’s a much tighter ship that I’m sailing on, you know? So I’m doing that, and I did a threepage spot in a horror comic that’s cowritten by Ghostface Killah and The RZA. It was actually through an old punk connection, this guy who put out some records in the late ’90s, and we kind of knew each other from way back then. He approached me last year at Comic Con and he was like, “I’m doing a comic that’s a tie-in with Ghostface Killah’s new album, it’s called ‘Twelve Reasons to Die.’ ” And I wound up just doing a couple pages of it, but the whole time I was like, this is some really full circle stuff. Not only the fact that it was Wu-Tang and it was being produced and co-written by this person I knew from our underground music world, but the publishers were horror comic writers Steve Niles, who was in the old D.C. punk bands Gray Matter and Three, and the guitar player from Bad Religion [Brett Gurewitz] was the other. It was like man, this one project just ties it all together (laughter).

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his story and being the story of millions of Americans, from my end one of the challenges, especially because so many recognizable historical figures are represented, is finding the balance between accurate and responsible representation, and thus doing my homework whenever possible, and trying to figure out where the areas lay within the book for me to pursue the kinds of narratives that I’m naturally drawn to. And for a lot of this, I’ll look at the script and you can clearly see what is described and what is required by what’s written, but then you look with a different set of lenses to see what is not described or written. So a lot of this, with “March,” one of John Lewis’s pivotal involvements in the Civil Rights movement was being a big part of the Freedom Riders campaign in 1961. And for example, all the Freedom Riders are pulling up into a Montgomery, Ala., Greyhound station and they’re rolling into this alley and it’s suspiciously empty and quiet and obviously something is about to go horribly wrong. But it’s about realizing that there’s a 10 second window where everyone on the bus knows they’re about to be hospitalized or possibly killed, but they’re not sure from which direction, exactly at which moment or from whom. In the greater context of the Civil Rights movement, there’s so much as far as tension, dread, anxiety in the waiting and in the struggle. And even when he’s a kid, hiding from his family and sneaking under the house so that he can sneak on the bus so he can go to school when he’s needed in the fields to farm. So identifying where a lot of these wordless moments when time starts flowing in a different way, and drawing those out and expanding upon those — that’s one of the biggest challenges, the balance between this accuracy and faithfulness and then the expressive depiction of these subjective experiences.

r o av

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Enjoy DINNER in either the restaurant or the bar LIVE MUSIC in the bar six nights a week Sat & Sun BRUNCH, 10-2 LUNCH Mon-Fri, 11-2 This Month’s Feature: 3-Course Prix Fixe Menu (Multiple Selections)

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Upcoming Music in the Bar Thursday, August 1 Karaoke, 8 pm Friday, August 2 Art Porter Week, 8 pm Saturday, August 3 Harlo Maxwell, 9 pm Monday, August 5 Monday Night Jazz Clifford Hawkins Quartet, 8 pm Tuesday, August 6 Jam Session with Carl Mouton, 8 pm Wednesday, August 7 Open Mic Night, 8 pm

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AUGUST 1, 2013

AFTER DARK, CONT. Tuesday Jam Session with Carl Mouton. The Afterthought, 8 p.m., free. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www.afterthoughtbar.com.

DANCE

“Latin Night.” Revolution, 7 p.m., $5 regular, $7 under 21. 300 President Clinton Ave. 501-8230090. www.littlerocksalsa.com.

EVENTS

Little Rock Farmers Market. River Market Pavilions, 7 a.m. 400 President Clinton Ave. 375-2552. www.rivermarket.info. New Belgium beer tasting. The Joint, 7-9 p.m., $10. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501-372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com. Tales from the South. Authors tell true stories; schedule available on website. Dinner served 5-6:30 p.m., show at 7 p.m. Call for reservations. Starving Artist Cafe, 5 p.m. 411 N. Main St., NLR. 501-372-7976. www.starvingartistcafe.net. Trivia Bowl. Flying Saucer, 8:30 p.m. 323 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-8032. www.beerknurd. com/stores/littlerock.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 7

MUSIC

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AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

Acoustic Open Mic. The Afterthought, 8 p.m., free. 2721 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-663-1196. www. afterthoughtbar.com. Chris Henry. The Tavern Sports Grill, 7 p.m., free. 17815 Chenal Parkway. 501-830-2100. www.thetavernsportsgrill.com. Gil Franklin & Friends. Holiday Inn, North Little Rock, first Tuesday, Wednesday of every month. 120 W. Pershing Blvd., NLR. Hawthorne Heights, The Supporting Cast, Great Forest. Juanita’s, 9 p.m., $10 adv., $12 day of. 614 President Clinton Ave. 501-372-1228. www.juanitas.com. Karaoke Extravaganza. Includes drink and food specials and cash prizes. Montego Cafe, 9 p.m., $5. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www.montegocafe.com. Live Karaoke and Dueling Pianos. Featuring Dell Smith and William Staggers. Montego Cafe, 9 p.m. 315 Main St. 501-372-1555. www. montegocafe.com. Ricky David Tripp. Rocket Twenty One, 5:30 p.m. 2601 Kavanaugh Blvd. 501-603-9208. www.ferneaurestaurant.com. Rosco Bandana, Poor Ol’ Uncle Fatty. 18-andolder. Stickyz Rock ‘n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 9 p.m., $6. 107 Commerce St. 501-372-7707. www. stickyz.com. Ted Ludwig Trio. Capital Bar and Grill, 5 p.m., free. 111 Markham St. 501-374-7474. www.capitalhotel.com/CBG.

COMEDY

James Johann, Emily Galati. The Loony Bin, 7:30 p.m., $7-$10. 10301 N. Rodney Parham Road. 501-228-5555. www.loonybincomedy. com. The Joint Venture. Improv comedy group. The Joint, 8 p.m., $5. 301 Main St. No. 102, NLR. 501372-0205. thejointinlittlerock.com. Standup Open Mic Night. Hosted by local comedians of the comedy collective Comedi ans of NWA. UARK Bowl, 9 p.m., free. 644 W. Dickson St., Fayetteville. 479-301-2030. uarkbowl.com.

DANCE

Little Rock Bop Club. Beginning dance lessons for ages 10 and older. Singles welcome. Bess Chisum Stephens Community Center, 7 p.m., $4 for members, $7 for guests. 12th & Cleveland streets. 501-350-4712. www.littlerockbopclub.

EVENTS

Legacies & Lunch: Jan Davenport. Main Library, noon., free. 100 S. Rock St. www.cals.lib.ar.us. “A Night of Champions.” With Kirk Franklin and Ray Lewis. Verizon Arena, 7 p.m., $28-$53. 1 Alltel Arena Way, NLR. 501-975-9001. verizonarena.com.

FILM

Movies in the Park: “The Avengers.” Coolers allowed, no glass containers. Concessions available, cash only. Movie begins at sunset. First Security Amphitheatre, 8 p.m., free. 400 President Clinton Ave.

POETRY

Wednesday Night Poetry. 21-and-older show. Maxine’s, 7 p.m., free. 700 Central Ave., Hot Springs. 501-321-0909. maxineslive.com/shows. html.

THIS WEEK IN THEATER

THEATER

“Project elan.” Junior performance of a new musical from The Rep’s Young Artists’ Workshop. Arkansas Repertory Theatre, Fri., Aug. 2, 7 p.m.; Sat., Aug. 3, 1 and 7 p.m., $10. 601 Main St. 501378-0405. www.therep.org. “South Pacific.” Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Pulitzer Prize-winning classic. Murry’s Dinner Playhouse, Tue.-Sat., 6 p.m.; Wed., 11 a.m.; Sun., 11 a.m. and 5:30 p.m., $15-$35. 6323 Col. Glenn Road. 501-562-3131. murrysdinnerplayhouse.com.

GALLERIES, MUSEUMS

NEW EXHIBITIONS, EVENTS

GARLAND HOUSE, 1114 Garland St.: “Garland House Vol. 3,” artworks by Stephen Cefalo, Logan Hunter, Caleb Knodell and Jason Andrew Smith, reading by Michael Inscoe, music by Whale Fire, 7:30 p.m.-midnight Aug. 2. L&L BECK, 5705 Kavanaugh Blvd.: “Impersonating the Impressionists,” paintings by Louis Beck, giclee drawing giveaway 7 p.m. Aug. 15. 660-4006. THE EDGE, 301B President Clinton Ave.: Arkansas Children’s Hospital fund-raiser, Aug. 6-10, portion of proceeds from sales of work by Avila (Fernando Gomez), Eric Freeman, James Hayes, Jerry Colburn, St. Joseph Thomason and Stephen Driver to go to hospital. 992-1099. BENTONVILLE CRYSTAL BRIDGES MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART: “Afrique Aya Explores the Soundsuit,” dancers and drummers perform in the late 20th century gallery, 7:30 p.m. Aug. 2. 479-418-5700. FAYETTEVILLE UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS: “Low Magic,” mixed media by Luke Knox, Aug. 1-30, Fine Arts Center Gallery, closing reception Aug. 29. HOT SPRINGS Gallery Walk is 5-9 p.m. Friday, Aug. 2. ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP GALLERY, 810 Central Ave.: Jim Reimer, paintings, and Bonnie Ricci, watercolors, through August. 501-623-6401. FINE ARTS CENTER, 626 Central Ave.: “Hot Springs National Photography Competition,” through August, 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue.-Sat. 501-624-0489.

CALL FOR ENTRIES

The Arkansas Pastel Society is accepting entries

AFTER DARK, CONT. to its national exhibition, “Reflections in Pastel, “ set for Nov. 8-Feb 23 at the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies. Deadline is Sept. 5. More than $5,000 in cash and prizes will be awarded, including a $1500 grand prize. The show will be juried by pastel artist Richard McKinley. For more information email apsreflections@gmail. com.

CONTINUING EXHIBITS

ARKANSAS ARTS CENTER, MacArthur Park: “Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Gainsborough: The Treasures of Kenwood House, London,” through Sept. 8, $12 adults, $10 seniors, $8 military, $6 students, free to members; “Bauhaus Twenty-21: An Ongoing Legacy,” photographs by Gordon Watkinson, through Sept. 22; “50 Works / 50 Weeks / 50 Years,” Alice Pratt Brown Atrium, through 2013; “Ryan Sniegocki: Museum School Ceramic Artist in Residence,” pottery; “Interwoven: Craft Exhibition,” from the permanent collection, through Nov. 17. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue.-Fri., 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Sat., 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sun. 372-4000. BUTLER CENTER GALLERIES, Arkansas Studies Institute, 401 President Clinton Ave.: “Get a Simple Landscape,” drawings by Jerry Phillips, through Sept. 29; “Creative Expressions,” work by individuals with mental illness at the Arkansas State Hospital, through Aug. 25. 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. 320-5700. CANTRELL GALLERY, 8206 Cantrell Road: “Painting Arkansas,” works by John Wooldridge, through Aug. 17. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sat. 2241335. CHRIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 509 Scott St.: Paintings from the Arkansas League of Artists and Local Colour.

COX CREATIVE CENTER, 120 River Market Ave.: Arkansas League of Artists Signature Member Show, through August. 918-3095. LAMAN LIBRARY, 2801 Orange St., NLR: “Discover Greatness: An Illustrated History of Negro Baseball Leagues,” photographs tracing black baseball from the 19th century through 1947, through Aug. 24. 758-1720. OXFORD AMERICAN’S SOUTH ON MAIN, 1300 Main St.: “Crossing Borders,” drawings and paintings by Marcus McAllister, photographs by Chris King, wall panels by Kimo Minton, drawings by Mia Fernandes, smoke drawings by Rob Tarbell, multimedia by Ryder Richards, through Aug. 10. STATE CAPITOL: “Spanning the Century (and more),” photographs of historic bridges by Maxine Payne, drawings, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Highway and Transportation Department, through August. THEA FOUNDATION, 401 Main St., NLR: Abstract works on paper and board by Emily Mitchell. 379-9512. BENTONVILLE CRYSTAL BRIDGES MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART, One Museum Way: “Angels & Tomboys: Girlhood in 19th-Century American Art,” work by John Singer Sargent, Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins, Mary Cassatt and others, through Sept. 30; “Surveying George Washington,” historical documents, through Sept. 30; “Genre Scenes on Paper from Crystal Bridges’ Permanent Collection,” through Aug. 12; “American Encounters: Genre Painting and Everyday Life,” five 19th century paintings by American and European artists, including two from the Louvre Museum in Paris, through Aug. 12; permanent

collection of American masterworks spanning four centuries. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon., Thu., Sat.Sun.; 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Wed.-Fri. 479-418-5700. FAYETTEVILLE WALTON ARTS CENTER: “Arkansas Women to Watch,” textiles by Louise Halsey, Barbara Cade, Jennifer Libby Fay, Jane Hatfield and Deborah Kuster, through Aug. 17, Joy Pratt Markham Gallery. 479-443-5600. HOT SPRINGS GARVAN GARDENS, 550 Akridge Road: “Splash of Glass: A James Hayes Art Glass Installation,” 225 pieces of art glass in 13 areas of the garden, through September. $10 adults, $9 seniors, $5 children, $5 dogs on leash. 501-262-9300.

ONGOING MUSEUM EXHIBITS

ARKANSAS INLAND MARITIME MUSEUM, North Little Rock: “Captain’s Cabin Exhibit,” photographs, biographies, sea stories from the crew, and personal artifacts, through August. 371-8320. CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL MUSEUM VISITOR CENTER, Bates and Park: Exhibits on the 1957 desegregation of Central and the civil rights movement. 9 a.m.-4:30 p.m. daily. 374-1957. CLINTON PRESIDENTIAL CENTER, 1200 President Clinton Ave.: “Oscar de la Renta: American Icon,” designs worn by Laura Bush, Jessica Chastain, Hillary Clinton, Chelsea Clinton and others, and other couture pieces, through Dec. 1. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 1-5 p.m. Sun. $7 adults; $5 college students, seniors, retired military; $3 ages 6-17. 370-8000. ESSE, 1510 S. Main St.: “What’s Inside: A Century of Women and Handbags (1900-1999),” purses

from the collection of Anita Davis, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Tue.-Sun., $10-$8. 916-9022. HISTORIC ARKANSAS MUSEUM, 200 E. Third St.: “Jason A. Smith: Stills”; “Arkansas Made,” “Reflected by Three: William Detmers, Scott Lykens and G. Tara-Casciano,” prints, ceramics, sculpture, through Aug. 4; “The Curious World of Patent Models,” through Sept. 29. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 1-5 p.m. Sun. 324-9351. MacARTHUR MUSEUM OF ARKANSAS MILITARY HISTORY, MacArthur Park: “Undaunted Courage, Proven Loyalty: JapaneseAmerican Soldiers in World War II,” through August. 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 1-4 p.m. Sun. 376-4602. MOSAIC TEMPLARS CULTURAL CENTER, 9th and Broadway: “Stirring the Soul of History, Vol. 1” newly acquired art by Lee Anthony, Barbara Higgins Bond, Danny Campbell, Ariston Jacks, Henri Linton, Mary Lovelace O’Neal, Bryan Massey, A.J. Smith, Ed Wade and Susan Williams. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue.-Sat. 683-3593. MUSEUM OF DISCOVERY, 500 President Clinton Ave.: “Wiggle Worms,” science program for pre-K children 10 a.m.-10:30 a.m. every Tue., 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue.-Sat., 1-5 p.m. Sun., $10 ages 13 and older, $8 ages 1-12, free to members and children under 1. 396-7050. OLD STATE HOUSE MUSEUM, 300 W. Markham: “Lights! Camera! Arkansas!”, the state’s ties to Hollywood, including costumes, scripts, film footage, photographs and more, through March 1, 2015; “Things You Need to Hear: Memories of Growing up in Arkansas from 1890 to 1980,” oral histories about community, family, work, school and leisure, through March 2014. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon.-Sat., 1-5 p.m. Sun. 324-9685.

www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

These venues will be open late. There’s plenty of parking and a free Trolley to each of the locations. Don’t miss it – lots of fun!

august 9

Arkansas League of Artists

Signature member show

free parking at 3rd & Cumberland free street parking all over downtown and behind the river Market (Paid parking available for BRANDGUIDELINES GUIDELINES modest fee.) BRAND SubmittedMay May6th, 6th,2013 2013 Submitted

03 3

Exhibition Closing & ACtivitiEs saturday, August 17 silvErpoint DrAwing workshop taught by Marjorie williams-smith $75 • 10am-12pm Pre-Registration deadline August 10

Art of thE originAl print DEMonstrAtion by Aj smith live Auction of original print produced Free Event • 1:30pm

FrEE trOllEy ridEs!➧

Opening reception for two new exhibits: • Heeding tHe Call: The Firefighter Collection of Johnny Reep • tHe SenSe Of nature: David Mudrinich, John Van Horn and Judy Wright Walter live music by The John Burnette Band

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

A museum of the Department of Arkansas Heritage

200 River Market Ave., Suite 400 501.374.9247 • www.arcapital.com

GALLERY 221 & ART STUDIOS 221 “Exhibition” by featured artist, Jennifer Cox Coleman JOIN US TO

CELEBRATE! 5-8PM

 Fine Art  Cocktails & Wine  Hor d’oeuvres Pyramid Come by during 2nd Friday Art Night to seePlace nd

Art Night

Downtown Little Rock 300 [BLUE] River Market Ave, LOWFIDELITY FIDELITYLOGO LOGO [BLUE] LOW Ste 105

Arkansas Tales: Visual Stories from Artist Robert Bean

GRAND OPENING

Second Friday

Find Us On Facebook & Instagram

120 River Market Avenue www.cals.org • 918-3093

Silverpoint Drawings of Aj Smith & Marjorie Williams-Smith

Mon - Fri 9am - 5pm, Sat 10am - 6pm, Sun – By Appointment

cientand andcost costeﬀective eﬀectivevariation. variation. ient ngand andallallstamp stampapplications. applications. g

Cox Creative Center

Reflections in Silver:

1001 Wright Ave. Suite C Little Rock, AR 501-372-6822 www.hearnefineart.com

local artists at

Through August 31

Galleries

“Rose with Veins” Artist: Marjorie Williams-Smith Size: 5 4/8” x 3 15/16” Medium: Silverpoint

Proud to support

the 2nd Friday Of Each Month 5-8 pm

200 E. Third St. Downtown Little Rock 501-324-9351 HistoricArkansas.org

2 & Center St “A VAriety of impressions” (501) 801-0211 Join “HOT SEAT ” BYUs 5-8pm

Pyramid PlaceR•ODGERS 2nd & Center St • (501) 801-0211 CATHERINE

♦ Fine Art ♦ Cocktails & Wine ♦ Hors d’oeuvres ♦

ART NOTES

sEcOnd Friday art night, august 9 Featuring works of art from ArtGroup Maumelle. 521 President Clinton Ave. River Market District (501) 975-9800

Gypsy Bistro 200 S. RIVER MARKET AVE, STE. 150 • 501.375.3500 • DIZZYSGYPSYBISTRO.NET

Gourmet. Your Way. All Day.

300 Third Tower • 501-375-3333 coppergrillandgrocery.com

A NEW GATEWAY TO LITTLE ROCK

The Old State House Museum

Presents Chamber Music by

Geoffrey Robson David Gerstein and

Friday, August 9, 1885 House Chamber Two Performances: 5:30 & 7 p.m. Free Admission • Museum open until 8 p.m.

Drivers Legal Plan Drivers Legal Plan

The Old State House Museum is a museum of the Department of Arkansas Heritage.

IGNITED ART: Ryder Richards’ “The Communion,” gunpowder and gold leaf, at South on Main.

The British are coming Other artists too, for South on Main show. BY LESLIE NEWELL PEACOCK

he Oxford American’s South on Main space opened its first exhibition of fine art Wednesday, a show featuring the work of a native Arkansan who lives in Paris and other artists, several of whom hail from across the pond. Hence the name, “Crossing Borders,” brought to the OA by Susan Mumford art. Special events — talks, workshops and wine tastings — will accompany the exhibition, which will run through Aug. 10. Arkansans will recognize the work of Marcus McAllister, who has shown at Gallery 26 and now lives in Paris. He works in kind of double-exposure style that combines figurative and abstracted forms. Visitors to the show will recognize the places captured by British photographer Chris King, whose work includes scenes of the South and is meant to encapsulate the idea of the show: How do artists from elsewhere see the South or other places their work takes them? King and McAllister will be in Little Rock during the run of the show and will give a talk about their work from 3-4:30 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 3. There will be a $5 charge. Prior to that will be a tasting of Southern wines from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Friday, Aug. 2; entry is $10.

Other artists include Kimo Minton, who is originally from Santa Fe but now spends half a year in London. He works in a style reminiscent of Le Corbusier — geometrical abstract figures fitted together — that he says is inspired by jazz. Mia Fernandes, who lives in the south of France, will show mixed media on paper. Rob Tarbell of Virginia uses smoke and colored inks to create expressive abstractions. Ryder Richards, also from New Mexico, “ ‘draws’ by igniting gunpowder,” he says of his work, which here includes images of guns. McAllister will give three workshops, “The Sketchbook as Creativity Tool,” from 9 a.m. to noon Aug. 3 ($50); a twoday workshop 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Aug. 5-6 ($150), and an evening workshop 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. Aug. 7 ($50). Reserve a space at Arkansas@artiswhyigetupinthemorning.com South on Main will be open for 2nd Friday Art Night from 5-8 p.m. Aug. 9, and there will be a closing reception from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Aug. 10. Mumford, who lives in London and is married to King, also hails from Arkansas. She is a Hendrix graduate and will speak on the Hendrix campus in November about her career. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

MOVIE REVIEW ADVERTISEMENT

hearsay ➥ Check out BOX TURTLE’S end of season sale during the first Thursday Hillcrest Shop ‘n Sip on Aug. 1. ➥ In honor of President Bill Clinton’s birthday, the CLINTON MUSEUM STORE in the River Market will host a huge sale for the entire month of August. You’ll also get a free I Miss Bill bumper sticker with every $30 spent. ➥ THE EDGE GALLERY will host a fund-raiser for Arkansas Children’s Hospital from Aug. 6-10. A portion of the proceeds from selected items will go to the hospital. Featured artists include Avila (Fernando Gomez), Eric Leon Freeman, James Hayes, Jerry Colburn, S. Joseph Thomason and Stephen Drive. For more information, call the gallery at 501-9921099. ➥ If you haven’t been to OZARK OUTDOOR SUPPLY’S big summer sale, then you’re missing out. Summer clothing is 25-50 percent off, all flip flops are 40-50 percent off and selected footwear is 50 percent off. ➥ DREAMWEAVERS will host its monthly second Saturday sale from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Aug. 9 and 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. Aug. 10. Don’t pass up this opportunity to score great deals on rugs, pillows, mirrors, artwork and other home décor items. ➥ Makeup artist Edward Bess will make a personal appearance at BARBARA/JEAN on Aug. 2-3. Call 501-227-0054 to schedule an appointment. ➥ CANTRELL GALLERY will host the fourth annual Arkansas League of Artists (ALA) ArtShow from Aug. 23-Oct. 19. The opening reception is scheduled from 6-8 p.m. Aug. 23 and is open to the public. Many of the artists included in the juried exhibition will be present at the reception. This year’s exhibit will be juried by esteemed artist and educator Dr. John Keller. Gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday. For further information, contact Cindy Scott-Huisman at 501-224-1335. 34

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

‘FRUITVALE STATION’: Michael B. Jordan stars.

The day Oscar Grant was killed ‘Fruitvale Station’ starts strong, but runs out of time. BY MIKE POWELL

“F

ruitvale Station” is a movie that tells us unfortunate things that we already know: Race matters, justice is imperfect and confusion has a way of leading to violence. Based on a true story, the movie follows 22-year-old Oscar Grant on what turns out to be the last day of his life. This is no secret, even without prior knowledge of the case. The movie opens with cell-phone footage taken on a subway platform in Oakland, Calif., of a row of black men sitting against a wall with police bearing down over them. It is shortly after midnight on New Year’s Day 2009, and the platform is crowded with onlookers. An officer rolls one of the men over onto his stomach. There is shouting, there is cursing, there is something being removed from the officer’s pocket. A gun goes off and the screen turns black. Now that we know how Oscar dies, the movie tries to reconstruct a story of how he lived — to make what feels abstractly devastating at the beginning of the movie feel personally devastating when we come back to it at the end. It’s a big task. Nobody wants to be lectured on the tragedy of obviously tragic events, or made to feel guilty about circumstances beyond their control. Thankfully, the movie does not do that. There are moments of absurd heavy-handedness, but also moments of poetry so ephemeral and true that I momentarily forgot the way it was all going to end. We learn plenty about Oscar in the first 10 minutes: He is horny, irrespon-

sible, casual and sweet-natured, but has a lurking temper that we can easily understand might get him into real trouble. Lying in bed next to Sophina, his girlfriend and mother of his child, he apologizes for cheating and tries to assure her he will not be fucking with that bitch again. He promises forever, and when Sophina rightly asks what he means, I almost thought he was going to pull the ring out right there, but no: He leans in and tries to make out with her. Their daughter, Tatiana, knocks, at which point he stuffs a gallon ziplock bag of weed into a closet, then invites her in to lie down with them. At 10 minutes after midnight, lying next to his daughter and baby momma in a tiny, disheveled bedroom, he texts his mother, wishing her a happy birthday, with four exclamation points. In short, we learn that Oscar is a sympathetic person, with obvious aspirations and more obvious flaws. As the movie unfolds, we find out he has lost his job at a supermarket for showing up late, and simultaneously trying to give up selling weed, not because he’s in any acute danger but because selling weed is not something that someone who wants to get his life on track does. It is New Year’s Eve, and Oscar, like so many people, has stale prospects but is hoping for a fresh start. Picking up some crabs for his mom’s birthday party, he meets a genteel white girl named Katie, who is struggling to figure out what kind of fish is best for frying. It’s for a friend she wants to cook for,

she explains sheepishly. “Is he black?” Oscar asks. “He’s white, but he knows a lot of black people,” she says, an almost extraterrestrially weird conversation designed to get us to understand that white or black, Oscar just wants to be helpful. Katie ends up on the phone with his Grandma Bonnie, who teaches her a thing or two while Oscar tracks down his now former boss in one of the aisles and asks for his job back. Low music throbs, and we can see Oscar is getting angry: “I need this fucking job,” he says, grabbing the manager’s arm. Played by Michael B. Jordan (Wallace on “The Wire,” quarterback Vince Howard on “Friday Night Lights”), Oscar is broad but boyish, with generous eyes and a nice smile. He seems scared by his own temper, or unable to fully carry it. This is crucial: While the movie suggests he can get angry enough to throw a punch, for the most part it presents him as exceedingly laid back. Real violence — the kind done to him in the final scenes of the movie — seems mostly foreign to him. His threat to the supermarket manager goes nowhere, and he wanders back to the fish counter, where Katie returns his phone to him and he smiles, swallowing his shame and becoming the friendly dude he’d been a minute or two earlier, and is for most of the movie. The contrast — between angry Oscar and friendly Oscar — is instructive, maybe too much so. The longer we follow him the more the anxious the movie seems to have him demonstrate the full

MOVIE REVIEW range of his character, knowing that time is running out. Single days can be microcosms for whole lives, but there are times the movie feels over determined. Ironically, the need to make meaning from Oscar’s life is what ends up sapping some of the power of the movie’s premise: We trade the loose specialness of the everyday for the steady march of storytelling. At one point, he cradles a pit bull struck by an indifferent car speeding down the road, and while he does not actually say “why, God, why?” the words are implied. The fulcrum of the movie is his mother’s birthday party. Grandma Bonnie cooks gumbo; Tatiana cracks crab legs over the sink next to her; Sophina scrubs shrimp and mom chops, while Oscar takes to an adjoining den — wood-paneled walls, beige carpeting on the floor — to talk football with unnamed male friends and relatives. The rhythm of the scene is easy, the dialogue overlapping, the camera softfocus and close enough to the characters’ bodies to feel their heat. They smile and laugh, seemingly at nothing, the way people simply happy to be in each others’ company do. When they gather in the den to say grace, the room is so small that we have to watch them from in the kitchen. It is a beautiful, intimate and effortless scene, and where we really come to see what Oscar stands to lose. At this point the movie remembers that it has a tragedy to get to, and starts becoming more vise-like. Oscar and Sophina have plans to head across the bay to see the fireworks in San Francisco. Oscar’s mother suggests they take the train instead of driving, both to avoid traffic and so they don’t end up driving drunk. For a parent to be concerned about a child’s safety is one thing, but for them to lay out travel logistics is another. On the ride over to Sophina’s sister’s house to drop Tatiana off, Oscar suggests they just stay in for the night and watch the fireworks on TV. When they drop Tatiana off, she tells Oscar she’s scared for him, because she heard gunshots outside. They were just fireworks, he assures her. Fate is not left to unfold, it is orchestrated and spelled out in flashing marquee letters every step of the way. We see one flashback in the movie, to a prison stint. We don’t know the crime. We do know that he meets a guy there — a hefty white guy with a collar of neck tattoos — that Oscar doesn’t get along with. Coming back from San Francisco — a dreamy, happy chain of scenelets that includes a subwaycar dance party, blunts, and a chance encounter between Oscar and a chiseled, yuppie-type web developer who tells him not to wait to marry Sophina —

Oscar runs into this tattooed guy on the train, and this is when the movie comes apart. They fight, the train stops, the police unload Oscar and his friends, but don’t bother to track down the white guys they fought with — the suggestion being subtle but really not that subtle. From here you know what happens. True to the reality of violence, the moment Oscar is shot feels haphazard and abrupt, not really the product of cause and effect. It could happen 30 seconds before it does or 30 seconds after. Lying on the deck of the station with blood seeping out of his mouth, Oscar reminds us of the thing we most need to know about him: “I have a daughter.” Oscar is black, which only seems to matter intermittently during the movie but by the end — at least in the mind of the 27-year-old writer-director Ryan Coogler and Oscar’s real-life community in the Bay Area — is crucially important. There are two officers most obviously responsible for Oscar’s abuse in the train station, one of whom is also responsible for his shooting. One of them has high cheekbones and cornflower hair, the other has square shoulders and a military buzzcut: Hyperbolically Aryan specimens, not white people with power so much as the idea of white people with power. But for the most part, the movie doesn’t concern itself with race headon. It’s an interesting strategy. Despite how procedural the movie feels by the end, what happens to Oscar is surprising precisely because his race, for most of the movie, hasn’t been an issue. The ugliest and most complex parts of “Fruitvale Station” — the nature of Oscar’s jail time and the post-shooting trial of the transit police officer — are ignored or relegated to postscript. In one frame, we learn that the officer’s defense team argued that in a moment of panic the officer had reached for his taser but actually pulled his gun, and only ended up spending 11 months in jail — words that leave the screen too soon. Asking whether or not the movie is tragic is different from asking whether or not the events that inspired it are. Provoked or unprovoked, a victim of honest confusion or overt racism, Oscar Grant, an unarmed 22-year-old man, is shot in the back by a police officer. “Fruitvale Station” treats the event with little mystery and less ambiguity. It starts strong but gets tiring because you are continually being told how to feel. Then again, what’s really sad about Oscar’s story is that there aren’t many ways to feel about it to begin with.

PEARLS ABOUT SWINE

Hogs should be solid in short-term

earls was on momentary hiatus of Gerry DiNardo for a tick, but the summer didn’t and Terry Bowden. But he offer much racket from the Hill anyway. Trust me — had the opportuis shepherding an nity availed itself, I would’ve emerged effort to ensure that future seafrom hibernation to mouth off. BEAU sons do generAlas, the baseball team meekly WILCOX crumbled under the weight of enorate more prolific mous preseason hype, the basketball buzz. The one area where the Hogs program kept up its seeming state of have made waves is a positive one: disarray, and SEC Media Days mostly with a couple of minor exceptions, the offered us extraterritorial amusement news from the Broyles Athletic Comin the form of Johnny Manziel explainplex in recent weeks hasn’t been about ing away an offseason replete with suspensions or defections, but about Kardashianesque attention whoring. commitments to upcoming classes. Bret Bielema enters his first sumThe caliber of player that Bielema is mer as head coach of the Hogs holding attracting is inarguably superior to hard and fast to the same mantra that those who wanted to be a cog in the has so far been symbolic of his short Petrino machine; moreover, players tenure: He wants who arrived two or to build a winner, seasons ago are The caliber three and turn a deaf ear doing what you would to pundits who are of player that expect, rededicating themselves after feelmore or less unconBielema is ing undoubtedly run vinced that he can pull the trick. The attracting is aground last fall. Hogs aren’t makthis reainarguably son,It’snotfor ing ripples this year wanton hombecause, well, prosuperior to those erism, that I cannot on the popular jections for 2013 who wanted to jump bandwagon that sugare roughly as modest as they were be a cog in the gests Arkansas is due for Bobby Petrino a deep, season-long Petrino machine. for in 2008, Houston bruise in 2013. There Nutt in 1998, Danny will be a fully-realized Ford in 1993, etc. season preview coming Some may contend in two weeks but let’s that even Petrino just say for now that had more talent I am a bigger believer on campus when in the short-term than most. It’s a function of two things: (1) his debut season began, because Ryan Mallett was serving out the obligaa relatively soft early schedule that, tory one-year transfer season on ice for a change, keeps Bama at bay until well into the latter half, and (2) a reaand a cadre of talented receivers had jumped onboard to make Casey Dick sonably competent amount of skill on appear useful. both lines, some of which is primed First-year Razorback bosses haven’t to live up to high advance billing for the first time. historically come onto the scene with the albatross of expectation around Bielema’s insistence on being coy their necks. Ironically, Nutt delivered about 2013 isn’t without purpose. He elects to tweet and banter to an argufar better than any of the others in Year One, benefiting substantially from the ably cavalier degree, but he knows SEC West being in its worst overall exactly what he has in his locker room. shape since the division format was And he isn’t going to engage in puffery. hatched. How often do you get the His competitive streak is miles wide, chance to pummel LSU, Alabama and and he feels his team can be a conAuburn all in the same season, after tender, within reason, much sooner all? Those days are a bygone anomaly. than most others think. We’ll assess Bielema obviously won’t have the how accurate that might be in upcomluxury of coaching against the likes ing editions. www.arktimes.com

AUGUST 1, 2013

Dining WHAT’S COOKIN’ CHEF MATTHEW BELL reports that his Oxford American-tied restaurant South on Main will officially open its doors for lunch on Monday, Aug. 5. Dinner will begin about two weeks later, Bell hopes, depending on how lunch service goes. The bar will be open for evening hours when dinner service begins and during concerts and events that happen before dinner service begins. During special events, such as the one Aug. 1 when 3 Penny Acre plays a free show, Bell will serve from his bar menu, which includes the likes of a hot chicken biscuit ($8) and cornbread sliders with pork belly, greens and pickled onion ($8). Check out an extensive preview of South on Main from Eat Arkansas’s Daniel Walker at arktimes.com/southonmain.

Leo’s Greek Castle 2925 Kavanaugh Blvd. 666-7414

QUICK BITE There’s more at the Greek Castle than just Greek food — check out Leo’s in the morning for breakfast, or order from the “American” side of the menu for classic sandwiches, burgers and more. HOURS 7 a.m. until 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday, 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. Sunday. OTHER INFO All major CC, no alcohol.

LITTLE ROCK/ N. LITTLE ROCK

AMERICAN

4 SQUARE CAFE AND GIFTS Vegetarian salads, soups, wraps and paninis and a broad selection of smoothies in an Arkansas products gift shop. 405 President Clinton Ave. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-244-2622. BLD daily. ARGENTA MARKET The Argenta District’s neighborhood grocery store offers a deli featuring a daily selection of big sandwiches along with fresh fish and meats and salads. Emphasis here is on Arkansas-farmed foods and organic products. 521 N. Main St. NLR. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-379-9980. L daily, D Mon.-Sat., B Sat., BR Sun. ARKANSAS BURGER CO. Good burgers, fries and shakes, plus salads and other entrees. Try the cheese dip. 7410 Cantrell Road. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-663-0600. LD Tue.-Sat. ASHLEY’S The premier fine dining restaurant in Little Rock marries Southern traditionalism and haute cuisine. The menu is often daring and always delicious. 111 W. Markham St. Full bar, All CC. $$$. 501-374-7474. BLD Mon.-Sat. BR Sun. BELWOOD DINER Traditional breakfasts and plate lunch specials are the norm at this lostin-time hole in the wall. 3815 MacArthur Drive. NLR. No alcohol, No CC. $. 501-753-1012. BL Mon.-Fri. BEV & GUY’S FISH & CHICKEN Seating is limited to eight, so customers might want to consider the carry-out option. This restaurant specializes in fried catfish fillets and chicken and all the trimmings. 3319 John Barrow Road. No alcohol, No CC. $. 501-224-2981. L Fri.-Sat. D Thu., Sat., Sun. BRAVE NEW RESTAURANT The food’s great, portions huge, prices reasonable. Diners can look into the open kitchen and watch the culinary geniuses at work slicing and dicing and 36

AUGUST 1, 2013

ARKANSAS TIMES

JESS ROBERTS

DINING CAPSULES

BETTER THAN EVER: The gyros platter at Leo’s Greek Castle.

The Castle abides New Leo’s owners do right by the old Hillcrest favorite.

here’s always a sense of apprehension when a long-time favorite restaurant changes hands, especially one such as Leo’s Greek Castle, the Hillcrest mainstay that operated under the leadership of Hector Parodi for two decades. Parodi sold out to a couple of young men earlier this year, and while we wished new owners Frank Cox and Thomas Alford the best, we weren’t sure if Leo’s would remain on our regular rotation of good spots for cheap eats. After all, Leo’s couldn’t possibly be the same under new management, right? Well we finally made it into the place, and we can answer that question in the affirmative: Leo’s isn’t the same. And lucky us that it isn’t, because the food is better than ever. For our first trip back in this new era of Leo’s, we decided to put the place through its paces and order strictly from the Greek side of the menu, figuring that a couple of American guys could probably get the burgers and sandwiches from their native cuisine right. To this end, we started with the Sampler Platter ($6.99), a sort of “greatest hits” of Mediterranean

starters that includes three dolmades, a large bowl of hummus, and a small cup of tabbouleh. The dolmades were small, but packed with flavor, served cold with a couple of slices of lemon just like we like them. Each bite of rice stuffing and tender grape leaves was a pleasure, and we knew we were off to a good start. Our previous experience with Leo’s hummus hadn’t been a great one, the chickpea puree overwhelmed by the flavor that reminded us of nothing so much as pickle brine. The hummus on our most recent trip was worlds better, with chickpeas blended with tahini to create a dip that was smooth, nutty, and accented perfectly by the dusting of spices on top. The pita served with the hummus was hot and fresh, pillowy soft and quite tasty. It made a nice contrast to the cold, tangy dolmades. The tabbouleh was, unfortunately, the only miss of the meal, because while the parsley and bulgur wheat were fresh, they could have used a kick of flavor, preferably the traditional lemon juice and cucumber that make this dish so refreshing.

The tabbouleh proved to be the only bump in the road of this meal, however, and our next dish — a piping hot spanakopita ($3.75) — had us back on the right track in no time. Tender, flaky puff pastry stuffed with seasoned spinach and feta cheese was good enough on its own, but paired with a cup of cold tzatziki sauce it was perfect. The contrast of crisp, golden brown pastry with the soft, savory filling was nice. With our appetites whetted, we turned to our main course, the Gyros Platter ($8.99), a large portion of shaved gyros meat served with pita, fries, and a small pile of onions and tomato. Our last trip to Leo’s had seen our gyros served up tough and overcooked, but these slices were nice and juicy, seared just right and spiced well. Another portion of tzatziki made for an excellent addition to the meat and bread, and the fresh onions and tomatoes added depth to the dish. The meat was so good that we wished we could have traded in our fries for a little extra, especially since these fries are of the frozen and quick-fried variety. Still, despite the fries, this was a fantastic plate of food. We ended our meal as all Greek meals should be ended — with a piece of baklava ($1.79). More delicious puff pastry was in play here, this time holding a wonderful filling of seasoned nuts and drenched in honey. It’s a crunchy, wonderfully messy dessert, and made for a sweet end to a good meal. By the time we reached our last bite, our initial fears had been replaced by a new belief: Leo’s Greek Castle is here to stay, and better than ever.

Information in our restaurant capsules reflects the opinions of the newspaper staff and its reviewers. The newspaper accepts no advertising or other considerations in exchange for reviews, which are conducted anonymously. We invite the opinions of readers who think we are in error.

sauteeing. It’s great fun, and the fish is special. 2300 Cottondale Lane. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-663-2677. LD Mon.-Fri. D Sat. BRAY GOURMET DELI AND CATERING Turkey spreads in four flavors — original, jalapeno, cajun and dill — and the homemade pimiento cheese are the signature items at Chris Bray’s delicatessen, which serves sandwiches, wraps, soups, stuffed potatoes and salads and sells the turkey spreads to go. Arkansas Fresh Breads supplies the bread; the olive oil sourdough is an exclusive. You can buy loaves, too. Petit Jean supplies the ham and peppered beef. Breakfast features cinnamon rolls and muffins. 323 Center St. Suite 150. No alcohol, All CC. 501-353-1045. BL Mon.-Fri. CAPITAL BAR AND GRILL Big hearty sandwiches, daily lunch specials and fine evening dining all rolled up into one at this landing spot downtown. Surprisingly inexpensive with a great bar staff and a good selection of unique desserts. 111 Markham St. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-374-7474. LD daily. CAPITOL BISTRO Serving breakfast and lunch items, including quiche, sandwiches, coffees and the like. 1401 W. Capitol Ave. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-371-9575. BL Mon.-Fri. CATERING TO YOU Painstakingly prepared entrees and great appetizers in this gourmetto-go location, attached to a gift shop. Caters everything from family dinners to weddings and large corporate events. 8121 Cantrell Road. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-614-9030. Serving meals to go: LD Mon.-Sat. CATFISH HOLE Downhome place for wellcooked catfish and tasty hushpuppies. 603 E. Spriggs. NLR. Beer, All CC. $-$$. 501-758-3516. D Tue.-Sat. CIAO BACI The focus is on fine dining in this casually elegant Hillcrest bungalow, though excellent tapas are out of this world. The treeshaded, light-strung deck is a popular destination. 605 N. Beechwood St. Full bar, All CC. $$$. 501-603-0238. D Mon.-Sat. CRAZEE’S COOL CAFE Good burgers, daily plate specials and bar food amid pool tables and TVs. 7626 Cantrell Road. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-221-9696. LD Mon.-Sat. DIXON ROAD BLUES CAFE Sandwiches, burgers and salads. 1505 W. Dixon Road. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-888-2233. BLD Mon.-Sat. DOE’S EAT PLACE A skid-row dive turned power brokers’ watering hole with huge steaks, great tamales and broiled shrimp, and killer burgers at lunch. 1023 W. Markham St. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-376-1195. LD Mon.-Fri., D Sat. EJ’S EATS AND DRINKS The friendly neighborhood hoagie shop downtown serves at a handful of tables and by delivery. The sandwiches are generous, the soup homemade and the salads cold. Vegetarians can craft any number of acceptable meals from the flexible menu. The housemade potato chips are da bomb. 523 Center St. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-666-3700. LD Mon.-Fri. FILIBUSTER’S BISTRO & LOUNGE Sandwiches, salads in the Legacy Hotel. 625 W. Capitol Ave. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-374-0100. D Mon.-Fri. FIVE GUYS BURGERS & FRIES Nationwide burger chain with emphasis on freshly made

B Breakfast L Lunch D Dinner $ Inexpensive (under $8/person) $$ Moderate ($8-$20/person) $$$ Expensive (over $20/person) CC Accepts credit cards

fries and patties and over 15 toppings for you to create your own burger. 13000 Chenal Parkway. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-225-1100. LD daily.; 2923 Lakewood Village Dr. NLR. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-246-5295. LD daily. FLYING FISH The fried seafood is fresh and crunchy and there are plenty of raw, boiled and grilled offerings, too. The hamburgers are a hit, too. It’s self-service; wander on through the screen door and you’ll find a slick team of cooks and servers doing a creditable job of serving big crowds. 511 President Clinton Ave. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$. 501-375-3474. LD daily. THE GRAND CAFE Typical hotel restaurant fare from this Hilton cafe. 925 South University Ave. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-664-5020. BLD daily. GRUMPY’S TOO Music venue and sports bar with lots of TVs, pub grub and regular drink specials. 1801 Green Mountain Drive. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-225-3768. LD Mon.-Sat. HOMER’S Great vegetables, huge yeast rolls and killer cobblers. Follow the mobs. 2001 E. Roosevelt Road. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-374-1400. BL Mon.-Fri. 9700 N Rodney Parham. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-224-6637. LD Mon.-Sat. THE HOUSE A comfortable gastropub in Hillcrest, where you’ll find traditional fare like burgers and fish and chips alongside Thai green curry and gumbo. 722 N. Palm St. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-663-4500. D daily, BR, L Sat.-Sun. IRONHORSE SALOON Bar and grill offering juicy hamburgers and cheeseburgers. 9125 Mann Road. Full bar, All CC. $. 501-562-4464. LD daily. J. GUMBO’S Fast-casual Cajun far served, primarily, in a bowl. Better than expected. 12911 Cantrell Road. Beer, All CC. $-$$. 501-916-9635. LD daily. JIMMY’S SERIOUS SANDWICHES Consistently fine sandwiches, side orders and desserts for 30 years. Chicken salad’s among the best in town, and there are fun specialty sandwiches such as Thai One On and The. Garden Get there early for lunch. 5116 W. Markham St. No alcohol, CC. $-$$. 501-666-3354. L Mon.-Sat., D Mon.-Sat. (drive-through only). KRAZY MIKE’S Po’Boys, catfish and shrimp and other fishes, fried chicken wings and all the expected sides served up fresh and hot to order on demand. 200 N. Bowman Road. Beer, All CC. $$. 501-907-6453. LD daily. LOCA LUNA Grilled meats, seafood and pasta dishes that never stray far from country roots, whether Italian, Spanish or Arkie. “Gourmet plate lunches” are good, as is Sunday brunch. 3519 Old Cantrell Road. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-663-4666. BR Sun., LD Mon.-Fri., D Sat. MILFORD TRACK Healthy and tasty are the key words at this deli/grill that serves breakfast and lunch. Hot entrees change daily and there are soups, sandwiches, salads and killer desserts. Bread is baked in-house, and there are several veggie options. 10809 Executive Center Dr., Searcy Building. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-223-2257. BL Mon.-Sat. OYSTER BAR Gumbo, red beans and rice (all you can eat on Mondays), peel-and-eat shrimp, oysters on the half shell, addictive po’ CONTINUED ON PAGE 38

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DINING CAPSULES, CONT. boys. Killer jukebox. 3003 W. Markham St. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-666-7100. LD Mon.-Sat. OZARK COUNTRY RESTAURANT A longstanding favorite with many Little Rock residents, the eatery specializes in big country breakfasts and pancakes plus sandwiches and several meat-and-two options for lunch and dinner. Try the pancakes and don’t leave without some sort of smoked meat. 202 Keightley Drive. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-663-7319. B daily, L Mon.-Fri., D Thu.-Sat. PURPLE COW DINER 1950s fare — cheeseburgers, chili dogs, thick milk shakes — in a ‘50s setting at today’s prices. Also at 11602 Chenal Parkway. 8026 Cantrell Road. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-221-3555. LD daily, BR Sat.-Sun. 11602 Chenal Pkwy. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-224-4433. LD daily, BR Sat.-Sun. 1419 Higden Ferry Road. Hot Springs. Beer, All CC. $$. 501-625-7999. LD daily, B Sun. THE RELAY This grill offers a short menu, which includes chicken strips, French fries, hamburgers, jalapeno poppers and cheese sticks. 12225 Stagecoach Road. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-455-9919. LD daily. THE ROOT CAFE Homey, local foods-focused cafe. With tasty burgers, homemade bratwurst, banh mi and a number of vegan and veggie options. Breakfast and Sunday brunch, too. 1500 S. Main St. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. BL Tue.-Sat., BR Sun. SALUT BISTRO This bistro/late-night hangout does upscale Italian for dinner and pub grub until the wee hours on the weekends. 1501 N. University. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-660-4200. L Mon.-Fri., D Tue.-Sat. SANDY’S HOMEPLACE CAFE Specializing in home style buffet, with two meats and seven vegetables to choose from. It’s all-you-can-eat.

1710 E 15th St. No alcohol, No CC. $. 501-3753216. L Mon.-Fri. SCALLIONS Reliably good food, great desserts, pleasant atmosphere, able servers — a solid lunch spot. 5110 Kavanaugh Blvd. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-666-6468. L Mon.-Sat. SHORTY SMALL’S Land of big, juicy burgers, massive cheese logs, smoky barbecue platters and the signature onion loaf. 1100 N. Rodney Parham Road. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-224-3344. LD daily. SONNY WILLIAMS’ STEAK ROOM Steaks, chicken and seafood in a wonderful setting in the River Market. Steak gets pricey, though. Menu is seasonal, changes every few months. 500 President Clinton Ave. Full bar, All CC. $$$. 501-324-2999. D Mon.-Sat. STAGECOACH GROCERY AND DELI Fine po’ boys and muffalettas — and cheap. 6024 Stagecoach Road. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-455-4157. BLD Mon.-Fri., BL Sat.-Sun. TERRI-LYNN’S BAR-B-Q AND DELI Highquality meats served on large sandwiches and good tamales served with chili or without (the better bargain). 10102 N. Rodney Parham Road. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-227-6371. BL Tue.-Fri., BLD Sat. (close at 5pm). WEST END SMOKEHOUSE AND TAVERN Its primary focus is a sports bar with 50-plus TVs, but the dinner entrees (grilled chicken, steaks and such) are plentiful and the bar food is upper quality. 215 N. Shackleford. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-224-7665. L Fri.-Sun., D daily. WINGSTOP It’s all about wings. The joint features ten flavors of chicken flappers for almost any palate, including mild, hot, Cajun and atomic, as well as specialty flavors like lemon pepper, teriyaki, Garlic parmesan and Hawaiian. 11321 West Markham St. Beer, All

CC. $-$$. 501-224-9464. LD daily.

ASIAN

A.W. LIN’S ASIAN CUISINE Excellent panAsian with wonderful service. 17717 Chenal Parkway. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-821-5398. LD daily. CHINA INN Massive Chinese buffet overflows with meaty and fresh dishes, augmented at dinner by boiled shrimp, oysters on the half shell and snow crab legs, all you want cheap. 2629 Lakewood Village Place. NLR. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-771-2288. LD daily. CURRY IN A HURRY Home-style Indian food with a focus on fresh ingredients and spices. 11121 North Rodney Parham. Beer, Wine, No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-224-4567. LD Mon., Wed.-Sun. HANAROO SUSHI BAR One of the few spots in downtown Little Rock to serve sushi. With an expansive menu, featuring largely Japanese fare. Try the popular Tuna Tatari bento box. 205 W. Capitol Ave. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$. 501-3017900. L Mon.-Fri., D Mon.-Sat. LEMONGRASS ASIA BISTRO Fairly solid Thai bistro. Try the Tom Kha Kai and white wine alligator. They don’t have a full bar, but you can order beer, wine and sake. 4629 E. McCain Blvd. NLR. Beer, Wine, All CC. 501-945-4638. LD Mon.-Sun. MR. CHEN’S ASIAN SUPERMARKET AND RESTAURANT A combination Asian restaurant and grocery with cheap, tasty and exotic offerings. 3901 S. University Ave. $. 501-562-7900. LD daily. NEW CHINA A burgeoning line of massive buffets, with hibachi grill, sushi, mounds of Chinese food and soft serve ice cream. 4617 John F. Kennedy Blvd. NLR. No alcohol, All CC.

$-$$. 501-753-8988. LD daily. 2104 Harkrider. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-764-1888. LD Mon.-Sun. PHO THANH MY It says “Vietnamese noodle soup” on the sign out front, and that’s what you should order. The pho comes in outrageously large portions with bean sprouts and fresh herbs. Traditional pork dishes, spring rolls and bubble tea also available. 302 N. Shackleford Road. No alcohol, All CC. $$. 501-312-7498. LD Mon, Wed.-Sun. SEKISUI Fresh-tasting sushi chain with fun hibachi grill and an overwhelming assortment of traditional entrees. Nice wine selection, also serves sake and specialty drinks. 219 N. Shackleford Road. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-221-7070. LD daily. SHOGUN JAPANESE STEAKHOUSE The chefs will dazzle you, as will the variety of tasty stir-fry combinations and the sushi bar. Usually crowded at night. 2815 Cantrell Road. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-666-7070. D daily. TOKYO HOUSE Defying stereotypes, this Japanese buffet serves up a broad range of fresh, slightly exotic fare — grilled calamari, octopus salad, dozens of varieties of fresh sushi — as well as more standard shrimp and steak options. 11 Shackleford Dr. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-219-4286. LD daily. WASABI Downtown sushi and Japanese cuisine. For lunch, there’s quick and hearty sushi samplers. 101 Main St. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-374-0777. L Mon.-Fri., D Mon.-Sat.

BARBECUE

CHIP’S BARBECUE Tasty, if a little pricey, barbecue piled high on sandwiches generously doused with the original tangy sauce or one of five other sauces. Better known for the

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DINING CAPSULES, CONT. incredible family recipe pies and cheesecakes, which come tall and wide. 9801 W. Markham St. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-225-4346. LD Mon.-Sat. DIXIE PIG Pig salad is tough to beat. It comes with loads of chopped pork atop crisp iceberg, doused with that wonderful vinegar-based sauce. The sandwiches are basic, and the sweet, thick sauce is fine. Serving Little Rock since 1923. 900 West 35th St. NLR. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-753-9650. LD Mon.-Sat. PIT STOP BAR AND GRILL A working-man’s bar and grill, with barbecue, burgers, breakfast and bologna sandwiches, plus live music on Friday and Saturday nights. 5506 Baseline Road. Full bar, No CC. $$. 501-562-9635. BLD daily.

EUROPEAN / ETHNIC

CREGEEN’S IRISH PUB Irish-themed pub with a large selection of on-tap and bottled British beers and ales, an Irish inspired menu and lots of nooks and crannies to meet in. Specialties include fish ‘n’ chips and Guinness beef stew. Live music on weekends and $5 cover on Saturdays, special brunch on Sunday. 301 Main St. NLR. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-376-7468. LD daily. ISTANBUL MEDITERRANEAN CUISINE This Turkish eatery offers decent kebabs and great starters. The red pepper hummus is a winner. So are Cigar Pastries. Possibly the best Turkish coffee in Central Arkansas. 11525 Cantrell Road. No alcohol, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-223-9332. LD daily. LAYLA’S GYROS AND PIZZERIA Delicious Mediterranean fare — gyros, falafel, shawarma, kabobs, hummus and babaganush — that has a devoted following. All meat is slaughtered according to Islamic dietary law. 9501 N Rodney Parham Road. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-227-7272. LD daily (close 5 p.m. on Sun.). NEXT BISTRO & BAR Mediterranean food and drinks. 2611 Kavanaugh Blvd. Full bar, All CC. 501-663-6398. D Tue.-Thu., Sat. TAZIKI’S GREEK FARE Fast casual chain that offers gyros, grilled meats and veggies, hummus and pimento cheese. 12800 Chenal Parkway. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$. 501-225-1829. LD daily.

ITALIAN

CAFE PREGO Dependable entrees of pasta, pork, seafood, steak and the like, plus great sauces, fresh mixed greens and delicious dressings, crisp-crunchy-cold gazpacho and tempting desserts in a comfy bistro setting. Little Rock standard for 18 years. 5510 Kavanaugh Blvd. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-663-5355. LD Mon.-Sat. CIAO ITALIAN RESTAURANT Don’t forget about this casual yet elegant bistro tucked

into a downtown storefront. The fine pasta and seafood dishes, ambiance and overall charm combine to make it a relaxing, enjoyable, affordable choice. 405 W. Seventh St. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-372-0238. L Mon.-Fri., D Thu.-Sat. GRADY’S PIZZA AND SUBS Pizza features a pleasing blend of cheeses rather than straight mozzarella. The grinder is a classic, the chef’s salad huge and tasty. 6801 W. 12th St., Suite C. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-663-1918. LD daily. IRIANA’S PIZZA Unbelievably generous handtossed New York style pizza with unmatched zest. Good salads, too; grinders are great, particularly the Italian sausage. 201 E. Markham St. Beer, Wine, All CC. $-$$. 501-374-3656. LD Mon.-Sat. THE ITALIAN KITCHEN AT LULAV Comfortably chic downtown bistro with excellent Italian fare. 220 A W. 6th St. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-3745100. L Mon.-Fri., D Mon.-Sat. MELLOW MUSHROOM Popular high-end pizza chain. 16103 Chenal Pkwy. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-379-9157. LD daily. PIZZERIA SANTA LUCIA A mobile pizza oven, imported from Italy, that churns out fine pies. They’re on the smaller side and not topped to excess, but quite flavorful. 1401 S Main St. No alcohol, All CC. $$. 501-666-1885. Various times. ROMANO’S MACARONI GRILL A chain restaurant with a large menu of pasta, chicken, beef, fish, unusual dishes like Italian nachos, and special dishes with a corporate bent. 11100 W Markham St. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-2213150. LD daily. U.S. PIZZA Crispy thin-crust pizzas, frosty beers and heaping salads drowned in creamy dressing. 2710 Kavanaugh Blvd. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-663-2198. LD daily. 5524 Kavanaugh Blvd. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$. 501-664-7071. LD daily. 9300 North Rodney Parham Road. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-224-6300. LD daily. 3307 Fair Park Blvd. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-565-6580. LD daily. 650 Edgewood Drive. Maumelle. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-8510880. LD daily. 3324 Pike Avenue. NLR. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-758-5997. LD daily. 4001 McCain Park Drive. NLR. Beer, Wine, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-753-2900. LD daily. ZAFFINO’S BY NORI A high-quality Italian dining experience. Pastas, entrees (don’t miss the veal marsala) and salads are all outstanding. 2001 E. Kiehl Ave. NLR. Beer, Wine, All CC. 501-834-7530. D Tue.-Sat.

LATINO

CANON GRILL Tex-Mex, pasta, sandwiches and salads. Creative appetizers come in huge quantities, and the varied main-course menu rarely disappoints, though it’s not as spicy as competitors’. 2811 Kavanaugh Blvd. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-664-2068. LD daily.

CHIPOTLE MEXICAN GRILL Burritos, burrito bowls, tacos and salads are the four main courses of choice — and there are four meats and several other options for filling them. Sizes are uniformly massive, quality is uniformly strong, and prices are uniformly low. 11525 Cantrell Road. All CC. $-$$. 501-221-0018. LD daily. COTIJA’S A branch off the famed La Hacienda family tree downtown, with a massive menu of tasty lunch and dinner specials, the familiar white cheese dip and sweet red and fieryhot green salsas, and friendly service. 406 S. Louisiana St. Full bar, All CC. $$. 501-244-0733. L Mon.-Fri. LA REGIONAL A full-service grocery store catering to SWLR’s Latino community, it’s the small grill tucked away in the back corner that should excite lovers of adventurous cuisine. The menu offers a whirlwind trip through Latin America, with delicacies from all across the Spanish-speaking world (try the El Salvadorian papusas, they’re great). Bring your Spanish/ English dictionary. 7414 Baseline Road. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-565-4440. BLD daily. TAQUERIA KARINA AND CAFE A real Mexican neighborhood cantina from the owners, to freshly baked pan dulce, to Mexicanbottled Cokes, to first-rate guacamole, to inexpensive tacos, burritos, quesadillas and a broad selection of Mexican-style seafood. 5309 W. 65th St. Beer, No CC. $. 501-562-3951. LD Tue.-Thu.

AROUND ARKANSAS

BENTON

DENTON’S TROTLINE Saline county-ites love the buffet dining that, besides great catfish, offers shrimp, chicken, gumbos and snow crab legs. 2150 Congo Road. Benton. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-315-1717. D Tue.-Sat. ED AND KAY’S The pies alone are worth a stop at this Benton-area mainstay. “Mile-High” pies topped with meringue and including coconut, chocolate and the famous PCP (pineapple, coconut, pecan) are dang good; plate lunches feature Arkansas-grown produce like PurpleHull peas and fresh garden tomatoes. Benton. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. (501) 315-3663. BLD. TAQUERIA AZTECA The best authentic Mexican in the Benton/Bryant area. Try the menudo on Saturday. 1526 Highway 5 N. Benton. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-794-1487. LD Mon.-Sat.

CONWAY

BLACKWOOD’S GYROS AND GRILL A wide variety of salads, sandwiches, gyros and burgers dot the menu at this veteran of Conway’s downtown district. 803 Harkrider Ave. Conway. No

alcohol, All CC. 501-329-3924. LD Mon.-Sat. BOB’S GRILL This popular spot for local diners features a meat-and-two-veg cafeteria style lunch and a decently large made-to-order breakfast menu. 1112 W. Oak St. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-379-9760. BL Daily. DUE AMICHE ITALIAN RESTAURANT Stromboli, pasta, pizza, calzones and other Italian favorites. 1600 Dave Ward Drive. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $$. 501-336-0976. LD Mon.-Sun. FABY’S RESTAURANT Unheralded MexicanContinental fusion focuses on handmade sauces and tortillas. 1023 Front Street. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $$. 501-513-1199. L daily, D Mon.-Sat. 2915 Dave Ward. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-329-5151. LD Mon.-Sun. FU LIN RESTAURANT Japanese steakhouse, seafood and sushi. Good variety, including items such as yam tempura, Karashi conch, Uzuzukuri and a nice selection of udon. 195 Farris. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-329-1415. LD Mon.-Sun. HOLLY’S COUNTRY COOKING Southern plate lunch specials weekdays. 120 Harkrider. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $. 501-328-9738. L Mon.-Fri. PITZA 42 You’ll find pizza made on pita bread and a broad salad menu here. 2235 Dave Ward Dr. Conway. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-2051380. ZAZA The Conway spin-off of the beloved Heights wood oven pizza, salad and gelato restaurant is bigger than its predecessor, with a full bar and mixed drink specials that rely on a massive orange and lime juicer. 1050 Ellis Ave. Conway. Full bar, All CC. $$-$$$. 501-336-9292. LD daily.

HOT SPRINGS

CULINARY DISTRICT A coffeehouse and lunch cafe inside a kitchen store/gourmet grocery with delectable sandwiches and such. The grilled cheese with bleu-cheese mayo is addictive. 510 Ouachita Ave. Hot Springs. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-624-2665. L Tue.-Sat. THE PANCAKE SHOP The Pancake Shop’s longevity owes to good food served up cheap, large pancakes and ham steaks, housemade apple butter and waitresses who still call you “honey.” 216 Central Avenue. Hot Springs. No alcohol, All CC. $-$$. 501-624-5720. BL daily. VINA MORITA RESTAURANT AND WINE BAR The chef and therefore the cuisine are from central Mexico, so while there are many items familiar to Arkies for whom “Mexican” means “Tex-Mex,” there are many more options, including amazing fish dishes and daily specials that impress. 610 Central Ave. Hot Springs. Full bar, All CC. $-$$. 501-6257143. LD daily. www.arktimes.com august 1, 2013 39 39 www.arktimes.com AUGUST 1, 2013