Metro Times 11/09/22

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metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

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NEWS & VIEWS Feedback

a lot of Chester arcol stories. Strange place then, strange now. Great work.

— J osep h W . A dams III, F acebook

W e received resp onses to J oe L ap ointe’ s story about the political influence of H illsdale College.

This is about fascism plain and simple.

— Rick ey W oody, F acebook

[ They] want a right-wing charter school in Grosse Pointe. What do you think losing another 100-200 students will do to our district? — @GP MIMemes, Twitter Fantastic article! Deep dive into this very scary institution. I wonder how enrollment is going at the Hillpoint school? Hopefully low. —@janefiore, Twitter y first job out of ichigan State was at the Hillsdale Daily News in 1976 . Heard

Joe’s investigative reporting reminds me why I loved Metro Times. Investigative reporting is, in my opinion, the most important read in safeguarding the rights of all people thorough honest, thorough and intelligent reporting for the sake of all who are kept unaware, intentionally or not. Metro Times should also make it easier to find these investigative stories on your weekly website feed. Thank you oe for your excellent reporting on this story.

Much appreciated. — A licia Banuchi, email

Vol. 43 | No. 4 | November 9-15, 2022

News & Views Feedback ............................... 4 News ...................................... 6 The Incision........................... 8 Cover Story How a first responder’s death might have sent an innocent man to prison. ..................... 10 What’s Going On Things to do this week ........ 18 Music Apollo Brown ....................... 20 Food Review ................................. 24 Bites ..................................... 26 Weed One-hitters ........................... 28 Culture Arts ...................................... 30 Film ...................................... 34 Savage Love ......................... 36 Horoscopes .......................... 38

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metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

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NEWS & VIEWS

The “kitty grotto,” so named because it’s been overrun by friendly stray cats.

RANDIAH CAMILLE GREEN

Welcome to The Convent, a wellness oasis and Airbnb in a former Detroit nunnery

By Randiah Camille Green A FLAG OF the Black Madonna blows in the wind at the entrance of The Convent — a new health and wellness community in Detroit.

Rather than nuns, the former convent on the edge of Detroit and Hamtramck is now occupied by private massage therapists, estheticians, visual artists, and even a psilocybin journey facilitator.

The owners of Detroit’s formerly infamous bathhouse The Schvitz purchased the convent in July of 2022 and quickly renovated it into a healing oasis where practitioners serve private clients in rooms that were once nuns’ quarters. A former chapel on the first floor will be used as a gallery space for art openings, yoga classes, and other events.

The owner of The Schvitz and The Convent, Paddy Lynch, says it will give affordable studio space to wellness practitioners and artists.

“A lot of the people who’ve been working out of The Schvitz for a number of years now have done really well there, but a lot of them are either mobile or working out of their homes,” he says. “I felt like not a ton of people had combined art and wellness, and this would be a nice space to make up for that.

Healers and wellness practitioners aren’t really seen as artists, but they kind of are. It’s like the healing arts.”

The Convent had its grand opening and open house on Saturday, Nov. 5 with an art exhibit, jazz music, and drinks, and a ribbon-cutting ceremony with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, though some tenants have already begun accepting clients.

The building was built in 1929 and occupied by the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth. It later became a host to a number of other occupants including a detox facility, nursing home, and shelter for battered women.

“My wife and I were educated by Polish nuns growing up and I’m really fascinated how the City of Detroit built more religious institutional architecture than almost any other city,” Lynch says.

“Much of it has gone into disrepair or isn’t being used. What do you do with these buildings? You certainly shouldn’t tear them down, and in some cases, they’re historically protected, so you’ve gotta find interesting and positive ways to use them.”

A grotto next door to The Convent is flanked by angels on either side and is dedicated to Our lady of Częstochowa, or the Black Madonna, who hangs above the community’s doorstep. Lynch doesn’t own the holy site, which he calls “the kitty grotto” because it’s been overrun by friendly stray cats, but it does

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reinforce the building’s storied history and add to its gothic lore.

Among the roughly 20 occupants at The Convent, there are six resident artists, two nonprofits, a lymphatic specialist, and a botox physician.

One of the nonprofits, Lynch & Sons Fund for the Arts (which is owned

by Lynch’s family), will be awarding six-month artist residences with studio space inside The Convent.

“At the end of that six months, they can show their work in the chapel or do a reading if they’re a poet or writer,” Lynch says.

There’s also an Airbnb inside called Magdalene, which co-owner Margarita Valbuena calls a “decompression getaway.”

The Airbnb space features a simple bedroom and living room with a couch, mini fridge, and walls adorned with work from artists in the building. The room goes for $75 a night, and the idea is that visitors will book a session with one of the practitioners during their stay.

“We want to keep it pretty accessible and simple,” Valbuena says. “It’s not fancy, per se. We’re not a luxury respite.

It’s more like, ‘Hey, you know the haunted convent? You wanna sleep here for a night?’”

Valbuena co-owns Magdalene with

three other women including Lynch’s sister Caitlin Lynch, who collectively call themselves the “choir girls.” Magdalene has had a few guests so far, who Valbuena tells us have said they “felt healing energy in the space.”

“It’s like a little retreat in Detroit for people who just want a night away from whatever their grind is,” she says. “Like an ‘I do a lot in my life and I need space to rest’ kind of place.”

While showing us around, Lynch adds that several clairvoyants have said the building may be haunted or have “heavy energy.”

“I’m told by some of the parishioners that it changed hands multiple times and a few of the operators were pretty sketchy, like the place just didn’t have good energy,” Lynch says. “People were locked up in here. We’ve had clairvoyants come through here and there’s a couple of rooms where they’re just like, woah.”

A staycation in a potentially-haunted former convent with a psilocybin journey or massage on top sounds pretty damn good to us.

The Convent is located at 13301 Mound Rd., Detroit. More information is available on Instagram, @convent_detroit and @magdalenedetroit.

Michigan GOP denigrated Muslims before courting them over ban on books MICHIGAN REPUBLICAN candidates and a large group of Muslims have found themselves on the same side of an issue — banning books in Dearborn.

Over the past month, the unlikely bedfellows have protested Dearborn Public Schools’ refusal to remove LGBTQ+ affirming books from libraries.

Conservative Republicans and some Muslim advocates held a “Unite America” rally in Dearborn, a heavily Democratic city that conservatives have long neglected because of the heavy presence of Islam.

Some of the Republicans who gathered in Dearborn have a history of making Islamophobic remarks and surrounding themselves with antiMuslim zealots. But that didn’t stop the far-right reactionaries from trying to score political points among Muslims ahead of the Nov. 8 election.

Among those featured at the rally were secretary of state candidate Kristina Karamo, attorney general hopeful Matt DePerno, and Michigan GOP Co-Chair MeShawn Maddock.

Karamo, a conspiracy theorist with a reputation for indulging in Christian nationalism, has described Islam as oppressive and violent. In a 2018 podcast, Karamo and a guest spent more than 50 minutes criticizing the Muslim Brotherhood and Muhammad, the founder of Islam whom Karamo called a sexual predator.

“Some of the things Muhammad did teach was it’s OK to rape. It’s OK to have a sex slave,” Karamo said. “People think many folks are just saying these things. It’s really true. He did teach that this type of behavior is permissible.”

In a video in 2018, Karamo said Islam is fundamentally violent.

“Oftentimes the media paints this picture that Islam is a peaceful religion,” Karamo said in a 2018 video.

“You can survey Islamic countries and say that is not the case. Name one Islamic country where a religious minority and women aren’t persecuted.

I’ll wait.”

Maddock and her husband, state Rep. Matt Maddock, R-Milford, also have a history of making anti-Muslim comments and speaking out against Muslim refugees.

In 2017, Meshawn Maddock bragged that she helped “support and promote” an “anti-sharia” rally in South-

Judge dismisses Karamo lawsuit seeking to reject tens of thousands of Detroit votes

Protesters rallied at DTW against former President Donald Trump’s 2017 travel ban.

field, where demonstrators spread misinformation about radical Islam taking hold in the U.S. The event was hosted by ACT for America, which claims Islamic law is incompatible with Western democracy. The Southern Poverty Law Center described ACT for America as an anti-Muslim hate group.

After a terrorist attack in France in 2015, Matt Maddock spread fear about Muslims in the U.S. “It’s inevitable the same terror and mayhem will happen here,” Maddock wrote on Facebook. “It’s just a matter of time. They are already here. Pay close attention to how this plays out and their tactics. Tell (Gov. Rick) Snyder we don’t need any more Muslim refugees.”

The Dearborn rally also featured Tamara D. Carlone, a fear-mongering conservative who is running for a seat on the Michigan State Board of Education. Carlone has repeatedly mocked the Islamic faith and called it anti-American.

In 2019, Carlone blasted training for public school teachers that was designed to dispel misinformation about Muslims.

“It is in the curriculum, the books, the teachers minds, and our kids will be lied to and told Christianity sucks and Islam rules,” Carlone wrote on Facebook.

“They are going after our innocent kids with young and developing minds on purpose,” Carlone added.

She shared demeaning memes of Muslims and falsely claimed that “We now Have a Muslim Government.”

“Our nation and our government has been infiltrated by people who want to destroy us,” the Facebook post reads. “It WILL only get worse. Plus John Kerry’s son in law is an Iranian

STEVE NEAVLING

muslim. Had enough?”

Despite her anti-Muslim views, The Detroit News endorsed Carlone.

All of the Republicans are also devout supporters of former President Donald Trump, who proposed banning Muslims from entering the country.

But none of that rhetoric was present at recent protests in Dearborn, where Republicans and the Muslims they have ridiculed came together to fight what both groups have falsely called attempts to indoctrinate children with LGBTQ+ ideology.

Protesters held signs like, “Keep your dirty books in the closet” and “Whatever happened to the good old days?”

“Dearborn is a diverse and vibrant community where Muslim families thrive and lead,” Sam Inglot, deputy director of the Progress Michigan Political Action Fund, tells Metro Times.

“Now, as part of a nationwide trend, right-wing extremist bad actors and Michigan Republican candidates are spreading disinformation in order to further their political agendas, despite spreading lies and fear about Islam for years.”

He adds, “Republicans are using Dearborn’s Muslim community to score political points, when in reality, they have no respect for those who practice Islam. The way Michigan Republicans have been twisting the truth for weeks to pit parents and teachers against each other is bad enough, but they have a history of denigrating the Muslim community. This display of two-faced politicking reminds us all how Republicans have no shame when it comes to using a community as political pawns, regardless of the damage they might cause.”

—Steve Neavling

A WAYNE COUNTY Circuit Court judge on Monday rejected a lawsuit

by Republican Secretary of State candidate Kristina Karamo that sought to trash tens of thousands of absentee ballots cast by Detroit voters in Tuesday’s election.

Judge Timothy M. Kenny slammed Karamo and her attorney for failing to “produce any shred of evidence.”

“While it is easy to hurl accusations of violations of law and corruption, it is another matter to come forward and produce the evidence our Constitution and laws require,” Kenny wrote in the order dismissing the case. “Plaintiffs failed, in a full day evidentiary hearing, to produce any shred of evidence.”

Karamo, an election denier who has made a plethora of false claims about election fraud, urged the court to require Detroit voters to cast their ballots in person or show an ID to vote absentee. To verify absentee ballots, election officials rely on signature verification, not photo identification.

Tens of thousands of Detroit voters have already cast absentee ballots.

In her lawsuit, Karamo cited a widely denounced propaganda film, 2000 Mules, by conservative provocateur Dinesh D’Souza, that falsely claimed widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election.

Kenny said there was no credible evidence in the lawsuit.

“These claims are unjustified, devoid of any evidentiary basis and cannot be allowed to stand,” Kenny said.

Although Karamo claimed that election fraud was statewide, her lawsuit targeted Detroit, a predominantly Black city that overwhelmingly votes for Democrats.

The judge’s ruling is just the latest embarrassing rebuke of Karamo’s baseless conspiratorial claims.

“Plaintiffs have raised a false flag of election law violations and corruption concerning Detroit’s procedures for the November 8th election,” Kenny wrote. “This Court’s ruling takes down that flag.”

—Steve Neavling

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

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NEWS & VIEWS

Social media and Trumpism have abstracted our politics into a reality show. Understanding that should shape how Democrats engage.

SCOTT R. GALVIN, UPI / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

The Incision

The Great American Political Reality Show™

By A bdul E l-S ayed

Late last month, Paul Pelosi,

husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was violently assaulted in his own home by a hammer-wielding assailant screaming, “Where’s Nancy?!”

Right-wing rhetoric validating violence as a political tool had claimed another victim. I tweeted as much.

Over time, facts have emerged to vindicate my assessment. But that hasn’t stopped Twitter spinmasters, including the new “Chief Twit” himself, lon usk, from floating baseless conspiracy theories. The lewder the better, it turns out.

What has surprised me about the situation isn’t how cynical right-wing Twitter and their bot army can be — trust me, I know a thing or two about that — but just how little people cared about the actual person underneath the whole thing.

I don’t know Paul or Nancy Pelosi.

I do not agree with Nancy Pelosi on everything. But you don’t have to know her to know she’s given her life’s work to serving our country — and has been absolutely vilified for it. also know a man having cranial surgery after being

attacked with a hammer deserves some respect.

Somehow, that man and what he and his family have endured has been lost in our Great American Political Reality Show™.

Our political discussion has focused on “polarization,” the observable fact that our two main political parties have never been further apart. We’ve also heard a lot about “negative partisanship,” or the way that the failure of the other side seems to evoke more emotion than the success of our own. And we’ve seen the violent consequences of all of this before. But what we sometimes miss is the way the media has abstracted us from real-world consequences. In an increasingly digitallyintermediated world, American politics is rendered abstract and distant by the screens through which we view it. Every actor has been wittingly or unwittingly cast as a character in an infinite reality show. Lost in the conversation about “wins” and “losses” are real people who live real lives. Paul Pelosi, a man who took a literal hammer to the head, was rendered into nothing more than sub-

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strate for the Show.

If the Show could strip away the humanity of a rich, powerful husband of a rich, powerful politician, imagine what it can do to the millions of people whose lives are thrown about by the passage or failure of legislation, big and small, that robs them of healthcare here, or trades a job away there?

Republicans not only understand this, they’ve driven and benefited from it. Indeed, the two most canonical Republican leaders of the past 40 years are Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump — one a former actor and the other a reality TV star. They thrive by decoupling the Show of our politics from its harsh realities.

What Reagn built, Trump optimized.

He recognizes that to many Americans, particularly those who support him, he’s little more than a character they see on TV. He captures the worst of their id and feeds it back to them.

They love him for it. It’s professional wrestling, but in suits.

That helps explain an obvious paradox of Trumpism: You might think that saying the worst things people think

out loud should come at some political cost. But if you say it enough, it does just the opposite. The Show desensitizes people. “That’s just Trump being Trump!” As if Trump being Trump was as harmless as the most annoying character doing that thing they do on that show you watch — as if Trump being Trump didn’t mean that schools would whither for lack of funding, healthcare less affordable, or kids around the country would get bullied in their schools because of their accents or who their parents were.

Rendering our politics into a reality show has consequences for those of us on the other side, too. I often hear an honest question from well-meaning Democrats: “How come we never just hit back?” Not hitting back is a sign of weakness, they argue; if we just took a few swings, then the public would see that we’re strong.

But we can’t just hit back. Think of your favorite sitcom. There’s always a cast of characters you get to know as the show progresses. By the end of a season, you have an idea of how they’re going to react to any given episode’s antics. Usually they do just what you’d predict. But if they deviate, even for a moment, the show’s writers usually make it the focus of an episode — taking great pains to explain why they zigged when you just knew they’d zag.

Character deviation is only acceptable when it’s fully explained.

In our political reality show, Democrats are the upstanding responsible ones. We’re Danny Tanner to the GOP’s Uncle Jesse, (except in this version of F ull H ouse, Uncle Jesse is scheming to burn down the house and run away with the insurance money). Imagine if Danny were to behave like Uncle Jesse does all the time — you’d wonder what got into him. It’s so … out of character.

Meanwhile, if Uncle Jesse acts responsibly for once, all he hears is applause. By turning our politics into an abstracted, disintermediated reality show, Republicans have figured out how to persistently lower the bar for themselves in the eyes of the viewers, while holding Democrats accountable to the highest ideals of the character they play.

But there’s a reason someone has to play that role. It’s because they understand that our politics are not a show. There are real lives at stake when the Supreme Court upends the right to choose when, where, and with whom to create a family, or when politicians throttle Medicaid to pass tax cuts for their donors. None of us should forget that. Our job, in fact, is to keep reminding America of it.

O riginally p ublished Nov. 1 in The Incision. Get more at abdulelsayed.com.

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PHOTO: KELLEY O’NEILL

Fire wall Fire wall How a first responder’s death might have sent an innocent man to prison

By Eddie B. Allen Jr.

IN

the redemptive setting of Ypsilanti’s Second Baptist Church a well-dressed woman with a pleasant smile greets a man just released from prison. On this sunny September afternoon Ronnell Johnson is free after 14 years, following what the Washtenaw County prosecutor determined to be a wrongful robbery conviction.

The woman co hosting ohnson’s reception through the mbassadors roup, a nonprofit support initiative, is Maxine Willis, who hopes the next homecoming will answer a prayer. Her son, Mario Willis, is serving year 12 of a 3 0-year minimum sentence for the 2008 blaze that killed firefighter alter arris.

“The reason that you see all this here,” she later says, near basement shelves of court files, “is that it’s heart-wrenching to have a child in prison. But I didn’t just want to be a mother who said, ‘My child didn’t do this.’ I wanted to show it through evidence and facts.”

Convicted in what prosecutors framed as an arsonfor-insurance money scheme at 74 18 East Kirby St. in Detroit, Mario Willis and his advocates await a judge’s decision, following a motion that could win his freedom. The filing includes disturbing claims of coercion and suppressed evidence while Willis was painted as villain in a crime widely regarded as one of Detroit’s worst of the decade.

“I’ve been looking forward to having the opportunity to tell my story and have this false narrative changed,” he says from Saginaw Correctional Facility during a telephone call with Metro Times.

Among numerous, sometimes complex, issues that Willis says snowballed into his imprisonment are: n F als e tes tim ony: Darian Ivan Dove, the central figure in illis’s conviction, alleges detectives Scott Shea and Lance Sullivan refused to accept that the fire which killed arris

was accidental; Dove, who is serving a 17-year minimum sentence, ultimately testified that illis paid him to set the fire, then ove tried to recant the story. n M is leading s tatem ents : Rance Dixon, then a Detroit Fire Department investigator, allegedly misidentified the location of gasoline detected at 74 18 East Kirby, testifying that its placement proved the blaze was deliberately set. n I ns u rance cov erag e: Evidence jurors were presented, but Willis’s current attorney believes they misunderstood, shows that 74 18 East Kirby wasn’t even insured in a way that would let illis profit from its destruction. n W ith h eld ev idence: Jurors never saw videorecorded footage in which Willis and his future

wife explain their whereabouts on the night of the fire.

“That ‘innocent until proven guilty?’ That’s not true,” says Willis, 4 1. “You have to prove your innocence. The law doesn’t say it, but in actuality you do.”

His insider’s understanding of the criminal justice system is nothing he or his family would have predicted.

Coming from a stable, two-parent, Christian home, perhaps no one thought a future including prison less imaginable than Mario Lamont Willis. While a student at St. Martin DePorres High School he played trumpet in the band and competed on the squad of DePorres’s football team champions. A 1997 Detroit News profile of the teenager in the special “On Detroit” section, with the headline “Doin’ the Right Thing,” describes how Willis performed for younger children as part of his mother’s drug awareness group. Then six-foot-three and 256 pounds, Willis was known to don a costume, transforming into Z ack the Lion, to help Maxine Willis deliver positive messages to her audience.

Graduating from DePorres in 1999, he won a football scholarship to play lineman at Eastern Michigan University, but a car accident that left Willis susceptible to concussions forced a change of plans. Still, being what he calls “a glass-half-full kinda guy,” he bounced back.

“My father had always owned property. Both of my parents are entrepreneurs, so I enrolled back at Davenport University as a marketing major,” says Willis.

Equipped with Davenport’s instruction and supMaxine Willis believes her son Mario is innocent.

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port from his family, he began learning the real estate game. One mentor and asset was his godfather, the late Detroit business trailblazer and former NFL pro, Brady Keys. Known for operating successful Burger King and Kentucky Fried Chicken franchises in the 1980s and 1990s, Keys had also inspired and backed “K.E.Y.S. Kids” (an acronym for “Kids Enjoy YourSelves”), the drug prevention program with a TV show Maxine Willis produced for WHPR-TV in Highland Park. Before long, Keys had groomed his ambitious, young godson to take over a struggling shop in Detroit.

“He allowed me to manage it for a year and he was so impressed that I was able to bring the numbers back, he allowed me the opportunity to acquire the business,” Willis proudly recalls.

Located on West McNichols, Ramsey & Ramsey beauty shop became Mario’s Hair Salon, named for a large, bald man who didn’t need its services.

Good Samaritans Progress continued as illis bought his first residential property, a three-unit apartment building. He focused on Detroit real estate, he says, having been taught by his parents, “I need to live in my city, I need to own in my city.” He eventually bought about a half-dozen more homes, including 74 18 East Kirby. Along with a sense of personal fulfillment, illis’s contributions toward renewing the community’s landscape earned him a 2005 resolution from Detroit City Council.

Meanwhile, a struggling outsider to the family had come to the attention of Marvin Willis, Mario’s dad.

Marvin, a former entertainer with the Detroit Emeralds and co-writer of the 1970s R& B classic “Float On,” oversaw K.E.Y.S. Kids Plaza, the studio and building that also housed Mario’s Hair Salon. Marvin had hired Darian Dove, who was then in his late-3 0s, to do odd jobs and repairs, but when work became scarce he referred Dove to Mario.

“This is kind of what we do. We help people out,” Mario Willis says.

Dove, who declined a request to be interviewed by Metro Times, had substance abuse issues and a criminal record that included felonies, adds Willis. But his work was solid, so Willis took him on, even giving him a place to stay. Preferring the nickname “Gino,” Dove was embraced by the Willis clan. As he proved himself a reliable handyman, Dove made an agreement with Mario to trade the equivalent of monthly rent for part of his salary, so Dove and a girlfriend moved into one of Willis’s houses.

Willis’s wife, then his high school sweetheart, has fond early memories of Dove and Valorie Ann Williams, to whom she occasionally gave clothing.

“Honestly, I liked them. They had grown to be like family in a lot of ways,” says Megan Willis. “I’m very protective of Mario, so I try and keep an eye on people who are around him.”

She says Dove occasionally grumbled that other maintenance workers who’d been hired were affecting his pay, but she saw no signs of disloyalty. Now and then came word of tools disappearing from properties where “Gino” had worked, yet his relationships with the Willis family remained intact. n there was a small fire at ast irby, but the cause was undetermined after investigators identified nothing suspicious. By then illis had sold the house to Megan, so he hired Dove to help repair the damage. They discussed the possibility of Dove

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becoming a tenant there when it was livable again. It would take a tragedy, a homicide investigation, and three years for Willis to learn that Dove began accessing the house without anyone’s permission.

A TALE OF TWO DATES The facts of what happened at 74 18 East Kirby Saturday, Nov. 15, 2008 would be debated for years, but one thing Willis and Dove both claim their night involved was enjoying a woman’s company. Willis and Megan, who married in 2009, made regular practice of scheduling quality time together, so it was dinner and a movie for them. Dove’s encounter was much more complicated, mainly because his date for the night wasn’t the lady with whom he lived. He’d run into a woman who has been identified only as elisha and went with her to East Kirby hours before Walter Harris would die at the scene. What Dove apparently imagined to be a harmless bit of trespassing at Megan’s property ended in a 911 call. He’d later say he caused the blaze while trying to keep Felisha warm when a flammable concoction spilled from its container.

On Sunday morning the fire department called Megan, telling her about the incident during which the roof of the building reportedly collapsed with Harris inside. Today she still maintains she and Willis had slept together through the night. Although she owned the East Kirby house, Willis helped address investigators’ questions, given his familiarity with its history of break ins and the previous year’s fire. “ ou have the death of a first responder, so ’m giving them everything they think they need,” he recalls.

While the community mourned Harris, who was regarded as one of the Detroit Fire Department’s finest and most well liked, weeks and months passed.

Dove attended Willis family gatherings and performed regular work tasks, never mentioning any firsthand knowledge of what occurred at ast Kirby. But by the next year he found himself on the radar of Detroit Police. n a five page, handwritten account ove points fingers directly at etroit Police etectives Lance Sullivan and Scott Shea, the homicide investigators who interviewed him and Willis on multiple, separate occasions, stating “ the date was, first time, June 9, 2009, I, Mr. Dove, was arrested … now they want to put words in my mouth … they are telling me that I can spend the rest of my life in prison.”

The letter further describes a call placed while Dove was in police custody, alleging that Sullivan urged him “to get Mr. Mario to say something on the phone to get him in jail.” But “that did not work at all, so they got mad and put me back in the cell,” Dove writes.

A recording of the conversation Dove describes was never played for the jury during Willis’s eight-day trial in April 2010.

“It wasn’t making sense to me,” Willis says, remembering the call. “ e went from talking about traffic tickets to talking about this fire.”

Seemingly puzzled by Dove’s questions like, “What if somebody saw me that morning?” Willis answers, “I don’t even know what you talking about, dog.’”

(The term “dog” is slang for “man.”)

Later in the call, Dove says, “I need to know what the hell to say.”

“The truth, shit. Hell,” Willis replies. “What you mean, ‘what to say?’ Nothing. You said that like you trying to make something up.”

ot much later illis says he finally learned ove was connected to the fire. hat he still didn’t know is that Dove had been rehearsing what Willis calls an outright lie, one Dove would repeat before a judge, fearing a conviction for Harris’s death would seal his own death in prison, due to habitual offenses.

In a conversation with Sullivan, secretly recorded after Dove’s release from jail, Dove’s tone is resentful as he says Willis did nothing for Dove’s girlfriend while he was in custody.

“That fits the whole pattern,” etective Sullivan says. “The whole ‘I’m above you,’ ‘I don’t care about you … I’m a so-called business man. I own all these houses.’”

In less than a year, Willis would listen from a defendant’s table at Frank Murphy Hall of Justice as the government depicted him in a similar way.

Forces and factors Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Robert Stevens told jurors Dove was “an ordinary minion who thrives and survives based on what (Willis) provides him for work.”

“He’s a nothin’. He’s a handyman,” Stevens declared, adding, “… his boss, a coward who sends this person out to take the hit.”

Having accepted a plea deal to reduce his sentence, ove no longer insisted the fire was a tragic accident he mounted the witness stand, saying Willis wanted the house burned to collect insurance money. In return for his cooperation Dove was handed a seconddegree murder conviction, but Willis’s appellate lawyer Craig Daly says he likely would be serving no prison time, had he maintained his original story of the accident.

“That’s a weak manslaughter, negligence case. I think they would have had a hell of a time trying to prosecute him,” says Daly.

Dove’s recorded 911 call, during which the mysterious Felisha’s voice is reportedly heard in the background, and Dove’s claim to Sullivan of having tried to smother the fire himself, suggest lack of intent, says Daly, not to mention lack of foresight that Harris would die.

“That’s a tough, tough case,” Daly adds.

Willis, too, remains puzzled that jurors weren’t more doubtful about a conspiracy after hearing Dove’s 911 call.

“If you want something burned to get money, you want the most damage possible,” he says. “You’re not dialing 911 for help.”

But there were more issues for Willis to overcome: Lt. Rance Dixon, Detroit Fire Department’s investigator, testified that flames started along the house’s walls, consistent with a deliberate attempt to burn the structure vertically for maximum destruction in minimum time. In fact, samples Dixon took were tested by Michigan State Police forensic experts, showing that only charred floor boards tested positive for gasoline — supporting Dove’s explanation that an accelerant could have spilled when the container was kicked.

“I think what happened is that he had a theory,” aly says of i on, “and he changed the facts to fit his theory.”

Dixon could not be reached for comment, despite a Metro Times interview request to the Detroit Fire Department.

If not somehow unpersuasive, perhaps more confusing to jurors was a discussion of the insurance coverage at 74 18 East Kirby.

“In this case, the homeowner’s policy had lapsed, so the mortgage company put on it what they call a ‘forced-placed’ insurance policy,” adds Daly.

A 2018 letter requested by Willis for his appeal and e oneration efforts states that proceeds from the policy “would have been issued to the mortgage company.”

Referring to statements made during trial, Kenneth . orotkin, insurance counselor with the Southfield based Korotkin Insurance Group, adds, “There were numerous references made that Mario Willis had pure financial reasons to obtain proceeds or profit from a fire at . irby on ov. , . ario illis, again, would not have been entitled to any of the insurance proceeds.” (Neither Korotkin, nor his insurance agency, had associations with 74 18 East Kirby.)

Korotkin’s letter also stresses that Willis no longer owned the house since he’d sold it to Megan, who “would also not have received any direct benefit,” because forced-placed coverage solely protects “the mortgage company for the amount owed to them.”

“Unless you’re talking about it like we are, in context, calmly, the jury hears about it and it sounds bad, doesn’t it?” Daly admits. “Forced insurance.”

He adds, “Megan took a loss on this of tens of thousands of dollars, because they weren’t going to get any insurance money.”

Willis says he and Megan learned only when it was reported by TV news that the house they’d still planned to restore was demolished by the city three weeks after the fire. There had been no opportunity to hire an adjuster and the permit to raze the building wasn’t issued until two days after it was leveled, Willis says.

Almost a year before his trial, a property he owned on the other side of town was damaged after police kicked in its door, shocking tenants who lived there.

PHOTO: COURTESY OF MAXINE WILLIS

Mario Willis and Megan, who married in 2009, say they were together on the night of the Nov. 15, 2008 fire.

They’d come to the wrong address, expecting to arrest Willis, who was licensed to carry the pistol he says was near him at his actual home with Megan in Farmington Hills.

“It would have been Breonna Taylor before Breonna Taylor,” he says, comparing the breach to a Louisville, Kentucky, case that drew nationwide attention.

Taylor died in 2020 after she was stricken by police, who said they fired shots in response to her boyfriend Kenneth Walker. Walker admitted shooting out of fear for his and Taylor’s lives when he thought the cops were criminal intruders.

“I thank God I wasn’t there,” Willis says, “because if I had been home with Megan and they had the right address, they would have killed me.”

He voluntarily turned himself in to police after learning of their mistake.

A lonesome Dove The rental property incident left Willis shaken, but also suspicious. Shea and Sullivan had come to the house when Willis still lived there, interacting with him peacefully, despite knowledge of his CCW permit. The detectives knocked, saying they had a warrant to take his vehicle as part of their investigation, Willis recalls. When he asked to grab his briefcase from the Ford Excursion, they agreed, but frisked him first to be sure his pistol wasn’t within reach.

He later wondered: Had the cops who swarmed the house hoped he’d shoot at them out of fear when they kicked in the rental home’s door?

The black Ford Excursion he drove became an-

other point of dispute at Willis’s trial. He recalls an interview when detectives showed him a DVD case, saying they had footage of his SUV from the night of the fire.

“No, you don’t,” Willis answered.

They had images not only from the same date, but placing his truck near 74 18 East Kirby, the cops told him.

“No, you don’t,” Willis repeated.

In his revised version of the events, Dove told police he and Willis drove to a gas station at Mt. Elliott and Gratiot, parking as they watched 74 18 East Kirby burn. Prosecutors called a police expert to testify about images of the Excursion captured at a fueling location. Despite lacking a date or time stamp, what Willis calls “maybe about 3 0 seconds of fuzzy video” was shown to the jury, suggesting Willis’s vehicle might, indeed, have been where Dove placed it. Even the police witness acknowledged the footage was a re-creation, but Judge Michael Callahan allowed the video, despite defense objections.

“This is cheating! ” says Bill Proctor, the former WX YZ Channel 7 reporter and a private investigator hired by Willis’s family. fter filling key roles in freeing wrongfully convicted men from prison, Proctor says the level of malfeasance by police, fire, and court officials in illis’s case is particularly striking.

“The government gets to do that,” he adds. “They have all the authority and all of the influence. They come in the door pounding their chest and saying, ‘I’m right! ’ even when they know they’re wrong.”

Deciding the prosecution was indeed correct, jurors convicted Willis.

Having played star witness a month earlier, Dove, who Maxine Willis describes as “a character,” appears to have felt isolated when several weeks after beginning his sentence he sent her a letter and makeshift Mother’s Day card. Signed “Gino” and “D. Dove,” the letter’s content suggests levels of comfort and entitlement that seem to contrast the reality that he helped send Maxine’s youngest son to prison.

“Hi, mama,” he writes in the missive dated May 1, 2010. “This is your stepson. Well I have been alright in here, but miss y’all nd wish that can finish helping Pops with the building, because that was fun.

Maybe when I come home I hope that I will still have a job.”

Adding, “mama, I am so, so sorry,” Dove ruminates, wishing he could “start over with” his life and asking God to help him “get through this and come back home with my family that took me in.” eceiving no response from a ine, five weeks later, Dove penned a compelling attempt to recant his testimony against Mario Willis. The letter, which finds ove often referring to himself in third person, reads in part: “I remember that morning about 2: 3 0 a.m. or 3 : 20 a.m. on Nov. 15, 2008. That I did talk with Felisha, because we was old friends at that time, because I met her at a friend’s house, and we was talking about having fun and we had some beers & weed, but I did not smoke weed. So we [ decided] to go over to East Kirby Street … and then she said she had to use the bathroom … So we went in and took the beer & weed in the house, and it was a little cold in the house … but then, after that, we was playing around … and she, Felisha, said, ‘Is it any heat in the house to break the chill?’ … And it was some gas in the house because I had found some wood and a big piece of metal, and I poured a little gas on the metal

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and started a little fire to keep ove & elisha warm, but forgot to move the plastic gas can and we was kissing, and before knew what was going to happen please, please was not trying to put the house on fire.” ove details feeling “scared to death” while elisha was in tears, attempting to smother the fire with clothing items and eventually finding a nearby pay phone to dial . ttempts by illis’s defense team and investigators to locate elisha, whose voice is reportedly heard describing firefighters arriving in the distance, all failed.

“But let’s get this right,” ove’s letter continues. “ don’t know why the people are saying that r. ove did this fire on ast irby for . nd for a fireman to get killed, would never do something like that in my life, because ario is my boss and he let r. ove stay in one of his houses. nd ario did not hire r. ove to burn down the house, because that was gonna be my house with my girlfriend.” ove describes having bumped his head while trying to contain the blaze, and learning that “by the morning they were short a fireman” after arris’s death. e vents frustration at the media’s portrayal of the accident “like r. ove is a killer and r. ario is the mastermind of the situation.” ove’s letter concludes with regret that arris lost his life, reiterating illis’s innocence “ nd promise that r. illis was not around when was over on ast irby Street r. illis did not know nothing about this situation at all. had keys to the house, and did not want to go and pay for a motel room” to entertain elisha.

Painstakingly detailed and often emotional, ove’s account ultimately failed as a formal recantation of damning testimony against his one time benefactor.

The ichigan Court of ppeals rejected the lengthy “truth statement,” as ove titled it.

“The recanting statements are particularly suspect,” wrote the appeals judges, “because, assuming that ove actually made the statements, he apparently waited until after he learned the full e tent of his sentence and made statements that tended to reduce his own culpability by characterizing the fire as accidental.”

But just a few paragraphs earlier in the written decision the panel acknowledges the recantation as “consistent with ove’s original claims in une ” nearly a full year before ove was ever sentenced. aly wanted to recall ove to the witness stand and cross e amine him about the statement, but the Court of ppeals denied the effort, refusing illis’s re uest for a new trial. aly says he understands doubts about ove, given changes in his story. t one point before sentencing, ove even flip flopped into alleging that illis joined him inside the ast irby house, impatient because he wasn’t seeing flames “ stated to him that could not do it. That’s when he snatched the lighter from me, stating, our dumb ass can’t do anything right ’ and set the house on fire. e both ran out of the house.”

But aly points out that ove gave recantation a second try in a sworn affidavit dated arch , , insisting, “ ario illis had nothing to do with the fire.” “ uring their interrogations,” ove’s statement reads, “the police insisted that was paid by ario to set the fire and they told me could be forgiven for the fire if ario paid me to set it. They made the idea seem very appealing and they pushed very hard for me to adopt their story.”

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aly says ove’s affidavit subjects him, once again, to a cross e amination if illis is granted the motion for relief and evidentiary hearing being filed this month. The statement actually boosts ove’s credibility, he adds. “ would say that no one would go to court and say that they lied under oath, knowing that could put him in prison for the rest of his life,” aly says. “ arian ove is eligible to be released soon. hy would he risk it f he gets on the stand and says he lied, the deal he accepted is off.”

‘Damn! You caught a body?’ bout si weeks after ove’s affidavit an additional sworn statement from alorie nn illiams was given in support of illis’s innocence. “ n ovember of was paying very close attention to ove’s comings and goings from our home because knew he was cheating on me,” the affidavit reads. “ slept very little and very lightly during that time, and made sure was always awake when ove left and returned.” illiams is certain illis never retrieved ove after midnight the date of the fire, as ove told authorities illis had, because “ illis never came to our house for any reason after p.m.” “ always knew when ario came by in the big truck, because it would vibrate the windows because of the engine size,” her statement reads.

But detectives never interviewed illiams, who concludes “ f they had, would have told them the truth.”

Back in a former carpenter and one time housing inspector named alter Collier awaited his own interview about an encounter with ove. hile at ayne County ail a year earlier, on charges of which he was eventually cleared, Collier heard the familiar description of the ast irby blaze as accidental. ove “told me he was with a woman when this happened he also told me that ario illis had given his name to the police and he was going to get back at him for doing that,” reads Collier’s affidavit.

Still unaware ove had been there ov. , , illis says he told investigators about ove only when they asked for names of those who had access to the dwelling. aly says his client’s transparency further demonstrates innocence because it defies logic for a criminal to identify his co conspirator. “ ou are not going to do that with an arson for profit,” aily adds, “especially not with someone like arian ove.” hen Collier une pectedly found himself in a courtroom “bullpen” with illis while awaiting the verdict in his own case, he shared ove’s story and was asked to call illis’s then attorney right Blake. “ fter was found not guilty and released called r.

Blake and left my name and number,” Collier states.

Later missing the returned call from Blake, he says he tried reaching the lawyer again, leaving his name and number, but was never contacted to testify in illis’s defense. man identified as ikemo Burton crossed paths with ove, who he knew as “ une Bug,” in lockup a few months later, according to Burton’s unsworn, handwritten statement. “ asked him how much time he was in for. e told me years,’” reads the paragraph printed on ichi-

gan epartment of Corrections Prisoner Stationery. “ said, amn ou caught a body or something ’ e went on to tell me he was over off irby and Townsend at a house with one of his girls. They was getting high and made a mistake and started a fire. e said they called and left, but the ne t day he heard a firefighter died and the rest is history. nd that was why he was here and with so much time.”

Like illiams and Collier, Burton remains unknown to jurors who’d been chosen to vote for ario illis’s guilt or innocence.

Commissioning an alibi nother figure who would remain unknown to jurors has become much more familiar to the public in . Chuck Simms, then a lieutenant and arson investigator for the etroit ire epartment, was recently promoted from interim commissioner to the commissioner post. Simms, whose name appeared on both the prosecution and defense witness lists, was ultimately never called to testify, but has revealed himself as a potential asset in illis’s e oneration efforts. Simms intercepted illis on une , after illis says he was tricked into visiting the police precinct, although he’d willingly answered uestions about the fire. egan illis was being held on traffic related charges, he was told. “ t was a complete lie,” he says. “ never paid .

She never had any warrants. don’t know why they felt the need to concoct a story.” n fact, he says, egan had been uestioned about the fire and what she and ario did during the hours leading to it “date night,” dinner and a movie, she’s recorded saying before telling detectives they slept at home until the ne t day. egan had already left the precinct when illis arrived with cash in hand, so he cut short the ensuing conversation with detectives after their uestions became “accusatory,” he says. eading out the door, he was greeted by then Lt. Simms. “ ey, ario, don’t leave,” illis recalls Simms saying. lthough eager to get back to an aluminum siding job at one of his properties, illis agreed to talk,

say anything and knew it was guilty.’ passed out.”

Opposite page: Darian Dove testified that Willis (this page) paid him $20 to set the fire before recanting the story.

but asked that they first step into an empty interrogation room.

Simms had interviewed illis on ov. , , four days after the fire, but illis only remembered his face. t one point during their video recorded talk at the precinct he asks the lieutenant’s name, to which Simms replies, “Chuck,” though he doesn’t appear in the camera’s view. cerpts from actual interviews conducted with illis and egan by Simms, etective Shea, and etective Sullivan are posted at justiceformariowillis. com, the website launched by supporters in . “ ou remember what you told me, right ” Simms asks illis. “ remember you told me y’all went out that night. ’all went out to dinner or something.”

Simms’s memory is significant, says illis, because, despite illis’s and egan’s repeated, matching accounts to police and fire officers of how they spent the night of arris’s death, etective Shea testified at trial that illis never gave an alibi. Shea took the stand, saying he “reviewed the entire file.” hen reached by phone, Shea, no longer a P officer, declined to comment about the investigation.

Sullivan could not be reached, despite two interview re uests through etroit Police edia elations.

Simms did not respond to several telephone and email re uests to be interviewed by Metro Times.

Like illis, it’s likely the commissioner was clueless that his confirmation of the alibi was being recorded. lso apparently clueless were police who’d continued recording in the same interrogation room where egan sat more than an hour earlier. illis had inadvertently chosen an empty cubicle that preserved both his and egan’s words. But the discovery wouldn’t be made until three months after illis was convicted. is dad arvin owned and operated a video production company. Late nights, a ine illis lay in bed while her husband reviewed footage of the investigation that took their son away from them. “ would just hear him saying, Shut up, ario ou talking too much et up and get outta there ’” a ine recalls she, too, wishing illis hadn’t spoken without a lawyer.

One evening, arvin dozed off while watching the interview detectives conducted with his daughter in law, egan. But he woke up to a familiar voice none of them knew was also contained on the tape ario’s. lbeit too late to keep him out of prison, his answers to Simms’s uestions proved ario had shared his whereabouts on ov. , . et, having failed to convince jurors he was in bed with egan, illis was stuck. The prosecution had mocked the notion of his transparency, despite knowing illis filed a re uired alibi notice with the court, meeting the deadline, says appellate lawyer aly.

“The thing that’s stunning is that nobody jumped up to object and the judge never said, ait a minute. That’s not a proper argument,’” aly says.

But egan says someone had indeed jumped while she was on the stand testifying in illis’s defense, only she insists ssistant Prosecutor Stevens leaped for the wrong reason. “ remember very clearly the man jumping up and down and asking, if ario and were together, why didn’t tell anybody,” egan says. ithout Shea affirming the fact that she had, and PHOTOS: MICHIGAN DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS

Fire wall

with none of the video evidence that clearly proves it, even udge Callahan took illis to the woodshed, lecturing him about trying to deceive the court with egan’s testimony. egan says she took particular offense at the idea she was manipulated, given her partnership with the man she’s known since they were teenagers. Callahan issued illis, who was and had no criminal record, a whopping to years in prison, improperly e ceeding sentencing guidelines. illis has been re sentenced four times, each with media fanfare and members of the etroit ire epartment making their presence felt at rank urphy all of ustice downtown. n years practicing law, aly says he’s never seen displays like those etroit ire personnel have coordinated at illis’s appearances, such as filling the courtroom and parking a ladder rig in front of rank urphy.

Both illis and egan say various personnel observing proceedings often did whatever they could to rattle nerves.

“Because was on bond, was walking into the courtroom everyday with my wife, my family, and my supporters, and there was definitely an intimidation factor,” illis recalls.

Sneers and curses were directed his way, even with his mother beside him, he says, causing the e lineman to wonder, “ hat if they try to do something to me ” Similarly, egan says firefighters would do things like “follow you onto the elevator” or populate stairs leading to the courthouse entrance, but she kept her “head held high.” “ was representing ario and didn’t want them to know they were getting to us.”

Later she’d slip away by herself “ would go into the bathroom and cry,” she says. “ know that bathroom very well.” major moment when she didn’t cry was at the trial’s conclusion, her body reacting too uickly for tears to form. earing that the jury reached its verdict, egan left her job, but she arrived at rank urphy after the illis family had already left the courtroom. “ can see it like it was yesterday,” she says. “The elevator doors opened and saw their faces. They didn’t

sked if her son had truly achieved the mini an ilbert, real estate magnate status jurors were led to believe he had, a ine illis lets out a laugh. “ o ust doing O ,” she says, “had five or si properties that my sister helped him invest in.”

Through decades of work, which included producing a puppet show for ancy eagan during eagan’s “ ust Say o” anti drug campaign, a ine has collaborated with the same agencies that helped convict her son. “ ’ve been around these groups and ’ve seen them do great things,” she says, “but to have them come to trial and distort, and line up fire trucks and carry signs that said, ario illis, murderer ’ hate to say it, because my momma told me you don’t call people liars but they lied.”

Pooling resources with relatives including egan’s parents, and occasionally organizing fundraisers, a ine estimates they’ve spent “probably , ” in legal fees since . There have been other costs, too The , s uare foot . . .S. ids Plaza, former home of ario’s air Salon, mysteriously went up in flames. Battle scarred and feeling unsafe, in a ine and arvin illis left their west side etroit home of years.

Like countless numbers of etroiters, in the wake of arris’s death a ine heard positive things about him. “ y son is also a good man. Two good men were lost,” she says. ttempts by Metro Times to interview or gain reporting assistance from no fewer than si etroit ire epartment e ecutive level or staff members were all unsuccessful. dditionally, a Sept. , reedom of nformation ct re uest for fire investigation records related to ast irby remains unanswered, in violation of ichigan statute.

Proctor, the private investigator, says firefighter culture is comparable with, if not more rigid than, the so called “blue curtain” attributed to police.

“Think about it this way,” adds Proctor. “ iremen literally live with one another where they’re in the beds, they’re showering, they’re in space together as much as they are with their own family.” esire to gain accolades from a high profile case like arris’s death might also have fueled action and inaction by fire and police officers, says Proctor “There are people whose ambition drives them to do things in uniform and behind blue curtains,’ and that kind of crap, but a lot of the bad acts that we see have to do with the idea of guys on a treadmill, under pressure to close cases.” ith a record of zero “tickets,” meaning citations for breaking prison rules, illis has channeled his energy into daily e ercise, helping to host church services, and supporting a youth diversion program at Saginaw Correctional in the years he has served. e’s hopeful his court case is reopened, if not through the motion for relief, through ayne County’s Conviction ntegrity nit C , which received the case in spring . aria iller, spokesperson for the ayne County Prosecutor’s Office, which oversees C , says illis’s file is “in the initial review stage.” “ tell people, on’t listen to me,’” illis adds.

“Look at the facts and the evidence.”

This story continues with part two in next week’s issue.

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

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metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

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WHAT’S GOING ON Be sure to check venue websites for updated information. Add you own events to metrotimes.com/ addevent.

Wednesday, Nov. 9

An excellent lesson on Egyptian gods, but short of visually stunning

Live/ Concert

Demi Lovato - Holy Fvck Tour 8 pm; Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $4 0.50-$14 0.50.

Jack Kays-the Man With A Guitar On Tour 7 pm; The Shelter, 4 3 1 E. Congress St., Detroit; $16 .

Ken Mode, Frail Body, Deeper Graves, Pythian 7 pm; Sanctuary etroit, Caniff, amtramck .

Men I Trust 7 pm; Magic Stick, 4 120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $26 .

Thursday, Nov. 10 Live/ Concert A Night of Renaissance (Beyonce Night) 7 pm; Pike Room, 1 S. Saginaw, Pontiac; $15.

Babyface 8 pm; Sound Board, 2901 Grand River Ave., Detroit; $6 5-$85.

Death From Above 1979 7 pm; El Club, . ernor wy., etroit Steve Vai 7 pm; Cathedral Theatre at the Masonic Temple, 500 Temple St., Detroit; Turnover pm Saint ndrew’s all, 4 3 1 E. Congress St., Detroit; $25.

Friday, Nov. 11 Live/ Concert

Men I Trust 8 pm; Garden Bowl, 4 120 Woodward, Detroit; ALASKA presents THE RED 4 FILTH TOUR 2022 8 pm; Magic Stick, 4 120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $25-$95.

ARRN and witchpucker 7-10 pm; Entropy Studios, 25908 West Six Mile, Redford; $10.

Ballz Deluxe: Volume 4 Album Release with Hell Rides North 7 pm; Pike Room, 1 S. Saginaw, Pontiac; $15.

Hollywood Casino Greektown Presents Josh Turner 8 pm; The usic all, adison ve., etroit $3 5-$75.

Jessie Reyez - The Yessie Tour 7 pm; The Fillmore, 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $3 0-$6 5.

Jinjer: USA Tour 6 pm; Saint ndrew’s all, . Congress St., Detroit; $3 9.50.

MC Lars, I Fight Dragons, Schaffer the Darklord 7 pm; The Loving Touch, 226 3 4 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; Squirrel Nut Zippers 8 pm; Magic Bag, 22920 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $3 8.

The Lonely Ones 7 pm; The Token Lounge, 2894 9 Joy Rd., Westland;

Immersive King Tut is on display through the end of December.

THE “IMMERSIVE ART EXHIBIT” trend where digital animations are projected onto walls has made a stronghold in Detroit.

It started with Immersive V an Gogh, continued with Immersive K limt, and now we have Immersive K ing Tut, with Immersive Nutcrack er and the Disney Animation Immersive Experience on the way. The exhibits are all helmed

by Lighthouse Immersive, which set up shop in a former German culture club in downtown Detroit.

Immersive K ing Tut opened to the public on Friday, Nov. 4 , and after expressing skepticism of digital projections of Van Gogh’s paintings in favor of the original paintings, which are now on display at the DIA, we decided to give this one a fair shot. It was also a special occasion: Nov. 4 , 2022 happens to be the 100th anniversary of the discovery of King Tut’s tomb.

We were expecting something where maybe we enter the pharaoh’s tomb, come face to face with Egyptian gods, and touch hieroglyphics as they came alive before our eyes.

Instead, you enter a room where animations of ancient Egyptian lore are projected on the wall. The Egyptian Sun God Ra recounts King Tut’s life, burial, and descent into the underworld where he helps Ra defeat the gods of chaos.

It’s clear the creators’ intent was to transport us into King Tut’s tomb and commune with the pharaoh, but it falls short of visually stunning, especially when you catch a glance at the pi elated projections on the floor beneath you.

Rather than the visuals, the best part of this exhibit is the story accompanying the show, narrated by Ra. Ra teaches us about Egyptian deities like Osiris, the god of the deceased, and sky goddess of love and fertility, athor. s a and Tut traverse the underworld in a uest to save not just Egypt but the entire universe, they’re

18 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

MARGO HAWK/COURTESY PHOTO

attacked by the great serpent Apophis, who threatens to destroy Ra’s light.

Of course, with the help of other deities, Ra and Tut are victorious, saving the universe from chaos. It closes with Ra reminding us that his light shines down on our paths every day. (Remember, he is the sun.)

The dramatic story will fascinate history aficionados, admirers of polytheistic religions, or anyone interested in the mysteries of ancient Egypt. The experience is also more intimate in the second floor viewing room, while a larger room on the third floor feels more dramatic. Both rooms play the same storyline.

Some critics have dismissed projection mapping exhibits as “wall-sized screensavers”, and we can understand why. Immersive K ing Tut feels more like a drive-in movie projected on four walls than a detailed work of art. We found the replica of King Tut’s tomb with his mummy inside that’s displayed on the first floor of Lighthouse ArtSpace to be far more interesting.

To be fair, we have seen some pretty amazing digital projection mapping exhibits, like teamLab Borderless in Tokyo, where you become a part of the experience as you walk through bursting constellations, rooms of infinite light, and cascading flowers.

That experience left us with high standards, so the animated video at Immersive K ing Tut felt flat. t seems very much like a “do it for the ‘gram” experience for social media influencers, not an art e hibit.

— R and iah C am ille G r een Immersive King Tut will be on disp lay until the end of December at L ighthouse A rtS p ace; 311 E . Grand River A ve., Detroit. F or more info, see immersive-k ingtut.com/ detroit.

Local buzz By Broccoli and J oe Z immer elcome to a new column about etroit’s music scene. ot a tip at music@ metrotimes.com! $12-$6 0.

The Motown Sounds Of Touch 8 pm; Andiamo Celebrity Showroom, 7096 E. 14 Mile Rd., Warren; $3 2-$4 9.

W.A.S.P. With Special Guests Armored Saint pm arpo’s, arper venue, etroit .

Will Sheff / Okkervil River w/ mmeadows 7-11: 3 0 pm; The Parliament Room at Otus Supply, 3 4 5 E Nine Mile Rd, Ferndale; $20.00.

DJ/ Dance Fast & Loose w/ DJ Nervous Recs + special guests 9 pm-2 am; Second Best, 4 2 Watson St., Detroit; Free.

Malaa: Don Malaa Album Tour 9 pm-2 am; Russell Industrial Center, 16 00 Clay Ave., Detroit; $25.

Saturday, Nov. 12 Live/ Concert

Games We Play 7 pm; The Loving Touch, 226 3 4 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $16 .

IMMINENT SONIC DESTRUCTION • Hate Unbound • Brucifer • Gravebloom • Theandric 6 & 7 pm; The Token Lounge, 2894 9 Joy Rd., Westland; $8.

Jake Scott with Rosie and Brynn Cartelli 7 & 8 pm; Magic Stick, 4 120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $18.

Kayzo 8 pm; Russell Industrial Center, 16 00 Clay Ave., Detroit; $4 0.

The Kris Kurzawa Group w/ Barbara Payton Play Zeppelin 7-11 pm; The Parliament Room at Otus Supply, 3 4 5 E Nine Mile Rd, Ferndale; $15.00.

Ladies Night Out Starring: Bobby Brown, Joe, El Debarge And Next 8 pm; Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $6 9-$16 5.

Loathe, Static Dress, Omerta, Paledusk 6 : 3 0 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, Caniff, amtramck .

Michigander 7 pm; Saint Andrew’s all, . Congress St., etroit .

Patrick Topping 9 pm; Magic Stick, 4 120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $20-$25.

Randy Kaplan Double Header 7-9 pm Berkley Coffee, est ile Rd, Ste 50o, Oak Park; $10 suggested cover (door jars or can pay card at bar).

Supper Club 6 : 3 0-10: 3 0 pm; Trust Cocktails, Shareables & Nightlife, 205 West Congress Street, Detroit; Free Entry Call for table reservations.

Sunday, Nov. 13 Live/ Concert

“St. Celilia Sing” -4 : 3 0 pm; Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament, 984 4 Woodward, Detroit; Freewill donation.

Drugdealer with Reverend Baron

7 pm; Magic Bag, 22920 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $20.

Duke Tumatoe & The Power Trio 6 pm; The Token Lounge, 2894 9 Joy Rd., Westland; $15-$80.

J-Rose Loops “Twilight Mantra” Album Release 6 : 3 0-11: 3 0 pm; The Parliament Room at Otus Supply, 3 4 5 E Nine Mile Rd, Ferndale; $15.00.

Saxappeal + The Crü Live 7-10 pm; Baker’s Keyboard Lounge, 20510 Livernois Ave., Detroit; 15.00.

Sunday Jam Sessions Hosted

by Sky Covington & Friends 8 pm-midnight; Woodbridge Pub, 516 9 Trumbull St., Detroit; Donation.

The Early November 20 Year Anniversary Tour 6 : 3 0 pm; The Loving Touch, 226 3 4 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $20.

The Slackers, Killer Diller 7 pm; Sanctuary etroit, Caniff, amtramck; $20.

Tyrese 8 pm; Sound Board, 2901 Grand River Ave., Detroit; $52-$99.

Warren Symphony Orchestra Kicks Off 49th Season with “Made in America” Concert on November 13 3 -5 pm; Macomb Center for the Performing rts, arfield Rd., Clinton Township; $23 ADULT - $20 SENIOR - $10 COLLEGE STUDENT K-12 FREE.

DJ/ Dance Bar Wars w/ Chuck D and TRBLMAKR 10-11: 4 5 pm; Fifth Avenue Novi, 25750 Novi Rd., Novi; 5.00.

The Basement Detroit 7-9 pm; Livestream Event, The Interwebz, The Interwebz

Monday, Nov. 14 Live/ Concert

AFI with Drab Majesty 7 pm; Magic Stick, 4 120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $3 5.

Tuesday Nov. 15 Live/ Concert

Mat Kerekes 6 : 3 0 pm; Pike Room, 1 S. Saginaw, Pontiac; The Happy Fits 7 pm; El Club, 4 114 . ernor wy., etroit The Offspring: Let The Bad Times Roll With Guests Simple Plan 8 pm; Caesars Palace Windsor Augustus Ballroom, 3 77 E. Riverside Dr., Windsor; $4 3 -$83 .

VOLA 7 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, 293 2 Caniff, amtramck .

DJ/ Dance B.Y.O.R Bring Your Own Records Night 9 pm-midnight; The Old Miami, 3 93 0 Cass Ave., Detroit; Free.

HYD BRINGS HYPERPOP TO TOWN: It’s commonplace for tours with smaller budgets to bypass Detroit for places like Chicago and call it “good” for their Midwest commitments. That means Detroit concertgoers don’t always get to see smaller experimental acts that fans are buzzing about online. The upcoming yd show at illis Show Bar on Wednesday, Nov. 9 is an exception. yd n e ayden unham is a PC Music-associated artist with production backing from hyperpop heavyweights like A.G. Cook, Danny L. arle, and the late SOP .

Getting recognition early in their career as the face of the legendary experimental pop and performance art energy drink project “ ey QT” a . . Cook SOP collaboration , this year yd has returned to the spotlight in full force. The songs released so far are a perfect blend of glitchy pop hooks with cavernous deconstructed club beats that should appeal to fans of Caroline Polachek (who has production credit on yd’s upcoming album as well). Judging from the striking visuals and videos for each new single, one can assume the live show will be just as impressive.

THE WHISKEY CHARMERS DROP NEW FULL-LENGTH: The Whiskey Charmers are dropping its fourth full-length record On The Run on Saturday, and they’re throwing a show at amtramck’s nt all to mark the occasion. The show will feature performances by Emily Rose along with Elspeth Tremblay & The Treatment, and it’s sure to be a doozy. aving won several etroit Music Awards in recent years for their work on previous albums The Valley and Lost on the Range, listeners will enjoy their evolving take on traditional Americana and country music. (The band’s video for the track “Water” is worth a watch if you haven’t seen it.)

FAR-OUT ELECTRONIC MUSIC AT MARBLE BAR: Detroit has no shortage of dance music, and at times it can be hard to wade through the noise and find the shows that are truly worth attending. Of course Marble Bar is one of the go-to spots to look out for, and this weekend they’ll be bringing Miami’s Dany

Hyd.

it us up

COURTESY PHOTO

Daze and New York’s Fred P for a night of music beamed in straight from the outer reaches of space.

The show also features a stacked lineup of local support, including hometown hero 2Lanes, Texture’s very own Jacob Park, and a late night ambient set by the acid ueen herself, Rebecca Goldberg. Expect a healthy serving of classic house and techno, presented through the lens of a group of artists that combine to form a show that is greater than the sum of its parts. Early bird tickets are available on Resident Advisor.

AIR PEOPLE FLEW INTO OUTER LIMITS LOUNGE: Detroit super-group of sorts Air People dropped its self-titled full-length debut last week sorry for the flurry of hyphens), and threw a Thursday night soiree at Outer Limits Lounge to celebrate. If you had to imagine what a show at Outer Limits should sound like, the track “ ang” off the record might serve as a proper sonic landscape. A slow, boozy jam that feels like a song you’ve loved for a long time even if you’ve never heard it before, “Yang” is nestled within a project that blends all of the influences of the band’s members into a cohesive, engaging collection.

At times psychedelic, other times homely and comforting, the record is the result of many years of work, and serves as a solid foundation for what will hopefully be a long tenure in Detroit’s live music scene. If you’re not already familiar, the two other bands on the show’s bill are worth checking out as well: Woman Believer and CC Nobody (formerly Career Club).

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

19

MUSIC

Apollo Brown in his studio.

20 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

A boom bap hero

Legendary producer Apollo Brown on his new album, his legacy, J Dilla, and the Detroit sound

By K ahn S antori Davison

Apollo Brown’s studio

KAHN SANTORI DAVISON

might be one of the most sleek and organized creative spaces in southeast Michigan. A computer sits on a desk surrounded by four speakers and a few production instruments and tools. His framed concert posters all hang on walls above bookshelves full of records, diecast cars, and a few slices of hip-hop memorabilia. The floor is carpeted, and all the furniture is black.

“I told my wife if I die tomorrow, burn this room,” he says. “Burn all that equipment, my external hard drives. I got five computers, i acs with music on it — burn that shit. I don’t want that music out. If it’s not out right now, I don’t want it out.”

Over the last 15 years Apollo Brown has been one of the most consistent producers in and outside Detroit. He’s produced 3 0 full-length albums (which all hang framed above a black couch) and a litany of singles and album cuts for artists across the globe. He’s a self-described “revolver” because he exclusively and unapologetically makes ’90s-inspired boom bap beats. Where his producer counterparts have evolved into trap, alternative hip-hop, and other experimental sounds, Brown has stayed in one sonic lane. This has made Brown an outlier, a throwback — but also a hero.

Born Erik Stephens, Apollo Brown grew up in Grand Rapids within a plethora of musical influences.

“My mom is white and my dad is Black, so they listened to different types of music,” he says. “I always tell people that one day I could be listening to the Isley Brothers version of ‘Summer Breeze,’ the next day I might be listening to the Seals & Crofts version of ‘Summer Breeze,’” Brown says with a laugh.

Once Brown got into hip-hop he was heavily influenced by east coast acts like Wu-Tang, Mobb Deep, Gang Starr, Nas, and producers like Pete Rock and DJ Premier. He never learned to play any instruments, but had an inquisitive nature when it came to sounds. “I would always dissect the music, I would always listen to one part over and over,” he says.

By age 16 he was experimenting with his own hand as a producer. “It was some of the worst beats ever,” he says, shaking his head. “Me and Bronze Nazareth, we bought ourselves software

called Voyetra, it came with Windows 95. This was around 1996 . It was a sound manipulation program. We would mess with that. We wanted to rap, we wanted to make music.”

Brown enrolled in Michigan State University, where he spent more time making beats in his dorm room than breaking down math equations in class. After obtaining his bachelors in business administration he moved to Detroit, got a steady job, and became more of a closet producer.

“Ten or twelve [ years] went by before I showed my beats to anyone,” he says.

In 2007 he met Detroit emcee extraordinaire Finale, who ushered him onto the Detroit rap scene. “I didn’t realize there was an underground scene or a fan base for the kind of music I was making,” Brown says.

“I encouraged him to work with more local artists and jump in the beat battles to crack some heads and get known,” says friend and frequent collaborator Finale.

The mid-2000s were pivotal years for Detroit hip-hop. The city was reeling from the 2006 death of J Dilla, who represented the largest slice of what many felt was the quintessential Detroit sound. Helluva’s “basement sound” that would go on to take over the world was still in its infancy. The city still had a plethora of talented producers like DJ Butter, Black Milk, Waajeed, Ta’Raach, and Denaun Porter (just to name a few). The proverbial baton had been passed and Detroit hip-hop artists stepped up to the plate.

“Yea we had no choice but to take the torch and run with it … it became an obligation for some and an obsession for others,” says emcee Finale.

Later on that year Brown entered a producer showcase hosted by DJ House Shoes. Brown was still unknown to Detroit’s hip-hop scene, so there were no real expectations as the showcase featured notables DJ Dez and Nick Speed. Each producer had 15 minutes to display their arsenal, and Brown left a shocked room full of dropped jaws buzzing eardrums after he concluded his set. Even he was astonished at the reactions.

“People were coming up to me left and right telling me how my beats were fire,” he says.

Brown took the momentum and started doing more showcases and beat

battles. “I was just trying to make the hardest, craziest beats I could make …

I didn’t realize there were people were sitting back waiting for a sound like mine,” he says By year’s end he released his first album, S k illed Trade. “It was just a little janky album I put out myself,” he says.

“I just wanted to put something out.

I hate it to this day. It was a bunch of unfinished stuff.”

Brown’s name and skills grew, but being a producer wasn’t paying his rent.

He decided to take a job in Cleveland as a city inspector and commuted to Detroit on the weekends to participate and beat battles and link up with other artists. By 2010 he had reached a crossroads.

“The first week of the year got laid off,” he says. “Two days later ichael Tolle from Mello Music Group called and told me he wanted to bring me aboard and give me a production contract.”

“Mike from Mello hit me about him and so many others,” says Finale. “And I told them like I’ll still tell them, ‘Y’all better lock in with him because this one is special.’ I’m so proud of my brother.”

Mello Music Group is an Arizonabased boutique record label founded

by Tolle in 2007 that looked to bring more boom bap, soul, and a rigid underground sound back to the forefront of hip-hop. A combination of hip-hop becoming more commercialized and the rise of southern trap began to take attention away from east coast legacy acts and emerging artists who preferred a ’90s backpack sound. Fledgling labels like Rawkus and Loud who had rosters that included Mos Def, Mobb Deep, Pete Rock, and Talib Kweli were all defunct. This resulted in smaller labels like Grieslda, It’s a Wonder World Music Group, and Stones Throw Records (which J Dilla was signed to) looking to fill the void.

Though skeptical, Brown understood that signing to Mello was an opportunity to make the kind of music he wanted to make and get paid for it.

“The only people on the roster then was Kenn Starr and Oddisee,” Brown says.

“I decided to give it a year to see if it would work. And if my bank account didn’t reflect what wanted it to reflect, if my reputation didn’t reflect what wanted it to, then I would just update

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

21

my resume and go back to work.”

Brown wasted no time cranking out projects for Mello’s evolving roster, including The Reset, Gas Mask, and Brown Study in 2010. The projects usually featured a variety of underground artists including Detroit’s own Marv Won, Finale, Invincible, Boog Brown, and Miz Korona. With Brown you won’t get layered keyboards, synthesizers, unnecessary filtered samples, or orchestra aesthetics. Brown’s clean but gritty, sharp but jagged. He gives you honest variations of kick and snare drums and the melody usually resides in the strings, keys, or horns.

“I don’t use the term ‘backpacker,’” he says. “I don’t look at the music that I make or the artists that I make it for as backpackers. I use the term boom bap, because it’s hard to describe this music to somebody without saying boom bap.

I don’t do a lot of commercial-style triple-time hi-hats. I’ve produced all over the place, but I usually stay within a certain realm and it’s usually a boom bap style.”

In 2011 he took an auditory pivot releasing Clouds, a laid-back melodic instrumental album built more to fill in the backgrounds at cafes or cold nights snuggled with a good book.

Brown calls it the most important album of his career.

“I come from a battle culture, but I still wanted people to know I can make life music,” Brown says. “I wanted people to be able to relax to my music.

It became my highest-selling album. I think yearly, it’s still my highest-selling album.”

By 2012 he started to be recognized more nationally with the release of Trophies with New York’s O.C. and Dice Game with fellow Detroiter Guilty Simpson. “Those really put me on the map,” he says. Then came The Brown Tape with Wu-Tang Clan’s Ghostface Killah, the critically acclaimed Ugly Heroes with Verbal Kent and Red Pill, The Easy Truth with Skyzoo, Anchovies with Planet Asia, and Mona Lisa with Joell Ortiz.

Along the way Brown has also quietly produced tracks for artists that the average hip-hop fan is unaware of, like Danny Brown’s “Contra,” Chance The Rapper’s “The Writer,” and WestSide Gunn’s “Mt. T.” “For a while West was closing his shows out with ‘Mr. T.’ That was an accident,” Brown says. “Me and West was going to make an album and that was just one song. But that was around the time where he was getting signed, that whole Shady deal, so all that stuff fell through.”

When asked what his favorite album is, Brown looks at the wall above his couch at all 3 0 album covers

“I think as a producer we have our interpretation of what a Detroit sound is. When I did Sincerely Detroit, that was my interpretation of Detroit’s sound. I don’t think I have a Detroit sound, never have.

Dilla to me is the sound of Detroit.

That’s who I look at.” and refuses to pick one. “I don’t have a favorite because they were all a specific mood, a specific place,” he says. “ ach one of my albums I treat like one of my kids. I don’t rank them, but I love them all e ually but differently.”

He acknowledges the quality of his work means the most to his fans, not necessarily the quantity.

“If I make a post today asking, ‘What’s your favorite Apollo Brown album?’, everybody will say something different,” he says. “ veryone doesn’t just gravitate to one album. That’s when you know you’re doing it right.”

In the fall of 2019 he released his most ambitious effort, Sincerely Detroit. The 21-track album featured 59 Detroit artists including Kuniva from D12, Slum Village, Nolan The Ninja, Boldly James, Ro Spit, Trick Trick, Royce Da 5’9”, and Phat Kat (just to name a few). The album was more than just a musical love letter to the D. It was a statement piece, a celebratory hip-hop acknowledgement that Detroit’s boom bap culture was alive and thriving and is still part of the fabric of the Detroit sound. Detroit hip-hop has always been a melting pot of boombap and street. You can pop in the Old Miami and hear an emcee chopping up nouns and verbs over a ’70s soul sample and some tough drums. Or you can hit Harpos and hear a club banger and grimy street tales over arpeggiated and monophonic bass lines. They all encompass the Detroit experience and diversity. Much like the city itself, Detroit’s hip-hop scene has always been defined but the sum of its parts rather than a singular sound.

During the late ’90s through early 2000s, boom-bap received more national recognition, whereas Detroit’s trap and street artists have dominated over the last 5 years.

“For me there’s not a single Detroit sound,” Brown says. “I think as a producer we have our interpretation of what a Detroit sound is. When I did Sincerely Detroit, that was my interpretation of Detroit’s sound. I don’t think I have a Detroit sound, never have. Dilla to me is the sound of Detroit. That’s

22 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

who I look at. But I’ve always thought I had an east coast sound.”

Instead of being overly focused on what he felt Detroit wanted to hear, Brown’s production has always been more of a combination of what he wants to make and wants to give to the world.

“I think you start losing when you’re trying to make music for the city that you’re in,” he says. “I think you’re better off in your career if you make music for the world and it just happens to find its way back to the city. You can’t just make music for your block. You gotta have a broader scope than that.”

The result has been an international fanbase that stretches through Germany, France, Italy, and New Z ealand, where Brown tours and regularly sells out shows. “They genuinely love the music out there, they respect the music,” he says. “When you do shows here, the crowd is other emcees and producers. Overseas, everyone is a fan.

You get spoiled out there. If you go into any club right now and ask who Apollo Brown is, 99 out of 100 people wouldn’t.

If you go into any underground club, the numbers will be higher. And if you leave the city the chances of people knowing who Apollo Brown gets even higher.”

On his newest album Cost of Living, Brown partners with Windy City emcee Philmore Greene to deliver more of Brown’s specific brand of production over Greene’s personal and introspective lyrics. Brown doesn’t give you anything he hasn’t given you before — he just keeps giving you better versions of it. The song “Paradise” is reminiscent of Wu-Tang’s “Can it Be All So Simple,” and in the lead single “Time Goes,” Brown’s steady head-nodding bassline is the perfect medium for Greene’s introspective baritone flow “Back when entertainment was shared at the same time/ We all moved to the same tune, same rhymes/Same drop of a dime, we shared memories was precious/ Nowadays it seems kind of hectic.”

As Brown has entered his 4 0s, he’s reflective and more thankful for the journey more now than he’s ever been.

ip hop is like professional sports you usually only get a handful of years to earn as much money and notoriety before it all fades away. Brown has defied that. His rise has been slow but sho’.

He’s a building block for Mello Music, and his career has ascended because of it.

“I was a nobody at that time so that was big for him (Tolle) to believe in me, to hit me up, and tell me I had what it takes,” Brown says. “I’m in a family atmosphere. I’ve been with Mello for 13 years. We’ve created a brand together. I call myself Kobe on the Lakers.”

While admitting he’s slowing down a bit, Brown has no doubt he’ll reach the 50-album milestone. “ e don’t have retirement benefits.

We don’t have 4 01k matches,” he says.

“It’s up to us to take our IRAs to make sure our future is good. We kind of gotta work as long as we can. I have a renewed love for it. There was a time when I thought about going back to school and doing something else. But I’m always going to be in the music industry. Being a producer is what I’m good at. It’s the only thing that can put a smile on my face when it comes to work.”

Brown often feels like he was born in the wrong decade — that his legacy would be evaluated differently if he were around in the ’90s producing boom bap bangers alongside Pet Rock and DJ Premiere. But at the same time, would rik Stephens be pollo Brown without the inspiration from those same producers he saw as heroes as teen? Ultimately, Brown’s timing has been perfect for Detroit, and perfect for the world.

“I’d say his style represents how one pays homage while simultaneously carving out his own niche,” says emcee and friend Boog Brown. “The contribution to Detroit hip-hop is that everywhere he goes, he city goes too. It’s the international reach that changes the game.” “ want to know that was significant to hip-hop, not just Detroit hip-hop,” Brown says. “There’s that question out there, ‘Would you rather be successful or significant ’ That’s a hard uestion to answer, but everyone has their own definition of success. But to me, significant’ is more of a concrete word to describe where I want to be. I’m already successful. I got a beautiful wife, beautiful kids, I have a beautiful home, the vehicles that I want, the career that I want. I’m surrounded by great people.

But I want to know that I’ve made a significant impact on hip hop.”

Apollo Brown and Phillmore Greene’s Cost of Living is available on all streaming platforms on Nov. 15.

Thurs 11/10

HAPPY 247th BIRTHDAY TO THE U.S. MARINE CORPS! HAG/Mammon/ Disturbio313 Doors@9pm/$5 Cover

Happy Birthday, Simon!

Fri 11/11

HAPPY VETERANS DAY! Please thank a veteran for their service!

Craig Brown Band/Slizz/ The Hi-Views Doors@9pm/$5 Cover

Mizz RUTH’S GRILL @7pm Sat 11/12

Kings of Strings/Big B and the Actual Proof/ Crimson Eyed Orchestra (Blues) Doors@9pm/$5 Cover Mon 11/14

FREE POOL ALL DAY Tues 11/15

B. Y. O. R. Bring Your Own Records (weekly) Open Decks! @9PM NO COVER! Coming Up in November:

11/18 Dark Red/The DeCarlo Family/Lunar Missionaries 11/19 BANGERZ AND JAMZ (Monthly DJs) 1/23 Thanksgiving Eve w/ DJ Bet & DJ Skeez 11/24 Thanksgiving Day! Open 8am for the Parade JELLO SHOTS always $1

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

23

FOOD

The brisket burger and a cocktail from Petty Cash.

A petty review

By Biba A dams

Food critic The Hungry Black Man is known for traveling the nation and supporting primarily Black-owned restaurants with his open and honest reviews, written in a fun and engaging style, which he shares with his more than 90,000 Facebook followers.

So when the 40-year-old writer visits places like the then-new restaurant Petty Cash on Detroit’s Historic Avenue of Fashion, which he did back in July, his opinion has high value.

In a deviation from his normal friendly-but-fair review style, The Hungry Black Man (née Starex Smith) eviscerated the upscale restaurant’s menu, including its cocktails, which he described as “reminiscent of what 19th century sailors would drink right before a long adventure filled voyage.” e added that each burned his throat, and their flavors were not distinctive.

The review was so bad that I even canceled plans to eat there.

But I have to say, having now visited, my experience was the exact opposite of Smith’s.

I was joined for dinner by chef and blogger Angela Davis, also known as The itchenista, fresh off a shoot for an online series called My S hop p ing L ist for Food Network. It was an opportunity to bring a fine tuned palate to try the food

with me, as well as to celebrate Davis and her accomplishments.

Because of the previous review, we thought it was only right to order from the cocktail menu. A selection of craft cocktails is curated by bar manager Lani Ingersoll, who has previously worked at Detroit hotspots like Bad Luck Bar and Flowers of Vietnam.

Davis and I sampled the Bulba, a bright, herbaceous cocktail featuring grains of paradise-infused blanco tequila, orange blossom, Thai basil, cucumber, and Angostura bitters. We also tried Soma Time, a citrusy gin concoction, and Unit 01, a bittersweet cocktail featuring bourbon, Aperol, Braulio, ginger, and lemon. Contrary to Smith’s review, we found the cocktail menu to be original and flavorful.

We tried to order some of the same items that Smith did, including the curried carrots, which he raved about — and indeed, they were delicious. We also tried the peach and radicchio salad, which wasn’t great, as the peaches were underripe and a little too hard.

Smith had the peri peri wings and the brisket burger — which he also said was delicious. We skipped both of those and opted for the lamb ribs and mussels bouillabaisse, both of which were fantastic.

24 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

VIOLA KLOCKO

Smith also had a duck confit, which he blasted. The dish was removed from the menu; Petty Cash’s restaurant manager confirmed that it wasn’t well received.

Head chef Dominic McCord — who is visible on the line in the open concept kitchen — has made changes to the menu after some negative feedback, symbolizing Petty Cash’s commitment to growing and developing. That’s according to founding partner Rufus Bartell, who noted that Smith’s visit came on only the restaurant’s second day of operations.

He added that operations for a new restaurant are always a work in progress, and condemned Smith for the scathing review, which he said had somewhat of a cooling effect on the new restaurant. s a policy, Metro Times generally waits at least three months to review a new restaurant in order to give it an opportunity to work out any kinks.)

Managing partners Rufus and Ron Bartell (the former NFL player who also owns nearby Kuzzo’s Chicken & a es , rt icks, and elly cBride have made a $1.5 million investment in the restaurant, which was years in the making, stalled several times due the coronavirus pandemic.

“I had to go to Midtown or Birmingham or Royal Oak to get food that I liked,” he previously told Metro Times.

“I wanted to put what we like in our neighborhood. Why should we have to travel outside our neighborhood to get what we like ” The restaurant has impeccable ambi-

Petty Cash 20050 Livernois Ave., Detroit 313-380-6336 Pettycashdetroit.com Entrées $16-$46

ance, tastefully decorated in shades of teal, black, and gold, and features large photos of Motown legends — including a gigantic photo of Marvin Gaye over the bustling bar.

One of the things that should help make Petty Cash a hotspot is that it already appears to have become a place where people come to see others and be seen. The night we visited, a Friday, found us dining in a packed dining room with a very diverse crowd.

For dessert, we tried a rock ’n’ berry parfait, which featured Rock and Ryeroasted berries, a raspberry sorbet, pop rock meringue, black currant drizzle, and fresh berries. It was truly a palate cleanser, and the perfect send off to a great meal and the start of a night on the town.

With indoor seating for 82 and an outdoor patio with 42 seats, Petty Cash is currently reservations only, with a $10 deposit per diner. The spot has the potential to be a high-end dining anchor of the Avenue of Fashion, which has undergone a renaissance in recent years.

Despite a negative review from a visitor, Petty Cash has garnered support from customers within the city and is evolving — and could become a new classic.

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

25

FOOD

up and passed a follow-up inspection which allowed them to resume business.

“They shut down for three hours, opened right back up to sell chili and other items on their menu knowing they had a rodent infestation, which means you’re serving people rodent urine, urine feces, and rodent hair,” Benson said. “I know that there are dozens, hundreds, and thousands who take great pride in the food that they serve, but not everybody does and when they don’t, then the residents are the victim… This ordinance is one thing that ensures transparency.”

Benson said those opposing the ordinance are sending the message “that Black restaurants can’t handle serving food safely.”

Council member Gabriela SantiagoRomero stood with concerned restaurant owners who are still recovering

from the effects CO had on the food industry.

“While I think this ordinance has the right intentions, I believe it’s not the right time,” she said. “Restaurant owners say they need support from funding to [ food handling] training, to better and easier licensing and permitting processes… . This is still the ecosystem that they work under. I want us to focus on what they need before we ask for additional pressure from this ordinance.”

The council stalled voting on the food safety proposal for nearly two months and it was revised before they finally struck it down.

The revision included the addition of a QR code that potential diners could scan to get more information on why the restaurant received a particular rating.

—R and iah C am ille G r een

RANDIAH CAMILLE GREEN

has been delayed three times: originally it was to open in July of 2022 but got pushed back to September, then October, and now Nov. 1 is the “forreal, forreal” opening date.

“The number one delay was COVID and after that finding workers wasn’t easy,” Daye says. “It was just one thing after another, especially when you get into remodeling these older buildings, there’s always something extra you’re gonna find. ou have a plan but guess what, it’s gonna take an additional month because there’s something else you have to fi . e also wanted to make sure we had a good team in place.”

The space can technically accommodate around 3 0 people, but it’s a tight squeeze in the former gas station with just a few tables and chairs. Daye says they’re planning for mostly carryout orders with some grab-and-go sandwiches and salads also on offer.

Inside, the restaurant features a mural of a blazing phoenix by local artist Cameron enkins aka Camflage .

“The phoenix represents strength and rebirth and redemption, which reminds us every day that we have a purpose and can achieve our goals,” Daye says. “This has been a dream and it’s finally happening. t took longer than we wanted, but we are finally achieving it.”

See You Tomorrow also has a liquor license and hopes to eventually offer a boozy brunch and an outdoor patio in the spring. A building expansion is planned for much later once the restaurant gets its bearings.

“We’re gonna have a Sunday brunch so I’m sure we’re gonna have mimosas and all that stuff, but as we open and are tweaking things we want to make sure everything is perfect with our food and service first,” aye says. “The first few months are gonna be seeing what people ask us for and figuring out what we need to change.”

For now, the “Q-Line Scramble” with turkey sausage, spinach, swiss cheese, and sundried tomatoes, and “Kale Quinoa Toss” are menu highlights.

Breakfast will be served on Tuesdays through Sundays from 8-11 a.m. and brunch from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. The restaurant is closed Mondays.

See You Tomorrow is located at 774 0 Woodward Ave., Detroit.

—R and iah C am ille G r een

Detroit brunch spot See You Tomorrow is finally open FOR THE PAST three years, a glowing “See You Tomorrow” sign has enticed passersby on Woodward Avenue in Detroit’s New Center neighborhood.

We’d always drive by and wonder who are you, and what makes you think you’ll see us tomorrow? It turns out it’s a fast-casual brunch cafe, and after several delays, See ou Tomorrow finally opened on Nov. 1. gg scrambles, chicken and wa es, salmon croquettes, salads, sandwiches, and rotating soups make up its no-frills menu.

“It’s a soul-warming food concept,” says See You Tomorrow general manager Suzette Daye. “There was a need

for a fast-casual breakfast place in the area so that’s how the idea came about.

We wanted to make it simple and not anything outrageous so people can pick up some breakfast while they’re going to work or school.”

Daye says See You Tomorrow aims to offer some slightly healthier options like breakfast potatoes and chicken wings that are broiled instead of fried.

The menu also has vegetarian options like a veggie scramble (though vegans are pretty much out of luck).

The buzz around See You Tomorrow began when the restaurant was awarded a Motor City Match grant to rent the space in 2018. The opening

Detroit City Council strikes down food grading ordinance IS DETROIT READY for a colorcoded system alerting potential diners whether restaurants are up to code with the health department? The answer is a resounding “nope.”

Detroit City Council rejected council member Scott Benson’s proposed food grade ordinance 6 -3 on Tuesday last week.

During the public comment period, more than two dozen residents and restaurant owners spoke against the ordinance, which many felt would hurt local businesses and serve as a sort of “scarlet letter.”

If it had passed, Detroit restaurants and food trucks would have been required to place a placard in their win-

dow showing the results of their most recent health inspection. The idea was something similar to New York’s food grading system with color-coded signs replacing A-B-C grades.

A green card would indicate a restaurant passed, yellow would mean the business had some issues, and red is for when they’ve been ordered to shut down by the city.

Benson trashed Lafayette Coney Island as an example of why the ordinance should have been passed.

The coney failed an inspection when rat poop was found onsite, but quietly continued service without resolving the infestation and was ordered to shut down. They’ve since cleaned the place

26 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

27

WEED

Pleasantrees to give away free weed for menstrual product donations

Midwest CannaNurses founders Biyyiah Lee and Ebony Smith.

COURTESY PHOTO

Midwest CannaNurses get social equity grant

By Randiah Camille Green A GROUP OF nurses who want to educate about the therapeutic benefits of cannabis has received a $50,000 grant to do so.

Midwest CannaNurses is the latest recipient of Gage Cannabis Co.’s $1 million social equity grant program, which funds cannabis companies in communities affected disproportionately by the war on drugs.

Midwest CannaNurses was founded in 2020 by licensed Detroit nurses Ebony Smith and Biyyiah Lee. They believe it’s their duty to normalize cannabis as medicine.

The minority-owned company offers consulting services to canna businesses and potential patients on proper dosing, safe consumption, and “individualized CannaPlans” through its “Outgrow The Stigma” initiative.

In a press release, Lee said Gage’s generous grant will aid the group’s mission to educate the community about cannabis as a healing modality.

“With this contribution, we will be able to provide professional development for nurses and allied health professionals and expand our community outreach efforts by holding more

educational seminars for the public,” she said in the release. “We’re glad to see companies like Gage seeking opportunities to support organizations that uplift diverse communities, and this social equity grant will enable us to continue advocating for safe and informed cannabis use.”

Previous recipients of Gage’s social equity grant include Redemption Cannabis and non profit unners High 5k.

More information is available at mcn. health.

Former Muskegon house converted into cannabis dispensary A FORMER MUSKEGON Township house has been converted into Lucky’s Cannabis Co., a new dispensary set to open Friday.

The store is located at 14 4 6 Holton Rd. in a renovated two-story, threebedroom brick house originally built in 194 7.

“It’s an interesting space and much different than how other stores are configured,” arc obert, President of Lucky’s, said in a statement. “It was a challenge to make this space wheelchair accessible, functional and inviting. We think we nailed it.”

The business includes a reception area, a sales floor, and office space. The

walls have been painted with colorful murals, and its outdoor area can also be used for community events.

The business is open for adult-use sales to anyone age 21 or older.

The company previously opened a dispensary in Big Rapids.

The dispensary is expected to open at 9 a.m. on Friday, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony at 3 : 3 0 p.m. A number of other cannabis vendors will be on hand.

The store says it will also collect cash donations for Veteran’s Day, which will be sent to the Muskegon County Veterans Center.

“The donations will support the food pantry there,” said Robert. “For de-

28 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

cades, veterans have advocated for cannabis legalization here in Michigan and on the federal level. Their first hand knowledge of the healing properties of cannabis for pain and PTSD has helped sway how the public views cannabis.”

Customers who donate will receive a free premium pre-roll.

“Supporting our veterans and community at large is an integral part of Lucky’s ethos, and this is just one of many ways we plan to continue this mission, “ said Raahul Reddy, co-owner and principal.

More information is available at luckyscannabis.com.

—L ee D eV ito

CANNABIS COMPANY PLEASANTREES aims to help support women with its new brand, Pistil Janes.

For its market debut, the company has partnered with the Lansingbased organization Helping Women Period (HWP). The organization aims to provide free menstrual products to people experiencing homelessness or from low-income households.

“A portion of proceeds from the sales of Pistil Janes products will be donated to local, women-focused organizations and nonprofits our first partner is elping omen Period,” said Pleasantrees retail marketing manager Perry Haselden said in a press release. “We are excited to support the missions of these organizations while continuing to expand our Social Equity efforts through Pistil anes.”

That’s not all Pleasantrees is doing. On Tuesday, Nov. 15, Pleasantrees will host a donation drive at all of its locations. When customers (21 and up) donate a box of menstrual hygiene products to a HWP drop box, they will receive one free gram of Pistil anes flower for their donation.

Pleasantrees will be accepting new (and unused) bladder control products, panty liners, tampons, and pads. Monetary donations are accepted as well.

“Helping Women Period is so excited to join forces with Pleasantrees to discuss eliminating stigma,” said Lysne Tait, the executive director of Helping Women Period, in a press release. “The stigma associated with menstruation is experienced differently by individuals of different cultures and backgrounds. Cannabis use by women is also subject to these barriers of accessing products, openly discussing use, and being treated with understanding and openness by their communities.”

Pistil Janes’ initial launch will include three flower products The Empress (sativa), The Goddess (hybrid), and The Temptress (Indica).

One gram will retail for around $10 with an eighth retailing around $3 0.

—A lex W as h ingto n

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

29

CULTURE

Zombo the Clown is the skeletal mascot of Detroit’s Theatre Bizarre, an “immersive” theatrical event dubbed “The Greatest Masquerade on Earth.”

JOSH JUSTICE

Growing pains at Theatre Bizarre

The former underground party has gotten bigger — but some longtime crew members have left amid allegations of a ‘cult’-like atmosphere

By L ee DeV ito

Last month, Zombo the

Clown made his triumphant return to Detroit’s Masonic Temple. The ghoulish character is the mascot for the longstanding Halloween festival Theatre Bizarre, which had been called off since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dubbed “The Greatest Masquerade on Earth,” the event draws more than 2,000 attendees from near and far to two sold-out weekends. Tickets sold for $125 apiece this year for the general admission events on Saturday, with exclusive Friday night gala tickets fetching $3 00.

Theatre Bizarre’s devotees include its crew of some 1,500 workers and volunteers who help transform the already grand Masonic Temple into an even grander carnival, an “immersive” theatrical experience with multiple floors of entertainment including live performances from fire breathing acrobats and musical acts like horrorcore rapper Esham, BDSM-themed rooms, and over-the-top costumes. In metro Detroit, it’s not uncommon to see cars

with orange Z ombo bumper stickers, and attendees and crew show their devotion by crying out “Hail Z ombo! ” in a call and response.

But some cracks appear to be forming among that crew. A number of longtime members have resigned or plan to resign after this year, Metro Times has learned, including the award-winning burlesque performer Roxi D’Lite.

One of the most visible faces of Theatre Bizarre, D’Lite announced her resignation from her role as the coproducer of its Dirty Devil’s Peepshow burlesque stage in a Facebook post just days before the event. The announcement accompanied a photo of D’Lite posing with Z ombo, his arm around her neck.

“It is with a heavy heart that I have to make this announcement but after about 17 years of dedication to Theatre Bizarre I have resigned just 10 days from show,” D’Lite wrote. “This decision to leave was one not taken lightly and I am devastated.”

She didn’t offer many more details,

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but urged her fans to continue to attend the event and support the show that she helped produce. “I will miss you all, my favorite audience in the entire world and so many of my dear friends in this community,” she added.

D’Lite and at least one other stage manager resigned after complaints had been leveled against Theatre Bizarre’s stage director Casey Miller regarding what has been described as a “pattern of behavior,” including treating cast and crew disrespectfully and using his power in the production to give preferential treatment. Another burlesque performer, Kate Nickerson, wrote in a series of social media posts that she dated Miller starting in 2008 when she had just turned 18 and he was a decade older, a consensual relationship that she now sees as exploitative. D’Lite resigned after her husband Dante Wildern was fired from the production for criticizing Miller and Theatre Bizarre management in a now-deleted comment under one of Nickerson’s posts, writing, “they don’t give a fuck. They

push out the people who speak up.

Myself included. Never thought that would happen.”

D’Lite declined to comment on the record to Metro Times, other than to voice concerns about publishing a story before the event so as not to disrupt it. Wildern and Miller also declined to comment.

In an email, Theatre Bizarre creator John Dunivant acknowledged that Wildern was fired after criticizing Theatre Bizarre and Miller on social media, but denies that others were “pushed out.”

Wildern, who is also a singer who goes by Charlie Champagne, had been a fi ture at Theatre Bizarre since he was a child, and univant even officiated the marriage between Wildern and D’Lite. Dunivant tells Metro Times he is “deeply saddened at the loss of these two as friends,” adding that he found the situation “heartbreaking.”

Theatre Bizarre is the artistic vision of Dunivant, a painter and sculptor who was designated a Kresge Artist Fellow in 2011. The event started as an

underground party at Detroit’s former Michigan State Fairgrounds in 2000 and grew in popularity by word of mouth — eventually drawing increased scrutiny from city officials, who in shut it down a day before it was to start, citing code violations. Organizers made an 11th-hour arrangement to move Theatre Bizarre to the Fillmore that year, and the event has called the Masonic Temple home since 2011, where it has continued to grow, expanding to two weekends.

But current and former crew and volunteers who spoke with Metro Times allege that despite the higher profile, the event is still run in many ways like an underground party. While live entertainment company AEG Presents entered into an exclusive agreement with the sprawling Masonic Temple complex in 2019 to operate and book its two music venues, the Masonic Temple Theatre and the Cathedral Theatre, Theatre Bizarre is a private event not under its purview. The Masonic Temple, a secret organization run by the fraternal order of the Freemasons, did not respond to a request for comment.

Dunivant has eschewed corporate sponsorship in order to maintain his artistic vision for Theatre Bizarre, though at the cost of greater financial stability.

He has long claimed the event does not turn a profit, and says all money brought in pays the team staff and provides a stipend to the volunteers, entertainers, artists, and operational costs.

For its many workers, it’s a labor of love.

“Theatre Bizarre is a high-stress, fast-paced environment with massively talented creative personalities to navigate,” Dunivant says. “With an event of this magnitude, vision is key. With creativity can come conflict, especially when over 1,000 people are involved.”

A gothic beacon

ate ickerson says she first became involved with Theatre Bizarre in 2008, when she was 17. An aspiring musician and burlesque performer, she says she was immediately enchanted by the production, which transformed six lots near Detroit’s old Fairgrounds into a veritable Halloween theme park for what was then a one-day event, with carnival-like signs and attractions that had been weathered to look old and decrepit. Dunivant and his crew even came up with an elaborate fictitious backstory that alleged Theatre Bizarre was the site of Detroit’s original State Fair, but like many other things in the city had been abandoned over the years.

The grounds also became a sort of bohemian artists colony where Theatre

“It’s this constant, ‘Are you good enough for Zombo, are you good enough for Theater Bizarre?’ sort of mentality ... because it’s what makes people work hard for free.”

Bizarre crew lived year-round, including Miller. Months after she turned 18, Nickerson says she began a relationship with Miller and moved in with him.

She says she had dreams of becoming part of the Theatre Bizarre crew, and got a role as a stagehand for D’Lite, as well as a gig performing as a character during a wrestling event held on the grounds. Her character was a doll.

“I was a human marionette, which, I don’t know, what a fitting, unfortunate metaphor, eh?” she says by phone from Pennsylvania, where she now lives.

“Casey is the one who came up with my tagline, ‘Detroit’s living doll.’ And it’s so ironic.”

She maintains that the relationship was consensual, though she now sees how the difference in their ages, as well as Miller’s power within Theatre Bizarre, created an asymmetrical and controlling dynamic. Miller referred to himself as her manager, she says, but would date other people and not allow her to do the same. “We were living in the same house, and sometimes I could hear him sleeping with other women through the floor because our rooms were right next to each other,” she says.

Nickerson says she went along with the arrangement for years, which she described in an Instagram post as being “emotionally and psychologically abused.”

“It was a lot,” she says. “I was 19 and I desperately wanted to be a part of that community. I wanted more than anything to be part of Theatre Bizarre.

I mean, it’s beautiful,” she says, choking up with tears, adding, “It’s a beautiful party. t’s magnificent art.”

The grounds drew all sorts of other like minded young people, Nickerson says. “There’s a reason why people like me show up, because when you put out a call for volunteers, you get every goth teenager in Detroit who wants to be a part of Clown Town,” she says.

“And honestly, I think that’s the thing that is so rewarding and beautiful about Theater Bizarre, is the way that the volunteers come together to make something bigger than themselves,” she says. “It makes you want to be a part of it. It makes you see it as a community.

It’s a Theater Bizarre family, but the thing about family is that sometimes your family members do serious shit, and you have to come to terms with

whether or not you want to be part of [ that] .”

Eventually, Nickerson made the decision to leave Miller and Theatre Bizarre, an experience she likens to leaving a cult. She says she feared being ostracized by her community.

“It’s scary as shit to come out against Z ombo,” she says, describing a work hard, play hard culture in which the crew seemed to be in a perpetual contest to see who was the most dedicated. “It’s just like, well, ‘How many years have you been around? How many hours have you worked? Well, how old are you? How much do you smoke? How much can you drink? How hard can you party?’ It’s this constant, ‘Are you good enough for Z ombo, are you good enough for Theater Bizarre?’ sort of mentality that is being pitched because it’s what makes people work hard for free.”

She adds, “It’s just a real boy’s club.

And the boy at the top is John Dunivant.”

When Metro Times tried to contact other Theatre Bizarre crew and volunteers for comment, we encountered a cloud of paranoia. Word of our inquiries spread quickly, and a number of workers even accused Metro Times of being a spy sent on behalf of Dunivant to root out dissenters. Most would only speak off the record out of fear of retaliation, including litigation. (Dunivant says the only person who has been threatened with legal action was Wildern “in a heated moment” during his firing.

“Let’s just say our priorities grew apart and I look forward to having more of my time back to pursue my own creative efforts,” said one longtime worker who was planning on leaving after this year.

“Yeah, I know that’s super PC. I’m not here to stir up shit.”

Another longtime worker who requested anonymity out of fear of retribution said, “I quit this year and won’t be back. Not only do I not feel safe or protected I feel exploited by a crew I loyally served.”

Others insisted that only a very small number of people were leaving for various reasons, including doing the event for many years, and claimed that they had not heard of any major issues behind the scenes.

“I mean, it’s really intense,” admits Daniel Land, who has been working at Theatre Bizarre since the State Fair-

grounds days and now runs its in-house movie theater, dubbed the Sinema.

“Watching it grow into a much more, you know, thoroughly organized and meticulous organization is something that I have seen, and I gotta imagine that leads to a lot of headaches and could lead some to burnout.”

Another long-time worker who requested anonymity in exchange for candor says she plans on quitting because of the culture.

“The energy of it is very cultish,” she says, adding that she believes the environment is ripe for “grooming.”

“You got these young people that want to be a part of a group,” she says, adding, “These youngins, they’re so loyal to these older folks.”

From the underground to HR

Dunivant says that new this year, a human resources role was created within Theatre Bizarre to try to mediate internal conflicts, a position that was created by a dedicated volunteer.

Petra McAninch, a longtime friend of Nickerson who joined the production around the same time as her and rose through the ranks to become stage manager of the Crystal Ballroom, says she resigned this year after bringing concerns about Miller’s “pattern of behavior” to Theatre Bizarre leadership, including the HR person.

McAninch says Theatre Bizarre leaders have long preached a “see something, say something” culture and a “zero tolerance” policy for harassment, which emboldened her to speak up.

Aside from Miller using his position in Theater Bizarre to manipulate performers, other concerns McAninch voiced included accusations of misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia.

McAninch, who came out as transgender during her time at Theatre Bizarre, says Miller continued to use her former name and pronouns, and laughed about it.

When she asked Miller to stop, she says he responded with a shrug. McAninch also says she saw Miller speak to D’Lite disrespectfully, and says other women have complained about his behavior, with at least one performer requesting to not be left alone with him.

But McAninch says shortly after she brought up the concerns to Theatre Bizarre leadership, Miller texted and attempted to call her, indicating that the concerns had been brought directly to Miller. At that point, McAninch says she feared retaliation.

“At the time he was very much still my boss,” McAninch says. “He was my direct superior in the company. And there’s certainly, in my opinion, a conflict of interest and danger to letting the accused immediately know that something is

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

31

accused, even before a formal HR complaint is even filed.”

McAninch says she then had a nearly three-hour phone call with Theatre Bizarre’s HR contact, detailing the pattern of behavior and asking for Miller to be removed from the show out of concern for the safety of performers. hen it was clear Miller would not be removed from the production, McAninch says she decided to resign, just days before the event.

Dunivant says Theatre Bizarre management investigated McAninch’s complaint but found no other crew members who could corroborate the claims. “ e’re saddened by Petra’s departure she was a key asset to the success of the stage she managed,” univant says.

In her resignation letter, McAninch agreed to stay on in some capacity to help keep the production running. The dedication to the production is the thing that unites all Theatre Bizarre crew, she says — which she thinks is why so few others have voiced concerns.

“I think one of the factors in people not speaking up is the fact that there is, in my opinion, a culture of exclusivity and in many ways of elitism, that you get to be part of this show,” c ninch says.

“There are many performers who’ve worked on the show below their usual

rates. ... will say, as a person working in theater as a stage manager, it is at a lower rate than I would usually be comfortable with or entertain, personally.”

She adds, “I haven’t done that show for the money for a very, very long time.”

Another factor that prevented McAninch from speaking up was the fear of losing her community, she says.

“I absolutely had fear that if I spoke out there were people who would never speak to me again,” she says.

“This has been my community for a decade and a half,” she says. “ t is absolutely heartbreaking to have things end this way, and to see a very dear friend of mine [ Nickerson] not have been able to feel safe or comfortable in this space for years. nd it took a lot of processing for me to realize how safe I didn’t feel, and I think the transphobia I experienced articulated it to me in a way that made it so much clearer that I no longer felt safe.”

McAninch thinks there could be another reason other crew members aren’t speaking up, too.

“I think when the dynamic of your party is a fake cult, or a pretend cult, as it were,” she says, “ think it may have the side effect of sort of rubbing off into reality.”

32 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

Building a better Fistotorium

Metro Times also learned of issues with one of Theatre Bizarre’s BDSM-themed rooms, a dungeon called the Fistotorium that features a dominatri . n past years, consenting attendees lined up to be spanked by the dominatrix, or even have hot candle wa dripped on them.

But the attraction was very popular, and consent can be hard to establish in a large crowd of people who might be into icated. There was some sort of incident during the 2018 event, with Theatre Bizarre parting ways with the previous dominatrix and her crew, bringing in a new performance troupe the ne t year. t’s not clear what happened some rumors say the dominatrix was hurting guests even after they asked her to stop, or was using language that was beyond the pale, or was into icated. univant acknowledged that Theatre Bizarre severed ties with the former troupe, but would not say why, only that it did not involve an into icated dominatri .

This year, a new system was introduced in which attendees could only gain access to the Fistotorium if they had tokens, but some told Metro Times that it was not clear how to get the tokens. ith tickets to the event costing a pretty penny, they said they felt cheated

for not gaining full access to the event. “ e’re always looking to improve the guest e perience,” univant acknowledges. “The istitorium and the areas surrounding the space are key attractions, which leads to congested areas, as so many want to e perience the space.”

To try to mitigate the crowd, Dunivant says a reservation system was created to disburse tokens with a time stamped on them so attendees could stagger their entry into the istotorium.

“The idea was to move people away from just lingering in the hallway waiting to get in and move them out into the rest of the building to enjoy other attractions,” univant says. “ e did fail in better communicating to our guests how that reservation system would work.”

Dunivant says he has seriously considered all criticisms that Theatre Bizarre has faced. Previously, he told Metro Times that this year’s Theatre Bizarre almost didn’t happen. number of crew members were divided on whether to continue this year due to CO .

In the end, it was decided that the show must go on.

“I take all of these accusations to heart as this isn’t just a production or a party,” he says, “it is my life’s work and I take the care and safety of this community very seriously.”

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

33

Flesh and the Devil

CULTURE

Rated: N/A Run-time: 109 minutes

Greta Garbo and John Gilbert in Flesh And The Devil.

PICTURELUX / THE HOLLYWOOD ARCHIVE / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

The actors steal the show in this old silent film

By George E lk ind

Clarence Brown’s Flesh

and the Devil is nearly a century old now, but its story is even older. Starring John Gilbert, Greta Garbo, and Lars Hanson as a trio joined and placed at odds by friendship and by romance, the silent film playing at the Senate Theater on Saturday, Nov. 19) dramatizes the ruptures brought on by unspent desire, and the strains jealousy can bring upon a durable, sworn, and presumably lifelong friendship. In doing so, it casts Garbo, here playing Felicitas von Rhaden, a wealthy beauty who captures male attention, as a kind of homewrecker of male bonds. The temptations she introduces into the men’s lives are rooted, it’s said within the film, in the workings of the devil reflecting the kind of faltering, often blinkered spiritual interests of the film’s scenario. But the film’s performances — especially Garbo’s — and its direction are not nearly so thin, allowing it to rise above its story’s native faults.

As two German soldiers living out their years of service between wars, Gilbert’s Leo and Hanson’s Ulrich begin the film in a state that’s largely carefree. aking sick to play hooky when we find them at the film’s open, the pair make the most of their days off even the

consequences they face when caught slacking seem strangely modest. Partners in a long, homosocial companionship rooted in their time on what they call the idyllic “Isle of Friendship,” they live for the naive sounding off duty pleasures of “furlough… home… champagne… sleep! ” While more fragments of adult life remain implicit within those ellipses, their shared characterization as boyish, at once mischievous and innocent, colors what follows.

Then enter Felicitas, who shifts Leo’s orientation. Spying her at a ball in a moment accentuated by a swift fade which brings Garbo’s face from a background feature to a scale at which it fills the whole frame, Leo suddenly abandons Hertha, Ulrich’s swooning younger sister, on the dance floor in public, in dogged pursuit of his new crush. This abortive romantic dynamic toward a potential romance with Hertha seems typical of Leo, who takes her for granted as an accessory to her brother while implying an enduring perception of her as essentially still a child). Contrasting innocence and experience, and pitting innocent, orderly desire against its less publicly acceptable and easily embraced forms, the film’s whole arc stems from this rupture — though it’s a moment that

34 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

passes by swiftly, and one Hertha bears with good humor. rom there, in one of the film’s standout sequences, Leo follows Felicitas into a shadowy glade outside, a space of mystery evoking the ambiguities of adult life. Edenic in its cast, Leo slips more deeply into infatuation here, each avoidant answer from Garbo’s character “ hat does it matter ” “Perhaps.”) making him more captive to her opaque charms. “You seem young,” she remarks late, creating a mirror of the dynamic between Leo himself and Hertha — the key distinction being her willingness to embrace what Leo feels toward her. When the pair share a cigarette, it becomes the screen’s sole source of light between them, an intimate and totalizing space. From there, an affair becomes inevitable.

The interplay smoking requires — of a focused physical dialogue between the face and hands — could hardly be more suited to Garbo. While her expression within the scene is one of patient reserve, it remains intent in ways fated to erupt seconds and then much more time later. I’ll say — hopefully without spoiling too much – that the stuff of real life comes between them, generating distance along with friction.

With this comes opportunity for much

more florid actorly performance.

Within this period of separation — which Ulrich works to mitigate — the characters find space for agony as well as contemplation, with rifts within and between each figure deepened by romantic longings made, by workings of the film’s compact social world, unsatisfactory or unfulfilled. s the film’s tensions all simmer, with dichotomies between old ties and new desires — loyalty and want, propriety and self fulfillment all in play, the film’s mannered world gives way to a manic energy which takes hold of different characters in turn.

Garbo makes the most of this, whether caressing a column with a sense of fulsome suggestion, caught in indecision, or bearing witness to bloodshed and its fallout. Acting richly with her face and hands and allowing her composure to crack more readily than in her later work, she easily subverts the film’s dialogic depiction of her as monstrous and to its benefit, the characterization never truly lands.

As Leo, Gilbert captures a sense of torn-ness between cordial decency and violent want, swerving between deep resentment and effortful feats of consideration. In his role as Ulrich, Hanson provides a baseline against which the other key players contrast against. The schema works each is very good in their own way, managing both a certain largeness often deemed alienating today especially for those dipping a toe in silent film alongside a more nuanced form of emotional agility that brings the film’s raw feelings — not always accounted for so well by its script — past its time and into the present.

Playing into a desire for naive simplicity, of things making sense and falling into a certain predictable order, the film’s trajectory and its intended “lessons,” stated as they are) play richly against the sense of turmoil that runs through it. With F lesh and the Devil benefiting from an easy meshing of its cast’s palpable subjective feelings with its own form, the film’s depiction of its characters’ romantic desires refuses to allow for the kind of containment the story attempts. Expressing a deep longing to go back to a more innocent time, a more ignorant and even childlike state, a sense of dissonance brought on through this impossibility brings out a greater sense of tragedy than more forced harmonies in its story would ever likely manage.

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

35

CULTURE Savage Love Loaded Questions

By Dan Savage There is more to this week’s Savage Love. To read the entire column, go to Savage.Love.

Dear Readers: I’m away this week, so we’re re-running a popular Q& A from a few years back. This column originally appeared in late June of 2018.

I’ll be back next week with a brand-new column. —Dan

Q:

I am a 24-year-old straight guy who recently broke up with my girlfriend of more than four years. One of the reasons we broke up was a general lack of sexually compatibility. She had a particular aversion to oral sex — both giving and receiving. I didn’t get a blowjob the whole time we were together.

Which brings me to why I am writing: One of my closest friends, “Sam,” is a gay guy. Shortly after breaking up with my girlfriend, I was discussing my lack of oral sex with Sam, and he said he’d be willing to “help me out.” I agreed, and Sam gave me an earth-shattering blowjob. I was glad to get some and had no hang-ups about a guy sucking me.

Since then, Sam has blown me three more times. My problem is I am starting to feel guilty and worry I am using Sam. He’s a very good buddy, and I’m concerned this lopsided sexual arrangement might be bad for our friendship.

Sam knows I am not into guys and I’m never going to reciprocate, and I feel like this is probably not really fair to him.

But these are literally the only blowjobs I’ve received since I was a teenager.

What should I do?

—T o tally H ave R es er vatio ns O ver A d vantage T ak ing

A : Only one person knows how Sam

feels about this “lopsided sexual arrangement,” THROAT, and it isn’t me.

Z ooming out for a second: People constantly ask me how the person they’re fucking or fisting or flogging feels about the fucking or fisting or flogging. uys write to ask why women ghosted them; women write to ask if their boyfriends are secretly gay.

36 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

And while I’m happy to speculate, I’m not a mind reader. Which means I have no way of knowing for sure why some woman ghosted you or whether your boyfriend is gay. Or in your case, THROAT, I have no way of knowing how Sam feels about the four norecip blowjobs he’s given you. Only Sam knows.

And that’s why I wrote you back, THROAT, and asked you for Sam’s contact information. Since you were clearly too afraid to ask Sam yourself (most likely for fear the blowjobs would stop), offered to ask Sam on your behalf.

I wasn’t serious — it was my way of saying, “You should ask Sam.” But you sent me Sam’s contact info, and a few minutes later I was chatting with Sam. “Yes, I have been sucking my straight friend’s cock,” Sam said to me. “And I am flattered he told you was good at it. That’s an ego booster! ” Sam, like THROAT, is 24 years old.

He grew up on the East Coast and met T O T early in his first year at college. Sam came out at the end of his freshman year, to THROAT and his other friends, and he now lives in a big city where he works in marketing when he isn’t sucking off T O T. y first uestion for Sam re you one of those gay guys who gets off on “servicing” straight guys?

“I’ve never done anything with a straight guy before this,” said Sam. “So, no, I’m not someone who is ‘into servicing straight guys.’ I have only ever dated and hooked up with gay guys before! ” So, why offer to blow T O T “I didn’t know until after he broke up with his girlfriend that he hadn’t gotten a blowjob the whole time they were together — four years! ” Sam said. “When I told him I’d be happy to help him out, I was joking. I swear I wasn’t making a pass at my straight friend! But there was this long pause, and then he got serious and said he’d be into it. I wondered for a minute if it would be weird for me to blow my friend, and there was definitely a bit of convincing each other that we were serious. When he started taking his clothes off, thought, So this is going to happen.’ It was not awkward after. We even started joking about it right away. have sucked him off four more times since then.”

For those of you keeping score at home: Either THROAT lost count of the number of times Sam has blown him — THROAT said Sam has blown him three more times after that first blowjob or T O T got a fifth blowjob in the time that elapsed between

sending me his letter and putting me in touch with Sam. So, does this lopsided sexual arrangement — blowing a straight boy who’s never going to blow him back — bother Sam? “I suppose it is a ‘lopsided sexual arrangement,’” said Sam. “But I don’t mind. I really like sucking dick and I’m really enjoying sucking his dick.

He has a really nice dick! And from my perspective, we’re both having fun. nd, yes, ’ve jacked off thinking about it after each time I sucked him.

I know — now — that he thinks it is a bit unfair to me. But I don’t feel that way at all.”

So, there is something in it for Sam, THROAT. You get the blowjobs, Sam gets the memories. (Memories that he jerks off to later. nd Sam assumes that at some point, memories are all he’ll have.

“He will eventually get into a relationship with a woman again, and our arrangement will end,” said Sam. “I only hope nothing is weird between us in the future because of what has happened in the past few weeks.” had one last uestion Sam is really good at sucking cock — he gives “earthshattering” blowjobs, according to THROAT — but is THROAT any good at getting his cock sucked? As experienced cocksuckers know, a person can suck at getting their cock sucked: They can just lay/ stand/ sit there, giving you no feedback, or be too pushy or not pushy enough, etc.

“That’s a really good uestion,” Sam said. “I have to say, he is very good at it.

He really gets into it, he moans, he talks about how good it feels, and he lasts a long time. That’s part of what makes sucking his cock so much fun.”

Dear Readers: It’s me again. I got a lot of letters in response to T O T’s uestion. This one appeared in the column the following week. —Dan

A : You ran a letter about a gay man (“Sam”)…

Go to Savage.Love to read the rest.

Beginning next week, Nov. 14 , Savage Love will be exclusively available online at Savage.Love. Find Dan there! questions@savagelove.net.

Listen to Dan on the Savage Lovecast.

Follow Dan on Twitter @FakeDanSavage.

metrotimes.com | November 9-15, 2022

37

CULTURE

Free Will Astrology

By Rob Brezsny

ARIES: March 21 – April 19 When you Aries people are at your best, you are driven by impeccable integrity as you translate high ideals into practical action. You push on with tireless force to get what you want, and what you want is often good for others, too. You have a strong sense of what it means to be vividly alive, and you stimulate a similar awareness in the people whose lives you touch. Are you always at your best? Of course not. No one is. But according to my analysis of upcoming astrological omens, you now have extra potential to live up to the elevated standards I described. I hope you will take full advantage.

TAURUS: April 20 – May 20 In my experience, you Tauruses often have more help available than you realize. You underestimate your power to call on support, and as a result, don’t call on it enough. It may even be the case that the possible help gets weary of waiting for you to summon it, and basically goes into hiding or fades away.

But let’s say that you, the lucky person reading this horoscope, get inspired by my words. Maybe you will respond by becoming more forceful about rec-

A good Veterans Day, Remembrance Day or Armistice Day to all that served. Especially to those who are no longer with us or never came back.

11 Hour 11 Day 11 Month

ognizing and claiming your potential blessings. I hope so! In my astrological opinion, now is a favorable time for you to go in quest of all the help you could possibly want. (P.S.: Where might the help come from? Sources you don’t e pect, perhaps, but also familiar influences that expand beyond their previous dispensations.)

GEMINI: May 21 – June 20 Sometimes, life compels us to change. It brings us some shock that forces us to adjust. On other occasions, life doesn’t pressure us to make any shifts, but we nevertheless feel drawn to initiating a change. My guess is that you are now experiencing the latter. There’s no acute discomfort pushing you to revise your rhythm. You could probably continue with the status quo for a while. And yet, you may sense a growing curiosity about how your life could be different. The possibility of instigating a transformation intrigues you. I suggest you trust this intuition. If you do, the coming weeks will bring you greater clarity about how to proceed.

CANCER: June 21 – July 22 “ e suffer more often in imagination than in reality,” wrote ancient Roman philosopher Seneca. That’s certainly true about me. If all the terrible things I have worried about had actually come to pass, I would be unable to function. Luckily, most of my fears have remained mere fantasies. What about you, fellow Cancerian? The good news is that in the coming months, we Crabs will have unprecedented power to tamp down and dissipate the phantasms that rouse anxiety and alarm. I predict that as a result, we will suffer less from imaginary problems than we ever have before. How’s that for a spectacular prophecy?

imagination like a bulb needs a socket.

My imagination needs reality like a blind man needs a cane.” I think that’s great counsel for you to emphasize in the coming weeks. Your reality needs a big influ of energy from your imagination, and your imagination needs to be extra well-grounded in reality. Call on both influences with ma imum intensity!

JAMES NOELLERT

His novel R unning in the F amil y describes his experiences upon returning to his native Sri Lanka as an adult.

Among the most delightful: the deluge of novel sensory sensations. On some days, he would spend hours simply smelling things. In accordance with current astrological omens, I recommend you treat yourself to comparable experiences, Virgo. Maybe you could devote an hour today to mindfully inhaling various aromas. Tomorrow, meditate on the touch of lush textures. On the next day, bathe yourself in sounds that fill you with rich and interesting feelings.

By feeding your senses like this, you will give yourself an extra deep blessing that will literally boost your intelligence.

LIBRA: Sept. 23 – Oct. 22 You evolved Libras understand what’s fair and just. That’s one of your potencies, and it provides a fine service for you and your allies. You use it to glean objective truths that are often more valuable than everyone’s subjective opinions. You can be a stirring mediator as you deploy your knack for impartiality and evenhandedness. I hope these talents of yours will be in vivid action during the coming weeks.

We non-Libras need extra-strong doses of this stuff.

LEO: July 23 – August 22 Poet Matt Michael writes, “Sure, the way trees talk is poetry. The shape of the moon is poetry. But a hot dog is also poetry. LeBron James’ tomahawk dunk over Kevin Garnett in the 2008 B Playoffs is poetry. That pothole always fail to miss on Parkman Road is poetry, too.” In accordance with current astrological omens, Leo, I’d love for you to adopt Michael’s approach. The coming days will be a favorable time to expand your ideas about what’s lyrical, beautiful, holy, and meaningful. Be alert for a stream of omens that will offer you help and inspiration. The world has subtle miracles to show you.

SCORPIO: Oct. 23 – Nov. 21 Here are tips on how to get the most out of the next three weeks: 1.

Be a master of simmering, ruminating, marinating, steeping, fermenting, and effervescing. . Summon intense streams of self-forgiveness for any past event that still haunts you. 3 . Tap into your forbidden thoughts so they might heal you. Discover what you’re hiding from yourself so it can guide you. Ask yourself prying questions. 4 . Make sure your zeal always synergizes your allies’ energy, and never steals it. 5. Regularly empty your metaphorical trash so you always have enough room inside you to gleefully breathe the sweet air and exult in the earth’s beauty.

VIRGO: August 23 – Sept. 22 Virgo author Michael Ondaatje was born in Sri Lanka, but as a child moved to England and later to Canada.

SAGITTARIUS: Nov. 22 – Dec. 21 “I straddle reality and the imagination,” says Sagittarian singer-songwriter Tom Waits. “My reality needs

38 November 9-15, 2022 | metrotimes.com

CAPRICORN: Dec. 22 – Jan. 19 Sometimes, Capricorn, you appear to be so calm, secure, and capable that people get a bit awed, even worshipful. They may even get caught up in trying to please you. Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily — as long as you don’t exploit and manipulate those people. It might even be a good thing in the coming weeks, since you and your gang have a chance to accomplish big improvements in your shared resources and environment. It would take an extra push from everyone, though. I suspect you’re the leader who’s best able to incite and orchestrate the e tra effort.

AQUARIUS: Jan. 20 – Feb. 18 If you have been posing as a normal person for too long, I hope you will create fresh outlets for your true weird self in the weeks ahead.

What might that entail? I’ll throw out a couple of ideas. You could welcome back your imaginary friends and give them new names like Raw Goodness and Spiral Trickster. You might wear fake vampire teeth during a committee meeting or pray to the Flying Spaghetti Monster to send you paranormal adventures. What other ideas can you imagine about how to have way too much fun as you draw more intensely on your core eccentricities?

PISCES: Feb.19 – March 20 I suspect you will have metaphorical resemblances to a duck in the coming weeks: an amazingly adaptable creature equally at home on land, in the water, and in the air. You will feel comfortable anywhere you choose to wander. And I’m guessing you will want to wander farther and wider than you usually do. Here’s another quality that you and ducks will share: You’ll feel perfectly yourself, rela ed and confident, no matter what the weather is. Whether it’s cloudy or shiny, rainy or misty, mild or frigid, you will not only be unflappable — you will thrive on the variety. Like a duck, Pisces, you may not attract a lot of attention. But I bet you will enjoy the hell out of your life exactly as it is.

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