6.29 Indy Week

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jUne 29, 2022

Stained GlaSS CeilinGS

Despite its inclusive messaging, a Durham Catholic school denies a job to a transgender parishioner. By Lena GeLLer, p. 5

Ongoing controversy at Pioneers Church takes a turn when the organization disaffiliates with its denomination. By sarah edwards, p. 7

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Raleigh W Durham W Chapel Hill VOL. 39 NO. 26

North Carolina laws regulating industrial hemp sales in the state could go into freefall this week. p. 9 PHOTO BY BRETT VILLENA

CONTENTS NEWS 5 7 9 11

A Durham Catholic school is udner fire (again) for discriminating against an LGBTQ member of its community. BY LENA GELLER Since it opened, Pioneers Durham has been a lightning rod for controversy.

Now it's leaving the United Methodist Church. BY SARAH EDWARDS NC hemp bills are on life support as lawmakers prepare to go home for the summer. BY HANNAH KAUFMAN AND MARIANA FABIAN The stark realities of a post-Roe North Carolina BY JASMINE GALLUP

ARTS & CULTURE 12 14

Award-winning choreographer Abby Zbikowski’s new work at the American Dance Festival is a radical primer on claiming space. BY BYRON WOODS Theatre Raleigh’s staging of Yellow Face is sharp and timely.

BY KATY KOOP

15 Tab-One's latest release, Glory in the Weight, drips with wisdom.

BY RYAN COCCA

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BACK TA L K

Last week, we republished a story from the 9th Street Journal about a community meeting between city and Durham Housing Authority officials and local residents addressing the controversial redevelopment of Fayette Place, a neighborhood within the Hayti community, and the Hayti Reborn proposal that was not selected for the redevelopment project. Reader ROBERT B. GLENN JR of Durham sent us the following letter:

Durham

e Your article states that “the housing authority stirred controversy after tapping Durham Community Partners to redevelop the Fayette Place site.”

The process for selecting a developer was done pursuant to federally required procedures which were open and transparent as required by federal law.

The fact that Hayti Reborn was not selected speaks to its lack of qualifications and nothing more.

For many advocates for the low-income community, the number one problem in Durham is affordable housing. The proposal will create 774 affordable housing units on Fayette Place. This development will target low-income residents, the vast majority of which will be black.

Beginning in 2018 there has been ample opportunity for public input in the development of the project. Durham CAN led a vigorous campaign to encourage the housing authority to develop affordable housing on the site. If you consult your archives, you will read about several actions held on the site by CAN to gather public engagement and input from the Hayti community. It was because of this public engagement process that the housing authority chose to build housing on the property.

Hayti Reborn was not rejected, rather a more qualified developer was chosen; one that has a track record necessary to raise the $189,000,000 needed for the development. The Hayti Reborn project plans to develop 2000 acres in the Hayti area. The Fayetteville Street development is less than 10% of that land. Building housing on the Fayetteville track will help secure the success of the development of the remaining 1981 acres.

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15 MINUTES Siri Chenna, Peggy Tatum, and Amanda Mandy Founders of the Gut Patrol

BY CARYL ESPINOZA JAEN backtalk@indyweek.com

The Gut Patrol is a community project raising awareness about preventative measures against gastrointestinal cancer. This year, the group hosted a health fair and donated over 200 bags of food in collaboration with the Black Farmers Market and Duke University.

What gave you all the idea to start the Gut Patrol Project?

Amanda: In my work as a research coordinator, I was seeing a trend of younger folks coming in with gastrointestinal issues.

That helped me to speak to our researchers, doctors, and epidemiologists, like, “Why is this happening?” And then with the death of [actor] Chadwick Boseman, that just really stirred something up in me. Like, 45, colorectal cancer and dying—how long [ago] did this start?

The providers in our work afforded me an opportunity to get a grant with the North Carolina Gastrointestinal Society. I reached out to Peggy and said, “You’ve helped me write this grant, you’re well connected, we can get this together.” And we formulated the Gut Patrol to go out and bring awareness to the community about gastrointestinal health.

What events has the Gut Patrol hosted so far?

Peggy: We just did the one health fair on March 15. But we had a number of speaking engagements on our schedule where we were going around because we did a special edition on TCP Magazine just for the Gut Patrol. We’ve participated with the State Employees Credit Union Association and we’re part of their health fair.

Siri: We also did a webinar back in February where we had around 80 participants or attendees come in collaboration with our Duke Health Advisory Team to put that together. And we do envision having more of these in the future.

When the Gut Patrol hosts a seminar or a health fair, what are some of the big points you usually hit?

Peggy: Amanda took all the questions on the webinar. We covered stomach cancer and colon cancer on it, and we had folks online asking for advice as to what to ask their doctor if they went to the doctor.

Amanda: We get a lot of people asking about probiotics, about health programs, about when they should talk to their health care provider. Our advisory team is made up of a gastroenterologist, a hepatologist, an epidemiologist, and the director of the Duke Cancer Institute’s office of equity and inclusion.

They have a program called Patient Navigator so when people come in and they don’t have a provider or insurance, the Navigator program can help them find providers within the system.

How are you receiving funding and help for this project?

Peggy: Duke has also given us a lot of resources and the people on the advisory team, and that’s invaluable. When we were telling people about what we were doing with the Gut Patrol, they understood the vision— not everybody, but the ones who understood just came in and did their own contributions.

We have a number of partners; someone came in and made us T-shirts.

We’ve been looking toward other methods of income as far as other grants are concerned.

But we want to make sure whatever we apply for, we’re able to adhere to what all those guidelines are. It’s not just a one-stop thing.

We’ve got other things to do. We’ve got other plans for the Patrol. W

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Durham

Immaculate Misdirection An ostensibly progressive Catholic school in Durham is under fire again for discriminating against an LGBTQ member of the school’s governing parish.

BY LENA GELLER lgeller@indyweek.com

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hen I ask Wilhelmina Indermaur what she likes about Catholicism, her voice gets breathy and she starts talking at top speed, like she knows she only has so much time to answer the question and wants to pack in as much as she can.

She loves attending Mass, and describes it as a multisensory, “fully immersive” experience: the sound of the music, the smell of the incense, the taste of Communion, the physical movements (“we stand, we sit, we kneel; it’s like a dance”).

She loves the church’s ancient rituals, like reciting different prayers at different times of the day, and she loves the Catholic devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. She wears a silver medallion engraved with the venerated saint, and her Instagram bio boasts the Latin phrase totus tuus, which comes from a devotion called the Consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary and translates to “totally thine.”

“Having this maternal energy and this maternal side of what divinity can be is very appealing to me, especially as a trans woman,” she says.

Indermaur grew up in Raleigh and was raised in the United Methodist Church, but her grandmother, whom she calls Oma, was German Catholic, and she loves how practicing Catholicism makes her feel close to her ancestors.

Indermaur started attending Catholic Mass regularly during college. She was going through a lot—her mom was battling uterine cancer; her oma had died unexpectedly of ovarian cancer; she had been sexually assaulted multiple times; she had come out as gender queer—and found the church to be a “safe place.”

The Catholic Church generally isn’t known for being inclusive, but Indermaur says she always felt accepted as a queer person—and then as a queer, transgender

woman, after she transitioned in 2019.

“I never felt like [the church] contradicted who I was,” Indermaur says. “I never felt like I was not meant to be there.”

That changed two weeks ago, when Indermaur learned that Immaculata Catholic School had prohibited her from working on its campus due to her gender identity.

Indermaur had been planning to take a role at the K–8 Durham school as an in-class aide for a disabled child whom she nannied throughout the pandemic.

The child—we’ll call her Emily—would start school at Immaculata in the fall, so her family had hired Indermaur as an independent contractor. Emily uses a wheelchair and requires assistance with both mobility and communication, so Indermaur would be advocating for her needs; helping her complete schoolwork, eat lunch, and use the bathroom; and taking her from class to class and to appointments with her physical and communicative therapists, whom she meets during the school day.

Indermaur seemed like the perfect person for the job: not only was she familiar with Emily’s needs, but she had experience as an educator—she was a preschool teacher for the three years before the pandemic—and she was deeply ingrained in the community of both Immaculata and its governing parish, Immaculate Conception. Indermaur is registered as a parishioner of a Catholic church in Raleigh, but she’s been attending Mass at Immaculata regularly since 2017, when she moved to Durham. She frequently makes solitary visits to pray under the statue of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception on the church grounds and lights candles in the parish office chapel when she’s feeling distressed.

In 2020, she took a job nannying two children—in a different family than Emily’s— who attend Immaculata and has spent the

Wilhelmina Indermaur

PHOTO BY BRETT VILLENA

past two years accompanying them to the school’s Friday morning prayer services, coaching them through religion homework, and chatting with their teachers.

When Emily’s parents offered Indermaur the in-class aide position, Indermaur was thrilled at the opportunity to work within the community she’d grown to know and love, and until two weeks ago, everything seemed set to go: she’d completed the necessary paperwork, passed a background check, and had multiple conversations with parents and teachers, who all seemed excited to have her on board.

Then, on June 16, Indermaur got a call from Emily’s parents. They were crying when she picked up the phone.

Jacek Orzechowski, the pastor of Immaculate Conception, had called an emergency meeting earlier in the week between the parish’s clerical staff and the school’s administrative staff, Emily’s parents told her. At the meeting, Orzechowski had stated that because Indermaur is transgender, she is unfit to work on Immaculata’s campus. (Immaculata, Immaculate Conception Church, and the Catholic Diocese of Raleigh did not respond to interview requests for this story.)

“It was devastating,” Indermaur says. “I stayed in bed for a day and a half, and I didn’t eat for two days.”

She felt a little better after the third day, when she posted about the situation on social media and messages of support began to come pouring in. But she still felt isolated in her grief; she only knows

a few other LGBTQ Catholics, she says, so there weren’t many people who could really understand what the loss felt like. She also resented the school for forcing Emily’s parents to find a replacement aide last-minute.

“At first I had a kind of crisis of like, can I even be Catholic anymore? Can I support being a part of an institution that continues to do all these awful things?” Indermaur says. “But the spirituality is really important to me. And I feel like the church won’t change unless people inside of it are working to change it.”

She decided she would continue to practice Catholicism but no longer sees herself as part of Immaculata and Immaculate Conception’s community.

“I don’t feel like I can go near Immaculata,” Indermaur says. “I’ve been avoiding driving past it. I don’t know if I’ll ever feel welcome there again.”

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he day before Indermaur found out she’d been barred from working on Immaculata’s campus, the school posted an image of a sunset overlaid with rainbow letters that say “REMAIN IN MY LOVE” on its Instagram account.

“Happy Pride month!” the caption reads.

“Immaculate Conception welcomes members of the LGBTQ community.”

Two days later, the church posted the same text on Twitter and included it in a newsletter to parishioners. While the message seems ironic in the wake of Indermaur’s experience, it aligns with ImmacuINDYweek.com

June 29, 2022

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June 29, 2022

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late Conception’s self-proclaimed commitment to social justice issues.

The parish is known for being fairly progressive; it has five “social action ministry teams,” including one that offers a space for support and discussion of “sexuality, gender, and spirituality in a loving, non-judgmental faith community,” and it’s named as one of four LGBTQ-friendly parishes in the state of North Carolina by Catholic LGBTQ advocacy group New Ways Ministry.

But Indermaur isn’t the first person to throw that label into question.

In 2018, Immaculata made national news when it invited, then uninvited, openly gay Immaculata alum and then Durham City Council member Vernetta Alston to speak as part of the school’s Black History Month celebration. Durham City Council member Jillian Johnson, who is queer, also had her invitation rescinded.

Christopher VanHaight, the pastor of Immaculate Conception at the time, said he decided to rescind Alston’s invitation after some parents expressed worry that “having a pro-gay-marriage politician speak at the school was calling into question the school’s commitment to upholding Catholic moral teaching,” The News & Observer reported. VanHaight canceled school the day after the recision, citing possible protests. After receiving backlash from parents and community members, VanHaight re-invited Alston to speak at Immaculate Conception at a later date. Alston was welcomed with a standing ovation when she took the pulpit the next month.

Angela Belusik, a teacher’s aide at Immaculata who has worked at the school in varying capacities for the past four years, says that until two weeks ago, she was under the impression that the school had “moved past” the incident with Alston. When she heard that Indermaur had been banned from teaching on the campus, she says it felt like “a smack in the face.”

Belusik describes Indermaur as “a present part of our community.” She has long seen Indermaur at morning prayer services and listened to students gush about her, and she made a point to introduce herself at the end of the school year.

“I was super excited to learn that she was going to be at the school,” Belusik says.

She views Immaculata’s rejection of Indermaur as a decision made in fear.

“What the kids would see is a loving, caring human able to care for another individual. And they would learn from that how to be compassionate humans,” Belusik says.

“This is not teaching them compassion.”

Belusik says she doesn’t believe that the decision speaks to the heart of Immaculata. Though she can only speculate, she

says her gut tells her that the ruling came from higher up. (There is no explicit stance regarding transgender people in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, though a number of dioceses in the United States have issued policies denying their existence over the past two years.)

“I think, unfortunately, Immaculata is part of a greater system where their hands are tied,” Belusik says.

Or maybe that’s just what she wants to believe, she says.

Leila Wolfrum, whose daughter recently graduated from Immaculata as school president, says the school frequently credits the diocese with its controversial decisions, but she doesn’t think the “out of our hands” excuse absolves the school of fault.

“Not to use religious language, but that covered a lot of sins for them,” Wolfrum says. “I think they were able to express closed-mindedness—and worse—under that shield.”

Wolfrum wasn’t aware of Indermaur’s rejection until I told her about it, but she says that if the diocese is indeed behind it, it’s disturbing that the school didn’t push back more.

“The idea that the diocese could make a decision like that, and that the community wouldn’t stand up for her, is astonishing to me,” Wolfrum says.

Belusik was the only teacher I could find who agreed to go on the record, though another teacher told me that much of Immaculata’s faculty is upset about Indermaur’s treatment. Belusik was raised Catholic but no longer identifies with the denomination—there’s too much she disagrees with, she says—and currently attends services at Duke Memorial United Methodist Church in Durham. She recognizes that speaking out against her employer may cost her her job, but she wants to exhibit the same courage that Duke Memorial pastor Heather Rodrigues showed when she first consummated a marriage between a same-sex couple within the walls of the church.

The day after our interview, Belusik asked if she could call me back with something that had kept her up during the night. When I answered the phone, she was crying.

“To those who have been beaten down and traumatized by religion, and threatened in the face of hate, through Christ and through religion—I want to say that there are people who don’t believe that that is our Christ,” Belusik says. “Our Christ would welcome Wilhelmina at the table. The same-sex couple who are the parents of one of my students would be at that table. And the hate would not be welcome at the table.” W

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Durham The exterior of Pioneers Durham PHOTO BY BRETT VILLENA

Separation of Church Since opening, local organization Pioneers has drawn considerable community pushback. Now, it’s suddenly leaving its United Methodist Church denomination. BY SARAH EDWARDS sedwards@indyweek.com

O

n Saturdays, for the past few months, a small group of protesters gather in Durham holding signs that read things like “Keep Durham Queer” and “You Can’t Nuance Your Way Out of Homophobia.”

The organization they’re protesting, Pioneers Durham, is a hybrid church-slash-business run by pastor Sherei Lopez Jackson. I reported on Pioneers when it first opened last November and it began to receive community pushback for its stance on LGBTQ+ inclusion—about which it initially demurred, though Lopez Jackson eventually admitted that she will not marry queer couples but says that they are welcome at the church—among other things. Since then, that pushback has amplified, forcing the United Methodist Church (UMC), with which the church has been affiliated, to step in and respond to the criticism and, more recently, causing the church to disaffiliate entirely from that denomination.

But first, the real estate space: Pioneers is located at 408 West Geer Street, a highly sought-after property in Downtown Durham. Immaculately bright and white, the

shop has the spacious feel of an Apple store or West Elm showroom; sometimes, there are people inside. Per its website, the space operates as an “innovative redemptive enterprise,” and inside, you can purchase tea and items by local artists—soap, candles, uplifting greeting cards—or use it as a coworking space; on the weekends, the space will eventually flip into a church. Lopez Jackson also recently announced plans to open up space for childcare.

It is this slippery blend of church and commerce, paired with an evasive communication style, outreach contoured around affluent new Durham populations (the Pioneers Instagram account often includes a string of hashtags for nearby luxury condos), and the non-affirming stance on LGBTQ+ issues, that has spurred controversy.

For a while, across the street, Motorco Music Hall, which faces Pioneers, hung large banners quoting LGBTQ+ activists, and rainbow flags dotted Geer Street. A petition condemning the church accrued more than 7,500 signatures, Motorco hosted a well-attended community forum about the church, and the Google Maps page of Pioneers was

swamped with one-star reviews (though there has also been an influx of five-star reviews). Since late November, the satirical Instagram account @realnativechurch has maintained a prolific posting schedule and a pointed, sepiatoned caricature of Pioneers.

In March, a group of local UMC pastors penned an open letter to regional leadership denouncing Pioneers and asking the UMC to cut financial ties with it.

“United Methodists criticize Pioneers’ brand-first approach to community building and are wary of the church’s opaque relationship to a for-profit business sponsored by the Annual Conference. In response to each of these charges, Pioneers has remained silent or recommitted to the practice that originated the concern,” the letter stated. “We stand with those who say that the broken trust between Pioneers and the people of Durham is beyond repair.”

The tension may be local, but it has also crept into broader discussions about the direction of the UMC, with which Pioneers is affiliated.

Or was affiliated with, at least.

On June 5, Lopez Jackson’s husband, Daniel Jackson, head pastor at Downtown Durham’s Trinity United Methodist Church, stood up in the pulpit and announced to the congregation that he would leave his post and join his wife as co-pastor at Pioneers.

“Now is the right season for my transition,” he said.

“A part of this transition, on a practical note, is Pioneers changing from a United Methodist church to a Wesleyan church. The Wesleyan Church denomination is a historic sister church of the UMC that was launched as an abolition movement coming out of the main Methodist branch.”

To a congregant sitting in a church pew, this announcement may have seemed out of the blue, especially since Lopez Jackson had written a letter to Trinity less than two months before, thanking the church for its support of Pioneers and spelling out hopes for the future. But around the time of that letter, the North Carolina Conference—the regional umbrella leadership of the UMC—also made Pioneers halt services, according to local UMC pastor Heather Rodrigues, as part of ongoing mediation between the church and other local LGBTQ-affirming Methodist pastors.

Pioneers then announced it was leaving the UMC. As Daniel Jackson said from the pulpit, the Wesleyan Church has a progressive history: rooted in the teachings of John Wesley, the denomination broke off from the larger UMC in 1843 and went on to elevate abolitionist and feminist principles. But if its history is more progressive than its UMC counterpart’s, in the present day it toes a much harder line on other social issues—including, notably, LGBTQ+ rights.

“We adhere to the teachings of scripture regarding gender identity, sexual conduct, and the sacredness of marriage and believe that sexual relationships outside of marriage and sexual relationships between persons of the same sex are immoral and sinful,” the Wesleyan website reads.

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When asked for an interview about this sudden denominational shift, Lopez Jackson declined to interview or comment for this follow-up story, though she sent two emails, both labeled off-the-record, in which she asked me not to write one.

Over the past few months, though, INDY Week has received an outpouring of comments from readers who feel a vested interest in the future of this space and its stake in a changing city. Much of denominational inner workings—the way language is chosen, the way conferences and committees are structured, the way church finances are handled—can feel like religious inside baseball. But religion itself, and the way it functions inside a community, is profoundly personal. It should also be profoundly public.

I

n 1832, 11 years before the Wesleyan Church was founded, a small congregation of 30, the first Methodist group in the area, began meeting at a small schoolhouse a mile east of Durham. This was the beginnings of Trinity United Methodist, which now meets in a large gothic steepled structure on the corner of Liberty and North Church Streets, overlooking city hall. For years, it has hung rainbow banners outside its gates and spelled out a message of inclusivity in its church bulletin.

As the INDY previously reported, the UMC at large has been inching toward a split over LGBTQ+ issues. In March that split became further realized when the UMC announced it was postponing its 2022 general conference—originally scheduled for 2020, and at which church leaders were expected to vote on a split— until 2024. In May, the conservative faction of the church decided it could wait no longer and launched the Global United Methodist Church.

It’s not as if the friction within the UMC— or the friction between Pioneers and community members, for that matter—exists in a vacuum. Increasingly, LGBTQ+ rights are coming under vehement attack and just last week, in a solo concurring opinion regarding the overturning of Roe v. Wade, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that the court should reconsider “Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell”—three rulings that protect contraception, same-sex relationships, and same-sex marriage.

But while many churches may be conflicted about their stance on inclusion, in Durham, Trinity United Methodist Church has not appeared to be one such institution.

This made the 2020 pastoral appointment of Daniel Jackson, a freshly minted Duke Divinity graduate, all the more puzzling to some members of Trinity’s congregation.

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Alice Stone, a lifelong Methodist, was one such Trinity congregant. When she learned of Jackson’s appointment during the early pandemic, she signed up for one of the virtual coffees he offered and was excited to learn that he shared a vision of young adult outreach with her.

Several months later, she received a Facebook notification from Jackson’s wife, Sherei Lopez Jackson, inviting her to like the Pioneers page. This came as a surprise to her: it was the first time she was learning of a new church plant, which struck her as odd, given Trinity’s implicit relationship with it.

“My original frustration is that the information that I was getting was not coming from the pulpit or from congregational meetings or from any of that—it was social media,” Stone says. “Recognizing that our population is largely older and not really on social media, I then had concerns about what was happening, what the congregation knew and didn’t know, and what was kind of being decided on their behalf.”

Community outreach is normally the first step when the UMC decides to open and support a new church.

But in this case, Stone wasn’t alone in being in the dark: other local UMC churches, some just a few blocks away, had not been aware of the new church.

Stone says she contacted UMC’s Staff Parish Relations Committee with questions and was encouraged to reach out directly to Jackson with concerns. This wasn’t exactly standard procedure but Stone approached Jackson anyway with questions about Trinity’s involvement in Pioneers. Shortly thereafter, Stone says, Lopez Jackson blocked her from accessing Pioneers’ Facebook page. Frustrated at the lack of transparency, Stone and her husband left Trinity. They have not rejoined a United Methodist church since.

Natalie Spring is a mother of two schoolaged children, one of whom is queer. She walks past Pioneers often. Her mistrust of it, she says, is in part its lack of transparency about its beliefs. She also feels it stands in for other lurking prejudices.

“It’s not a ‘capital-C church,’ right? It’s a ‘social enterprise,’” Spring says. “A lot of straight people just kind of forget—because, like, ‘Oh, Durham is perfect, Durham is great.’ And it’s not. In some ways, this is a reminder to people that we don’t live in a bubble in Durham. Everything is not for everyone. Here is a manifestation of that.”

Jesse Huddleston, the director of music ministry at CityWell United Methodist Church and cochair of the Pride: NC Steering Committee, says that, among other things, they are disappointed by the way Pioneers has responded to conflict.

“More than my disappointment in learning that they weren’t affirming, I really felt disappointed by the way they were responding to community members,” Huddleston says. “There wasn’t a sincere openness to equitable, real, authentic conversation.”

You will find scant evidence of this conflict on the Pioneers website and social media pages. Offline, Pioneers’ engagement has also ping-ponged: According to local resident Caleb Parker—who is Methodist and married his husband in 2020 at a local Methodist church—at some protests Lopez Jackson would sit outside the church with baked goods and a sign encouraging people to come talk to her. At other points, she blocked local queer residents from the business’s Instagram account, on which comments are already disabled.

The church also did not engage with a list of questions I emailed over, including a request for the name that the business is registered under, which the INDY was unable to locate online, and for a copy of the church’s most recent 990, which is supposed to be publicly available. (Lopez Jackson also responded “no comment” to my query about whether it was true, as rumor has it, that she and Daniel Jackson traveled to Waco, Texas, to seek guidance from home renovation television stars Chip and Joanna Gaines, who have drawn criticism for attending a megachurch led by a pastor adamant that same-sex marriage is a sin.)

In November when I spoke to Lopez Jackson, she told me that the church and

“In some ways, this is a reminder to people that we don’t live in a bubble in Durham.

Everything is not for everyone.”

O

f course, there are other businesses and churches in Durham that are homophobic. Plenty of residents are, too: when Amendment 1—a referendum to the state constitution banning same-sex marriage—passed in 2012, as many as 30 percent of Durhamites voted in support of it. Pioneers is not alone in its theology. Despite—or perhaps because of—this, opponents of Pioneers believe it still needs to be held to task.

business have different tax statuses, but it is unclear where the organization’s business designation lives online. In both the reporting of this and the previous piece, Mark Hutchins—landlord of 408 West Geer Street—did not return calls from the INDY inquiring after more details about the lease.

And so Pioneers has chugged along, slowly forming a quiet presence on Geer Street.

There are occasional events—a Juneteenth celebration, a series of coworking lunches, and recently, a book launch from the writer Jonathan Martin that, according to the event description, centers on religious trauma and “disentangling the good news of the gospel from the toxic theologies that have rendered Jesus unrecognizable.”

Weeks ago, before Pioneers announced its disaffiliation, community organizers had planned a reparative meeting with UMC leaders—including Bishop Leonard Fairley, resident bishop of the North Carolina Conference—hoping for the denomination’s leadership to take responsibility for its unquestioning support in launching the church. When Pioneers shifted to the Wesleyan Church, organizers decided to continue with the meeting regardless on June 21. I did not attend—media was asked not to—but reportedly about 50 people showed up, and Huddleston told me that they believed that leadership was “sincere in their lament over how things had transpired.”

To be clear: the UMC, on paper, is still not an affirming denomination, and Fairley also declined to comment for this story, except to say that he was looking forward to working with area clergy to “address the harm.”

Still, it seems like change is afoot.

“I don’t think this could have happened 15 years ago,” says Caleb Parker, in reference to the forum, which he helped organize. “We’ve come a long way.”

Also to be clear: although Pioneers has switched denominational affiliations, local organizers still very much want the organization to leave.

“Our last question [to UMC leadership] was ‘Do you still believe it is your responsibility for the Methodists to get Pioneers out?’” Parker says. “And they said, yes, they feel that that is their responsibility.”

Natalie Spring walked away from the meeting hopeful that Pioneers’ new denomination will, at the very least, force the church to be more explicit about its beliefs.

“I own my beliefs,” Spring says. “I would like them to own their beliefs and see if it’s profitable. And if it’s not, maybe that becomes a story, too: they tried to have a church, in the middle of a queer neighborhood, that wasn’t affirming, that was overtly anti-gay—and this is what happened.” W

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North Carolina

Marijuana Mayhem Hemp needs water and sunlight; NC hemp bills need a miracle.

BY HANNAH KAUFMAN AND MARIANA FABIAN

backtalk@indyweek.com

T

here’s a growing industry here in North Carolina, and with it come countless rules, gray areas, and legal confusion—and no, we’re not talking about NFTs. The hemp industry has been blooming in the state for years, but North Carolina is one of 12 states that doesn’t have a medical marijuana program. With the end of the legislative session on Thursday, and with it the sunset of the state’s 2017 industrial hemp pilot program legalizing hemp, CBD, and delta-8 products for sale here, we’re left puzzling over a number of bills sitting in the General Assembly—some of which could help patients who desperately need access to medical marijuana, and some of which could hurt local hemp farmers and business owners who have built their lives around the industry.

North Carolina is far ahead in the hemp game but far behind in legalization, putting the local industry at a disadvantage, says Gabrielle Jarrell, a chair at NC NORML, an organization that advocates for decriminalization and legalization of weed.

“There’s lots and lots of hemp farmers in North Carolina. We have a phenomenal climate for growing hemp, so it’s become a blossoming industry, especially out west— but it’s an industry that’s been hit hard,” Jarrell says.

“There were 1,500 hemp farmers in 2020. And now there’s only 360 remaining.”

But those 360 farmers include only those whose hemp farms are officially registered with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). In January, the USDA took direct oversight of all hemp cultivation in the state. Farmers weren’t pleased with this development, says Sarah Carson, fundraising chair at NC NORML. “A lot of farmers have private farms and when the USDA comes in, you have to give them open access— anytime they want. They can come to your farm, inspect your crop, do all of these things that farmers are like, ‘Whoa, I don’t want to be a part of this,’” Carson says.

There are still many more active hemp farmers in the state, many of whom likely didn’t know they were supposed to register with the USDA or are waiting to see the future of the North Carolina hemp industry before they register, says Nicolette Baglio, a cannabis policy advocate and hemp entrepreneur.

Another reason the industry is in flux right now is the uncertainty of medical marijuana legality. There are several

John and Carol Bocello, owners of The Hemp Company, and their three sons cannabis-related bills in the state legislature. One of those is Senate Bill 711, or the NC Compassionate Care Act, currently awaiting a vote in the state house. Axios reported that house Republicans voted internally last week not to advance the bill, but even if it doesn’t pass this session, it’s likely it will be pushed through soon, given public support to pass the Republican-led bill while the party controls both chambers of the General Assembly, says Baglio.

What is SB 711?

SB 711 would set up a restrictive medical marijuana program in North Carolina, granting 10 medical cannabis supplier licenses for companies to apply for in the state.

The Medical Cannabis Production Commission, which is established in the bill, would decide on 10 companies out of 20 recommended applicants chosen by the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services. Baglio says this bill would create a very limited, unprofitable structure that doesn’t benefit the majority of North Carolina’s patients.

“Not only are the license structures incredibly limited—that’s 10 licenses that would get to operate 80 dispensaries—but the patient access list is so small that it really only covers between 3 and 5 percent of North Carolinians that would even qualify, so it just doesn’t make sense,” Baglio says. “‘The math doesn’t math’ is what we like to say.”

PHOTO COURTESY OF SUBJECTS

But here’s the bill’s main catch: each license costs $50,000, and the bill requires proof that each applicant will be able to operate as a supplier for two years in the form of liquid and non-liquid assets, which could be difficult for local start-ups and small business owners. The bill also mandates that each company has someone on board with prior operation experience of cultivation, production, and management of cannabis products in a state-licensed medical or adult-use cannabis operation—neither of which have ever been legal in North Carolina.

Morgan Davis, a cannabis business lawyer based in Raleigh, says that the bill “requires that the company prove that they have a consultant or an investor or someone who’s been involved in the medical marijuana industry before, which necessarily requires that they’re going to have to go out of state, because obviously no one in North Carolina has been involved in that industry in the last five years. Not legally, anyway.”

Even if a North Carolina business does have experience growing, announcing it to the government would instantly put a target on their back, says Carson.

“You’re going to be looked at like, ‘Why do you have experience growing?’” Carson says. “A lot of people are just like, ‘Why am I going to incriminate myself?’”

Because local cannabis businesses would have a difficult time participating in SB 711’s medical marijuana program, the bill opens the door to huge cannabis companies called multistate operators (MSOs) to come in from other states where medical marijuana is legal and monopolize North Carolina’s industry, says Carson.

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June 29, 2022

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INDYweek.com

“If a business is a multimillion-dollar business, they could buy five of those licenses and own half of the market in this state,” Carson says. “That’s really not fair, and that’s what a lot of these businesses are looking at.”

Several MSOs are waiting to jump in the moment SB 711 passes, including Cresco Labs, Jushi Holdings, and Trulieve, the largest medical marijuana company in Florida.

Trulieve and Merida Capital—the private equity firm behind Cresco and Jushi—hired state lobbyists shortly after the bill was introduced last year, says Baglio.

“One of the reasons that North Carolina is so confusing is because we actually built a bustling hemp industry before, we’re late to the legalization game,” Baglio says. “And so why would these incoming MSOs want to play nice and be like, ‘You guys keep that, we’ll do this.’ They’re not. They’re being like, ‘Great, we’ll take it all, thanks.’”

But Baglio says there is still hope for local hemp farmers.

Most of the major MSOs, including Cresco and Jushi, reported declines in revenue in the first quarter of 2022 compared to the previous quarter. (Trulieve’s revenue was up 4 percent.)

Baglio says those declines were driven by discerning consumers. She compares the cannabis industry to another popular industry in the state—craft beer.

“You’re starting to really see that nobody’s going to want your Walmart cannabis,” Baglio says. “As the customer is getting more knowledgeable and more sophisticated, they don’t want Sam’s Club.

They don’t want Walmart cannabis. They want craft beer. They want craft cannabis.

They want to buy local and from someone that they trust.”

But unless another bill is passed quickly, North Carolina’s whole hemp industry as it currently operates is under threat.

What other bills are there?

The state’s 2017 industrial hemp pilot program is set to expire June 30, and even though hemp is legal and off of the controlled substances list under the federal 2018 Farm Bill, North Carolina lawmakers have so far chosen not to address the program—leaving no state protections for hemp after June 30 unless a new bill is passed this week.

Senate Bill 762 was originally the champion bill for farmers, but after it was stripped last week of language protecting hemp in its most recent version, there are now two other bills that could benefit the hemp industry if passed this

“As the customer is getting more knowledgeable and sophisticated, they don’t want Sam’s Club.

They don’t want Walmart cannabis.

They want craft cannabis.” session: House Bill 1051 and Senate Bill 455. Both have the goal of conforming the state’s hemp laws to match federal hemp laws, but SB 455 would permanently exclude hemp from the state’s controlled substances act—and is the furthest along of any of the bills. Versions of the bill passed both the state senate and house, but its current iteration is awaiting a senate committee hearing.

“Senate Bill 455 is actually the closest to the touchdown in our opinion,” Baglio says. “The senate could vote on this bill and have it on [Gov. Roy] Cooper’s desk in an hour—and they’re unwilling to do it.”

If lawmakers don’t make any moves on this bill or any others by Thursday, all hemp products will become illegal in the state Friday, says Baglio. While hemp growers with a USDA license are safe, businesses involved in the retail side lose all protection.

“It essentially criminalizes an entire industry of CBD and delta-8 manufacturers, retailers, growers, processors—so we hope that doesn’t happen,” Baglio says.

“And obviously, if no hemp bill is passed and the provisions expire, it’s just going to create a very confusing gray area of what’s legal and what’s not—even though all we’ve really been asking for is to operate under the federal farm bill.”

Grace Holtkamp owns Merry Hill Hemp, an organic CBD hemp farm in Mebane created in 2017. It was the first farm in the country to run a pick-your-own hemp season, an annual tradition that was created to destigmatize cannabis.

“I have a USDA hemp license, because I’m required to, so I can still grow,” Holtkamp says. “But I cannot sell to my own

home state, and as a farm that is dedicated to our local community and dependent on our local community, that’s not only unfair, it’s nonsensical.”

Furthermore, Holtkamp says, farmers are attempting to understand the chaos and confusion of these bills at the same time that they are investing their livelihood in their plants for another year of growing, as hemp growers need to get their crop in the ground by mid- to late June in North Carolina.

“So you have people like us, who have just planted hundreds, if not thousands, of plants, and now this legislation has suddenly taken this U-turn,” Holtkamp says.

“It’s very daunting.”

What does this mean for the hemp industry?

John Boccella, co-owner of The Hemp Company, a family-owned hemp store in Raleigh, says he is fighting hard to hold on to their right to sell their products.

“I feel an obligation for advocacy,” Boccella says. “The Hemp Company is a family business for us. Two of my three boys work at The Hemp Company, and it’s really important to us as a family business. It’s also really important to the relationships that we’ve built with our customers in the community. I’ve been focusing very much on getting the hemp laws restored back in the state.”

Boccella says that SB 711 was not created for the benefit of hemp farmers and companies based in North Carolina. He also emphasized that North Carolina has the capacity to benefit from all of this.

“It’s important that the state benefits, and when I say the state, I mean in revenue tax dollars. They can benefit as well—[the] North Carolina farms, manufacturers, retailers, families that are North Carolina residents versus these giant corporations that are outside and not even registered to the state of North Carolina,” Boccella says.

With SB 455 languishing, lawmakers seem to have little urgency in renewing hemp provisions before they expire, says Baglio, the hemp entrepreneur.

Baglio, among other business owners, has also put pressure on Cooper to issue an executive order protecting hemp, but she says Cooper hasn’t made any indication that he will do so.

“We as North Carolinians have always embraced and supported our small businesses and farmers,” Baglio says. “So I think it’s pretty shocking to see the legislators turning their backs on this industry.” W

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North Carolina

The Clock Is Ticking The uncertain future of abortion in North Carolina

W

hen a draft opinion from the U.S. Supreme Court leaked in May, pro-abortion advocates knew it was likely that Roe v. Wade would soon be overturned.

But for many, the court’s final decision Friday still came as a shock.

“Honestly, when it happened, I was surprised. I think I held out a little bit of hope that the leak might change something,” says Ashley Reynolds, a North Carolinian who had her first and only abortion 25 years ago, at age 17. “I felt collective sadness for the rest of the day. Then the next day I was angry.”

Reynolds, who joined a pro-choice protest in Raleigh earlier this year, took to the street again this weekend for a protest in Cary, she says. Hundreds of pro-abortion advocates across the Triangle also marched to make their voices heard.

“I hope the momentum can stay until November,” Reynolds says. “There’s a lot at stake in North Carolina, so we’re not in the clear. I hope everyone remembers this.”

For women in North Carolina, the clock is ticking. As soon as the Supreme Court decided to overturn Roe v. Wade on Friday, a countdown started, one to the end of reproductive freedom. Abortion is still legal in North Carolina, a fact that has become a touchstone for pro-choice advocates this week. But with the decision, there’s now a caveat: “Abortion is still legal … for now.”

Republican leaders have said they won’t file any new abortion bills before the end of the legislative session, but they’re already taking steps to reinstate North Carolina’s 20-week abortion ban, which a federal judge struck down in 2019. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s decision—that Roe, decided in 1973, was “egregiously wrong and deeply damaging”—sets the stage for a winning appeal by Republicans.

Senate leader Phil Berger and house speaker Tim Moore wrote in a letter Friday that they “stand ready to take necessary steps” to restore the state’s 20-week ban.

The letter, sent to Democratic attorney

BY JASMINE GALLUP jgallup@indyweek.com

general Josh Stein, threatens action next week, giving Stein until July 1 to reinstate the law.

Stein’s office will almost certainly shoot down that request; it has fought the 20-week ban since it passed. But Stein’s resistance won’t matter to Berger and Moore, who will likely file their own request to lift the court’s injunction currently blocking enforcement of the law.

Most women, if they’re lucky, find out they’re pregnant between three and four weeks. Then, after a phone call to a clinic, state law requires people seeking abortions to wait three days before their first appointment. Following the Supreme Court’s decision, clinic staff are also expecting an influx of patients, creating wait times for appointments, says Amber Gavin, vice president of advocacy and operations for A Woman’s Choice, which runs three abortion clinics in Raleigh.

And that’s all before accounting for the amount of time it takes to make travel arrangements or save money for an abortion, not to mention exceptional circumstances that may prevent people from seeking an abortion until later in a pregnancy.

“Every year in the U.S. between 54[,000] and 63,000 people get abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. It’s for a lot of different reasons,” Gavin says, including paying for travel, hotels, and childcare.

“Now patients are going to have to travel hundreds of miles. People who are already facing barriers to accessing abortion early in pregnancy will suffer the most: people who are struggling to make ends meet, people of color, and young people.”

Republican leaders have also announced their intent to pass more laws criminalizing abortion when the legislature resumes its normal session in January. Speaker Moore wrote in a statement that “North Carolinians can expect pro-life protections to be a top priority of the legislature” next year.

It’s unclear what that means, but it could include a near-total ban on abortion, like

Tennessee’s, or a six-week ban on abortion, like the one North Carolina Republicans introduced last year.

The one big obstacle standing in the way of the North Carolina legislature is Governor Roy Cooper, who can veto anti-abortion laws.

Republicans reintroduced several anti-abortion measures last year, including Senate Bill 405, similar to a bill Cooper vetoed in 2019. SB 405 passed the senate but not the house and targeted doctors providing abortions by making it a crime to “not treat infants who survive abortion,” a misleading statement that implies medical professionals are performing infanticide, according to Planned Parenthood.

Another measure, House Bill 453, would have banned doctors from performing abortions supposedly based on the presumed race or sex of a fetus or on a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome. Cooper vetoed that bill, too.

But Cooper’s veto power may not last forever. In November’s election, Republicans only need to win three more seats in the house and two more seats in the senate to achieve a veto-proof supermajority.

“If the General Assembly wants to pass a [total] abortion ban, and they’re able to get that ban into law, the courts are really not gonna be as much of a help as they had been in the past,” says Tara Romano, executive director of Pro-Choice NC, “because there’s no longer that federal protection.”

Women and pro-choice activists across the state had been expecting the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, but the decision still hurt, says Romano.

“It still felt hard,” she says. “This is a right that was just stripped away from over half the people in this country. I know a lot of people are feeling sad and scared. I think the idea behind it was to make people feel powerless. Young folks have said to me, ‘I always knew I was second class, but now it really feels like it.’”

The majority opinion, penned by Alito, also overturns Planned Parenthood v. Casey,

a 1992 decision that upheld the federal right to abortion.

“The decision of a bare majority of Supreme Court justices to completely overrule Roe, Casey, and more than 20 decisions reaffirming or applying the fundamental right to abortion is not conservative in any traditional sense. It is radical,” says Neil Siegel, a professor of law and political science at Duke University.

“In one fell swoop, the court has eviscerated half a century of constitutional law that has protected women’s bodily integrity, autonomy to chart their own life’s course, and equal citizenship. I often disagree strongly with the court, but this decision has shaken my confidence in it.”

Siegel added that the court’s decision calls into question the right to contraception, intimacy between two consenting adults, and interracial and same-sex marriage. Although the majority of the conservative justices stressed that Friday’s ruling should not cast doubt on other cases or precedents, Justice Clarence Thomas took a different stance, arguing the Constitution’s due process clause does not protect any substantive rights.

In a concurring opinion, Thomas wrote the Supreme Court should reconsider cases like Griswold v. Connecticut, which affirmed the right to access contraception; Lawrence v. Texas, which affirmed the right to privacy and struck down so-called sodomy laws; and Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage.

“This decision was bad, but we also worry what else might be coming,” says Romano.

On the question of abortion access, Romano says she remains committed to the fight. She and other activists are educating people on their right to abortion and how, where, and when they can get one.

“I have colleagues in a lot of other states, including some states where abortion is no longer legal,” Romano says. “We’ve worked hard to keep abortion access legal in North Carolina, and I feel fortunate we have an opportunity to fight for it.” W INDYweek.com

June 29, 2022

11

STAGE

RADIOACTIVE PRACTICE

Abby Z and the New Utility | von der Heyden Studio Theater, Durham | June 30–July 2 | americandancefestival.org

A production shot from Radioactive Practice PHOTO BY EFFY GREY

Moving In Award-winning choreographer Abby Zbikowski’s new work at the American Dance Festival is a radical primer on claiming space.

BY BYRON WOODS arts@indyweek.com

C

horeographer Abby Zbikowski knows that our culture has made showing up difficult for many.

“But there are ways of being visible—and not just in the shell of whatever body you’re in. It’s also what you can do in that body, through action, to affect your surroundings,” she says.

The award-winning choreographer, whose latest work, Radioactive Practice, appears at the American Dance Festival this week, goes quiet for a moment, then adds: “Some people don’t speak all their politics. They embody them.”

In a bracing solo at the start of the new work, you can almost feel the sting of Jennifer Meckley’s palms as they slap her forearms: an alerting gesture seemingly designed to wake the skin. The moment comes at the outset of a piece in whose sections dancers undergo a series of rapid, radical reorientations: cascades of sudden, and sometimes explosive, shifts and relocations, individual and group positionings that are briskly occupied, rigorously explored, and then evacuated.

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The work seems in many ways a primer on how to claim space in an age of pressurized anxiety. “We’ve been in a lot of tornadoes,” Zbikowski says as she reflects on how both her work and the culture have changed during the pandemic.

A completed earlier version of the work was scheduled to premiere in New York one week after all theaters closed down for COVID in 2020; as the quarantine stretched over a year, she was only able to retain four of the composition’s 10 performers. Zbikowski ultimately had to create a new work, building it upon the real-life relationships among a sextet including Meckley and Fiona Lundie, founding members of her company, Abby Z and the New Utility.

From the first moments of Zbikowski’s 55-minute gauntlet, their bodies are undeniably emphatic as they negotiate its conspicuously ever-shifting circumstances. Their feet pummel the floor with pile-driver triplets—stomp stomp breath, stomp stomp breath—before Lundie lunges across the room at full extension in another section, swiping her left hand around before a pivoting hip slide across the floor.

Full commitment and full presence—at full throttle—are key elements throughout. The group burns through kilocalories, channeling incredible energy and strength. Dancer Alex Gossen repeatedly turns 90 degrees in midair while propelling himself upward from all fours from the floor; Benjamin Roach lifts Lundie’s form from the floor and flings her backward in a jaw-dropping later exercise.

The insistence and endurance the dancers evince have a genesis in the pandemic as well. “It’s like a slow burn all the way through,” Zbikowski says. “It’s been like a fire we’ve all had to keep going through. I think everyone can relate to just keeping going, now more than ever.”

A relentless, adrenal agency pulses in the sequences of Radioactive Practice.

Zbikowski notes that the most avant-garde or forward training and work she’s seen anywhere has been from African choreographers. “I think it’s because they’re not coming from the same starting point—ballet and modern—that a lot of choreographers have in the US. “There’s something about the energy that’s just jumping out of the people as they’re moving.” Examining that energy calls Zbikowski to scrutinize “what is in us and what it has come to mean.”

Where other dancemakers have remained preoccupied with gossamer distractions of dwindling relevance in a culture in increasingly open conflict and a larger world at war, Zbikowski and her dancers remind us that there is an undeniable fierceness in the life force and that its energies can be harnessed, combined, and directed toward collaboration and exploration—and, if need be, escape—from current circumstances.

“Maybe ‘primal’ isn’t the right word,” Zbikowski reflects.

“There’s something primordial in me, in which we’re not just talking but have the ability to shout; this sense of needing to rally the troops, like a battle cry.”

Agency feels good. Roundhouse kicks punctuate certain sequences, while performers yell not only cues but encouragement elsewhere during Zbikowski’s labyrinth of sequences. “Get it, Alex!” a colleague shouts when Gossen executes an intricate traffic pattern with torso, arms, and feet; dancer Jinsei Sato, meanwhile, beams while embodying a torsional move across stage.

Dancers flick off gestural patterns of behaviors that no longer serve and fling themselves headlong into cyclic gestures that might suggest something somewhere between full-body davening and auto-exorcism. As the work develops, the keys to not just claiming space, but marking, transforming and filling it to the brim with sheer life force, become clear.

They include agility, full investment in each moment, and thorough exploration of all options. Remain nonattached to any circumstance, and burn through all that excess energy; it has to get out in any eventuality.

Perhaps the biggest key of all? Keep moving. W

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W INDYweek.com

June 29, 2022

13

STAGE

YELLOW FACE | HHHH1/2

Theatre Raleigh, Runs through July 3rd | theatreraleigh.com

A production still from Yellow Face PHOTO COURTESY OF THEATRE RALEIGH

About Face Theatre Raleigh’s sharp rendition of Yellow Face is a timely look in the mirror. BY KATY KOOP arts@indyweek.com

D

avid Henry Hwang’s Yellow Face, presented by Theatre Raleigh, examines Asian American identity, politics, and “yellowface”—the term for white actors playing Asian characters, often to the point of caricature. Yellowface has a long history, extending from Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany’s to, more recently, Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in the Shell and Tilda Swinton in Doctor Strange.

In this comedic, semiautobiographical play, playwright and activist David Henry Hwang, who has long decried yellowface, accidentally casts a white man in an Asian role in the play he is staging. What follows is an unreliable kind of memoir, with fact and fiction blurring into a timely examination of Asian American identity and race, alongside the different “faces” people wear every day.

Yellow Face is staged in Theatre Raleigh’s intimate new TR Studio, and scenic designer Miyuki Su’s hyper-realistically painted thrust stage allows the audience to view director Telly Leung’s electric staging from 14

June 29, 2022

INDYweek.com

left, right, and center. Paired with Charlie Raschke’s engaging lighting and projection design—often casting the stone building facade with newspaper clippings, looming faces, graceful leaf gobos, and even jarring static—the set becomes a character in and of itself, bearing testament to the histories being retold.

As actors—who are efficiently dressed for their many roles by costume designer Kishara McKnight—move around tables, stand on chairs, and rip open upstage’s red curtain, the play provides an apt portrayal of the tension between identity, art creation, and the American Dream.

Audience members on either side of the stage are lit by color-changing windows and dynamic lighting, firmly placing us in the heart of a sharp comedy that moves quickly and pulls no punches. Racial discrimination, whiteness, and Asian American identity often coexist in the same punch line.

Beyond cutting jokes and impersonations of famous figures, the emotional core of The-

atre Raleigh’s rendition is at its strongest when it looks at the relationship between Hwang and his father, in roles played expertly by Hansel Tan and Alan Ariano.

With phone conversations and one-onone conversations over newspaper clippings, Tan and Ariano show the distinct experience of what it means to balance both your parents’ dreams and your own, especially as an artist. Ariano is a particular standout, with his comedic characters stealing scenes and, as Hwang’s endearing father, becoming a performer you can’t keep your eyes off of.

His particular portrayal of Wen Ho Lee—a Taiwanese American scientist who was accused by the U.S. Justice Department of being a Chinese spy and was jailed in solitary confinement without bail for 278 days—aided by Eric Alexander Collins’s eerie sound design, is a heart-wrenching portrayal of a dark chapter in American history.

Members of the dynamic ensemble Brook North (Stuart Ostro and others), Kylie Robinson (Leah Anne Cho and others), Liam Yates (Announcer and others), and Ali Evarts (Jane and others) quickly and aptly portray so many different roles from David Henry Hwang’s life, and it’s stunning to watch, as is Pascal Pastrana’s pitch-perfect Marcus, antagonizing Tan’s biting Henry David Hwang in every way as a perfectly infuriating, albeit charming, white man.

As a biracial Asian American myself, who straddles Asian identity and whiteness, for me this sharp comedy feels especially apt.

In the midst of a resurgence of racism that prompted the #StopAsianHate and #RepresentionMatters movements—as well as all the ways marginalized people are continuing to get their rights stripped on a daily basis—this examination of self feels like it could have premiered in 2022, not 2007.

Yellow Face starts with Tan’s Hwang placing different actors on stage before the first moment of the show, after a completely silent pre-show. We see a writer trying to work out the farce we live in every day by placing actors and then himself onstage. By bringing us into his play, his mind, his alienation, and behind his many faces, maybe he can make us see where we are and where we have been that much clearer. W

M U SIC

TAB-ONE: GLORY IN THE WEIGHT | HHHH

[M.E.C.C.A. Records LLC; June 21]

Carrying the Load The songs on Tab-One’s meditative latest release, Glory in the Weight, drip with wisdom.

BY RYAN COCCA music@indyweek.com

A

lot has happened in the life of Raleigh rapper TabOne since he and the five other founding members of hip-hop group Kooley High released the album David Thompson in 2011, more than a decade ago.

These events have varied widely, from the professional (Rapsody, one of the other emcees in the group, split off to pursue a solo career, ultimately earning a Grammy nomination for Best Rap Album) to the personal (Tab moved back from Brooklyn to Raleigh, got married, settled into a nine-to-five, and had two children) and the utterly random (Tab and his wife Whitney were featured on the house-hunting HGTV reality show Love It or List It in 2017).

In between occasional releases from Kooley High, Tab-One has also made three solo albums of his own, expanding on his ideas and enjoying the extra legroom within instrumentals that don’t have to be shared with other emcees. The result has been a sound not altogether unfamiliar from that of Kooley High but with clear, albeit subtle, differences: less boisterous, more measured; a tad less optimistic, a bit more world-weary.

On his excellent, meditative new release, Glory in the Weight, that weariness isn’t completely gone—how could it be, after 15-plus years in rap?—but it’s matched with a sense of contentment and self-assurance that makes every song drip with wisdom and makes the album some of the best, most enjoyable work of Tab’s solo career.

Over the course of 13 pleasantly unhurried songs that move with all the urgency of a humid North Carolina afternoon, Tab touches on a handful of familiar themes: perseverance, family, creativity, and mental health. But unlike his previous album, Balancing Act, on which some verses were particularly literal (“Now my son talkin’ ’bout a waffle on his plate / Hit him with the gummy vitamins, now he’s straight”), Glory creates more points of entry by staying higher-level. On the song “Cool It Down,” Tab speaks to the universal feeling of bygone youth, rapping, “Remember when we used to rock to make the party start / Now it’s hard to party, we just tryin’ to make solid art.”

It’s a line that could easily come off as resigned or bitter on another album, but within the confident, unbothered context of Glory, it doesn’t—it’s just a neutral statement of fact. Time passes, life changes, and we don’t have to pretend otherwise. And that, like the many other affirmations on this album, is a real load off. W INDYweek.com

June 29, 2022

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CULTURE CALENDAR

Please check with local venues for their health and safety protocols.

Chastity Brown performs at the Pinhook on Wednesday, June 29 PHOTO COURTESY OF THE PINHOOK

Durham Refugee Day Sat, Jul. 2, 2 p.m. Durham Central Park, Durham.

RRR has on an encore screening at Alamo Drafthouse on Wednesday, June 29.

PHOTO COURTESY OF ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE

En Serenade $5. Sat, Jul. 2, 9 p.m. Rubies on Five Points, Durham.

Kate McGarry and Keith Ganz $25. Sat, Jul. 2, 8 p.m. Sharp Nine Gallery, Durham.

Pale Waves $18. Sat, Jul. 2, 8 p.m. Motorco Music Hall, Durham.

screen

Queer Agenda! $5. Sat, Jul. 2, 10 p.m. The Pinhook, Durham.

Teens in Trouble $10. Sun, Jul. 3, 8 p.m. The Pinhook, Durham.

Live Jazz with Danny Grewen & Griffanzo Mon, Jul. 4, 6 p.m. Imbibe, Chapel Hill.

music Chastity Brown $12. Wed, Jun. 29, 8 p.m. The Pinhook, Durham.

Live Jazz with Marc Puricelli and Friends Wed, Jun. 29, 7 p.m. Imbibe, Chapel Hill.

Below Decks Thurs, Jun. 30, 8:30 p.m.

The Fruit, Durham.

Debbie the Artist $8. Thurs, Jun. 30, 8 p.m. The Pinhook, Durham.

Jazz at the NCMA: Jonathan Butler $50+. Thurs, Jun. 30, 7:30 p.m. NCMA, Raleigh.

Jazz on the Roof: Al Strong Thurs, Jun. 30, 7 p.m.

The Durham Hotel, Durham.

Valient Thorr $15. Thurs, Jun. 30, 8:30 p.m. Local 506, Chapel Hill.

Wes Collins Band Thurs, Jun. 30, 7 p.m. Southern Village on the Green, Chapel Hill.

Can’t You Hear Me Rockin’: A Tribute to The Rolling Stones $10.

Fri, Jul. 1, 8 p.m. Cat’s Cradle, Carrboro.

Dvořák New World Symphony $15+. Fri, Jul. 1, 8 p.m. Koka Booth Amphitheatre, Cary.

The Floor Presents: Demarkus Lewis $10+. Fri, Jul. 1, 9 p.m.

The Fruit, Durham.

Lunar Vacation $15. Fri, Jul. 1, 8 p.m.

Cat’s Cradle Back Room, Carrboro.

Purity Ring $26.

Fri, Jul. 1, 8 p.m.

The Ritz, Raleigh.

School of Rock Fri, Jul. 1, 7 p.m. Local 506, Chapel Hill.

Shaquim Muldrow Quintet $15+. Fri, Jul. 1, 8 p.m. Sharp Nine Gallery, Durham.

Train: AM Gold Tour $22+. Fri, Jul. 1, 6:30 p.m. Coastal Credit Union Music Park, Raleigh.

Zach Wynne Fri, Jul. 1, 7:30 p.m. The Oak House, Durham.

EnoFest $25+. Jul. 2 and 4, 10 a.m.

West Point on the Eno, Durham.

mc chris $16.

Mon, Jul. 4, 8 p.m.

Cat’s Cradle Back Room, Carrboro.

Fenton Live!

Music Series Tues, Jul. 5, 6:30 p.m.

Fenton, Cary.

Live Jazz with the Brian Horton Trio Tues, Jul. 5, 9 p.m.

Kingfisher, Durham.

RRR #ENCORRRE $12. Wed, Jun. 29, 8:15 p.m. Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, Raleigh.

The Mitchells vs. the Machines $5+. Thurs, Jun. 30, 8:30 p.m. Koka Booth Amphitheatre, Cary.

Summer of Soul Thurs, Jun. 30, 9 p.m. The Nasher, Durham.

Top Gun: Maverick $8. Jul. 1-7, various times. The Drive-In at Carraway Village, Chapel Hill.

Buffalo Common Jul. 1-3, various times. Lump, Raleigh.

Flash Gordon and The Sword and the Sorcerer $10. Fri, Jul. 1, 7 p.m. The Carolina Theatre, Durham.

Hotel Transylvania $8. Fri, Jul. 1, 8:45 p.m. The Lumina Theater, Chapel Hill.

Independence Day $8. Sat, Jul. 2, 8:45 p.m. The Lumina Theater, Chapel Hill.

Rob Gelblum Tues, Jul. 5, 7 p.m. Imbibe, Chapel Hill.

stage

American Dance Festival Jun. 3–Jul. 20, various times.

Various venues, Durham.

Paragon Theaters Grand Opening: Minion Mania Sat, Jul. 2, 10 a.m.

Paragon Theaters Fenton, Cary.

Pee-wee’s Big Adventure $10. Jul. 3-4, various times.

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, Raleigh.

Lump in the Night: The Return of the Living Dead and Action USA Sun, Jul. 3, 8:30 p.m. Lump, Raleigh.

Watch Durham: A VERY Durham Film Screening Series Tues, Jul. 5, 7 p.m.

Durty Bull Brewing Company, Durham.

Tim Meadows $18+. Jun. 30–Jul. 2, various times.

Goodnights Factory & Restaurant, Raleigh.

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etc.

Fourth of July Celebrations 72nd Annual WattsHillandale Fourth of July Parade and Celebration Mon, Jul. 4, 10 a.m. Oval Park, Durham.

An Old-Fashioned Fourth of July Celebration Mon, Jul. 4, 1 p.m. Horace Williams House, Chapel Hill.

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PHOTO VIA UNSPLASH

Brier Creek Commons Star-Spangled Block Party and Fireworks Show Mon, Jul. 4, 8 p.m. Brier Creek Commons, Raleigh.

Chapel Hill July 4th Fireworks Mon, Jul. 4, 7 p.m. Southern Community Park, Chapel Hill.

Children’s Independence Day Parade Mon, Jul. 4, 9:30 a.m.

Durham Central Park, Durham.

B’rukhim Haba’im: Stories of Welcome Wed, Jun. 29, 9 a.m. City of Raleigh Museum, Raleigh.

Durham Bulls Game and July 4th Fireworks $17+. Mon, Jul. 4, 6:35 p.m. Durham Bulls Athletic Park, Durham.

Fourth of July!

Mon, Jul. 4, 11 a.m.

North Carolina State Capitol, Raleigh.

July 4th Cookout on the Roof Mon, Jul. 4, 5 p.m. The Durham Hotel, Durham.

July 4th Open House Mon, Jul. 4, 11 a.m. Joel Lane Museum House, Raleigh.

Bill Rawls: The Cellular Wellness Solution Thurs, Jun. 30, 7 p.m. Quail Ridge Books, Raleigh.

Raleigh’s 4th of July Fireworks Mon, Jul. 4, 6 p.m. Dorothea Dix Park, Raleigh.

Stars, Stripes, & Strings! Fourth on the Farm Music Fest $25+. Mon, Jul. 4, 11 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. Old Mill Farm, Durham.

Town of Carrboro Independence Day Celebration Mon, Jul. 4, 11 a.m.

Carrboro Town Commons and Weaver Street Market, Carrboro.

Town of Cary Independence Day Celebration $35+.

Mon, Jul. 4, 7:30 p.m. Koka Booth Amphitheatre, Cary.

Sally Greene and Paul Jones: The Edward Tales and Something Wonderful Thurs, Jun. 30, 5:30 p.m.

Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill.

FOR OUR COMPLETE COMMUNITY CALENDAR: INDYWEEK.COM INDYweek.com

June 29, 2022

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P U Z Z L ES

NEWDED AN S! EXPO R H U

If you just can’t wait, check out the current week’s answer key at www.indyweek.com, and click “puzzle pages” at the bottom of our webpage.

In-Store Shopping Curbside Pick Up www.regulatorbookshop.com 720 Ninth Street, Durham, NC 27705

Hours: Monday–Saturday 10–7 | Sunday 10–6

su | do | ku

this week’s puzzle level:

© Puzzles by Pappocom

There is really only one rule to Sudoku: Fill in the game board so that the numbers 1 through 9 occur exactly once in each row, column, and 3x3 box.

The numbers can appear in any order and diagonals are not considered.

Your initial game board will consist of several numbers that are already placed. Those numbers cannot be changed. Your goal is to fill in the empty squares following the simple rule above.

If you just can’t wait, check out the current week’s answer key at www.indyweek.com, and click “puzzle pages.”

Best of luck, and have fun! www.sudoku.com solution to last week’s puzzle

18

June 29, 2022

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6.29.22 INDY CLASSIFIEDS classy@indyweek.com

r webpage.

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LAST WEEK’S PUZZLE

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