Isthmus: Dec 15-21, 2016 by Isthmus

DECEMBER 15-21, 2016

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VOL. 41 NO. 50

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MADISON, WISCONSIN

2016

PG-13

Can true crime stories help fix a broken justice system? Written by: Nathan J. Comp

PLAY

Help Bodhi Beat Cancer Three-year-old Bodhi will spend part of the holiday season getting chemotherapy to treat his leukemia. You can help Madison-area kids like Bodhi by supporting UW’s campaign to end childhood cancer. Here at UW-Madison, our physicians are performing cutting-edge research that is saving the lives of children who otherwise may not have survived. Visit uwhealth.org/supportlocalkids and learn how your holiday gift will support groundbreaking childhood cancer research and family-centered patient care.

Fighting cancer so kids won’t have to CH-46892-16

ISTHMUS.COM DECEMBER 15–21, 2016

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■ CONTENTS ■ WHAT TO DO

4 SNAPSHOT

DOGGEDLY

State workers down franks to raise money for charity.

6-9 NEWS

HIGHWAY TRAGEDY

Could stronger Uber regulations have saved a pedestrian killed on the Beltline?

MICHAEL CUMMINS

NATHAN J. COMP

COVER STORY NATHAN COMP has been working on solving the disappearance and presumed murder of Amos Mortier for more than nine years — some months intensely, some less so. But he’s always thinking about it. He recently teamed up with California filmmaker Kristina Motwani, a UW grad, to co-produce the true crime doc, What Happened to Amos? It’s long been a dream of Comp to make such a documentary, and he hopes more young journalists “take on crusades of their own” in order to right wrongs in the criminal justice system. But, he warns, “You gotta have a special kind of fire in your belly for this line of work.”

OPINION MICHAEL CUMMINS was part of the “Never Trump” faction within the Republican Party; now he has given up on the party altogether. This week he writes eloquently about threats to civil liberties under the new administration. While many have focused on the role of the judiciary, Cummins takes a different tack, warning that watchdogs should keep a close eye on the military and the Posse Comitatus Act, which bans the use of military personnel for domestic law enforcement.

BUCKING THE LAW

Another rare white deer was shot in Sauk County.

10 TECH

STARTUP ASSISTANCE

Bunker aims to make the gig economy run more smoothly.

12 OPINION

CIVIL LIBERTIES WATCH

Keep tabs on the military for signs of government overreach.

16 COVER STORY

KILLER CONTENT

A new generation of true crime filmmakers is focusing its cameras on the justice system.

23-28 FOOD & DRINK

REELING

André and Tenaya Darlington serve up a new guide for cocktailing while watching movies.

BROCACH REDUX

The Irish pub now has the sleeker lines of an American bistro.

29 SPORTS

PUT ME IN, COACH

Wisconsin nurtures its walk-on players.

30-31 MUSIC

TOGETHER AGAIN

Blueheels reunite with new tunes after a five-year hiatus.

32-33 SCREENS JAMES KREUL

SCREENS

JAMES KREUL saw his first experimental films as a freshman at UW-Madison. “I didn’t know what I was watching, but I wanted to see more,” he says. He programmed avant-garde screenings through graduate school, and his own experimental films were featured at the Wisconsin Triennial in 1999. He currently runs the local cinema website, Madison Film Forum (madfilm.org).

The longest night Friday, Dec. 16, Aldo Leopold Nature Center, 6:30-8:30 pm Saturday, Dec. 17, Fitchburg Community Center, 1-7 pm Wednesday, Dec. 21, Olbrich Park sledding hill, 4-8 pm The shortest day — and longest night — of the year falls on Dec. 21, but there are celebrations of the winter solstice throughout the week. Take a guided hike and eat snacks around the campfire at the Aldo Leopold center (RSVP: aldoleopoldnaturecenter.org); join Circle Sanctuary in Fitchburg for its annual feast with stories and gift giving (RSVP: circlesanctuary.org); or head to Olbrich Park for the annual event hosted by Friends of Starkweather Creek, with a bonfire, singing, ice lanterns and refreshments (madsolstice.org).

Out in the cold

AVANT COLLAGE

Sixty Six is a compilation of 12 short films by innovator Lewis Klahr.

40 EMPHASIS

LIFT YOURSELF UP

New climbing gym focuses on strength and fitness.

IN EVERY ISSUE 9 MADISON MATRIX 9 WEEK IN REVIEW 12 THIS MODERN WORLD 13 FEEDBACK 13 OFF THE SQUARE

34 ISTHMUS PICKS 41 CLASSIFIEDS 41 P.S. MUELLER 41 CROSSWORD 43 SAVAGE LOVE

PUBLISHER Jeff Haupt ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Craig Bartlett BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Mark Tauscher EDITOR Judith Davidoff NEWS EDITOR Joe Tarr ASSOCIATE EDITOR Michana Buchman FEATURES EDITOR Linda Falkenstein ARTS & CULTURE EDITOR Catherine Capellaro STAFF WRITERS Dylan Brogan, Allison Geyer EDITORIAL INTERN Elisa Wiseman CALENDAR EDITOR Bob Koch ART DIRECTOR Carolyn Fath STAFF ARTISTS Todd Hubler, David Michael Miller, Tommy Washbush

ISTHMUS is published weekly by Red Card Media, 100 State Street, Suite 301, Madison, WI 53703 • Edit@isthmus.com • Phone (608) 251-5627 • Fax (608) 251-2165 Periodicals postage paid at Madison, WI (ISSN 1081-4043) • POSTMASTER: Send address changes to 100 State Street, Suite 301, Madison, WI 53703 • © 2016 Red Card Media, LLC. All rights reserved.

The frigid temps this week are a stark reminder that many in the community face serious housing challenges. This panel discussion and Q&A hosted by the Madison Institute will focus on challenges around homelessness and evictions. Panelists include Dane County Supervisor Heidi Wegleitner, the Tenant Resource Center’s Brenda Konkel, the Road Home’s Melissa Menning and Madison Metropolitan School District homeless resource teacher Jani Koester.

Party in the lobby Friday, Dec. 16, Catholic Multicultural Center, noon-7 pm

All are invited for entertainment, food and more at the annual Radiothon fundraiser for the Catholic Multicultural Center, which provides basic help for people in need and services for economic and educational advancement. La Movida (1480 AM) will broadcast live until 6 pm, and also take donations over the phone; donate online at cmcmadison.org.

Belt it out Sunday, Dec. 18, 5701 Raymond Rd., 3 pm

The Hallelu! Concert & Carol Sing at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church is an antidote to the canned Xmas music being piped into stores. A choir and orchestra will lead everyone in Advent and Christmas classics. Sing along without garnering any dirty looks.

FIND MORE ISTHMUS PICKS ON PAGE 34

DECEMBER 15–21, 2016 ISTHMUS.COM

CONTRIBUTORS John W. Barker, Kenneth Burns, Dave Cieslewicz, Nathan J. Comp, Aaron R. Conklin, Ruth Conniff, Michael Cummins, Marc Eisen, Erik Gunn, Mike Ivey, Bob Jacobson, Seth Jovaag, Stu Levitan, Bill Lueders, Liz Merfeld, Andy Moore, Bruce Murphy, Kyle Nabilcy, Kate Newton, Joel Patenaude, Jenny Peek, Michael Popke, Steven Potter, Adam Powell, Katie Reiser, Jay Rath, Gwendolyn Rice, Dean Robbins, Robin Shepard, Sandy Tabachnick, Denise Thornton, Candice Wagener, Tom Whitcomb, Rosemary Zurlo-Cuva ADVERTISING PRODUCTION MANAGER Todd Hubler ADVERTISING MANAGER Chad Hopper ADVERTISING ASSISTANT Laura Miller ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVES Lindsey Bushart, Peggy Elath, Lauren Isely WEB ANALYST Jeri Casper CIRCULATION MANAGER Tim Henrekin MARKETING DIRECTOR Chris Winterhack EVENT DIRECTORS Kathleen Andreoni, Courtney Lovas CONTROLLER Halle Mulford OFFICE MANAGER Julie Butler SYSTEMS MANAGER Thom Jones ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT Carla Dawkins

Saturday, Dec. 17, Central Library, 9:15 am

■ SNAPSHOT

From le , Chris Anderson, John Hogan and Jason Ri el compete in a state Department of Administration hot dog eating contest to raise money for Partners in Giving.

Dog day afternoon BY DYLAN BROGAN ■ PHOTO BY BRETT STEPANIK

Budget policy analyst Dan Subach walks into the Wisconsin Room at the Department of Administration building with 45 hot dogs, setting 15 franks in front of three competitors. This is no ordinary DOA luncheon. A crowd of employees has gathered around the table to watch the spectacle, as Subach introduces the men about to face off in an eating contest. “He went into the IT field because he heard you get to work with both cookies and spam,” booms Subach to the delight of his co-workers. “He’s all about the mega-bite... Chris ‘Who Let the Dogs Out’ Anderson.” The contest is part of a “tailgate party” for DOA employees at the agency’s headquarters on East Wilson Street to mark the end of the eight-week Partners in Giving campaign. Each year, millions of dollars are donated by state and UW employees in Dane County through the workplace fundraising campaign. But today’s event is mostly about watching colleagues force hot dogs down their gullets. “Some say our next contestant was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. It’s true, and he hasn’t laid it down since,” jokes Subach. “He went to a Jimmy Buffett concert because he thought it was all-you-could-eat. He claims he’s going to be in the weiner circle...John ‘Hollow Leg’ Hogan.” After the applause dies down, Subach introduces the final contender.

“His working title is State Capitol superintendent. He got this title because he does a super job of walking around the Capitol asking his co-workers, ‘Do you intend to eat that?’ He can clear a table like a hurdler...Jason ‘Dinner Dude’ Rittel.’” These three guys, about to battle for the title of DOA hot dog eating champion, usually go by different titles: Anderson is information system professional for the State Transforming Agency Resources (STAR) Project; Rittel is superintendent for the Wisconsin State Capitol; and Hogan is assistant deputy secretary. Rittel and Hogan have draped clear plastic ponchos over their buttondown shirts, while Anderson wears oversized novelty sunglasses, a purple fedora and a white paper cape. A timer is set to five minutes, and they’re off. Rittel gobbles down the dogs like a champ for an early lead. Hogan isn’t far behind and dunks the buns in water in order to choke them down. Anderson is taking a slow and steady approach. But an increasing look of dread sweeps over his face as he methodically chews, takes a sip of water and swallows. “It’s the first year we’ve had a hot dog eating contest,” says Angela Keelan-Martinez, a policy analyst. “It’s just a fun way to end this year’s campaign.” Keelan-Martinez volunteers her time to chair the Partners in Giving fundraising drive for the DOA. Proceeds from selling lunches at the event will also go to charity. All the food was paid for by state workers. Keelan-Martinez paid out of her

ISTHMUS.COM DECEMBER 15–21, 2016

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own pocket for Maynard G. Mallard — mascot of the Madison Mallards — to appear at the fundraiser to add excitement to an otherwise normal workday. “We consider this an extension of our public service to make Wisconsin and the world a better place,” says Keelan-Martinez, noting that state workers in Dane County raised $2.5 million through Partners in Giving last year. “State employees are always very generous.” But they have reasons not to be. In 2011, Gov. Scott Walker’s Act 10 effectively cut salaries for thousands of state employees with benefit reductions in health care and retirement plans — hitting the pocketbooks of the lowestpaid workers the hardest. In January, additional protections for state workers were curtailed with an overhaul of the Wisconsin civil service law. Several attendees at the hot dog contest ask not to be quoted. When asked why, one employee says, “Have you been under a rock the last five years?” But with seconds left in the contest, those wounds appear far from anyone’s minds, as the crowd hoots and hollers encouragement. “Five. Four. Three. Two. One,” chants the crowd in the final seconds of the competition. The eaters are given robust applause as they swallow final bites of mangled hot dogs and buns. But the levity can’t last forever. Soon, employees head back to their offices to perform the duties of the state. ■

WAS ISTHMUS INVITED TO THIS EVENT? No HOT DOG EATING CONTEST RESULTS 1ST PLACE: Jason “Dinner Dude” Ri el with 8 dogs 2ND PLACE: John “Hollow Leg” Hogan with 4.5 dogs 3RD PLACE: Chris “Who Let the Dogs Out” Anderson with 3 dogs NUMBER OF ACTUAL DOGS AT THE EVENT: One. Yachi, a yellow lab. A member of the Capitol Police force, Yachi is the only dog in the state certified to detect explosives on a mobile target. She can sniff out the invisible “vapor wake” le by a bomb that’s on the move. PARTNERS IN GIVING STARTED: 1973 TOTAL MONEY RAISED: More than $70 million RECIPIENTS: 520 local, regional, national and international charities and umbrella organizations such as Community Shares and United Way of Dane County

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■ NEWS

“Could have been prevented” Pedestrian was in an Uber shortly before being hit on the Beltline BY DYLAN BROGAN

Why didn’t the Uber driver call the police? That’s the question the family of Dustin Dilks is struggling with following the death of the 27-year-old. Dilks was struck by a vehicle and killed while walking on the Beltline in the early hours of Nov. 21. Police have yet to release a report on the incident, but details from the preliminary investigation were shared with Dilks’ family, who spoke to Isthmus. “As a family, our goal is to try to prevent this from happening to anyone else,” says Christina Bishop, a cousin of Dilks, who grew up with him and considers him a brother. “It is a very difficult time for us, especially considering that it’s possible this tragedy could have been prevented.” Dilks had been out with friends in Middleton before heading home on Nov. 21. He had been drinking, so he used Uber to find a safe ride home. Dilks was with an acquaintance who was severely intoxicated and acting cruelly, says Bishop. Dilks’ companion was a “friend of a friend” whom he didn’t know very well. “The guy that Dustin was with was being very drunk and obnoxious,” Bishop says police told her, based on what the driver told officers. “He was being belligerent and saying some not very nice things to Dustin. Dustin wasn’t really responding to this guy. Then the Uber driver heard someone say they were going to be sick.” The Uber driver pulled over to the side of the eastbound Beltline somewhere between the University Avenue and Gammon Road exits. Dilks stepped out of the vehicle. After failing to coax him back inside the car, the driver left him on the side of the highway. According to what police told the family, the driver never exited the vehicle. “The investigating officer said to us, ‘I wanted to let you know that the entire time [the Uber driver] was being interviewed I kept thinking, why didn’t you call the police,” recalls Bishop. “It doesn’t sound like it was an argument. Seems like Dustin was just fed up. It surprised us that he got out of the car on the Beltline. But it didn’t surprise us that he just walked away from an uncomfortable situation. Dustin was not someone who could be rattled easily.” Approximately 20 minutes later, Dilks was struck and killed by another vehicle while walking on the highway. Madison police spokesperson Joel Despain says Dilks was hit by more than one vehicle. “Dustin was on the Beltline for a minimum of 15 minutes before he was hit. He was sending texts and made tons of phone calls in that time period,” Bishop says. “The last phone call he made was at 2:17, the same time the first 911 call came in.” The Uber driver, who has not been identified, is 22 years old. “She had been driving Uber for about a month,” says Bishop. “She was just doing it for extra cash to pay for school or something.”

“We believe there has to be...training and supervision for people who drive for hire.” — Mayor Paul Soglin

The city of Madison passed an ordinance in March 2015 regulating app-ride services under its taxicab ordinance. But the following month, state legislators preempted that local regulation, giving transportation network companies like Uber and Lyft a green light to operate in Wisconsin. Dane County lawmakers urged Gov. Scott Walker to veto the legislation, arguing it provided minimal oversight and usurped local control. Mayor Paul Soglin says what happened on the Beltline underscores the need to regulate services that provide rides to the general public. “It’s an example of why we believe there has to be a certain level of training and supervision for people who drive for hire,” says Soglin. “There is not one way the city could have regulated that situation after the state preempted us two years ago.” Paul Bittorf, business manager at Union Cab Cooperative, based in Madison, says its drivers are given 24 hours of on-the-job training before hitting the road on their own. The taxi company’s insurance also requires drivers to be 25 years or older. “If you can’t verify that a driver can do the job and do it safely, that’s a huge issue. Not just anyone is a good fit for the job,” says Bittorf. “If you don’t give them any training at all, I can’t imagine what that’s like.” Like other taxi companies in town, Union cab drivers are in constant contact with a central dispatcher. Bittorf says even experienced drivers rely on dispatch in threatening or compromising situations. “One thing I wondered about when Uber first came around is how they will deal with people throwing up in cars. It happens. Especially late at night when people have been

drinking. I wouldn’t put my car through what a taxi cab goes through,” says Bittorf. “We train our drivers that in any situation, the priority when pulling over has to be the safety of the passengers.” It is not illegal to pull over on the Beltline, according to Dane County Sheriff Dave Mahoney. However, law enforcement doesn’t encourage it. Pedestrians and bicyclists are prohibited from being on the Beltline at all times. In a statement to the media, investigators wrote, “there is no criminal culpability in this case.” The family of Dustin Dilks plans on pursuing legislation that requires hired drivers to notify police if a passenger is let out on a controlled-access highway like the Beltline. “If you hire someone to drive you somewhere — for whatever reason — [and a passenger] gets out of the car on a road where pedestrians are prohibited, such as the Beltline, that driver should be legally required to call the police,” says Bishop. “If the Uber driver had called the police, there is a very high likelihood that Dustin would be alive today.” Bishop also thinks Uber’s requirement that a driver be 21 years of age is too low. “Going back to my 22-year-old self, I almost wonder if [the driver] was afraid to call police because she thought she might get [Dilks] in trouble. I don’t think we’ll ever know, but I’m trying to understand from her point of view why she didn’t call the police,” said Bishop. “If you have to be 25 to rent a car, I don’t see why you don’t have to be 25 to drive people around.” Uber did not respond to a request for comment. ■

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n NEWS

Fear for the white deer Sauk County residents want hunters to obey hunting ban on rare breed BY JOEL PATENAUDE

Before the snow started to fly, it was easier to imagine how an all-white or albino deer would stand out against the stark and leafless rolling terrain of rural Sauk County, northwest of Madison. White deer can be seen a mile away, which makes them vulnerable to coyotes and hunters — those who don’t know they’re protected animals. Despite the love residents of the Leland-Plain area have for the wild white deer, a population that may include 25 animals in the area, hunters are believed to have killed five in the past four years. The most recent one was a 5-year-old, nine-point buck in Bear Valley, just west of Leland, on Nov. 25, during the annual nine-day deer gun season. It was shot by someone from outside the area. The buck frequented the backyard of Bryan Walsh northwest of Plain. He says he often whistled to the deer, which his 11-year-old daughter named “Whitey.” Walsh says he had hundreds of encounters with the buck, and he watched it put on weight and mass. “He looked like an elk,” Walsh says. “He was damn near tame. He’d never been shot at.” Walsh, a 46-year-old truck driver and former hunter, wants to know why it’s not common knowledge that it’s illegal to kill or possess albino or all-white deer, as stated in Statute NR 10.02 and on page 18 of the 2016 Wisconsin Deer Hunting Regulations booklet, which states: “It is illegal to possess albino or all-white deer, which are entirely white except for the hooves, tarsal glands, head and parts of the head.... Albino and white deer may not be harvested.”

Walsh is not alone in priz According to the citation ing the white deer in the area. issued by a Department of He and many of his neighbors Natural Resources conserhave signs in their yards that vation officer, David J. Ryan, read “Protect the White Deer.” 48, of Clinton, Wisconsin, Walsh says he knows one “admitted to shooting at, bowhunter who had Whitey harvesting and tagging the in his sights no less than five all-white buck deer.” times and didn’t shoot it. However, Walsh and oth “We’re all hunters here. We ers in Sauk County contend respect wildlife and obey the it was not David Ryan but a law. We’re all ethical hunters,” relative of his who actually says area resident and wildlife downed Whitey. Walsh thinks photographer Mike Richard. Ryan is taking the fall for anHe helped set up the website other hunter, a Madison busiprotectthewhitedeer.com in nessman who owns property 2012 after the last publicized in the area. shooting of one. During firearm deer sea Residents keep a close eye son, state law allows one on their local white deer, so member of a hunting party to they’re reasonably certain that kill game for another memin addition to the five killed by ber. “It happens all the time hunters since 2012, another during deer gun season,” says four died in car accidents, DNR conservation warden MIKE RICHARD and coyotes have picked off a One of the revered white deer that live in the Leland area. A different supervisor Mike Green. “You couple white fawns. can use one of the other parwhite buck from the herd was illegally killed by a hunter on Nov. 25. White and albino deer, ty’s tags.” while uncommon, are the re Regardless of who shot the sult of reproducible genetic mutations in non- in August 2015. White deer also enjoy protec- deer, David Ryan admitted to the violation, white deer populations. Nevertheless, the tion in neighboring Illinois and Iowa. which carries a minimum fine of $303.30 few pockets of white deer found in Wisconsin While the white buck and the protection and a maximum forfeiture of $2,152.50. (such as farther north around Boulder Junc- it enjoyed was well known to Walsh and his Ryan was cited, and the carcass was contion and in Buffalo and Wood counties) have neighbors, he wants to know why hunters fiscated. engendered protective emotions in hunters “from the big city” and elsewhere don’t know “I’m convinced 100 percent that the and non-hunters alike, keeping them off lim- the deer can’t be shot. citation is right, thorough, righteous and its, by personal ethics and the law. “Ignorance is no excuse,” Walsh says. the right one,” deputy chief warden Karl For a time white deer could be culled in “Why isn’t it common knowledge that the Brooks says. counties wherever chronic wasting disease had white deer is protected, like a badger, crane The case is now pending in Sauk County been detected, including Sauk County, but pro- or [timber] rattlesnake? Nobody’s out pop- Circuit Court. Calls to Ryan and the relative tection of white deer was reinstated statewide ping them.” seeking comment were not returned. n

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■ MADISON MATRIX BIG CITY

State ethics commissioner Robert Kinney resigns in disgust from the new watchdog agency over concerns that the organization won’t enforce ethics requirements for lobbyists and officials. Kinney says commission members voted to strike from the mission statement language about “furthering Wisconsin’s tradition of clean and open government.”

‘TIS THE SEASON

President-elect Donald Trump tweets his criticism of the F-35 fighter jet program’s cost just days after the Air National Guard’s Truax Field is named one of five finalists for deployment of the new generation of fighter jets.

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Treasures and memorabilia saved by famed Madison prankster Leon Varjian could soon be part of UW-Madison’s new “humor archives,” the State Journal reports. Varjian maintained three storage lockers in Madison for more than 30 years, until his 2015 death.

glitz & glamour for everyone on your holiday list! U.S. Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wausau) calls Madison a “Communist community” and claims Dane County is the only one hand-counting votes in the presidential recount (it isn’t). Mayor Paul Soglin then calls Duffy a “moron” but later apologizes, clarifying: “I should have said [Duffy] is a liar and a charlatan.”

SMALL TOWN

■ WEEK IN REVIEW MONDAY, DEC. 12 ■ Wisconsin’s presidential

TUESDAY, DEC. 13 ■ Rep. Joel Kleefisch

(R-Oconomowoc) announces that he will propose a bill next year to randomly drug test all high school students participating in extracurricular activities, the Wisconsin State Journal reports. Kleefisch says the aim is to combat heroin use, but some Democrats are opposed to treating kids like “criminals.”

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■ Trump’s “thank you” tour

makes a stop in West Allis. When Trump thanks native son U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan, the crowd boos. “I’ve come to appreciate him,” says Trump, trying to reassure. “[Ryan’s] like a fine wine. Every day goes by, I get to appreciate his genius more and more. Now, if he ever goes against me, I’m not gonna say that.” ■ State Sen. Jennifer Shilling (D-La Crosse) tells the La Crosse Tribune that she won’t be running for governor any time soon. The recently reelected Senate minority leader has been included on short lists of Democrats who could challenge Gov. Scott Walker in 2018.

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election recount ends in undramatic fashion, confirming Donald Trump as the winner. “Completing this recount was a challenge, but the real winners are the voters,” Elections Commission Chairman Mark Thomsen says in a statement. ■ The Madison Plan Commission unanimously approves a conditionaluse permit to allow Dane County to convert the former Madison Chamber of Commerce building on East Washington Avenue into a Day Resource Center to help people who are homeless. The longawaited facility is set to open in 2017. ■ The Plan Commission also conditionally approves land use for the Cosmos and the Spark, two adjacent buildings proposed for the 800 block of East Washington Avenue. The development will house American

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n TECH

The trouble with being your own boss North-side tech startup Bunker aims to take the hassle out of contract work BY WENDY HATHAWAY

More than 53 million American adults are their own boss. Freelancers, consultants and contract workers are expected to make up half the nation’s workforce within the next decade — a dramatic shift away from traditional employment models. San Francisco-based technology startup Bunker, which opened its Madison office in April, aims to help out the gig economy. Bunker’s new digital marketplace, buildbunker.com, offers independent contractors and businesses of all sizes a way to fulfill the insurance requirements necessary to ink a contract for a new project. Kevin Kiser, head of brand strategy for Bunker, says one of the hardest parts of being one’s own boss is managing the paperwork — which often includes purchasing insurance. Independent contractors are sometimes required to have policies that protect for general liability, professional liability, worker’s compensation and employer’s liability, among others. It’s a process that’s often cumbersome and confusing. It can also take several weeks, stalling the project and racking up costs for everyone involved.

Kiser says Madison native Chad Nitschke, co-founder and CEO of Bunker, spent over a year chatting with business owners and service providers in Wisconsin and across the country to better understand the hang-ups and complexities of the current system. That’s how he came up with the idea. The Bunker platform allows businesses and independent contractors to manage and share insurance requirements in one place. For example, with just a few clicks, an HR professional can input contractor requirements. Then, they notify the freelancer, who can upload proof of existing coverage or purchase a new policy in as little as 10 minutes. Bunker launched a private beta test of its product in October, and for now, its product is geared toward three distinct markets. There’s the “1099 space,” which includes virtually any business — from energy to health care — that pays people to do temporary work, such as graphic designers, web developers and sales consultants. Bunker also works with franchise owners taking on new franchisees, and property owners who require tenants to have business insurance to lease space.

Kiser says Nitschke’s business relationships in Madison and the insurance industry allowed them to more quickly overcome the financial challenges many Midwestern startups face. “Bridging the gap from Wisconsin to the West Coast, where a lot of the potential funding lies, can be a major obstacle,” he says. “Having investors in California and here in our own backyard really helped us get off the ground and fueled our success so far.” Kiser is referring to one of Bunker’s earliest investors — American Family Insurance —

whose local headquarters is just one of the reasons the company chose the north-side neighborhood for its Madison location. Sitting on Northport Drive, Bunker is one of the first technology businesses to put down roots in the neighborhood, which welcomed a new 20,000-square-foot Willy Street Co-op in August. “We’re one of the first tech companies to settle on the north side, but hopefully we can get some momentum going,” Kiser says. “It would be great to see a collection of like-minded startups in a shared space that can innovate together.” Kiser says they’ve already received positive feedback from early beta users and within the insurance industry, praising the system for simplifying the onboarding process, reducing compliance risks and cutting down on manual effort. The team is now focused on testing and improving the tool to get it ready for a full release, but Kiser says they hope to hire additional people and expand the Madison office over the next several years. n

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n OPINION

Last line on civil liberties If the military brass start fleeing under Trump, we’re all in trouble BY MICHAEL CUMMINS Michael Cummins is a Madison-based business analyst.

The surprise victory of Donald Trump left some civil libertarians in a state of panic. In their view, intolerance toward dissent and disregard for the rule of law were central to the president-elect’s campaign platform. Almost as quickly, commentators emerged to insist that everything will be just fine. These optimists did not discount Trump’s authoritarian ambitions, but argued that other political institutions would keep a rogue executive largely in check. Said Noah Feldman of BloombergView, “basic rights and the rule of law aren’t going to disappear because Donald Trump was elected. The Constitution was built for our situation.” Indeed, panic is premature. But America is not invulnerable to tyranny. In fact, President Trump will have a clear path to obliterating institutional opposition, should he choose to take it. Total dominance would require little more than a ruthless determination on his part. For as long as it stays in Republican hands, Congress would offer no meaningful resistance to Trump December absolutism. It1will trim a budget proposal here the true final arbiter of governmental afand rebuff a tariff there, but presidents are the fairs. Americans have never really had to undisputed leaders of their party. Anyway, pro- consider that. But if ever Commander in tecting civil liberties has not been high on the Chief Trump dismisses an adverse court list of GOP priorities for a very long time. decision by asking, “and how many divi The judiciary, on the other hand, would do sions do the justices have?” (paraphrasing its best to have our backs. Even right-leaning Josef Stalin), our institutional framework judges embrace broadly protective interpre- will promptly begin to crumble. tations of the First, Fourth and 14th Amend- Now, the current leadership of our armed ments. Most of the Supreme Court’s conserva- forces is steeped in respect for federal laws tive justices were, for example, happy to help like the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, which smack down some of the Bush administration’s prohibits the use of military personnel for more egregious post-9/11 due process abuses. domestic law enforcement. And military cul That a president might fail to heed a Su- ture, as codified in official doctrine, “reject[s] preme Court directive is unthinkable to most and report[s] illegal, unethical, or immoral Americans. But Newt Gingrich, one of Trump’s orders or actions.” At one point during the top advisers, believes that “[i]f the court makes campaign, retired four-star general Michael a fundamentally wrong decision, the president Hayden insisted that “American armed forccan in fact ignore it.” Such stunningly audacious es would refuse to act” if President Trump notions might soon be taken seriously in the an WI unlawful 1306 Regent Street,issues Madison, 53715order. 608.257.2627 Oval Office. But when asked how he would deal The citizens of many countries know intui- with a military that might not fulfill his evtively that their military, not their judiciary, is ery whim, Trump seemed equally certain

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that “[i]f I say do it, they’re gonna do it.” Such confidence could be written off as bluster, coming from almost anyone else. But Trump is a man of extraordinary will. And soon he will have the power to transform the culture of the military into one of unquestioning obedience. By law, a commander in chief’s authority to forcibly discharge military personnel is

THIS MODERN WORLD

limited. But there are a number of ways a president can sideline an uncooperative member of the upper ranks. Trump could systematically purge those he deems insufficiently servile from the high command and nominate sycophants to replace them. With a team of yes-men in control of the American military machine, quite literally no one could tell President Trump what to do. Trump has actually hinted at such a move. In September, he said, “I think the generals have been reduced to rubble...to a point where it’s embarrassing to our country.” Under his presidency, “they’d probably be different generals, to be honest with you.” And Trump has announced plans to fill many top civilian positions in his administration with recently retired officers who have deep ties to the military command structure. He has already developed an unsettling habit of referring to “my generals.” What about the rank-and-file, all of whom have taken an oath to support and defend the Constitution? Lamentably, the more independent-minded among them might soon flee on their own. In a recent poll, one in five active service people said they are less likely to reenlist in a Trump-commanded military. So, civil libertarians, now is not the time for panic. And with good fortune, that time will never come. But keep a very close eye on the established military brass. If they start falling, like so many canaries in a coalmine, hit the streets and hit them with tenacity, while you are still free to do so. n

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■ FEEDBACK

Compassionate coverage Allison Geyer: It was an adventure, a new perspective and heart-felt weekend as we traveled and camped at Standing Rock (“In for the Long Haul,” 12/1/2016)! The Lakota Sioux people are blessed to have you report their heritage, beliefs and the rights of protecting our earth! Thank you for showing me a front-page news lady with compassion and class! Char Braxton (via email)

than conventional oil, from crossing Dane County. But, with the recent election, Trump’s America is coming perilously close to losing its democratic moorings. For us to succeed in defending a livable world for our grandchildren, which Enbridge’s brazen jackboot tactics threaten, every one of us will have decide whether we cannot not be there when high noon comes to Medina. Peter Anderson For 350 Madison (via email)

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Kudos for the coverage Allison Geyer has given to the brave Standing Rock tribe. Isthmus readers should know that Dane County, with its proud history in the 2011 Wisconsin Uprising, is next. The Keystone XL pipeline, running from the boreal forests of Alberta through the Great Plains and onto export markets, was defeated last year as an unacceptable threat to global warming. But, now, another pipeline company, Enbridge, is picking up Transcanada’s slack. Soon, Enbridge, one of the pipeline partners using outrageous paramilitary tactics in North Dakota, will try to expand its pipeline system to carry dirty tar sands oil through the Midwest, including Wisconsin and the northeast tip of our county in the town of Medina. 350 Madison will be leading opposition to Enbridge’s plans to exploit the vast Athabascan tar sands reserves, which release three times more greenhouse gases

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Who will use Badger Ammo site? Re: “Tread Lightly,” 12/1/2016: Bicyclists might tread lighter than dual-sport motorcyclists if they’d stop paving everything! Dual-sport motorcycles are single-track vehicles, so they require nothing wider than a walking trail, unlike ATVs. Many of us use motorcycles for our daily transportation and choose dual sports because they offer an escape from the world of cars. We get tired of getting run over by all those lighttreading hikers and bicyclists driving to the site of their recreation. Aaron Fisher (via Facebook)

Correction An article in the Dec. 8 issue, “Diversity Drama,” incorrectly listed the name of the Government Alliance on Race and Equity.

Share comments with Isthmus via email, edit@isthmus.com, and via Forum.isthmus.com, Facebook and Twitter, or write letters to Isthmus, 100 State St., Suite 301, Madison WI 53703. All comments are subject to editing. The views expressed here are solely those of the contributors. These opinions do not necessarily represent those of Isthmus Publishing Company.

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■ COVER STORY

2016

PG-13

Can true crime stories help fix a broken justice system? PLAY

Written by: Nathan J. Comp

radley Ross was on his way to pick up his fiancée the night of Nov. 19, 2004, when he ran a red light in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and collided with another vehicle. According to the police report, Ross, 25, exited the car and fled the scene.

ISTHMUS.COM DECEMBER 15–21, 2016

He hasn’t been heard from since.

Police suspected he ran to avoid arrest on an outstanding warrant. When his family later reported him missing, police didn’t take it too seriously. Bradley, they assumed, was living off the grid to avoid paying child support. “We knew that wasn’t right,” says his sister Crystal Ross. “We talked every couple of days. I know he wouldn’t have just gone off like that and not contacted anyone for 12 years.” Last summer, Crystal, 34, contacted The Vanished, a weekly podcast featuring mostly obscure missing persons cases. Launched in February, The Vanished’s creator and host, Marissa Jones, hired me as a researcher as she began work on Bradley’s case. It soon became

clear that Bradley didn’t drive that night, and likely had fallen victim to foul play. “There has actually been a development regarding someone mentioned in the episode,” Crystal told me last month. “We found out the names of people we’d never heard before.” Over the last decade, “true crime” has saturated American pop culture, with an offering of serialized documentaries, television shows and podcasts that revel in their potential as crusaders for truth and justice. Purveyors of true crime increasingly are pushing the boundaries of a genre long seen as tabloid fodder into a court of last resort for those the justice system has failed.

Since 2011, “new true crime” documentaries and podcasts have been instrumental in helping get at least three wrongfully convicted men released from prison (Paradise Lost), at least two convictions overturned (Making a Murderer and Serial), and one suspected serial murderer arrested (The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Hurst). Featured in Netflix’s Making a Murderer — a documentary that raised questions around the convictions of two Manitowoc men for a grisly 2005 murder — Madison defense attorney Dean Strang says it’s impossible to know how much influence these serials had on the cases they documented. Another Wisconsin-based documentary — tentatively scheduled for release late next year — explores the unsolved disappearance of Fitchburg resident Amos Mortier. Based on my investigative reporting, What Happened to Amos? raises questions about one man’s innocence and another’s guilt. I asked Strang whether the genre can make a meaningful difference in the judicial system. “I think in a particular case where some sort of treatment of a true crime identifies, convincingly, new suspects, or raises new doubt about the accuracy of a conviction, is where they have the most impact,” he says.

The Paradise Lost movies made by Bruce Sinofsky (left) and Joe Berlinger (right), kept attention on the case of Damien Echols (center), who was released in 2011. WHEN I GRADUATED FROM Middleton Alternative High School in 1996, I wanted to make movies. That summer I discovered the kind of films I wanted to make after watching Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills. Filmed in the cinéma vérité tradition of the 1960s, filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky documented the trial of three teens accused of murdering three 8-year-old boys, whose sexually mutilated bodies were discovered in an isolated woods in West Memphis, Arkansas, on May 6, 1993. Authorities claimed Jason Baldwin, 16, Jessie Misskelley, 17, and Damien Echols, 18, killed the boys in a show of fealty to Satan. “We came down on the scene a week after the arrest of the West Memphis Three to explore how these kids became so disaffected with life that they would take three 8-year-olds into the woods and sacrifice them to the devil,” recalls Berlinger during a recent phone interview. “There was no agenda for social justice; we thought they were guilty.” The kids-killing-kids storyline was consistent with what was happening elsewhere. That February, two 10-year-old boys in Britain were caught on camera leading 2-year-old James Bulger from a Liverpool shopping mall before beating him to death. Grainy images of the toddler holding his killer’s hand were broadcast around the world. By the time filming began, Misskelley had confessed to restraining one boy as Baldwin and Echols sodomized and murdered the other two. “All of the papers had printed the alleged confession of Jessie Misskelley,” Berlinger says. “We later find out it was a highly manipulated statement, and the confession that was printed wasn’t even as given, but was the result of multiple interrogations.” Twenty-three years later, 16-year-old Brendan Dassey confessed to helping his uncle, Steven Avery, rape

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and murder 25-year-old Teresa Halbach before burning her remains in a fire pit. Like nearly everybody interrogated by police over the past 60 years, detectives in both cases used the Reid Technique, which relies on “reading” nonverbal cues for signs of dishonesty, exaggerating the physical evidence — real or not — to induce feelings of hopelessness and wearing down psychological resistance. “We’re the last English-speaking country to cling tenaciously to the Reid Technique,” Strang says. “There are more reliable techniques...that are grounded in good behavioral psychology, not 1940s psychology.” Both teens — Misskelley and Dassey — had belowaverage IQs. Their statements exhibit telltale signs of coercion, but in 1994, when Misskelley went on trial, false confessions weren’t well understood. West Memphis police recorded only the last 41 minutes of Misskelley’s 12-hour interrogation, so defense experts had little to work with. Dassey’s four-hour police interview in 2006, on the other hand, was videotaped

per Wisconsin law and was cited by the U.S. magistrate who overturned his conviction on Aug. 12, 2016. Strang says without the videotape, now available online in its entirety, the written police report would have become the definitive account of the interrogation. “That report would have presented a spontaneous, unburdening, articulate young man,” Strang says. “That video puts the lie to any sanitized written description of that interview.” Even champions of the Reid Technique have said the detectives who interrogated Dassey crossed lines that shouldn’t have been crossed. “Those lines often are crossed,” Strang says, “and even when they’re not, the Reid Technique, by design, is psychologically coercive, manipulative, and the results can be false confessions by people who think the only way out is to tell police what they want to hear.”

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The four-hour video of Brendan Dassey’s interrogation, in which investigators used the controversial Reid Technique, tells a different story from what police claim.

■ COVER STORY IN AUGUST 1996, A MAN named Mike Polkinghorn took his 15-year-old daughter to meet detective David Miller at the Middleton Police Department after finding a quarterounce of marijuana hidden in her pillowcase. Miller then called me. “I contacted Comp at work and told him I would be forwarding a charge of delivery of THC to the district attorney’s office,” Miller wrote in a Sept. 9, 1996, report. The girl, and her friend, accused me of selling them the weed and identified me from photo lineups. I didn’t know either of them; neither could recall the date or time this deal allegedly occurred. But that didn’t matter. At 18, I already had too many runins with Middleton police, and Miller knew I smoked copious amounts of weed. Innocence notwithstanding, the wrongful accusation taught me an important lesson: When it comes to crime, the truth is what authorities decide it is.

The only presumption was guilt. Family and friends asked the same accusatory question: Why would she accuse you? There wasn’t a satisfying answer until weeks later when I learned the girl had lied. According to Miller’s report, “...her dad was pressing her very hard for the seller’s name and she had to name someone, so she picked Nate Comp as...his name came to mind.” There it is: Because my name came to mind. The outcome didn’t reaffirm any faith that justice prevails. In the CCAP-era, a record of being charged bears little distinction from a conviction. Criminal charges, regardless of severity, are always life changing. It frightens me still to think how easily such a change can come. Miller could have let the district attorney hash it out, with lifelong repercussions for me. To his credit, when provided new details, he did the difficult thing; he copped to being wrong.

Writer Nathan Comp was wrongfully accused of selling pot to a minor in 1996. The experience taught him that the “truth is whatever authorities decide it is.”

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IF ONE IS DESTINED FOR a wrongful conviction, selling weed to a minor isn’t the worst charge. It isn’t like triple murder, or killing a cop, which Randall Dale Adams came within three days of being executed for in 1979. Filmmaker Errol Morris’ 1988 documentary, The Thin Blue Line, re-examined the 1976 murder of Dallas police officer Robert Wood. Adams was convicted in part because of testimony from 16-year-old David Ray Harris. But Harris had bragged to others about killing “that pig in Dallas,” and had stolen the car and gun used in the crime. Arrested for a different murder a decade later — on the day Morris planned to interview him — Harris joked during his prison interview, “I often say it’s my favorite excuse for missing an appointment: ‘I’m sorry, I was off killing someone.’” Harris eventually admitted to killing Wood but was never charged. He was executed in 2004 for a 1985 murder. The Thin Blue Line — a seminal work of new true crime — inspired a generation of filmmakers, journalists, advocates and others to begin taking a closer look at the work of police and prosecutors. According to the University of Michigan’s National Registry of Exonerations, 435 of more than 1,900 exonerations on

record resulted from advances in DNA testing. Of these, 232 stemmed from mistaken witness identification, 159 involved official misconduct, 132 involved perjured testimony and false accusations, and 79 involved false confessions. “This is just the tip of the iceberg, because not every case makes its way through the system, and not every case has DNA evidence,” Berlinger says. “Twenty of those DNA exonerations were death row cases like Damien Echols. Paradise Lost was my wake-up call.” As much as 4 percent of the nation’s prison population are wrongful convictions. “That’s a lot of people in a nation with 2.2 million in prison on any given day,” Strang says. THE SAME YEAR I WAS ACCUSED of selling drugs, a 19-year-old Eau Claire man fled to Madison after selling drugs to an undercover officer. That man, Amos Mortier, lived in Dane County until he went missing on Nov. 8, 2004. In August 2007, 17 search warrants implicating local musician Jake Stadfeld in Mortier’s presumed murder were unsealed in Dane County Circuit Court. I later began working on a book about the case, intrigued by people who’ve gone missing and those who’ve gotten away with murder.

The fate of Amos Mortier, who disappeared in 2004, will be the subject of a documentary next year.

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But the deeper I dug, the more I doubted Stadfeld’s guilt. In fact, the evidence eventually pointed to a man who, like Stadfeld, allegedly owed Mortier a large amount of money relating to Mortier’s marijuana business. A former neighbor of this man told authorities in October 2005 that he had confessed to killing Mortier, providing numerous details that jibed with facts not publicly known. Asked what ruled out this man as a suspect, former Fitchburg detective Shannan Sheil-Morgan last month told me, “Well, the person who told us that story is a crackhead, and I didn’t find him to be a credible person.” The man had allegedly told his “crackhead” neighbor that he had stabbed and disposed of Mortier on a farm near Poynette. Phone records show the man called a farm northeast of Poynette prior to Mortier’s disappearance. Sheil-Morgan couldn’t recall what connection the man had to the farm, but said photos of the farm taken by investigators were proof the search had been thorough. Thoroughness, however, didn’t include searches of any homes, vehicles, barns, garages or computers. Sheil-Morgan places the man outside of Dane County that day; he has claimed to have worked all day — in Madison. After a request for an on-camera interview was sent to the man from What Happened to Amos? director and Verona native Kristina Motwani in August, he put his East Washington Avenue house up for sale. It sold in October. Authorities haven’t shown any interest in reviewing the evidence. I asked Strang about this almost uniform response from law enforcement when challenged. “There would be humiliation, embarrassment and uncomfortable political questions asked of people who might lose their public offices,” he says. “That’s why police and prosecutors so often close ranks and seek to avoid scrutiny, and even to deny the obvious.”

■ COVER STORY BERLINGER AND SINOFSKY underwent an evolution following their first interviews with the West Memphis Three. “Damien was hard to read because he was a narcissistic, nihilistic teen who was digging the fact that people thought he was capable of doing this,” Berlinger says. “But [Baldwin] struck me as incredibly credible in his denial of guilt.” Baldwin’s scrawny limbs hinted that something was off. “If you believed the prosecution’s story, he was wielding a 10inch serrated hunting knife and castrated one of the boys,” Berlinger says. “It was a gut feeling that this does not seem believable.” Paradise Lost didn’t challenge the prosecution’s theory, but kept a critical distance from its subjects. “The film was an exercise in journalistic storytelling where we didn’t tell the audience what to think,” Berlinger says. “We decided we wanted to treat the audience like a jury, and that’s a bold decision because you have somebody’s life in your hands potentially.” The film earned awards and great reviews, but it didn’t move the needle in the case. “We were haunted by the fact that even though we were getting pats on the back, these guys were still rotting in jail, one of them on death row,” he says. He and Sinofsky, who died in February 2015 from diabetes-related complications, eventually made two more Paradise Lost films, Revelations and Purgatory. As Purgatory was being filmed, new DNA evidence led to the 2011 release of the West Memphis Three, by then in their 30s, under an Alford plea. They could maintain their innocence, despite pleading guilty to three counts of first-degree murder. Each was subsequently sentenced to time served. “These guys did get out, but they’re not really exonerated, and if it wasn’t for the films, Echols himself has said that he would be dead,” says Berlinger. “If the state of Arkansas believed these guys were guilty they wouldn’t have let them out.”

would have been “the news” for a big reveal at the end of 12 episodes. Filmmakers Andrew Jarecki, Marc Smerling and Zachary Stuart-Pontier came under fire for their HBO series The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Hurst. Some questioned how long they held on to new evidence linking Durst, a Manhattan real estate heir, to a 2000 murder in L.A., along with a seeming hot-mic confession, before handing it to police. Strang downplays suggestions that Making a Murderer omitted key details to curry sympathy for Steve Avery. He says the series was “quite” faithful to the truth. “As someone who had a front-row seat to that entire trial and pretrial process for 16 months, it looked like an accurate description on the whole of what happened.”

The West Memphis Three, after their arrest in 1993 for the alleged murders of three 8-year-old boys. I asked Berlinger if blowback from authorities ever led him to second-guess himself. “No, because I didn’t burden myself with having to prove innocence,” he says. “I burdened myself with there being too many questions in this case to put somebody to death. Even though my personal belief was total innocence, the mission of the film does not take on that burden.” Even when a case is clearly flawed, authorities often dig in their heels. When Dassey’s conviction was overturned, Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel successfully fought to keep him behind bars pending resolution of the matter. “It’s easier and more appealing to use the state’s interest in finality to hide the truth or to sweep it under the rug,” says Strang. “Much less cynically, there is the confirmation bias. Once we come to a conclusion on something, it is very hard to change our minds.”

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MEDIA SCHOLARS LIKE Thomas Joseph Watson have admonished new true crime for failing to acknowledge the artifice of its own constructed nature. “The Paradise Lost...films have intervened in the progression of an ongoing criminal case, shifting and revising assertions of guilt and culpability,” Watson wrote in a 2014 paper, “Rethinking History Through Documentary.” “In an attempt to document the story and the events that emerged following this violent triple homicide, the violent reality of the case has been continually re-contextualized.” Berlinger shrugs off the criticism. “If it’s the only way to bring attention to a case that is flawed, where an innocent person is sitting in prison, I’ll take that flawed approach,” he says. “The film is not the court of law. The film is saying, ‘Hey, there is something fucked up here, and we need to re-look at it.’” Serial’s Sarah Koenig has also been criticized for playing “hide the ball” with what traditionally

IN 1840, WRITER WILLIAM Thackeray’s first-person essay, “Going to See a Man Hanged,” chronicled the cheer among the 40,000 attendees of a public execution in Britain. “We asked most of the men who were near us, whether they had seen many executions — most of them had,” Thackerey wrote, noting that most also were unmoved by the spectacle. “People did not care about them at all; nobody ever thought of it after a bit.” Many still view convicts in a similar way. Thousands of innocent unknowns languish in American prisons today because they’re too poor to prove their innocence. Ever heard of the War on Injustice? Probably not. Although it has yet to be officially declared, new true crime journalists might be its front-line soldiers, shining a light on the judicial system’s darkest moments. As a genre, its lasting influence is likely more diffuse. “It can affect the culture in years ahead in ways that lead to reform in the public’s willingness to accept reform,” Strang says. “I do think these things become important in opening minds and shaping popular views of the justice system.” ■

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Screen time André and Tenaya Darlington pair cocktails with classic Hollywood cinema in Movie Night Menus BY DYLAN BROGAN

for Isthmus). “It’s like a group or date-night version of that. Classic cocktails and movies were born at the same time, so we want people to discover them together.” The Darlingtons watched hundreds of films in the Turner Classic Movie archive and selected 30 in which food and drink play prominent roles. The result is a film history/ cookbook/mixology guide that acts as a template for a theme-based movie night.

There’s suggestions for how to “set the scene” and some movie trivia to boot. “We hope it can be like a book club where people get together and do this,” says Darlington. “The movies are fantastic, and the recipes are really accessible. If nothing else, it’s a great excuse to rewatch some of the best films ever made.” Take Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope (1948), where a “perfect murder” is committed as

an intellectual exercise between two Columbia-educated aestheticians. “It has all the creepy Hitchcockian elements plus lots of food and drink. There are great party scenes where guests are eating off a truck with a dead body in it,” says Darlington. “They are literally partying on a dead guy’s [makeshift] coffin pretty much the entire film.”

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If the stunning views of Monument Valley in the classic western Stagecoach (1939) don’t take you back to the old American west, perhaps a piping-hot bowl of bourbon chili will. Pairing food and cocktails to classic cinema is the name of the game in Movie Night Menus (Running Press, $22), the latest book from brother and sister duo Tenaya and André Darlington. “It’s basically a version of ‘Netflix and chill,’” says André Darlington (a former food writer

■ FOOD & DRINK

Did you know Daisy...

Movie Night Menus continued from 23

The murdered man in Rope was strangled to death, so that film is paired with an Art of Choke cocktail, a dark, bitter drink that uses the Italian digestif Cynar. The main menu suggestion is “Camembert in a Coffin” (a recipe that involves placing a wheel of camembert cheese inside a loaf of bread.) Additionally, there are instructions for parmigiano rope twists that complement the bitterness of the cocktail. The films featured in Movie Night Menus span the early 1930s through the 1980s. Movies highlighted include Female, The Thin Man, Guys and Dolls, The Graduate and the original Rocky. They represent three eras of Hollywood: the freewheeling “pre-code” era before enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code; the “classic” era, dominated by a handful of big studios; and the “new Hollywood,” brought about by the decline of the studio system as well as the end of the production code. “The early 1930s seem incredibly modern. You have women divorcing. There’s acknowledgment of urban issues. Drinking problems. People are very honest about things,” says Darlington. “1930’s movies feel like ’60s/’70s movies.” For Woody Allen’s Annie Hall (1977), one of the modern classics featured in the book, a New York deli sandwich tray

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is paired with a Brooklyn Cocktail (cousin to another borough-named cocktail, the Manhattan). There’s also an “Aware” salad that demonstrates the cultural shift in cuisine that has occurred since the romantic comedy was in theaters. “At the time, Woody Allen makes fun of this certain salad. Now it’s how Los Angeles eats. It’s just standard,” says Darlington. “I think back in the ’70s, yoga was funny. Salads with weird microgreens were funny. What a great statement that the things Woody Allen makes fun of in the ’70s are mainstream now.” ANDREW PURCELL Movie Night Menus is available for Sit down to Casablanca with a roasted eggplant pre-order online and will be in stores on Dec. 27. This is the second book tagine, a traditional Moroccan dish, and a French 75, written by the brother and sister made with gin and champagne. team; their first, The New Cocktail Amazingly, there were no sibling squabHour, was released in April. Tenaya is an Engbles over which movies to select. “At this lish professor and food writer based in Philapoint, I can’t even tell which parts I wrote and delphia (and a former features editor at Isthwhich parts she wrote,” says Darlington. mus). André still calls Madison home. To write Tenaya and André will soon have a regular the book, they watched the films together cocktail column in Organic Life magazine. They while video chatting on Google Hangout. Neihave already started writing their third book, ther was a big film buff before Turner Classic too. “Pairing booze and vinyl is what we’re Movies approached them to write the book. currently working on,” says André. “So the col“I feel like I got a degree in American cinema,” laboration is alive and well.” ■ says Darlington.

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American bistro The revamped Brocach downtown has lost some of its Irish identity BY KYLE NABILCY

The first snow has hit us, the color palette of our corner of the world shifting from earth tones to white and gray and black. If there’s a season for the hearty, carby fare one usually finds on an Irish menu, it’s winter. Brocach on the Square used to be an Irish pub in a loud, slightly theme park-y way. The interior design came by way of an Irish pub design firm, lending a just-addGuinness kind of authenticity. Still, it delivered an ambience. The restaurant closed from the end of May to the beginning of October for a total makeover. In the process, dark-stained walls turned to plaster white, and velvety cushions gave way to blond-ish wood. It went from Irish pub to Every American Bistro. The facade is matte black, and it’s hard to see in the windows, too, giving the impression it’s not quite open for business. Counterintuitively, the dining room is too bright. It feels too much like a restaurant in a hip apartment that’s between tenants, or a museum without art. The menu retains some Irish classics, but veers to a more mainstream American bistro selection. A four-item brunch menu includes a proper English breakfast called the Large Brocach Breakfast. House-made bangers and blood sausage lead off the usual lineup of potatoes, bacon, grilled tomato, bacony baked beans, toast and two eggs your way. Even though my blood sausage was missing, it was still a large breakfast. It’s the kind of thing you’d want to eat after a morning of shoveling. Otherwise the menu is heavy on lunch, with only a handful of dishes unique to the dinner menu. One, the half roasted chicken, is in fact fully roasted and equally delicious — crisp skin with plenty of lemon and herbs, and juicy meat. The reuben is an excellent, meaty rendition of the classic. The horseradish cream was imperceptible, but the sand-

The double-pa ied Capitol burger is heavy on the cheese and tasty.

ERIC TADSEN

wich didn’t suffer because of it. It’s okay if it’s a regular, unfussy reuben. The beef pot pie, on the other hand, begged for salt. Its voluminous puff pastry topper was the highlight. Sides were confusing. Entrees often came with fries without that being listed on the menu, so it was hard to know whether to order sides or not. The fries and mashed potatoes were fine, and the mac and cheese would have been, too, if it had been hot. Avoid the caramelized cabbage and bacon; mine was limp, sour and entirely uncaramelized. Spend time with the starters, instead. I liked the croquettes, a thin skin of fried bread crumbs around quite a bit of creamy mashed potatoes and bacon. The crab, corn and bacon dip was light on bacon, but not everything actually needs bacon. With its clean flavors and roasty, blistered surface, the dip was a pleasant callback to summer. Seafood can be found all over the menu, from a clam “chowdah” that’s mostly potato and corn but still okay, to a spendy lobster roll. I liked the buttery toasted bun, and the lobster was plentiful, but the flavor of the celery slaw dominated.

Fish and chips stuck the landing with a savory batter, moist fish and dill-heavy tartar sauce. The isthmus is being overtaken by the greasy, unfancy, lo-fi double cheeseburger (see also Lucille, Forequarter), and Brocach’s double-pattied Capitol burger is heavy on the American cheese. It’s a pretty nice burger, and fits in well with this trend, but it also feels like the kind of thing you can find anywhere now. One of our servers mentioned chef Kate Magee’s pastry experience and expertise, and the hefty slice of carrot cake with a coconut frosting proved it. Why, then, Brocach would also serve a pre-made cheesecake is beyond me. If you manage to save room, save it for the housemade stuff. The new Brocach is a challenging restaurant to get a grasp on. In its old iteration, its allegiance to Ireland was clear, but in its new form, it’s a cipher, an almost blank slate. Whether in the form of better ambience, more consistent execution from the kitchen, or just the subtle weathering of time, Brocach needs to find its new identity.

BROCACH IRISH PUB ■ 7 W. Main St. ■ 608-255-2015; brocach.com ■ $4 - $22 5 pm-midnight Mon., 11 am-midnight Tues.-Thurs., 11 am-2 am Fri.-Sat., 11 am-midnight Sun.

Celebrate one of the most famous protests in American history by drinking whiskey out of a tea cup. In preparation for the event, the Malt House has been barrelaging its own Manhattan recipe for six weeks. The tavern will be serving Rittenhouse Rye cocktails for $4, too. At 2609 E. Washington Ave., 4-11 pm.

*Be

Tapping 5pm

The 12 pubs of Christmas

Food and toy drive

Saturday, Dec. 17

Sunday, Dec. 18

A bar crawl for the holidays with draft beer specials, prizes, costume contest and caroling. Hop from the Up North Bar to Madison’s, Natt Spil, Lucille, the Rigby, Brocach Irish Pub, Tiki Shack, Buck & Badger, Wisconsin Brewing Tap Haus, Paul’s Club, Cask & Ale and the Plaza. Registration is at Up North Bar 1-2 pm. Admission is a nonperishable food item. Crawl starts at 150 S. Blair St. and runs 1-6 pm.

Drop off a nonperishable food item or toy for Santas Without Chimneys (a nonprofit that provides gifts to homeless children in Madison). Stay to hear holiday tunes performed by Martini Three. Admission is $6 at the door or $5 with donation. At the East Side Club, 3735 Monona Drive, 4-7 pm.

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DECEMBER 15–21, 2016 ISTHMUS.COM

Friday, Dec. 16

Fri. Dec. 16

Eats events Boston Tea Party Anniversary

Bourbon Barrel Release Party

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’Tis the season for spiced beers. Lakefront has released one annually since the early 1990s. However, this year the brewery decided to depart from its traditional Holiday Spice Lager and released a bigger, bolder brandy barrelaged version. Here, flavor comes from a variety of ingredients, including cinnamon, cloves, ginger, orange peel and Wisconsin clover honey from Kallas Honey Farm of Milwaukee. The base is a strong malty winter warmer with lots of Munich, caramel and chocolate malts. What really makes the spicing smooth is six months of aging in brandy barrels. “Brandy is a Wisconsin thing, so it’s a little local twist on a spiced beer,” says the brewery’s Matt Krajnak. Oaky barrel tones with hints of toffee and dark fruits dominate the aroma, which even increase if you drink it from a goblet. It pairs well with desserts, or drink it on its own as a nightcap. I was reminded of the

ROBIN SHEPARD

decadent seduction of rum-spiced eggnog. It’s a welcome winter warmer for the holiday beer enthusiast. Lakefront Brandy Barrel-Aged Spiced Winter Lager finishes at 13.9 percent ABV and is sold in six-packs for around $15/each. This is a beer that will age well, perhaps for several years, if cellared properly.

— ROBIN SHEPARD

Warm tidings Oomph to combat winter from Oliver’s A Nice Pear Oliver’s Public House, 2540 University Ave., offers a diverse and extensive cocktail menu, with seasonal specials from bartender Ricky Pajewski. One clever new entry is “The Matthew McConaughey,” a rye whiskey shot (“All rye, all rye, all ryyyyeeeee,” as the menu describes it). Another, “A Nice Pear,” is labeled “a heartwarming cold-weather sipper, perfect for reminiscing over Pink Floyd’s psychedelic hits of the ’70s.” It wasn’t until I wrapped my fingers around the rum-based drink that I realized how cold my hands had been: The steamed beverage is an ideal remedy to the frigid outdoors. A Nice Pear begins with cooked brown butter — the same ingredient the cooks use to make panroasted trout — set with Plantation five-year rum for 24 hours in preparation. The rum is then topped with honey syrup, lemon juice and a housemade mulled pear cider. (The bar juices fresh bartlett pears and adds sarsaparilla, vanilla bean, cardamom and clove, among other spices.) The result is beautiful,

CAROLYN FATH

topped with the slightest bit of foam and a twist of orange. Created with finesse by Pajewski, A Nice Pear balances the sharp and the sweet. It’ll give drinkers just enough courage to weather the cold.

— LEXY BRODT

DECEMBER 15–21, 2016 ISTHMUS.COM

■ FOOD & DRINK

Gift Certificate Sale

Brewhaha

Critics say Olbrich biergarten is being forced on neighborhood Madison is used to opposition to development projects. But Ald. David Ahrens says something is different about the neighborhood resistance to a proposed biergarten at Olbrich Park. “The operating assumption is that the fix is in,” says Ahrens, summarizing criticism of the proposal to create a 300-seat beer and food concession at Olbrich beach. In May, the city issued a request for proposals for “placemaking services” at the Olbrich Park beach house. This fall, two proposals were recommended — the biergarten, to be operated by the BKM Group, and a watercraft rental service from Rutabaga Paddlesports. The two private companies would rehab the beach house and lease the building; a percentage of sales would go back to the city. But some park neighbors see problems. Jenn Jackson, who lives near Olbrich, says a community meeting Dec. 8 was attended mainly by those opposed to a private developer selling beer in a public park. She’s concerned about handing public green space over to private hands and the “lack of experience”

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the BKM Group has running an alcohol-related business (the business was formed in June). “Putting alcohol in a park sends a message that the only way we can create a community space is by selling alcohol,” says Jackson. Additionally, Jackson says neighbors were not given an opportunity to offer other “placemaking” ideas that don’t involve alcohol before the request for proposals went out from the city. Wallner says this is the standard process for park projects. Ahrens is alarmed that more than a dozen people have accused him of “hiding the project” from the public. “It’s not a done deal by any means,” says Ahrens. “I heard 20 times that this is being

railroaded through. I got an email this weekend that said local government is being controlled by special interests. But there have been no votes.” Ahrens sees the paranoid rhetoric of the presidential election being applied to the routine workings of local government. He calls it “frightening to see how that has saturated civic discussion.” “What’s troubling is the assumption that there is a conspiracy at the highest level to hide something nefarious,’ says Ahrens. “I mean, c’mon. This is a goddamn biergarten and canoe rental.” The biergarten still needs to be approved by several city committees as well as the full Common Council. The developer hopes to have the process completed by February. Jackson says it sure “seems like a done deal” to neighbors who oppose the plan. “There was a feeling of like, ‘Whoa. I didn’t realize this was really going to happen,’” says Jackson. “A lot people didn’t think a city project could take place this quickly. Well, it can when certain people want it to.” ■ A longer version of this story is at Isthmus.com.

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Give a guy a chance Badger footballâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s stellar history with walk-ons BY MICHAEL POPKE

Joel Stave, J.J. Watt, Joe Schobert and Chris Maragos share more than a history as high-profile Wisconsin Badgers football players. Each of them walked on to the UW program, eventually earned a scholarship and were on National Football League rosters as of earlier this season. Few universities can equal Wisconsinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s reputation for embracing and nurturing hard-working walk-on players. A recently published book, WalkOn This Way: The On-Going Legacy of the Wisconsin Football Walk-On Tradition (KCI Sports Publishing, $24.95), written by former UW walk-on tight end Joel Nellis and Buckys5thQuarter.com writer Jake Kocorowski, focuses on the programâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s past 25 years and the emphasis former head coach and now athletic director Barry Alvarez placed on student-athletes who initially joined the Badgers without an athletic scholarship. Those players often were â&#x20AC;&#x153;undersized, underdeveloped and under-recruited,â&#x20AC;? as the authors describe the hundreds of walk-ons who have come through the UW program in the post-Don Morton era and played a vital role in Wisconsin footballâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 216 wins and six Rose Bowl appearances since 1990. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a long list that begins more or less with Joe Panos, who walked on at Wisconsin after his 1989 season at Division III UW-Whitewater, sat out his first season

as a Badger per NCAA transfer rules and then began making his mark in 1991 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Alvarezâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s second season. â&#x20AC;&#x153;With the weeding out of the weak in Alvarezâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s first campaign as head coach, opportunities opened up for the scout-team defensive lineman,â&#x20AC;? Nellis and Kocorowski write. Panos would emerge as captain of the 1994 Rose Bowl team, the first of many walk-ons to achieve that status. Other renowned Badger walk-ons include 2016 captain Dare Ogunbowale and former Green Bay Packers Jared Abbrederis and Mark Tauscher, now an Isthmus co-owner. While the stories of many walk-ons read similarly, what makes Walk-On This Way a winner is its singular focus on an overlooked category of player from a specific era of Wisconsin football. The authors interviewed more than 100 former student-athletes and coaches â&#x20AC;&#x201D; including Alvarez and current head coach Paul Chryst, plus several past assistants â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and their knowledge of the game runs deep. Nellis brings personal perspective that adds intimacy and authenticity, and in the foreword, former UW safety, three-time firstteam All-Big Ten player, 10-year NFL veteran and current Badgers secondary coach Jim Leonhard concisely yet effectively recalls his own personal walk-on journey. The obvious reference in the title to Aerosmithâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s signature single, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Walk This Way,â&#x20AC;? is kinda cool, too. â&#x2013;

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Plans for dedicated jazz venue Saxophonist Hanah Jon Taylor is hoping to gain support of neighbors BY BOB JACOBSON

Madison fancies itself a world-class city, and in some ways it is. In others, not so much. A world-class city, for example, has a real jazz joint. A number of local venues, including the Brink Lounge and Cardinal Bar, currently host live jazz shows. But Madison has been without a fulltime, dedicated jazz venue — a place designed for listening, with an in-tune house piano, comfortable seats and no pool table or giant TV to compete with — for years. That gap has become intolerable to Hanah Jon Taylor, so the sax whiz and educator is trying to fill it in the coming months with a new venue, Cafe Coda. Taylor, who emerged from Chicago’s experimental scene, has collaborated with a who’s who of adventurous jazz artists, and tours abroad regularly. He has already launched two jazz venues since moving to town two decades ago: the House of Soundz on Willy Street and the Madison Center for Creative and Cultural Arts. Both were vibrant crucibles of music until the forces of development and gentrification “pulled the rug out from under them,” according to Taylor. What Taylor learned from those two earlier efforts was that without the full support of a landlord who shares your vision, survival will always be tenuous. He felt like he had found that landlord, as well as a suitable downtown location, when he connected earlier this year with Terry Tao, owner of the space at 329 W. Mifflin St. on the ground floor of Metropolitan Place, which housed Metropolitan Coffee and Wine until late 2015. “He gets it,” Taylor says, about Tao.

Taylor says a jazz club would serve as a hub for a revitalized scene.

Taylor and his associate, Susan Fox, hustled to put together a plan with a timeline that calls for a grand opening in early March. Taylor launched a GoFundMe campaign in September with a goal of $10,000. Ald. Mike Verveer, who represents the neighborhood and sits on the Alcohol License Review Committee, is a fan of the project, as are a number of other Madison luminaries, including former UW Chancellor John Wiley. Verveer says he has not heard any significant opposition from the neighborhood, and expects the ALRC and city council to give the project their blessing. (Note: As a fellow musician, I contributed to the crowdfunding campaign.) But just as the fundraising campaign was nearing its initial goal in early December, the condo association that represents residents

of Metropolitan Place expressed concern about potential noise issues. They insisted that Taylor consult with an acoustics expert prior to signing a lease to determine what actions might be needed to protect condo dwellers’ eardrums from stray blue notes. Taylor understood from the start that opening a venue in a residential building means thinking about noise, and he is willing to invest in soundproofing. But after weeks of friendly relations, the condo association’s hardball position caught him off-guard. Complicating matters, Tao, the landlord who “gets it,” has become less communicative, preferring to interact through a real estate agent who brokers Metropolitan Place deals. Tao chose not to comment on the project for this story. Taylor has heard that the space has been shown to at least one other potential business. Meanwhile, Taylor says he is exploring other possible locations. He plans to attract far-flung creatives to the space, and doesn’t want to be put into the position of having to tell them to pipe down. Johannes Wallmann, director of jazz studies at UW-Madison, agrees the city needs a new venue: “Minton’s Playhouse, the Village Vanguard, Chicago’s Jazz Showcase...these storied clubs created communities of musicians and audiences and fostered the development of new sounds,” Wallmann says. “Madison’s jazz scene deserves a venue to call home. No single thing will make a greater impact than having a quality venue dedicated solely to jazz.” n

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Baroque holiday traditions Madison Bach Musicians elevate the season’s offerings BY JOHN W. BARKER

In a season filled with Nutcrackers and Christmas Carol performances, the Madison Bach Musicians have established their own worthy tradition: the Holiday Baroque Concert. The beginnings of a blizzard notwithstanding, a considerable and enthusiastic audience turned out for the sixth annual concert Dec. 10 at First Congregational Church. A delightful program was delivered by four singers and six instrumentalists. The singers (Chelsea Morris Shephard, Joseph Schlesinger, Scott Brunscheen and Matthew Tintesbegan) began with music from two Renaissance masters, Joaquin Desprez and Orlandus Lassus: the first two sections of Desprez’s Mass on the “Pange lingua” chant, and two of Lassus’ Latin Motets. The rest of the first half was devoted to Baroque instrumental music, played by violinists Kangwon Lee Kim and Brandi Berry, violist Marika Fischer-Hoyt, cellist Martha Giese Vallon, bassoonist Marc Vallon and harpsichordist Trev-

or Stephenson. They delivered a trio sonata by Johann Fox, a Bassoon Sonata by Georg Philipp Telemann and a Partita by Heinrich Biber for two re-tuned violins and continuo. The second half of the program was more explicitly seasonal. The splendid soprano Chelsea Morris Shephard sang a charming Nativity cantata by Alessandro Scarlatti, accompanied by the instrumentalists. That was followed by a short but powerful aria by the group’s eponymous hero, J. S. Bach, from his St. John Passion — a preview of the group’s full performance of that work is scheduled for April — strongly sung by tenor Scott Brunscheen. The concert wrapped up with a more extended representation of Bach: his Christmas Cantata BWV 122, Das neugeborne Kindelein, a richly clever six-movement elaboration of the Lutheran chorale of that title. The individual solo sections were handsomely rendered, while the use of only the evening’s four singers re-created what must have been

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Founder and director Trevor Stephenson (at keyboard) offers a talk before each concert.

Bach’s own practice, and gave the choral sections particular clarity. Trevor Stephenson offered his usual pre-concert remarks about the program and its contents. As founder and director of the group, he has established a sturdy and flourishing tradition of presenting Baroque music with sensitivity, style and artistry. I am already looking forward to the seventh annual holiday concert. n

Badger hall-of-famers Madison and Wisconsin rock Cleveland’s museum BY TOM KOBINSKY

The magnetic pull of vintage tunes draws you into the coolest gig on earth and doesn’t let go until eight hours later, when it’s last call for rock ’n’ roll. For music lovers, a visit to Cleveland’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is a sensory grab. It’s well worth the flight or drive for a day trip, and although debates will always rage about who is and isn’t included, the hall captures an important facet of our cultural history.You can marvel at the music your parents danced to, and wonder about whatever it is kids are listening to today. All the big stars are there, of course, but just beyond Ringo’s drum kit, around the corner from Elton’s velvet cape and Mick’s “Satisfaction” suspenders, and nestled next to the Boss’ vintage Telecaster are artifacts from Garbage, Da BoDeans, Timbuk 3 and other Badger rockers, past and present. Wear comfortable shoes, and keep your eyes peeled for memorabilia from Madison’s musical past, including: n Tickets for Midwesterners Cheap Trick’s 1976 show at the Stone Hearth ($1); photos and clips from Johnny Cougar (John Mellencamp) at the Church Key and the Violent Femmes on Library Mall. n Photos, posters and wreckage from the 1967 plane crash that resulted in the drowning of Otis

Speaking of Garbage, Redding and his you can get a close look band, scheduled to at Shirley Manson’s play that night at the outfit (in an early MTV Factory, at the corner video of “Stupid Girl” of State and Gorham. playing nearby) and n The backing youngster photos of Vig, boombox played by Steve Marker and Duke Grammy-nominated Erickson (remember Fire Timbuk 3’s Pat Town and Spooner?). MacDonald and BarOr how about bara Kooyman. They checking out some played it numerous handwritten lyrics from times at Memorial Bon Iver’s Justin VerUnion Terrace. non? He’s based in Eau n Demo tapes from Claire, and has provided Smashing Pumpkins Violent Femmes, 1982. a leg up to many musiand the Replacecians from the region. ments, who recorded When you visit, arrive early. Hint: Take at Smart Studios in the early 1990s escalators up and work downward to avoid n Video of Waukesha’s Les Paul explaincrowds. Save the theater venues (looping ing how he invented the solid-body elecconcerts, induction ceremonies, vintage mutric guitar. sic TV shows, etc.) until your feet ache. Some musicians who still play here in To keep the hall fresh, curators add new Madison are already famous enough to displays each year, honoring the most recent make the cut. For example, Freedy Johninductees. For 2016, that includes Cheap ston gigs in Madison with Steely Dane; Trick (who began by playing high school the hall displays lyrics and artwork from proms and a UW dorm cafeteria) and our his 1994 Bad Reputation record, which was neighbors from the south, Chicago. n produced by Butch Vig, of Garbage fame.

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DROIDS ATTACK • ZEBRAS • BEREFT WHISKY PIG • CAVE CURSE SATURDAY, JAN. 7

GERALD WALKER • DUMATE CRASHPREZ • SINCERE LIFE ZED KENZO • BROADWAY MUSE MOJAMID

MAMA DIGDOWN’S BRASS BAND IMMIGRE • DJ PHIL MONEY

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SATURDAY, JAN. 14

THEM COULEE BOYS DIG DEEP • CHICKEN WIRE EMPIRE ARMCHAIR BOOGIE

THURSDAY, JAN. 12

PUNK FEST MASKED INTRUDER

DOORS OPEN AT 7PM MUSIC STARTS AT 8PM

ARMS ALOFT TIM SCHWEIGER & THE MIDDLE MEN JAILL • NO HOAX • STATIC EYES

WWW.MAJESTICMADISON.COM

thu dec

HELMET "Dead To The World" US Tour

Local H 8pm

fri Dec

16 Songwriter Robby Schiller has penned new material for a Dec. 21 reunion.

18+

Hippie X-mas PHUN as Phish Laser Cats as The Grateful Dead 9Pm

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Whad'ya Phil Gnarly Inferno: Know & The Tough Guys 20 Year High Noon The Willies Reunion 17 at Saloon sat dec

12pm $10

ing and with minimal post-production, is Get Lonely, a crunchy set of new Schiller songs, including an instant Blueheels classic: a Todd Rungren-meets-Princesounding number, “Electric Laundry Lady.” “This time we just wanted to get together, arrange some new tunes and record them basically live. Rely on our instincts and see what that would get us,” says Cargin. What it got them was vintage Blueheels served up with the fearless attitude of a live show. The High Noon show will be the rock ’n’ roll reunion of the year as the Blueheels pick up right where they left off. “The only difference now,” says Cargin, “is that a Blueheels show is more like a fun vacation than a tedious day job.” n

$25

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Black Sheep Bazaar

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FUNKY MONDAYS HAPPY HOUR FEATURING

mon dec

The Clyde Stubblefield 19 All-Stars 6pm $7

wed Dec

21 thu Dec

Blueheels Faux Fawn 6:30PM $10

Dogs Of War Bird's Eye Chris LaBella 9pm

$10, $5 before 10pm

18+

DECEMBER 15–21, 2016 ISTHMUS.COM

The eccentric personalities who make up Madison’s pioneering garage-grunge rock band Blueheels can’t live with each other — and they can’t live without each other. The latter part of the equation is good news for fans, because Blueheels are reuniting Dec. 21 at the High Noon Saloon after a nearly five-year hiatus. The original Blueheels took shape in Neenah in 2005 around the prolific songwriting of Robby Schiller. Between 2008 and 2012 it was actually difficult to miss a Blueheels show. They toured the state as hard as any. Live, the band was confident and rebellious — like the Replacements, only consistently tight and without the blood and dresses. The boys spilled out from whatever modest barroom dressing room was available and brought the party already-in-progress to the stage. Schiller’s themes have always been bent and quirky — often dispatching everyday losers deep into a fog of misunderstanding and romantic dead ends. But it’s the combination of Schiller’s voice — a Leon Russell croak — and Justin Bricco’s manic lead guitar that creates the Blueheels sound. By 2012 the band had worn the treads off the tires. Even as the touring continued, the group began work on their fourth album, Weather Machine, also known as “the project that would

eventually kill the band,” according to drummer Adam Cargin. “Between 2008 and 2012, we played a ridiculous amount of shows. Being together all the time is eventually what made us all need to take a break and do something else with our lives,” says Cargin, who emphasizes that no major event precipitated the break. “On stage we could read each other’s minds as we changed songs up almost nightly, trying to keep things interesting as we played some bar for the hundredth time.” Every musician knows that kind of cohesion doesn’t grow on trees. So it’s no surprise that the players got hungry to play together again. It’s not as though the members have been twiddling their thumbs these past years. Schiller, an arborist in Madison, has continued to write and perform, most notably as drummer for Little Legend. When not on tour as guitar tech for Lucinda Williams and the Indigo Girls, Bricco performs with Green Bay’s Snowbirds. Cargin is a stay-at-home dad in Providence, Rhode Island. Keyboardist Teddy Pedriana is working as an electrical engineer in Milwaukee, where he also performs with his band Versus the Magnet. Bassist Landon Arkens is head engineer at Madison’s Blast House production facility. Blast House is where the guys gathered in August to once again kick up their heels in the studio. The result, after only two days of record-

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It’s been too long since Madison film audiences had a chance to catch up with the work of Lewis Klahr, one of the world’s top experimental filmmakers. Klahr, who visited the UW-Madison campus in 2006, is a master of collage animation. His films have been staples at experimental film programs at the New York Film Festival and elsewhere. In fact, when Film Comment magazine asked critics to name the top avant garde filmmakers of the decade ending in 2010, Klahr ranked fourth. Former Village Voice critic J. Hoberman called Klahr “the reigning proponent of cut and paste.” On Dec. 16, UW-Cinematheque will screen Klahr’s feature-length anthology, Sixty Six, a compilation of 12 short films completed between 2002 and 2015. General viewers might associate collage animation with Terry Gilliam’s work for Monty Python and expect madcap humor. While humor has a place in Klahr’s work, his films deliver short bursts of imaginative

transformations and sublime beauty. The tone often remains contemplative, even meditative. Klahr’s technique is deceptively simple: He places cut-out comic book images on multiple planes in front of the camera and systematically explores all of the possible permutations of the arrangements, creating a visual language unique to his films. The images and objects retain their individual meanings and create new ones as Klahr juxtaposes them in new compositions. But they also retain their physicality as paper, toy blocks or buttons, casting shadows on the planes behind them.

One particularly mesmerizing permutation of his technique, seen in the first film Mercury and later in Mars Garden, bleeds together images from both sides of a comic book page. In Mercury we hear Leonard Cohen’s “Minute Prologue,” and the technique transforms mundane images from Flash comics into a dreamlike meditation on relationships. While some of the shorts distill or transform the melodramatic narratives found in the comic book sources, the films are best approached as repetition and variation on a theme. Viewers expecting linear narratives might get frustrated with the repetition and not see the value in the variations, which are the key to Klahr’s work. In Ambrosia, one simple variation on a series of photographs of disheveled postmeal dinner tables shifts our emotional response to those images from detachment to sorrow. The magic that Klahr performs in the films of Sixty Six relies on the mystery that exists in images, even mundane ones. n

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Skate like you mean it

Film events

Derby doc Roller Life shows pleasure and pain of high-impact sport

The Jungle Book: Disney’s beautiful and thrilling live-action/CGI/3-D (whew!) adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s timeless collection of fables about man-cub Mowgli and the furry denizens of his tropical habitat. Central Library, Dec. 15, 6 pm.

BY LAWRENCE GANN

NOW PL AYING ROGUE ONE: A STAR WARS STORY CC & DESCRIPTIVE NARRATION - NO PASSES Fri to Tue: (12:00, 1:00, 3:00, 4:00), 6:00, 7:00, 9:00, 10:00

ISTHMUS.COM DECEMBER 15–21, 2016

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CC & DESCRIPTIVE NARRATION - NO PASSES

Fri: (12:15, 3:15, 4:30), 6:15, 7:05, 9:15; Sat & Sun: (11:10 AM, 12:15, 3:15, 4:30), 6:15, 7:05, 9:15; Mon & Tue: (12:15, 3:15, 4:30), 6:15, 7:05, 9:15

MANCHESTER BY THE SEA

Fri to Tue: (1:15), (4:05), 6:55, 9:45

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Fri: (1:40, 4:20), 7:00, 9:45; Sat & Sun: (11:05 AM, 1:40, 4:20), 7:00, 9:45; Mon & Tue: (1:40, 4:20), 7:00, 9:45

NOCTURNAL ANIMALS Fri to Tue: (1:45), 9:35

CC & DESCRIPTIVE NARRATION

Amenity Fees Vary With Schedule - ( ) = Mats. www.sundancecinemas.com/choose LOCATED AT HILLDALE MALL 608.316.6900 www.sundancecinemas.com Gift Cards Available at Box Office

Showtimes subject to change. Visit website to confirm Closed captioning and descriptive narrative available for select films

Showtimes for December 15 - December 21

Fans of roller derby are about to see the fastgrowing sport depicted on the big screen, as Roller Life, a documentary from Appleton filmmaker Michael Brown, skates into the Majestic Theater on Dec. 17. In the last 20 years, organizers have created more than 2,000 leagues all around the globe, including, in 2004, Madison’s Mad Rollin’ Dolls, which is currently ranked 35th. Dedicated volunteers have created a comprehensive rule set and governing body for the sport, the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA). Emily “Hammer Abby” Mills, who competes for the Mad Rollin’ Dolls, says self-organization is a lynchpin of the sport. “Roller derby was and is more of a community that created a sport to grow within it,” says Mills. “People within roller derby are the ones who built the sport from the ground up.” Mills says the sport attracts a diverse group of women to its ranks: “It retains those punk rock, queer, campy roots, while also being an intensely challenging and competitive sport.” Brown’s film follows Milwaukee’s Brewcity Bruisers for a year. It captures the drama of competition and players’ lives outside the rink, focusing as much on derby’s hard-hitting athleticism as it does on its vibrant culture. “They’re moms, bankers, coaches,

humanitarians and chefs,” says rookie Brewcity Bruiser Melissa “Killer Queen” Nodurft, who appears in the film. “Their lives were a fishbowl during the filming.” Brown says he began the project knowing very little about the sport. This is his second documentary; the first was a 2014 film on Wisconsin ghost stories, Haunted State: Whispers from History Past. “I have so much respect for these athletes,” Brown says. With Roller Life, he hoped to help “create awareness and stomp [out] misconceptions” that roller derby didn’t demand the speed, strength and endurance of other sports. Nodurft says she looks forward to new audiences learning about derby. “Newcomers can only introduce new ways of thinking and add diversity to the culture,” she says. “The more the merrier!” n

New Year’s Evil: Midnight murders follow the time zones across the country toward an L.A. radio DJ who is warned of the plot. Central Library, Dec. 15, 6:30 pm. UniMadEx: Experimental short films by UW students, faculty and alumni. Union South-Marquee, Dec. 15, 7 pm. Elf: The silly and surprisingly touching story of Buddy (Will Ferrell), who was raised among Santa’s elves but leaves the North Pole to search for his real father in New York. Majestic Theatre, Dec. 15, 8 pm; Neighborhood House, Dec. 16, 6:30 pm (with kids’ crafts, snacks). Doukyuesei: Anime Club screening (RSVP: 246-4548). Hawthorne Library, Dec. 16, 7 pm. Sixty Six: Dazzling combination of collage and animation by Lewis Klahr. UW Cinematheque, Dec. 16, 7 pm. See story, above. UW Communication Arts Showcase: UW Cinematheque student showcase. Union South-Marquee, Dec. 17, 7 pm. Roller Life: Documentary about flat track roller derby. Majestic Theatre, Dec. 17, 7 pm. See story, left. Captain Blood: UW Cinematheque: A 17thcentury Irish doctor (Errol Flynn) goes pirate. Chazen Museum of Art, Dec. 18, 2 pm. Alive Inside: Documentary about how music can help combat memory loss. Madison Senior Center, Dec. 20, 1 pm. How to Get Ahead in Advertising: A young ad exec can’t come up with a slogan for pimple cream, and develops an unusual blemish of his own. Bos Meadery, Dec. 21, 7 pm.

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DECEMBER 15–21, 2016 ISTHMUS.COM

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Dueling Nutcrackers

PICKS OF THE WEEK

Madison Ballet: Saturday (2 & 7 pm) and Sunday (2 pm), Dec. 17-18, Overture Center-Overture Hall Dance Wisconsin: Saturday (2 & 7:30 pm) and Sunday (2 pm), Dec. 17-18, UW Memorial Union-Shannon Hall Lucky Madison: We have two full-length Nutcracker ballets. Pick one, or see them both to compare and contrast. Madison Ballet (pictured right) has lavish sets and artistic director W. Earle Smith’s romantic and sweeping pas de deux, ushering in Act I’s snow scene. Dance Wisconsin’s version (pictured left) features American Ballet Theater guest artists Gillian Murphy and Marcel Gomes. Dance Wisconsin director Jo Jean Retrum returned to a more traditional Nutcracker in 2015 after many years of presenting their feverdreamish “Fantasy” version. Both have live orchestras performing Tchaikovsky’s beloved score, colorful costumes, charming children and festive/tedious party scenes (depending on your mood). Both are likely to inspire young audience members to demand ballet lessons.

picks

fri dec 16 M USIC

thu dec 15 MU S I C

Tip Top Tavern: Tos Hopkins, folk, free, 9 pm.

COME DY

Ben Ferris Quintet album release Friday, Dec. 16, Crescendo Espresso Bar, 7:30 pm

Busy Ben Ferris is a music educator by day and spends his nights playing with so many bands it’s hard to keep track. This event celebrates the release of his debut album, Home. It showcases his considerable chops, honed with UW-Madison’s bass legend Richard Davis, and features illustrious bandmates Paul Dietrich (trumpet), Nicholas Bartell (tenor sax), Miguel McQuade (drums) and Paul Hastil (piano).

ISTHMUS.COM DECEMBER 15–21, 2016

Gloss Coats + Wood Chickens

Helmet

Wil Anderson

Thursday, Dec. 15, High Noon Saloon, 8 pm Formed while bandleader Page Hamilton was studying jazz guitar at the Manhattan School of Music, Helmet has always been one of heavy music’s more unpredictable, experimental groups. Now the “Unsung” rockers are hot off the release of Dead to the World, their first album in six years, and it sounds like they were never gone in the first place. With Chicago hard rock heroes Local H.

Thursday, Dec. 15, Comedy Club on State, 8:30 pm

Bos Meadery: Le Gran Fromage, Cajun, 6:30 pm. Brink Lounge: Aaron Williams & the Hoodoo, 8 pm. Frequency: Lorenzo’s Music, Brother Rye, 8:30 pm. Harmony Bar: Backroom Harmony Band with Cris Plata, Americana, 8 pm. Malt House: Dollar Bill & the Bucks, 8 pm.

Wil Anderson is one of the funniest Australians around. Delightfully brassy with an air of giddy, eloquent cynicism, his ability to turn self-deprecation into astute observation has enthralled audiences. He’ll cover how suffering from osteoarthritis can lead to awesome barbecue tongs, Vegemite (obviously), his friend’s problems with burkas, and just his general “Wilosophy.” With Matt Alano-Martin, Ben Katzner. ALSO: Friday-Saturday, Dec. 16-17, 8 & 10:30 pm.

ART E XHIBITS & EV ENTS MSCR Pottery Sale: Annual fundraiser, 8 am-6 pm on 12/15-16 and 9 am-3 pm, 12/17, Madison School & Community Recreation. 204-3005.

Friday, Dec. 16, Art In Gallery, 8 pm When local artist Shelley Peckham debuts her work at Art In, she’ll be doing so in pretty good company. This Means War! has lined up a killer night of music to support her: Madison rockers Gloss Coats and Wood Chickens (pictured, who are releasing their Christmas EP) will be joined by Mike Maimone of the Chicago band Mutts. Support your local scene, and have a ton of fun doing it.

Destroy All Christmas Friday, Dec. 16, Frequency, 9 pm

Few things go hand-in-hand quite like Christmas and metal (after all, “Santa” is just a quick letter-switch away from “Satan”). If live sets from Droids Attack and House of Lud aren’t enticing enough, there will also be gifts from the bands, free slices of Ian’s “Droids A-Snack” pizza and a special visit from Santa-Bot. Can’t beat that for a $7 cover.

Dead Man’s Carnival Friday, Dec. 16, Majestic Theater, 8 pm

For many, a carnival brings to memory the overlapping smells of churros and horse poop. Dead Man’s Carnival blows apart any preconceptions. The Milwaukee-based variety show combines vaudeville and DIY punk rock for a spectacle that includes magic, striptease, fire performance and aerial gymnastics, to name just a few of the acts included in “the greatest show un-Earthed.” Arts + Literature Laboratory: Taylor/Hendrickson/ Hamer/Grosse, improv, 8 pm. Bos Meadery: Lords of the Trident, unplugged, 6 pm. Brink Lounge: Jazz Ahead, 7:30 pm. High Noon Saloon: Phun, Laser Cats, 9 pm.

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United Way Bluegrass Benefit

SAT, JAN. 14 - 7 PM

SAT, FEB. 25 - 8 PM

MADFEST JUGGLING ONE WOMAN SEX AND THE CITY EXTRAVAGANZA FRI, JAN. 20 - 8 PM

WED, MAR. 1 - 7 PM

CLASS of 2017”

The Fly Fishing Film Tour 2017

FRI, JAN. 27 - 8 PM

FRI, MAR. 3 - 8 PM

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TICKETS AVAILABLE AT OVERTURE.ORG, 608-258-4141, AND AT THE OVERTURE CENTER BOX OFFICE.

ZOSO

“No Teeth, No Entry Tour”

The Ultimate Led Zeppelin Experience

MON, FEB. 6 - 7:30 PM

SAT, MAR. 4 - 8 PM

DAWES BoDeans Christopher Titus WE BANJO 3 FRI, MAR. 10 - 8PM

FRI, FEB. 10 - 8 PM

“End Of The World Tour”

SAT, FEB. 11 - 8 PM

SAT, MAR. 11 - 8PM

Shut The Folk Up and Listen

THUR, MAR. 16 - 7:30 PM

Gaelic Storm WED, MAR. 29 - 7 PM 10th Annual

Wild & Scenic Film Festival THUR. - SUN, MAR. 30 - APR. 2

WISCONSIN FILM FESTIVAL

SAT, APR. 8 - 7:30 & 10 PM

HUMP! TOUR 2017 SAT, APR. 15 - 8PM

THE ZOMBlES ODESSEY AND ORACLE 50th ANNIVERSARY

TUE. & WED, APR. 18-19, 7 PM

BANFF MOUNTAIN FILM FESTIVAL 2017 SAT, APRIL 22 - 8 PM

JOEY’S SONG BENEFIT

The Know-It-All Boyfriends & Guests

SUN, MAY 14, 3 PM LEO KELLER Paula Poundstone KOTTKE WILLIAMS Listen To Your Mother 8th Annual

FRI. DEC. 16 - 8:00PM

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DAWES BARRYMORE THEATRE • FEB. 6 TICKETS ON SALE NOW AT BARRYMORELIVE.COM

SAT. JAN. 14 - 7:00PM Madison Area Jugglers present The 47th Annual

MADFEST

Juggling with special guests

JACK KALVAN & CO. • ANDREA NOEL

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T I C K E T S AT O V E R T U R E C E N T E R . O R G .

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Tickets $20 advance, $25 d.o.s

Tickets on sale at Sugar Shack, Star Liquor, MadCity Music, B-Side, Frugal Muse, Strictly Discs, the Barrymore, online at barrymorelive.com or call & charge at (608) 241-8633.

DECEMBER 15–21, 2016 ISTHMUS.COM

EXTRAVAGANZA

■ ISTHMUS PICKS : DEC 16 - 17 Knuckle Down Saloon: Reverend Raven & the Chain Smokin’ Altar Boys with Westside Andy, blues, 9 pm. Mickey’s Tavern: Pollinators, Easy, Calliope, Momotaros, free, 10:30 pm. Orpheum: Home Free, country Christmas, 8 pm. UW Union South-Sett: UW Jazz Orchestra, 5 pm. Wil-Mar Center: Common Chord, Bruce Buttel, 8 pm.

ALL-INCLUSIVE

New Year’s Eve

Extravaganza

DEC. 31 • 6 PM -CLOSE LIVE 2 Bars! MUSIC 2 Bands! Live at Nine Twice the Fun! & Tom Brusky All You Can Eat & Drink! Includes: half-liters of bier, rail & first call liquors, domestic & microbrew bottles, glasses of house wine, all-you-can-eat buffets throughout the night, party favors & Champagne at midnight!

ISTHMUS.COM DECEMBER 15–21, 2016

Must be 21+ to enter.

Band

9PM -1AM

Get Your Tickets Before They’re Gone $75 before Dec. 23 $80 from Dec. 27-31 (or until sold out)

608.258.8619

Come Back In for Breakfast on New Year’s Day

$3 Bloody Marys, Mimosas & Screwdrivers Served from 8am-4pm

514 E. Wilson St. Madison essen-haus.com coimebackintavern.com

THEATER & DANCE

John Waters Christmas Friday, Dec. 16, Barrymore Theatre, 8 pm

Prince of Peace, move over. It’s time for a Christmas story starring the “Prince of Puke,” aka legendary filmmaker John Waters. He may be irreverent, but the man loves the holiday season. His one-man show “explores and explodes traditional archetypes” as he talks about his desire to give and receive perverted gifts, the American obsession with Santa Claus and Waters’ unhealthy love of true-crime holiday horror stories.

The Wizard of Oz Friday, Dec. 16, Bartell Theatre, 7 pm

You’re not in Kansas anymore. This re-imagined production of The Wizard of Oz by Mercury Players Theatre puts a Sconnie twist on the classic story. Dorothy gets whisked away from a Wisconsin Dells waterpark and faces off against the Wicked Witch of West Towne with the help of the good Witch of Up North. This family-friendly comedy is written as British panto-style theater, which means men dress as women, women dress as men and audience participation is encouraged. ALSO: Saturday (7 pm), Sunday (2 pm) and Wednesday-Thursday (7 pm), Dec. 17-18 & 21-22. Through Dec. 30. A Christmas Carol: Children’s Theater of Madison, 12/10-23, Overture Center-Capitol Theater, at 2:30 pm Saturdays-Sundays, plus 7 pm on 12/16-17, 2:30 pm on 12/22 and 2:30 & 7 pm, 12/23. $56-$26. 258-4141. Last Week in December: Encore Studio for the Performing Arts, 8 pm, 12/16-17, Mary Dupont Wahlers Theatre. $15. 255-0331.

Willy Porter & Carmen Nickerson Saturday, Dec. 17, Stoughton Opera House, 7:30 pm

Hailed by the Boston Globe as having “the Olympian speed of Leo Kottke bolstered by rootsy vocals and twisting, offbeat lyrics,” Willy Porter is a Wisconsin staple. The Mequon-born, Milwaukee-based troubadour has released nine critically acclaimed albums and is currently supporting Bonfire to Ash, a collaborative album with Carmen Nickerson, whom he’s worked with regularly since 2013.

Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience Saturday, Dec. 17, Orpheum Theater, 8 pm

Some tribute bands have more provenance than others, and this is one such group: Jason Bonham is the son of Zep drummer John Bonham. Jason has drummed with the other members of the legendary hard rockers at some of their very infrequent reunion performances since disbanding after John’s death in 1980. The band also features Stoughton native James Dylan on vocals.

The Rousers & Friends Saturday, Dec. 17, Harmony Bar, 9:45 pm Three-plus decades since forming, the Rousers remain one of our most reliable sources for a rockin’ dance party. With help from special guests including Cris Plata, Tom McCarty and Al Falaschi, they will present an evening of fan favorites and some Christmas songs wrapped up Rousers-style.

A Christmas Carol: Dramatic reading, 6 pm on 12/16-17 and 5 pm, 12/18, Young Shakespeare Players Playhouse. Free. youngshakespeareplayers.org.

sat dec 17 M USIC

Harmonious Wail album release Saturday, Dec. 17, Old Sugar Distillery, 7:30 pm

Fronted by Madison’s First Couple of Swing, Sims and Maggie Delaney-Potthoff, Harmonious Wail has spent almost three decades perfecting the sounds of Gypsy swing and be-bop jazz. At this festive release party for Holiday Spirits, treat yourself to a “Wail N’Good Cheer” signature cocktail while taking in Harmonious Wail’s versions of holiday classics, plus a few surprises, such as Burt Bacharach’s “What the World Needs Now.”

Rhyme & Reason Saturday, Dec. 17, The Wisco, 10 pm

For its third birthday, the Rhyme and Reason underground hip-hop concert series is bringing in all the heavy hitters of Madison’s burgeoning scene. Neu Dae, Reakt20, Conscious Object, Dizzo, Rawz Option (pictured) and Leet Moteef will each perform a couple of songs (with LiquidForm hosting and Mr. Bomb Camp on DJ duties), culminating in a massive freestyle cypher session open to anyone who wants to hop on the mic. Check the rhyme, Madison!

➡

SEARCH THE FULL CALENDAR OF EVENTS AT ISTHMUS.COM

Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia’s Production

BROWN BEAR, BROWN BEAR & Other Treasured Stories by Eric Carle SAT, JAN 14, 11 AM

G I V E T H E G I F T O F OV E RT U R E ! SERIES PARTNER

COMMUNITY PARTNER

JAN 3 – 8

Jersey Boys

JAN 10

CITIZEN: Reggie Wilson/ Fist and Heel Performance Group

JAN 12 FREE

MadCity Sessions: Oh My Love & Modern Mod

JAN 12

Patti LaBelle

JAN 14

Brown Bear, Brown Bear and Other Treasured Stories

JAN 25 – FEB 5

The Phantom of the Opera

FEB 12

Boyz II Men

FEB 18

Duck Soup Cinema: Safety Last

FEB 19

Elephant & Piggie’s We Are in a Play!

SPONSORED BY

SERIES SPONSOR

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n ISTHMUS PICKS : DEC 17 - 21 Bethel Lutheran Church: Wisconsin Chamber Choir, “O Wondrous Mystery,” holiday concert, 7:30 pm. Bos Meadery: Mad City Jug Band, free, 6:30 pm. Brink Lounge: Cliff Frederiksen, free, 9 pm. Cardinal: Grupo Candela, DJs Chamo, Rumba, 10 pm. Chazen Museum of Art: UW Horn Choir, free, 1 pm. Club Tavern, Middleton: City Electric, free, 9 pm. Come Back In: Mad City Funk, free, 9 pm. Crystal Corner Bar: Fringe Character, Dub Foundation, 9:30 pm. High Noon Saloon: Phil Gnarly & the Tough Guys, The Willies, 5:30 pm; Inferno 20th anniversary party: DJs WhiteRabbit, Siberia, Ryan Bannen, Elly Fine, Samrock, VJ Alistair Loveless, free, 9 pm. Hody Bar Middleton: Chameleon, rock, free, 9 pm. Immanuel Lutheran Church: Madison Area Community Christmas Festival, Choir, orchestra & Ringing Badgers handbell ensemble, 2 & 7 pm. Knuckle Down Saloon: Pistol Pete, blues, 9 pm.

Whad’Ya Know?: Podcast recording with hosts Michael Feldman & Stephanie Lee, noon, 12/17, High Noon Saloon. $10. 268-1122.

T HE AT E R & DANCE Dinner Detective: Interactive murder mystery dinner theater, 6 pm, 12/17, DoubleTree Hotel. $59.95. RSVP: thedinnerdetective.com. 866-496-0535.

ART E XHIBITS & EV ENTS Holiday Craft Sale: UW Clay Collective, Mad Gaffers & Fresh Hot Press annual event, 9 am-5 pm, 12/17-18, UW Art Lofts. facebook.com/events/658462787650352.

sun dec 18 MUS I C

Lakeside Street Coffee: Kristy Larson Trio, 7:30 pm.

Majestic Theatre: DJs Josh B. Kuhl, Nick Nice, 9 pm. Mezze: Charlie Painter & Friends, jazz, free, 9 pm. Mickey’s Tavern: Squarewave, Tippy, free, 10:30 pm. Mr. Robert’s: The Benders, free, 10 pm.

Speakeasy & Swing: Prohibition-themed interactive event, 8 pm, 12/17, Brink Lounge, with music by Professor Pinkerton & the Magnificents, games, dancing & more. $55 ($135 VIP includes 6 pm cocktails & dinner). RSVP: facebook.com/SpeakandSwing.

Gangstagrass

Harmony Bar: Cajun Strangers, 6 pm (lesson 5 pm). Heritage Congregational Church: Dawn Lingard, Robert Eversman, Cynthia Bacon Hammer, Christmas concert, free, 4 pm. High Noon Saloon: Nathan Kalish, Lou Shields, 8 pm. Olbrich Gardens: Duke Otherwise, 2 pm. The Rigby: Madison Jazz Jam, free (all ages), 4 pm.

MUS I C

Magma Carta CD release Local indie rock trio Magma Carta is celebrating the release of its new CD, Zugzwang, and is doing it in style. The band will be joined by Twin Cities pop-rock troubadour Pelham and fellow Madisonians Bassliss, a three-piece that combines hardcore funk and heavy metal. Fans of R.E.M. and the Shins shouldn’t skip this one. Crystal Corner Bar: David Hecht & the Who Dat, R&B/reggae, 9 pm.

THEATER & DANCE

Malt House: Onadare, Irish, free, 7:30 pm. OutReach: Women with Wings, drop-in singing circle designed for women, 6:30 pm. Up North Pub: The Lower 5th, rock, free, 8 pm.

Black Sheep Bazaar: Local makers’ market, 10 am-6 pm, 12/18, High Noon Saloon, with DJ Beau Devereaux. Free admission. facebook.com/blacksheepbazaarwi.

wed dec 21

mon dec 19

MUS I C

Blueheels + Faux Fawn

Sunday, Dec. 18, Frequency, 8 pm

No, it’s not a new strain of marijuana marketed to fans of ’80s rap. Gangstagrass is a Brooklynbased sextet that deals in the unlikely mashup of hip-hop beats and bluegrass melodies,

tue dec 20

Tuesday, Dec. 20, Frequency, 8 pm

East Side Club: Martini Three, holiday music, canned food/toy donations for Goodman Community Center pantry & Santas Without Chimneys, 4 pm.

ART EXHIBITS & EV ENTS

Me and Julio, Fitchburg: Best Practice, free, 9 pm.

SP EC I A L EV EN TS

Brocach Irish Pub-Square: Bi Dana, Irish, free, 5 pm.

Old Befana: 30th anniversary production of holiday musical by Ken Lonnquist: 9 & 11 am, 12/18, First Unitarian Society. Free. kenland.com.

Madison Community Seventh-day Adventist Church: Jennifer LaMountain, Steve Darmody, 11 am.

Tip Top Tavern: Willma Flynn-Stone, Desiree Mathews, Willma’s Fund benefit drag show, 10 pm.

perfect for fans of Trampled by Turtles and N.W.A. What began as an isolated experiment in 2006 has grown into a genre-bending (genre-creating?) group famous for writing the Emmy-nominated theme song for the FX show, Justified. With The Lower 5th.

Wednesday, Dec. 21, High Noon Saloon, 6:30 pm

M USIC High Noon Saloon: Clyde Stubblefield All-Star Band, 6 pm. Up North Pub: Pine Travelers, Americana, free, 7 pm.

Describing themselves as “a train wreck in the people’s key,” the members of Blueheels are pretty funny guys. But their

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musical talent is no laughing matter: The Madison group is back after a five-year hiatus, promoting a new album. They’ll be joined by Faux Fawn, a local chamber folk sextet. See story, page 31.

Lynnea Godfriaux & Brad Pregeant Wednesday, Dec. 21, Louisianne’s, 6 pm

Fans of New Orleans-style jazz will want to mark this one in their calendars. Vocalist Lynnea Godfriaux and pianist Brad Pregeant, longtime Madison jazzers who relocated to Colorado, bring their annual holiday show back to warm up the frozen tundra. Brink Lounge: Tim Whalen Quintet, jazz, 7 pm. Cardinal Bar: DJ Ashoka, 9 pm. The Frequency: Caskey, Cityboisteets, Charles Grant, Gooh, Landon Devon, 9 pm. Ivory Room: Jim Ripp, piano, free, 8 pm.

Munich Dunkel release, free, 7:30 pm. Uno Chicago Grill-Crossroads Drive: Northern Comfort, bluegrass, free, 6 pm.

T HE AT E R & DANCE

Guys on Ice Wednesday, Dec. 21, Barrymore Theatre, 7:30 pm

Fer cryin’ out loud, ya can’t get more Wisconsin than singing and dancing ice fishermen! Fred Alley and James Kaplan’s popular musical is set in an ice shanty and features the talented Doug Mancheski and Steve Koehler as Marvin and Lloyd. The buddies ham up the regional accents, delivering songs like “Ode to a Snowmobile Suit” (“From the top of your hat to the tip of your boot, when it’s 30 below, there’s no substitute for the comfort and warmth of your snowmobile suit”). ALSO: Thursday, Dec. 22, 7:30 pm. Through Jan. 1.

Malt House: Don’t Spook the Horse, free, 7:30 pm.

S PECI AL E V ENTS

Middleton-Cross Plains Area Performing Arts Center: Middleton Community Orchestra, 7:30 pm.

Starkweather Winter Solstice Celebration: Singing, drumming, refreshments & bonfire, 4 pm, 12/21, Olbrich Park. 251-1893.

Parched Eagle Brewpub: Birds Birds Birds, plus

FRONT & CENTER MADISON’S PLACE FOR WINTER EVENTS & ACTIVITIES NEW YEAR’S EVE CELEBRATION AND MIDNIGHT BALL DROP December 31 @ 6:00 PM

Destination New Year’s Eve December 31 @ 9 PM - 1 AM The Edgewater brings the Big Apple to with to Madison Bucky’s backyard an iconic ball drop at midnight, Empire State-inspired with an iconic ball drop at midnight, Empire State-inspired fare and ice skating on our own mini mini Rockefeller Rockefeller Center Center to put in York a New York rink—allrink—all sure to sure put you in ayou New state ofstate mind.ofWays mind. Ways to celebrate: to celebrate: Enjoy Dinner at The Statehouse with a five-course prix fixe featuring iconic dishes from NYC — $85 per person Attend the Destination New Year’s Event in the Grand Ballroom and receive complimentary beer, wine and champagne while enjoying live music from a 10-piece big band! End the night with a midnight “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” buffet. Tickets — $100 per person Book overnight packages with event ticket and dinner options starting at $399

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A complex wall New gym to focus on climbing and fitness BY AMELIA COOK FONTELLA

Keith Kubiesa is standing in front of what looks like a giant framed cave at Summit Strength & Fitness, a new climbing-focused gym opening south of the Beltline off Greenway Cross in mid-January. “It’s a work of art,” he says. This impressive work of construction will soon be finished into a complex climbing wall, complete with 1,600 holds (some of them made locally by Driftless Climbing) and challenging angles. Kubiesa, who has a background in snowboarding, got serious about climbing when a snowless winter five years ago pushed him to try something new to stay active. Since 2012, he’s$13 beenadvance a coach for the climbing team at Boulders, currently Madison’s sole climbing gym. Summit will be a climbing-specific training facility. While the gym will welcome

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ing regimen: “Climbing allows you to move your body in a different way, and it’s a big mental challenge.” The gym’s climbing classes home in on specific aspects of the sport. A movement class will help climbers perfect their techniques, and a training class aims to make climbers more efficient. A fitness class focuses on warm-up techniques and endurance. There will also be personal training opportunities and a youth climbing team. Kubiesa says coaches and climbers in the community have offered a hand as he worked to establish his new gym. He’s excited to see how climbers will continue to grow in his new space. “Madison is still, in the climbing world, not really known.” He’d like to see that change. “I hope that Summit Strength & Fitness will produce strong climbers and athletes who are proud to call Madison home.” ■

SUMMIT STRENGTH AND FITNESS ■ 3118 Kingsley Way ■ 608-515-8385 ■ trainclimbsummit.com

3rd Annual

Featuring 80 local performers

climbers of all ages and abilities, it’s designated for serious practice. “When you’re in here, it’s just you and your group,” Kubiesa says. No kid birthday parties, team-building outings or people trying out climbing as part of a first date. “You have to come in here with a mindset that you’re here to work out. It’s not a social club.” Summit Strength & Fitness won’t serve only the climbing community, though. With six years of experience as a personal trainer, Kubiesa will continue to work with all types of athletes. In addition to climbingbased activities, the gym will offer general fitness classes and has space devoted to exercise equipment like weights and a pullup bar. There will be a strip of astroturf for agility training. “You don’t need to feel like you have to climb to come here,” Kubiesa says. However, he says that climbing does make a great addition to any athlete’s train-

Summit figures to be the climbing enthusiast’s climbing gym, with 1,600-plus holds to grace the new space (under construction, above).

Box Office open one ho ur prior to each performance

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Jobs Tired of stress and long hours? East side Madison disabled man looking for help with in-home personal cares. Hoyer experience required. Part time. $11.66/hr. Contact Deanna at rymaszewskid@clanet.org or (608) 242-8335 ext. 3111.

Caring People Needed! Energetic, dependable and fun people desired to assist the elderly in Madison. Nonmedical companionship and in-home care. Flexible hours. Home Instead Senior Care: (608) 663-2646. Now hiring: Dietary Aides, Resident Assistants, C.N.A.â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s, LPNâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s, and RNâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s. Sign on bonuses for some positions. Apply today! www.oakwoodvillage.net

Would your daughter like to learn more about emotions and the brain? The UW Department of Psychiatry is looking for 9-11 year girls to participate in a paid research study. Girls who are currently receiving treatment for anxiety or other emotional issues, or who have been treated for anxiety in the past are not eligible to participate. Girls who have braces are also not eligible to participate. Receive $200 for participation in 3 research sessions. Additional study visits over the next 3 years may yield a total payment of up to $950. Participation includes MRI brain scans, clinical assessment interviews, behavioral tasks, and questionnaires about health and mood. If you think your child fits these criteria, please visit our website at www.KnowYourEmotions.com for more information and a link to our screening survey. You can also contact the HealthEmotions Research Institute by phone at (608) 265-4380 Volunteer with UNITED WAY Volunteer Center Call 246-4380 or visit volunteeryourtime.org to learn about opportunities Santas Without Chimneys invites you to â&#x20AC;&#x153;adoptâ&#x20AC;? a homeless child or family this holiday season! Great for families, kidsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; schools or organizations and teams. By signing up to sponsor or â&#x20AC;&#x153;adoptâ&#x20AC;? a child or family enrolled in the program, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re helping bring the magic of the season directly to someone whoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d otherwise go without. Wisconsin winters can be bone-chilling, and not everyone has enough winter wear to keep them warm. Neighborhood House Community Centerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Winter Wear Drive collects new or lightly used winter wear items for Madisonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s community members, and your help is needed to put a hat on everyoneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s head. Looking for donations of the following items in sizes for people of all ages: coats, hats, mittens, gloves, scarves, boots and snow pants. For a list of other holiday volunteer opportunities, view The 2016 Holiday Wish list located on United Wayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s website: https://www.unitedwaydanecounty.org/ 2016/11/united-ways-2016-holiday-wish-list/. If you are interested in obtaining a paper copy, contact the Volunteer Center.

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Put the ___ on (squelch) Bezos or Buffett, e.g. Enjoy Mt. Hood, say Eerie sign Phone setting Accessories often gifted in June 37 Bait shop purchase 38 1958-61 polit. alliance 39 â&#x20AC;&#x153;Nature ___ a vacuumâ&#x20AC;? 41 Put under a spell 44 â&#x20AC;&#x153;Star Trek: TNGâ&#x20AC;? counselor Deanna 45 South African playwright Fugard 46 Potential Snapchat debut of 2017 48 Track on a compilation album, maybe 52 â&#x20AC;&#x153;___ Moreâ&#x20AC;? (Backstreet Boys song)

53 55 56 57

Broadcast Chronicler of Don Juan Exploiting, in England Orange Free State colonizers 58 Cheapen 59 Chimichanga ingredient 60 Protectors of the orbs? DOWN

1 Obiter ___ 2 â&#x20AC;&#x153;___ Life: The John Lennon Storyâ&#x20AC;? (2000 TV biopic) 3 Mushroom features 4 Like some cranes 5 Bumps an R down to a PG-13, perhaps 6 Peaceful poem 7 Barnyard fowls

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Slouching toward 2017 BY DAN SAVAGE

Perhaps you’re not the best person to ask, being a cis white man, but as a queer woman of color, the election had an extremely detrimental effect on my relationships with my white partners. I love and care for them, but looking at those results has me wondering why the fuck they didn’t do better in reaching out to their shitty relatives? I’m sick of living at the whim of white America. I’m aware this is the blame stage of processing, but it’s left me unable to orgasm with my white partners. I’m really struggling with what Trump means for me and others who look like me. I know my queer white partners aren’t exempt from the ramifications of this, but I wish they had done better. Respond however you like. Devastated Over National Election First and most importantly, DONE, you don’t have to fuck anyone you don’t wanna fuck — period, the end, fin, full stop, terminus — but we owe it to ourselves to be thoughtful about who we’re fucking, who we aren’t, and why. Data isn’t a turn-on for most people, DONE, and I’m not suggesting the data I’m about to cite obligates you to fuck anyone.

But queer voters (a group that includes millions of people of color) didn’t just reject Trump, they did so by wider margins than some communities of color (groups that include millions of queers). While 14 percent of LGBT voters backed Trump, 28 percent of Latino voters and 19 percent of Asian American voters backed Trump. (Only 8 percent of African Americans voted for Trump.) The shitty and unfathomable votes of some POC — and some queers (WTF, 14 percenters?) — doesn’t get your white partners off the orgasmkilling hook. It’s possible your white queer partners didn’t do enough to persuade their families back in Clinton County, Iowa, to vote against hatred, fascism, racism, and Trump. (Trump won Clinton County, Iowa, by five depressing points.) Like you, DONE, I’m struggling with what this election means. I’m not going to tell you what to do, or who to do, or how to process the election. I am going to tell you to talk with all your partners about your fears and your anger, and I encourage you to do whatever and whoever feels right going forward. I have an idea for something that I think might make it a bit easier for us to survive Trump. What if there were “Trump Minus 100” parties? Every time we get another 100 days closer to the end of the Trump/Pence administration, we have a get-together to celebrate,

commiserate, protest, raise money, whatever. The first party would be just a few days before the inauguration—to stiffen people’s resolve — and then three or four parties a year after that. Here are how the dates fall out: Sunday, Jan. 15, 2017 (1,100 days left); Tuesday, April 25, 2017 (1,000 days left); Thursday, Aug. 3, 2017 (900 days left); Saturday, Nov. 11, 2017 (800 days left); Monday, Feb. 19, 2018 (700 days left); Wednesday, May 30, 2018 (600 days left); Friday, Sept. 7, 2018 (500 days left); Sunday, Dec. 16, 2018 (400 days left); Tuesday, March 26, 2019 (300 days left); Thursday, July 4, 2019 (200 days left and the Fourth of July!); Saturday, Oct. 12, 2019 (100 days left); Monday, Jan. 20, 2020 (0 days left). What do you think? One Hundred Days At A Time Something about seeing the next four years broken up into 12 — just 12! — 100-day chunks makes it seem less daunting. Orange Julius Caesar can do a lot of damage over four years, of course, but breaking his term into 100-day increments, and making each hundredth day a day of action, is a great idea. If someone out there wants to pick up OHDAAT’s idea and run with it, I purchased the URL TrumpMinus100. com. Get in touch, show me your plan, and I’ll pass the URL on to you.

JOE NEWTON

In response to Peaceful Protester from a couple of weeks ago — the reader who suggested protesting at Trump’s inauguration — everyone needs to know that a protest is already planned! It’s called the Women’s March on Washington, but all genders are welcome, and local protests are being organized around the country for those who can’t make it to Washington, DC. Protesting in Minnesota Thanks for sharing, PIM! Email Dan at mail@savagelove.net or reach him on Twitter at @fakedansavage.

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