The Tulsa Voice | Vol. 4 No. 14

J U L Y 5 – 1 8 , 2 0 1 7 // V O L . 4 N O . 1 4

In the race between education and disaster, can a downtown brain trust give Tulsa the lead?

INNOVATION AT 36 DEGREES NORTH P23 ALSO DOWNTOWN

B E E R FOR B R E A K FA S T P 12

WOR D ON T H E S T R E E T P19

B A L L OU T AT BOK P29

paradise never sounded So Good.

Tickets On Sale Now

Trevor noah fri, july 14 Thompson square sun, july 16 mac Mcanally fri, july 21 peter frampton fri, july 28 Lindsey buckingham & Christine mcvie sat, aug 5 Ralphie may fri, aug 18 Toto and pat benatar & neil girardo fri, sept 8 tom jones sat, oct 7 chase rice fri, oct 27 Tickets On Sale July 12 Ron white fri, sept 15 Live music 7 nights a week, starting at 5pm

81st & RIVERSIDE 888-748-3731 RIVERSPIRITTULSA.COM

2 // CONTENTS

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

ENJOY SOME OF THE BEST DINING TULSA HAS TO OFFER

MCNEL L IE’S w w w . m c n e l l i e s . c o m PROBA BLY T UL S A’S BES T PUB 1S T & ELGIN

YOKOZUN A w w w . y o k o z u n a s u s h i . c o m DOW N TOWN’S BES T SUSHI. 2ND & DE T ROIT

FA S SL ER H A L L w w w . f a s s l e r h a l l . c o m HOUSEM A DE S AUS AGES A ND A GRE AT BEER G A RDEN 3RD & ELGIN

EL GUA P O’S w w w . e l g u a p o s c a n t i n a . c o m

EN JOY ME XICA N FOOD A ND M A RG A RITA S ON DOW N TOW N’S ONLY ROOF TOP PATIO 1S T & ELGIN

T HE TAV ERN w w w . t a v e r n t u l s a . c o m FINE DINING IN T HE BR A DY A R T S DIS T RICT M AIN & BR A DY

DIL LY DINER w w w . d i l l y d i n e r. c o m BRE A K FA S T SERV ED A L L DAY LONG 2ND & ELGIN

EL GIN PA RK w w w . e l g i n p a r k b r e w e r y. c o m

PIZZ A, HOUSE-BRE WED BEER, WINGS, 60 + T VS ELGIN & M.B. BR A DY

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

CONTENTS // 3

l a u n n A 0 2 th

For full lineup, schedule, & tickets, please visit woodyfest.com!

WOODY GUTHRIE FOLK FESTIVAL July 12 - 16 , 2017 th

th

OKEMAH, OKLAHOMA

Arlo Guthrie | Red Dirt Rangers | Turnpike Troubadours John Fullbright | Sarah Lee Guthrie | Shawn Mullins Wink Burcham with Jacob Tovar | Ellis Paul | Folk Uke Bad Dog Band with Joel Rafael | Butch Hancock | SONiA Terri Hendrix | Miss Brown to You | Monica Taylor Jared Tyler | Bob Livingston | Michael Fracasso Lance Canales | Grant Peeples | Rod Picott | K.C. Clifford George Ensle | Hardin Burns | Kevin & Dustin Welch Larry Spears | Anna Canoni | Seth Glier | David Amram Burns Sisters Don Conoscenti | Sam Baker & MANY, MANY MORE! Featuring Songwriting Workshops, Children’s Concerts, Special Book Signings & More Special Events!

SPECIAL TRIBUTE TO JIMMY LAFAVE WEDNESDAY, JULY 12 TH With Generous Support From: Oklahoma Arts Council | Philip Landers | BancFirst | Mez Mezera & Audrey Auld-Mezera | PSO | Golden Pony Casino | Okemah Casino George Kaiser Family Foundation | Martin Guitar | Woody Guthrie Publications | Crystal Theatre | Nightflying | Parks Brothers Funeral Home | Vierson Family Foundation | The Tulsa Voice 4 // CONTENTS

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

July 5 – 18, 2017 // Vol. 4, No. 14 ©2017. All rights reserved.

PUBLISHER Jim Langdon MANAGING EDITOR Liz Blood ASSISTANT EDITOR Kathryn Parkman DIGITAL EDITOR John Langdon ART DIRECTOR Madeline Crawford GRAPHIC DESIGNERS Georgia Brooks, Morgan Welch PHOTOGRAPHER Greg Bollinger AD SALES MANAGER Josh Kampf AD EXECUTIVE Craig Freeman EDITORIAL INTERN BreAnna Bell GRAPHIC DESIGN INTERN Katie Volak

19

CONTRIBUTORS Mark Brown, Alicia Chesser, Barry Friedman, Mitch Gilliam, Jeff Huston, Fraser Kastler, Jim Kelly, Hans Kleinschmidt, Nathan Knapp, Jennie Lloyd, Melissa Lukenbaugh, Mary Noble, Joe O’Shansky, Gaylord Oscar Herron, Carly Putnam, Damion Shade, Doug Summers, John Tranchina, Eddie Washington The Tulsa Voice’s distribution is audited annually by

DOWNTOWN GUIDE

BY TTV STAFF

What to do, where to go, and how to say it, plus a new TTV installment—“Word on the street”

Member of

23

The Tulsa Voice is published bi-monthly by

INCUBATING, INNOVATING

BY DAMION SHADE

A fellowship for teachers at 36 Degrees North hopes to spur new kinds of growth in local public schools

1603 S. Boulder Ave. Tulsa, OK 74119 P: 918.585.9924 F: 918.585.9926 PUBLISHER Jim Langdon PRESIDENT Juley Roffers VP COMMUNICATIONS Susie Miller CONTROLLER Mary McKisick DISTRIBUTION COORDINATOR Amanda Hall RECEPTION Gloria Brooks

MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD Send all letters, complaints, compliments & haikus to: voices@langdonpublishing.com FOLLOW US @THETULSAVOICE ON:

Downtown Tulsa constructed with wooden blocks in 1967 | GAYLORD OSCAR HERRON

NEWS & COMMENTARY

ARTS & CULTURE

7 MORE EXPENSIVE, LESS USEFUL

B Y CARLY PUTNAM

12 AN INTERPRETATION OF ORPHA’S

B Y MITCH GILLIAM

26 SETTING AS CHARACTER

B Y NATHAN KNAPP

What the Senate Republican health care plan would mean for Oklahoma

Beer for breakfast in downtown’s purest dive

Rilla Askew’s new collection of essays takes a hard look at home

8 SEND IN THE CLONES

B Y BARRY FRIEDMAN

14 HAMBURGER HEAVEN

B Y MARK BROWN

29 FULL COURT PRESS

B Y JOHN TRANCHINA

The Brownies of yesteryear, gone to greener pastures

The race to replace Jim Bridenstine

42 BAD NEWS

B Y FRASER KASTNER New ordinance criminalizes haunting specter of poverty … and other items too good not to satirize

MUSIC J U L Y 5 – 1 8 , 2 0 1 7 // V O L . 4 N O . 1 4

32 RUSH TO THE ISLAND

B Y EDDIE WASHINGTON A new summer music festival comes to downtown In the race between education and disaster, can a downtown brain trust give Tulsa the lead?

FOOD & DRINK

34 COMMUNAL EXPERIENCE

B Y LIZ BLOOD

An interview with Adrienne Gilley

16 POP ART

B Y MARY NOBLE

Tulsa’s tiniest ‘sicle shack

TV & FILM 39 NOSTALGIA VS. DISCOVERY

B Y JOE O’SHANSKY Shout! Factory TV is a trove of kitschy delights

40 GMO-TIONAL TALE

B Y JEFF HUSTON

BOK Center to host Week 3 of BIG3

28 WELL-DESERVED RECOGNITION

B Y ALICIA CHESSER TATE revamped its process, theater community approves

ETC. 27 ARTSPOT 30 THEHAPS 38 MUSICLISTINGS 41 FULLCIRCLE 43 THEFUZZ + CROSSWORD

Adventure parable indicts food industrial complex

INNOVATION AT 36 DEGREES NORTH P23 ALSO DOWNTOWN

B E E R FOR B R E A K FA S T P 12

WOR D ON T H E S T R E E T P 19

B A L L OU T AT BOK P29

ON THE COVER Downtown Tulsa shot by local photographer Doug Summers. Find him on Instagram at @dsummers2012.

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

36 SEEMS LIKE YESTERDAY

B Y JIM KELLY Tulsa Sound legend David Teegarden inducted to Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame

41 DROPKICK LADIES

B Y JOE O’SHANSKY

‘GLOW’ shines light on a lost era

CONTENTS // 5

editor’sletter

The magic formula

I

t’s easy to look up to the people we idolize and think, what’s their magic formula?

Hemingway committed himself to around 500 words per day (one, single-spaced page of typed text), kept track of his output on a chart, and worked at a standing desk.

He didn’t touch alcohol until after he was done writing. Carson McCullers sipped Sonnie Boys, a mixture of hot tea and sherry, throughout the day as she wrote.

Susan Sontag preferred to write by hand with a

felt-tip pen on a legal pad.

E.B. White refused to listen to music while putting pen to paper. Maya Angelou rented a hotel room in her hometown by the month to keep as a writing space. Haruki Murakami said the routine of writing a novel is like survival training, that “physical strength is as necessary as artistic sensitivity.”

I could go on. As an editor, I am fascinated by the writing habits of others.

The fascination is borne of admiration, and a desire to do similarly: live a meaningful life, and

engage with readers in this community. We often discuss in our office how lucky we are to have readers who support our paper, understand our references, and appreciate our often-irreverent tone.

For this issue’s cover story, writer (and teacher) Damion Shade interviewed 36 Degrees North Director Dustin Curzon and The Mine Program Director Hannah Ralston to find out how they’re trying to improve local education—and by extension, the future of Tulsa (pg. 23). Their Teacher

“Why does watching a dog be a dog fill one with happiness?”

Innovation Fellowship, which wrapped June 29, is on track to stimulate new problem-solving techniques for a problem-riddled enterprise.

I’m pleased to publish one more story about what it will take for Tulsa to thrive and succeed— and highlight some of the individuals always on the lookout for a new magic formula. a

LIZ BLOOD

MANAGING EDITOR

F L O AT I N G T OY S

– J.S. Foer Boz balls

Dash Frisbee

WOX Tug Toy

L AKE SNAC KS

1778 UTICA SQUARE OPEN M–SAT, 10–6 6 // NEWS & COMMENTARY

WINNER!

Snow Cone Treats July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

okpolicy

I

n late June, Senate Republicans emerged from secret negotiations to unveil their version of a bill to make big changes to America’s health care system. The last big health care reform, the Affordable Care Act, created popular new consumer protections for all Americans and extended health coverage to tens of millions who couldn’t get it before. Nevertheless, many remain unsatisfied with high premiums and deductibles, as well as limited options on the individual marketplace.

Unfortunately, the Senate Republican plan (the Better Care Reconciliation Act, or BCRA) would only make these problems worse. The BCRA would require Americans to pay substantially more for worse coverage. It would undercut the health care safety net, nearly doubling the uninsured rate, while delivering a massive tax cut for corporations and the wealthy.

In 2017, more than 100,000 Oklahomans received tax credits to help purchase private coverage on healthcare.gov. The BCRA would make those credits much smaller and allow insurers to charge older people more. In Oklahoma, this means premiums for a 60-year-old earning around $40,000 would jump by more than $5,000—the third-largest jump in the U.S. Nationwide, premiums would jump 20 percent in 2018.

Although the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that premiums will eventually decline under the BCRA, that’s because many older, sicker, and thus more expensive patients will drop coverage as it becomes unaffordable.

Those who manage to stay insured would find their insurance is less useful. The BCRA allows states to duck required benefits like prescription drugs and maternity care, effectively reinstating discrimination against preexisting conditions that a state doesn’t require insurers to cover.

The BCRA would devastate access to care for low-income children, people with disabilities, and the elderly by making unTHE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

precedented cuts to Oklahoma’s Medicaid program, known as SoonerCare. The bill cuts Medicaid 26 percent by 2026, with more cuts to come as health care costs grow. Oklahoma would have to either make up the difference from its own budget or cut services.

While the bill gives states more flexibility to administer Medicaid, shrinking federal funding means they only get to decide what or who to cut.

For Oklahoma, there are no good options. Children make up two-thirds of SoonerCare patients, and SoonerCare covers half of all kids in rural communities.

Should they lose coverage? Nearly half of Oklahoma’s Medicaid spending goes to the 1 in 6 members who are aged, blind, or have a disability. What care would we decide they don’t need anymore?

Millions would be pushed off Medicaid but not given any realistic ability to buy useful insurance in the private marketplace— which is why the CBO estimates this bill would cause 22 million Americans to go uninsured.

It’s hard to say what health care problem the BCRA aims to fix. There’s no indication that health or access to health care would improve under this plan.

What it does do is massively cut taxes for the rich. The BCRA would use savings from cutting marketplace subsidies and Medicaid for low- and moderate-income Americans to pay for more than $600 billion in tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations. By 2025, the wealthiest 400 families in America would get average annual tax cuts of $7 million.

As these facts come out, the BCRA has become extremely unpopular, and there is a chance of stopping it if enough Americans speak out. We must act fast to stop this attempt to roll back consumer protections and slash Medicaid, just to give tax cuts to big business and the very wealthy. a

MORE EXPENSIVE, LESS USEFUL What the Senate Republican health care plan would mean for Oklahoma

by CARLY PUTNAM

Carly Putnam is a policy analyst with Oklahoma Policy Institute (www.okpolicy.org).

NEWS & COMMENTARY // 7

viewsfrom theplains

B

efore the election of Donald Trump, when you listed the top 100 truly awful things that would happen if he became president—once you got past the end of the world as we know it and, worse, Omarosa Manigault on the government payroll—this would have been coming in around Number 87:1 First District Congressman Jim Bridenstine recently had a second interview with Trump administration officials about a position in the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the three-term Republican said late last week.

Just our luck.

Bridenstine is neither an engineer nor a scientist, so of course he’s the front-runner for this position. Trump is a president, after all, who said he wanted to surround himself “only with the best and most serious people,” like Betsy DeVoss at Education, Scott Pruitt at EPA, his own personal concierge as head of New York federal housing programs,2 and a non-scientist at USDA.3 For 18 months, between 2009 and 2010, if you recall, Bridenstine did run the Tulsa Air and Space Museum—and it and NASA both have the word “space” in their names, so there’s that. Who better to put in charge of the $18.5 billion agency than a guy who lost somewhere between $140,000 (Bridenstine’s figure) and $310,000 at a museum in Oklahoma?4 His time at TASM qualifies him to be head of NASA about as much as my enjoyment of cheese makes me eligible to be head of the National Dairy Council. More significantly, Bridenstine rejects the science of climate change, even though NASA’s own findings show that global warming is undeniable and potentially calamitous.5 The current warming trend is of particular significance 8 // NEWS & COMMENTARY

SEND IN THE CLONES The race to replace Jim Bridenstine

by BARRY FRIEDMAN

because most of it is extremely likely (greater than 95 percent probability) to be the result of human activity since the mid-20th century and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented over decades to millennia.

For his part, Bridenstine tried to put words together:6 Mr. Speaker, global temperatures stopped rising 10 years ago. Global temperature changes, when they exist, correlate with sun output and ocean cycles.

Yes, fellow scientists, sun output.

Bridenstine is so certain climate change is a hoax, he demanded President Obama throw himself on the mercy of Oklahomans for even talking about it.7 “ … And we also know that this President spends 30

times as much money on global warming research as he does on weather forecasting and warning.

For this gross misallocation, the people of Oklahoma are ready to accept the President’s apology and I intend to submit legislation to fix this.”

Anyway, it’s now July and Bridenstine still hasn’t been tapped—how badly does this guy interview anyway?—and the job remains unfilled and the agency is presently being run by an acting administrator.

Take note, the president hasn’t filled 85 percent of key executive branches.8 None of this, however, has stopped Republicans in Oklahoma’s First District from falling over each other in their attempts to replace Bridenstine, who has said he won’t seek re-election in 2018.

As of July 1, the following Republicans have filed: NATHAN DAHM, Oklahoma state senator, Broken Arrow9 Dahm bills himself as a Constitutionalist—of course—who also believes anyone who performs an abortion10 in the state should be charge with a felony, which, if we’re to follow his logic, would also include you ladies having them. He also believes any registered gun owner should be able to carry a weapon inside the State Capitol,11 saying, “I’ve had people tell me that they wish I was dead, or I would be killed, or I would catch a bullet.” This is why we don’t allow them to carry guns into the building in the first place!

DANNY STOCKSTILL, Brookside Baptist Church pastor12 Stockstill is worried about the moral decay of our nation, particularly the demise of the First Amendment, which he strongly supports, unless it starts supporting Godless infidels. “The First Amendment was designed,” he says, “to prevent a theocracy—not to prevent or impede any religion from being practiced. But the First Amendment is being used as a tool to establish, promote, and protect atheism.” He doesn’t mention which religion is being impeded, who’s doing the impeding, and what form it’s taking, much less who these marauding band of atheists are who are building houses of non-worship across the nation and demanding protection. But this isn’t about facts—it’s the issue he wants, so he and others trot out this notion that religion, their religion, is under attack. Some cashier at Target fails to tell people like Stockstill “Merry Christmas” or some atheist kid makes a stink about his public school mandating a moment of silence, and it’s time to strap on a wireless headset, get in front of the congregation, and preach about the end of the Republic.

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

TIM HARRIS, former Tulsa County District Attorney13 Upon announcing his intention to run for Bridenstine’s seat, Harris said, “If this is the Lord’s call, and he has told me to run, God never tells you to do something without equipping you to do it.”14 Can we please, for the love of you-know-who, knock it off with this already? Even good people of faith have to recoil at the trivialization and familiarity—as if God (if there is one) has a stake in the OK-1 Republican Primary.

Thing is, Harris may actually be the sane one in the group, which is scary. He also claims to be—wait for it—a constitutionalist, which is good, because every primary needs a least two who wrap themselves in a document that doesn’t mention God once. If I had to pick, I’d say he gets Bridenstine’s endorsement, which should be enough to get the nomination and the seat, except …

KEVIN HERN, businessman15 Hern, who owns 10 local McDonald’s restaurants, has more money than the other candidates and God put together, and if the Kochs and money have taught us anything about politics lately, it’s that seats can be bought. Hern promises to “shake up” Washington and favors repealing Obamacare and replacing it with “a health care reform that lowers costs and improves services for patients,” which might be a tad more believable if he provided such coverage to those who sling burgers for him. And, of course, that wall:16 Border security is essential to keeping Americans safe. I will not be bullied by the progressive liberals in Washington. It’s time to secure our borders. It’s time to BUILD THE WALL.

ANDY COLEMAN, veteran17 Recently, Coleman—whose website is oddly written in the third person—indicated he would never vote for a tax increase if elected and believes Obamacare should be “thoughtfully” replaced (as opposed, one imagines, to the heartless way the GOP is going about it now) and writes that Planned Parenthood “enjoys profits from the intentional destruction of unborn children,” a patent and cynically THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

incendiary bastardization of what the organization does.

These aren’t candidates, they’re clones, all cut from the same cloth, more specifically, ALEC position paper. But here’s the question: Is there no other GOP thinking out there in Oklahoma’s first district?

Is there no one who remembers that health insurance in 2008, before Obama took office, was an unsustainable disaster, no one who entertains the possibility that unfettered gun access is a bad idea, no one who believes that rape, incest, and the life of the mother should be a mitigating circumstance when it comes to abortion, no one who will admit that a focus on tax cuts and social issues have produced a dysfunctional state legislature and record deficits, no one who believes that their religious proclivities should be kept out of the classroom and the public square, and no one who believes in—dare I say, loves—the institution to which they so desperately want to be elected, no one who sees the beauty and possibility and necessity and transcendence of good governance?

Stupid question. a

1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6) 7)

8)

9) 10) 11) 12) 13) 14) 15) 16) 17)

Tulsaworld.com: Rep. Jim Bridenstine still a prospect for NASA job politico.com: playbook agweb.com: Trump to Pick Non-Scientist as USDA Chief Scientist tulsaworld.com: Air and Space Museum board members differ on Bridenstine climate.nasa.gov: Climate change: How do we know? ofa.us: Jim Bridenstine Is A Climate Change Denier thinkprogrss.org: Congressman Demands Obama Apologize To Oklahoma For Investing In Climate Change Research businessinsider.com: WHO’S RUNNING THE GOVERNMENT? Trump has yet to fill 85% of key executive branch positions nathandahm.com theamericanview.com: Oklahoma’s Senator Nathan Dahm: “The Hell-Hound of Abortion” normantranscript.com: Open carry debate focuses on the Okla. State Capitol, itself stockstillforcongress.com votetimharris.com muskogeepolitico.com: Former Tulsa DA Time Harris running for congress hernforcongress.com ourcauseourvoice.com: Build the Wall andycoleman.org

ARE YOU CURRENTLY PAIN-FREE BUT WANT TO LEARN HOW TO REGULATE PAIN? A TU IRB-approved research study is being conducted at The University of Tulsa that uses biofeedback to teach participants to regulate responses to pain. Participants must be healthy, currently pain-free, and able to attend 3 laboratory training sessions (3.5-4.5 hours/ day). Behavioral and physiological reactions to painful stimuli will be assessed each day to test the efficacy of the training.

Up to $300 compensation will be provided for completing the study.

CONTACT: Psychophysiology Laboratory for Affective Neuroscience (PI: Jamie Rhudy, PhD)

918-631-2175 or 918-631-3565

And as for me, thou upholdest me in mine INTEGRITY, and settest me before thy face FOR EVER. FIRST CHURCH OF CHRIST, SCIENTIST 924 S. Boulder Church & Sunday School • 10:30am Wednesday Meeting • 6:00pm

OKLAHOMA STUDY OF NATIVE AMERICAN PAIN RISK RESEARCH PARTICIPANTS NEEDED

$200 compensation ($100/day)

INVESTIGATORS: Drs. Jamie Rhudy & Joanna Shadlow CONTACT: The University of Tulsa Psychophysiology Research Laboratory 918-631-2175 or 918-631-3565

A novel research study is being conducted at The University of Tulsa to identify potential markers of risk for chronic pain in healthy (currently painfree) Non-Hispanic White and Native American individuals.

This study is safe, non-invasive, and does not involve medication. Participants must be able to attend 2 laboratory sessions (4-5.5 hours/day) in which physiological and behavioral reactions to different stimuli are recorded. This is a University of Tulsa, Cherokee Nation, and Indian Health Service Oklahoma Area Office IRB approved research study.

We’re giving away FREE STUFF! Register for the July giveaway at thetulsavoice.com by 7/31! $250 DOWNTOWN DINING PACKAGE INCLUDES: Billy’s on the Square Elote Café & Catering McNellie’s Group Naples Flatbread & Wine Bar Sisserou’s Caribbean Restaurant

NEWS & COMMENTARY // 9

NEW & V I N TA G E V I N Y L

NEW DOWNTOWN LOCATION!

T U R N TA B L E S LIVE MUSIC

WE BUY RECORDS !

11A M -11P M E V E R Y D AY 918 . 7 9 4 . 7 8 81 11 E B R A DY S T

SUN • 11am - 6pm MON-WED • 11am - 8pm THUR-SAT • 11am - 11pm 208 N MAIN ST 918-398-6700 IDAREDGENERALSTORE.COM

woodyguthriecenter.org

JOHN MCCUTCHEON THUR. JULY 6 • 7pm

MIKE STINSON BAND SAT. JULY 8 • 7pm

WOODY GUTHRIE POETS SUN. JULY 16 • 2pm

PAUL BURCH SUN. JULY 16 • 7pm

address 102 EAST BRADY STREET, TULSA, OK

74103

phone 918.574.2710

email INFO@WOODYGUTHRIECENTER.ORG 10 // BRADY ARTS DISTRICT GUIDE

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

Not just an ordinary bar Delivery Available Daily & Weekly Specials Full Service Catering Join us for the tastiest Chicken & Waffles in Tulsa!

21 E. Brady St. 918-585-8587

18 East M. B. Brady St. 918-588-2469 cazschowhouse.com

14 West M.B. Brady • 918.582.3383 • MexicaliBorderCafe.com LE ON SA

THANK YOU TULSA,

N O W !17

WE LOVE YOU!

# BWC

F20

BEST OF TULSA READERS’ CHOICE 2017

BEST OF TULSA

Voted Best Night Club & Best LGBT Bar/Club

READERS’ CHOICE 2017

OPEN 7 DAYS A WEEK 303 MLK Jr. Blvd. www.gypsycoffee.com

EUGENE MIRMAN

KYLE KINANE SKLAR BROTHERS

T U L S A’ S P R E M I E R E D A N C E C L U B

124 N. Boston Ave • 918-584-9494 clubmajestictulsa.com

GINA BRILLON NAOMI EKPERIGIN DAVID GBORIE JORDAN ROCK

BYRON BOWERS

JACQUELINE NOVAK

NICK VATTEROTT

SAM JAY

LATE LATE BREAKFAST

LIZA TRIGGER

BRIAN MOSES JOSH MEYERS

SEPTEMBER 7TH -10TH , 2017 10 East Archer St, Suite 1-101 • 918-698-0082 shopetnika.com THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

STAN D U P • IMPROV • PODCASTS • FILM • PARTIES • LIVE MUSIC

BLUEWHALECOMEDYFESTIVAL .COM BRADY ARTS DISTRICT GUIDE // 11

downthehatch

ORPHA’S LOUNGE 412 W. 4th St., opens at 8am every day, with drink specials from 9–11am.

GREG BOLLINGER

AN INTERPRETATION OF ORPHA’S Beer for breakfast in downtown’s purest dive

by MITCH GILLIAM

A

Start your day with Tulsa’s best breakfast tacos!

BACON • SAUSAGE CHORIZO • VEGGIE

LOCATIONS! 7:30am-10:30am

Monday

Location varies! Check Facebook!

Tuesday

Tulsa County Library, 6th & S. Denver

Wednesday

Tulsa City Hall, 2nd & Cincinnati

Thursday

Tulsa Area United Way, 1430 S. Boston

Friday

Arvest Bank , 5th & Main

Follow us on Facebook & Twitter!

For catering, order online: www.t-towntacos.com 12 // FOOD & DRINK

nalysts say dreams about snakes and public restrooms can indicate stress and a desire for change in waking life.

I figured my dream about folding dress shirts into a backpack while running late for a math test meant it was time for open at Orpha’s. I kissed my snooze button goodbye at 9 a.m. and made my way downtown.

Mentions of its name conjure ophidian, scatological, and stabby images in the minds of many. Orpha’s—located on Fourth Street, between Cheyenne and Boulder avenues—is downtown Tulsa’s oldest bar. It opens at 8 a.m., but its regulars never set alarms. They’ve usually been up all night.

I walked up the wheelchair ramp that morning, past the “smoking permitted sign” on Orpha’s metal security door. A doorbell chimed when I entered, and the few morning drinkers broke their necks on me. But I passed their smell test and the patrons returned to watching “The Price Is Right.”

The bar is shotgun style, with two pool tables swallowing up the bulk of the real estate. The glow from the digital jukebox cut through the plumes of cigarette fog. I ordered Orpha’s signature breakfast item—a $5 pitcher of low-point Bud Heavy—and a friendly man named Don sat by me with the same.1

“I work overnights and come straight here,” Don said. “It’s still morning to me!”

He asked if I watch “MASH,” to which I regretfully replied no.

“Well, Hawkeye pours the beer in his cereal and says, ‘Snack, crackle, and burp!’”

The morning bartender, Angela, told me she’s worked nearly every day for the last three weeks, and doesn’t understand the bar’s rough reputation.

“Everyone that comes in here takes care of each other and makes sure nothing bad happens,” she said.

Sure enough, a rowdy drinker was soon removed for flipping the bird. His speech was indecipherable other than a few “motherfuckers” in his word salad. Moments before, the man—a regular—was cleaning Orpha’s microwave to repay Angela for a brew she bought him. He was politely asked to leave, and it was understood he would be on better behavior the next morning.

Orpha’s has maintained its Fourth Street location since 1958, holding its two-bucks-a-draft ground while luxury hotels and cocktail bars pop up around it. The BOK Center brings new blood to Orpha’s on show nights, but Orpha’s still knows to care for its own. A free pitcher is offered to customers who cash their paychecks at the bar.

“If you come in here on the first of the month, this place is completely packed out,” Don said.

The man across from me sets up stages overnight at the BOK Center and unwinds afterwards during Orpha’s 9–11 a.m. “happy hour.” Next to him was a bald and bearded man in sunglasses with a glass of red wine.

Out of equal parts respect and an unwillingness to bug a Rasputin lookalike, I left him undisturbed.

Conversation topics remained light between Angela and her red-eyed regulars—Rey Mysterio’s high-flying wrestling feats and more idle chatter.

When Angela noticed someone stole the coconut she brought back from Hawaii, the bar responded collectively, dismayed and genuine: Nooooo!

Angela sat down next to her regulars and they guessed along to “The Price Is Right,” trying to get close without going over. Hank Williams Jr.’s “Family Tradition” played on the jukebox while I finished my pitcher. a 1) Current Oklahoma liquor laws state that “liquor may be served in bars and restaurants between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 a.m., any day of the week.

Beer (up to 4% alcohol by volume) may be served between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 a.m. on Sunday, and between 7:00 a.m. and 2:00 a.m., Monday through Saturday.”

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

Party at The Max

EVERY DAY! Funday:

OPEN AT NOON W/ FREE HURTS DONUTS CHAMPAGNE MIMOSA BAR LIVE EVENT BINGO @ 2pm (WIN A GAMEBOY COLOR!)

Monday: BLUE MONDAY W/ DJ ROBBO @ 9pm $1 COORS ORIGINAL

Tuesday: FREE TOKENS W/ EVERY PURCHASE Wednesday: TEAM TRIVIA NIGHT W/ QUESTIONABLE COMPANY @ 8pm (WIN A SUPER NINTENDO!)

Thursday: LADIES NIGHT W/ DJ MOODY 1$ COORS ORIGINAL FREE TOKENS FOR THE LADIES W/ ANY PURCHASE

Friday:

7/7 • BOO YA W/ RETRO DJ 7/14 • BOO YA W/ DJ MOODY

Saturday: 7/8 & 7/15 • DJ A.B. OF OLD SCHOOL SUNDAYS ON KJAMZ

6808 S Memorial Dr Ste 146 918-461-2605

www.highgravitybrew.com

I wish...

DID YOU MISS WHAT WAS HAPPENING IN TULSA L AST WEEKEND? DON’T MISS OUT THIS WEEKEND! Join 19,500+ subscribers who receive the weekly Insider e-newsletter to find out what the editors of The Tulsa Voice and TulsaPeople recommend for their weekend!

Sign up for the FREE weekly Insider today at TheTulsaVoice.com/ theinsider.

... to be a policeman ... to go to a Florida theme park

In 1982, wishes became reality: Make-A-Wish® Oklahoma was born. Oklahoma children with life-threatening conditions were offered hope, strength and joy. ... to have my own elephant

... to meet a real airline pilot

More than 2700 wishes later, our mission has never been stronger.

This year, as we celebrate our 35th anniversary, we’ve asked a select team of 35 former Wish kids, families, volunteers and supporters to help spread the word.

We’re calling it 35 for 35. Make-A-Wish® America has agreed to match us dollar for dollar to help us reach our goal of $350,000.

... to be a cowboy

... to have an NYC shopping spree

Be a part of our legacy.

Help us continue to make wishes come true.

Visit 35for35MakeAWish.com or call 918-492-9474. #Wish35

... to have a playset in my backyard

... to give a piano to my teacher THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

FOOD & DRINK // 13

citybites

He doesn’t have an office, only an answering machine.

And he always wants to meet at Hamburger Heaven.

— HOLLY GOLIGHTLY, “BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S”

B

ill Bowen and his sidekick—a guy we always called and knew only as The Sidekick1—walked into The Grapevine as if they owned the place. They entered through the back door, past the kitchen, like the regulars they were.

Both of them sported eyeglasses, and the brown slack, thin white button-down uniform of their other home away from home, Brownies Hamburgers.

They sat down at Davo Kifer’s bar as if they owned that, too. I saw more of Bowen then than I did as a kid, growing skinny in part on his 2-ounce hamburgers. I never saw a guy have more fun.

We’d come for the jazz. The Frank Adams combo. Charlie Parker’s “Au Privave.” We were in the mood.

“Rolling Rock,” my buddy Jim said, but I’d been reading my first Hemingway and was looking to fry bigger fish.

“Whiskey and soda,” I said.

“Scotch whiskey or Bourbon whiskey?” said Davo, his ponytail still on his head and not yet in the frame that would hang behind the bar.

“Scotch,” I guessed, and correctly, as time would tell. It was a lesson learned.

1988. I was to learn a great many things that summer.

In our salad days, Brownies was our go-to place, it and Furr’s and Monterey House. You are what you eat. I was something of a mess.

My parents took us to Brownies before Golden Hurricane basketball games at the nearby Pavilion, where the great Steve Bracey held court. Willie Biles, 14 // FOOD & DRINK

HAMBURGER HEAVEN

The Brownies of yesteryear, gone to greener pastures

by MARK BROWN

Painting of past employees by Diane Ainsworth McDonald hangs at Brownies Hamburger Stand, 2130 S. Harvard Ave. | MELISSA LUKENBAUGH

Sammy High and Ken “Grasshopper” Smith shooting jumpers down at the rim from the baseline corner, hanging high enough off the floor I could have walked beneath him. The pep band playing horny renditions of “The Horse” and “Light My Fire.”

My wife says a realtor took us there during our search for a house over in Bryn Mawr, but I don’t recall that trip. She’d never been to Brownies, Mrs. Brown, and hasn’t been since. It’s where I took my dad to tell him we were moving to France for a year. The haze of the World Trade Center had yet to clear. While we were away, Brownies put “freedom fries” on the menu.

When America was more lean than mean, hamburgers were

single patties the size of a coaster, buns painted with mustard and garnished with dill pickles and sliced onions. Now they’re double and triple meat-stuffed with bacon and barbecue and gobs of cheese and special sauces. And America is, well.

“Look at that hamburger!” said my kid, pointing to such a specimen glowing on a billboard out on 412 near Locust Grove, just over Snake Creek. You’d think he’d seen a UFO. I eat a hamburger a year and try to keep it simple. I like how those burger-stand burgers will perfume a person’s clothes for hours. I’ve always liked the way the buns shine with the mist of grease, like Susan Dey’s chipmunk cheeks.

I ate a black-bean burger once without irony. There’s a gourmet Brownies in Utica Square where a sushi bar used to be.

I’m just taking stock.

Gary Lee Hahn waited tables at Brownies until he died of cancer in 2008. He was 57. He started at Brownies in 1964. Do that math.

The lone blip on the radar: He opened Gary’s Grill in the Jenks RiverWalk in 2005 and closed it in 2006. He returned to Brownies, the prodigal nephew, coming home to open arms and onionsfried-in.

Sterlin Harjo eases the title character of his fi lm “Mekko” back into the world (after 19 years in prison) with a friendly waitress and a generous slice of pie.

I’m reminded of Jim Harrison’s character Brown Dog, who fell in love with a woman because she smelled like food. Harjo shot his scene at Brownies.

“It’s a type of place that bridges our grandparents’ generation with ours,” he said. “Asian fusion or hummus doesn’t do that.”

People come here to eat, not watch TV, their menu choices limited, unlike their Dish and cable.

Going by the menu, you’d think it was 1972. The only thing simpler would be a soup line. Bread and meat are the foundations of a burger, Harjo said, “like a house built with wood and steel.”

In my father’s room are many houses: Bill’s, Claud’s, Hank’s, Ron’s, Ted’s, Arnold’s, Freddie’s, Moe’s, over the eons. Brownies could have been Bill’s but it must have already been taken. Bowen got his start at Troy’s on 11th, which was next door to Brownie’s Root Beer Stand, the owner of which sold Bowen his root beer machines and even his neon sign, the one of the kid running off with a burger and mug.

Everybody called Ken Brown, my dad, Brownie. Only one or July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

two of my friends call me that.

Disambiguation: A brownie is also, of course, a chocolate treat; a Kodak camera, the original pointand-shoot; a rank of Girl Scout, one ahead of Daisy in the chain; a small-caliber pistol; the model of Fender Stratocaster favored by Clapton during his Derek and the Dominos days; and a wee goblin of Scottish lore who’ll perform household tasks, typically at night, in return for something to eat.

Progenitor of the “Will work for food” promise.

Sterlin Harjo’s dad’s nickname? Yup.

The counter was wide open, its stools upholstered in ketchup red, their footrests worn to bare steel in spots. Instead, I snuck into the first booth, beneath the Diane Ainsworth McDonald painting of the Brownies crew of old. Eleven caricatures in the illustration, eleven characters. Bill and Darrell Bowen, each with a glass in hand; Cleo Peace, Brownies baker for 34 years, brandishing a pie. Both the Hahns, Gary and Rodney. Another fistful of folks I vaguely recall.

Nearly all, if not all, gone. A kind of hamburger heaven.

“You know what you want,” asked a waitress, “or you need a little time?”

I ordered a frosty mug of root beer for the first time in years.

“Menu’s up there,” she said, pointing high above the counter. An old-fashioned hamburger is $2.55, a cheeseburger $3.25.

Old-fashioned means mustard, onion, pickles. Add lettuce and tomato and you have Deluxe, $2.90 and $3.60, respectively.

In spite of that, I ordered the 4-ounce hamburger steak, hold the Texas toast, and the fries, freedom fries, a colossal mound of the once-fried, soggy variety. Freedom isn’t free: A side of them is $2.25. Slaw, salad, cottage cheese, each $1.75. The prices are frozen in time, unlike the one I read in the sports page lying on the counter: “Riley to make $3.1 million.”

The grill cook read the slip and spanked a patty of ground beef into a thin disc, heaved on a pile of chopped onions, smacked the patty facedown onto the grill, and smothered it with a bacon THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

press. Amid this harsh discipline, my hamburger steak came out, as promised, a perfect medium. I ate it slowly—who knew when I’d be back?—and all but the greasiest of the fries, raking them through the Heinz ketchup that Brownies still keeps in glass bottles, the ones you look silly shaking back and forth. Anticipation.

Bill Bowen bought his hamburger meat up the street at Sipes, now a Dollar Tree.

Drysdale’s, Mi Cocina, the Office Depot near ORU—all former Sipes grocery stores.

“Save room for a slice of pie?” my waitress asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. Chocolate, butterscotch, banana, coconut, lemon. Meringue like the lid on the Metrodome.

“I’ll let you sit and ponder it,” she said.

“This must be where pies go when they die,” said Agent Dale Cooper, “Twin Peaks.” First “Twin Peaks.” Six thousand nine hundred ninety-five views on YouTube, 18 seconds. Peggy Lipton in baby blue. I decided to settle for a piece of complimentary green apple Super Bubble.

“Was everything OK for you, honey?” said the woman ringing me up. Without thinking, I said it sure was.

“You have a blessed day, then,” she said, handing me my VISA. I got in my car and turned the A/C to 11, backed up carefully in the undisputed Worst Parking Lot in Midtown, and drove out the rear entrance into a sea of asphalt on the edge of FloSo, between Empire Optical and a gutted old building with a sign in front: “Coming Soon.” a

It's always perfect weather to take a dip (in ranch dressing).

E AT AT YO U R FAVO R IT E FO O D T R U C K D R I N K D ELI C I O U S LO C AL B EER & CO C K TAI L S

1) Ed Mondor. “He and Bill said, ‘You should put our names on the back of our chairs,’” said Joe Kifer, brother of Davo and son of Grapevine owner Nelson Kifer.

“Instead, I bought them each hand-blown glasses at Margo’s in Utica Square. It’s funny: The same people who hung out in Utica Square would loosen their ties when they came to Brookside.”

TO SEE A GALLERY OF MELISSA LUKENBAUGH'S PHOTOS FROM BROWNIES, FIND THIS ARTICLE ON THETULSAVOICE.COM.

#G E T YO U R FIX AT FU EL6 6

24 39 E A ST 11TH ST

/// FU EL6 6 O K .CO M FOOD & DRINK // 15

foodfile

GREG BOLLINGER; ILLUSTRATION BY KATIE VOLAK

POP ART

Tulsa’s tiniest ‘sicle shack

by MARY NOBLE T HE POP HOU SE O W NERS A ND brothers Chris and Robby Davis have made me a pop believer.

Wow was all I could think as I sampled the creamy Key Lime Pop made with yogurt, fresh-squeezed lime juice, and cream cheese.

“That is our standard for whether a pop makes it on the menu—is it a wow pop?” Chris said.

I eagerly moved on to the next flavor, blueberry cheesecake.

Coated in graham cracker crumbs, it’s reminiscent of the creamy strawberry shortcake treats you loved as a child—but better.

Chris’s idea for The Pop House grew from an itch to ditch his corporate job and work for himself. What started out as a bike cart peddling pops at Guthrie Green and events around town is now a charming blue and red shack at 3737 S. Peoria Ave. that opened June 9. Besides The Pop House’s growing popularity, winning $15,000 from the 2016 Tulsa StartUp Series helped propel them to their Brookside location.

“That’s what really made a lot of this possible,” Chris said.

The Davises avoid artificial additives and partner with local businesses to source high-quality ingredients—so you can have a frozen treat 16 // FOOD & DRINK

without the added guilt. Blackberries and blueberries come from Thunderbird Berry Farm in Broken Arrow, the coffee pops’ cold brew from Tulsa’s Danger Cats Coffee, and the Pineapple Jalapeño Pop is spiced with subtle heat from another Kitchen 66 startup—Baby D’s Bee Sting hot sauce.

The brothers are also looking into a partnership with Weber’s on South Peoria Avenue to create a root beer float pop.

The stand currently sells 19 different flavors, with a rotating “pop of the week,” like the Birthday Cake Pop that debuted the week of June 19th to commemorate their first anniversary of being in business.

You can also spoil your pup with a Pupsicle, made of yogurt, honey, and blueberries. (These are fine for human consumption, too, but are shaped like dog treats.)

As the seasons change, so will their flavors and ingredients. The shack will close for winter around November, but not before offering fall flavors such as pumpkin pie, caramel apple, and s’mores. Customers can also order pops from Kitchen 66 year-round.

As the Davises look toward the future, they see possibilities for more Pop Houses in Tulsa and nearby. a

Mention @TheTulsaVoice when you post on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter with a picture of a burger from one of these establishments for a chance to win a $50 gift card.

We’ll pick a new winner every week in July.

Stay full, Tulsa.

check in at location

add location

mention restaurant

BAXTER’S INTERURBAN GRILL • A Downtwon Tulsa Tradition Since 1978! Join us for Bacon Burger Monday! $6.99 for our most popular Honey Pepper Bacon Burger with choice of side.

All day, every Monday!

717 S HOUSTON AVE • 918-585-3134 BAXTERSGRILL.COM July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

MARGARITAVILLE • From a large flowing margarita machine to our tropical atmosphere, Margaritaville is more than a restaurant; it’s a state of mind. Margaritaville has everything you need to have a good time: Multi-level venue featuring 2 bars (The Dock Bar, Salty Bar), several private dining areas (Chickee Dining, Tiki Dining), 2 levels of covered terrace dining, stilt walkers throughout the property and live music on the Main Stage and a nightly interactive Volcano Show.

8330 RIVERSIDE PKWY • 918-995-8080 MARGARITAVILLETULSA.COM

PALACE CAFÉ • The Palace burger is a generous half pound prime rib steak burger that is ground fresh in-house. It is served on a delicious house-made brioche bun dressed with fresh arugula, Fontina cheese, and onion marmalade. Paired with rosemary truffle fries, this burger is fit for a king! Also try our Turkey Burger featuring house ground turkey with apple onions and celery, chipoltle aioli and served on a brioche bun with grilled vegetables.

1301 E 15TH ST • 918-582-4321 • PALACETULSA.COM THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

POLO GRILL • It’s life changing!” are words used by a patron to describe Polo Grill’s Half-Pound Tenderloin Burger, a popular menu choice topped with grilled onions, house-made pickles, a choice of cheddar, Swiss, smoked gouda or blue cheese, and served on a Kaiser roll. A fixture in Utica Square for 34 years, Robert Merrifield’s lauded restaurant also offers a flavor-filled Texas Burger featuring chipotle aioli, smoked cheddar, fried jalapenos and onion hay. Each of the robust club burgers offers fresh ground tenderloin off-the-grill and buns toasted to perfection.

2038 UTICA SQUARE • 918-744-4280 • POLOGRILL.COM

BRICKTOWN BREWERY • As “The Oklahoma Original,” we are proud to share our passion for local beer and great food with each of our guests. Our craft beers, burgers and Twisted Comfort Foods are prepared and served with a focus on quality, flavor and portion. Truly, great food that surprises!

BROOKSIDE: 3301 S PEORIA AVE • 918-895-7878 WOODLAND: 9409 E 71ST ST • 918-994-4456 BRICKTOWNBREWERY.COM BURGIN’ OUT // 17

MCNELLIE’S • Sure our beer selection is immense, but the food’s pretty good too! McNellie’s menu is filled with fresh, reasonably priced food. Every day, our dedicated kitchen staff works hard to make a variety of items from scratch, using the best ingredients available.

Enjoy our $3.99 burgers & fries every Wednesday from 5-11pm.

DOWNTOWN: 409 E 1ST ST • 918-382-7468 • MCNELLIES.COM SOUTH: 7031 S ZURICH AVE • 918-933-5258 • MCNELLIESSOUTHCITY.COM

DILLY DINER • Downtown Tulsa’s favorite diner. Serving up breakfast all day, housemade bread, pastries, pies & cakes, homemade soft serve, house cured meats, local produce and so much more! Join us for our 1/2 price appetizers every Wednesday from 4-7pm. Open till 1am on weekends.

402 E 2ND ST • 918-938-6382 • DILLYDINER.COM 18 // BURGIN’ OUT

FASSLER HALL • Welcome to Fassler Hall Tulsa. This German gem in the heart of downtown Tulsa is known for its German beer and live entertainment.

Half price sausages every Monday, 11pm to midnight! Try the burger with smoked Gouda cheese, sauer kraut & mustard, served with fries.

304 S ELGIN AVE • 918-576-7898 • FASSLERHALL.COM

THE TAVERN • The Tavern is a modern interpretation of the classic neighborhood pub. All dishes are developed using simple preparations that showcase the quality and flavors of each ingredient on the plate. The Tavern offers a wellcurated list of artisanal beer, worldclass wine and specialty spirits.

201 N MAIN ST • 918-949-9801 • TAVERNTULSA.COM July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

As always, TTV is here to help you navigate Tulsa’s streets, scenes, people, and slang.

In this section, our focus turns to the city’s core.

BY TTV STAFF PHOTO BY DOUG SUMMERS

WORD ON THE STREET You know you’re downtown when …

“… you see someone driving the wrong way down a one-way street.”

— TARIN ROBERTS, SERVER

“ … you see a different sunset every day. When I’m driving downtown, I get a different skyline and sunset every day.”

— TIM “QUESO” HANNIS, JANITOR

“… you see food trucks parked at Guthrie Green.”

— JACINTA HARRIS, COLLEGE STUDENT

>>>

\ d a u n - ' t a u n\ ' 1. of, relating to, or located in the lower part or business center of a city 2. the lower part of a city; especially : the main business district THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

FEATURED // 19

WORD ON THE STREET

A maze of history and legend in hidden tunnels

“ … a redneck walks into Soundpony then walks out two minutes later because Lizard Police is playing.”

— GLENN HICKS, SERVER

“… my daughters always want to go to the “pink place,” Pinkitzel. They have their own corner table. When the pink bus drives by and we’re at Pinkitzel, they’re in heaven.”

— DAVE SHERRY, RETIRED TEACHER AND STAY-AT-HOME DAD

“… we see the well-preserved architecture, as well as the diversity of culture, of people and of restaurants. We can’t get it anywhere else.”

— PATRICIA FRISBEE, VOCATIONAL EVALUATOR & REAL ESTATE DEVELOPER

“… there is a line of scantily clad teens waiting for an EDM show at Cain’s.”

“… you’re surrounded by beautiful Art Deco architecture.”

— LINDSEY ROE, RESTAURANT GENERAL MANAGER

— DIXIE CARROLL AND BILL JETTE, RETAIL STORE OWNERS FROM RHODE ISLAND

Construction of downtown’s underground tunnels began in 1929 under the auspices of Waite Phillips and were originally intended to transport materials between the Philtower and Philcade Building via an 80-foot subterranean pathway beneath South Boston Avenue.

By some accounts, Phillips feared he would be targeted in a kidnaping for ransom in the 1930s and used the tunnels for safe passage between the buildings. During the Prohibition era, which continued in Oklahoma until 1959, the tunnels likely served as a thoroughfare for bootleggers.

Teri French, founder of the Paranormal Investigation Team of Tulsa, includes a passage in “Tulsa’s Haunted Memories” about two boys who claimed “the underground tunnels were the site of satanic rituals, where animal sacrifices would take place” and that “it was common to find remnants of such rituals, as well as punk and goth bands playing music there.”

Time magazine investigated in 1971: “On certain nights over the past two years, residents along a street in downtown Tulsa, Okla., have heard puzzling, ghostly wisps of guitar music floating up from beneath the pavement.”

Time discovered a group of teenagers who go underground on weekends—not for ritualistic sacrifice, but rather “to play their music, smoke, and relax.”

“We’re not disturbing anybody,” a student at Tulsa Junior College said. “We have these giant underground openings that nobody uses. It’s like something the city gave us without knowing it.”

“I do my best playing down there,” another teen said.

In total, the buried byways connect eight buildings, three parking garages, several restaurants, and a hotel. The tunnels, in combination with above-ground skyways, make it possible to walk from First and Main to Fifth and Boston without stepping on a street.

Tulsa Foundation for Architecture will lead a Tulsa Underground Tunnels tour on August 12, and Tours of Tulsa offers private tours all year long.

TO OUR CREDIT Historic tax incentive restoring downtown

“ … it’s perfectly safe to take a nap in the street.”

“… you’re doing great because the Spaghetti Warehouse has fallen.”

— VAL ESPARZA, GRAPHIC DESIGNER

— EVAN HUGHES, COMEDIAN

“… Pee Wee tries to sell you sneakers.”

“… you can find great local food.”

— MITCH GILLIAM, TTV CONTRIBUTING WRITER

— RAY LICKLATER, BARTENDER

20 // FEATURED

Oklahoma’s Historic Tax Credit program has been a behind-the-scenes superhero, helping save and repair downtown Tulsa’s buildings by matching federal tax credits for certified restoration of historic properties.

The program has benefited 77 historic buildings in the state, like the Tulsa Paper Company warehouse (now the Woody Guthrie Center), old City Hall (now Aloft hotel), Ward Building (now Sisserou’s), Mayo Hotel, among many others. Nearly a quarter of those 77 projects occurred here, with $230 million invested in Tulsa buildings through the program from 2001–2015.

Most structural revitalization projects that occurred in the last 15 years were only possible through this incentive.

A 2016 study by Tulsa Foundation of Architecture concluded that “as a fiscally responsible tax incentive … [the] program

has been remarkably successful in creating jobs, in generating tax revenues at the state and local levels, and in increasing the understanding and appreciation of the wonderful history of Oklahoma as represented in its historic buildings.”

Still, despite the progra m’s tremendous benefits to Tulsa and the state—including the creation of more than 3,000 jobs—legislature attempts to cut the program every year.

Find Tulsa Foundation of Architecture’s full study on historic tax credits at www. tulsaarchitecture.org.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY KATIE VOLAK

You know you’re downtown when …

UNDER EVERYTHING

Airlock To “airlock” someone is to kick them out of a bar or restaurant because of elevated intoxication.

ONEOK Field Baseball field between Greenwood and Brady districts, home of the Drillers. Pronounced wun-oak.

American Parking Parking enforcement akin to a bullied child devoted to petty revenge.

Poppers Slang term for the inhalable alkyl nitrates that come in small bottles and deliver a short high followed by a gross headache.

Art Deco a. Style of architecture and design that rejects historicism and bends toward the abstract with geometric patterns and stylized elegance—essentially, modernism turned into a fashion statement. b.

Symbol of the unabashed consumerism of Tulsa’s erstwhile boomtown days.

Blow the doors off To cut the sleeves off of a T-shirt. Especially popular in summer months. See also: “Summer” and “Take the top down.”

Blue Dome District Named for a disused Gulf Oil service station. Lots of bars. Roughly between Fourth Street and The Tracks, Frankfort to Cincinnati avenues.

BOK Tower A half-as-high replica of one of the original World Trade Center towers in New York. Minimalist, modernist, and designed by the same architect, Minoru Yamasaki.

Brady Arts District This district, full of bars, restaurants, hotels, museums, galleries, and music venues, has always been named for Civil War photographer M.B. Brady, who was definitely not a Klansman.

We’ve always been at war with Eastasia.

Bordered by Detroit Avenue to the east, First Street to the south, and the curve of Interstate 244 to the north and west.

Race riot Understatement of the century.

The River Short for the Arkansas River, often mistakenly considered the western border of Tulsa proper. #westsidebestside Student loans Monthly payment that makes living downtown even more unaffordable.

Center of the Universe a. Tourist attraction appealing mostly to teenagers and photographers. b. A metaphor for provincial narcissism. c. Failed Tulsa music fest.

Cherries and berries A police cruiser’s lights flashing in your rearview.

Coney A hot dog with chili, cheese, mustard, and onions. Invented by Greek immigrants in New York City, perfected by Greek immigrants in Tulsa.

Deco District The part of downtown that, if you squint just right, almost looks like a real metropolis. Approx. north-south from First to Eighth streets and east-west from Cincinnati to Denver avenues.

East Village District Fun to play and shop there, expensive to live there. Bounded east-west from US Highway 75 to Elgin, from Eighth to Third streets.

Fest Short for “festival.” Annual downtown fests include Blue Dome Arts Festival, Blue Whale Comedy Festival, Habit Mural Festival, Hop Jam, International Jazz Fest, Juneteenth, Mayfest, Tulsa Overground Music & Film Festival, Tokyo in Tulsa, and World Culture Music Festival. See also: pg. 32.

First Friday See pg. 27.

Greenwood District Historically, the 35block district that Booker T. Washington dubbed “Black Wall Street.” Greenwood District of 2017 is roughly 12 blocks, bordered

by The Tracks to the south, Detroit Avenue to the west, and the northeast curve of I-244.

Grocery store A place that is not in walking distance.

IDL Stands for “Inner-Dispersal Loop.” Refers to the 1.4-square-mile area enveloped

by Interstate 244’s, Highway 64, and Highway 75. Accessible year-round via multiple construction detours.

Juicin’ limes When you drive downtown at the magical speed (posted speed limit) that lets you hit every green light in a row.

See also: “Squeezin’ lemons.”

Kaiser a. Autocratic German emperor b.

Type of crusty round bread roll c. Everyone’s most favorite billionaire banker fixing up Tulsa.

Midtown Adult Bookstore Where Tulsans can buy pornographic novelties ironically and poppers unironically.

Summer Approx. March–October. Especially brutal on the asphalt parking lots of the concrete jungle.

Squeezin’ lemons When you speed up to make it through a yellow light.

SWERF Stands for “sex worker exclusionary radical feminist,” which is a weirdly common thing to overhear people talking about for some reason.

Take the top down To make a crewneck shirt into a V-neck shirt with scissors.

The Tracks The train tracks between Archer and First streets are more of a post-modern inconvenience than the social divide they once were. Sometimes, when you’re stopped for an especially long freight, it’s fun to fantasize about hopping on and taking off to find God, or whatever.

To avoid this existential crisis altogether, simply drive over the bridge on North Detroit Avenue or M.L.K. Jr. Boulevard.

HAVE A GLOSSARY ENTRY OF YOUR OWN? Tell us what we missed: voices@langdonpublishing.com

Downtown Tulsa in 1971 | GAYLORD OSCAR HERRON

Brunch The weekend’s most important meal, giving you the fortitude to recover from the night before and the strength to make all the same mistakes again. Popular downtown spots include Bramble, MixCo, Fassler Hall, Dilly Diner, and so, so many more.

An imperfect and incomplete downtown glossary

FEATURED // 21

WOOD FIRED CUISINE Lovers of wine and creativly constructed “Oklahoma Gaucho” cuisine.

NOW OPEN FOR LUNCH TUESDAY - SATURDAY 11am - 2:30 pm DINNER SERVICE TUESDAY - SATURDAY 4pm - 11pm 122 N Boston Ave • 918.728.2435 1 6/30/17 • amelias.us 4:11 PM

Ando _1-2Page_Tulsa Voice_July05_2017_press.pdf

Downtown Tulsa Blue Dome District 114 S. Detroit

Tenbysimmo = #MEAT If it’s not the best meat pizza you’ve ever had, I won’t charge you.

– Mike Bausch Owner, Andolini’s Pizzeria

Enough of each meat to cover the pizza on its own:

Pepperoni ............Sliced in house Genoa Salami......Sliced in house Italian Sausage ...Made in house

Pastrami................ Made in house Ground Beef......... Never frozen Canadian Bacon... Why not?

andopizza.com 22 // FEATURED

WINNER!

Chicken Pesto Pizza. Pesto @950°tastes better.

10 BUCK LUNCH Monday – Friday (Specialty pizza and salad lunch options)

Tues: DeepCuts Pint Nights; Wed: Wine & Dine Wednesdays 100% wood-fired, 100% authentic Napoletana pizza.

Carefully selected wines and beers available.

House made daily micro-batch Italian gelato. STGItalian.com July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

HANS KLEINSCHMIDT

A fellowship for teachers at 36 Degrees North hopes to spur new kinds of growth in local public schools

BY DAMION SHADE

A

daptation is more than change—it’s the mechanism by which a species becomes better suited to its environment. The 21st century is still a new environment, and the way the next generation survives is by learning ways to solve problems that their parents couldn’t even imagine. Right now, Oklahoma is in survival mode, and eerily positioned to test H.G. Wells’ axiom that “civilization is in a race between education and disaster.”

FEATURED // 23

Local educators who participated in the 2017 Teacher Innovation Fellowship, photographed at 36 Degrees North HANS KLEINSCHMIDT

There isn’t a parent in the state who hasn’t wondered what a more than $800,000,000 budget shortfall means for their kids’ futures. If there is a way out of this rapidly devolving math problem, it seems most likely to be found in small communities and local businesses and dependent on the willingness of overworked, underpaid educators to adapt. To that end—and to aid those educators—a group of Tulsa business leaders began a forward-thinking grant program earlier this year called the Teacher Innovation Fellowship, designed to bring complex business problem-solving strategies into the Oklahoma classroom.

36 Degrees North (named after Oklahoma’s line of latitude) is what’s known as a collaborative workspace, designed as a onestop basecamp for local entrepreneurs. Imagine the aesthetic of an Apple Genius Bar paired with a college campus. It’s meant to be a place where profoundly differ24 // FEATURED

ent groups of people work side by side. Group workspaces for freelance writers and software developers alongside spaces for video editors and engineers resemble the kind of venture capital incubators that are standard fare in the California tech industry.

Unassuming, bearded, brighteyed, and idealistic, Director Dustin Curzon describes 36 Degrees North like a modern brain trust designed to build profit and community all at once.

“Our mission at 36 Degrees North is really to connect entrepreneurs to a place to work, a community of passionate individuals and to the resources they need to succeed,” he said.

So, in collaboration with local leadership development fellowship The Mine, 36 Degrees North created the Teacher Innovation Fellowship, a grant program that awards money to groups of teachers who propose the most innovative solutions to Tulsa’s education problems.

“Brian Pascal. He’s the president for The Foundation for Tulsa Schools. I blame him for all this,” Curzon said. “This was his original idea. Brian told me last year that teachers had some of the best pitches that he had ever seen. They were really innovative and they weren’t asking for a lot of money, but they could do so many cool things. So that was really kind of the spark that drove us. We were looking at The United Way innovation grants.”

In March 2017, the Teacher Innovation Fellowship received nearly 100 applications. From those, the fellowship chose 15 educators, including pre-K teachers, science and math teachers, and an outdoor education and yoga specialist, and grouped them in teams of four.

In June, the diverse crews from Tulsa and Union Public Schools spent two weeks in classes at 36 Degrees North learning human-centered design, a problem solving strategy coined and de-

veloped by the global design firm IDEO—the company that designed the original Apple mouse and the modern red shopping carts at Target.

“They kind of created this human-centered design process.

One [team] may have an engineer and an attorney and a designer and a psychologist all working on the same problem. IDEO became known for putting a wide array of viewpoints on all their designs,” Curzon said.

For the two weeks, the teachers received a $1,000 stipend and spent several hours a day studying the strategy method and learning about collaborative process from Hannah Ralston, program manager of The Mine.

“Many of our fellows are Teach for America alumni, and working with the Teacher Innovation Fellowship was The Mine’s first real dive into projects in the education sector. It was a great alignment,” Ralston said. “We seek projects with a large impact on the Tulsa

community in education, public health, and economic development through social enterprise— all exciting possibilities.”

On June 29, each of the teacher teams pitched their solutions to a panel of judges.

“Each team had five to seven minutes to pitch. We had [$20,000 in] grant funding from the United Way to award money to the teams that evening. They weren’t really competing with each other for the money so much as themselves— can they come up with a compelling reason why they need that much? And the judges decided based on their presentation. We wanted them to be competitive but to know that they’re not going to walk away empty handed,” Curzon said.

Members of the teams ran the gamut from teachers who’ve been in the field for two years to others who have more than 20 years of experience. Part of the fellowship’s aim was to encourage the teams to use their group’s dynamic to help tailor and narrow their inquiry. Over the next year, 36 Degrees North will have regular check-in meetings with the teaching teams to gauge their progress.

“Part of their pitch presentation was setting a goal, [such as] by the end of the next school year we want to x. We want to have this many students go through a program, or this many classrooms pilot the program,” Curzon said. “We’ll check in with them throughout the school year to see how that’s going and ask if there’s anything we can do to help them.

The biggest measure of success for us is if these teachers feel encouraged and excited to try these ideas going into the school year.”

The process sounds esoteric, but the solutions the teachers are seeking are practical. One team, from Hamilton Elementary, sought funding for a stone meditation garden and a community garden to combat one of the surrounding area’s most basic problems: it’s a food desert. Another team pitched a teaching mentorship program to help combat Oklahoma’s epidemic of teacher

burnout and support teachers’ mental health. One group, made up of educators from three different schools, wants more parent and community engagement events with experts to discuss civic issues and encourage parents in social development and civic engagement with their neighborhoods.

“Instilling in teachers this kind of entrepreneurial, innovative thinking is going to affect students who will be the future business owners and leaders of tomorrow,” Curzon said. “We’re actively helping businesses grow, but we’re also helping Tulsa as a community become more entrepreneurial and continue to make that part of our DNA.” The goal of each of the team’s solutions—as well as the solutions hoped for by The Mine and 36 Degrees North—is to fill in the gaps. Real life problems created largely by the great recession and the current funding crisis continue to grow. Hungry kids can’t learn. Teachers with 35 children in a classroom rarely remain in education for long. Overworked, underfunded local schools with no other meaningful connection to their communities rarely help

solve any of those communities’ problems.

Think about this: the number one employment industry in Oklahoma is transportation. This means truck drivers and various transport vehicle drivers often working for oil and natural gas, the most common job in the state, could eventually be out of work.

Volkswagen and other automakers estimate the first driverless car will come to market in 2019.

Education, which can and should create new opportunities for the citizens of this state, is the only answer for such a problem. Teachers need tools and methods to equal the scale of crises seen and unforeseen.

“I’ll join the chorus of many other people in saying Tulsa’s biggest challenge is the education system, and I know the mayor’s office and the school districts are working really hard with what they have to make it work,” Curzon said, then added that the creators of the Teacher Innovation Fellowship hope to replicate it in the future.

“We want to do our part. We can’t change the whole system, but we can contribute a little bit to it.” a

FORCE MULTIPLIER Created in 2013, The Mine is a leadership development fellowship with a goal of sharpening and developing local talent working on social impact projects.

The Mine teaches human-centered design, a problem-solving technique that involves human perspective in all steps of the process. According to Director Hannah Ralston, the technique and relationships have already yielded dividends.

“The Mine partnered with the Tulsa United Way to revitalize their innovation grant process,” Ralston said. “Since 2014 we’ve awarded over $815,000 to different projects to benefit the community. That second year, we worked with Lobeck Taylor Family Foundation to create a business plan for Tulsa’s first kitchen incubator, Kitchen 66, which celebrated its first anniversary in February and has graduated 16 food businesses from its launch program.”

Ultimately The Mine wants to be a force multiplier for social good by taking a small idea and making it better and easier to replicate elsewhere.

Ralston is excited about the direction the fellowship is heading.

“We’ve increased the number of people attending social innovation workshops, with 40 individuals trained in the last month alone. We want to continue this momentum to build a culture of social innovation in Tulsa.”

One team working on their proposal ahead of the fellowship’s pitch night GREG BOLLINGER

FEATURED // 25

bookworm

Setting as character

Rilla Askew’s new collection of essays takes a hard look at home

by NATHAN KNAPP

“O

n some level I’m always writing to Oklahoma,” Rilla Askew said to me over the phone. “Who I’m thinking of is the people I come from … I’m always looking to show us to us.”

As Askew puts it in the opening essay of “Most American: Notes From a Wounded Place,” published in June this year by University of Oklahoma Press: These regions don’ t claim us, although Oklahoma borders and reflects all of them. It’s as if each region shrugs and says to itself, ‘No, it’s no part of us; it must belong to them over there.

In the book’s nine essays, Askew takes on the subject of what Oklahoma is, what it has been, what it could be—and her love of Oklahoma bears the mark of its complicated background.

She writes: Oklahomans reflect the whole of the American paradox: our selflessness and keen self-absorption, our conservatism and revolutionary impulses, our modernity and deep ingrainedness in the past. We are a generous people, compassionate, self-sacrificing, capable of great heroism, decent.

Violent. Filled with prejudice. Profoundly and pridefully independent.

Sentimental.

Although the overriding theme has to do with place, specifically this place, the book also functions as a memoir-in-essays, detailing 26 // ARTS & CULTURE

Rilla Askew will speak at Booksmart Tulsa at Central Library on July 10, 7pm. | COURTESY

Askew’s childhood in Bartlesville, a summer in her late-teens in Tahlequah, and her time in Tulsa before she left for New York to pursue acting. The book also tells the story of her return to Oklahoma, where she lived for a time in the wild, rattlesnake-infested Sans Bois Mountains near McAlester.

Askew now splits time between

Norman, where she teaches creative writing at the University of Oklahoma, and her home in the Catskill Mountains in upstate New York.

The book is about how we deal with loss, and love, and it’s also, repeatedly, about awakening to things. Nearly all of the essays turn on some awakening

of Askew’s—some kind of new profound knowledge or epiphany—that occasionally feel too easily earned.

This is exacerbated by the fact that most of the essays reference or quote—some repeatedly— from Askew’s previous novels and other writing. It’s not wrong to reference one’s own work, but the casual, repetitive way in which these essays reference her writerly past lends some of them the tone of an acceptance speech.

Still, such a talented writer with such a powerfully instinctive grasp on what Oklahoma is, in all its contradictions, is hard to come by.

Her sense of place, though a major part of what is best in this book, is not the only richness present here. Askew is at her best when she sets her own inner psychology aside and tells a story, like her retelling of the tornado that destroyed the little town of Boggy in 1945, her straightforward account of the senseless 2013 beating of her god-son’s stepfather at the hands of Brooklyn police. It’s her knack for intuitive storytelling that seems most Oklahoman of all.

She’s profoundly optimistic, but also aware of the state’s darker side, like the Tulsa race massacre and Oklahoma’s part in the genocide, displacement, and removal of Native American peoples from their lands. She doesn’t pull punches when it comes to talking about how fucked up this place can be, has been.

“What keeps you coming back here?” I asked.

“I think it’s the ineffable pull of home,” she said. a July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

artspot

Galleries galore

by TTV STAFF

Openings at this month’s First Friday Art Crawl

This July 7, Brady Arts District’s First Friday Art Crawl is exactly what you’ll need after a mid-week revel in loud fireworks, jorts, and cheap beer.

Per usual, several galleries are hosting openings, while other standbys have continuing exhibitions. Whatever art you stumble upon, thank the lucky stars you can fish in the crick one weekend, and ponder existentialism via fermenting sculptures the next.

AHHA 101 E. Archer St. Abstract Nature This exhibit features a series of works

by Blake Conroy that address his concerns regarding the environment. Conroy’s intricate nature images are made by cutting holes and forms in paper and metal.

Dermis Dermis is a series created by digital artist Waad Almujalli that examines the creation of the alter ego. Almujalli’s work is made up of computer-generated stills that explore self-discovery and the nature of emotions and how they shape her reality.

BRADY ARTISTS STUDIO 23 E. M.B. Brady St. Clay artists at Brady Artists Studio will be hosting a series of handbuilding and wheel throwing demonstrations and a pottery exhibition.

CLUB MAJESTIC 124 N. Boston Ave. Hoe You Think You Can Dance A dance competition at Brady Arts District’s favorite LGBT-friendly dance club known for their drag shows, DJs, and outdoor patio.

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

LIVING ARTS OF TULSA 307 E. M.B. Brady St. Sense-Vessel: Stimulating Porous Experience This show, featuring the work of Tim Brown and S.E. Nash, is the curatorial debut of the gallery’s new artistic director, Jessica Borusky. On opening night, Nash will make a fermented Kraut-chi in a culinary performance, and Tim Brown will give an artist talk on his sculpture and installation exploring the intersection of light and space.

Wabi Sabi Taro Takizawa’s work focuses on prints, drawings, and large-scale vinyl wall installations that recall printmaking methods with repetitive, meandering, engulfing patterns.

MAINLINE ART BAR 111 N. Main St. Revealing Patterns Artist Carrie Dickason explores color, pattern, space, and movement through abstract, meditative drawings composed of Mylar slide masking tape on vinyl and ink, tape, acrylic, and foam on paper and board.

TAC GALLERY 9 E. M.B. Brady St. Ships Passing in the Night Built loosely around the concept of missed connections, “Ships Passing in the Night” is a mixed-media art installation by Megan Mosholder that uses light, sound, and moving images to isolate the audience from one another and outside distractions.

TULSA GLASSBLOWING SCHOOL 19 E. M.B. Brady St. Glassblowing demonstration by Jon Bolivar.

ZARROW CENTER 124 E. M.B. Brady St. Stitch: Beyond Function An exhibition of artists that use stitching as a means of expression. a ARTS & CULTURE // 27

onstage

WELL-DESERVED RECOGNITION TATE revamped its process, theater community approves

by ALICIA CHESSER Philbrook Museum of Art hosted the 2017 Tulsa Awards for Theatre Excellence ceremony on June 25 | ERNESTO HERNANDEZ

A

costume designer bedecked in black with a giant red flower in her hair. A dashing teen actor with a spectacular afro. A lighting designer in jeans, who was present at the creation of the Tulsa Performing Arts Center.

Wild crew? Yeah. They’re part of the vast and varied theater community that makes an immense, and often unrecognized, contribution to Tulsa’s arts scene, its economic development, and quality of life.

These theater-makers and a strong contingent of theater-lovers got some well-deserved recognition as they packed the elegant house at Philbrook Museum of Art’s auditorium on June 25 for the 2017 Tulsa Awards for Theatre Excellence. The annual ceremony is intended by its sponsoring organization, the George Kaiser Family Foundation, to recognize, promote, and strengthen appreciation for Tulsa’s theater community (and also infuse it with some much needed cash— $22,500 of it, to be precise).

Last year’s TATE ceremony was, in the opinion of many of those in attendance, less than excellent. As I reported in the Voice last August, it provoked an outcry of dissatisfaction thanks to the antics of Gary Busey, who received a Distinguished Artist Award in embarrassingly vulgar fashion, as well as to a perceived unfairness in the distribution of the large cash awards for Outstanding Production, the top two

28 // ARTS & CULTURE

of which went to one already well-sponsored organization.

To its massive credit, GKFF took the outcry seriously and deeply revamped its judging process and event priorities under the leadership of the Tulsa Community Foundation’s Julia White and a committee of working (and vocal) theater-makers.

The big question raised after last year’s awards: how is this event actually helping Tulsa theater? Those I spoke to after this year’s ceremony thought the GKFF had gotten more than a few things right.

Andy Axewell, one of the actors honored for Outstanding Performance in a Supporting Role (for Theatre Tulsa’s “Glengarry Glen Ross”), noted how extraordinary it was to see so many people get awards. In addition to already-existing honors for acting and direction, the committee added recognitions this year in important categories like set design and decor, props, and sound.

Timothy Hunter, an actor who performed in two of the topaward-winning shows, said this year’s event highlighted the fact that Tulsa’s theater community consistently strives for excellence.

“We’re lucky to have the GKFF here to recognize and support that.”

Meghan Hurley, who starred in American Theatre Company’s “In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play),” which took top honors for Outstanding Production, agreed. “It was wonderful to see

that every show got some recognition,” she said. “We really saw the heart of the art being honored, all the pieces that go toward putting productions together.

The TATEs let us give back in a bigger way.”

“I really trust this group of judges,” said Erin Scarberry, Clark Youth Theater’s director, referring to Dr. Maria Beach, Frank Gallagher, Linda Jenkins, JoJo Nichols, Robert Odle, Billie Sue Thompson, James Watts, and Robert Young, who were required to attend every nominated show and submit extensive critical feedback about each one.

“With them you have the confidence that things turned out as they should.”

The TATE committee did away with the Distinguished Artist award this year, refocusing attention on the distinguished folks right here and featuring some of them in excerpts from the nominated shows, performed live.

The Mary Kay Place Legacy Award, presented by Theatre Tulsa’s Sara Phoenix, went to Tom Poss, Tulsa’s veteran lighting designer, whose four decades of experience include teaching in Tulsa Public Schools and working with nearly every performing arts organization in town. (He recommended a book to the audience, so I’m passing on the good word: “The Dramatic Imagination” by Robert Edmond Jones.)

American Theatre Company won the first place award for Outstanding Production for “In

the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play),” with Theatre Tulsa coming in second with “Glengarry Glen Ross” and Theatre Pops in third with “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot.” Clark Youth Theatre’s “Rumors” won Outstanding Youth Theatre Production.

The Excellence in Acting award went to Chris Williams.

Jarrod Kopp was honored with Excellence in Direction for Theatre Tulsa’s “Peter and the Starcatcher” (a production that also won for Excellence in Design and Outstanding Lighting Design

by Isaac Holton). Melissa Sparks and Grant Goodner received awards for their props and sound design for “Glengarry Glen Ross,” while Richard Ellis and Crista Patrick won for set design and costume, hair, and makeup for “In the Next Room.” The award for Outstanding Original Work went to Heller Theatre’s “The Light Fantastic or In the Wood” by David Blakely, and Sara Phoenix received a nod for Outstanding Promotion for her work with Theatre Tulsa.

And your Outstanding Performers, Tulsa? In lead roles: Jeremy Geiger, Meghan Hurley, Juliette Rose, Will Carpenter, Brian Rattlingourd, Jimmy Pike, and Lenora Martins. And in supporting roles: Sidney Flack, Pam English, Nick Cairns, Andy Axewell, Angela McLaughlin, Cornelius Johnson, Dale Sams, Freddie Tate, Kimberly Manning, Michelle Cullom, Thomas Hunt, and SynCeerae Robbins. a July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

sportsreport

Gilcrease Museum and the Henry Zarrow Center for Art and Education

Summer Art Camps 2017 June 19 through Aug. 11, 2017 9:00 a.m.-Noon & 1:00 p.m.-4:00 p.m.

5-6 years old at Gilcrease Museum 7-12 years old at Zarrow Center

Andre Owens for 3's Company and Ball Hogs’ Rasual Butler playing at Barclays in Brooklyn | COURTESY

FULL COURT PRESS

Prices per week Half-Day Classes: $100 members; $125 not-yet members All-Day Classes: $200 members; $250 not-yet members Register online at gilcrease.org/summercamp.

BOK Center to host Week 3 of BIG3

by JOHN TRANCHINA

BIG3 BASKETBALL IS COMING TO Tulsa on July 9, and, as the name suggests, it’s kind of a big deal.

In another bit of evidence proving that our city is becoming a major destination for elite-level sports, the BOK Center will host the new three-on-three professional basketball league featuring retired NBA stars as players, including 11-time NBA All-Star Allen Iverson, with Hall of Fame legends such as Julius “Dr. J” Erving, Clyde Drexler, and George Gervin as coaches.

The brainchild of rapper/actor Ice Cube, BIG3 has eight teams and started its 10-week season on June 25 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. There will be four games slated every Sunday in a different city, leading up to the playoffs on August 20 in Seattle and then the championship game on Saturday, August 26, at the new T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

The games will be televised the next night on Fox Sports 1 as a sort of a “Monday Night Basketball,” except for the final, which will be televised live on Fox. The Week 3 games at the BOK Center, which also hosted the first two rounds of the NCAA basketball tournament in March, will be the first in a city that doesn’t have an NBA team, followed by Rupp Arena in Lexington, Kentucky (home of the University of Kentucky Wildcats) in Week 7, and of course, the final two weeks in Seattle (Key Arena, former home of the Thunder) and Vegas.

In addition to getting a chance to see some former NBA stars, who, in addition to Iverson, also include guys such as Kenyon Martin, Mike Bibby, Rashard Lewis, and former Tulsa 66er THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

Rasual Butler, the three-on-three game adds some interesting wrinkles, not the least of which is the half-court format.

The teams have clever names such as 3-Headed Monsters, Killer 3s, and 3’s Company, and the action is not based on a clock. Games are played until one side reaches 60, with teams having to win by at least two points, and halftime comes when the first squad hits 30. There is a 14-second shot clock and there’s even a 4-point shot, which occurs when a player makes a basket while touching one of three small 4-point circles located a few feet beyond the 3-point arc.

One note about Iverson: the 2001 NBA MVP, now 42, is the player/coach for 3’s Company, and in his team’s 61–51 win over the Ball Hogs in Brooklyn, he put much more emphasis on his coaching role than playing, only stepping onto the floor for nine minutes.

The first-week games were entertaining, competitive, and even featured plenty of intense physical play (hand-checking is allowed) and trash-talking. The players are not treating this like a glorified All-Star tournament—they are clearly going all out and competing hard for the prize money that will be awarded to the BIG3 champions. a Big3 at BOK Center July 9, starting at 2pm: GAME 1: POWER VS. 3-HEADED MONSTERS GAME 2: KILLER 3S VS. TRI-STATE GAME 3: BALL HOGS VS. GHOST BALLERS GAME 4: TRILOGY VS. 3’S COMPANY

TICKETS AVAILABLE AT WWW.BOKCENTER.COM

TU is an EEO/AA Institution.

GILCREASE.ORG

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL 2017 TATE WINNERS: WINNER: In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), American Theatre Company 1ST RUNNER-UP: The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, Theatre Pops 2ND RUNNER-UP: Glengarry Glen Ross, Theatre Tulsa OUTSTANDING YOUTH PRODUCTION: Rumors, Clark Youth Theatre

SUPPORT LOCAL THEATRE! VISIT WWW.TATEAWARDS.ORG. ARTS & CULTURE // 29

thehaps

BOOKSMART

COMEDY

Sherman Alexie, the National Book Award-winning author of “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian” reads from his moving new memoir “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me.” Jul. 6, 7pm, All Souls Unitarian Church, booksmarttulsa.com

“The Daily Show” host Trevor Noah will perform at River Spirit Casino’s Paradise Cove. Jul. 14, 8pm, $55–$65, riverspirittulsa.com

50TH ANNIVERSARY

POETRY

Celebrate Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band at With a Little Help: Maud Squad Reimagines Sgt. Pepper. The jazz trio will perform the album (and other Beatles songs) with guests. Jul. 7, $7, 8:30 & 11pm, Fassler Hall, facebook.com/maudsquadtulsa

Poets and rappers go head-to-head for cash prizes in Poets vs. Rappers: The Trilogy at Living Arts.

Jul. 14, 8pm, $10–$12, livingarts.org

GAME DAY

COSPLAY

Try one of over 100 games or enter the Klask tournament at Boardgame Brunch at Fassler Hall.

Jul. 8, noon–5pm, facebook.com/shufflestulsa

Oklahoma’s largest convention for Japanese and pop culture, Tokyo in Tulsa, returns to Cox Convention Center. Jul. 14–16, $65, tokyointulsa.com

BASKETBALL

THEATRE

Ice Cube’s three-on-three basketball league BIG3 comes to the BOK Center with teams consisting of former NBA players like Allen Iverson, Rashard Lewis, and Chauncey Billups. Jul. 9, 2–10pm, $20–$175, big3.com

The Tony Award-winner for Best Musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda, “In the Heights.” tells of the struggles and triumphs of a tight-knit community in Manhattan’s Washington Heights. Jul. 14–16, $20–$22, Tulsa PAC, tulsapac.com

MUSIC FESTIVAL

CONVENTION

Woody Guthrie Folk Festival returns to Guthrie’s hometown of Okemah, with performances from Arlo and Sarah Lee Guthrie, John Fullbright, Chris Blevins, Desi and Cody, and many more. Jul. 12–16, $40–$75, woodyfest.com

Find a crate-digger’s dream at the Route 66 Record Convention at Mammoth Comics, which will feature several vendors of vinyl, comic books, and more. Jul. 15, 10am–4pm, mammothcomics.com

FOOD FESTIVAL

FLEA MARKET

Head 40 minutes southeast of Tulsa to the 51st Annual Porter Peach Festival for live music, The Porter Peach Pageant, games and activities, and free peaches and ice cream. Jul. 13–15, Downtown Porter and Livesay Orchards, porterpeachfestivals.com

Tulsa Oddities and Curiosities Expo, features weird taxidermy, wet specimens, antiques, odd jewelry, unusual art, and all things creepy, strange, and bizarre. Jul. 15, noon–5pm, $5, American Legion Post 1, facebook.com/tulsapunkrockfleamarket

For the most up-to-date listings

thetulsavoice.com/calendar 30 // ARTS & CULTURE

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

thehaps

BEST OF THE REST EVENTS Poetry in Motion: An Evening with Elise Paschen // Elise Paschen is editor of the best-selling anthology “Poetry Speaks to Children,” served as Executive Director of the Poetry Society of America from 1988 to 2001, and is co-founder of Poetry in Motion, a nation-wide program that places poetry posters in subways and buses. // 7/5, Tulsa Ballet, booksmarttulsa.com Tulsa Cowgirls // Oklahomans for Equality host an exhibit of works

by Sandi Willhite. // 7/6-7/31, Dennis R. Neill Equality Center, okeq.org Route 66 Shandy Shin Dig // Try some unique shandies made with Foolish Things’ house lemonade and American Solera beers. // 7/6, Foolish Things Coffee Company, foolishthingscoffee.com Movie in the Park: Creed // 7/6, Guthrie Green, guthriegreen.com Pup Party in the Park // Socialize with your four-legged friend and other dogs at this fundraiser for Puppy Haven Rescue. // 7/8, Wade Whiteside Community Center and Park, puppyhavenrescue.com Watching Their Dance: Three Sisters, A Genetic Disease and Marrying into a Family at Risk for Huntington’s // Therese Crutcher-Marin discuses her new memoir. // 7/8, Woody Guthrie Center, woodyguthriecenter.org Bring Your Own Pool Party // Bring a kiddie pool to fill up and cool off at Fuel 66. There will be a crawfish boil and a dunk tank for any to try. // 7/8-7/9, Fuel 66, fuel66ok.com Tulsa Our City // Legacy Creative presents this original piece that looks at Tulsa’s turbulent past and hopeful future through live music and dance. // 7/8, Guthrie Green, guthriegreen.com Motorcycle Swap Meet // Meet with bike enthusiasts and swap parts for cash. // 7/9, Admiral Twin Drive-In, jwswapmeet.com/ Admiraltwin.html

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

Riverwalk Movie Night: Finding Dory // 7/10, Riverwalk Crossing, riverwalktulsa.com Rilla Askew: Notes From a Wounded Place // In her first nonfiction collection, award-winning novelist Rilla Askew casts an unflinching eye on American history. Traversing a line between memoir and social commentary, Askew places herself and all Americans in the role of witness to uncomfortable truths about who we are. // 7/10, Central Library, booksmarttulsa.com

Annie Jr. // Theatre Tulsa’s Broadway Beginners perform this pint-sized version of the musical classic. // 7/13-7/16, Tulsa Performing Arts Center - John H. Williams Theatre, tulsapac.com/index.asp Midwest Harp Festival Concert Series // Festival faculty perform 7/17, Solo Competition winners perform 7/18, Erin Hill performs 7/20, and Combined Harp Ensembles perform 7/22. // 7/177/22, Lorton Performance Center, midwestharpfestival.org/concerts

Mystery & Murder: Julia Thomas Book Launch // Julia Thomas celebrates the release of her new murder mystery, “Penhale Wood.” // 7/12, Mainline Art & Cocktails, booksmarttulsa.com

Rose Rock Opera Institute: Food, Song, and Wine! // 7/8, Naples Flatbread, roserockoperainstitute.com

Movie in the Park: Zootopia // 7/13, Guthrie Green, guthriegreen.com

Improv Pop // 7/6, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com

Ok, So...Story Slam: Detours // Tulsans tell true stories based on a given theme for cash prizes. // 7/13, IDL Ballroom, idlballroom.com

The Game Rift // 7/7, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com

An Affair of the Heart // Green Country’s largest handmade, boutique, and gourmet market. // 7/14-7/16, Expo Square - River Spirit Expo, heartoftulsa.com 2nd Annual Summer Tiki Party // Celebrate summer with the sweet nectar of the Tiki gods. // 7/15, George’s Pub, georgespubs.com Woody Guthrie Poets // As part of the Woody Guthrie Folk Festival, WGP read selections at the WGC. // 7/16, Woody Guthrie Center, woodyguthriecenter.org

PERFORMING ARTS Rose Rock Opera Institute: An Evening of Scenes and Arias // Aspiring young singers from around the country perform in this capstone to Rose Rock’s three-week operatic training intensive. // 7/14, Fly Loft, roserockoperainstitute.com Little Big Shots // A talent show for kids ages 14 and younger hosted by comedian Velly Vel. // 7/16, Greenwood Cultural Center, greenwoodculturalcenter.com

COMEDY

Army of Stand Ups // 7/8, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com wellRED Comedy Tour w/ Trae Crowder, Drew Morgan, Corey Ryan Forrester // 7/8, Cain’s Ballroom, cainsballroom.com Sunday Night Stand Up // 7/9, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com DEAFinitely Funny: A night of deaf-accessible comedy // 7/9, Loony Bin, loonybincomedy.com/Tulsa The Gauntlet w/ Heather Mackay, Austin Bryant, T.J. Clark, Ryan Green, Thomas King, Ronel Williams, Patrick Moody, Nick Birkitt, Hannah Marrs, Micah Medina // 7/11, The Blackbird on Pearl, facebook.com/ Blackbirdtulsa

Josh Phillips // 7/12-7/15, Loony Bin, loonybincomedy.com/Tulsa Comfort Creatures // 7/14-7/15, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com Mike Merryfield // 7/5-7/8, Loony Bin, loonybincomedy.com/Tulsa T-Town Famous // 7/7-7/21, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com

SPORTS Tulsa Drillers vs Frisco RoughRiders // 7/5, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index Tulsa Drillers vs Frisco RoughRiders // 7/6, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index The First Mile // Kick off training season for Tulsa’s iconic fall runs, Route 66 Marathon and Tulsa Run. // 7/6, Fleet Feet Sports, fleetfeettulsa.com Tulsa Drillers vs Frisco RoughRiders // 7/7, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index Tulsa Athletic vs Little Rock Rangers // 7/8, Memorial High School Lafortune Stadium, memorial.tulsa. schooldesk.net Tulsa Drillers vs Midland RockHounds // 7/8, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index Diva Dash 5K // 7/8, BOK Center, divadash5k.com Tulsa Drillers vs Midland RockHounds // 7/9, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index Tulsa Drillers vs Midland RockHounds // 7/10, ONEOK Field

The Game Rift // 7/14, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com

Blacklight Run // 7/15, Tulsa Raceway Park, blacklightrun.com

Laughing Matter Improv // 7/15, pH Community House, facebook.com/ LaughingMatterImprov

Tulsa Drillers vs Arkansas Travelers // 7/16, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index

Sherry Johnson // 7/16, The Blackbird on Pearl, facebook.com/Blackbirdtulsa

Tulsa Drillers vs Arkansas Travelers // 7/17, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index

Sunday Night Stand Up // 7/16, Comedy Parlor, comedyparlor.com

Tulsa Drillers vs Arkansas Travelers // 7/18, ONEOK Field, milb.com/schedule/index ARTS & CULTURE // 31

Tea Rush, musician, rapper, and festival organizer—Rush Fest will be at The Fur Shop on July 15.

GREG BOLLINGER

musicnotes

S

RUSH TO THE ISLAND A new summer music festival comes to downtown

by EDDIE WASHINGTON

32 // MUSIC

ongstress TaNesha Rushing, aka Tea Rush, is just one emerging artist among many in Tulsa trying to separate herself from the crowd. To that end, she’s created Rush Fest, an island-themed festival with an indoor and outdoor stage featuring more than 30 artists and musicians, including Miko The Artist, Trillary, Pade, J-Friday, Keeng Cut, and Miss Val, on July 15 at The Fur Shop.

“Rush Fest Island Summer 2017 is definitely going to be lit—a lot of love and a lot of talent—and I’m very appreciative to the people who have allowed me to be in their lives, and vice versa.

I’m excited about it,” Rush said.

“I just wanted to unite everybody that I’ve grown to know … and some of the people I am collaborating with on my new songs for the summer, along with other people that I’ve taken a liking to throughout this year, learning new artists and being in this new realm of people in art,” Rush said.

Tea Rush grew up with a musical family, with her father, Tulsa musician Charles Rushing, being one of her biggest influences.

Rushing was a blues musician who played the guitar.

“He had a band called the Soul Brothers, and he had a lot of live practices at the house, and he played a lot of instruments.” she said.

Rush first made a name for herself locally by writing hooks and rapping.

“When I first met her, almost a decade ago, she was extremely shy,” said Matt Le-On, a producer and conscious rap artist. “[Matt Le-On] was like this Afro-centric, peaceful type of artist,” she said. “His style introduced me to another part of music. I liked this, so I get to be more about the kings and queens and the earth and life.”

A regular performer at The Situation, Rush used the open mic to help shake off her jitters before performing at J Parlé, a literary

magazine, which hosts a monthly platform for artists to showcase their work.

“To see her holding down the scene and improving the music culture is a quantum leap from Ms. Anonymous to Tea Rush,” Le-On said.

In October 2016, she released her debut album, All of Me—a blend of R&B and hip-hop. Its opening and closing tracks showcase her soulful, melodic voice, while in between her versatility is obvious in her sleek and groovy rap style. The album also features Mr. Burns, aka Earl Hazard, and Steph Simon.

“When I first met her, she was so shy that we had to leave the studio in order for her to record,” Simon said. “I have enjoyed watching Tea grow as an artist,” After releasing her album, she performed in live shows with Simon and Marcus James and hosted her own live performance of All of Me. Most recently, Rush performed at Juneteenth.

Though her namesake, Rush Fest was created just as much to promote other artists as her own music.

“Expect a good time.” Rush said. “… Expect to see unity amongst different cultures, and just Tulsa coming together as a music realm.

“It will be fun, love, and a very inviting environment. No one treats anyone like a stranger in that group of people and you can learn about the types of music going on in the town, from new artists to artists who have been here—and the connection and the vibe we all have together.” a

RUSH FEST The Fur Shop | 520 E. 3rd St. Sat., 7/15, 6pm ‘til last call Tickets are $10 in advance, $15 at the door, and VIP tickets are $45. Call 918607-2228 or 918-892-7954 for more ticket information. Must be 21+ to attend.

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

TRANSITIONING IN TULSA

BY SARAH SZABO

“THEY’RE GONNA LIKE YOU IN THERE.” Handcuffed and helpless, you stand still, and stay silent. There’s no need to ask what the officer means, and he doesn’t feel the need to explain. This is a familiar line from movies. This is something that sounds like it makes sense.

Here’s what it feels like: tunnel vision. Time loses meaning. An earthquake in your chest and, just beneath it, your frozen heart. The skin goes cold, but your mind goes hot with alarm. The teeth grit, the jaw sets. This is a fear response—fear, and a sense of resignation.

The officer asks you, “Is that your real hair?” You keep your mouth shut. Thankfully, he doesn’t try to find out. Of course it’s your real hair, long and slightly tangled at the night’s end, sprouting straight out from your scalp, the hair you’ve had since the day you were born.

At the police station, two medical technicians take blood from your arm. Later you will see the paperwork where they crossed out their initial guess of “F” on the box beside “Gender” and specified that you are, in fact, a man.

They don’t treat you like a man, though. They treat you like a liar. You said you were a woman, and you lied.

Why would you do this, they wonder. Why on earth would you choose to do this?

That’s a good question, but the wrong approach.

Viewed another way, the answer is pretty simple—it was never a choice at all.

(Left) Gibby, from Pawnee, Oklahoma, looks out over Oceti Sakowin camp at Standing Rock at dusk. He has camped there for nearly two and a half months. (Above) Campers sit on “Facebook Hill,” one of the few spots in Oceti Sakowin one can receive cell service.

Mni Wiconi D I S PAT C H F R O M S TA N D I N G R O C K

BY LIZ BLOOD PHOTOS BY JOSEPH RUSHMORE

I cut northwest through the flat farmland of South Dakota, past small tractor dealerships and gleaming silver grain silos.

Grass and wheat fields slowly gave way to velvety golden hills, dappled by royal blue lakes. Soon, the Missouri River appeared—a rich azure snaking through the land, flowing south toward the Mississippi River on its way to the Gulf of Mexico.

An hour north, thousands have gathered at Standing Rock Sioux Indian Reservation—my destination—over the last several months to protect the river, protesting construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL).

Oceti Sakowin (pronounced oh-chet-ee sack-oh-ween), meaning “Seven Council Fires,” is the main camp of the Standing Rock protests. Citizens from between 200 and 500 Indian nations have set up camp at Oceti Sakowin this year; flags from the nations whipped in the wind on poles lining Crazy Horse Avenue, the camp’s main artery.

The pipeline, owned by Energy Transfer Partners—a division of the same company that almost bought Tulsa’s Williams Companies before the price of oil plummeted— has a proposed route from the Bakken and Three Forks crude oil production areas in North Dakota 1,172 miles to Patoka, Illinois. If completed, it will carry 470,000570,000 barrels (19-23 million gallons) per day.

Direct protest efforts began this past March and have ramped up in recent months. Camps on the Sioux reservation and surrounding federal land were

as small as a few people, to start, and have grown to populations of over 9,000, according to Kalyn Free, an Choctaw citizen and environmental and Indian lawyer in Tulsa who visited Standing Rock in October.

The Standing Rock Sioux tribe and tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of other Native Americans, indigenous people from around the world, and non-native allies, see DAPL as an immediate threat to farming and drinking water, ecosystems, wildlife and food sources surrounding the Missouri River and its tributaries.

On November 4, the Army Corps of Engineers asked that DAPL halt its construction. Rumors of a 30-day pause in construction as a result of negotiations between the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the Corps circulated Oceti Sakowin camp. The Corps, however, said it was only a proposal.

At present, Energy Transfer Partners is in the process of constructing the drill pad for drilling underneath Lake Oahe, but has not yet received the easement from the Corps. The drill has been delivered.

“This Bakken pipeline is no different than the Keystone XL pipeline,” said Dallas Goldtooth, organizer for the Indigenous Environmental Network’s Keep It in the Ground campaign. “It threatens the sacred waters of the Missouri, it threatens the very sensitive waters of the Ogallala Aquifer … it is attempting to lock our country into more fossil fuel dependency … We must keep this oil in the ground for the benefit of all future generations.”

The current camp exists on federal land that was originally promised to the Sioux under the 1851 Treaty of Fort Laramie.

“Honor the treaties” and “Mni Wiconi” (“water is life”) are common rallying cries.

By now, millions of people connected via Facebook have seen pictures and video of Native and non-Native protesters (who call themselves water protectors) at Standing Rock clashing with police and DAPL security. Frequently, these posts use the hashtags #noDAPL or #standingrock.

Many of the images are disturbing— showing nonviolent protesters being beaten with batons, shot at with rubber bullets, attacked by dogs, faced with Humvees and long range acoustic devices (LRADs), and tear gassed and maced by heavily-armed officers wearing riot gear and gas masks.

The press has been slow to catch up, though smaller reporting outfits like Unicorn Riot and Eco Watch have been keeping close tabs for months. In the wake of several mass arrests (including the arrest of 141 protesters on October 28) and a surge in police presence, national media coverage has increased.

As I entered the camp early in the afternoon on November 3, I steeled myself for what I imagined would be daily, violent clashes between protesters and police.

What I found was different.

roads are dirt and camp floors for the most part are tamped-down fields.

Soon after arriving, I participated in a direct action training, during which newbies were given the rundown on camp operations.

“How many of you are from the northwest?” the trainer asked the group—about 80 people clustered in a small wooden building. A few people raised their hands.

“Ok, how many of you are from the east coast?” More hands. “Alright, how many of you are police officers?”

The group laughed.

He took us through the camp’s direct action principles:

I WAS BORN IN TULSA at Hillcrest Medical Center on July 16, 1990. But if you were to go looking, you would find no record of the birth of Sarah Szabo. There was no Sarah Szabo then—just a young, transgender baby, born a boy to loving parents.

Transgender people are often met with the question of self-awareness—“when did you know?” And the answer tends to be, “I always knew.” It’s not that I knew that I was transgender, not necessarily. But I knew and could feel, from my earliest memories, that something was wrong. I grew from a young boy to a young man, all the while trying to learn the sorts of things that boys, men, are supposed to do, the kind of people they’re supposed to be. I learned from my mistakes. During a second grade discussion on fashion in history, I mentioned to the class that I’d always wanted to wear a tunic—you know, like Link, the Hero of Time from the Legend of Zelda. He’s a boy. He wears a tunic. And the class laughed at me. The realization stung acutely. Maybe boys don’t dress like that, so why did I want to?

We are protectors, not protesters.

We are peaceful and prayerful.

Isms have no place here.

We are nonviolent.

Respect locals.

No weapons, or what could be considered a weapon.

Property damage doesn’t get us closer to the goal.

All campers must get orientation.

Direct action training for all who want to be in action.

No children in potentially dangerous situations.

We keep each other accountable.

This is a ceremony, act accordingly.

Oceti Sakowin is nestled beneath Highway 1806, and flanked by Missouri River tributaries and hilly fields of long grass. Its

Oceti Sakowin is a place of prayer and ceremony. Its residents are asked to practice

“The culture has acknowledged we exist, but now we are finally being seen—not as villains, victims, or punchlines, but as people.”

I moved through adolescence feeling very out-ofstep. My long hair, tight jeans, pink shoes. My fashion sense in old pictures is hopeless, stuck between worlds, fueled by a lack of commitment.

I wanted it to go away, but by the time I reached high school, the truth grew clearer and clearer. By the time I got to college, the choice was undeniable—live as I really am, or die right now. I chose to live.

It was the last week of December 2008 when I decided, terrified, to announce to my family that I was about to commit to the boldest New Year’s resolution.

I told them one by one over the course of a daylong emotional ultramarathon. By the time the sun went down, I was out of tears to cry. I remember the tension in the laundry room, where I cornered my mother while she folded towels, wringing my hands, saying, “I have to tell you something,” and taking thirty seconds to speak again. Mom was so scared. “Please,” she said, “Spit it out.” So I did.

I remember the way my little brother crumpled in the hall, unable to comprehend it all at once. The way my dad laughed as he heard the news, a gregarious guffaw, reveling in the novelty of the world, as far from mean-spirited as could be. My sister, 9 years old, had only one question, the first words out of her mouth: “So, I’m going to have a big sister?” Then she smiled the kind of smile that makes you feel like your heart is going to explode.

The family followed her lead. They circled the wagons, drawing lines in the sand against extended family

that was sometimes less than kind. My grandpa’s first instinct was to protect me—“We don’t need to tell anyone this.” That was the most startling; the family patriarch had a vision of his whole family versus me—and he chose me.

I am still repaying my debts to my family, who all deserve the world and more. But at the same time I am alone, trawling America, trying to figure out the world while avoiding the stares from people who are apprehensively trying to figure out me. “What is that?” they wonder. “Is that a man or a woman? Ma’am? Sir?” The scrutiny can take a lot of shapes, and change rapidly—confusion to amusement, antagonism, rudeness, wrath. How do I make the people in charge—the normal people—feel more comfortable with me? This is an ugly feeling, one that leaves me constantly experiencing the world with one eye turned slightly inward, perpetually lazy to the beauty of life, always busy battling fear.

The fear is all encompassing, and not unfounded.

Assault, rape, vicious murder. The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs has on record 18 homicides in 2013, 20 homicides in 2014, and according to the Human Rights Campaign, 21 last year, at least. Trans people are killed angrily; they’re often torn to pieces.

Like Yaz’min Shancez, whose body was found smoldering, in pieces, set on fire, next to the trash.

HONESTLY, YOU CAN’T REMEMBER which one of your captors implied to your face that you would be raped in the Osage County Jail. Even at the moment when he says it, you don’t really hear him—but for your captive body, you are somewhere far away, utterly dissociated. It’s the only way that you can bear the treatment, or the stares. You notice the uncomprehending silence from other inmates before you’re processed and locked into solitary confinement. On the door they write, “KEEP ISOLATED.” As your numbness begins to dissipate, you think to yourself with the darkest gallows humor that it’s kind of funny the only place here where you’re apparently safe from sexual assault is an isolation cell nicknamed “the hole.”

All this for the contents of a pipe. You knew the law—that part’s your fault. But you only thought you knew the punishment.

They forget to offer you a shower, but they do provide you with half-doses of your medication, the label of which they evidently didn’t correctly read. An officer whose face you cannot see walks by your cell and asks about the condition of “that thing in there,” and you know he’s talking about you.

PHOTOS BY MELISSA LUKENBAUGH // DRESS FROM LITTLE BLACK DRESS // MAKE-UP BY RANDI THOMPSON // WARDROBE STYLING BY STACY SUVINO

FEATURED // 23

26 // FEATURED

March 2 – 15, 2016 // THE TULSA VOICE

THE TULSA VOICE // March 2 – 15, 2016

FEATURED // 27

THE STATE WE’RE IN

O C T. 5 - 1 8 , 2 0 1 6 // V O L . 3 N O . 2 0

OKLAHOMA’S FRACTURED NARRATIVE

BY BARRY FRIEDMAN

14 // NEWS & COMMENTARY

We cozied into the booth next to each other, not across from each other the way the table was set. It took a minute to rearrange things. When the waitress appeared, I was still sorting forks and stems.

“Welcome to the lounge,” she said, setting two menus in front of us before pitching the fish of the day. “I’ll be back with a wine list, but if you’d like, we also offer a martini cart.”

“Excellent,” I said.

“I’ll send it right over,” she said, and did.

“Vodka or gin?” the cartender asked. There was a bottle of each next to little bowls of olives and lemons. Toulouse-Lautrec would have painted him.

Gin, of course. The lounge house martini balances Martin Miller’s London Dry with a splash of Dolin vermouth. They sang harmony. I slipped the lip of the glass over my own.

“We should do our 25th here,” I said, snapping a tip off a garlic breadstick. She was navigating the wine list by votive.

“Is that soon?” she said, squinting. “No.” “I’m just saying, if it makes it.”

“Make it? To our 25th!”

“Not us. This.”

The light of a dozen spiny chandeliers was absorbed in a library’s worth of mahogany wood and beveled glass. Bartenders in suspenders moved briskly past servers replenishing serviettes, as if choreographed to the soft drum-and-bass.

Tucked in an alley somewhere inside the IDL, the lounge has no official name, address or signage—just an unassuming copper bull hanging over an anonymous door. A phone number hides in some not-too-distant corner of the Internet, but you have to want to find it. It all reminded me of somewhere, a dining room in another city, or a film, maybe even a book.

I can picture Graham Greene’s Maurice Bendrix having his own booth here, plying Sarah Miles.

“Maybe the Atlantic Sea Grill,” I said.

“Yeah, kinda,” she said.

Maybe. Say, if the Atlantic Sea Grill grew a pair.

The Starters

I never open a menu before a drink. It’s a curse. Once the genie is out of the bottle, the pressure of wishes takes over. But my martini had run dry.

A menu should read like a table of contents, not an index. The lounge’s menu offers three starters, 20 // FEATURED

a couple of salads, three entrees, four sides, and not a chicken in sight. First things first.

“Give us a slice of the bacon,” I said. “And the escargots. And the wedge.”

Escargots are funny. These dozen were farmraised. Found in the wild, they must be purged.

“I have done this,” wrote London chef Fergus Henderson, “though it is quite emotional.” He then describes a time in the Hebrides when his party imprisoned several snails, starving them and biding time. “Days seemed to pass watching the poor captive snails leaving trails of snail poo on the sides of the bucket.”

Would you eat snails? Maybe that’s why they float them in what’s called “snail butter.”

The wedge is my dad’s salad from my youth.

While I zigzagged from the tang of so-called “Italian” to the sugary “French,” he stuck with Roquefort. I went there, eons later, to the cave in France where big wheels of the stuff grow mold, to impress him. He was more about the dressing.

The wedge salad thrives on the creamy, nutty Maytag blue developed at Iowa State University almost 60 years ago. Here, it coats threadbare slices of red onion and halved cherry tomatoes that are more blueberry in size. The chunk of iceberg—a far cry from its torn-leaf, limp-biscuit self—is cold enough to bite back.

The $4 bacon—a meaty strip from the back, not the belly—arrived on a plate scorching to the touch, the salad on one equally frigid. What a touch! The world has become so lukewarm.

Only in a morgue should you lay a piece of meat on a cold slab.

“What’s that music?” I asked, raking the bacon through the tomato dipping sauce with a zing of horseradish. Anymore, it’s such a dumb question.

“I’m not sure,” said our host. “It’s Pandora, based on Thievery Corporation.”

He found the band on Shazam, some name we both immediately forgot. He shouldn’t have bothered, but he did.

To eat snails you brace the shell with a tight set of tongs—scalloped on the ends, like forceps—and retrieve the snail with a tiny fork.

The tongs are tricky, and I kept spraying snail butter across the tablecloth. Good thing I don’t deliver babies.

“Wow,” she said, chasing a bite of bacon with a sip of Decero Malbec.

I ordered a Bonny Doon Syrah and opened the meatier portion of the night’s program.

The Sides

If ever I’m wandering in the desert and manna falls from the sky, I hope it’s potatoes Egan.

Not a staggering plate of pommes frites, but a half-dozen Russet wedges nestled in a chafing dish.

David Egan, manager of operations at the Cattlemen’s Café in Stockyards City, inspired this dish. Some men get bridges, others office complexes, but Egan’s name is etched in a potato dish for the ages. Crunchy outside, creamy within and born for the butter that baptizes it.

Cheese—a generous grating of Grana Padano, less known but older than its Parma cousin, created 900 years ago by Cistercian monks—and a sprinkling of lemon zest completes the rapture.

Creamed spinach: soothing and mineral— another good marriage. I can’t eat steak with-

June 15 – July 5, 2016The // host THE TULSA VOICE tipped the dish that corralled

Tucked in an alley somewhere inside the IDL, the Lounge has no official name, address or signage—just an unassuming copper bull hanging over an anonymous door.

A phone number hides in some not-too-distant corner of the Internet, but you have to want to find it.

out it. I could, but I’d feel hollow. Like pouring milk over your granola from one of the cartons with missing persons on it.

The sides, however delicious, must now take a backseat. You can’t put a bull on your menu, hell, over your door—the stocky sort of breed you see chasing the guys in white up the side streets of Pamplona—and not be about steak.

Ours was still cooking when I felt the shift: the lounge had become less of a restaurant and more of a bar. They offer two dinner services— an early one that starts at 6 and late-ish one at 8—so at not quite 9:30 this atmospheric change came as a bit of a surprise.

I found myself staring at a piece of art on the far wall, an abstract of metal shapes against a salmon-pink background, a delicate light framed in dark wood. Then I realized I was looking out a window, into the adjacent alley, at a collection of conduit.

“Could I get a glass of the Stepping Stone?”

I asked, taking a tasty step up from the Bonny Doon. Out of the corner of my eye, the bull was charging.

The Meat

There’s a filet on the menu. And, in a throwback worthy of Barry’s wishbone, a market fish choice. That night it was a tower of shellfish on ice, the sort that put Balthazar on the map. I’d never dream of ordering it but respect why it’s there. Restaurant fish being the flown-in sort, it had all but vanished from the local tables of the day. To see it back in full regalia felt like Napoleon riding side-saddle up the Champs Elysees.

Clearly, I’d drunk the Kool-Aid, and the Syrah. I had the bull by the horns. Or it had me by the britches. I’d made up my mind what to eat weeks ago. It was predestined, inevitable.

The Lounge Table Steak is a prime Porterhouse, $43 a person, served in slices a la Peter Luger. The price per person stays the same, but the cut grows thicker as the size of the party increases. (Our steak for two was 1¾-inches thick. One that serves a party of five climbs to 2½ inches.)

THE TULSA VOICE // February 17 – March 1, 2016

it onto a bread plate, at a tilt. “Slice of tenderloin for the lady,” he said, forking a morsel, “slice of strip for the gentleman. And some vitamins.”

He spooned onto our plates a bit of the blood and clarified butter that pooled at the end of the dish.

“Enjoy. I’ll be back in a few bites.”

Enjoy. A rage pumped inside me, a primal urge. If a doe had pranced by I’d have tackled her. The meat was on the rare side of the medium-rare she’d ordered. It melted on the tongue in the sublime way of sashimi. The seasoning was notable in its strength and simplicity: an occasional but satisfying show of salt. The size was colossal. We’d make tacos with most of it come Tuesday. Out of nowhere, the door opened, letting in a reviving blast of cool air. My wife shivered.

“When there’s a big snowstorm in New York,” she said, “do you think the restaurants just don’t open?”

“If the trains run, I guess,” I said. Hell or high water, can they afford not to?

Under a glass, on a coaster, another golden bull, the adoration of Aaron in Exodus. What better way to ride out the shrinking price of oil than on a tidal wave of animal fat? What better emblem to paw and stomp in the face of a downturn?

But they rein it in. In spite of all the bull, the service is discreet. The staff glides around confidently, in control, and nobody said farmto-table once. I ate a similar menu several years ago at Keen’s, the old Herald Square chophouse. The lounge’s is bolder, and better. It’s not resting on anything, like laurels.

“You finish this,” she said, nudging half a glass of Katherine Goldschmidt cabernet across the crisp, shirt-like tablecloth. I stabbed another piece of beef, my last, and swirled the cab in the glass. Chewed, swallowed. Drank, swallowed.

“You having fun?” we said together. Jinks.

The End

The cake—the only dessert on the menu— needs a tale of the tape: “Weighing in at 3 and quarter pounds and standing 12 inches tall …”

It’s got a steak knife stuck in it, as if a toreador had just buried the blade. Six layers of crumb, six of chocolate buttercream, it rises off the plate like the Flatiron Building off Fifth Avenue. We went at it vertically, forking a point off the corner. Half the bar had turned to regard the spectacle. They cheered us on, but we could go no further. My head spinning, I sought comfort in our surroundings. The chatter of other tables, the darkness of lacquered wood. Couples strolled by sporting a mishmash of finery.

We’d eaten cake and that called for a digestif. A meal should cascade, like a mountain freshet into a deep pool. After some confusion we’ll just call Scottish, the server brought a 10-year-old Talisker in a cut-glass tumbler.

I sipped and the whiskey settled me. “Come here. This is a very good malt whiskey. Go ahead, it’ll settle your stomach.” Dustin Hoffman doing Dutch Schultz in Billy Bathgate.

“What’s wrong?” my wife asked. I’d gone silent.

“Nothing,” I said, with a twist of a smile. a FEATURED // 21

2017 First Place Awards: (shown above)

// Best Feature Writing: Liz Blood - Mni Wiconi // Best Page One Layout: Madeline Crawford - New American Cinema // Best Spot Photography: Joseph Rushmore - Am I Next // Best Graphic Illustration: Pearl Rachinsky - Farewell, Leon // Great Plains Awards Best Web Page Design, Single Page // Best Diversity Coverage: Sarah Szabo - As I am: Transitioning in Tulsa // Best Editorial Commentary: Barry Friedman - The State We’re In // Best Leisure Writing: Mark Brown - Finding the Bull //

THE VOICE IS PSYCHED! THE TULSA VOICE received seven FIRST PLACE AWARDS and three SECOND PLACE AWARDS in late April in the 2017 Oklahoma Society of Professional Journalists Awards. TheTulsaVoice.com received the “Best Web Page Design, Single Page” award in the 2017 Great Plains Awards, a regional contest sponsored by The Tulsa Press Club. The Art Directors Club also honored the Tulsa Voice with two Graphex awards. These honors add up to 25 total awards for journalistic and artistic excellence for the Tulsa Voice in the past 2 years!

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

Additional Honors: SPJ Awards: Page One Layout, Second Place: Geogia Brooks - Morgan Welch, Madeline Crawford: Major Arcana Story / Photo Essay, Second Place: Joseph Rushmore - Mni Wiconi Entertainment Feat. , Second Place: Joshua Kline - Lee Roy, West Texas and Bob

Graphex Awards: Best in Show Print: The Tulsa Voice New American Cinema Cover Interactive: The Tulsa Voice Best of Tulsa Microsite 2016

MUSIC // 33

musicnotes

Adrienne Gilley in TTV’s courtyard on June 22 | GREG BOLLINGER

Communal experience An interview with Adrienne Gilley

by LIZ BLOOD

O

n June 22, it was hot— and the turtles that inhabit our courtyard were nowhere to be found. Still, Courtyard Concert attendees sat with rapt attention as Adrienne Gilley ran through her interesting and strange chord progressions and tempo changes with varying degrees of loudness and softness in her voice. We were sitting, but it felt like we were on our toes.

Gilley’s music makes you think she probably has a lot to teach us.

From early influences of church music and ‘80s pop country, she’s clever but sincere, sweet but never saccharine. Her voice is at once playful like Regina Spektor’s and pragmatic, like how Karen Dalton can get.

Adrienne Gilley’s performance was the grand finale of The Tulsa Voice’s summer 2017 Courtyard Concert series. The series will resume in the fall, or whenever temperatures stop making us want to hide under rocks like our turtle friends.

Visit thetulsavoice.com for a video from her Courtyard Concert and find information about

34 // MUSIC

her upcoming shows at facebook. com/AdrienneRosanne.

GILLEY: Well, I had a guitar and I plucked it, but as far as really like in any style, I didn’t really try that hard. I just plucked at songs so I could mostly sing.

LIZ BLOOD: Was there a musical background to your childhood?

BLOOD: What’s the most memorable show that you’ve played?

ADRIENNE GILLEY: Yes, church. The Assembly of God and the Pentecostal Holiness Church—it was sort of music out of the Charismatic movement of the ‘40s and ‘50s. [And] my dad is a musician and both his parents were musicians. My dad played jazz and could play by ear pretty much his whole life.

GILLEY: It would have to be singing with Green Corn Rebellion at the Soundpony. I mean, that I’ve played when I’m playing my guitar and singing my stuff, that’s a different story. But those shows are mind-blowing. It’s my favorite place as far as being with a big loud band like that and being on the floor with the audience. It feels more like a communal experience rather than like we’re up here on the stage and you’re down here observing us.

BLOOD: Do you remember the first song you learned to play?

GILLEY: It was Neil Young “The Birds.” It’s off of After the Gold Rush. (singing) Lover there will be another one. That whole album is just great. I listened to it a lot when I was like 18.

BLOOD: That’s when you started playing?

BLOOD: Yeah, it is nice that you get to be right there in it with them.

Do you have any nonmusical influences when you’re playing or songwriting?

GILLEY: On songwriting … just life, I guess. Is that what you

mean? I mean, I’m inspired by nature a lot—by trees and clouds.

I feel like it just kind of frees me up to want to write, but I’m not necessarily writing about those clouds. You know?

BLOOD: Yeah, I know. I think that’s exactly what I mean. Any kind of thing other than, like, listening to Neil Young might inspire you, but that’s a musical influence.

GILLEY: Okay, yeah. The sound of the trees blowing. Just really when it’s really windy. I love just being around that. It’s probably the closest thing to the ocean sound that we have in Oklahoma.

BLOOD: Speaking of the ocean, what are your desert island discs?

Like, if you were stuck and needed some tunes?

GILLEY: Definitely a Beatles album, probably Let it Be or Rubber Soul.

Rufus Wainwright—his second album, Poses. It’s incredible. What I love about Poses—or one of the things, I should say, I love about that album—is that their July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

harmonies, they’re just … there’s this particular song—the way that their voices blend and they have this way of sort of pressing down on the notes in a … I’m not sure.

It just blends really well. It’s so beautiful. Her name is Martha Wainwright, she has two or three albums herself that are really good. And Nina Simone, Lady Sings the Blues.

BLOOD: “Daddy’s Hands”?

GILLEY: Oh, you don’t know that?

BLOOD: Nope.

GILLEY: Daddy’s hands were—it’s like—“rough and hard when I was lying, hard as steel when I had done wrong, but there was always love in daddy’s hands.” It’s pretty weird.

BLOOD: Yeah, especially if you got spanked as a kid. (laughs)

drop the heavy question here at the end.

GILLEY: I know, right? (laughs)

GILLEY: It’s a way to connect with myself, other people, the universe, that’s like—I don’t know—sort of contained in a way that I can’t do in other ways. It’s just such a release. And without words. It’s freedom, it’s life. I don’t know. a

GILLEY: It’s like the way that child is rationalizing it. Like, “Well, I’m doing this because I love you.”

BLOOD: Yeah, no thanks. Okay! So, what is music to you? Just gonna

BLOOD: Sounds like a good island.

Do you have a dream venue?

GILLEY: No, not really. I mean there’s so much about this to figure out still, you know? I’m really excited to be here.

BLOOD: You mentioned earlier you hadn’t been doing this in earnest for that long. How long have you?

GILLEY: In earnest, playing my guitar and singing for four or five years. I’ve been playing shows probably more like four. But really only three playing in regular venues. I was doing some stuff at the Coffee House on Cherry Street. I had a duo called Rosie and Dot and we just asked if we could play and it was great. All our friends came. But my first gig with my songs was probably in 2014 or late ’13.

BLOOD: What’s the best show you’ve ever been to? Or what’s up there?

GILLEY: What’s up there? Oh my gosh. The Skatalites at VZD’s in Oklahoma City was a really, really special show for me because it was the first time I ever saw them live and I’d been listening for a long time so just the overall experience was so incredible.

BLOOD: What about guilty pleasure listening?

GILLEY: The Judds. I still like The Judds. Wynonna and Naomi. I grew up hearing a lot of country music and a lot of ‘80s pop country. So, whenever I hear—I mean, I don’t, like, put on the album and just, like, bliss out—but when I hear The Judds, I am happy, you know? (singing) Mama he’s crazy.

And “Daddy’s Hands,” that one makes me so uncomfortable.

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

MUSIC // 35

musicnotes

SEEMS LIKE YESTERDAY Tulsa Sound legend David Teegarden inducted to Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame

by JIM KELLY

David Teegarden Sr. in his studio | GREG BOLLINGER

A

mong Tulsa’s most prominent recording artists, Grammy Award-winning musician and producer David Teegarden Sr. has always been in good company.

From the epoch of rock in the ‘60s to this century’s raw, earthy Red Dirt movement, Teegarden and his colleagues shaped the unique fusion of rockabilly, jazz, country, gospel, and blues in the musical thread forever known as the Tulsa Sound.

On June 14, Teegarden was inducted into the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame in Muskogee in recognition of his lifetime achievement in the music industry.

“Looking back, I reflect on Bob Seger’s lyrics, ‘I’m older now, but I’m still running against the wind,’” Teegarden said.

Beginning in his childhood in the 1950s, Teegarden studied and performed music at Immaculate Conception School in North Tulsa.

When Elvis Presley played his brand of swaggering rock ‘n’ roll at the Tulsa fairgrounds in the late 1950s, 12-year-old Teegarden was awestruck.

“I saw the power of music on audiences and wanted to be a part of that,” Teegarden said.

36 // MUSIC

He began playing as drummer in numerous BYOL drinking establishments and bars around town while still underage, developing his shuffle style of rock, blues, swing, and jazz.

In the early ‘60s, at J.J. Cale’s behest, Teegarden joined another Tulsan, the soulful neo-Gospel, hippie-country composer and keyboardist Leon Russell in Hollywood when Russell was playing with session players known as “The Wrecking Crew.” In 1966, Teegarden returned to Tulsa frustrated—at 18 years old he was unable to work in L.A. clubs.

In the late ‘60s, he and fellow Tulsan Skip Knape (aka Van Winkle), a talented organist and vocalist, formed Teegarden & Van Winkle. Independently, both had played on the flip side of J.J. Cale’s “After Midnight” when it was first released in ‘66.

In 1968, band manager Jim Cassily invited Teegarden and Knape to Detroit. Teegarden had always been drawn to the music powerhouses of the Motor City and there they cut several albums.

Swept up in the early ‘70s activist and peace movement, Teegarden, Knape, Bob Seger, and guitarist Mike Bruce were invited to perform at the John

Sinclair Freedom Rally along with John Lennon, Stevie Wonder, poet Allen Ginsberg, Bobbie Seal of the Black Panthers, and others.

At this juncture, Seger lined up with Teegarden & Van Winkle.

After touring for over six months together, they recorded Smokin’ O.P.’s (1972) with Bruce. The album, released on Punch Andrew’s Palladium Records (Billboard #63), consisted mostly of covers and scored a hit with Tim Hardin’s “If I Were a Carpenter” (#76 US). The record peaked at 180 on the Billboard 200.

But even after all that, Oklahoma called the rock drummer home. He built a home production company just outside Tulsa, near Beggs.

“I found a farm, which was ideal to use as a recording studio, and made my home,” Teegarden said.

Today, he owns and operates Teegarden Studios, located just down the street from Leon Russell’s old Church Studio, at 1431 E. 3rd St. in the Pearl District.

There, he’s equipped with vintage microphones, a piano, and a Hammond B-3 organ, plus state-of-the-art sound panels and software.

“I’ve had recording studios

my whole life,” Teegarden wrote on his website. “Music is my life.

Being able to share my experience and passion with a variety of talented artists from diverse genres is most gratifying.”

Over the years, he’s worked with many Tulsa-based musicians and established national artists, including guitarist and vocalist Paul Benjaman, local legend Steve Pryor, legendary blues and country-style singer and songwriter Don White, guitarist Charles Tubberville, bluegrass multi-instrumentalist Randy Crouch, blues player Dustin Pittsley, and bands Whirligig, Local Hero, Freak Show, Henna Roso, and Hanson, as well as Tulsa high school and professional jazz bands, including jazz master David Brewbeck.

“Tulsa is my hometown and I’m very familiar with the local music community. I was born and raised here and there are plenty of good musicians and good music,” Teegarden said.

Of the OMHF award, Teegarden said, “I deeply appreciate the respect and incredible honor to be bestowed this award that very few receive in their lifetime and the pleasure of the moment in the presence of my wife, children, and grandchildren.” a July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

Food, Full Bar, Live Music & Good Times!

THE LOOP

loop

224 N. Main • 918-599-9200 thehuntclubtulsa.com Located in the Historic Brady Arts District.

FREE IT ’S L E G A L

Don’t miss the bus!

Use the real time Bus Tracker App available at Scan the QR code and keep track of the Loop with the Tulsa Transit Bus Tracker App. tulsatransit.org facebook.com/TulsaDowntownTrolley

T IL L

Tulsa’rsee F ONLY u na Marij yaer Law

Free legal representation for first offense marijuana possession.

Tulsa District & City Courts only.

No juvenile cases.

Reasonable fees for other charges.

Some restrictions apply.

Michael Fairchild • Attorney at Large • 918-58-GRASS (584-7277)

KEEP NEWS

REAL Do you have our next story?

TELL US:

voices@langdonpublishing.com THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

MUSIC // 37

musiclistings Wed // Jul 5

Mercury Lounge – Travis Linville* MixCo – America, Fuck Yeah! Vinyl night* Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Eicher Wednesdays – ($10) pH Community House – KANATIA, Sam Regan, DROWN, DER GHUL – ($5) Soundpony – My Brother and Me The Colony – Tom Skinner’s Science Project Vanguard – Talking Forever, Emma, The Classics – ($7-$10)

Thurs // Jul 6

Crow Creek Tavern – The Hitmen Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Cabin Creek – Darrel Cole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – SquadLive, Scott Eastman Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - The Joint – Dionne Warwick – ($35-$45) Hunt Club – Jabe Burgess Mercury Lounge – Paul Benjaman River Spirit Casino - Paradise Cove – Santana – ($95-$360) Safari Joe’s H2O Water Park – Acoustic Open Mic Soundpony – Algebra* The Colony – Jacob Tovar’s Thirst Utica Square – GrooveYard Vanguard – Nuns, Planet What – ($10) Woody Guthrie Center – John McCuthcheon* – 7 p.m. – ($25-$28) Zin Urban Lounge – Randy Brumley

Fri // Jul 7

American Legion Post 308 – Round Up Boys Ed’s Hurricane Lounge – The Plums, Dixie Wrecked Fassler Hall – KNIPPLE & Friends play Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band* Guthrie Green – Starlight Band - Jazz Under the Stars Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Cabin Creek – Great Big Biscuit Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – Avenue, Donte Schmitz Hunt Club – Daniel Jordan Mercury Lounge – The Eric Tessmer Band, Dane and the Soup Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Jazzwich: Live Music and Food Truck Lunch Pepper’s Grill – The ScissorTails River Spirit Casino - 5 O’Clock Somewhere Bar – Randy Brumley Soul City – Kalyn Fay The Bistro At Seville – Dean DeMerritt and Sean Al-Jibouri The Blackbird on Pearl – Groovement – ($10) The Boxyard – Kalyn Fay The Colony – Chris Blevins Utopia Bar & Lounge – DJ MO Vanguard – Wednesday 13, Invidia, Gabriel and the Apocalypse, Fist of Rage – ($15) Whiskey Dog – The Hitmen

38 // MUSIC

Sat // Jul 8

Billy and Renee’s – Stop the Violence Benefit w/ Redneck Nosferatu, Red Beard Wall, For The Wolf, Stinky Gringos, Decomposed, The Mules, Handsome Sinner, Joey & Bria* Fair Fellow Coffee Co. – The Singer and The Songwriter Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Cabin Creek – Rod Robertson Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – Hook, The Hi-Fidelics Hunt Club – Amped Mercury Lounge – The South Austin Moonlighters Soul City – Jason Ellmore Soundpony – DJ Whynot The Beehive Lounge – Space Horse, Hey Judy, Caregiver to a Monster* The Blackbird on Pearl – Miko The Artist CD Release w/ Jerica D. Wortham, Mz. Val, Jilliam Marie, Tea Rush, Kenya Soulsinger* – ($15) The Colony – Combsy w/ Annie Ellicott* The Fur Shop – The Ex-Bombers* The Venue Shrine – Faster Pussycat – ($16) Vanguard – The Tiptons CD Release w/ Jesse Joice, Crossroads* – ($10) Woody Guthrie Center – Mike Stinson Band – 7 p.m. – ($20) Yeti – Brujo Roots, The Zach Short Group, When The Clock Strikes, Caezar*

Sun // Jul 9

East Village Bohemian Pizzeria – Mike Cameron Collective Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Dean DeMerritt’s Red Dirt Improvisations - CD Release w/ Shelby Eicher, Scott McQuade, Sarah Maud, Jared Johnson, Sean Al-Jibouri, Wade Robertson, Sandy Shapoval* – 5 p.m. – ($15) Soul City – Mark Bruner & Shelby Eicher Soundpony – Super Thief The Colony – Paul Benjaman’s Sunday Nite Thing Vanguard – The Putz, Class Zero, The Riot Waves, Pawn Shop Heroes – ($7-$10)

Mon // Jul 10

Hodges Bend – Mike Cameron Collective Mercury Lounge – Chris Blevins The Colony – Seth Lee Jones Vanguard – Dawn Patrol, Holy Void, Disparity Gospel – ($7-$10)

Tues // Jun 11

Guthrie Green – Starlight Band - Night at the Movies Gypsy Coffee House – Open Mic Night Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – Pumpkin Hollow Band Mercury Lounge – Wink Burcham & Jacob Tovar Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Depot Jazz and Blues Jams River Spirit Casino - 5 O’Clock Somewhere Bar – Erin O’Dowd Riverwalk Crossing – Hawk Nelson Smitty’s 118 Tavern – Scott Ellison Band Soul City – Tuesday Bluesday w/ Dustin Pittsley Soundpony – CFM, TOONS, The Cairo Gang, Planet What* The Boxyard – Dean DeMerritt Jazz Tribe

The Colony – Singer/Songwriter Night Vanguard – Short Leash, Gold Route, Undervalued – ($7-$10)

Wed // Jul 12

Fassler Hall – Wayne Garner Band Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Eicher Wednesdays – ($10) The Colony – Tom Skinner’s Science Project Vanguard – Fervent Roze, Ragland, Lucid Reality – ($7-$10)

Thurs // Jul 13

Billy and Renee’s – Hailshot, Towering Abomination, Left Strait Down Cain’s Ballroom – ZOMBOY, Cesqeaux, Ricky Remedy – ($20-$40) Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Cabin Creek – Travis Marvin Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – nighTTrain, Travis Marvin Hunt Club – Erin O’Dowd Band Kendall Whittier Main Street – Kendall Whittier After Five w/ Pat Kelley, Olivia Duhon, Stephanie Oliver Trio* Mercury Lounge – Paul Benjaman Safari Joe’s H2O Water Park – Chris Hyde Slo Ride Saloon – Scott Ellison Band Soundpony – BookMobile, Plastic Psalms, Class Zero The Colony – The Soup Kitchen w/ Dane Arnold Utica Square – Eldredge Jackson Vanguard – Nuns, Ester Drang* – ($10)

Fri // Jul 14

American Legion Post 308 – Joe Harris Cain’s Ballroom – Wade Bowen, Read Southall Band, B.C. & The Big Rig – ($18-$33) Fassler Hall – Darku J Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Cabin Creek – Lucas Gates Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – Zodiac, Ayngel & John Hunt Club – Tony Romanello and the Black Jackets Josey Records – Planning For Burial Mercury Lounge – Thunderosa Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Jazzwich: Live Music and Food Truck Lunch Pepper’s Grill – Paul Benjaman and Friends River Spirit Casino - 5 O’Clock Somewhere Bar – Randy Brumley Soul City – Multiphonic Funk Soundpony – Afistaface The Blackbird on Pearl – Eric Himan – ($5) The Boxyard – Kalyn Fay The Venue Shrine – Murdock’s Birthday Bash – ($5) Utopia Bar & Lounge – DJ MO Vanguard – Panic, Le Cure, Thin White Dukes (Tributes to Morrissey, The Cure, and David Bowie) – ($15)

Sat // Jul 15

Billy and Renee’s – Madewell, The Plums Gypsy Coffee House – Marilyn McCulloch Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Cabin Creek – Runnin’ On Empty Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Riffs – Time Machine, Frankline Birt Hunt Club – Weston Horn and the Hush

Lennie’s Club & Grill – Shotz Los Cabos - Jenks – Midas 13 Lot No. 6 – The Electric Rag Band Mercury Lounge – Lucky Tubb & The Modern Day Troubadours Riverwalk Crossing – The Tiptons Soul City – KALO CD Release* Soundpony – Pony Disco Club The Venue Shrine – Geek Ink Anniversary Party w/ DJ P, DJ Kylie, Kartel aka Bling Crosby – ($7-$10) Unit D – Follow The Buzzards, Soul Surferos* Vanguard – Violence to Vegas, Fight the Fade, Modern Myth – ($10) Virgola – Stephanie Oliver Trio Woody Guthrie Center– WGC Songwriters Evening w/ Lauren Barth, Jesse Aycock, Dylan Golden Aycock, Max Gomez – ($18-$20)

Sun // Jul 16

East Village Bohemian Pizzeria – Mike Cameron Collective Elwood’s – Cody Woody, Rusty James Porter Fassler Hall – Patrick Sweany Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - The Joint – Ronnie Milsap & Diamond Rio – ($39-$49) Mercury Lounge – High Spirits, Bible of the Devil, Lizard Police* Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – David Amram & Friends – 5 p.m. – ($5-$20) River Spirit Casino - Paradise Cove – Thompson Square – ($20-$30) Soul City – Mark Bruner & Shelby Eicher Soundpony – Brujoroots The Colony – Paul Benjaman’s Sunday Nite Thing Vanguard – Vox Vocis, SPRNRML, Galaxia, Lilac Kings – ($7-$10) Woody Guthrie Center – Paul Burch – 7 p.m. – ($20-$22)

Mon // Jul 17 Hodges Bend – Mike Cameron Collective IDL Ballroom – Dion Timmer, KrewX, P.C.P., Noizmekka – ($17.20) Mercury Lounge – Chris Blevins The Colony – Seth Lee Jones Vanguard – Swing Low, War Prayer, Capitol Offense, Withered Bones, Colorblind – ($7-$10)

Tues // Jul 18 Cain’s Ballroom – Oklahoma Music Academy Summer Jam Guthrie Green – Starlight Band - The Best of the Big Band Era Gypsy Coffee House – Open Mic Night Mercury Lounge – Wink Burcham & Jacob Tovar Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame – Depot Jazz and Blues Jams Soul City – Dustin Pittsley Band Soul City – Tuesday Bluesday w/ Dustin Pittsley The Colony – Singer/Songwriter Night Vanguard – In the Whale, Behold The Brave, Bringer – ($7-$10)

July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

popradar

Ninja Sentai Kakurangers is streaming on Shout! Factory TV | COURTESY

Nostalgia vs. discovery SHOUT! FACTORY TV IS A TROVE OF KITSCHY DELIGHTS

by JOE O’SHANSKY SINCE 2003, SHOUT! FACTORY has been in the business of procuring cult films and vintage television shows, endowing them with HD remasters where possible, and packaging them on DVD and Blu Ray with well-curated extras. It’s basically The Criterion Collection of cool shit.

Shout! Factory TV is their free, ad-supported streaming service offering a boutique collection of nostalgic artifacts.

A section called VHS Vault— which mimics the playback of an old VCR, tracking-error graphics and all—is where I found “Never Too Young to Die,” a schlock-fest supreme that, being a lifelong KISS fan, I saw in 1986. John Stamos, not yet Charles but definitely in charge, plays a high school gymnast who joins forces with a coke-addled Vanity to avenge his father’s death and foil the nefarious plans of the hermaphroditic super-villain responsible, Velvet Von Ragnar (played with manic glee by Gene Simmons). It’s just as awesome as it sounds.

“Good Sex with Dr. Ruth Westheimer,” which ran on Lifetime in the 1980s, is—inexplicably—also here. I watched it with my parents back then because they were cool like that.

Westheimer was (and is, at 89) too adorable to seem filthy.

This was her Trojan horse for fundamentally changing the way America talks about sex on television.

Yet, nostalgia has nothing on discovery, which I found out on THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

the couch one toasty afternoon, having my chakras realigned by “Ninja Sentai Kakurangers.”

Five high school students with a sentient food truck are granted the power to transform into spandex-clad ninjas, defending Tokyo from the Yokai—evil spirits loosed from ancient Japanese history.

A mid-90s progenitor of the more widely known “Power Rangers” series in America, “Kakurangers,” despite its rigid formula—the Yokai cause weird trouble, they face off with the valiant Kakurangers, and are rudely vanquished—offers a nearly infinite (and awesome) variety of ways to terrorize kids.

The episodes are morality plays, mixing tokusatsu series like “Ultraman” with Toho kaiju beat-em-ups such as “Gamera” into a demented dreammélange of forced perspective chaos that is a delightful product of its time.

One standout among many, “The Bakeneko’s Shop!!”: A Yokai called the Bakeneko lures two moppets with a cat’s purr and imprisons them in cages with other sobbing abductees at her secret restaurant with a plan to butcher and feed them to her phantasmagorical customers. Hilarity ensues.

If you’re craving a dose of trippy and traumatic children’s programming (who isn’t, really?), look no further.

Visit www.shoutfactorytv.com and poke around for some hidden gems yourself. a FILM & TV // 39

filmphiles

Ahn Seo-Hyun and the super pig in “Okja” | COURTESY NETFLIX

GMOtional tale

Adventure parable indicts food industrial complex

by JEFF HUSTON

T

o fulfi ll its stillborn efforts to revolutionize the fi lm distribution model as we know it, Netfl ix would need to start making good movies.

Well, it just did.

“Okja,” the latest from South Korean genre stylist Bong Joonho (“Snowpiercer,” “The Host”), is the streaming giant’s overdue artistic shot across the bow.

It’s the second Netfl ix fi lm in a month from Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment, and the first with legitimate merit since 2015’s “Beasts of No Nation” (a movie

Tulsa’s independent and non-profit art-house theatre, showing independent, foreign, and documentary films.

40 // FILM & TV

Netfl ix bought but didn’t produce) that deserves a big screen experience. Sadly, other than at a few select theaters in New York and LA, that’s an experience viewers will never get.

The silver lining? You can watch it right now if you’re a Netfl ix subscriber, whether on TV, computer, or (God forbid) smartphone.

“Okja” is, like Joon-ho fi lms before it, a dark fantasy adventure parable about contemporary sociopolitical issues centered on the damage we’re doing to the planet. This one’s an indictment of the food industrial complex— both its obscene means and ends—by way of a “Girl and Her Dog” construct, except the dog is a super pig.

Mirando, a big U.S. multi-national conglomerate, has bred 26 super piglets from a new pedigree of porcine they apparently discovered in Chile. To prove their commitment to non-GMO foods, the company has given the piglets to organic farmers around the world to raise for the next 10 years, all through a glitzy media rollout.

Fast-forward to a decade later: Mirando sets to collect its property and cash in on its elaborate

marketing stunt, while one heartbroken South Korean girl named Mija (Ahn Seo-Hyun) defiantly embarks on a rescue mission to save the super pig Okja they’ve taken from her.

The connection Mija shares with Okja instantly recalls Elliot and E.T., and it’s established early on through wonderfully conceived moments that mix thrills with sentiment. But this is more Miyazaki than Spielberg, with a visual style and tone more akin to Asian anime than Hollywood blockbuster, albeit with R-rated language (indiscriminate F-bombs are dropped by American corporate and media stars) and cruel, violent scenes of animal abuse that will unsettle any person of any age.

Like a kindred spirit to the recent incarnation of Wonder Woman, Mija is an action heroine resolutely driven by moral virtue, conviction, and love. She receives unexpected aid from a leftist band of non-violent eco-terrorists called the Animal Liberation Front (yes, ALF for short) whose purpose is obvious: freeing animals from captivity and torture. They’re so vegan, they even snack on asparagus stalks.

Although Joon-ho’s fi lms have always been socially conscious, “Okja” finds the fi lmmaker standing on his most unabashed soapbox yet even as he stages spectacular action sequences, mincing no words in his grievances with how we harvest meat for the masses and, more prophetically, warning of the Rubicon we’re broaching with the genetic manipulation of sentient animals.

The two sides of the capitalist impulse are squarely in Joon-ho’s sights—slick advertising deception on one end, ruthless profit calculation on the other—represented in the owners of Mirando, twin sisters Lucy and Nancy, both played by Joon-ho veteran Tilda Swinton. Her absurd, over-the-top villain is better calibrated than Jake Gyllenhaal’s caricatured reality TV star lackey, though neither have nary a nuance.

Ahn Seo-Hyun is the fi lm’s righteous soul, yet still fragile and tender, while Paul Dano’s ALF leader is the paragon of noble compassion. Sure, this is a flatly biased polemic, but its emotional stakes are powerfully rendered.

As a result, “Okja” may only be adequate as satire, but it’s bursting with cinema and heart. a July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

popradar

A BRIEF RUNDOWN OF WHAT’S HAPPENING AT THE CIRCLE CINEMA Allison Brie and Betty Gilpin in “GLOW” | COURTESY NETFLIX

DROPKICK LADIES ‘GLOW’ shines light on a lost era

by JOE O’SHANSKY

I

t is fitting that “GLOW” is happening now, on Netfl ix.

With hits like “Stranger Things” and “Wet Hot American Summer,” the streaming service isn’t averse to ‘80s-set, original programming.

The 2012 documentary that inspired showrunners Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch, “GLOW: The Story of the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling,” produced by Tulsa-native Jason Connell, is also streaming on Netfl ix.

Flahive and Mensch had ample reason to be inspired.

Until the documentary, they had no idea that a wildly successful, nationally televised female wrestling troupe existed during the male-dominated WWF mania of the ‘80s. Four years found the ladies wrestling each other, and daytime talk show hosts (Phil Donahue gets dealt), and even tussling with Al Bundy on “Married With Children.”

In the documentary, the women weren’t a league of their own so much as a motley precursor to the Jerry Springer era of opportunistic trash television. Each of their characters was a stereotypical refection of a jingoistic time: Soviets, Nazis, and Arabs who battle a Lady Liberty-type and

THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

her allies for the carnival soul of 1980s America.

They were like astronauts, taking steps where women hadn’t, while walking a fine line between empowerment and exploitation.

But the importance and absurdity of G.L.O.W’s existence—even in the pantheon of how weird shit from that decade seems now— blurred that line. Particularly in retrospect, when it becomes clear what those relationships and that time meant to them.

As a comedic adaptation, Flahive and Mensch’s “GLOW” is a knockout. Marc Maron plays a sleazy B-fi lm director hired by a young movie producer to create a trashy, all-female syndicated wrestling show. That’s where most of the laughs are mined, leavened by the dramatic vein of its two leading ladies, Ruth (Allison Brie) and Debbie (Betty Gilpin), former besties who fall out when Ruth sleeps with Debbie’s husband.

It’s a hilarious, sweet, and charming surprise, boasting sharply written characters and performances from a uniformly fun ensemble cast. “GLOW” hooked me immediately—and not just because of its ironically unabashed male gaze. Though there’s that, too. a

Audrey Hepburn in “Wait Until Dark” | COURTESY

OPENING JULY 7 THE EXCEPTION Stationed in Holland at the home of Kaiser Wilhelm during the start of World War II, a German soldier seeks to find a resistance spy and falls for a young Dutch Jewish woman in the process—but can she trust him?

Starring Lily James, Jai Courtney, and Christopher Plummer. Rated R.

SPECIAL EVENTS REAL GENIUS (1985) A Graveyard Shift presentation of the cult comedy classic about teenage prodigies who develop a high-powered laser and then work to foil the plans of the military that seeks to use it as a weapon. One of the films that propelled Val Kilmer to stardom. Fri., July 7 & Sat., July 8, 10pm LAUREL & HARDY COMEDY SHORTS DOUBLE FEATURE Second Saturday Silents presents two early Laurel & Hardy shorts. “Putting Pants On Philip” (1925) sees the duo looking to get a Scottish nephew out of his kilt and into slacks, and in “Angora Love” (1929) they struggle to bathe their smelly goat to keep it hidden from their suspicious landlord. Sat., July 8, 11am BUSTER KEATON SHORT / LIVE MUSIC STARLIGHT CONCERT Free event on the lawn at Guthrie Green downtown. Organist Bill Rowland will play live music for the 45 minute Buster Keaton film “Double Whoopee.” Tue., July 11, 8pm

SUMMER KIDS FILMS SERIES Free special Wednesday kid matinees all summer long, with screenings of “Sing” on July 12 and “Trolls” on July 19, both at 1pm.

WAIT UNTIL DARK (1967) / CIRCLE CINEMA’S 89TH BIRTHDAY Circle Cinema celebrates its 89th birthday with a golden anniversary screening of the 1967 Audrey Hepburn thriller about a blind woman terrorized by criminals. The Tulsa Voice film critic Jeff Huston will introduce this special event, and concession prices will be reduced to 1967 prices: $1 popcorn and $1 soda. Sat., July 15, 7pm STOP MAKING SENSE (1977) The classic Talking Heads documentary that elevated the concert film to an art form. A postscreening Q&A will follow of an archived discussion with director Jonathan Demme and Talking Heads frontman David Byrne, moderated by New York Times film critic Janet Maslin. Wed., July 19, 7pm ANGELS IN AMERICA: PART 1 – MILLENNIUM APPROACHES (NT LIVE) A brand new 2017 staging of Tony Kushner’s epic Pulitzer Prize-winning play about the 1980s AIDS crisis, from the Tony Awardwinning director of “War Horse” and “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.” Starring Andrew Garfield and Nathan Lane.

A 5:45pm pre-show is hosted by Theatre Tulsa’s Nick Cains. Thu., July 20, 6pm. Part 2 will screen Thu., July 27, 6pm

FILM & TV // 41

NEW ORDINANCE CRIMINALIZES HAUNTING SPECTER OF POVERTY … AND OTHER ITEMS TOO GOOD NOT TO SATIRIZE • BY FRASER KASTNER

GOOD NEWS FOR MOTORISTS: PANHANDLING LAWS JUST GOT STRICTER Are you bothered by the high rate of homelessness in Tulsa? Does it keep you up at night knowing that somewhere in your city people are huddling for shelter and fearing for their safety? Do you feel guilty avoiding the gaze of panhandlers on the side of the road? Well, have we got good news for you.

Tulsa City Council passed an amendment to a city ordinance June 28 that increases fines for panhandling and makes prosecution easier. This is wonderful news for motorists, who are seriously tired of seeing those icky homeless people asking for money on the side of the road.

The amendment was sponsored by Councilor Karen Gilbert, who fears for the safety of church groups and firefighters during roadside fundraisers. Don’t worry, though, those groups can apply for a special-event license that will allow them to bypass this law at the whim of the city council.

Some worry that this amendment will victimize homeless people. But, but! Motorists won’t have to confront the haunting specter of poverty and social injustice on their way back to the suburbs. Plus, the homeless population will be reduced, if you’re willing to count jail as a home.

OKLAHOMA MEDICAL BOARD ACCUSES TULSA DOCTOR OF NEGLIGENCE Tulsa area doctor Leslie Masters is up for review after settling seven lawsuits between 2011 and 2015, all having to do with liposuctions she performed. The Oklahoma State Board of Medical Licensure and Supervision filed a complaint (Case No. 15-05-5144) in 2016 charging Dr. Masters with violations of the Medical Practice Act and “a pattern of repeated negligence,” among other things.

When will the medical board—hobbled by adherence to childish notions of public accountability—understand that Dr. Masters is a visionary, a trailblazer in the field of elective surgery?

Lawsuits aside, a real doctor doesn’t need “surgical training” to do surgery. Case in point: Dr. Masters apparently has none, and she’s performed plenty of surgeries. Not all of them went well, but you never hear about all the people who don’t get serious infections, do you?

And sure, Masters didn’t check vital signs or oxygen levels during some of her procedures, but everyone knows that the road to success is a lot shorter if you cut a few corners. Plus none of her assistants had proper medical training, so they probably would have done it wrong anyway.

But Masters’ real brilliance can be seen in what the investigation termed “The RK Complaint.” Filed by a woman identified as “RK,” the complaint outlines an innovative procedure developed by Dr. Masters. Masters gave RK several syringes filled with RK’s own extracted fat, instructing her to keep them in her freezer and inject them into her face when she felt her face needed a little extra something. RK then developed a severe infection as a result of self-injecting the fat.

But Masters had no way of knowing that RK’s fat had bacteria in it, given her educational background. Besides, how are you going to advance medical science if you don’t use a few guinea pigs?

We here at Bad News are grateful to Masters for advancing the field of Mad Science. Even in this age of “schools” and “the Hippocratic Oath,” sometimes you just gotta shuffle a few body parts around and see what happens.

42 // ETC.

Tips to get kids reading!

City councilors have recently pledged to incentivize students to complete the Tulsa library’s summer reading program with pies to the face, pug-kissing, and a variety of other twee rewards.

Let’s take a look at how you can get your little ones to read more at home.

Hide candy and snacks between pages of challenging books.

Your kid might put on some weight, but since childhood obesity rates in this state are out of control, they’re probably already a little chunky. Fat is better than fat and illiterate.

Enroll your child in private school. Most people don’t know this, but private schools are an excellent way to give your child a great education, especially if you’re looking for a way to get rid of several thousand dollars in a hurry. This isn’t a great option for lower- or middle-income families, but those kids learn other skills in public schools, like obeying authority, internalizing anger, and making improvised weapons—all of which are more likely to come in handy for them than reading.

Read a book once in awhile yourself. Your kid notices when you zone out in front of Netflix every night, and they’ll remember that shit when you force them to take part in this reading program thing.

Hold your state government accountable for running public education into the ground. This might sound crazy, but you don’t have to live in a state where businesses are prioritized over citizens. a July 5 – 18, 2017 // THE TULSA VOICE

THE FUZZ THE TULSA VOICE SPOTLIGHTS: TULSA SPCA

2910 Mohawk Blvd. | MON, TUES, THURS, FRI & SAT, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. 918.428.7722

NONA is our resident sweetheart! She is a female, 2-year-old pit bull terrier mix.

She is still a bit shy when she first meets people, but warms up quickly. Nona absolutely loves cuddling and is very friendly with other dogs. She needs a family who likes to snuggle and will be patient with her timid personality.

ACROSS 1 Classic Halloween song, “Monster ___” 5 Dad’s brother, to you 10 Hanging on one’s every word 14 Severely needing refinement 19 Common singing range for women 20 Starter TV episode 21 Home of Adam and Eve 22 Prefix meaning “sun” 23 They precede raising a family, often 27 Easily offended or tender 28 Miner’s exit 29 Blackberry drupe 30 A sex 31 Group not doing clerical work?

32 Cracker toppings for the well-heeled 33 Seance visitor, supposedly 37 Text attachments, sometimes 38 Relatives 39 Small crown 41 Animated wolf movie of 2010 48 “I knew it all ___!”

49 Nimble and quick 51 Oft-climbed thing 52 Leatherworking punching tools 53 Couple thousand pounds 54 Habitation of some wild animals 55 One swinging for the fences 57 Acquire through hard work 58 Unrelenting, as a lecture 60 “Beloved” writer Morrison 61 Ballet handrail 62 What nosy people are?

69 Left the bed

BUCKAROO is a 2½-yearold male Australian cattle dog mix. He already has excellent leash skills and is generally friendly with other dogs, but can be picky about his canine friends. Buckaroo enjoys anything water, and loves to spend the hot summer days lounging and playing in his pool. He is a very sweet and friendly guy, but will need a family with a good fence.

70 Carmaker no more 71 Nymph of river and lakes, in Greek myth 72 Dryer trap catchings 73 Light-minded pursuit?

76 Skirt covering much 77 Bard’s before 80 ___-to-order 81 Country singer McCoy 82 ___ carotene 83 One of two train berths 85 Like a pleasantly brief speech 89 Removing suds 91 Donkey relative 92 On a naval mission 93 Uses salt in winter 94 Like some liberties or wars 97 Place for a slugger to walk to 99 Long football pass trajectories 101 Large envelope type 102 Sword part 103 Numbers often found in parentheses 108 Take advantage of one part while rejecting the rest 111 More genuine and honest 112 Palindromic address with a letter missing 113 Any group of eight 114 Fails to be 115 Mambo King Puente and a Jackson 116 Escape in the sea?

117 Milk by-products 118 “Is-so” link DOWN 1 Sheffield rain slickers 2 Cosmetic emollient 3 Render senseless 4 ___ d’oeuvres 5 Like Albany’s position in New York 6 Nero’s zero 7 Novelist Barker or Cussler

8 It’s not quite a full run 9 Seventh Greek letter 10 Emulating scarlet?

11 Give entry to 12 Like many Irish bogs 13 Nitro relative 14 American of Mexican descent 15 Send in a payment 16 With no escort 17 Air-filled cavity of the skull 18 Edamame beans, e.g.

24 Comic’s asset 25 Anti-discrimination org.

26 Speedier or quicker 31 Easter flower 33 “Shoo!”

34 Equestrian sport 35 Pumped item 36 Howard the “Arrested Development” narrator 37 Wife VI for Henry VIII 38 Football injury site, often 40 Romanov royals 42 Story topping the others 43 Class for creative high schoolers 44 Roam, raid and plunder 45 Pitchers used as trophies 46 Harsh-lighting result 47 What may come before “your request” 50 Air-freshener scent 54 Money of Romania 55 Stocks’ partner 56 “No ifs, ___ or buts” 58 Member of the family 59 Grounded digit?

60 Type of powder 61 Reptile with quite a squeeze 62 Prevents hysteria 63 Bathsheba’s husband

The Tulsa SPCA has been helping animals in our area since 1913. The shelter never euthanizes for space and happily rescues animals from high-kill shelters. They also accept owner surrenders, rescues from cruelty investigations, hoarding, and puppy mill situations. Animals live on-site or with foster parents until they’re adopted. All SPCA animals are micro-chipped, vaccinated, spayed/neutered, and treated with preventatives.

Learn about volunteering, fostering, upcoming events, adoptions, and their low-cost vaccination clinic at tulsaspca.org.

SIMON is a 9-month-old male domestic shorthair mix.

He is declawed in the front, so his adopters should make sure he stays inside at all times.

He loves to get pets and belly scratches too. Simon is great with other cats and can’t wait to find his forever home!

64 Repetitive musical piece 65 Muddies, as the water 66 Apartment, to a landlord 67 Pitching scout’s gun 68 Eastmost figure on a sundial 73 How the marble installer liked his bacon served?

74 Signature things?

75 Minuscule amount 76 Prefix with “physical” 77 Grand in scope 78 Descartes or Lalique 79 Work done by forces of dynes 82 Round root vegetable 83 International Paris-based org.

84 Trident-shaped letter or inflation letters 86 They give you fits 87 Extreme military exercise 88 German industrial city 90 Necessities for entering some clubs 94 It’s in the Bay of Naples 95 Anyone’s two cents 96 Certain songbird 97 Some Greek cheeses 98 Big name in toy manufacturing 99 Rugged mountain crest 100 Easiest way to settle a debt 101 Dillon in “Gunsmoke” 103 Enemy leader?

104 Final notice?

105 Short run 106 Volcano in Sicily 107 Stone paving block 109 “Bon” or “mon” trailer 110 ___ Jones Industrial Average

LEGACY is a 1½-year-old female domestic shorthair mix. Legacy is a Hemingway cat (polydactyl) which makes her even more unique and beautiful. She loves to take naps and would even love to take a nap in your lap!

She may not like to play that much but she would make a great laidback and cuddly companion.

Universal sUnday Crossword UniTed sTaTes

By Timothy e. Parker

© 2017 Andrews McMeel Syndication THE TULSA VOICE // July 5 – 18, 2017

RIED is a 10-month-old female mixed breed (up to 44 pounds when full grown). She is eager to please and loves to play. She is not a huge fan of other dogs, but absolutely adores her human friends! Still under a year old, she can be pretty high-energy. Ried is a water dog and enjoys nothing more than playing in her swimming pool.

7/9 ETC. // 43

Pleas e re cycle this issue.