December 28, 2016 - Pittsburgh City Paper

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

FREE GOOD FRIDAYS

EVENTS 1.10 – 8pm FORCED ENTERTAINMENT: TOMORROW’S PARTIES New Hazlett Theater Co-presented with Carnegie Nexus, as part of the Strange Times series and The New Hazlett Theater Tickets $15/$12 Members & students or two shows (Forced Entertainment: Real Magic on January 11) for $20/$15 Members & students

1.11 – 8pm FORCED ENTERTAINMENT: REAL MAGIC New Hazlett Theater Co-presented with The New Hazlett Theater Tickets $15/$12 Members & students or two shows (Forced Entertainment: Tomorrow’s Parties on January 10) for $20/$15 Members & students

1.14 – 2pm SIP AND SKETCH AT ACE HOTEL Ace Hotel – Gym (East Liberty) Co-presented with The Ace Hotel Pittsburgh in conjunction with the exhibition Andy Warhol: My Perfect Body.

FREE

1.20 – 7pm MY PERFECT BODY: JAMES ELKINS LECTURE The Warhol theater Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Andy Warhol: My Perfect Body.

FREE

Presented by UPMC Health Plan

Each Friday in January, enjoy free museum admission, a cash bar, and Pittsburgh’s own DJ Huck Finn from 5 -10pm.

The Andy Warhol Museum receives state arts funding support through a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency funded by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency and The Heinz Endowments. Further support is provided by the Allegheny Regional Asset District.

Free Good Fridays are presented by NEWS

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

PYRAMID

TATTOO 12.28.2016/01.04.2017 VOLUME 26 + ISSUE 52

& Body Piercing

[EDITORIAL] Editor CHARLIE DEITCH News Editor REBECCA ADDISON Arts & Entertainment Editor BILL O’DRISCOLL Music Editor MARGARET WELSH Associate Editor AL HOFF Web Producer ALEX GORDON Staff Writers RYAN DETO, CELINE ROBERTS Interns MEGAN FAIR, LUKE THOR TRAVIS

[ART]

{COVER PHOTO OF BILL PEDUTO BY AARON WARNICK; PHOTO OF BILL PEDUTO IN DISGUISE AS ED CHADWICK ON UNDERCOVER BOSS COURTESY OF STUDIO LAMBERT/ CBS}

[COVER STORY]

Director of Operations KEVIN SHEPHERD Production Director JULIE SKIDMORE Art Director LISA CUNNINGHAM Graphic Designers JEFF SCHRECKENGOST, JENNIFER TRIVELLI

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2016 kinda sucked, but hopefully these memes looking back at the past year can help you laugh about it.

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“There’s just something special about walking through the parking lots and seeing all the fans tailgating together.”

[ADMINISTRATION]

PAGE 32

Circulation Director JIM LAVRINC Office Administrator RODNEY REGAN Interactive Media Manager CARLO LEO

[PUBLISHER] EAGLE MEDIA CORP.

[SCREEN]

“The film rings with the Pittsburgh-born playwright’s earthy dialogue, alternately hilarious and gut-wrenching.”

PAGE 30

News 06 Weird 12 Music 13 Arts 20 Events 23 Taste 26 Screen 30

Sports 32 Classifieds 34 Crossword 34 Free Will Astrology 36 Savage Love 37 The Last Word 38 NEWS

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THIS WEEK

SOMETIMES A PICTURE CAN BE WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS

ONLINE

www.pghcitypaper.com

Denzel Washington stopped in Pittsburgh for a premiere of his new film Fences.

Check out our review on page 30 and our blog from his visit, online at www.pghcitypaper.com.

2016 BE LIKE ...

Tune in to Soundbite this week for the final installment of our Iron City saga with editor Charlie Deitch. www.pghcitypaper.com.

“I’M TAKING EVERYONE”

In the latest installment of CP Longform, we review the decade-old case of a convicted murderer maintaining his innocence. Read it online at www.pghcitypaper.com.

CITY PAPER

INTERACTIVE

YEAR IN REVIEW Reflecting on the past 12 months in Pittsburgh, the heartache, the broken promises, and the traffic {BY CP STAFF}

Our featured #CPReaderArt photo from last week is a great winter photo of Pittsburgh by @pittsburgh_local. Use #CPReaderArt to share your local photos with us for your chance to be featured next!

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T

HE YEAR 2016 has been called everything from “a dumpster fire” to simply “the worst.” The country saw a new president elected — one whose rhetoric is, surprisingly, not completely in line with the political positions of most of us here at City Paper.

Folks in the U.K., our longtime ally, voted for Brexit. And in Pittsburgh, we lost a progressive police chief committed to improving police-community relations.

To say it’s been a rough year for liberals and progressives would be an understatement. So we thought, what better way to move into 2017 than to use humor to recap a year that made us all die a little inside? On the following pages, you’ll find memes of some of the stories CP covered in 2016, and others that have been ingrained in the collective consciousness of Pittsburghers (we’re looking at you, kid who got stuck

between two buildings).

We should definitely pray that 2017 is much brighter. (Although as we type this, Donald Trump is tweeting that he wants to “greatly strengthen and expand” America’s nuclear capability. Here’s hoping the bright light on the horizon isn’t courtesy of a mushroom cloud.) So before we embark on our unknown future, let’s reflect on the past year — the heartache, the broken promises, and the traffic.

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

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Weird Pittsburgh

SEND YOUR LOCAL WEIRD NEWS TO INFO@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

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Some dilapidated houses in Pittsburgh are quietly owned by the city, acquired through the seizure of properties for delinquent taxes. Their maintenance is outsourced to private contractors, but residents of more downtrodden neighborhoods have complained that the empty buildings just decay into eyesores. The problem has gotten so bad that agents for the Department of Permits, Licenses and Inspections recently cited eight properties owned by the city by accident, mistaking them for any other blights — meaning the city essentially fined itself as a deadbeat property owner. Inspectors are not supposed to cite government-owned buildings, Department Director Maura Kennedy explained to TribLive. com, “because it would be counterproductive,” so the department asked to withdraw the citations. District Judge Richard King did not allow them to take back three citations, arguing “what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.” The three properties, all in Allentown, were cited for weeds, garbage, fallen siding, a deteriorating porch and steps, and the presence of an abandoned car, among other alleged code violations. Judge King said the city “should get no better treatment and no worse treatment.”

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Bishop McCort Catholic High School in Johnstown has an intense sports rivalry with Westmont Hilltop High School, a nearby public school. Bishop McCort students recently formed a wrestling team, the Crimson Crushers.

They were scheduled to compete against the Hilltoppers of Westmont Hilltop. However, the Tribune-Democrat newspaper reported that Westmont Hilltop wrestling coach Matt Beaujon was considering exploiting a rule to force Bishop McCort to forfeit: In 2014, Pennsylvania’s Roman Catholic bishops decreed that “under no circumstances” should a male wrestler from a Catholic school tangle with a female opponent. The Hilltoppers have 12 girls on their co-ed squad. If Beaujon sent a female wrestler to compete, the all-male Crimson Crushers would have to forfeit. Bishop McCort coach Shad Benton admitted as much to the Tribune-Democrat. “I think the three key words that I read are ‘under no circumstances,’” Benton said. Perhaps the Almighty intervened on behalf of the Catholic school: Before the Hilltoppers could pull the gender trick, the match was canceled due to inclement weather.

It has not been rescheduled.

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This column has previously noted the antics of Lawrence “Crusty” Owens, an ex-con who interrupted an otherwise mundane council meeting in Farrell, Mercer County, to threaten to “beat senseless” a building inspector for issuing him citations. Recently, Owens, 51, came in sweatpants to read an “indictment” of the mayor and several council members, accusing them of theft and conspiracy. As he started reading aloud, a frustrated Mayor Ollie McKeithan ordered police to remove Owens, who mocked McKeithan by shouting,

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

“Massa, massa, please!” The meeting erupted into commotion as citizens and council members debated McKeithan’s ouster of Owens during a time meant for public comments.

The lack of civility apparently caught on, as Councilor Kimberly Doss “shout[ed] personal insults at McKeithan for about 15 minutes,” according to The Herald of Sharon.

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Johnstown police hunted down Richard Miller in July, after a woman stabbed by a new acquaintance said that name belonged to her attacker. Officers allegedly approached Miller on his mother’s porch, with guns drawn, ordered him to the ground and handcuffed him in front of his horrified family. Reportedly, they later interrogated him and held him for seven hours — at which point they realized they had arrested the wrong Richard Miller. According to Miller’s newly filed civil-rights lawsuit, police did a records search for that name and tracked down the nearest Richard Miller, with no

consideration for how common the name is.

The Tribune-Democrat reports that another Richard Miller was arrested for the assault three days later and convicted in December.

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A Dauphin County man apparently gave his wife the old coldcocked-in-an-alley excuse after he spent a night with another woman. PennLive.com reports that Erik Shepler allegedly told Steelton police that a mugger hit him in the head and took his bank card as he left a bar, leaving him with no memory of the 12 hours before he awoke in an alleyway. His wife told police he had been missing.

But police reportedly found surveillance video of Shepler with another woman at a convenience store. When interviewed, the woman told police Shepler met her at the bar and the two continued drinking at her apartment, a timeline reportedly confirmed by her building’s surveillance camera. Shepler was charged with making a false report.

WAYNOVISION

LOCAL

IF JANELLE MONÁE IS THIS GENERATION’S PRINCE, SOLANGE IS OUR KATE BUSH

BEAT

{BY LAUREN REARICK}

Music that helped me get through the day when 2016 felt like 1984

OUT SWINGING

INFO@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

For more information, visit jackswing. bandcamp.com NEWS

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Solange — A Seat at the Table: The younger Knowles sister’s intentional ambivalence on her breakthrough R&B album is a thing of healing, empowerment and poetic mystery. If Janelle Monáe is this generation’s Prince, Solange is our Kate Bush.

Blood Orange — Freetown Sound: A funky 17-track clapback “for everyone told they’re not black enough, too black, too queer, not queer the right way,” Dev Hynes told Entertainment Weekly.

Hamilton Mixtape: “Immigrants (We Get the Job Done),” featuring K’NAAN and Snow Tha Product, feels especially relevant under the new American demagogy.

Lizzo — Coconut Oil: Radical joy and righteous discontent are at play in equal parts on the Minneapolis rapper’s confident EP.

PLAYBACK: 2016 IN REVIEW

Isaiah Ross {PHOTO COURTESY OF JONATHAN LIGHTFOOT}

After nearly a decade of making music, Isaiah Ross is finding his voice.

From filling in on guitar for live performances with rock band Brightside to providing vocals and bass as a member of Skull Kid, Ross is no stranger to the Pittsburgh scene. But his latest project presents a new challenge — working (mostly) solo.

On New Year’s Eve, Ross will digitally release Cloud Cover, the first under his Jack Swing moniker. For the gritty, bluesinspired rock ’n’ roll project, Ross is the primary songwriter and instrumentalist.

During recording he was joined on drums by Conner Kapelewski.

Playing music since he was a teenager, Ross often dreamed of presenting music as a solo artist. Before he could do that, he felt he needed a little more time. “I tried to do something similar for awhile, but I just wasn’t good enough yet,” he says. “The Jack Swing name and idea always stuck with me.”

It wasn’t until this year, when Ross went through an emotional period, that he felt it was the proper time to unveil Jack Swing. Cloud Cover is his way of channeling those tumultuous feelings and dealing with the unexpected heartaches of life.

“The EP represents when life is coming at you in a million ways, and you find it so easy to get down on yourself and want to give up,” he says. “I realized I was in that low space, and I wanted to fight back and fight through it with my music.”

After completing the songwriting, Ross practiced extensively with Kapelewski to prepare for recording: Kapelewski would play drums while Ross worked on playing multiple instruments, finding ways to layer the sound. They eventually went to Very Tight Recordings, in Sharpsburg, for what Ross calls his most calculated recording attempt.

Pittsburgh’s scene provided inspiration for the release, including the addition of fellow DIY musicians for a full Jack Swing live band. Ross holds the people of the city very close to his heart, and he hopes listeners will hear the influence of Pittsburgh on the record.

“Now was the time for me to do this,” he says. “I’m really excited for Cloud Cover to be out there and for people to hear it.

It finally came to fruition.”

BY CARALYN GREEN

My favorite local releases of 2016

BY MARGARET WELSH

Swampwalk — Us vs. Them Self-recorded with a four-track sequencer run via her Gameboy (and a variety of other helpful synths, pedals, a drum machine, etc.), Anna Hale’s second full-length is full of layered hooky melodies, heavy beats and smart, stirring lyrics.

No Time — You’ll Get Yours The title says it all: This record is out for blood.

The highly anticipated LP from Pittsburgh’s catchiest oi! outfit is seriously pissed off, which is cool because so is everyone. Aggressive earworms like “Man in Uniform,” “Bow to None” and, of course, “Shit Society” are sure to resonate with those trying to stay angry in the new year.

MUSIC

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PK Delay — Dad Self-described father-ish figure PK Delay boldly and/or cheekily proclaimed 2016 “Dad Year,” and who am I to argue? On this EP, the prolific Delay effortlessly flows over Florida-based producer dirtbag’s subtle electronic backbone, and guest spots

by Choo Jackson and others add grit and balance.

Empty Beings — Confront the Living Dark, gothy post punk is well-mined territory, but Empty Beings does its New Wave forbearers proud and distinguishes itself with exquisitely sinister guitar tone and memorable vocal lines. The catchiest riffs from this EP haven’t left my head in weeks.

Old Head — Old Head This pro lineup (Phil Boyd, Jason Kirker and Mike Layton) plays like a band with nothing to prove, which, of course, means they end up proving to be very cool. Where so much psych-rock revivalism rings hollow, Old Head brings to mind the parable of the wise man who built his house on a foundation of solid rock.

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NEW YEAR’S EVE

TICK TOCK LIVE MUSIC BY

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Mars Jackson

Worst band names of 2016

BY TROY MICHAEL

Some favorite songs from local artists in 2016

BY ALEX GORDON

Breast Massage Cigarettes After Sex Horse Jumper of Love

Jackal Onasis Let’s Eat Grandma Naked Walrus

Sharkmuffin

Mars Jackson & Nice Rec — “Sunrise” Sandman — “Animal Jen” It It — “The End of Pig Death” S.L.I.P. — “No Hope for the U.S.A.” Swampwalk — “Mailbox” Tunatown — “Bird Man” Good Dude LoJack — “The Golden Peg” Mars Jackson — “Rabbit in a Hat” Emily Rodgers — “In the City” The Hipsters — “Finally Returning Home”

Best album everyone slept on in 2016

BY MEG FAIR

#THISISHARDROCK ©2015 Hard Rock International (USA), Inc. All rights reserved.

JOIN HARDROCKREWARDS .COM

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

Face Always Towards the Sun by Blithe Field As I peruse end-of-the-year album round-ups, I cannot help but notice a gaping hole in all of these lists. Where the heck is Face Always Towards the Sun?! In the present hellscape we live in, few things offer better escape than a carefully constructed album, especially one that manages to embody abstract concepts like nostalgia and acceptance. From the warm welcome-home hug of “Sleeping Bags in a Row” to the blissful “Milkshakes in the Rain,” Spencer Radcliffe uses ambience, electronics and room recordings to create an intimate and special sound unlike anything else released this year.

{PHOTO COURTESY OF JULIA DRATEL}

Circuit des Yeux

Some memorable shows of 2016

BY MARGARET WELSH

Circuit Des Yeux Feb. 27, Club Café Chicago-based experimental artist Haley Fohr, who performs as Circuit Des Yeux, cut a mysterious figure, hair brushed over her face as if she would have liked to disappear behind the force of her devastating baritone. She almost did. My soul is still recovering.

Lauryn Hill May 11, Carnegie of Homestead Music Hall It was her first time back in Pittsburgh since 1999, and fans were ready — if also apprehensive, since Hill caused some controversy by showing up hours late for earlier shows on that tour. She was a little late, but she was also pretty much perfect, so no one seemed to mind.

Vanilla Poppers Aug. 20, Cattivo With blistering vocals and irresistibly energetic tunes, the set these Cleveland punks played at Skull Fest won me over for life.

Angel Olsen Sept. 12, Mr. Smalls Theatre Everyone loved My Woman, and rightly so, but no recording can capture the pure vocal power that Olsen brings to her live shows. Also, two different (minor) fights broke out during her set — one of which involved a woman kicking some bro-y guy in the back of the knee when he wouldn’t stop talking.

What a night!

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Top 5 things musicians said to me in 2016 that might sound crazy at first, but ring true the more you think about them

BY MIKE SHANLEY “My work always has these kinds of ideas about art being able to imply, implicate and condition change in our society. That change is a purely spiritual one that has to be actualized by individuals who will take the opportunity to understand themselves through art in order to have this chance to do it.

Art is a less divisive practice than religion and, let’s say, work ethic and things like that. It allows you to find the better part of yourself and let that better part of yourself become a motivation to change our society to what we’d like it to be.”

— TRUMPETER WADADA LEO SMITH {CP PHOTO BY LUKE THOR TRAVIS}

Idasa Tariq

Favorite quotes from interviews, 2016

BY ALEX GORDON “All music should be folk music. If it’s not true to the origins of your forbearers, then go be a used-car salesman.” — DAVID THOMAS, PERE UBU “That’s sort of like doing the ‘YMCA’ and ‘Hava Nagila’ in the same dance.”

“… Older dude in his late 30s trying to be cool at the ’80s wine bar, watching Live Aid on TV. That’s kind of silly, but it’s kind of a misconjuring of an era, which I think is how memories work.”

— GUITARIST DAN BEJAR OF DESTROYER, INVENTING A NEW VERB AS HE DESCRIBES THE MOOD OF THE BAND’S ALBUM KAPUTT

“In the ’50s and ’60s, we did a lot if things, and [Sun Ra] said, ‘With this music, they’ll understand what I’m talking about in the 21st century.’ And I thought, ‘Damn, I gotta wait a long time! It’ll be a long time before they get to understand.’ Now they do.”

— MARSHALL ALLEN, LEADER AND SAXOPHONIST OF THE SUN RA ARKESTRA, ON THE FORWARD VISION OF HIS LATE BOSS

— HENRY SHAPIRO, CANTOR AT PARKWAY JEWISH CENTER

“I don’t look like a tourist, but I don’t look like I belong a lot of times.”

— IDASA TARIQ

“I blow the saxophone as a vocalist. I tell a story. ‘I Left My Heart in San Francisco’ does not have a trumpet solo, a piano solo and a bass solo. It would ruin the whole thing. It’s a message, a short story. You want a novel, you listen to John Coltrane!”

— ALTO SAXOPHONIST RICHIE COLE

“There’s a certain amount of manpower that you need to put an album together, that somebody like Beck, who can play instruments and knows about what kind of compressors to use — Beyoncé doesn’t care about that. She uses other people to do that, but she does the important thing, which is pick what she’s gonna do. I think a lot of people are working in that way now and I don’t have a problem with it.” — ANDREW WYATT, MIIKE SNOW “Just because I think fancy restaurants and drinking are disgusting doesn’t mean everybody has to.” — DAVE ROSENSTRAUS, S.L.I.P.

“Jazz is a big spectrum and there’s a lot of jazz in it. We might be playing different kinds of music than a traditional jazz, but that’s something we can also do. We’re educated in tradition of jazz but we don’t have to be stuck in it. There are people in jazz who understand that. People like Ornette Coleman. Sun Ra. People like Cecil Taylor, the Art Ensemble of Chicago. We understand a quality of the music, to try and keep it on a certain level. But at the same time, we try to push it forward. Otherwise, it’s just redundant.

What we hate, what we detest, we try to run from, is to be put in little boxes.

— TENOR SAXOPHONIST DAVID MURRAY

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ine V I P. M e M r o l o YEAR. Be a C d ay !

FO R A FU LL FE E g s to N O S TU D IO an d st ar t yo u r sa vi n S ig n u p n o w

New Year’s Eve [’80S NIGHT] + THU., DEC. 29 For the loyal fans of the weekly ’80s dance night at Belvedere’s Ultra-Dive, tonight marks the end of an era. This is certainly a sad “See you later,” as DJ hatesyou 2.0 (who will still be DJing other varieties of dance nights at the venue in 2017) has been a master of blending hits with deep cuts to satisfy any fanatic of the neon decade.

She also knows how to bring a room of varied personalities together with a welltimed appearance of “Thriller.” See you there; I’ll be the person going absolutely bonkers to The Pixies’ “Debaser.”

Meg Fair 4026 Butler St., Lawrenceville. $5. 412-687-2555 or www.belvederes ultradive.com

[PARTY] + SAT., DEC. 31 It’s an all-night affair at Spirit starting at 6 p.m. with a VIP NYE buffet, Frank Sinatra impersonator (Charlie Stayduhar) and fancy cocktails.

Beauty But the party really Slap starts at 8 p.m. with music taking over both levels of the venue. The Detour Takeover featuring Alex Price, Naeem and Gusto Keeb$ will fill the Lodge and your heart with the EDM you need, paired with visuals courtesy of Ben Tabas.

Upstairs, the Hall gig features The Paul Keys Band, Beauty Slap, SMI and more. For the midnight celebration, “Sinatra” and the Spirit Rockettes will kick the crowd into 2017 with class. MF 6 p.m. 242 51st St., Lawrenceville. $20-35. 412-586-4441 or www.spiritpgh.com

[PUNK] + SAT., DEC. 31 This past year was a disaster, and 2017 is looking like it might be on the same track unless we do some major leaning in and standing up (or desperate spin kicking). Give 2016 the kiss-off it deserves with Rock Against Trump, a

NEWS

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benefit for Standing Rock at The Shop. Protest with punk acts Eyeroll, Alement, Interloper and Peace Talks, whose brash sound anchors this gig. Throw up your middle fingers at the terrible year with a good old-fashioned circle pit. MF 7:30 p.m. 4214 Main St., Bloomfield. $5. All ages. 412-951-0622

[GLOBAL DANCE] + SAT., DEC. 31 If you’re looking to dance the night away and start the new year with gusto and good grub, Umami is hosting a New {CP PHOTO BY Year’s Eve party BILL O’DRISCOLL} complete with hors d’oeuvres from Chef Roger Li, a midnight champagne toast (likely not the bottom-shelf stuff you were going to buy for yourself) and drink tickets to make your spirit bright.

Maestros will be spinning an array of global dance music, while Edgar Um and Preslav Lefterov team up to spin hip hop, future funk, disco and dancehall, all of which is sure to get blood pumping and the positivity flowing. MF 10 p.m.

202 38th St., Lawrenceville. $40. 412-224-2354 or www.umamipgh.com

[ROCK] + TUE., JAN. 03 Kick January off right with a good ol’ rock gig.

Devon Goods makes music that’s emotive and honest. The New Jersey-based group blends the sensibilities of indie math icons like Minus the Bear with the paradoxical gritty gentleness of newer Joyce Manor and the storytelling of early Modest Mouse. Catch the clever tuneage at Black Forge Coffee House with an array of local talent, including Portrait People, Same and Distant Futures. MF 6:30 p.m. 1206 Arlington Ave., Allentown. $5. All ages. 412-291-8994 or www.blackforgecoffee.com

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TO SUBMIT A LISTING: HTTP://PGHCITYPAPER.COM/HAPPENINGS

ENCORE!

412.316.3388 (FAX) + 412.316.3342 X165 (PHONE) {ALL LISTINGS MUST BE SUBMITTED BY 9 A.M. FRIDAY PRIOR TO PUBLICATION}

Relive some of our favorite concert photos of the year

Mac Miller

ROCK/POP

DJS

THU 29

THU 29

CLUB CAFE. The Reckoning: The Music of REM. South Side.

412-431-4950.

HOWLERS. Nik & The Central Plains w/ Paul Luc. Bloomfield.

412-682-0320.

JAMES STREET GASTROPUB & SPEAKEASY. Chillent: Chanukah Show!

North Side. 412-904-3335.

JERGEL’S RHYTHM GRILLE. The Verve Pipe. Warrendale.

724-799-8333.

REX THEATER. Cabinet w/ Billy Strings. South Side.

412-381-6811.

BELVEDERE’S. DJ hates you 2.0 & DJ killjoy. NeoN 80s Night. Lawrenceville.

412-687-2555.

MR. SMALLS THEATER. Centrifuge Thursdays.

At the Funhouse. Millvale.

412-821-4447.

PERLE CHAMPAGNE BAR. Bobby D Bachata. Downtown.

412-471-2058.

FRI 30 Salt-N-Pepa

Steely Dan

BUTLER ART CENTER. String Machine. Butler.

724-283-6922.

CLUB CAFE. Nina Sainato & Eric Granata. South Side.

412-431-4950.

HOWLERS. Karaokw.

Bloomfield. 412-682-0320.

MOONDOG’S. 13 Saints w/ Those Gorgeous Bastards.

Blawnox. 412-828-2040.

REX THEATER. Cabinet w/ Billy Strings. South Side.

412-381-6811.

STAGE AE. Lotus w/ RJD2.

North Side. 412-229-5483.

FRI 30 ANDYS WINE BAR. DJ Malls Spins Vinyl. Downtown.

412-773-8884.

THE FLATS ON CARSON. Pete Butta. South Side.

412-586-7644.

ONE 10 LOUNGE. DJ Goodnight, DJ Rojo.

Downtown. 412-874-4582.

ROWDY BUCK. Top 40 Dance. South Side.

412-431-2825.

RUGGER’S PUB. 80s Night w/ DJ Connor. South Side.

412-381-1330.

STAGE AE. Lotus w/ RJD2.

North Side. 412-229-5483.

SAT 31

Wiz Khalifa

Snoop Dogg See more concert photos by our photo intern Luke Thor Travis at www.pghcitypaper.com > Watch + Listen > Slideshows

18

MON 02

THE GOLDMARK. Pete Butta.

Reggae & dancehall. Lawrenceville.

412-688-8820.

HAMBONE’S. Ian Kane, Ronnie Weiss & Tom Boyce. Jazz Standards, showtunes & blues.

Lawrenceville. 412-681-4318.

WED 04

SMILING MOOSE. Rock Star BELVEDERE’S. Karaoke w/ T-MONEY. Down N Derby.

South Side. 412-431-4668.

Lawrenceville.

SPOON. Spoon Fed. 412-687-2555.

East Liberty.

DIESEL. DJ CK. South 412-362-6001.

Side. 412-431-8800. . w w w MIXTAPE. paper pghcitym DJ Antithesis. .co ‘The 1990s (& a bag of chips)’ dance party.

Garfield. 412-661-1727.

1LIVE STUDIO. DJ Goodnight: ROWDY BUCK. Open Elements. Avalon.

Top 40 Dance. South Side.

412-424-9254.

412-431-2825.

STAGE AE. Lotus w/ Pigeons Playing Ping Pong. North Side.

1LIVE STUDIO. DJ Goodnight: 412-229-5483.

Open Elements. Avalon.

412-424-9254.

FULL LIST ONLINE

HIP HOP/ R&B

FRI 30

SAT 31

SUN 01

THE FLATS ON CARSON. Pete Butta. South Side.

412-586-7644.

EARLY WARNINGS

SAT 31 BALTIMORE HOUSE. Artistry. Pleasant Hills.

412-653-3800.

HOWLERS. Dumplings, Fangs of the Panda, Hi-Pony, The Lopez, Trash Bag. Bloomfield. 412-682-0320.

JERGEL’S RHYTHM GRILLE. Totally 80s. Warrendale.

724-799-8333.

MOONDOG’S. Norman Nardini. Blawnox.

412-828-2040.

OAKS THEATER. Jumpin’ Jack Flash. Oakmont.

412-828-6322.

SMILING MOOSE. Pop Punk Night. South Side.

412-439-5706.

STAGE AE. Lotus w/ Pigeons Playing Ping Pong.

North Side. 412-229-5483.

TUE 03

{WED., MARCH 15}

Agent Orange Hard Rock Café, 230 W. Station Square Drive, Station Square

ANDORA RESTAURANT FOX CHAPEL. Pianist Harry Cardillo & vocalist Charlie Sanders. Fox Chapel.

412-967-1900.

EASE MODERN COMFORT CUISINE. Ronni Weiss & Tom Boyce.

Regent Square. 412-871-3440.

GRILLE ON SEVENTH. Tony Campbell & Howie Alexander.

Downtown. 412-391-1004.

JAMES STREET GASTROPUB & SPEAKEASY. Join Max Leake, Paul Thompson, Tom Wendt & Ken Karsh. speakeasy.

The Commonheart. ballroom.

North Side. 412-904-3335.

SAT 31

WED 04

Carnegie Music Hall, 4400 Forbes Ave., Oakland {SAT., APRIL 04}

SUN 01

PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

Bryan Ferry Heinz Hall, 600 Penn Ave., Downtown

THE SOUTH SIDE BBQ RESTAURANT. Tony Germaine, singer/guitarist. South Side.

412-381-4566.

SAT 31 AMERICAN LEGION POST 496. Moose Tracks, Bill Couch.

Sheraden. 412-331-0341.

SUN 01

WED 04

JAMES STREET GASTROPUB & SPEAKEASY. Roger Humphries Jam Session. Ballroom. North Side.

412-904-3335.

TABLE 86 BY HINES WARD. RML Jazz. Mars. 412-370-9621.

VALLOZZI’S PITTSBURGH. Eric Johnson. Downtown.

412-394-3400.

{SAT., MARCH 25}

JAMES STREET GASTROPUB & SPEAKEASY. The Hannas, Sam Pelligrino, Portrait People, Time of Peace.

North Side. 412-904-3335.

KEYSTONE BAR. The Bo’Hog Brothers. Sewickley. 724-758-4217.

FRI 30

THU 29

THE R BAR. Billy The Kid and the Regulators. Dormont.

412-942-0882.

Bang on a Can

DOWNEY’S HOUSE. Aaron from The Lava Game.

Robinson. 412-489-5631.

JAZZ

JAMES STREET GASTROPUB & SPEAKEASY. Tony Campbell Saturday Afternoon Jazz Session.

North Side. 412-904-3335.

THE MONROEVILLE RACQUET CLUB. Jazz Bean Live.

Every Saturday, a different band.

Monroeville. 412-728-4155.

SUN 01

THU 29

HAMBONE’S. Calliope Old Time Appalachian Jam. Lawrenceville.

412-681-4318.

FRI 30

Bang on a Can

ACOUSTIC

ROCKS LANDING BAR & GRILLE. Tony Campbell & the Jazz Surgery. McKees Rocks.

412-857-5809.

ALLEGHENY ELKS LODGE #339. Pittsburgh Banjo Club.

Wednesdays. North Side.

412-321-1834.

PARK HOUSE. Shelf Life String Band. North Side. 412-224-2273.

WORLD FRI 30 CHILDREN’S MUSEUM OF PITTSBURGH. Ishtar Band.

North Side. 412-322-5058.

REGGAE THU 29 PIRATA. The Flow Band.

Downtown. 412-323-3000.

FRI 30 CAPRI PIZZA AND BAR. Bombo Claat w/ VYBZ Machine Intl Sound System. East Liberty. 412-362-1250.

COUNTRY SAT 31 RINKY DINKS ROADHOUSE. Big Guns Reunion w/ Ruff Creek & The Majors. Washington.

724-228-1059.

OTHER MUSIC THU 29 LINDEN GROVE. Karaoke.

Castle Shannon. 412-882-8687.

MR. SMALLS THEATER. Cello Fury. At the Funhouse.

Millvale. 412-821-4447.

FRI 30 LINDEN GROVE. Dancing Queen. Castle Shannon.

412-882-8687.

PAID ADVERTORIAL SPONSORED BY

What to do IN PITTSBURGH

Dec 28 - Jan 3 WEDNESDAY 28 Southside American

River Oaks (Shane Told of Silverstein) SMILING MOOSE South Side.

412-431-4668. With special guests Mark Rose & August Winters. All ages show.

Tickets: ticketfly.com or 1-877-4-FLY-TIX. 7p.m.

THURSDAY 29 Cirque Dreams Holidaze

BENEDUM CENTER Downtown. 412-456-6666.

Tickets: trustarts.org.

Through Dec. 30.

Reckoning CLUB CAFE South Side.

412-431-4950. Over 21 show.

Tickets: ticketweb.com/ opusone. 8p.m.

NEWS

REX THEATER South Side.

412-381-6811. With special guest Billy Strings.

Over 21 show.

Tickets: greyareaprod.com.

Through Dec. 30.

Drake Night NYE

WINTER LIGHT GARDEN COLOR WALK AT PHIPPS’ WINTER FLOWER SHOW AND LIGHT GARDEN

CATTIVO Lawrenceville.

412-687-2157.

With special guest DJ ADMC. Over 21 event. Tickets available at the door. 9p.m.

PHOTO CREDIT: PAUL G. WIEGMAN

CLUB CAFE South Side.

412-431-4950. With special guests Demos Papadimas & Jeremy Colbert. Over 21 show.

Tickets: ticketweb.com/ opusone. 8p.m.

Cabinet

Pittsburgh Improv Jam CABARET AT THEATER SQUARE Downtown.

412-456-6666. Over 21 show.

Tickets available at the door.

10p.m.

FRIDAY 30 305

Comedy Roulette: Comedy Debate CLUB CAFE South Side.

412-431-4950. With special guest John Dick Winters.

Over 21 show. Tickets: ticketweb.com/opusone.

10:30p.m.

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SMILING MOOSE South Side.

412-431-4668. With special guest DJ Adam. Over 21 event. Free admission. 9p.m.

MONDAY 2

Winter Flower Show and Light Garden

Nina Sainato

CLUB CAFE South Side.

412-431-4950. With special guest Eric Granata.

Over 21 show.

Tickets: ticketweb.com/ opusone. 7p.m.

Pop Punk NYE Party

PHIPPS CONSERVATORY Oakland. Tickets: phipps. conservatory.org.

Through Jan. 8.

Lotus

Pittsburgh

STAGE AE North Side.

All ages show.

Tickets: ticketmaster.com or 1-800-745-3000. Doors open at 7p.m. Through Dec. 31.

CULTURAL DISTRICT Downtown. 412-456-6666.

All ages event.

For info & schedules visit trustarts.org/firstnightpgh.

SATURDAY 31

Mikey & Bob Kiss 2016 Goodbye

Highmark First Night

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RIVERS CASINO North Side.

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412-231-7777. Over 21 event.

Tickets: riverscasino.com.

9p.m.

Saved by the 90’s “X Official NYE Party” REX THEATER South Side.

412-381-6811. Over 21 event.

Tickets: ticketfly.com or 1-877-4-FLY-TIX. 9p.m.

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TUESDAY 3

Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time HEINZ HALL Downtown.

412-456-6666.

Tickets: trustarts.org.

Through Jan. 8.

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[YEAR IN REVIEW: STAGE]

WE HAVE AN APT HISTORICAL MOMENT

ALL TOGETHER {BY MICHELLE PILECKI}

[ART REVIEW]

ART /

SCHOOL {BY CHARLES ROSENBLUM} Seven Guitars at Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Co. {PHOTO COURTESY OF GAIL MANKER}

At its heart, theater is about confrontation: the one-on-one (sometimes just one person confronting him- or herself). But there is a special art in cooperation, the many various conflicts woven into a fabric: the ensemble. A balanced group working together with everyone given a challenge and a chance in the spotlight. In no particular order, here are Pittsburgh’s notable ensembles of 2016.

Practically the definition of an “all-star” production, Kinetic Theatre Co.’s Three Days in the Country choreographed 13 disparate characters in duos, trios and crowds for this philosophical comedy.

Playwright Patrick Marber’s 2015 hit version of Ivan Turgenev’s A Month in the Country bounced under the direction of Andrew S. Paul, Kinetic’s producing artistic director.

Also indulging new takes on the classics, Cup-A-Jo Productions pulled out all the stops (teaming with Studio SixTHreeFouR) for Shakespeare’s sprawling Titus Andronicus, and sparkled with the more intimate Chekhovian The Sisters. Cup-a-Jo founder Joanne Lowe directed both her original adaptation of the Bard and Richard Alfieri’s 1995 version of Three Sisters, with updates and in non-standard spaces, respectively, a Highland Park backyard and the Lincoln Gallery of the Andrew Carnegie Free Library and Music Hall.

August Wilson’s Seven Guitars (1996) is already a classic, but Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Co. and artistic director Mark Clayton Southers enhanced the perfectly balanced seven-member ensemble with a thrilling ambience in the backyard of Wilson’s childhood home.

It was the Hill District in 1948 for sure, complete with real chickens.

Director Lundeana M. Thomas successfully stretched The New Horizon Theater’s resources, including its small cast, for an intimate production of Ifa Bayeza’s The Ballad of Emmett Till, a dream-like 2008 musical re-imagining of an historic event. Although I cannot name each actor in each show for space reasons, I must note that Jonathan Berry excelled in both Till (portraying several versions of the 14-year-old martyr) and in the aforementioned Guitars.

Throughline Theatre Co. Artistic Director Liam Macik evened out Abby Mann’s 2001 stage version of his star-heavy 1957 film Judgment at Nuremberg by double-, even triple-casting many roles, sometimes cross-gender. For The Summer Company, director John E. Lane Jr. similarly multi-cast the 10 “supporting” actors into more than 50 characters behind the five “leads” of Christopher Durang’s 1976 comedy, A History of the American Film.

A

RTS EDUCATION is very much in contention these days. Advocates insist that the drive to emphasize science, technology, engineering and math must also add an A for arts, if youngsters are to be educated suitably. STEM must become STEAM. Yet amid rampant education de-funding, detractors perceive visual art as extraneous and mark it the first thing to go. So we have an apt historical moment for the show The Gift of Art, at the Heinz History Center. What is the utility of visual art in schools?

This is a centennial celebration of a practice inaugurated in 1916 by One Hundred Friends of Pittsburgh Art, a subgroup of the Associated Artists of Pittsburgh. The Friends donate funds to buy works from AAP’s yearly show and give them to city schools.

Absent any record of an articulated approach to the curriculum of the time, it now seems a bit quaint to think that simply exposing students to works of art will be beneficial. Indeed, the curatorial stance of The Gift of Art is to engage actively with pedagogical approaches through which art can teach.

The exhibit is divided into eight sections that largely pose thematic prompts about works of art.

“Who Am I?” underscores the medium’s capacity to express identity. Ruth Richardson’s “Children Waiting” (1980), with two small African-American children standing tentatively outside a room

INFO@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

Samuel Rosenberg’s 1941 painting “Rest”

full of school administrators, provides a continuingly relevant rumination on race and school politics.

By contrast, Roy Hilton’s “The New Dress” (1934) is more gently dappled and spatially rendered. But its strength, as in Richardson’s work, is a study in personal resourcefulness and challenge.

THE GIFT OF ART continues through June. Heinz History Center, 1212 Smallman St., Strip District. 412-454-6000 or www.heinzhistorycenter.org

Unexpectedly, “A Sense of Place” is one of the weaker sections. Usually, you can’t go wrong with Pittsburgh landscapes (no other places need apply). But Abe

Weiner’s “Back of Isaly’s” appears muddied rather than fresh. Meanwhile, out in the History Center atrium, Doug Cooper’s multi-story Pittsburgh mural hangs permanently; this 20-year-old work is still fresh and still teaches lessons about place and art-making, perhaps better than the works in this exhibit.

Questions of quality, skill or reputation do not really enter into this show, which is fair enough, because that is not part of its expressed mission (and the presumption is that One Hundred Friends of Pittsburgh Art, who remain active, were doing their own curating as they went along).

The result, though, is that while a few works seem like slightly underachieving examples of a type, others are real showstealers that don’t quite receive their due in presentation.

Then there are the missing works.

During a century of inconsistent oversight, many pieces walked out the door.

Nearly 200 of them are reproduced in groups on 9-by-12-inch cards, with the milk-carton-like plea in the museum text.

Have you seen me?

A canvas by iconic steel-mill impressionist Aaron Harry Gorson disappeared at some point — into the auction house maybe, given the value of his other works?

Wall text explains that the Pittsburgh City Schools have offered amnesty, and they have received more than 500 returns as a result. Some handful of these stories themselves could make for a show, or some kind of online presence for the ongoing project of recovery.

In a city full of art museums, The Gift of Art does seem like a good fit for for the History Center, given the focus on Pittsburgh’s artists and schools. And the curatorial approach seems suitable for a general audience that will wander in after seeing other History Center exhibits on unrelated topics.

But its more specialized subtopics give this exhibit an additional appeal that could be emphasized even more without compromising its core mission.

A GAME FELLOW {BY TED HOOVER}

INFO@ PGHC ITY PAP ER.CO M

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MUSIC

It was said that people voted for George W. Bush because he seemed like the kind of guy you could sit down and have a beer with. By that metric alone, Rocky Bleier should be voted Emperor of the Known Universe.

Bleier is currently on stage at the Pittsburgh Public Theater in a one-man show called The Play, and it’s difficult to imagine a more engaging, comfortable presence than Bleier’s. The evening is very much like hanging out at your favorite bar, while one of the locals spins out several entertaining yarns about his life.

Most Pittsburghers are probably well aware of the man’s highlights: Born and raised in Wisconsin, Bleier lived above the family bar and came to national attention as captain of Notre Dame’s football team. In 1968, Bleier got drafted twice: first as running back for the Pittsburgh Steelers and then into the U.S. Army during the Vietnam war. It was during that second conflict that Bleier was seriously wounded in a grenade attack, and his ability to walk, let alone play ball, was in grave doubt.

But through sheer grit and determination he fought back and became part of the championship 1970s Steelers team. Since his retirement, he’s focused on business and become an outspoken advocate for military personnel and veterans.

Gene Collier, writer of the Art Rooney bio-play The Chief and well-known Pittsburgh sports columnist, takes what could have been your standard “and then I did this, and then I did this” sort of play and has crafted a script informed with a refreshing intelligence, non-linear structure and welcomed restraint. It’s only toward the end that Collier (and Bleier) indulge in crowd-pleasing sentimentality — my least favorite part of the evening —but they’ve built up so much goodwill maybe they’re allowed to. And besides, the audience ate it up!

Bleier projects such an easy-going, thoroughly nice persona it’s hard not to be enchanted. (He’s like a less fanciful Garrison Keeler.) He’s cheerfully self-deprecating, gracious to a fault, and packing just enough Midwestern common sense to keep the evening from becoming either precious or ponderous.

Bleier’s a storyteller more than an actor, so a big hand goes to director Scott Wise for shaping this performance (and evening) without any needless flourish and helping Bleier put the most theatrically entertaining Bleier on stage.

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BA S E D O N T H E BEST-SELLING NOVEL BY

MARK HADDON D I R E C T E D

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MARIANNE ELLIOTT

JANUARY 3-8 • HEINZ HALL

TRUSTARTS.ORG • BOX OFFICE AT THEATER SQUARE

412-392-4900 • GROUPS 10+ TICKETS 412-471-6930

THE PLAY continues through Jan. 7.

Pittsburgh Public Theater, 621 Penn Ave., Downtown. $15.75-75. 412-316-1600 or www.ppt.org ARTS

BY

SIMON STEPHENS

INFO@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

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N EW P LAY

PHOTO OF LUKE TREADAWAY BY HUGO GLENDINNING

QUESTIONS OF QUALITY, SKILL OR REPUTATION DO NOT REALLY ENTER INTO THIS SHOW.

[PLAY REVIEW]

Rocky Bleier in The Play at Pittsburgh Public Theater {PHOTO COURTESY OF PITTSBURGH PUBLIC THEATER}

Samuel Rosenberg’s “Rest” (1941) and Russell Twiggs’ “Mosaic #1” (1951) are, in diverging ways, especially strong works by textbook Pittsburgh masters. It’s almost as though the artistic greats constitute their own unlabeled show that you have to find yourself. It’s a fun exercise.

Indeed, other components of the exhibition would be compelling shows on their own. In a screening room at the Center, a slide show runs through more works from the collection. These include an additional order of paintings, with more of an emphasis on abstract work. Robert Paul Karlen’s “A Pattern of Restless” (1943) is a particularly provocative piece of hardedged abstraction at the edge of dreamlike surrealism. But it clicks by so quickly, and you have to wait several minutes for it to come around again. (Buying the catalogue partially alleviates this problem.)

Still, supplementing the wall-hangings with slides seems like a reasonable compromise: The larger and more typical audience is going to get more out of the big introductory-level show, which has its own structuring logic.

PNC BROADWAY IN PITTSBURGH IS A PRESENTATION OF THE PITTSBURGH CULTURAL TRUST, PITTSBURGH SYMPHONY AND BROADWAY ACROSS AMERICA.

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[YEAR IN REVIEW: DANCE]

[YEAR IN REVIEW: ART]

TRANSPORTATION

ART IN ACTION

{BY STEVE SUCATO}

{BY NADINE WASSERMAN} THERE ARE COUNTLESS ways to vilify 2016.

Installation view of Andy Warhol | Ai Weiwei at The Andy Warhol Museum

The optimism that motivates this renewed commitment to design in service of the public good also existed during a period in Brazil that inspired architects like Oscar Niemeyer and artists like Hélio Oiticica, prior to the 1964 military coup. Considered to be one of the most important Brazilian artists of the 20th century, his work in Hélio Oiticica: To Organize Delirium, at

[YEAR IN REVIEW: BOOKS]

PAGE-TURNERS {BY BILL O’DRISCOLL} Some notable releases by local authors that City Paper covered in 2016: We Show What We Have Learned (Lookout Books). From Paste to Publishers Weekly, Clare Beams drew glowing reviews for her debut story collection, whose characters operated in settings from plague-ravaged Europe to a secretive all-girls boarding school. Kirkus placed the collection on its list of best debut fiction, and no less than Joyce Carol Oates called Beams “[a] female/feminist voice for the 21st century.”

Swallows and Waves (Sarabande Books). The 60 poems in Paula Bohince’s widely praised new collection were all inspired by paintings and prints from Japan’s Edo period.

Why Are They Angry With Us?: Essays on Race (Lyceum Books). Larry E. Davis, a nationally recognized scholar on race relations, wants to help Americans talk more openly about race. The dean and founding director of the University of Pittsburgh’s Center of Race and Social Problems asks, “Why can’t black people claim Irish roots too?” and explores social media’s effects on racial equality, and the problems with comparing black Americans to immigrants.

Whiskey, Etc. (Queen’s Ferry Press).

Widely anthologized author Sherrie Flick’s

debut collection of short-short stories (57 in 207 pages) centers on themes of love and loss, and (said CP reviewer Fred Shaw), often “linger[s] on food and drink in evocative ways.”

World of Wakanda (Marvel Comics).

This spinoff from the iconic Black Panther series is co-written by poet and educator Yona Harvey. Harvey and Roxanne Gay got national press as the first African-American women ever to write for Marvel.

City of Secrets (Penguin Random House). The prolific Stewart O’Nan’s latest novel follows a Holocaust survivor working as a cabbie in Britishoccupied post-World War II Jerusalem. Wrote CP reviewer Stuart Sheppard: “[B]y immersing the reader in the particularity of a few characters, [O’Nan] captures a rich sense of the space and time surrounding them.”

Hip Hop Family Tree Book 4 (Fantagraphics).

Ed Piskor’s painstakingly researched, multi-volume graphic history of hip-hop culture has made the cartoonist and writer a comics icon; Fantagraphics calls him its “biggest breakout star of this decade.”

However, Piskor told CP that Vol. 4 might be the last installment for a while.

The Imperial Wife (Thomas Dunne Books). Irina Reyn earned strong reviews for her second novel, which tells the parallel but intersecting stories of a contemporary specialist in Russian art and 18th-century empress Catherine the Great.

DRISCOLL@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

CMOA, shows his innovative efforts to turn viewers into participants both in the museum and on the streets.

Interactive work is now quite common in contemporary art and was part of the appeal of artist Richard Pell’s Artist of the Year exhibition, The Myth of the Great Outright Extraordinary!, at Pittsburgh Center for the Arts. Pell’s work explores the complex stories that both ordinary and extraordinary people and objects tell, particularly at the intersection of science, engineering and culture. By focusing on ambiguity, Pell compels us to prioritize questions over answers.

Questioning the dominant narrative and celebrating the sacred in ordinary lives is what local artist-activist Vanessa German is all about. Her beautiful show Introspective, at the August Wilson Center for African American Culture, combined her well-known assemblage power figures and Stop Shooting posters with ravishing Black Madonna icons painted on paper tissues and towels.

Also expressing difficult subjects, such as her personal struggle with illness, by way of beautiful objects, were pieces by Sarika Goulatia, shown in multiple venues throughout the year.

Environmental issues were addressed by the Re:New festival, a highlight being “Hull,” by Ian Brill. And the bees, bugs and landscapes on display in both All Around Us and Pastoral Noir, at Wood Street Galleries, reminded us that we are not alone on this earth.

In our current political climate, our identities, our health and our environment have become particularly contentious issues. But for those of us who remember the political and social upheavals of the mid-20th century, the Toys the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s show at the Heinz History Center was a nostalgic treat that reminded us of the importance of creativity, particularly in uncertain times.

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company’s Analogy/Dora: Tramontane {PHOTO COURTESY OF PAUL B. GOODE}

But let’s not dwell on it. Instead let’s celebrate artists who use their creativity as a form of activism.

The highest profile artist-activist to show this year was Ai Weiwei in Andy Warhol | Ai Weiwei, at The Andy Warhol Museum and the Carnegie Museum of Art. Despite scrutiny and persecution by the Chinese government, Ai expertly uses his art as well as social media as tools for dissent. While social media can be a font of misinformation (that can lead to someone shooting up a pizzeria, for instance), it has become an essential public forum.

But as a virtual space, social media can’t replace the need for physical spaces.

The exhibition Building Optimism: Public Space in South America, at the CMOA, focuses on architectural projects intended to improve the daily civic lives of people living in cities such as Medellín, Caracas and Rio de Janeiro.

In a year filled with fine dance programs, here are seven that transported audiences from their seats to places, times and worlds away.

Dada Masilo: Swan Lake (Byham Theater, Jan. 30). South African dancer/ choreographer Dada Masilo and company took the audience and the 139-year-old Swan Lake ballet to modern Africa for a re-envisioned and memorable version of the classic that touched on issues of sex, gender, homophobia and the scourge of AIDS. Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre: Le Corsaire (Benedum Center, April 15-17). Continuing its run of “large company” ballets, PBT scored big with Le Corsaire. The three-act pirate ballet sailed audiences to an actionpacked, humor-filled land of slave girls, slave-traders, a rich pasha, and enough nonstop virtuoso dancing to fill several ballets.

CorningWorks: Remains — A OneWoman Show (New Hazlett Theater, Sept. 7-11). Revisiting her acclaimed 2013 dance-theater production, dancer/ choreographer Beth Corning and Tonywinning physical-theater director Dominique Serrand reworked the one-woman show about loss, and what emotionally and tangibly remains, into an even more poignant and universally relatable journey.

Takao Kawaguchi: About Kazuo Ohno (Andy Warhol Museum, Oct. 13). For those who never got to see the late Butoh co-founder Kazuo Ohno perform, Japanese dance and physical-theater artist Takao Kawaguchi painstakingly recreated several of his landmark performances from the 1970s and ’80s in a controversial yet wonderfully enlightening tribute to the master.

Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company: Analogy/Dora: Tramontane (Byham Theater, Oct. 21 and 22). Based on a riveting oral history that artistic director/choreographer Bill T. Jones conducted with his 96-yearold French-Jewish mother-in-law, this masterful dance-theater work whisked audiences through stories of her harrowing experiences as a nurse/social worker during World War II. STAYCEE PEARL dance project: Flowerz (Ace Hotel, Nov. 10 and 11). Choreographer Staycee Pearl and DJ/sound engineer Herman “Soy Sos” Pearl took audiences back in time to the ’90s New York club scene with Flowerz. Set to house music, the 50-minute contemporary dance work was a pulsating blast from the not-so-distant past.

Conservatory Dance Company: Ballet Off Center (Pittsburgh Playhouse, Dec. 2-11).

The Point Park University student troupe’s year-end repertory program featured several stirring contemporary ballets, none more so than choreographer Alexandra Damiani’s “Portrait de Femmes.”

The adroitly danced piece transported audiences to a surreal psychosexual world and left them spellbound.

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FOR THE WEEK OF

FreeEvent

12.29.16-01.05.17 Full events listed online at www.pghcitypaper.com

Terry Jones had a confusing childhood.

Not confusing for him; others just weren’t sure what to make of a black comic-book nerd who liked hip hop.

“I lived in the suburb of Penn Hills, but because my parents worked, I went to school in Garfield so I could go to my grandmother’s after school,” Jones tells City Paper. “So in the suburbs I’d hear racial slurs because I was black, but in the hood I’d get bullied because I wasn’t black enough. …

“One time I was playing the Star Wars Trilogy on my Game Gear and black people would make fun of me and yell shit like, ‘Black people don’t like Star Wars!’ Then, once, a white friend had some Brett Hull hockey cards, and I loved hockey and he was like, ‘You don’t know who Brett Hull is, you guys like basketball.’

So I kind of floated between both worlds, in limbo.”

Jones’ new comedy record, Limbo Negro, was recorded at the Pittsburgh Improv, in August. The Duquense University grad riffs, for instance, on that school’s lack of racial diversity. He imagines himself as the last raisin in a bowl of Raisin Bran: “Hopefully I’ll run into another raisin; nope, more milk.”

While a video download offered a deluxe version of Limbo Negro, Jones envisioned a classic comedy album like the ones he grew up on. Living incompletely in two worlds had Jones feeling what he now knows was depression. However, a Bill Cosby album “changed my life.”

“My three favorite comedians were Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy and Bill Hicks,” he says. “There was something about listening to those records and visualiz[ing] the guy on stage. It’s a difficult art to paint a picture with words and that’s what I’m trying to do here.”

For its online release, the video version of Limbo Negro will be streamed for free 7 p.m.-midnight Thu., Dec. 29, at www.epicastnetwork.com. At midnight, the album and its audio/video version go on sale on Itunes, Amazon, Bandcamp, GooglePlay, Spotify and Tidal. www.TeamTerry.Tv

{PHOTO COURTESY OF PAUL G. WIEGMAN}

^ Sat., Dec. 31: New Year’s Eve Family Celebration

thursday 12.29 PARTY The Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh is providing multiple options for marking the final few days of 2017. Today, from 1-2 p.m., sample New Year’s foods from all over the world, with Fresh Picks: New Year’s Traditions. Tomorrow, at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., enjoy short sets by the Ishtar Band, which interprets traditional Middle Eastern and Mediterranean music (and d employs a belly-dancer). And at 11:30 30 a.m.

Sat., Dec. 31, experience Pittsburgh’s earliest New Year’s party: Countdown to Noon! n!

The bedtime-friendly shindig dig lets you craft party blowers rs and party hats, and at noon features atures live music by Lee Robinson’s n’s jazz quartet. Bill O’Driscoll oll 10 Children’s Way, North Side.

Free with museum admission ion ($14-16; free for kids under er 2). www.pittsburghkids.org

even by 1900, the Yuletide industry was just coming into its own. Perhaps Pittsburgh’s best-preserved material record of this time is Clayton, home of tycoon Henry Clay Frick and family, and part of The Frick Pittsburgh. Through Jan. 8, the entire site in North Point Breeze (including the Frick Art Museum and café) continues its annual Holidays at the Frick programming, with expanded Friday hours until 9 p.m., plus strolling carolers, a holiday bar and carol more. At the museum, museum sample the exhibit The Frick Collects: From Rubens to Monet. A tour R of Clayton, meanwhile, meanwhi features a display of archival photographs photograph and documents revealing how one notably affluent family marked a the holiday. This year’s exhibit focuses on y Victorian toys and a the period’s evolving gift-giving traditions.

(Reservations tra are strongly recommended for stro the tour.)

BO 10 a.m.-9 p.m. to 7227 Reynolds St., North Point Breeze.

Breez $6-12. 412-371-0600 or www.thefrickpittsburgh.org www

PARTY PART

friday 12.30 EXHIBIT Christmas didn’t start to get et commercialized until the mid-1800s, id 1800 and d

BY CHARLIE DEITCH

^ Fri., Dec. 30: Down N Derby

Down N Derby doesn’t stop for New Year’s Eve Eve. In fact, monthly roller-skating disco party the monthl at Belvedere’s Ultra-Dive has actually l d CONTINUES ON PG. 24

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SHORT LIST, CONTINUED FROM PG. 23

^ Mon., Jan. 2: MessFest

{PHOTO COURTESY OF JASON COHN}

FESTIVAL Dividing time into discrete years is a pretty arbitrary practice, especially in a culture where the seasons barely affect people’s activities. But it does mean a good party every now and then. And on New Year’s Eve for the past 22 years, there’s been no bigger party here than Highmark First Night Pittsburgh.

The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust’s annual family-friendly, alcohol-free one-night festival takes over 14 Downtown blocks with more than 100 indoor and outdoor events, performances and activities, from live music, dance and comedy to visual art and dance lessons. It’s all for the price of a $10 First Night button (free for kids under 5), though some seated events require free vouchers, obtainable in advance.

The most seasonally apt First Night attraction might be the annual combination of fire and ice: ice-sculptors Ice Creations juxtaposed with fire-dance troupe Steel Town Fire (pictured). This year, the two team up on a fire-breathing dragon that’s sure to draw crowds. At 8 p.m., visitors will line Penn Avenue for the annual FedEx Ground Parade (think fire trucks, marching bands, giant puppets). A sample of what’s elsewhere: at the Byham Theater, three shows by touring magician David Lawrence; at the August Wilson Center, a silent disco with DJ Hatesyou, DJ Inception and DJ Jesley Snipes; and art shows at venues including Wood Street Galleries and SPACE. Most of the vouchered comedy shows are long sold out, but you can still check out dance performances by Unsuk Bellydance, Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre School and Reed Dance II; outdoor soul line-dancing sessions; and ballroom, swing and Latin rhythm dance classes from Arthur Murray. Or visit with best-selling children’s author Jonathan Auxier; try hands-on crafting; and stop by the hot-chocolate bar.

Perhaps most ubiquitously at the 23rd annual First Night, there’s live music, from bagpipes to jazz. Some of the featured acts include Jim Donovan & Sun King Warriors, with three vouchered shows at the Byham Theater; Johnny Angel and the Halos, with two vouchered sets at the Benedum Center; touring roots-rock duo ViRAGO; local pop-rock stalwarts Meeting of Important People; and Dr. Herbert Jones and the Heritage Gospel Chorale of Pittsburgh. The headliner is nationally acclaimed soul act the Nigel Hall Band, who’ll take the Highmark Stage at 10:45 and play till after the fireworks at midnight.

First Night buttons are available at the Box Office at Theater Square and participating Giant Eagles (where there’s a $1 discount with an Advantage Card).

BY BILL O’DRISCOLL

Sat., Dec. 31. 6 p.m.-midnight. Downtown. $10 (free for kids under 5). www.firstnightpgh.trustarts.org

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

been rescheduled from its usual Saturday slot this weekend to accommodate twice the revelry. The tunes at this 21-and-over event are spun by JX4 and Eyejay. Down N Derby will even rent you roller-skates. BO 9 a.m.-2 p.m.

4016 Butler St., Lawrenceville. $5-7 (skate rental is extra). RSVP by 7 p.m. today at www.downandderby.org.

saturday 12.31 PARTY If the Children’s Museum’s Countdown to Noon! is too early for you to celebrate tonight, and midnight is too late, try the New Year’s Eve Family Celebration at Phipps Conservatory. Phipps staff and volunteers will lead a program of games and activities for guests of all ages. But if it’s neither the earliest party nor the latest — the countdown is at 8:45 p.m. — it’s surely the one with the most green leaves and flowering plants around. BO 6-9 p.m.

1 Schenley Drive, Oakland. Free with regular admission ($11.95-17.95; free for kids under 2).

412-622-6914 or www. phipps.conservatory.org

monday 01.02 FESTIVAL

{PHOTO COURTESY OF CHILDREN’S MUSEUM OF PITTSBURGH}

^ Thu., Dec. 29: The Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh

Among local New Year’s traditions (at least the ones that happen after New Year’s Eve), none are slimier, or gooier, than MessFest. The 10th incarnation of this Carnegie Science Center attraction — moved from Jan. 1 this year because of Sunday’s Steelers game — is all about getting your hands on stuff you won’t necessarily be able to hold on to, including the ever-amorphrous Oobleck. Try your engineering skills at

^ Tue., Jan. 3: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

keeping raw eggs from a sticky end on the Egg Zipline; try finger-painting; compete in a pudding “pi”-eating contest; and see explosions and other messy demos in the Center’s three theaters. BO 10 a.m.-5 p.m. 1 Allegheny Ave., North Side. Free with museum admission ($11.95-19.95). 412-237-3400 or www.carnegiesciencecenter.org

tuesday 01.03 STAGE Simon Stephens’ 2012 play The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time was a U.K. smash that also wowed critics and audiences stateside. For starters, it won five 2015 Tony Awards, including Best Play. The show, based on Mark Haddon’s bestselling novel, concerns 15-yearold Christopher, a boy of high intelligence who has trouble processing everyday life (i.e., he’s likely somewhere on the autism spectrum). When he’s suspected of killing his neighbor’s dog, he sets out to find the real killer. ^ Fri., Dec. 30: Holidays at the Frick England’s National Theatre brings its North American tour of the show, courtesy of PNC Broadway in Pittsburgh, for eight performances at Heinz Hall starting tonight. The production is known for its multimedia staging; its director is Marianne Elliot, who also directed the memorable War Horse. BO 7:30 p.m. Continues through Jan. 8. 600 Penn Ave., Downtown. $26-77. 412-456-6666 or www.trustarts.org

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ON

THE BEEF BURGER PATTY WAS HEARTY, COOKED TO A BEAUTIFUL COLOR AND CRUST

BIG MEAT SANDWICHES {BY REBECCA ADDISON} Even in the winter, a trip to Dugout Deli can make you feel like you’re enjoying another day at the ballpark. The baseballthemed décor includes wall-to-wall murals of Pirates greats and fake ivy.

The newly opened deli fills a needed dining hole in Mount Washington, where the majority of options are diners and bars.

“The only other sandwich shop up here is the Subway, a traditional corporate deli,” says Shay Hard, the manager of Dugout Deli.

All of the meat is freshly sliced to order, and the selection includes Pittsburgh favorites like Isaly’s chipped ham. The sides are the usual deli offerings such as baked beans, coleslaw and potato salad.

“We give you a half-pound of meat on your sandwich, with a side and a pickle at a low price,” says Hard. “You’re not just getting a sandwich. You’re basically getting a whole meal.”

Hard says her favorite sandwiches come from the Dugout Favorites portion of the menu. The Fredo includes sopressata, spicy capicola, rosemary, ham, provolone, roasted red peppers, olive oil and oregano. And the Tony T. is made with spicy capicola, salami, mortadella, provolone, roasted red peppers and Italian dressing, all on a 9-inch Italian baguette.

So far the majority of customer feedback has come from those commenting about the ample meat in each sandwich.

“It’s better than having them tell us it’s not enough meat on there,” says Hard.

“Everyone has loved it.”

RNUTTALL@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

230 Virginia Ave., Mount Washington.

412-488-0200

the

FEED

Making and eating Hoppin’ John on New Year’s Day is supposed to bring good luck. Sort yours out now. It’s a simple dish of black-eyed peas and rice, to which you can add traditional flavorings (onion, bacon, salt) or whatever you want (such as assorted vegetable and meat leftovers). It’s hearty and nutritious, and we’re gonna need the luck.

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{CP PHOTO BY VANESSA SONG}

Jamison Farm lamb chops and gnudi, with fennel, leaks, sage, bacon, lamb sausage and pesto

TOP MARKET {BY ANGELIQUE BAMBERG + JASON ROTH}

T

HERE WAS a time when we’d have

expressed surprise that a scion of the Eat’n Park family had opened an upscale-casual grocery with attached restaurant and bar. But over the past decade, the Broadhursts’ growing portfolio of concepts, including Six Penn, The Porch and Hello Bistro, has made it clear that the local First Family of family dining is about more than smiley-face cookies and corporate catering.

Working on his own, Brooks Broadhurst has brought something distinctive to the Beverly Road micro-district in Mount Lebanon: a small gourmet grocery with butcher shop adjacent to a full-service restaurant.

And when we say “adjacent,” we don’t just mean side by side; the connected interiors are indicative of the closely intertwined goals of procuring and cooking good food.

In the shop, we spotted a number of our

PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

favorite ingredients from the specialty stores of the Strip District and other local purveyors, while the restaurant makes use of the same stock of carefully sourced meats, including Jamison Farms, sold a few feet away in the butcher shop.

BLOCK 292 292 Beverly Road, Mount Lebanon.

412-668-2292 HOURS: Lunch Mon.-Sat. 11:30 a.m.-3 p.m.; dinner Mon.-Thu. 4:30-9 p.m., Fri.-Sat. 4:30-10 p.m.; brunch Sat. 10 a.m.-2 p.m.

PRICES: Appetizers and burger $6-15; entrees $15-33 LIQUOR: Full bar

CP APPROVED The space, a former service station, provided a blessed respite from barn wood.

Instead, rustic notes came from exposed

roof joists, offsetting austere white walls and glossy, deep-gray steel. Tufted upholstered banquettes and honey-toned wood signaled that the space was meant to feel warm and comfortable, not formal. Tucked into a back corner, a cozy glass-walled private dining room made us want to crash someone else’s holiday party.

As the tiny grocery is carefully curated, so is the restaurant menu, created by Christian Schulz, formerly of Root 174, among others. The influence of Root’s chef/ owner Keith Fuller was apparent in the straightforward, but not simple, seasonal American fare. The menu was brief but broad, with everything from mussels and wings to carbonara and vegan pilaf. For lunch there are a variety of sandwiches, but only the house burger, available in beef or lamb, also pulls the evening shift.

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[PERSONAL CHEF]

BOOK YOUR HOLIDAY PARTY TODAY!

KIELBASA

AWA RD

{BY BETTY FLAJNIK, LEETSDALE} My memories of growing up in an Eastern European family in Ambridge include kielbasa, the version of sausage that traditionally graced our holiday table at the Christmas, New Year and Easter. As fragrant and tasty as it was, roasted and sliced on the diagonal or cooked in sauerkraut, I always ended up burping up the fat that is ground into the casing along with the meat. I hadn’t eaten kielbasa for decades, and a few years ago decided to honor the memories of my maternal Polish and paternal Slovenian ancestry by creating a modernized recipe and making my own. The foodie purist I have become prefers to avoid casing likely made from inhumanely raised pork, so I encase the meat mixture in baking parchment instead.

For anyone who thinks sausage-making is mysterious and difficult, you will be surprised (with the possible exception of firing up the grill in winter) how easy it is. Enjoy this updated recipe for an ethnic culinary treat, and Wesołych Świąt!

ING SAND INN W W

S! HE IC

It was pretty close to a perfect burger and worth the slightly steep price. The beef met our high expectations, with a slightly fine grind that was also hearty, cooked to a beautiful color and crust. Topping it was thick yet crisp bacon, arugula, tomato, onion jam and blue cheese. The jam was sweet, exactly enough to balance the savory burger, smoky bacon and intense cheese. The shoestringstyle fries alongside were extraordinary as well, as delicious as their fast-food kin but with more color and varied texture.

A roasted-beet salad also included roasted baby carrots. Even though both are sweet root vegetables, they managed to provide pleasing contrast, with the former more frankly sweet and the latter more plainly earthy. Tarragon vinaigrette enlivened and united the vegetables and arugula — a peppery counter to the starchy roots — without drowning the salad in dressing flavor; whipped goat cheese added tang and velvety texture.

Wings were a bit less successful. Although the menu described a dry rub, the roasted wingettes came coated in something rather more like tea: dark, flavorful flakes that were tasty, but frankly a bit much for the mild meat. The accompanying smoked-apple barbecue sauce, on the other hand, was a terrific riff on traditional smoky-sweet barbecue sauce, lending an outdoor, barbecued flavor to meat cooked in a kitchen.

Interestingly, lamb chops weren’t Frenched (the traditional preparation by which the long bone is exposed). Instead, a tapering “tail” of fat with a bit of meat was left intact. At first this seemed an odd choice, but the fat took on multiple textures, from fire-crisped edges to soft, succulent interior. It bathed the meat, already excellent, with richness.

Meanwhile, the accompanying side was wonderful: gnudi — little gnocchi — with fennel, leeks and sage, bacon, lamb sausage and pesto. This could really be an entrée of its own, with the meats serving almost as condiments for the pasta and shredded vegetables. With the chop unadorned, these complex flavors gave our palates something to think about between bites of the delicious lamb.

Skate wing is a unique offering, but Block 292’s preparation made us wonder why it isn’t served more often. Pan-fried, but not battered, the meat had a buttery, browned exterior and moist, succulent center. And as with the lamb chop, the sides almost stole the show: perfectly grilled cauliflower, a short stack of tender sweet-potato slices, and savory crumbles of sausage mornay.

Block 292 is a top-notch destination for sophisticated yet uncomplicated food suitable to a date, a family dinner or a celebration.

TRY OUR NEW GOURMET BURGERS, FEATURING THE AWARD WINNING

“SPARTAN” SP RT SPARTA HAPPY HOUR 1/2 OFF ALL DRAFTS Mon-Thurs 5-7 Fri & Sat 4:30-7:30

OPEN DAILY • 9AM - 1:30AM

BLACK & GOLD

INGREDIENTS • 1 lb. mixture of half ground pork and half ground bison or beef (preferably humanely raised and organic) • 2 tbsp. ice water • 2 large cloves garlic, finely minced • 1 tsp. wood-smoked salt or sea salt • ½ tsp. ground black pepper • ½ tsp. dried marjoram • baking parchment

FOOTBALL SUNDAYS

862 WESTERN AVE. 412-321-4550 • themoderncafe.com

• applewood smoking chips • lump hardwood charcoal (Charcoal briquettes or a gas grill might work, but don’t leave out the wood chips.)

INSTRUCTIONS Mix all of the food ingredients together.

For a better texture, don’t over-mix. Shape into a 1½-inch diameter sausage and roll up in parchment so that one side of sausage is covered with only one layer of paper. That’s the top of the sausage. Twist ends securely. With a toothpick, punch holes in the top and two other exposed sides of the parchment, about 1 inch apart.

Soak wood chips in water for 30 minutes while preparing the grill for smoking.

Throw the drained wet wood chips over the hot coals and immediately place the sausage on a rack away from the coals and close the lid. Smoke for about one hour.

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WE WANT YOUR PERSONAL RECIPES AND THE STORIES BEHIND THEM. EMAIL THEM TO CELINE@PGHCITYPAPER.COM.

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Thank you City Paper readers for voting us one of the Best Chinese Restaurants in Pittsburgh

China Palace Shadyside Featuring cuisine in the style of

Peking, Hunan, Szechuan and Mandarin

100

VEGETARIAN DISHES!

{CP PHOTO BY JOHN COLOMBO}

Tiki drinks at Hidden Harbor: Toucan Tango and the Zombie

[ON THE ROCKS]

BAD YEAR, GOOD DRINKS

Delivery Hours

The new breweries and new concepts kept flowing {BY DREW CRANISKY}

11:30 - 2 pm and 5-10pm

5440 Walnut Street, Shadyside 412-687-RICE chinapalace-shadyside.com

Meet. Eat. Repeat.

2016 HAS BEEN awfully rough. This year, single words could trigger sadness, anger and deep existential despair. Prince. Harambe.

Trump. Clickbait with titles like “Why 2016 Was a Total Dumpster Fire” has become a fixture on our various feeds. With all its ups and downs (so many downs), 2016 gave us plenty of reasons to drink. And though it might be a small comfort, drinkers in Pittsburgh have never had better options than they did this year.

In 2016, beer went from good to great.

Existing breweries hit strides and pushed limits, honing flagship brews and premiering some truly remarkable new ones.

There is now a regional brewery to suit any palate. I know I can turn to All Saints for expertly executed lagers, Spoonwood for yeasty Belgian styles, and Brew Gentlemen for all things dank and hoppy. A question about my favorite local brewery inevitably yields a long and winding answer — there is just so much good beer to be found.

Plenty of new breweries made a splash this year. I’ve been consistently impressed with offerings from Levity Brewing, which opened in Indiana, Pa., in January. The friendly atmosphere and top-notch beers make it well worth the hour’s drive. A little closer to home, Dancing Gnome has given hopheads a new haven. Though it opened less than two months ago, the striking Sharpsburg brewery has made its mark on Pittsburgh beer with a series of juicy,

fragrant IPAs and pale ales. And there are many more breweries on the horizon, from the hotly anticipated Southern Tier brewpub to Mindful Brewing, an ambitious restaurant and brewery slated to open in the South Hills early next year.

For Pittsburghers looking for a memorable night out, the options have never been broader. The best openings of 2016 didn’t just add another watering hole to the neighborhood — it brought entirely new concepts to Pittsburgh. Hidden Harbor introduced a mash-up of classic tiki and futuristic techniques to the unexpected neighborhood of Squirrel Hill. In Bloomfield, Apteka serves up comforting vegan pierogi alongside housemade cordials in a hip yet cozy atmosphere.

Most recently, I was taken with the midday negroni and the casual yet classy service at DiAnoia’s in the Strip.

Whether brand-new or a longtime favorite, the city’s best bars, breweries and restaurants are the ones with a vision.

We’ve all been to the places that attempt to be everything to everyone and end up feeling like a diluted, unfocused mess. I hope that 2017 brings more spots that find a hole in Pittsburgh and fill it, whether it’s brewing a perfect pilsner or making a space-age tropical cocktail. As we let the dumpster fire peter out and march hopefully into 2017, let’s raise a glass to the creative, hungry people who continue to make Pittsburgh a great place to live, work and drink.

DRINKERS IN PITTSBURGH HAVE NEVER HAD BETTER OPTIONS.

/

335 E. Main St. Carnegie, PA 412.275.3637 EatBakn.com

BREAKFAST. LUNCH. DINNER.

COCKTAILS. SUNDAY SUPPERS. HAPPY HOUR.

I N F O@ P G H C I T Y PA P E R. C OM

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

Formerly the

BOOZE BATTLES

Tin Angel

{BY CELINE ROBERTS}

Each week, we order the same cocktail at two different bars for a friendly head-to-head battle.

Go to the bars, taste them both and tell us what you like about each by tagging @pghcitypaper on Twitter or Instagram and use #CPBoozeBattles. If you want to be a part of Booze Battles, send an email to food-and-beverage writer Celine Roberts,, at celine@pghcitypaper.com. pg yp p

blogh.pghcitypaper.com

Clicking “reload” makes the workday go faster

THE DRINK: BLACK CK MANHATTAN

VS. S.

Butterjoint

Dishh O Di Osteria t i

214 N. Craig St., Oakland

128 S. 17th St., South Side

DRINK: Black Manhattan INGREDIENTS: George Dickel rye, Amaro Averna, black walnut bitters OUR TAKE: This cocktail blends the rich flavors of caramel from the Averna for a sweet, while also slightly bitter and salty, delight. Rye subs for bourbon as a more subtle base for the drink and adds some medicinal notes.

Make your New Years Eve reservation Today!

Special menu available.

Diningg with a

Now accepting Valentines reservations.

DRINK: Black Manhattan INGREDIENTS: Buffalo Trace bourbon, Amaro Averna, Angostura Bitters OUR TAKE: The notes of slight bitterness from the Averna balance nicely with the sweetness of the bourbon. In combination with the bitters, the result is vaguely nutty.

This cocktail is smooth and warming all the way down.

1200 GRANDVIEW AVENUE • MT. WASHINGTON 412-381-1919 • VUE412.COM

This week on Five Minutes in Food History: Charlie Deitch wraps up the final installment of our Iron City Beer series with the brewery’s move to Latrobe. www.pghcitypaper.com

One Bordeaux, One Scotch, One Beer 2009 Primitivo, Zypora Vineyards, Sierra Foothills, California $18/bottle After tasting wine from this vineyard a few years ago with the winemaker, Ron Casertano walked over and dropped his bottle of zinfandel in the trash. “He said, ‘What’d you do that for?’” says Casertano. “I told him, ‘Well, I thought I was doing this right until I tasted yours.’”

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This wine is available only outside Pennsylvania, but Ronald Casertano and Consumer Fresh Produce order 10 tons of grapes from Zypora every year, for those who might want to try home wine-making.

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SPACE CREEP {BY AL HOFF}

WASHINGTON, UNSURPRISINGLY, CAPTURES TROY IN ALL HIS RAGE, JOY AND SELF-PITY

Passengers is not a good trip. Director Morten Tyldum’s film is a mish-mash of genres and premised on a creepy plot point. The trailer suggests Passengers is a sci-fi thriller, but alas, it is not. (Some folks at my preview screening left in a rage, delivering the not-quite-accurate-but-stillfunny rant: “It’s You’ve Got Mail in space!”)

Look lively: Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence

In the future, a giant spaceship is autopiloting toward a new colony.

Onboard are more than 5,000 crew and passengers, safely tucked away in hibernation pods and scheduled to wake in 90 years. But a malfunction causes Jim (Chris Pratt) to wake early. In a variation on last-man-on-Earth/Robinson Crusoe, he spends a year alone, alternately staving off boredom and trying to solve problems.

For company, there is only an android bartender (Michael Sheen), who dispenses cocktails and pre-programmed aphorisms.

Then he decides to wake up somebody else, and he picks a pretty young blonde, Aurora (Jennifer Lawrence). And he lets her think she was awoken accidentally, and sad, she’s gonna live out her life on the empty ship, too. Naturally, she falls in love with him, because men write movies.

(Ignore the lack of chemistry between the leads.) The film’s middle third is either a fun rom-com or deeply problematic, depending how you feel about consent, agency and men re-animating women to be their companions.

Curiously left unexplored — or perhaps not; this film is rife with plot holes and inconsistencies — is why Jim never wakes anybody else, including useful crew members. (I’d wake up everybody: Turn this ship into a party, we’re all gonna die anyway.)

In the back third, Passengers finally realizes that mechanical troubles in space are very, very serious, and now everything gets ratcheted up to SpacePeril Freak-Out. Things explode, the bartender self-destructs, buttons flash red, spacesuits are donned, and so on and so forth. The problems are relatively perfunctory — though credit is due to a very bizarre mishap with the swimming pool — and mostly serve to patch up the problems in Jim and Aurora’s relationship.

The final fix is an epically lazy bit of plotting; the only emotion it should generate is rage. In 3-D, in select theaters

Life on the hill: Denzel Washington and Viola Davis

HOME GAMES {BY BILL O’DRISCOLL}

A

UGUST WILSON is America’s most-

produced playwright this year, but his audience remains largely limited to theater-goers. Meanwhile, popular culture is short on fully realized accounts of African-American life (not to mention great roles for African-American actors).

An elegant answer to both problems is Fences, director and star Denzel Washington’s new film adaptation of Wilson’s 1983 Pulitzer-winner.

Washington plays Troy Maxson, Wilson’s larger-than-life antihero: a 53-yearold former Negro Leagues baseball star who’s now a trash collector in 1950s Pittsburgh. Troy is deeply bitter that he missed his shot at the post-Jackie Robinson big leagues, and Fences finds him butting heads with his two sons, adult Lyons and teen-age Cory, and even, eventually, his beloved wife, Rose.

Like most of Wilson’s plays, Fences is set in the Hill District, and its strengths begin with Wilson’s own adapted screenplay (completed before his death, in 2005):

AHOFF@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

From the start, the film rings with the Pittsburgh-born playwright’s earthy dialogue, alternately hilarious and gut-wrenching.

In Wilson’s world, to hear characters sling lines like, “I’ll die and go to hell and play blackjack with the devil before I give you 10 dollars” is nearly half the reward.

FENCES DIRECTED BY: Denzel Washington STARS: Denzel Washington, Viola Davis Starts Sun., Dec. 25

CP APPROVED Troy’s life was constricted from the start by poverty and racism. He’s proud of providing for his family, but he sees existence as restriction and obligation. There are many reasons that he doesn’t want Cory, a promising athlete, to play football, but he sums them up with “The white man ain’t gonna let you get nowhere.”

Still, Troy’s struggle against his own fatalism and limits (he’s also illiterate), and

his quest for dignity, makes him an heroic everyman, too; that fence he’s building in his yard is a multivalent metaphor. The great Washington, unsurprisingly, captures Troy in all his rage, joy and self-pity.

Viola Davis matches him as the loving but long-suffering Rose, who quietly but forcefully exhibits her own strength. (Washington, Davis and actors including Stephen Henderson, Russell Hornsby and Mykelti Williamson all reprise their roles from the play’s acclaimed 2010 Broadway revival.)

Fences the play is set entirely in Troy’s backyard; Washington expands the action to include scenes both inside the house and abroad in a lovingly recreated 1950s Pittsburgh. And while his direction is straightforward, just often enough, Washington brings his camera in so we can watch him and his other fine actors at work up close.

Wilson’s powerful story, which encompasses not just love, sex, race, oedipal clashes, betrayal and death, but even music and sport, has the scope of a Great American Novel.

Washington and company do it justice.

D RI S C OL L @ P G H C I T Y PA P E R. C OM

vorite Hitchcock work. Dec. 29-Jan. 3 and Jan. 5. Row House Cinema

FILM CAPSULES CP

BREAD AND TULIPS. In Silvio Soldini’s 2000 comedy, a housewife, left behind on a bus tour, decides to start a new life for herself in Venice. In Italian, with subtitles. Jan. 6-8, Jan. 10 and Jan. 12. Row House Cinema

= CITY PAPER APPROVED

NEW ASSASSIN’S CREED. I imagine the actor Michael Fassbender in his off hours, sitting by a crackling fire brooding over poetry with a glass of brown nearby. But after sitting through this head-scratching actioner — an elaborate 15thcentury cosplay married to a Dan Brown thriller that is, in fact, adapted from a video game — I have adjusted my reveries: Fassbender must play Assassin’s Creed non-stop. It’s the only explanation for why he’d sign on to this mess. (If history teaches us anything, it is that no good movie has ever been made from a video game.)

At least he has fine company: Marion Cotillard, Jeremy Irons, Brendan Gleeson, Charlotte Rampling and Michael K. Williams also put in appearances. I’d prefer to see this top-caliber crew chew over a morally ambiguous courtroom drama, but narrative gobblygook awaits!

After a couple of prologues — one set in the 1400s, the other in 1986 Baja California — we scuttle ahead to the present, where Cal (Fassbender) is being executed in prison. Instead of dying, he wakes up in a different sort of confinement — a research joint in Spain where a father and daughter team (Irons and Cotillard) are searching for “the cure for violence.” Toward this, they have rounded up the descendants of an infamous assassin group, which includes Cal, to explore these baddies at the genetic level.

They hook up Cal to a virtual-reality machine known as the animus, which causes him to relive exciting times in 1492 as his ancestor, Aguilar.

Why? Because that’s the year that the assassins grabbed and hid “the apple of Eden,” a gizmo that is the origin of free will; the institute folks hope Cal/Aguilar will lead them to it.

Director Justin Kurzel splits the action between the past and the present, and spends plenty of the budget on old-world Andalusian set pieces and costumes. The assassins have groovy hooded outfits, are very good with swords and knives, and practice a particularly fun form of parkour with lots of body flips. (You need crazy cardio to be an assassin!) Their arch-enemies are the Knights Templar, the original “Say ‘Merry Christmas’!” cranks. It’s a lot less confusing than the present, where I could never even figure out who was the bad guy, what purpose Cal had or what you’d do with an apple full of free will anyhow. The most succinct aspect of the conclusion was that this muddled film is remaining ready for its likely unwanted sequel. (Al Hoff)

LA NOTTE. An unfaithful married couple (Marcello Mastroiani and Jeanne Moreau) experience another night of their deteriorating relationship, in Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1961 drama. In Italian, with subtitles.

Jan. 6-9 and Jan. 11-12. Row House Cinema

Assassin’s Creed man-child (he steals a Christmas tree, naughty boy!); gags that announce themselves hours in advance (countdown to the moose-floating-in-moose-urine piece of art breaking …); and yet another Steve Aoki cameo.

This meet-the-parents (ahem) riff has been done better before (and didn’t require the presence of two members of a 1970s rock quartet awkwardly airlifted into the last reel). If you’re simply going for the raunchy humor, you should also lower your expectations: You’ve heard it all before. At least the movie cops to the out-of-date set-up — that we’re watching a father and a potential husband fight over who gets the woman, though this isn’t setttled until the final scenes.

Some decent comic actors are lost in this, including Keegan-Michael Key, saddled with a silly accent; Megan Mullally; and Andrew Rannells, the funniest actor on Girls who gets only a line or two. But then there’s Elon Musk, who should stick to gadgets rather than gags. (AH)

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THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS. Gillo Pontecorvo’s influential 1965 docudrama recounts the armed dispute in 1954 between Algerians looking to reclaim their country and the French colonial forces intent on keeping it. In Arabic and French, with subtitles. Dec. 28, Dec. 30-Jan. 1 and Jan. 3-4. Row House Cinema NORTH BY NORTHWEST. Cary Grant stars as a man wrongly accused in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1959 thriller, which features two iconic scenes: Grant running from a crop-duster, and the gravity-defying climax on the face of Mount Rushmore. Matt Buchholz, who has spent the last year watching and blogging about Hitchcock films, will introduce the film at the 7:35 p.m. Fri., Dec. 30 screening. He will discuss his year-long project and explain why this one is his fa-

THE GREAT BEAUTY. When occasional journalist and Rome society fixture Jep Gambardella (Toni Servillo) turns 65, he grows more contemplative of his life: Has it all been a whirl of parties, bullshit and frivolous pursuits? Director Paolo Sorrentino examines this query in his loosely plotted but visually dazzling film. The luxurious homes, the crumbling Roman ruins, the gorgeous ennui of the decadent elite, the bright colors, sly wit and surreal moments will remind viewers of similar Fellini films. You might find the existential troubles of Gambardella not quite universal, but if you have the patience for this sort of arty, stylized Euro dramedy, this is a fine and mostly entertaining example. In Italian, with subtitles. Jan. 6-7 and Jan. 9-11. Row House Cinema (AH)

CP

LET S GET ’

S CIAL

EVOLUTION. In Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s offbeat film, a young boy lives with his mother — and similar young boys and mothers — on an island by the sea. The lad begins to question his odd existence, including the lack of men. In French, with subtitles. 7:30 p.m. nightly, Dec. 26-29. Harris WHY HIM? Last week, movie audiences were applying the “What is your why?”line from Collateral Beauty to that misguided dramedy. This week, they’ll be asking “Why this?” at Why Him? John Hamburg’s R-rated comedy shuffles out a tired premise, re-sets it at the holidays for maximum last-reel feels and hangs it with a slew of witless gags (now with more profanity!). The bigidea laugh here is the generation/cultural gap between a middle-aged Michigan dad (Bryan Cranston) and his daughter’s boyfriend, a Silicon Valley hipster-doofus zillionaire (James Franco, doing his thing).

So we get jokes about high-tech gadgets that already feel dated (that our toilet technology is decades behind Japan’s is nothing to laugh about); assorted fecklessness from another rich

AMARCORD. In Federico Fellini’s 1973 eulogy for his boyhood, the sex scenes, adolescent pranks and other earthy antics merely assure that our picture of little coastal Rimini in the 1930s is as raucous as it is lyrical. Families scream at each other — hilariously — over supper; lustful boys lie in confession; fascists march gaily, and interrogate suspected dissidents cruelly; a peacock flies through a snowstorm. The structure is episodic, the images often beautiful. In Italian, with subtitles. In Italian, with subtitles. Jan. 610 and Jan. 12. Row House Cinema (Bill O’Driscoll)

CP

Why Him?

REPERTORY BABE. A sweet pig dreams of herding sheep in this 1995 talking-animals classic directed by Chris Noonan.

Dec. 28-Jan. 2, and Jan. 4-5. Row House Cinema CHARADE. Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant star in Stanley Donen’s 1963 thriller about a widow and a stash of stolen cash. Also, European locales and a jazzy score by Henry Mancini. Dec. 31 and Jan. 4. Row House Cinema THE KARATE KID. A new kid (Ralph Macchio) being bullied learns self-defense — and so much more — from an elderly Japanese gardener (Pat Morita).

“Wax on, wax off.” John G. Avildsen directs this 1984 teen fave. Dec. 28-30, Jan. 1-3 and Jan. 5. Row House Cinema

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SPORTS REDUX {BY CHARLIE DEITCH}

JAMES CONNER’S “FIRST TOUCHDOWN OF THE SEASON WAS THE MOMENT OF THE YEAR.”

It doesn’t seem like we could find one more year-in-review story for this issue, but I do have another. For a long time, I believed that in a sports city like Pittsburgh, its alt-weekly should have a sports section.

This year that finally became a reality.

While we knew we’d do some coverage of major sports, the goal was to show you a side of Pittsburgh sports and recreation you might not know about.

Here are some of my favorites from this year. Please note that while I loved last week’s duckpin-bowling story, it’s not included because, well, it was last week.

How to catch a fly ball. This was our very first sports-page story and to be honest, we decided to do it because we already had a great picture. But after a Pirates fan was seen on national television drenched in his own nachos after going after a ball, we thought some tips were in order. “I would never sacrifice a beer for a ball,” one fan said. “But maybe nachos.”

{CP PHOTO BY LUKE THOR TRAVIS}

{CP PHOTO BY LUKE THOR TRAVIS}

Playing Through the Whistle. In October, CP interviewed author and Sports Illustrated writer, S.L. Lewis, about the book he wrote after spending five years getting an in-depth look at the Aliquippa football team and the community around it. In it, Lewis tells the stories of guys who made it big, the scores of others who are barely making it today, and the dozens that never got out alive. But as Price said, “I don’t think anyone gets out of Aliquippa wholly clean.”

Carlos Jaromir Blanco Jr. This young asylum-seeker came to Pittsburgh from Mexico City to escape the dangerous barrios that he and his family lived in. Now, Blanco is like a lot of young men from Western Pa., who feels the most at home on the football field. The best part of playing for North Allegheny High School as a starting defensive lineman, he says, is “making my family proud.”

The Command B.R.O.S. Earlier this month, we told you about Rahim Jones and Carl Harrington, two guys in their mid-40s who started playing scenario paintball to stay in shape. It grew into an obsession, and they’ve even developed a YouTube channel around it. Their personalities and love of the sport have turned them into ambassadors for the game. “Anybody can play this game. All races, ages, shapes and sizes,” Jones says.

CDEITCH@PGHCITYPAPER.COM

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Pitt running back, James Conner, moves up field against Georgia Tech Oct. 8 at Heinz Field.

PROFESSIONAL OPINIONS {BY STACY KAUFFMAN}

W

HAT A YEAR in sports for the city of Pittsburgh. From bringing home the Stanley Cup to resurging rivalries and inspirational comebacks, 2016 had a little bit of everything, including utter disappointment.

Thanks, Pirates.

When you’ve reached the zenith of your sport, like the Penguins did in 2016, it’s hard to place any moment above that.

And when City Paper asked some of the city’s sports-media personalities for their top sports moments, they all agreed that the Penguins hoisting Lord Stanley’s fabled Cup sits atop the mountain of 2016 moments.

Bob Pompeani, of KDKA TV, says the Pens’ story was great because they were out of playoff contention and then … magic. “GM Jim Rutherford made a gutsy call, fired his own hire in Mike Johnston, promoted Mike Sullivan and the team caught fire,” Pompeani says. Jim Colony,

PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

of the 93.7 The Fan Morning Show, says the litany of roster moves, via trades and the pilfering of their minor-league franchise in Wilkes-Barre, created the right mix of veterans and youth. “The recall of Matt Murray and his ascent to No. 1 goalie status ending up fueling their run,” Colony says.

However, one story that was huge, not just in Pittsburgh, but across the country was that of University of Pittsburgh running back James Conner.

Conner returned to the field after surviving cancer, to inspire his team to one of the best seasons in recent memory.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette sports columnist and 93.7 The Fan host Paul Zeise says Conner’s “first touchdown of the season was the moment of the year.”

Here are others that also garnered attention: The Pitt-Penn State football game.

The battle for Pennsylvania raged for the

first time since 2000. “There’s just something special about walking through the parking lots and seeing all the fans tailgating together,” says Zeise. Even better, the Panthers held on to win 42-39.

The Steelers rob Cincinnati of their first postseason win since Houston was home to the Oilers. WPXI’s Alby Oxenreiter calls this an “epic playoff game,” which ended up having a hand in the Steelers’ chances at a seventh Super Bowl.

The Vontaze Burfict head shot to Antonio Brown not only put the win in motion, but also sidelined the dynamic receiver for the loss in Denver a week later.

Three defensive rookies making an impact for the Steelers. Pompeani says this story is still gaining steam, but the 2016 draft has paid dividends on defense. “For the first time since 1971, three draft picks have turned into defensive starters,” he says. “Nobody expected that kind of development in year one.”

I N F O@ P G HC I T Y PA P E R. C OM

[THE CHEAP SEATS]

BESTIES AND WORSTIES {BY MIKE WYSOCKI} THE YEAR 2016 will be known as the time Lord Stanley made his return to Pittsburgh.

But it wasn’t all good news. The city of Cleveland came within a game of being called the City of Champions, the Pirates took a step back, and the Steelers stumbled out of the gate. James Connor’s season brightened an otherwise gloomy year, but things always have a way of balancing themselves out. So we here at Cheap Seats don’t just award the good times; we also recognize those we’d rather forget. Without further ado, we are proud to present the Second-Annual Besties and Worsties.

The Bestie for “Best Steelers RunningBack Performance After a ControlledSubstance Suspension” — also known as the Tim Worley Award — goes to Le’Veon Bell. After a nice three-game rest, Bell came out and attacked the record books. He had a 236-yard game against Buffalo, breaking the team record for most rushing yards in a single game.

The Worstie for “Worst Pirates Trade of the Year” — also known as the Aramis Ramirez and Kenny Lofton for Jose Hernandez, Matt Bruback, and Bobby Hill Award — goes to the Neil Walker trade. The Bucs sent the hometown kid and second-most recognizable Pirate to the Mets for another Jeff Locke, although this one was named Jon Niese. In fact, he was so Locke-like that they traded him back to the Mets. But in return, we didn’t get Neil Walker; we got Antonio Bastardo, a pitcher the Pirates let go earlier in the year.

The Bestie for “Best Beating-Up of a Bully” — also known as the Bill Mazeroski Award —goes to Duquesne men’s basketball coach Jim Ferry. Ferry ended Pitt’s bullying dominance in the City Game as the Dukes brought bragging rights back to Uptown. The last time Duquesne beat Pitt, people were talking on their landline phones about floppy disks and hanging chads.

The Worstie for “Most Painful Championship to Watch” — the Ravens vs. 49ers Super Bowl Award — goes to the World Series. It was the Cubs, a division rival and perennial loser, against Cleveland. There was nobody to root for. It was like watching a Capitals/Flyers playoff game or the Browns playing the Bengals. You just root for the one you hate so much more.

The Bestie for “Best Beatdown of the Orange” — also known as the 2016 Pitt

{CP PHOTO BY LUKE THOR TRAVIS}

Matt Murray in the Pens Stanley Cup victory parade

Panther Award — goes to the 2016 Pitt Panthers. Pitt beat (I refuse to say “squeezed”) Syracuse 76-61 in a football game with a basketball score. Syracuse allowed a Pitt touchdown almost every four minutes of the game. It’s a wonder Pitt’s defense was on the field long enough to allow 61 points of its own.

The Worstie for “Multiple Infractions of the Law in One Year” — also known as the Paul Spadafora Award — goes to Paul Spadafora. As this issue was going to press, Spadafora had been arrested for allegedly stabbing his brother in the leg, assaulting his mother, and threatening to kill police officers who had to use a Taser to deliver a knockout punch to the former world boxing champ. In April, he was also accused of putting a 63-year-old woman in a headlock at a McKees Rocks bar, drinking her beer, and then dragging her outside and throwing her to the ground. Earlier in the month, a convenience-store employee said the pugilist was holding a blueberry muffin in one hand and a “tactical knife” in the other. His lawyer told reporters that Spaddy was using the knife to spread butter on his muffin.

The Bestie for “Being Able to Bring the Stanley Cup to a Bar When You’re 22 Years Old” — also known as the Jaromir Jagr Award — goes to Matt Murray. Jagr had a Cup even before he could legally drink or gamble. But winning a Stanley Cup while you’re turning 22 isn’t bad either. Lord Stanley would make a great wingman or conversation-starter for a young guy at a bar.

And the Worstie for “Worst Loss of the Year” goes to the passing of Arnold Palmer.

Arnie was a common man from Western Pennsylvania who infiltrated the countryclub elite and then dominated them. Besides the astonishing career accomplishments, Arnie was simply good people.

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1. Southern fried veggie 5. Like leaves and saves 10. Conquistador’s home 14. Duke’s overseer 15. “The Sound of Music” stepmom 16. Caustic cleaner in a green can 17. German six-strings?

19. Go ballistic 20. Hard rain 21. Hamilton ___ (2016 rogue voters) 23. Indian royal 25. Hershey Bears sports org.

26. Swamp drained from 29-Across 29. Vice president Hubert’s paintings?

36. It’s low in rummy 37. Surrealist with a distinctive mustache 38. Simmering 39. One of three in this answer: Abbr.

40. Like a single cell organism 42. Belt with a kimono 43. Apia’s locale 45. Red coats, e.g.?

46. Swamp drained from 17-Across 47. “Visit Australia” pitches?

50. Cardinal points?: Abbr.

51. Computer port letters

52. 2017 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees 54. Cleaning equipment used in some bluegrass band instruments 59. Wahine word while waving 63. Swamp drained from 47-Across 64. Store that sells nothing but stand-alone kitchen counters?

66. Make a few changes 67. Not moving at all 68. Clinton : Kaine :: Dole : ___ 69. Start over 70. Political activist whose followers are called “Raiders” 71. Yalies

DOWN

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6. Like some troubling periods 7. Spoken aloud 8. Like some coat hangers 9. Monster Energy Cup Series org.

10. Advice columnist Hax 11. Not quite closed 12. Droops

13. Guitar, to a guitar god 18. Dinosaur National Monument state 22. 2000s teen drama set in California 24. Throwing discipline 26. Model wood 27. Pepperoni slices, often 28. Bacteria, so to speak 30. Candy in a shell 31. ___ del Rey 32. Like plasma TVs 33. Flying in the air 34. Dressed like a justice 35. Shocking news from an ultrasound 40. Swamp drained

from 64-Across 41. “By Jove!”

44. Helpful for 48. Pick up 49. Totally legit 53. Quench, as thirst 54. Off the mark 55. Without water 56. Bone fractured in some snowboarding accidents 57. Ran, as colors 58. King’s address 60. Civ pro student, likely 61. Port in many an LCD TV 62. Egyptian biters 63. Riviera vista 65. Narrow channel: Abbr.

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FOR THE WEEK OF

Free Will Astrology

12.28-01.04

{BY ROB BREZSNY}

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): As I was ruminating on your astrological omens for 2017, I came across a wildly relevant passage written by Rabbi Tzvi Freeman. It conveys a message I encourage you to memorize and repeat at least once a day for the next 365 days. Here it is: “Nothing can hold you back — not your childhood, not the history of a lifetime, not even the very last moment before now. In a moment you can abandon your past. And once abandoned, you can redefine it.

If the past was a ring of futility, let it become a wheel of yearning that drives you forward. If the past was a brick wall, let it become a dam to unleash your power.”

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Naturalist John Muir regarded nature as his church. For weeks at a time he lived outdoors, communing with the wilderness. Of course he noticed that not many others shared his passion. “Most people are on the world, not in it,” he wrote, “having no conscious sympathy or relationship to anything about them — undiffused, separate, and rigidly alone like marbles of polished stone, touching but separate.” Is there anything about you that even partially fits that description, Aquarius? If so, I’m pleased to inform you that 2017 will be an excellent year to address the problem. You will have immense potential to become more intimate and tender with all of the component parts of the Great Mystery. What’s the opposite of loneliness?

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Seven Chilean poets were frustrated by their fellow citizens’ apathy toward the art of poetry.

They sarcastically dramatized their chagrin by doing a performance for baboons. Authorities at

the Santiago Zoo arranged for the poets’ safety, enclosing them in a protective cage within the baboons’ habitat. The audience seemed to be entertained, at times listening in rapt silence and at other times shrieking raucously. I’m sure you can empathize with the poets’ drastic action, Pisces. How many times have you felt you don’t get the appreciation you deserve? But I bet that will change in 2017. You won’t have to resort to performing for baboons.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Donatello was a renowned Italian sculptor. His favorite piece was “Lo Zuccone,” a marble statue of the Biblical prophet Habakkuk. As Donatello carved his work-in-progress, he addressed it.

“Speak, damn you! Talk to me,” he was heard to say on more than a few occasions. Did the stone respond? Judging from the beauty of the final product, I’d have to say yes. One art critic testified that “Lo Zuccone” is a “sublimely harrowing” tour de force, a triumph of “forceful expression,” and “one of the most important

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marble sculptures of the 15th century.” I suspect you will have Donatello-like powers of conversation in 2017, Aries. If anyone can communicate creatively with stones — and rivers and trees and animals and spirits and complicated humans, for that matter — it’ll be you.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): According to Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami, “A certain type of perfection can only be realized through a limitless accumulation of the imperfect.” Let’s amend that thought so it’s exactly suitable for your use in 2017. Here’s the new, Taurus-specific version: “A messy, practical, beautiful type of perfection can be realized through a patient, faithful, dogged accumulation of the imperfect.” To live up to the promise of this motto, make damn good use of every partial success.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Gemini gymnast Marisa Dick has created a signature move that has never been used by any other gymnast. To start her routine, she leaps up off a springboard and lands on the balance beam doing a full split. The technical term for this bold maneuver is “a change-leg leap to free-cross split sit,” although its informal name is “The Dick Move.” The International Federation of Gymnastics has certified it in its Code of Points, so it’s official. During the coming months, I expect that you will also produce one-of-a-kind innovations in your own sphere.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): I hope you will be as well-grounded in 2017 as you have ever been — maybe even since your past life as a farmer. I trust you will go a long way toward mastering the arts of being earthy, practical and stable. To do this right, however, you should also work on a seemingly paradoxical task: cultivating a vigorous and daring imagination — as perhaps you did in one of your other past lives as an artist. In other words, your ability to succeed in the material world will thrive as you nurture your relationship with fantasy realms — and vice versa.

If you want to be the boss of reality, dream big and wild — and vice versa.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Even if you don’t think of yourself as an artist, you are always working on a major art project: yourself. You might underestimate the creativity you call on as you shape the raw material of your experience into an epic story. Luckily, I’m here to impress upon you the power and the glory of this heroic effort. Is there anything more important? Not for you Leos. And I trust that in 2017 you will take your craftsmanship to the highest level ever. Keep this advice from author Nathan W. Morris in mind: “Edit your life frequently and ruthlessly. It’s your masterpiece, after all.”

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): French painter Henri Matisse (1869-1954) turned out to be one of the supremely influential artists of the 20th century. But he was still struggling to make a living well into his thirties. The public’s apathy toward his work demoralized him. At one point, he visited his dealer to reclaim one of his unsold paintings. It was time to give up on it, he felt, to take it off the market. But when he arrived at the gallery, his dealer informed him that it had finally been bought — and not by just any art collector, either. Its new owner was Pablo Picasso, an artist whom Matisse revered. I think it’s quite possible you will have comparable experiences in 2017, Virgo. Therefore: Don’t give up on yourself!

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): “The self in exile remains the self, as a bell unstruck for years is still a bell,” writes poet Jane Hirshfield. I suspect that these words are important for you to hear as you prepare for 2017. My sense is that in the past few months, your true self has been making its way back to the heart of life after a time of wandering on the outskirts.

Any day now, a long-silent bell will start ringing to herald your full return. Welcome home!

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): In accordance with your astrological omens for 2017, I’ve taken a poem that Shel Silverstein wrote for kids and made it into your horoscope.

It’ll serve as a light-hearted emblem of a challenging but fun task you should attend to in the coming months. Here it is: “I’ve never washed my shadow out in all the time I’ve had it. It was absolutely filthy I supposed, so I peeled it off the wall where it was leaning and stuck it in the washtub with the clothes. I put in soap and bleach and stuff. I let it soak for hours. I wrung it out and hung it out to dry. And whoever would have thunk that it would have gone and shrunk, for now it’s so much littler than I.”

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Walk your wisdom walk in 2017, Sagittarius. Excite us with your wisdom songs and gaze out at our broken reality with your wisdom eyes. Play your wisdom tricks and crack your wisdom jokes and erupt with your wisdom cures. The world needs you to be a radiant swarm of lovable, unpredictable wisdom! Your future needs you to conjure up a steady stream of wisdom dreams and wisdom exploits! And please note: You don’t have to wait until the wisdom is perfect. You shouldn’t worry about whether it’s supremely practical.

Your job is to trust your wisdom gut, to unleash your wisdom cry, to revel in your wisdom magic.

If you’d like to enjoy my books, music and videos without spending any money, go here: http:// bit.ly/LiberatedGifts.

GO TO REALASTROLOGY.COM TO CHECK OUT ROB BREZSNY’S EXPANDED WEEKLY AUDIO HOROSCOPES AND DAILY TEXT-MESSAGE HOROSCOPES. THE AUDIO HOROSCOPES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE BY PHONE AT 1-877-873-4888 OR 1-900-950-7700

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My wife goes on long runs with her girlfriend. I’m sure they are having sex in the woods. I’m jealous because I’m not getting enough. What should I do?

Get your own “running” partner.

I’m four months pregnant. My husband won’t stop talking about how excited he is to taste my breast milk. I said he could try it from a bottle, but he wants it from the source. I want to be GGG, but this weirds me out.

Tell your husband you’re going to table this topic for the time being. It’s possible you’ll be less weirded out by the idea once you’re actually breast-feeding; the opposite is also a possibility. But pestering you about it for the next five months isn’t going to increase his chances of getting it from the source — quite the opposite. (And for the record: You can be GGG and still have hard limits/absolutely nots.)

I’m a 25-year-old gay man who doesn’t resonate with hookup culture. If I’m not comfortable fucking right away, how can I compete/find a partner?

Be upfront about what you are willing to do (fuck after a getting-to-know-you date or two) and what you are not willing to do (fuck after a “sup?” or two), and you’ll scare off the wrong-for-you boys and attract the right-foryou boys.

MUSIC

ISSUE

Coming January 4

I’m too broken. I don’t know where to start.

Therapy.

On the Lovecast, Dan Savage and the brilliant Randy Rainbow: savagelovecast.com.

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SEND YOUR QUESTIONS TO MAIL@SAVAGELOVE.NET AND FIND THE SAVAGE LOVECAST (DAN’S WEEKLY PODCAST) AT SAVAGELOVECAST.COM

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If you’re married and in an open relationship, do you need to include that info in your Tinder profile? Or can you wait until later?

You should include/disclose that info in your profile (best practice), but many similarly situated men choose to wait until later (understandable practice, considering the stigma). But the existence of a spouse must be disclosed sometime between the end of the first text exchange and the start of the first blowjob.

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“Hall passes” don’t work for many women because they can’t orgasm when having random sex once with a random guy. What alternative would you recommend?

Where is it written on your hall pass — or anyone else’s — that it can be used only with complete strangers? Nowhere, that’s where.

I’m in a FMF poly triad, and I’m looking to incorporate another guy into the mix. I’d look online, but I’m a public-school teacher in a small town. How do I find someone without outing myself and risking my career?

Ask your partners to do the headhunting.

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How do white people talk to black people about Donald Trump?

Fifty-eight percent of white people voted for Trump, and 8 percent of black people voted for Trump. So yeah, maybe instead of talking to black people about Trump, white people should shut up and listen to black people instead?

How do I avoid lesbian bed death?

Date gay guys.

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My partner/husband of 40 years says I still embarrass him. Is this unusual?

If he says it affectionately and occasionally, it’s not a problem and it’s not unusual. If he says it to degrade/humiliate/control you, it’s a problem and it’s unacceptable.

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Trans man and cis female, happily married, planning to get pregnant in the next five months. How do we break it to my wife’s family? Half of them don’t know I’m trans and will be carrying, and we don’t want to lie, but also we don’t want them to see us as anything other than just a couple.

Telling your partner’s family you’re trans isn’t going to decouple you. You’ll still be “just a couple,” it’s just that one of you is trans. Since you’re not going to be able to hide which one of you is pregnant — not in the Twitter/Instagram/Facebook era — the sooner you tell them, the sooner they’ll have their freak-outs, and the sooner they’ll return to seeing you as the couple you always were and still are.

All straight guys want to put it in your butt, but when you suggest eating it first, they run for the hills. How can I bridge this gap and get my ass eaten?

Date gay guys.

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How do I get my partner — who says he’s into it — to top me “properly,” i.e., work me into a sub space instead of him just melting into an ooey-gooey love ball?

There are lots of terrific pro doms in Portland, Ore. Hire one who’s up for showing your partner what proper topping looks like.

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WILL HAPPEN IN 2017?

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How common is it really for women to squirt? I get conflicting reports.

This answer, courtesy of the Kinsey Institute, isn’t likely to satisfy you: “Somewhere from 10 to 54 percent of women experience some type of fluid expulsion in tandem with sexual arousal and orgasm.” Maybe the incoming Trump administration can put the scientists they’re pulling off climate change onto female ejaculation, and we’ll have better numbers before the 2018 midterm elections.

How do you decide who wins an argument in a same-sex relationship?

A sudden-death round of Golden Girls trivia.

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I’ve heard so many horror stories and seen countless X-rays online — any tips for making sure I don’t lose any objects in my ass?

You know what you never see in those X-rays?

Butt plugs and other toys designed for butt play.

Stick to butt plugs with flared bases, dildos with bases that look like balls, orange traffic cones, etc., and you’ll be fine.

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How do you propose a foursome with your longtime friends without freaking them out or ruining the friendship?

Not proposing the foursome is the only way to avoid potentially freaking your friends out and ruining the friendship.

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Earlier this month, we recorded our Savage Lovecast Christmas Spectacular live at Revolution Hall in Portland, Ore. The audience submitted questions on tiny cards before the show, which allowed questioners to remain anonymous and forced them to be succinct. I promised the crowd I would answer as many of their unanswered questions as I could in this week’s column.

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{BY DAN SAVAGE}

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PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 12.28.2016/01.04.2017

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