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The insanity of ticket-splitting // Dying bats Why Wolf won // Little Big League // Sex toys citypaper.net
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Associate Publisher Jennifer Clark Editor in Chief Lillian Swanson Senior Editor Patrick Rapa Arts & Culture Editor Mikala Jamison Food Editor Caroline Russock Senior Staff Writers Daniel Denvir, Emily Guendelsberger Copy Chief Carolyn Wyman Contributors Sam Adams, Dotun Akintoye, A.D. Amorosi, Rodney Anonymous, Mary Armstrong, Meg Augustin, Bryan Bierman, Shaun Brady, Peter Burwasser, Mark Cofta, Alison Dell, Adam Erace, David Anthony Fox, Caitlin Goodman, K. Ross Hoffman, Jon Hurdle, Deni Kasrel, Alli Katz, Gary M. Kramer, Drew Lazor, Gair “Dev 79� Marking, Robert McCormick, Andrew Milner, Annette Monnier, John Morrison, Michael Pelusi, Natalie Pompilio, Sameer Rao, Jim Saksa, Elliott Sharp, Marc Snitzer, Tom Tomorrow, John Vettese, Nikki Volpicelli, Brian Wilensky Editorial Interns Indie Jimenez, Alyssa Mallgrave, Nia Prater, Sam Fox Production Director Michael Polimeno Senior Designer Brenna Adams Designer & Social Media Director Jenni Betz Contributing Photographers Jessica Kourkounis, Hillary Petrozziello, Maria Pouchnikova, Neal Santos, Mark Stehle Contributing Illustrators Ryan Casey, Don Haring Jr., Joel Kimmel, Cameron K. Lewis, Thomas Pitilli, Matthew Smith Human Resources Ron Scully (ext. 210) U.S. Circulation Director Joseph Lauletta (ext. 239) Account Managers Colette Alexandre (ext. 250), Nick Cavanaugh (ext. 260), Amanda Gambier (ext. 228), Sharon MacWilliams (ext. 262) Classified/Adult Advertising Sales Alexis Pierce (ext. 234) Editor Emeritus Bruce Schimmel 22
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Bruce Schimmel founded City Paper in a Germantown storefront in 1981. Local philanthropist Milton L. Rock purchased the paper in 1996 and published it until August 2014 when Metro US became the paper’s third owner.
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A n off-duty transit cop is arrested for allegedly masturbating while riding on the Broad Street Line. “Obviously this behavior is totally unacceptable from one of our employees,” says SEPTA spokesperson. “But can I just say how nice it is to see somebody enjoying their commute?” 22 26
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Curbside leaf collection returns after a fiveyear hiatus, but the Streets Department says it will only collect piles of leaves, not bags. “I am going to fuck your shit up,” says the wind. Meteorologists change the area’s “winter storm warning” criteria from 4 inches to 5 in the area. “But that’s almost up to my neck,” says John Bolaris. That’s a short joke. A lot of people forget: He’s of below-average height. That’s a whole line of comedy to work with. Local businesses say the election season has caused the price of advertising to skyrocket, often pricing them out of TV time. Hopefully you’ve used this time to reflect on some things, Steak ’Em Up. Four UPenn students take a one-year leave of absence to work on Down to Chill, an app they say is like Tinder, but for friends. Or like Pirate Bay, but for old people who want to talk about Jeopardy! Or Chatroulette for transit workers. Or like Tinder but with an embarrassing name. A luxury hotel is planned for the Center City block that is currently home to several small businesses, including well-known diner Little Pete’s. The public outcry is heated, 140-characters long and quickly forgotten because the World’s Cutest Quarterback hurt his bone. #thisaggressionwilleventuallystand
This week’s total: 0 | Last week’s total: -3 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
FUNGUS AMONG US: A fungus called white nose syndrome in bats sweeps through a colony, often bringing mortality rates above 90 percent. GreG turner
[ wildlife ]
Bat-pocalypse A deadly fungus has decimated the bat population in Pennsylvania and several other states. Why does it matter? By Emily Guendelsberger
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reg Turner used to count bats by the thousands. At an abandoned mine in bucks County less than a decade ago, Turner, a mammalogist with the Pennsylvania Game Commission, says he used to find more than 10,000 bats spread over seven different levels. “When you got to the very bottom, there were literally thousands of them in one or two particular rooms,” he says. This might sound spooky. but Turner finds empty caves much, much spookier. “The sites are truly like ghost towns when you go back — there’s just nothing left.” Turner sighs. “When I go to that room that had 3,000 to 4,000 bats, there’s two bats, or one bat.” He counted about two dozen total throughout the mine the last time he was there. That sort of decline isn’t uncommon in Pennsylvania. “The largest site I counted went down to 40 from 100,000. I had sites with 50,000 that went down to single digits,” Turner says. He sighs again. every bat expert City Paper spoke to sighed a lot, actually — we’re in the middle of a quiet and quickly spreading bat-pocalypse, and at the moment nobody knows how to stop it.
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Why care about whether bats live or die, aside from the world getting slightly more depressing with every extinction? Pragmatically, bats have a vital, if often unnoticed, role in ecosystems. “bats are the night vacuum cleaners of the sky,” says brenda malinics, who works with a number of wildlife rescues and is the main bat-rescue person for the Philadelphia area. They can eat around a third of their body weight in insects each night, the equivalent of about 3,600 mosquitoes even for the tiny little brown bat. bats vacuum up millions of tons of insects per year — insects that then can’t bite people or destroy crops. A 2011 paper projected that bat depletion could end up costing U.S. farmers more than $3.7 billion a year. malinics has been working with bats for 25 years, and she says she’s recently started getting a new kind of request: “I’ve had golf courses contact me pleading for help because of all the mosquitos — ‘How can we attract bats?’ ‘We want bats at our country club!’ because people can’t go outside during the day.” The reason behind all the empty caves first surfaced in north America seven years ago. A white fungus was noticed on the muzzles and wings of hibernating bats in a cave in upstate new York. It quickly became clear that the fungus was deadly, with mortality rates often above 90 percent of a colony. Since then, the fungus,
“Bats are the night vacuum cleaners of the sky.”
>>> continued on page 6
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politicalmachine By Jon Geeting
The insaniTy of TickeT spliTTing A misunderstanding of legislative politics. ➤ In a 1960 PresIdentIal debate, when
John F. Kennedy was asked why people should vote for him instead of Richard Nixon, the response he gave would be hard to imagine coming out of a modern politician’s mouth. In no uncertain terms, he told people to vote for him because he is a Democrat. “What are the programs that we advocate? What is the party record that we lead? I come out of the Democratic Party, which in this century has produced Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman, and supported and sustained these programs which I’ve discussed tonight. Mr. Nixon comes out of the Republican Party. … And it is a fact that for most of the last 25 years the Republican leadership has opposed federal aid for education, medical care for the aged, development of the Tennessee Valley and development of our natural resources. I think Mr. Nixon is an effective leader of his party. I hope he would grant me the same. The question before us is: Which point of view, and which party do we want to lead the United States?” These days, especially during midterms, candidates for office are typically discouraged from strongly associating themselves with their political parties. The Democratic Party’s strategy in this year’s midterms was to localize races, and turn races into contests between personalities rather than parties. The same strategy was employed in 2010, with similarly disastrous results, and in the wake of a historic Democratic defeat in 2014, it is surely time to retire it. In March, when the race for control of the state Senate seemed more in play, I wrote a column about five Republican-held Senate seats that state Democrats should pursue. How did those five races work out? Not only did the Democratic candidates lose every single one, they actually lost ground in the Senate. The Republicans gained three additional seats, expanding their margin to 10 in the upper chamber, and picked up eight more seats in the state House, for a 35-seat margin there. But how can that be, when Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Wolf enfeebled Republican incumbent Tom Corbett in a 10-point landslide? >>> continued on page 10
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✚ Bat-pocalypse
[ the naked city ]
<<< continued from page 4
called white nose syndrome when it affects bats, has spread to half the states. In many, like Pennsylvania, it’s almost completely wiped out many species. Turner has found the fungus in every cave and mine he used to survey. The last time the Fish and Wildlife Service made an estimate, in 2012, it said about 6.7 million north American bats had been killed by the syndrome. At the time, the fungus had been found in 12 states. now, it’s in twice that. The spores were probably brought over from europe by humans. It’s a cold-loving fungus, one that only germinates at low temperatures. For the three species of migratory bats in Pennsylvania, it isn’t a problem — an active bat’s high body temperature keeps it safe. but when the other six species of bats go into hibernation — dropping their body temperatures and putting their bodies and immune systems into power-saving mode — it becomes lethal. “The spore germinates and starts forming a fungal infection, and basically starts digesting the live cells of the wing membrane,” says Turner. “Then as the fungus grows, it makes spores, then those spores get all over the bats next to them, so if they’re in a nice cluster, pretty soon all of them will have these spores on them and all of them will have this infection.” This doesn’t result in caves carpeted with dead bats like people picture, Turner says. The fungus causes the bats to waste stored energy, so that they use up their hibernation fat by January or February. At that point, says Turner, “They have a decision to make — stay in and die where they’re at, or fly out and see what happens.” most fly out to search for nonexistent insects, where they freeze, starve or are picked off by predators. A few are brought to malinics. She says white nose syndrome isn’t as visible as it sounds —“People think of the classic white circle around the muzzle, but when white nose is exposed to warmer temperatures, it disappears” — but that she’s seen plenty of bats with signs they’ve had it. They’re emaciated, and “the wings look really ratty; they’ll be almost like tissue paper, crinkly; sometimes they’re shredded.” most of the time, she says, there’s nothing she can do for them. She sighs. “There’s so much we don’t know about bats,” says malinics. “They’re not an animal that has been fully studied, because for a very long time they weren’t valued for their importance to the environment. People just considered them vermin. now, everyone’s saying, ‘oh my God, we’ve got to do something to save the bats,’ and it may be too late, frankly. “We never appreciated bats until they’re gone,” says malinics. brent Sewall, an assistant biology professor at Temple University, has published a few papers with Turner on white nose syndrome. He says the situation is pretty bleak — there’s no way to keep the fungus from spreading, no cure for it, and once fungal spores get into a cave, they’re there for good. “In places like Pennsylvania, all or almost all of the suitable locations for hibernation have been contaminated with the fungus,” Sewall says. With nowhere else to go, the surviving bats are “forced to go to locations where they’re going to experience the fungus every winter.” but Turner and Sewall find a bit of hope in data they’re about to publish. “back when this had just appeared in the state and the bats were in the mass-mortality phase, when we looked at the wings of those bats, about 60 to 70 percent of the wings were just covered in infection,” says Turner. He and Sewall developed a method of using Uv light to measure the amount of infection. Turner says
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they found that bats at sites where the fungus has been present for several years tend to have much less infection, on about 20 percent of the wing. “We’re hopeful that at some point it’ll get to the same level as it is in the european range, where bats seem to do fairly well with it,” says Turner. “They get infected over there, but they don’t get heavily infected.” White nose syndrome likely came from europe, you’ll recall. “What’s interesting is that though this fungus is widespread in europe, it hasn’t caused any [bat] population declines that we’re aware of,” says Sewall. He and Turner are seeking funding to look further into why, and how it may relate to the tiny survivor groups of bats in north America. Sewall says his guess is that “the fungus probably has been in europe for hundreds or thousands of years, and whatever damage it might have caused initially has long since passed.” He and Turner are also interested in how bat-mortality rates appear to bottom out on a similar timeline. “When we look at the epicenter area in new York, we see that around the sixth year, a few of the sites’ populations start increasing. We were at year six in Pennsylvania last winter, and we’re starting to see a little bit of an increase at some sites,” says Turner. “So, hopefully, we’re at rock bottom.” He quickly clarifies that those increases mean counting 10 bats instead of eight in caves that recently contained thousands. “bats are very slow reproducers; a bat can live 30 to 35 years in the wild and produce one offspring per year,” he says. “So it’s going to take a long, long time for them to recover to anywhere close to where they were — probably 500 to 1,000 years.” That’s why, Sewall says, it’s extremely important to protect bats’ foraging and cave habitats right now. “one of the most challenging things for a species to survive is getting hit with multiple threats at the same time,” with disease, habitat loss and climate change generally being a big extinction-causing triumvirate, he says. “If we can reduce some of the other threats to bats, then they might be in a better position to respond to this new threat.” (emilyg@citypaper.net) (@emilygee)
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[ the naked city ]
election board had not voted since 2011. Clark voted in the 62nd Ward in the lower northeast, where he is registered to vote. Clark is the ward leader of the 28th Ward, in Strawberry mansion, even though the Philadelphia Democratic Party rules require ward leaders to be registered in the ward they represent.
LAST CALL: Tom Wolf at a labor-friendly rally at Warmdaddy's in South Philly on Election Day. Maria Pouchnikova
[ politics ]
Wolf Wins historic defeat of conservative agenda Republican Gov. Tom Corbett lost after four years of governing from the right in a left-leaning state. By Daniel Denvir, Emily Guendelsberger and Jim Saksa
D
emocrat Tom Wolf decisively ousted incumbent republican Gov. Tom Corbett on Tuesday on an election night that was otherwise an enormous, if muddled, victory for conservatives nationwide. Pennsylvania’s vote, however, was a rebuke of policies that slashed education funding, restricted abortion rights, cut social programs and cozied up to the state’s powerful and lightly-taxed natural gas industry. “You gotta focus on where the people are, especially around the issue of education,” says Democratic Philadelphia state Sen. vincent Hughes. “The hard right has held this guy captive, as they’re holding the rest of the republican Party captive. They’ve got him in a political straightjacket...If they’d loosened up the reins a little bit, it might be a different story.” Corbett governed from the right in a left-leaning state, signing a no-new-taxes pledge and shrinking the size of government services that people like. but Wolf must still grapple with a state legislature in which republicans managed to increase their majorities. republicans also held on to 13 of 18 seats in the U.S. House of representatives — benefitting from districts heavily gerrymandered to dilute Democratic votes. It was Corbett’s deep cuts to public education that most fueled anger, particularly in Philadelphia, where cuts have created a state of perpetual fiscal crisis and contributed to the elimination of thousands of teaching and staff positions and the closing of 30 schools. “I had to bring supplies to the schools,” said elizabeth, 44, a mother of three, who voted for Wolf at Thomas G. morton elementary School in Southwest Philadelphia. “That’s not the way it’s supposed to be done.” Corbett also lacked charisma and political instinct. once, he casually joked that gay marriage was akin to incest. He even failed to convince the republican legislature to back two legislative priorities: | P h i l a d e l P h i a c i t y Pa P e r |
privatizing state liquor stores and cutting public employee pensions. Corbett’s handling of the Penn State child sex-abuse scandal was another problem: Democrats, led by Attorney General Kathleen Kane, (apparently falsely) accused Corbett of delaying the investigation into football assistant coach Jerry Sandusky for political gain when he was Attorney General; but a multitude of Penn State alumni were infuriated by his apparent role in firing legendary coach Joe Paterno. In Philadelphia, Corbett was crushed. but turnout, despite early reports, was anemic. A full accounting is not yet available, but it appears that an even lower percentage of registered voters turned out than the roughly 40 percent who cast ballots for governor in 2010 — and far below the more than 60 percent who cast ballots in the presidential race in 2012. It is a pattern that consistently hurts Democrats. Kevin Kelly, one of three middle-aged white committeepersons working outside a polling place in a Southwest Philadelphia neighborhood that has in recent years become largely non-white, put the matter bluntly: Turnout would have been much higher if a “black guy” had been on the top of the ticket. That’s likely true, but any presidential race would have brought more voters to the polls. boosting Philadelphia turnout was critical, but Democrats had to strike a balance between energizing President obama’s base without tying candidates too closely to an unpopular president. on Sunday, obama rallied thousands at Temple University. one newish Philadelphia voter was City Commissioner Chair Anthony Clark, who claims to have cast a ballot on Tuesday. A City Paper investigation last month revealed that the chair of the city’s
Deep cuts to education fueled the anger.
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➤ ThaT hundreds of thousands of Philadelphians did not vote is a reminder that American democracy is marked by futility and alienation — and, for many ex-offenders barred from voting, disenfranchisement. but while voter interest is low, big money is absolutely enormous. Candidates and party committees in Pennsylvania gubernatorial, congressional and state legislative races raised more than $100 million this election cycle, according to the Institute on money In State Politics’ incomplete figures. That doesn’t include third-party groups like 501(c)4 non-profits, which can keep their donors secret. According to Pennsylvania Common Cause, this is one of only 11 states that place no limit on the amount of money individuals and PACs can contribute directly to candidates. not that it much matters in the free-for-all, post-Citizens United era. Wolf, a wealthy businessman, poured $10 million of his own money into his race and had raised $31.5 million as of oct. 24, according to data analyzed by PublicSource. That’s compared to $23.9 million for Corbett. major Corbett donations included at least $5.8 million from the republican Governors Association, which has received funds from libertarian manufacturing kingpin David Koch, right-wing Las vegas Sands mogul Sheldon Adelson and hedgefund manager Paul Singer. Wolf received strong backing from organized labor, including six-figure donations from unions, including the Pennsylvania State education Association PAC and the Pennsylvania Service employees International Union. According to the latest numbers from the Center for Public Integrity, an estimated $60 million was spent on the television advertisements that dominated the state's campaigns, more than in most other states. Wolf’s ads tended to tout him as a kindhearted businessman and father. Corbett’s ads ominously warned that Wolf would hike taxes. The progressive and labor-backed >>> continued on page 10
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✚ Political Machine
Ticket splitters effectively cancelled out their vote for Wolf. The problem is ticket-splitters. According to sources at the Pennsylvania Senate Democratic Campaign Committee, the key swing voters in the battle for control of the state Senate were college-educated, upper middleclass white men in the Southeast and Southwest suburbs. While it’s true the Senate districts are fairly badly gerrymandered, the Republican margin is still largely owed to thousands of suburban white men voting for Wolf, then splitting their tickets for Republican state Senate and House candidates — effectively cancelling out their votes for Wolf. Ticket-splitters represent everything that is wrong with American politics. While they may fancy themselves as independent and judicious people, their behavior reveals a profoundly immature misunderstanding of how legislative politics works. In fact everything that people hated about Corbett would not have been possible without the willing participation of the
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Republican state legislature. And yet these suburban white men sent the very same people back to Harrisburg to keep doing the same things. What’s needed here is a re-education about the virtues of party politics, and a return to the Kennedy view. Lawmakers in a big legislature represent little more than a basket of policy positions. You’re not picking a person, you’re picking a team and a set of values. Splitting a ticket isn’t insurance against extremism — it’s an assurance that nothing will get done, because you’ve assembled a querulous caucus optimized for bickering instead of passing good laws. ✚ Jonathan Geeting is engagement editor at
PlanPhilly. The views expressed here are his own. Contact him at jgeeting@gmail.com.
✚Wolf Wins Historic Defeat of Conservative Agenda <<< continued from page 8
Coffee and doughnuts at a polling place inside a home. group Pennsylvania Working Families accidentally sent, according to the Inquirer, 30,000 Philadelphians mailings advising them to vote at the wrong polling place. election watchdogs at Committee of Seventy said that they had received a large number of calls requesting information about polling-place locations. “While we get these calls every election Day, there are far more than usual today,” e-mails Seventy’s ellen Kaplan. “A number of callers got incorrect information from the PA Working Families flyer.” ➤ ElEction day was mostly smooth.
Book Signing
[ the naked city ]
<<< continued from page 6
“Fuck you, youse a fucking coward! Youse a fucking pork eater!” but early morning voters in Point breeze were welcomed to the polls by two grown men shouting and shoving. one of them , Anthony Tappe, a Democratic committee person for the 36th Ward’s 1st division, was incensed at what he called a “corrupted” situation inside the voting location for the 36th Ward’s 1st and 39th divisions. He said he had been unjustly excluded from working the polls. but there is sometimes great warmth even between Democratic and republican poll workers stuck in a room together for 13 hours, election after election. The 56th Ward’s 9th Division, in Holmesburg, has for more than 20 years voted at the home of 50-year veteran Democratic committeeperson Joe Seigafuse. Seigafuse and 9th Division republican committeeperson Dan brownsey Jr. were chatting in the garage.
They say ed rendell tried to relocate the now rare residential polling while he was governor. “but we got the machines back,” says Seigafuse, coyly. “A private residence is more personal. more of a hometown feeling,” says brownsey. “In the morning we had coffee and doughnuts, and lunchtime we make hot dogs and sauerkraut,” says Seigafuse. “And we eat ’em! We have a good time.” “He’s Democrat, I’m republican,” says brownsey. “but you know what? It’s all very neighborly. And I think sometimes that might be lost.” At St. Thomas Indian orthodox Church in oxford Circle, poll worker Sandy malkin says turnout was much better than the previous election, but that some of the elderly voters were having trouble with the ballot. malkin says the neighborhood is “working class, a lot of teachers, city workers, police and firemen, a lot of immigrants, new citizens. We’re very diverse — a lot of Chinese, a little bit of Indian, African people, AfricanAmerican.” She says she’s noticed that many of the new immigrant voters, in particular, have been taking selfies at the polls. “They think it’s very important.” (Daniel.denvir@citypaper.net)
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dream little dream by a.D. aMorosi
West Philly’s Locust Moon revives a comic striP classic.
heart of it:
Center, artist joshua o’Neill, a founder of Locust Moon comics shop in West Philly.
ComiCslaNd:
Top, artist aaron lange; middle, cover of the new book, “little Nemo: dream another dream;” below, a display at the comics convention at The Rotunda. 12 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
illustration by jim rugg
Book lauNCh:
photos by Maria Pouchnikova
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left, noted cartoonist Paul Pope was among about 30 artists who attended the launch party and convention.
a&e
artsmusicmoviesmayhem
hearhere By Patrick Rapa
The Majors The race for best local artist of the year is too close to call.
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➤ the whole “top thIs” and “best that” thing is only vaguely useful, if not utterly pointless, but listen: This has been one hell of a year for Philly rock. The War on Drugs, Nothing, Bleeding Rainbow, A Sunny Day in Glasgow (they count!), Pattern is Movement. So many bands dropped noteworthy records in this town and, with no Kurt Vile machine to steamroll them, the race for artist of 2014 is too close to call. So, what the hell, let’s welcome a late contender. Little Big League’s new record is a beauty. Tro pical Jinx, just released on Boston’s Run for Cover label, hits all the sweet spots for the discerning modern rock ’n’ roll listener. The choruses soar, the guitars go solo (sometimes ferociously) when called upon, the melodies stick around with parasitic persistence (in a good way). At the center of it all is Michelle Zauner, whose voice switches from agile to tough to fragile. She’s still capable of the bratty brazenness that defined Little Big League’s first record, 2012’s These Are Good People, but now there are more levels, more tempos and tricks. Just listen to the way her voice cracks and gasps like an ice cube in the heavyhearted first half of “In Air.” As ever, Zauner’s lyrics can be stunningly sad and dry all at once. “I can’t get you off my mind. I can’t get you off in general,” she quips/sighs on “Boyish.” “At some point you decide if you want to love or be loved more, and I chose wrong,” she shrugs on the title track. Modern ears may liken this record to ’90s revivalist rockers Speedy Ortiz. For the old heads: It’s reminiscent of Sonny Sixkiller — a bygone Philly band these kids have likely never heard. Neither comparison accounts for the sheer inventiveness of Little Big League’s sound. They’re gritty, witty and somehow tight and untamed at the same time. This thing ain’t over. (pat@citypaper.net)(@mission2denmark)
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A SIMPLE MISUNDER STANDING: (LR) Ames Adamson, Justin Jain and Jessica DalCanton get feisty in Interact Theatre Company’s Caught.
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✚ Fri., Nov. 7, 9 p.m., $10, with LVL UP, Tutlie and Spirit
of the Beehive, Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 N. Frankford Ave., 2157399684, johnnybrendas.com. 16 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
Kate raines/Plate 3
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curtaincall By Mark Cofta
➤ InterAct theAtre compAny Anyone who loves smart plays about smart people discussing smart subjects — plus unpredictable stories, fascinating characters and theatrical inventiveness — should see InterAct Theatre Company’s brilliant premiere of Caught. Playwright Christopher Chen explores ideas of responsibility in art and journalism, citing real-life cases like mike Daisey’s famous exaggeration of Chinese workers’ conditions on PbS’ This American Life and oprah’s exposure of James Frey’s “fictional autobiography,” A Million Little Pieces, to examine what truth can, should be and seldom is in art, news and relationships. exactly how he does this is best left unexplained, but suffice to say that little is what it seems. When we enter the Adrienne Theatre, we’re in the mana Gallery, seeing photos by Chinese artist and “symbol of all Chinese suffering” Lin bo. He shares ideas about “hypothetical art” and his crowning achievement, an “imaginary protest.” The bland art displayed — photos of people looking at artwork — slyly hints at what’s coming, which will rocket beyond the many cases of China’s suppression of artists it echoes. “A lie,” a New Yorker executive tells Lin in the play’s next layer, “is
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like a cockroach: If you see one, there are a hundred you’re not seeing.” We’re treated to a passionate debate about the nature and purpose of truth, and then Chen’s play explodes (propelled by elizabeth Atkinson’s understated sound design) into another dimensional layer, and another and another. I daren’t spoil it — the ride is just too thrilling, and relies on us not knowing what’s coming. Underappreciated local actors Justin Jain and bi Jean ngo, as both Chinese artists and American artists of Chinese descent coping with “arcane American truth battles,” give brilliant performances in multilayered roles, making Chen’s dizzying levels of dramatic reality feel real for us. Jessica DalCanton, Christie Parker and Ames Adamson shine in equally challenging supporting roles. To their credit as well as Chen’s and director rick Shiomi’s, the characters are not talking-head constructs, but genuine people whose emotional lives intertwine with their professional decisions. Shiomi’s detailed, expertly paced work — ably supported by melpomene Katakalos’s flexible set, Peter Whinnery’s incisive lighting and rachel Coon’s witty costumes — should fulfill Shiomi’s hope that Caught will be “a watershed moment in the emergence of Asian-American theater in Philadelphia,” an event long overdue. Through Nov. 16, $22-$38, InterAct Theatre Company at the Adrienne Theatre, 2030 Sansom St., 215-568-8079, interacttheatre.org.
Suffice to say that little is what it seems.
>>> continued on page 19
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[ darling, we’re up against it ]
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firstfridayfocus
[ album reviews ]
➤ lily & madeleine | A-
➤ deerhoof | A-
As this Indianapolis sister act continues its glacial transition from pristine folk to Sundays-style indie pop, let us bid farewell to the rock crit terminology we used to use in Lily & madeleine reviews: So long “simple.” Goodbye “spare” and “pristine” and “folk.” Some parts of their gorgeous second LP, Fumes (Asthmatic Kitty), could even be called rock ’n’ roll, with those pretty-as-hell voices suddenly met by melodies with prominent guitars and snare drums. See them at World Café Live on Friday; next time around they might —patrick rapa be doing death metal.
—Marc Snitzer
➤ stars | B These Canadian indie poppers could’ve been content to let the hips do the thinking on No One Is Lost (ATo). but, no. There’s words, and now the brain’s all tangled up in everything, thinking we’re getting Postal Service or new Pornographers when we’re supposed to be getting down to the heartbeat bass and robo disco rhythms. The computer’s self-aware, at least. Quoth the gentle and pretty “You Keep Coming Up”: Torquil Campbell: “I call it poetry.” Amy millan: “It’s called a pop hook.” —patrick rapa
flickpick
LUCIA THomé
For a record that’s bursting with confetti, psycho carnival joy and riffs, riffs, riffs, La Isla Bonita (Polyvinyl) really thrives in its delicate second half, where Satomi matsuzaki’s voice and some surf/spy sounds rise above the fun-house confusion. Deerhoof — who plays Union Transfer on Sunday — has excelled in giddy schizophrenia for 20 years. They’re not about to run out of ideas now.
By Mikala Jamison
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➤ the smith street band | B+ Coming from an Australian punk band that is probably pretty far from home on any given day, it’s fitting that Throw Me in the River (SideoneDummy) is concerned with location. That could either be a literal blip on a map (one track jumps from London to melbourne to “smoking weed in new York City in the rain”) or, taking Wil Wagner’s belligerent gut-spilling into account, a more impressionist sense of place —Marc Snitzer — one that’s found at the top of your lungs.
➤ FUll BleeD: PoetRy ComiCs show The whimsy of comics and the romance of poems here are mashed together to make a pretty art party. “FULL BLEED” features poets and artists like Paul Siegell, Emily Ballas and Bianca Stone, and will offer an art exhibition plus live sketch portraits of guests by artist Annie Mok. Stone says she’s not “entirely concerned” with defining Poetry Comics, “but rather seeing how many tiny silver arrows we can launch at it. And perhaps how many it can launch back at us.” 5-9 p.m., Indy Hall, 22 N. Third St., indyhall.org.
[ movie review ]
Interstellar
➤lUCia thomé, “FiRst islanD”
[ B ] Real emotion Remains something of a black hole for Christopher nolan,
and for much of the three-hour running time of Interstellar the resolutely cerebral director teeters delicately on its event horizon. The film takes place a generation into the future, after ecological disaster has turned the world into one giant dustbowl. matthew mcConaughey is a former astronaut turned farmer who discovers that nASA has continued in secret, run by former professor michael Caine, who is working on a long-shot rescue plan for the human race. nolan has a tendency to get explainy, especially in a story that involves some of the most complex subjects in modern science. This is a film, after all, where gripping suspense is mined from the ramifications of relativity as much as from daring spaceship maneuvers. Ultimately, Interstellar is an epic-scale debate over what it means to be human, as dispassionate reality conflicts with irrational emotion. As a man of science who faces real stakes in the form of his left-behind children aging at a rate outpacing his own, mcConaughey embodies that debate most effectively. Anne Hathaway’s passionate scientist struggles to reconcile the two, unfortunate given that the sole female crew member is reduced to a blubbering wreck, tearfully arguing for the metaphysics of love. nolan ultimately does pass over that aforementioned event horizon, with predictable effects; the film’s otherwise admirable dedication to hard science is crushed into gooey sentiment, a stab at Spielbergian hokum that seems written by one of the movie’s humor-programmed robots. but when it succeeds, which it does much of the time, Interstellar is a gripping adventure that’s equal parts ’50s sci-fi thrills, heady 2001 thought experiment and tortured philosophical debate. —Shaun Brady
Daring spaceship maneuvers.
THE STARS LOOK VERY DIFFERENT TODAY: Matthew McConaughey is an astronaut turned farmer in the “what it means to be human” epic Interstellar.
Sounds a little acid trippy, but intriguing: “If solids are made from moving parts, then maybe wrenches can be tied into knots and maybe the earth is built of steel and wood.” “First Island,” Thomé’s first solo show, reflects on when she learned as a child that solid objects are made of quickly moving atoms. “What if nothing is what is seems?” she thought. The exhibition features sculpture, digital installation and drawings. All, incredibly, made of atoms. 7-9 p.m., through Nov. 25 by appointment, LMNL Gallery, 1526 Frankford Ave., lmnlgallery.com. ➤ saRah KaizaR, “maRs show” Mental health issues are painfully stigmatized, des pite the millions suffering from diseases that quietly cripple everyday life. Kaizar says about “Mars Show” that she created the work after years of “chew ing on ideas” about mental health care. The show comprises large and smallscale drawings rendered in acrylics and vellum, to evoke Mars rovers. “This show is for my dad,” Kaizar says, “who was in outer space a lot of the time.” 5-9 p.m., through Nov. 30, 3rd Street Gallery, 45 N. Second St., 215-625-0993, 3rdstgallery.com. (@notjameson)
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SI T T I N â&#x20AC;&#x2122; I N
CENTER #WHOISSITTININ @KIMMEL
FREE
WED, NOV 12
Featuring Venissa Santi, Francois Zayas, plus DJ Matthew Law & Ciarra! Playing a variety of Latin Jazz
KIMMELCENTER.ORG/FREE 18 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
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✚ Curtain Call
[ arts & entertainment ]
<<< continued from page 16
➤ Arden TheATre CompAny Six actors play more than 40 characters in a story that spans more than 28 years in 20 locations, sharing Charles Dickens’ 13th novel in less than two hours. That’s Great Expectations, and Arden’s production largely lives up to its title. Director matthew Decker’s enthusiastic staging of Gale Childs Daly’s adaptation employs many playful techniques familiar to children’s theater audiences. Actors use objects like boxes and trunks to create everything from wedding cakes to horse-drawn carriages; they voice and act not only characters, but creaking floorboards and framed portraits. Josh Carpenter plays Pip, the poor orphan who dreams of becoming a gentleman. Kate Czajkowski, Doug Hara, brian mcCann, Sally mercer and Lindsay Smiling play all the other roles, aided by costume pieces designed for quick changes by olivera Gajic. The doubling complements Dickens’ clever coincidences and surprises. each has a primary role. Czajkowski shines as estella, the girl “brought up to wreak revenge on the male sex,” and mercer is her spooky adopted mother miss Havisham. Smiling plays Pip’s guardian Joe, the blacksmith, and Hara is Pip’s best friend Herbert. mcCann’s broad assortment of
characters includes escaped convict magwitch and lawyer Jaggers. The fast-paced show tells the novel’s story clearly, but falters with the book’s climactic violent moments. miss Havisham’s fiery demise is tepidly wrought, and a ferocious battle in the Thames river lacks shock and urgency. The production is strongest portraying the lighter tones of Pip’s story, but those darker aspects are essential to Pip’s extraordinary journey. Great Expectations raises the issue of whether novels should be adapted into plays (or movies, for that matter): Isn’t the book always better? maybe, but if this engaging, entertaining and enlightening production sends anyone to the bookshelf, it will have accomplished a lot. Through Dec. 14, $15-$50, Arden Theatre Company, 40 N. Second St., 215-922-1122, ardentheatre.org. (m_cofta@citypaper.net)
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2111 SANSOM STREET | PHILADELPHIA, PA
DIRECTED BY AARON CROMIE OCTOBER 22–NOVEMBER 16 BOX OFFICE: 215-496-8001
CAUGHT
Tickets $22-$38 interacttheatre.org 215-568-8079 Use code “CP” for $10 off!!!! 20 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
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movie
shorts
Films are graded by City PaPer critics a-F.
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Force Majeure
: New Force Majeure | AA freak occurrence puts strain on a marriage in ruben Ă&#x2013;stlundâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s crafty melodrama. Johannes Kuhnke and Lisa Loven Kongsli seem like a happy couple as they embark on a ski trip with their two children, but a moment of weakness on his part brings their troubles to the surface like a zombie bursting from a shallow grave, turning their vacation into a marital gauntlet. The subject matter is so familiar as to be mundane, but Ă&#x2013;stlund stages the coupleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s gradual unraveling as a sly comic horror, where once the floodgates have been opened every minor infraction becomes a major issue. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s painful and darkly hilarious; as the screws tighten, you lose track of whether youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re grinning or wincing. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;Sam Adams (Ritz at the Bourse) INterstellar See Shaun Bradyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s review on p. 17.
: coNtINuINg art aNd craFt | B mark Landis, a wisp of a man now in his early 60s, is an art forger. He creates beautiful and skilled copies and â&#x20AC;&#x153;giftsâ&#x20AC;? them to duped museums â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 46 in 20 states, including the Philadelphia museum of Art. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not illegal, as no moneyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s involved. He calls it â&#x20AC;&#x153;philanthropy.â&#x20AC;? The New York Times compared him to Truman Capote (voice) and Norman bates (creepy â&#x20AC;&#x153;motherâ&#x20AC;? anecdotes). He drinks sneaky booze out of a
milk of magnesia bottle. He reads a list of his mental-health diagnoses â&#x20AC;&#x201D; schizophrenia, psychosis â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and argues for or against each charge. He eats a lot of Tv dinners. Heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s got enemies â&#x20AC;&#x201D; matthew Leininger, a former museum registrar, pursues his cons in a Catch Me if You Can-style chase, but thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a snoozy subplot. The real interest is Landis â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a man who manages to be venerable, pitiable, reviled and awkwardly charming all at once. How artful. And how crafty. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;Mikala Jamison (Ritz at the Bourse)
BIrdMaN | B more tour de force than coup du cinĂŠma, Alejandro GonzĂĄlez Iùårrituâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s psychotropic psychodrama spelunks into the soul of a washed-up action star (michael Keaton) attempting to reinvent himself by staging raymond Carver on broadway. Although it shifts time frames and its relationship to reality, the movie, shot by Gravityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s emmanuel Lubezki, gives the appearance of being filmed in a single take. but the cinematographyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the only place where the seams donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t show. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s clever as all get-out â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and thrilling, in a superficial way â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but rarely stumbles onto real insight. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;SA (Ritz Five) cItIzeNFour | AThe scariest thing this Halloween was edward Snowden swearing in disbelief at the end of Laura Poitrasâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; gripping, disturbing documentary. Citizenfour, whose core is the now-(in)famous meeting between Snowden, Poitras and journalist Glenn Greenwald in a Hong Kong hotel room, offers, through Snowden, a kind of limited catharsis. Sure, heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s exiled from his own country and branded a traitor c i t y pa p e r . n e t | N o v e m b e r 6 - N o v e m b e r 1 2 , 2 0 1 4 | p h i l a d e l p h i a c i t y pa p e r |
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by many opposed to his disclosure of information on U.S. surveillance programs, but he’s done what he set out to do. In the last scene, though, Greenwald tells him of another whistle-blower who claims the U.S. has more than a million people on various watch lists, to which Snowden can only respond, “That is fucking ridiculous.” It’s an unforgettable moment. No matter how jaded we
are, there is always something that can shock us — and that shock is a powerful motivator. Poitras, who shared Pulitzers with Greenwald and barton Gellman for reporting the Snowden story in the Guardian and the Washington Post, knows that last year’s scandal is this year’s fait accompli. So, instead of rehashing the information that’s already been disclosed, she gives us moments that
drive home what happens when what was paranoid becomes a rational response to the facts. When a fire alarm sounds in the Hong Kong hotel, we might dismiss Snowden’s fear that it might be a trap, but when it sounds again and again, it’s harder to brush off. It’s easy to assume that the government’s ability to collect effectively infinite amounts of information will only harm bad people, but when it’s controlled by the same institution that determines what’s bad, the potential for misuse is equally boundless. We should be afraid, and Poitras’ essential film reminds us why. —SA
explorations. The offensive on-campus party that brings them together tests their tolerance for bullshit, but they don’t just come out on the other side as enlightened souls. Instead, they’re each placed in difficult positions complicated by questions of identity and expectation. Simien has a skill for capturing the tone of people so scared of speaking out of turn that they end up saying things they don’t believe. Dear White People doesn’t offer solutions, but it should spark better conversations. —Drew Lazor
(Ritz East)
the equalizer | B-
Dear white people | B+ The rare college comedy of the non-idiotic variety, writer/director Justin Simien’s debut is built around a simple sociopolitical suggestion: People shouldn’t be defined by their views. Dear White People isn’t out to revamp racial discourse — it’s content pointing out how ineffectual “real talk” can be when nobody’s really listening. Inspired by his own studies at California’s Chapman Uni-
versity, Simien keys in on a quartet of African-American undergrads at fictional Winchester, a snooty school run on old money and leftist selfsatisfaction. Textbook militant Sam (Tessa Thompson) organizes protests and shuns the hypocrisy of other black students who aren’t quite as conscious. Golden boy Troy (brandon P. bell), head of the historically black residence hall is an expert schmoozer, always concerned with pleasing his dean of students daddy (Dennis Haysbert). Introverted writer Lionel (Tyler James Williams) struggles to find a voice while tolerating clueless white girls playing with his Afro. Hopeful Tv star Coco (Teyonah Parris) makes every effort to conceal her humble upbringing. The movie could easily have played out with these four dawdling in their corners, but Simien, with preternatural dexterity, manages to showcase how each is more than the sum of their external 22 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
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(Wide release)
In following up Olympus Has Fallen, easily one of the most ’80s movies of 2013, Antoine Fuqua pricks the decade’s veins again, adapting The Equalizer to suit an audience with no frame of reference. Not that one’s needed: The show, starring edward Woodward as a hardass vigilante haunted by his CIA misgivings, was far from original then, and Fuqua wisely does little to tweak the formula now. Primed and predictable, Denzel Washington is a logical pick for the role of robert mcCall, a trained killer who ditches his violent black-ops past for a humdrum job at a Lowe’slike home-improvement chain. It’s unfulfilling but safe work, and mcCall seems to appreciate the friendships he forms with his co-workers. but when he catches a whiff of an innocent in serious trouble — call girl Alina (Chloë Grace moretz), a regular at the diner he frequents, keeps getting roughed up by her handlers — he slides back into scales-of-justice mode, and his decision mushroom-clouds into an all-out war pitting him against the boston hub of the russian mob. most of the baddies in the original series were about as intimidating as the gangsters in the “beat It” video, but Fuqua makes it a point to go edgy with the heavily armed help here, especially in the case of Teddy (marton Csokas), a psychotic overseas fixer who proves to be the best and only match for mcCall’s abilities. The director has always handled action in the most satisfying and unsubtle manner possible, and Washington does well keeping pace — it’s just that you already know the route from start to finish, and there’s never any sense that our hero might fall behind. —DL (Wide release)
Gone Girl | B Pitting diary entries against the ostensibly objective third-person, Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl is all about
[ movie shorts ]
perspective. Nick, played by ben Affleck in this Flynn-scripted, David Fincher-directed film, sees himself as a man ground down by his wife’s impossibly high expectations; Amy (rosamund Pike) casts herself as the victim of an emotionally and, eventually, physically abusive spouse, who may be responsible for her disappearance, or worse. Fincher’s movie adds a third perspective, or rather an interlinked set of them — the eyes of the world, which are increasingly trained
on the media sensation brewing in small-town missouri. In the movie’s first section, Amy is a present absence: a smear of blood not quite erased from a kitchen floor; a voice from a diary’s half-charred pages. Later — well, that would be telling. Suffice it to say that Pike excels in a part that’s all but impossible to bring to life, playing a character that’s been constructed by others since her parents turned her into the star of a series of children’s books. “Amazing Amy” quickly outpaced the real mcCoy, but the former’s success taught the real-life Amy how to hone in on the gap between who you are and who people want you to be. That divide, and the way we use lies and half-truths to build a rickety bridge across it, is at the heart of Gone Girl, and a slick and sickly heart it is. Where Flynn’s novel was blackly cynical, Fincher’s movie is more wryly bemused — a shift, though not an improvement. marriages are bound by aspiration: We agree to play our better selves, at least until we lose the stamina to keep it up. It’s powerful stuff, but it’s also thin, and Fincher doesn’t do much more than slap on a coat of varnish. —SA (Wide release)
the Guest | BShot in lurid colors and drizzled with a squelchy synthesizer score, Adam Wingard’s bloody thriller is so enamored of John Carpenter it might
as well be passing him mash notes in social studies. Like his dopey siege movie You’re Next, The Guest doesn’t wear its influences on its sleeve so much as tote them around in a plastic pail, slathering every available surface with genre fetishism, and just enough self-consciousness to pass off redundancy as homage. Downtown Abbey’s Dan Stevens is plenty menacing (and equally dreamy looking) as a military veteran who inveigles himself into the home of a deceased comrade and starts kicking up dust in a small town, teaching the family’s weak little brother to kick ass and drawing lustful glances from passing girls. but Wingard lacks the wit to invert the sexist stereotypes he draws upon, and final girl maika monroe isn’t given a character so much as a grab-bag of half-sharp lines and reaction shots. It’s like eating in a favorite restaurant after the kitchen staff has changed: everything looks right, but the taste is off, and no matter how much you eat, it never satisfies. —SA (Ritz at the Bourse)
what works and what doesn’t, mixing flashy Hong Kong-inspired gunplay with close-quarters mmA grappling that leaps off the screen. The stiffs, mini-bosses and big boys Wick works through en route to redemption — Adrianne Palicki, against type as a sneering rival assassin; Game of Thrones’ Alfie Allen as the russian mafia scion who started the whole thing — are sculpted with humor and economy in mind. That latter quality might actually be the most valuable, getting you in fast and out satisfied. —DL (Wide release)
nightcraWler | ADon’t look now, but Jake Gyllenhaal is mcConaughey-ing. After a weird string of roles that failed to even crack the lid on the irreverent leading
thing to do is to root for him to be arrested. Gilroy is so aware of what he’s got that he unrealistically structures his world to bloom’s benefit, but Gyllenhaal is too good for it to matter. —DL (Wide release)
White Bird in a Blizzard | CA master of disillusion, Gregg Araki had always identified with the struggle for identity, his queer-focused films unfolding with little regard for the standards of the normies who operate outside the conversation. but in adapting Laura Kasischke’s White Bird in a Blizzard, Araki seems beholden to his source material, producing a stilted coming-of-age tale that
has his voice but none of the usual energy. on paper it seems like a match: Kasischke’s Kat (Shailene Woodley), growing into her teenage body fast in the late ’80s, begins exploring her sexuality just as her long-miserable mother (eva Green) vanishes one day. It’s not intended to be a whodunit, but speculation about the disappearance ends up being more compelling than any of the directions Araki attempts to aim the conversation — that includes her interactions with her meek father (Christopher meloni), relationship with the boy next door (Shiloh Fernandez) and dalliances with the detective (Thomas Jane) handling her mom’s case. Too deliberate to be
[ movie shorts ]
a murder mystery and too surface to stand alone as a character-driven drama, it’s some of Araki’s flattest work — a shame, since Woodley is more than capable of being his type of heroine. —DL (Ritz at the Bourse)
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John Wick | B+ more action movies should be directed by stuntmen. If even a few of them turn out as enjoyable as David Leitch and Chad Stahelski’s John Wick, it’ll be a mitzvah for a genre long in need of a little back-to-basics counter-programming. It might seem odd to use the word “sincere” to describe a movie that literally consists of Keanu reeves killing dozens of suited-up schlubs over his dead beagle, but that’s what it is. No hifalutin wire work, no egregious CGI, no laughable attempts at a twisty-turny Guy ritchie plot — just
an hour and a half of slick ass-kicking, in the pissed-off American tradition. As Wick, a legendary hitman who left the underworld behind for love, reeves isn’t exactly King Lear, but anyone who’s looking for that is in the wrong theater anyway. Leitch, a prolific action veteran, and Stahelski, reeves’ stunt double going all the way back to Point Break, understand
man’s toolbox (Prince of Persia?!), he seems to have course-corrected, banging out edgier fare (see: Enemy) that gives him, and us, a little something to work with. Dan Gilroy’s shadowcloaked debut might just contain Gyllenhaal’s meatiest and most marketable role in years, a performance so eye-opening you’ll find yourself making excuses for some of the film’s flimsier devices. A hard-driving but directionless petty criminal operating in the non-glam circles of Los Angeles, Louis bloom is relentless without having anything to be relentless about, his unblinking discipline pushing him toward a goal he hasn’t yet set. (A possible place along the autism spectrum is hinted at.) His ambition finds its outlet in “nightcrawling” — risky freelance camera work that places him, and later his stammering street-kid partner (riz Ahmed), in violent and compromising situations. bloom’s footage soon becomes invaluable to struggling Tv producer Nina (rene russo), leading to a complex professional and personal relationship shaped by their shared appetite for control. Unpredictable, unscrupulous and often straight-up spooky, Gyllenhaal’s character is one you find yourself rooting for, even if the right
c i t y pa p e r . n e t | N o v e m b e r 6 - N o v e m b e r 1 2 , 2 0 1 4 | p h i l a d e l p h i a c i t y pa p e r |
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events listings@citypaper.net | november 6 - november 12
[ why don’t you pull yourself together and rejoin polite society ]
EXCUSE ME, I’M SORRY TO BOTHER YOU, BUT I JUST HAVE TO TELL YOU: I LOVE YOUR VOICE: Tig Notaro plays the Trocadero on Friday. ruthie Wyatt
Events is our selective guide to what’s going on in the city this week. For comprehensive event listings, visit citypaper.net/events. iF you Want to be liSted: Submit information by email (listings@ citypaper.net) or enter it yourself at citypaper.net/submit-event with the following details: date, time, address of venue, telephone number and admission price. Incomplete submissions will not be considered, and listings information will not be accepted over the phone.
11.6
thursday [ folk ]
Gruff rhys $13-$15 | Thu., Nov. 6, 8:30 p.m., with Decade, Boot & Saddle, 1131 S. Broad St., 267-639-4528, bootandsaddlephilly.com. If you miss the thick Welsh accents and the fuzzy pop of Super Furry Animals, frontman Gruff rhys’ newest solo project should be your cup of bragawd. 24 | P h i l a d e l P h i a C i t y Pa P e r |
A combination album, app, book and film, American Interior has the wryly engaging rhys exploring a little-known piece of history: a church-led push of anti-english nationalism across Wales in the 1700s that led to young men leaving home for the new World. —A.D. Amorosi
[ theater ]
Mary PoPPins $82-$182.50 | Through Jan. 4, Walnut Street Theatre, 825 Walnut St., 215-574-3550, walnutstreettheatre.org. The stage adaptation of the classic Disney film has made its way to the Walnut. Lindsey bliven plays the titular nanny and Philly theater favorite Jeff Coon plays the grumpy patriarch George banks. The show features some of the original songs, such as “Chim Chim Cher-ee” and “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” plus new additions created specifi-
cally for the musical adaptation. —Nia Prater
[ theater ]
The Glass MenaGerie $24-$35 | Through Nov. 23, Act II Playhouse, 56 E. Butler Ave., Ambler, 215-654-0200, act2.org. receiving the barrymore Award for outstanding Lead Actor in a Play (for his star turn in Theater Horizon’s I Am My Own Wife) has inspired Charlie Delmarcelle to even greater heights. The next day, Act II’s production of Tennessee Williams’ 1944 classic opened and Delmarcelle’s assured, intimate portrayal of Tom may be his best work yet. Director James Christy makes Tom more obviously the storyteller: He announces scene titles, watches from the wings and comments directly to us. He’s aided by 2014 Life Achievement Award winner Carla belver, who infuses his mother,
n o v e m b e r 6 - n o v e m b e r 1 2 , 2 0 1 4 | C i t y Pa P e r . n e t
Amanda, with Southern nobility while resisting her flighty excesses. Amanda Schoonover shows why no one’s better at playing damaged young women; her Laura avoids the role’s traps, revealing a girl ready to bloom. Sean bradley likewise brings a fresh, believable sense to Jim, the Gentleman Caller. Daniel boylen’s set and James Leitner’s lighting make the titular figurines magical, and, with John Stovicek’s bold sound, they make the heartbreaking climax a terrible, beautiful moment. by stripping away its baggage, Act II Playhouse’s production breathes new life into a familiar play. —Mark Cofta
how rough and rude a rapper Lil Jon can be; his cocksure attitude and artistry has been irrevocably overshadowed by Dave Chappelle’s imitation of his “WHAAT” catchphrase and his role on Donald Trump’s Celebrity Apprentice. make no mistake: Lil Jon is hardcore. DJ-eDm music maker Steve Aoki is no slouch either, judging by his most recent album, the highly conceptual and deeply danceable Neon Future (Ultra). —A.D. Amorosi
[ hip-hop ]
[ dance ]
sTeve aoki/lil Jon
fresh Juice
11.7 friday
$61.45 | Thu., Nov. 6, 8 p.m., with Raven Felix, Electric Factory, 421 N. Seventh St., 215-627-1332, electricfactory.info.
$10-$15 | Fri.-Sat., Nov. 7-8, Mascher Space Cooperative, 155 Cecil B. Moore Ave., 512-680-0418, mascherdance.org.
You might not remember
experimental dance is alive
and well when mascher Space Co-op stages Fresh Juice, its annual show of works by resident artists. The slate of presenting artists features nicole bindler, Antonia Z brown, Loren Groenendaal, ben Grinberg and Adam Kerbel, offering pieces based on physical empathy, gender politics and radical trust, among other things. All on the bill truly represent the term “independent artist,” and you can bet this show will squeeze out lively sparks of talent and inspiration. —Deni Kasrel
[ comedy ]
TiG noTaro $25 | Fri., Nov. 7, 8 p.m., with Michelle Biloon, Trocadero Theatre, 1003 Arch St., 215-922-6888, thetroc.com. before people were talking about Tig notaro “lifting souls” and “breaking hearts” with her comedy, they were talking about
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AVAILABLE ON
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November 8 & 9
Greater Philadelphia Expo Center/Oaks, PA Special Guest Appearance by Johnny Hiland Sponsored by Martin Six String Customs 4UBUJPO "WF s 3UF s &YJU BU 0BLT 4BU n BOE 4VO n Buy + SEll + trAdE NEw + uSEd + ViNtAGE 5VSO 6OVTFE (FBS *OUP CASH$$ #SJOH BO *OTUSVNFOU UP SEll or trAdE! "ENJTTJPO 4BU 4VO
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released in August, Tudo (Sony) is something inbetween: quirky with traditional, gorgeous modern bossa nova with too much smooth jazz and adult contemporary tones. Luckily, bebelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s voice is its centerpiece â&#x20AC;&#x201D; singing in Portuguese, english and French â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s magical. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;A.D. Amorosi
11.11
[ events ]
play, which was based on a Greek myth about 50 young brides forced to marry their 50 cousins. They flee and the K i m b e r Ly r e i L Ly
Media Business Authority & WRTI 90.1FM Present
tuesday [ theater ]
Big Love $21-$25 | Nov. 11-23, Villanova Theatre at Vasey Hall, Villanova University, 800 Lancaster Ave., Villanova, 610-519-7474, theatre.villanova.edu. How do you make a 2,484year-old play accessible to a modern audience? Adapt it and change the title from The Suppliant Women to Big Love. Thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what Charles L. mee did with Aeschylusâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 470 b.C.
men pursue, resulting in a very modern, theatrical and often funny confrontation about feminism, rape culture and the language of consent. â&#x20AC;&#x201D;Mark Cofta
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f&d
foodanddrink
feedingfrenzy By Caroline russock
m A r I A P o u C H n I k o vA
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➤ Now SeatiNg
Lo Spiedo | The lunch and dinner menu for Marc Vetri’s venture into the Navy Yard treads the line between Italian and American in the best possible way. There are burgers and brisket sandwiches and even a “New England Style” octopus roll alongside a trio of pastas, wood-fired apps like tuna and shrimp spiedini and large-format grilled proteins for sharing. Round out the meal with a selection of contorni (side dishes) like cast-iron-skillet mac and cheese or whole roasted cabbage with Gorgonzola. There’s all sorts of exciting things happening at the bar, too, including housemade tonics for G & Ts, roasted tomato Bloody Marys and custom-brewed ginger beer. Mon.-Thu., 11 a.m.-9 p.m.; Fri., 11 a.m.-10 p.m.; Sat., 5-10 p.m.; Sun., 5-9 p.m. 6301 S. Broad St., 215-282-3184, lo-spiedo.com. TT Skewer Shop | The latest addition to the Chinatown snack scene is TT Skewer, a storefront specializing in Northern Chinese-style kebabs and hot pots.With the priciest skewer topping off at $5 for short ribs, the menu ranges from accessible (sweet corn and mini hot dogs) to adventurous (chicken hearts and gizzards). Build-your-own hot pots begin with a mild to spicy broth that’s customizable, with 35 add-ons like lotus root, sweet-potato noodles and cuttlefish dumplings. Tue.-Thu., 3-11 p.m.; Fri.-Sat., 3-11:30 p.m.; Sun., noon-9 p.m. 78 N. Ninth St., 215-460-6617. Devil’s Pocket Food & Spirits | Partners Andrew Wagner and Marcus Versace took over the recently shuttered Resurrection Ale House and are keeping the neighborhood-watering-hole vibes. Offered are 12 rotating drafts and a solid bottle selection plus a menu of easygoing bar fare like nachos, wings and hummus — along with a no-bar-menu-is-completewithout-it LaFrieda burger. Open daily, 11:30 a.m. to 2 a.m. 2425 Grays Ferry Ave., 215-735-2202. Got A Tip? Please send restaurant news to restaurants@ citypaper.net or call 215-735-8444, ext. 207.
MENU GOLD: Nachos with Massaman-style lamb are a Tuk Tuk standout. neal SantoS
[ review ]
collision courses An exciting concept, a fusion of Thai and Mexican cuisines, comes up short in the execution. By Adam Erace
tUK tUK real | 429 South St., 267-639-2396, tuktukreal.com. Mon.,
5-10 p.m.; Tue.-Sun., 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Appetizers, $5-$10; entrees, $7-$18; desserts, $6-$8.
F
rom Yucatan tamales to Lebanese milk shakes, few food cravings go unmet in a city such as ours. Yeah, I’d like a bakery specializing in brêton kouign amann within walking distance of my house, but for the most part, it’s exceedingly difficult to do something here in the restaurant industry that hasn’t been done already. enter Tuk Tuk real. A cooperative venture from Circles frontman Alex boonphaya, and his former sous and now partner, Silvestre rincon, Tuk Tuk real blends the chefs’ Thai and mexican backgrounds in a fusion that’s apparently caught the attention of the Food Network. After jotting down our order, our enthusiastic server strummed her fingers in excitement: “Do you know Aaron Sanchez? He’ll be here filming next week.” Why? I asked.
“I guess he’s never seen anything like this in the country,” she replied. I can’t speak to Sanchez’s travels, but as far as I know, nobody else in town has brought Thai and mexican cuisines together on a plate. It sounds exotic, strange, but the cuisines intersect everywhere, from their pantries (lime, chiles, rice) to cooking methods (wrapping fish in banana leaves) to thriving street-food cultures. “They have so much similarity that people aren’t aware of,” explains boonphaya, whose core move at Tuk Tuk is swapping out the Latin herbs for Southeast Asian ones, interjecting lemongrass, basil and kaffir lime into conversations between tacos and cilantro, oregano and pork. When it works, it works. Imagine a golden pyramid of nachos, accessorized with all the usual suspects: fresh chopped tomato, pickled jalapeños, melty cheese, a crema crisscross. Then trim the pile with ropes of braised, pulled, coconut-drenched massaman-style lamb. oh. Hell. Yes. We pillaged the nachos in silence, a few blissful moments that could not be ruined. not by my agua jamaica, which tasted strangely of garlic. nor by Tuk Tuk’s half-baked ambiance. The South Street space feels both naked and cluttered, a queasy green shaft with a long open kitchen, shiny tables and a banner outside that barely conceals the former tenant, Paul’s Fresh Cut
rEAd morE citypaper.net/ mealticket
>>> continued on page 30
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jonesin’
let’sgetiton
By Matt Jones
A weekly column on sex of all stripes. By Rachel Kramer Bussel
“lucky number seven”—for the 700th jonesin’ puzzle.
best-sellinG seX toys for couples of All kinDs ➤ I’ll never forget the first time I went home
✚ Across 1 4 9 12 15 16 18 19 20 21 26 27 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 41 42 43 44
Upsilon’s follower Talking-animal tale WWII general ___ Arnold Bottom of a parking garage Spare parts? 1998 Bryan Adams album Dinner ingredient? Home to Hercules’s lion OB/___ Competitions like those in 8 Mile “His Master’s Voice” label “Just let me finish” Round body Cop’s request before “I’m going in” Get the bad guy You, to Christoph Waltz One who’ll leave a mark “La la la can't hear you,” for short Punctured tire sound Dessert after an Italian meal ___ Majesty One side of a bilingual store sign Former Tonight Show announcer Hall He pitched the only World Series perfect game Pit stop stuff Mercredi preceder
45 46 53 54 55 56 57
“Who’s a good boy?” response It’s sometimes added to table salt Like scuffed CDs Secure locales A degree of success? Singer/songwriter Jones Freshmen-to-be, perhaps: abbr.
✚ Down 1 2 3
4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 13 14 15 17 20 21
Mideast grp. Apple variety created in Minnesota Song that starts “Twenty, twenty, twenty-four hours to go” Lobster ___ Diavolo Actress Michalka ___ Paese (semisoft cheese) 2022’s Super Bowl (if they keep using Roman numerals) “Mouse!” Is stealthy like a snake Quatrain rhyme scheme Korean sensation Mag VIPs Slowly, on sheet music “Star-crossed” lover Laurelin’s partner in Tolkien’s Two Trees of Valinor Brazil’s Mato ___ Standup comedians’ supporters
✚ ©2014 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com)
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1980s Hostess product Oktoberfest locale Thwarting type Nightmare visions Called in honor of, as a relative Famed Fords Missile-warning gp. Dance in a pit Freddy formerly of D.C. United Baby seal Singer Janis Ship passing in the night? Cousteau’s sea Ex-Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James “Well, look at you!” Count follower
lAst week’s solution
with a man and he unearthed restraints from beneath his bed, tied me down and then used a vibrator on me. It felt amazing, all the more so because it was such a surprise. before that evening, I’d associated sex toys with women. It made sense for my female lovers to have an arsenal of colorful erotic extras, but boys with toys were a novelty. not anymore. now, my boyfriend and I have two well-stocked drawers of colorful devices. our sex toys are a mix of playthings meant for him, for me or those designed for couples, like the new We-vibe 4 Plus, which comes with a remote control and corresponding app, so the wearer can hand over the reins to a lover. The idea behind the We-vibe 4, a silicone, Ushaped, wearable vibrator ($179), is that it can provide G spot and clitoral stimulation simultaneously, leaving your hands free for other types of fun. When offered the chance to test it, I decided to see if it really was the best of all battery-operated worlds. When I turned it on, I was surprised by how intense a sensation I felt immediately — and I’m used to the powerful plug-in magic Wand! The toy was so strong, though, that even though it is curved to fit and stay “snugly in place,” with me it didn’t. Gradually, it worked its way out. I tried it again on a different day, thinking I’d be more prepared. Again, though, it started to slide out, making it hard to enjoy the vibration, and also making me feel a bit like a failure. (Yes, even sex columnists can be perfectionists.) When we tried having intercourse with the Wevibe 4 in, it didn’t work for either of us. The fit was too tight for me, more uncomfortable than erotic. While my guy can appreciate the sensation of a toy rubbing against him, he admitted, “I just like being inside you.” I can’t argue with that! even though it wasn’t my thing, I get why a toy like the We-vibe, which has gone through several iterations, is a best-seller at Philly sex shops Sexploratorium and Kink Shoppe, and appreciate that it’s not just for straight couples. explained Kale, Sexploratorium’s toy buyer, “Although it was designed with cisgender, heterosexual couples in mind, the We-vibe 4 is versatile. It’s great for wearing under a harness while strapping on since it gives the wearer hands-free vibrating pleasure. I’ve heard of creative folks
[ crossword ]
wrapping the u-shaped vibe around the base of the penis during oral sex.” Kink Shoppe owner Frank Hovermann recommends the “not so obvious” choice of vibrator ola by minna, which lets users customize the types of sensation it provides. Hovermann appreciates that “a person can
use this on their partner and keep them guessing as to what sort of sensation and intensity is coming next.” Also popular among his clientele are bondage restraints, especially their handconditioned, hemp bondage rope. Want more suggestions? Searah Deysach, owner of Chicago’s early to bed, recommends the vibrating velvet dildo, the mio vibrating cockring and my personal favorite, the magic Wand. As my small experiment
One size doesn’t necessarily fit all when it comes to sex toys. shows, one size doesn’t necessarily fit all when it comes to sex toys. The good news? With some creativity, any toy can be a “couples” toy. ✚ Rachel Kramer Bussel is the author
of the essay collection Sex & Cupcakes and editor of over 50 erotica anthologies, most recently Hungry for more and The big book of Submission. She tweets @raquelita.
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Cellco Partnership and its controlled affiliates doing business as Verizon. Wireless (Verizon Wireless) proposes to build a 160-foot monopole Communications Tower. Anticipated lighting application is medium intensity dual red/white strobes. The Site location is 10195 Northeast Ave., Philadel-
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[ i love you, i hate you ] 22
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to place your free ad (100 word limit) ➤ email lovehate@citypaper.net BEING TIRED Alot of older people say that if a younger person says they are tired they don’t know nothing about being tired and I am here to say that I do know something about being tired and I am fucking tired. What gives people the right to say something like that because nobody knows the situation but you! So who are they to fucking judge you and comment on that! I do my own shit and pay my own fuckin bills! once again who the fuck are they to mind someone else’s business!
never be. because of our differences, they won’t let us be together. We can’t even eat at restaurants, just a plate of spaghetti. I would take you off that leash that woman has you on. With me, you’d be free.
IN-LAWS They think I’m stupid...I know their real intentions but for my spouse I try to ignore it not to mention I was raised to have respect but it’s hard when they don’t respect me. They are always undermining me and throwing digs but I just kill them with kindness
neighborhood really doesn’t need the kind of negativity that I spread that night. I’m sorry for my actions, and I’m sorry it’s taken so long for this to get out. I’d like to say this in person, and thank you for not giving me the response I asked for and deserved, but I don’t know how to arrange that. So, please accept this apology.
LOVE AT FIRST WORD Sweetheart, I remember seeing your first words online and getting right then and there some es-
BOOGER Just when I gave up on loving anyone you knocked on my door and one very long night later I was hooked. moving here for me was the most romantic thing anyone could ever ask for. and now after swearing I never would, I’m moving with you to the other end of the country. my love for you couldn’t be any stronger. as we get ready for our adventure down south together I know it wont be our last. we wont forget to look back at the city of brotherly love. I hope we never forget all the memories we had here. I look forward to many more memories with you. Here’s to cold days. Leeree xoxo
ADOP
ME
SADIE!
FOR YEARS I MISSED YOU I missed you so much it didn’t make any sense and when I went on facebook just to see if you were on there..you happened to be on there...I was so thrilled to have see your face after 20 years or so. I look forward to us being together and catching up! even though you're married we can make something work out. even if it isn’t sexual I don’t mind. I just want to be in your presence and breathe your air.
FORBIDDEN LOVE You, salt and pepper hair (magnificent!). me, tall lanky blonde. I see you every day, staring longingly out your window. Sometimes, I stop and stare back. I feel our souls become entwined at that gaze. Your sad eyes see through this mask of mine - they see the real me. I don’t know your name, but our love can
MY STINKY We have been together for 2 years now. I love you more now then I ever have, Im so glad that I met you. Who would have known that I would find my true love over the phone not me? I thank God for you being in my life, you have made me so happy and I wouldn’t trade you for the world. Thank you for treating me like the Queen that I am. I can’t wait until we get married and spend our life together forever. If you ever went away from me I would wish I had Aladdin’s Lamp to bring you back to me. I know that I haven’t shown my appreciation but I want you to know that I appreciate you and I love you. Love Sheena
SECRET LOVE
DEADBEAT How could you do this to her? You wanted this baby and after 13 years she gave into you begging for a child even though she was scared what you were going to do and her fears became a reality. In the beginning you were great then you wouldn’t even hold your child or look at him. You then decided for whatever reason to cheat and leave her and your son to do you. You would think because the way your father was you would want different for your son but I guess you are the piece of shit everyone originally knew you were. You fooled us all after all these years we all thought you grew to become a man well you showed us. I hope you and your little whore you are fucking with get a disease you fucking scum bag. Your son is better off without you cause you are no one to look up to you're a loser. I hope you and your whore rot in hell you piece of shit. and you didn’t even cheat with someone cute I hope your dick falls off so you can't spread your seed anymore.
mundane a cloak my yearning wears... Are the songs right? Will Love Find a Way? I hope so. Finding you now has made all that’s been difficult in my life so far, that much more worthwhile. This love only grows, baby. You know I love you always.
T
1YEAR OLD
I’m Sadie, a fun-loving 1-year-old pit bull mix who’s looking for love. I’m an outgoing and bouncy girl who loves other dogs. Please give me a home!
PAWS Old City Adoption Center at 2nd and Arch Streets.
All PAWS animals are spayed/neutered, vaccinated, and microchipped before adoption. For more information, call 215-238-9901 or email adoptions@phillypaws.org
smile and bear it. I’ve had enough of their shit my spouse needs to realize I’m the good one here and start sticking by me and tell them to respect me the way I have always respected them. beLLS!!!!!
JUST AN APOLOGY A few months ago, while riding my bike late at night in Northern Liberties, I was very rude and confrontational to someone. I’d like to apologize to that person. I’m not a very good person, but I’m not a very bad person either. I’m ashamed of what I did that night. I’ve never done anything like that before, and I hope I never do anything like that again. The
sence of your soul that is so utterly endearing. our meeting was inevitable. We find each other lifetime after lifetime. And now that we’ve found each other once again, what will we do? What can we do? even when we cannot be together, I am always with you. remember the ‘French afternoon’ we became lovers? of course. And every lovemaking, every kiss that will not end, gaze into your eyes, feel of your body on mine, since, leaves us hungry for our next time together. How ironic that ‘all’ we do is make love when I want so much to just sleep with you, walk in the hood, grocery shop, read to you, gaze at art, watch the sun set on a whole day spent with you. How
I am so in love with you, and I hate that I have to fucking hide it. I’ve been seeing you for a year and a half and no one knows. I love sneaking around with you. You’re amazing for letting your wife's daughter and her kids live with you. And you work far too much. but I’m happy with the way things are, because if I was married to you I’d probably see you even less. I love you, and I hope we continue seeing each other for a long time.
SOON We met march 19, 2009, and who would have thought that 18 months later not only are we together but we are genuinely completely in love with each other talking about getting married and having a family with each other. our chemistry is like no other i have ever experienced before. The way you kiss me and caress my body with your hands makes my pussy so wet. I can not get your hard fat cock inside of me fast enough but you know that never happens like that.First I need to make sure it grows to its full potential by placing you in my mouth while on my knees looking up at you with my eyes begging you to fuck me. Three orgasms later i am in total bliss and have never been so satisfied before in my life sexually mentally emotionally. I love you eric and I will be your wife soon.
TOUCH ME I was begging for you to touch me in the most intimate way! You make me feel like I am on top of the world. You caring nature, your strong hands, makes me feel like I am floating or something. I just want us to be happy, I want us to have a friendship, and a good understanding of this is what life is truly about, finding someone and settling down. You mentioned to me that you wanted two kids. I want that also. I can’t wait until our bodies become one! I love you!
✚ ADS ALSo APPeAr AT CITYPAPer.NeT/lovehate. City Paper has the right to re-publish “I Love You, I Hate You”™ ads at the publisher’s discretion. This includes re-purposing the ads for online publication, or for any other ancillary publishing projects.
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