The Georgia Straight - JFL NorthWest - Feb 14, 2019 by The Georgia Straight

FREE | FEBRUARY 14 - 21 / 2019

Volume 53 | Number 2665

FIGHTING SUPERBUGS Tech firmâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s wastewater solution

WEN WEI DANCE

A new ode to women

JANE STOLLER

The queen of decluttering

JFL NorthWest Fred Armisen makes comedy for more than the music-obsessed; plus, Howie Mandel, Dave Attell, Roy Wood Jr., and much more

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CONTENTS

February 14 – 21 / 2019

COVER

At JFL NorthWest, Fred Armisen promises jokes aimed at more than budding John Bonhams. By Mike Usinger Cover photo by Catherine Opie

T H I S M O N T H AT

TECHNOLOGY

Axine is cleaning up wastewater to solve antibiotics resistance and help fix an upcoming health problem. By Kate Wilson

FOOD

A local mother-daughter team has partnered with Belizean farmers to market whole-root turmeric paste. By Gail Johnson

22 MOVIES

The Vancouver JFL Film Festival takes a powerful look at abuse, addiction, and the perils of standup comedy . By Adrian Mack

24 MUSIC

Sackville-spawned Partner is serious about its music while maintaining a wicked sense of humour on its accomplished In Search of Lost Time. By Mike Usinger

e Start Here 9 THE BOTTLE 4 CANNABIS 24 CONFESSIONS 18 DANCE 4 HOROSCOPES 9 I SAW YOU 21 MOVIE REVIEW 5 NEWS 4 REAL ESTATE 27 SAVAGE LOVE 16 THEATRE

e Online TOP 5

e Listings 19 ARTS 25 MUSIC

Vancouver’s News and Entertainment Weekly Volume 53 | Number 2665 1635 West Broadway, Vancouver, B.C. V6J 1W9 T: 604.730.7000 F: 604.730.7010 E: gs.info@straight.com straight.com DISPLAY ADVERTISING: T: 604.730.7020 F: 604.730.7012 E: sales@straight.com

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Here’s what people are reading this week on Straight.com.

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Human foot found inside Nike shoe on West Van shoreline. Friends and fans remember Vancouver producer Phil Western. Another Brick in the Wall: The Opera to open 2020 festival. Eight outdoor adventures to conquer in B.C. in 2019. Embracing diversity is easy for VPD cop of Mauritian ancestry.

ONE AND A HALF FEBRUARY 21

JOHNNY BOOTLEG FEBRUARY 22

THE PLAYERS FEBRUARY 28

GeorgiaStraight @GeorgiaStraight @GeorgiaStraight

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FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 3

CANNABIS

Weed historian’s recipe for resistance by Piper Courtenay

t has taken 10 years, but cannabis activist and selfproclaimed agitator David Malmo-Levine has released Vansterdam Comix. From decades spent galvanizing crowds at smokeins and 4/20 demonstrations, Malmo-Levine has had a front-row seat to cannabis legalization in Canada. And now there’s a comic book detailing all of it. Since 1994, he has been arrested multiple times, selfrepresented at the Supreme Court, and advocated for peaceful civil disobedience—all in the name of social justice and cannabis liberation. He is also the city’s unofficial weed historian as founder of the Herb School in 2004 and the Herb Museum in 2007, which preserves things like prohibitionist propaganda and pharma relics of the plant’s once-acclaimed medical benefits. “Noam Chomsky said: ‘The responsibility of intellectuals is to tell the truth and expose lies,’ ” Malmo-Levine says during a chat with the Georgia Straight at a Hastings Street cannabis lounge. “Now that I have done my homework on the drug-war lies and how to resist scapegoating nonviolently, anyone who reads this [comic book] is both empowered and given a sacred duty.” Cannabis activist David Malmo-Levine and artist Bob High Inspired early on by acclaimed American linguist and have detailed Vancouver’s drug-war history in a comic book. political activist Chomsky, Malmo-Levine set out to create a manifesto of the misinformation plaguing a subcul- and blowing it in the face of “the man”. ture he helped build: Canada’s weed community. “It’s so much more than that!” Malmo-Levine says. The result? A 420-page, highly detailed, and con- “There are some key moments in our activism history textually rich comic book chronicling the global drug that I managed to record in there to show how a group of war, anchored on his involvement in Vancouver’s can- scapegoats can resist their genocide in a nonviolent and nabis movement. almost fun way.” Malmo-Levine pays tribute to English novelist George In the book, he explains the origin stories of some of Orwell in his dedication, which should inform any liter- the best-known local advocates of the existing indusate reader of its politically radical contents even before try—from Hilary Black to John Conroy—and their early the first few pages. days spent fighting authoritarian figures who sought to His first attempt at the comic was incinerated on snuff out grassroots activism. April 27, 2004, when an arsonist burnt down He describes pivotal events in the antiBlunt Brothers, a local bring-your-ownprohibition fight, like Vancouver’s bud lounge. All that remains of the very first Cannabis Day in July early copy is the cover, which is 1996 and the origins of the 4/20 included as the last page of the demonstrations. The book new comic. After completing also exposes mistakes made the second draft, the auin sensationalist media thor toted the manuscript coverage, political coraround in a backpack to ruption, police brutality, weed-industry events, and criminal activity pitching the comic book within the cannabis to publishers. In 2018, movement itself. Don Briere, owner of There are pages that the dispensary Weeds cite the early uses of “hug Glass and Gifts, inpower” (a peaceful tacvested. Now the graphic tic to protect protesters encyclopedia of activfrom arrest), safety tips – David Malmo-Levine ism is bound in a glossy for novice black-market soft cover and ready for pot dealers, and amusing distribution at a handful of sidebars, like the top 10 ways remaining grey-market disto get busted. pensaries throughout the city. About 100 pages of the comic The book’s interwoven stories, book document what he says often interspersed with decades’ worth of gets him labelled as “cuckoo crazy”— vibrant, hand-drawn illustrations, detail evidenced-backed theories about the role firsthand accounts of drug busts, rallies, and of cannabis in high-profile assassinations, wars, free-love celebrations, all of which were predominantly cover-ups, and mind-control experiments. oral history until this record. “That’s the stuff that’ll turn the world upside Teaming up with local artist Bob High, whose illus- down,” he says, adding that validating what are often trations can be seen in dispensaries around Vancouver, cast off as conspiracy theories is really why he wrote Malmo-Levine presents both an anecdotal and evidence- the book in the first place. based framework for understanding the global drug war, With recent federal restrictions placed on cannabis unpacking myths that have stigmatized generations of education and corporate campaigns aimed at capitalizpot smokers. ing on a shiny new version of the industry, much of this He has written about “reefer madness”, the crude cap- information has been ignored or lost. Malmo-Levine’s italization on parental hysteria, and political scapegoating book points a hard spotlight on some of the glaring flaws on his website, PotFacts.ca, and in books in the past, but his still prevailing in modern cannabis culture. most comprehensive work is certainly Vansterdam Comix. “It’s going to take a big misinformation campaign to For many Canadians, legalization began as an idea counteract the lies that have been pushed down everyin Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s head—a cam- one’s throats for so long,” he says. paign promise fulfilled. To those people, anything “This is my weapon to fight back against the ignorance. before that was just a bunch of hippies smoking weed It’s a recipe for resistance.” g

I have done my homework on the drugwar lies and how to resist scapegoating nonviolently.

City seeks culture in return for density

by Carlito Pablo

he developer of a proposed 35-storey condo tower is giving the City of Vancouver what it wants. The city has asked for a new art gallery, so it is going to get one. The planned downtown development is at the northeast corner of Hornby and Drake streets. According to a rezoning application by Merrick Architecture filed on behalf of 1290 Hornby Street Ltd., the developer previously suggested providing a daycare facility “in response to early recommendations” by the city. However, this was seen later as “impractical” because of the small site of the development. The city then “shifted to request provision of a minimum” of 10,000 square feet of “cultural amenity space in the podium”. In return, the developer would get more density. “In exchange for the increased density, cultural amenity space…has been included in the design, proposed as the only other occupancy in the building beyond market housing,” the rezoning application states. The gallery will be located on the main and second f loors of the building’s podium. As the application notes, this component of the project is being provided 4 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

“in direct response to the City’s request”. Moreover, “it will be designed and executed as a turnkey space, customized to requirements yet to be defined by the City’s Cultural Services Department, and turned over to the City as an airspace parcel upon project completion.” Once completed, the public gallery is expected to “provide a nucleus for the City’s emerging arts precinct”. The rezoning application notes that the existing maximum floor-space ratio, or FSR, is 5.5. FSR is the ratio of a building’s total floor area to the size of the land. Accordingly, the application states that “a maximum FSR of 10.5 is being sought in order to achieve the density lift necessary to make redevelopment economically feasible.” The rezoning is subject to a future public hearing by council. A total of 159 condos are planned for the development. A community open house is scheduled on March 14 at the Portofino Room of the Executive Hotel Vintage Park Vancouver (1379 Howe Street). The event will be held from 5 to 7:30 p.m. g

HOROSCOPE

by Rose Marcus

erfectly timed for sweethearts’ day, Mars enters sexy and sensual Taurus on Thursday. There’s no need to make it a one-day affair, though. Friday’s moon in Cancer also sets a good backdrop for date night or for cuddling up on the couch. The weekend is an emotional mixed bag. As Saturday wears on and Sunday gets up and running, the stars are building up steam. There’s something to work through, to deal with, or to get past. If you hit a wall, a block, or a hurdle, it won’t be for long. Friday may be Trump’s deadline day, but Monday is the real-deal day. Venus/ Saturn in Capricorn starts the day on a cementing, completion, or makeit-official track. Also happening on Monday, Chiron enters Aries, the sun enters Pisces, and, to finish up the day, Mercury and Neptune team up. That’s a lot of stage-setting for Tuesday’s super full moon in Virgo. Something exposed, revealed, or set in motion paves the way to improvement. This full moon is full of corrective potential. It can produce a saving grace, a hidden advantage, a blessing in disguise, or an opportunity to heal, fix, repair, rescue, improve or refortify, scoop a bargain, or top up what’s missing. Although perfection or the ideal may be out of reach, a creative solution will prove to be the best option. A subtle transit for some, an inyour-face transit for others, Chiron is a no-pain/no-gain archetype. For the next eight years, Chiron in Aries calls upon the inner warrior to find the courage and initiative to choose a radical new way of being and of living.

ARIES

March 20–April 20

Mars leaves Aries for Taurus on Valentine’s Day but you still have another few built-for-speed weeks of Uranus in Aries to face, especially so if you are born April 18 to 20. If you are born on or near March 20, you are first on the Chiron-in-Aries list. Saturday through Wednesday can trigger or shatter it. It’s opportunity in the making.

FEBRUARY 14 TO 20, 2019 Tuesday could see you nail a job or gain recognition or reward for a job well done. Watch for an opportunity to correct, improve, complete, scoop a deal, fill in a gap, add, or learn something extra.

VIRGO

August 23–September 23

Finishing up an intense week on a smooth track, Friday is even better than Valentine’s Day for cuddling up. For the next six weeks, Mars in Taurus will hold you steady while you go. Sunday through Wednesday, opportunity is ripe for the taking. The full moon could deliver good news or a job, or see you hit go in some timely, healing, or corrective way.

LIBRA

September 23–October 23

Since the beginning of the year, Mars in Aries has been driving you hard. Mars in Taurus, starting on Valentine’s Day, continues to keep you focused on gaining better ground, especially financially and emotionally. Sunday through Tuesday, a timetable or contract (karmic or actual) reaches a finalization or fruition. The exposing super full moon colours in the potential and solidifies a new reality.

SCORPIO

October 23–November 22

Mars in Taurus gives you a better feel for how it’s shaping up and how to play it next. Sunday/ Monday, you’ll reach an important conclusion, finish, or no-turningback threshold. News, a contract, a talk, or a result defines next options, cements the next phase or stage. Tuesday, watch for the unexpected, a surprise advantage, or an opportunity to fix it, save, or scoop a bargain.

SAGITTARIUS

November 22–December 21

You’ve been firing on all cylinders this week. Creativity continues to flourish, potentials too. As of Valentine’s Day, Mars enters Taurus, giving you more to go on and more to show for it. Aim to make the most of it Friday and Monday. Saturday/Sunday produces added strain, TAURUS but as of early Monday, it’s over or April 20–May 21 done. Tuesday’s super full moon unThe sparks continue to fly, covers something important, useful, although Mars, freshly into Taurus or advantageous. on Valentine’s Day, is likely not aimCAPRICORN ing for the sweet spot so much as it is December 21–January 20 pushing you to do better by yourself. Venus and Saturn in CapDon’t block yourself; go for it/break new ground instead. The intensity of ricorn have you working your Tuesday’s super full moon in Virgo way through to an important finbuilds as early as Saturday. Monday ish line through the start of next through Wednesday can be an eye week. Mars in Taurus, starting on Valentine’s Day, helps you to make opener. solid gains where it serves you best. GEMINI Cuddle up, soak it up Friday night. May 21–June 21 Monday through Wednesday Ride the good wave. Mars sets you up to make a major breaktakes an exit out of Aries, but look through. to the Gemini moon to keep it/you AQUARIUS in full swing on Valentine’s Day January 20–February 18 through Friday. Saturday/Sunday, This is no ordinary passage emotions run the show. Monday/ Tuesday holds exceptional poten- of time. Over this next week, sevtial to bring something to fruition, eral planets change signs and several to complete or begin. The super full notable transits happen, including moon in Virgo sets up the opportun- next Tuesday’s super full moon in ity to fix, heal, improve, or renovate. Virgo. What comes to pass sets up fresh opportunity to fix, improve, CANCER heal, and/or redirect. Some potenJune 21–July 22 tials and advantages are hidden or You stand to gain from Mars obvious; some hit out of the blue. in Taurus, launching on Valentine’s PISCES Day. For the next six weeks, Mars asFebruary 18–March 20 sists you to get more out of the time Friday is as good as Valenyou spend and the things you do. Friday is ideal for feeling your way tine’s Day for catering to one you along. Don’t underestimate the hid- love (self included). Emotions run den gift, advantage, or saving grace the gamut this weekend. Monday of next Tuesday’s super full moon in through Wednesday can be exposing or overwhelming or open the Virgo. pathway to healing and improveLEO ment. The super full moon can reveal July 22–August 23 or open up something unexpected, Earlier in the week, Mars/ make the potential real or the dream Uranus in Aries fired it up. Starting come true. g on Valentine’s Day Mars in Taurus gives you something more tangible Book a reading or sign up for Rose’s free and/or substantial to go on. Monday/ monthly newsletter at rosemarcus.com/.

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And yet the benefits—like the will translate into an additional lifestyle and having easy access to na700,000 privately owned cars, at to13 FOOD ture’s playground—somehow make day’s rate in of the vehicle ownership. Scary There are a bunch of newcomers participating the challenges of staying in one of the think about how bad Dine Out Vancouver Festival 2019, andstuff here if areyou eight. most expensive places in the world traffic, congestion, and parking are By Tammy Kwan worthwhile, even if that means comalready. Choosing a round-trip caring up with creative ways of making share is a far more sustainable way 27 MUSIC life in the cost lane more affordable. to get around (reducing GHG emisWith his authentic and gritty Dirty South Blues, It’s no surprise, then, that accordsions by up to 50 percent) without Vancouver’s Robert Connely Farr masters an ancient ing to a 2018 report by Vancity, Vanhaving to sacrifice your needs. Better art form straight from the juke joints of Bentonia. couver has more carsharing vehicles still, of the 700 Modo cars available, By Mike Usinger per capita than any other North one in five is electric or hybrid. American city. Approximately 3,000 carshare vehicles are on our streets, IT’SOnline LOCAL AND e Start Here e TOPINCLUSIVE 5 edging us ahead of other West Coast Here’s what people are dol24 ARTS HOT TICKET d SINCE MODO is a co-op, your hot spots like Seattle, Portland, and Members of Modo like Alicia can take a ski trip to the mountains with vehicles like this Jeep, which comes with snow tires. reading this week on a local lars are going toward supporting San Francisco. 13 THE BOTTLE Straight.com. member-owned business, which helps B.C.-based carsharing coopera- You can’t always anticipate when CANNABIS IT’S11AFFORDABLE with local economic and social growth. tive Modo has been helping people a quick catch-up with a friend is IT’S CONVENIENT And Modo stands by its mandate of get on the road for 22 years, but it’s going to turn into an epic session 28 CONFESSIONS only recently that the option of Open of putting the world to rights. You d DIFFERENT TASKS require d IT COSTS the average Canadian being driven by people, not profits. It’s 11 between HEALTH $8,600 and $13,000 per for that reason Modo aims to connect Return has been introduced—giv- can never guess when that mor- different vehicles. One day you driver HOROSCOPES to own and operate a vehicle—a people with places in a way that’s afing Vancouverites further cause to ning coffee date is going to become might need a larger vehicle with year12 to add to the cost of Van- fordable, convenient, sustainable, and discard their cars and opt for a more afternoon tea—followed by a mid- winter tires to get you and your hefty24sum I SAW YOU sustainable mode of transportation. night snack. In fact, according to a friends up to Whistler, and the couver living. By comparison, Modo inclusive. 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Bottles of wine will be 30-50% Robinson objects off along Furthermore, with $5 beer specials to religiously based and publicly throughout the day.

ormer NDP MP Svend Robinson will forgetfan. the time fornever every on February 12, 1994, when a funded health organizations such crusader for patients’ rights as Providence Health Care prohibdied in his presence with the help of a iting medically assisted death on CENTRE BAR AND HONEY SALT doctor. The previous September, Sue their premises. He wants the law LOUNGE Rodriguez hadLOTUS narrowlyWHISKEY/TEA lost her atchanged to AFFAIR ban this. IT’S A FAMILY tempt in the Supreme of Can“This is completely unacceptAT T H Court E BAR The Honey Salt lounge will ada to have physician-assisted death able, thatfor a publicly funded healthFeel the energy of the game at Centre Bar with be transformed the declared legal. care institution should deny the $5 beers and special à la carte menu items. entire family with game Her body was rapidly deteriorating people who are living there their your game day at Centre Bar & Lotus day food and drink specials as a result of a Elevate fatal neurodegenerative constitutional right to medical asLounge with all day happy hour. throughout the in day. disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, sistance dying.” so she went ahead and ended her life. Robinson promised that if he’s A special prosecutor was appointed Svend Robinson says the law is far too elected, he will bring forward a to investigate whether Robinson had restrictive on medically assisted death. private member’s bill to deal with broken any law by refusing to divulge these issues if Lametti doesn’t take FOR F U Lthe L legislation D E TA I LS V Iaction. S I THe also hopes to make this a the name of the medical practitioner. amend before the fed“A wholePA nation was really moved eral election this October. “He was one plank platform. R Q VA N C O U V E R . C O M / T H E B IinGthe GNDP AM E by her courage and by the dignity with of four Liberal MPs who voted against “That should be an election issue which she sought that change,” Robin- this bill,” Robinson noted. “He under- in every constituency in this counson recently told the Georgia Straight stood it didn’t respect the decision of try,” the former MP emphasized. by phone. “The special prosecutor rec- the Supreme Court of Canada.” Robinson has told his partner, ommended to the government that no He cited several areas of concern, Max Riveron, that if he develops earcriminal charges be laid against me.” including the law’s requirement of ly-stage Alzheimer’s disease and he's Twenty-one years “reasonable foreseeability” of death. unable function, he wants Riveron 3 9 Slater, M I T in H EFebruS T, VA NCOUVE R, BC | PA R Q VA N C O Uto VE R.COM ary 2015, Robinson was thrilled when In effect, Robinson said, a person has to ask a doctor to end his life in acthe Supreme Court of Canada came to to be near death to qualify for a med- cordance with his wishes. But the law a different verdict in a case involving ically assisted exit from this world. doesn't allow this. B.C. residents Lee Carter, Hollis John“The Supreme Court of Canada’s "It's basic, and yet in this bill the son, Gloria Taylor, and physician Wil- test was ‘grievous and irremediable’,” government is refusing to do that," liam Shoichet. Taylor, like Rodriguez, he noted. “That’s very different from he said. "That's another area of was suffering from ALS and did not reasonably foreseeable death.” concern." g want to die slowly, racked with pain. The law banning doctor-assisted death was ruled unconstitutional when a competent adult person clearly conFOR ALL the wealth it has created, New Economy”, a 2015 paper pubsents and has a grievous and irremedicapitalism has unleashed a litany lished by his Connecticut-based able medical condition that causes enbotanistrestaurant.com bananaleaf-vancouver.com of evils. Climate change. Wars. think-tank Capital Institute. during suffering and is intolerable. elsanto.ca Poverty. Inequality. Alienation. Fullerton will deliver a VancityRobinson, however, maintained doomed? Can it be sponsored talk, “Reimagining thatTHE theGEORGIA TrudeauSTR government’s Med- 17 – 24Is/ capitalism 4 AIGHT JANUARY 2019 saved? Former Wall Street execu- Economics: How Living Systems ical Assistance in Dying legislation, tive John Fullerton believes cap- Can Fix a Broken One”, on Tueswhich passed in 2016, does not meet italism is fundamentally sound, day (February 19) at the Vancouthe terms of the Carter ruling. save for some hiccups. Fullerton ver Convention Centre West (1055 “That law is unconstitutional,” he laid out his ideas in “Regenerative Canada Place). It will be preceded said. “It is cruel and it is unjust.” Capitalism: How Universal Prin- by a Vancity community marketRobinson, now the NDP candidate ciples and Patterns Will Shape Our place, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. g in Burnaby North–Seymour, called on Justice Minister David Lametti to

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FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 5

URBAN LIVING

HIGH TECH

Pro advice for organizing your life Clean tech offers solution for wastewater treatment by Janet Smith

The chemical-free key is called a hydroxyl radical by Kate Wilson

Vancouverite Jane Stoller (left) is the brains behind Organized Jane, a holisitic decluttering and coaching service.

ane Stoller traces her passion for organization back to her childhood on an Ontario farm. As young as six years old, she relates, she was putting books in order by publication date and sorting her stuffed animals by colour. There were, of course, other factors that the Vancouver talent behind Organized Jane, a holistic decluttering and coaching service, started to recognize as she got older. “My parents were Swiss, and Switzerland is a very small, organized country,” she tells the Straight over the phone in advance of hitting the B.C. Home + Garden Show, from Wednesday to next Sunday (February 20 to 24) at B.C. Place Stadium. “I spent a lot of time in urban dwellings in Europe, and the major difference in North America is we’re such a consumerist society. In Europe, it’s quality over quantity. In Vancouver we have small dwellings but large storage lockers to store all our stuff.” Stoller has turned her knack for neatness into a business and a book called Organizing for Your Lifestyle: Adaptable Inspirations From Socks to Suitcases. Over the years, she’s seen what she does become a bona fide trend, with more organization experts, more homewares aimed at helping you organize your mountains of stuff, and shows like Tidying Up With Marie Kondo ruling Netflix. What sets Stoller apart is her practical method of taking a holistic approach to the way you declutter. And her signature is starting with the closet. “I always hone in on it because it’s the first thing that you see in the morning, and saving 10 minutes per day will help you stay organized,” she explains. “We waste time looking for things.” Stoller’s approach is to get you to honestly assess your lifestyle when you tackle all that apparel. “I ask ‘What are your main activities? What are your main outfits at work? What would you like to spend more time doing?’ ” she says. Those answers help guide what gets removed, what gets stored, and what gets put where it’s easily accessible.

Her tricks include topnotch and keep them nice”), and cloth hangers (“You want to preserve shelves that unfold to hang from the those high-quality clothing items closet rail and are easily put away as seasons change. “I’m also a big fan of see-through boxes, where you can quickly see what’s in them,” she adds. Another key area for organization is the kitchen, she says, especially in Vancouver, where cupboard space is Want to declutter like a demon? at a premium. The impulse to purHere are some items that might chase gadgets is hard to resist these help you channel your inner days, but be ruthless about what you neat freak. actually need. “Frequency of use is d BUMERANG HANGERS so important in a kitchen,” she says. IKEA’s solid-wood hangers, “The things you use on a daily basis $6.99 for an eight-pack, have to be at eye level and within treat your clothes like the easy reach.” investment they are. These And banish the junk drawer, alstructured beauties can ready. “It’s not a good habit to get support even your heaviest jackets, and they boast a into to put all the stuff we don’t use in shoulder shaper for your there,” Stoller advises. slippiest blouses and most Another area her city-dwelling delicate sweaters. clients struggle with is the bathroom. She says it’s time to “sober d HONEY-CAN-DO 8-SHELF up your toiletries”. “It’s dangerous ORGANIZER Battle clutter because these products expire,” she with this durable, hanging reinforced-fabric shelving says. “I sort through them quarterly, that attaches to your closet but at least do it annually.” Her derod and is roomy enough for sign tricks here, especially when you winter sweaters. It collapses can’t fit a nice big medicine cabinet easily when the weather turns or cabinets in your bathroom, are warm ($48.99 at Bed Bath & Plexiglas containers that can sit on Beyond). Find the style in deep top of each other. blue, black, white, and natural The biggest hurdle in all this? poly-cotton. Bonus: two fabric Stoller sees it over and over with her slide-in drawers for your socks, clients. “From my experience, it’s bebelts, or scarves. ing overwhelmed,” says Stoller, who’s d TOP SHELF ORGANIZER already working on her second book. Rather than jamming your “You just have to do it step by step.” sweaters onto a too-hard-toAnd that means not necessarreach shelf, these ingenious ily making things look like they’re little slide-out cloth shelves straight out of a magazine layout. help you keep ’em folded like “I often disagree with articles where Marie Kondo would ($12.98 at Real Canadian Superstore). everything is ultra organized and there are these pretty little boxes. Are d BAMBOO LAZY SUSAN you going to use those? Are you going Washable and made from to be able to sustain that?” she says. durable bamboo, this 14-inch “In décor and design we are really rotating plate looks nice obsessed with Instagram and things enough to use on your diningbeing perfect.” g room table. But stick it in your

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Jonathan Rhone is the CEO of Axine Water Technologies; the Vancouver company has been named to the Global Cleantech 100 list for the third year running.

anadian health care is on the edge of a crisis. For the past 70 years, antimicrobial drugs, including antibiotics, have been used to successfully treat infections, but over time bacteria have developed resistance to those medicines. Certain strains of germs responsible for pneumonia, urinary-tract infections, gonorrhea, and more can no longer be countered by prescription drugs, raising questions about how society will tackle these diseases in the future. One of the biggest culprits in creating these superbugs, ironically, is pharmaceutical companies—or, more specifically, their wastewater. Like any manufacturing plant, big pharma factories require water for processes including cleaning the reactors between batch runs. Much of that liquid becomes contaminated by the drugs’ active ingredients. Although in some cases the wastewater and its pollutants are successfully treated on-site, much of it ends up at sewage-treatment plants. Those stations don’t have adequate processes to break down the pharmaceutical molecules, and harmful bacteria can gain resistance through exposure. In the view of Jonathan Rhone, CEO of wastewater-treatment company Axine Water Technologies, that’s a big problem. “All the studies done have shown that active pharmaceutical ingredients from manufacturing plants… are a significant contributor to [creating] antimicrobial-resistant bacteria,” he tells the Georgia Straight on the line from his Vancouver office. “It doesn’t get treated by the sewagetreatment plants because they’re nonbiodegradable organics. “There is a multibillion-dollar market in North America where industrial manufacturers don’t have a solution for treating this type of wastewater with some of these toxic organics with it. Typically, it has to be put in a truck and driven to a special facility where it’s incinerated using fossil fuels. So it’s very energy-intensive, high-cost, and has lots of environmental liabilities associated with it. With Axine, the wastewater comes into our system, it gets treated, and then it can either be reused on-site or safely discharged to the sewer. And there are no waste products.” The theory behind Axine’s technology has been around for a long time, but it’s only in recent years that a company has found a way to operate the technology economically. “We don’t need any chemicals,” Rhone says. “In very simple terms, we have electrodes with advanced catalyst materials on them. When we apply electricity to them, they produce an oxidant on the surface of the catalyst. That generates one oxygen,

and one hydrogen, which is called a hydroxyl radical. “That hydroxyl radical is very reactive,” he continues. “So we f low the wastewater through a series of these catalysts that produce hydroxyl radicals on their surface. The hydroxyl radicals react with the organic pollutants—anything from pesticides to pharmaceuticals to solvents—and they basically rip the molecules apart. They oxidize them back to their basic building blocks of oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen gas.”

In Canada, we’re punching way above our weight class in this area. – Jonathan Rhone

Although the process might sound simple, it’s technically challenging. Wastewater varies from one plant to another, and the concentrations of pollutants are inconsistent. Axine’s system, however, is able to treat a broad range of organic compounds, which also allows it to serve industries outside of pharmaceuticals, including electronics manufacturing. That versatility is one of the factors that led the company to be named to the Global Cleantech 100 list for the third year running—a prestigious award that, Rhone says, spotlights the technological leaps the Burnabybased organization has made since its inception in 2010. “It’s kind of the gold standard to be named to the Cleantech 100,” he says. “They’ve got a blue-chip panel of several dozen investors who look at something like 14,000 different companies from all over the world. From that, they pick 100. “In Canada, we’re punching way above our weight class in this area,” he continues. “I think last year we had 13 companies [selected], and this year we have 12. In British Columbia, which is one of the most productive clean-tech ecosystems in the world, we had six companies named this year to the Cleantech 100, which is just astonishing. It’s a big honour for us, and it’s validation of the incredible work that our team’s doing to take this idea and turn it into a product that has an impact.” g

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Turmeric makes a difference Vancouver-based entrepreneurs are using the root to improve lives by Gail Johnson

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inter getaways often mean heading to sunny climes to surf or stretch out on a beach. For Umeeda and Nareena Switlo, travelling from Vancouver to Belize has a very different purpose: to run their social enterprise, Naledo. The motherdaughter duo makes the world’s first wildcrafted whole-root turmeric paste, in the process supporting hundreds of farmers in the Central American country that has staggeringly high unemployment rates. Umeeda and her family, who are of Indian descent, came to Canada as refugees from Uganda in the 1970s. Umeeda’s own mom’s cooking helped keep them connected to their culture throughout their displacement, so the women have always had a keen interest in food. (Nareena’s late father, Gary Switlo, cofounded Concert Box Office.) A few years ago, while Nareena was working in international development, Umeeda was volunteering with CUSO in Belize. Her job was to advise the government on opportunities for youth; 70 percent of the country’s population is under age 29. While there, in a village called Toledo, Umeeda attended an Indian diaspora conference. She heard the story of how the town’s ancestors had come to Belize as indentured slaves from India more than 200 years prior. One of the farmers ended up showing her turmeric that was growing wild on his

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There’s growing interest in new flavours and health benefits of food. – Nareena Switlo

land. Their ancestors had brought the root with them. After months of experimenting, the Switlos came up with a recipe for bright orange, whole-root turmeric paste. Called Truly Turmeric, it also contains cold-pressed coconut oil, fresh lime juice, and sea salt. In doing so, they founded Naledo, which partners with more than 350 small-scale farmers and employs people aged 19 to 32 who are paid twice the country’s minimum wage and receive mentorship and entrepreneurial training. “Some of them have saved enough money to attend postsecondary education or advance their children’s education,” Nareena says in a phone interview. “The impact on people’s lives is real.”

The Switlos are clearly doing something right; when they appeared on Dragons’ Den late last year, they got offers from all six Dragons. Truly Turmeric is now sold in hundreds of stores across the country, with plans to expand to the United States. “In the western world, people are learning more about the Ayurvedic traditions of eating your medicine and about how a whole-food diet impacts your day-to-day functioning,” Nareena says of the food’s appeal. “Turmeric has been in our Indian culture for generations, and there’s this growing interest in new flavours and health benefits of food. Turmeric really stands out in those areas.” Turmeric, which is usually sold in powdered form, has been shown to have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. However, when the root is boiled and dried to be turned into powder, many essential oils and nutrients are lost, Nareena says, whereas the root’s natural compounds remain intact when it’s made into a paste. The paste can be added to soups, smoothies, stir-fries, curries, salad dressings, and other dishes; it can be swapped for powdered turmeric in any recipe that calls for it. Some people add a small amount of it to water to refuel after a workout. The Switlos are currently developing a turmeric-based lemonade, a functional beverage, to be released this summer. g

DRINK

Gaja wine family sets a very high bar

by Kurtis Kolt

n the way to a Whistler ski vacation, Gaia Gaja (pronounced â&#x20AC;&#x153;GUY-ahâ&#x20AC;? for both), of Italyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s renowned Gaja winemaking family, presented an intimate tasting of current and upcoming releases for a small group of wine-trade people at Robson Streetâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s CinCin Ristorante and Bar. This was the wine-world equivalent of BeyoncĂŠ joining you and your pals at karaoke, or Meryl Streep coming over to watch the Oscars with the gang. As Krug is largely regarded as the top of the Champagne game, or Domaine de la RomanĂŠe-Conti is commonly viewed as the pinnacle of Burgundy, it is the wines of Gajaâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; which have evolved since Gaiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s great-great-grandfather founded the winery in 1859â&#x20AC;&#x201D;that have become the high point of Italian wine, particularly since Gaiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s father, Angelo, began taking over the winery in 1961. During the subsequent decades, he made waves internationally for bringing Italian wine into modern times, going from rustic to more elegant styles, employing sustainable farming methods, not being afraid of bolstering their oak program, and focusing on single-vineyard, premium wines of place. This began in Piedmont, Barbaresco, and Barolo, but expanded to projects in Tuscany in the 1990s and a new venture on Mount Etna thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s only just beginning. â&#x20AC;&#x153;It is my sister Rossana and I starting to take things over, and my younger brother Giovanni is just now joining the family business,â&#x20AC;? she told us. â&#x20AC;&#x153;We are still working out everyoneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s roles, because for now the only hierarchy we have is my father, and then thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s everyone else.â&#x20AC;? When she was born, her father was so concerned the family name would not live on if he and his wife, Lucia, didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have a son that they named her Gaia so there would be at least some level of eponymous continuity. She spoke of her familyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s hard work, efforts, and sacrifices over the years, making decisions like not putting their name on quality wine that wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t of high-enough quality, or recently planting 250 cypress trees on the property to encourage birds to nest, adding to the vineyardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s biodiversity, something that hasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t yet come to fruition. â&#x20AC;&#x153;So far, theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re just standing there, doing nothing.â&#x20AC;? The Gajas work with consultants, but not winemaking consultants.

They heed the advice of a botanical expert, an entomologist, a geneticist, and more to fine-tune their vineyards, coming up with what can casually be described as their own proprietary nod to biodynamic farming. This is not a family that idles well, and although Angelo has set a very high bar for their wines, there is a new generation eager to continue pushing upward. Here are a few of their coveted wines, currently available around town.

Merlot, 35 percent Syrah, and 10 percent Sangiovese teems with juicy red and black berry fruit, punctuated by fresh rosemary and oregano. GAJA BAROLO DAGROMIS 2013 (Piedmont, Italy; $116.99, Marquis Wine Cellars)

Considering that two of Gajaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s toptier Barolosâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the Sperss from Serralunga and the Conteisa from La Morraâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;each run over 500 bucks, this version from adjacent vineyards can be considered a bargain. It was a cool GAJA CAâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;MARCANDA PROMIS year in 2013, allowing slow and steady 2016 ripening while the fruit retained fresh (Tuscany, Italy; $86.86, Marquis acidity. This one always offers a textWine Cellars) book layout of tar and roses, leather, Purchased by the family in 1996, the purple fruit, chocolate, and anise. 60-hectare Caâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Marcanda property in Tuscany produces wine that casts GAJA SITO MORESCO 2016 a spotlight on international grape (Piedmont, Italy; $130.34, Marquis varieties. This combo of 55 percent Wine Cellars) From this 10-hectare site in Barbaresco comes an awfully pretty blend of Nebbiolo, Merlot, and Barbera. The varieties are fermented separately, then blended together before spending a year in oak. While it can lay down for many years, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s by WITH SKI SEASON in full all means good to go today. swing, this weekâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cocktail comes from Whistlerâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;speGAJA BARBARESCO 2013 cifically, the villageâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Pangea (Piedmont, Italy; $289.99, B.C. Pod Hotel. Created by food Liquor Stores) and beverage director Matt I had a sneak peek at Gajaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s 2016 Scott and manager Raul BauBarbaresco thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s still going to be tista Campos, the Dalmatian a while before hitting our market. is a drink that the two say Considering itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just a baby, I was â&#x20AC;&#x153;shouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t work but doesâ&#x20AC;?. impressed by how integrated and Perfect for aprĂ¨s-ski. balanced it was, with lovely cherry fruit, floral notes, and hints of cola THE DALMATIAN and spice. It was my favourite of all the wines we tasted, enough to 1 oz vodka make me want to go out and grab Âž oz cracked-black-pepper the last few bottles of this highly syrup touted 2013 vintage. If you have the means, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d go to the Park Royal B.C. 1 oz grapefruit juice Liquor Store location, where thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Â˝ oz lemon juice less than a case left on the shelf. Of course, most of us arenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t about to To make the cracked-blackdrop everything to go spend 300 bucks pepper syrup, combine 250 on a bottle of wine. For those looking millilitres water with 6.25 for something a little more accessible grams of cracked black for tonight, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m going to suggest Alpepper in a pot and bring to a boil. Steep for five minutes, vear Alange Tempranillo 2016 (Ribera then fine-strain. Combine del Guadiana, Spain), a Marquis Wine liquid with 250 grams of sugar Cellars exclusive coming in at $20.78. and heat below 100Â° C until Earthy black berry fruit and anise fully dissolved. dominate the nose, while that black fruit gets a little more savoury on the Pour all ingredients over palate, with elements of dried plum ice and stir. Garnish with a and Kalamata olives joining juicy currosemary sprig. rants and blackberries. Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a nice smattering of fresh basil and sage, liftby Gail Johnson ing the fruit profile and making it a food-friendly delight. g

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I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 11, 2019 WHERE: Granville / Robson/ Georgia I was walking towards Georgia and you were walking towards Robson. I saw you walking down, tall and handsome. Wearing a black winter jacket with your hood up. I smiled and maintained eye contact and you softly saidâ&#x20AC;&#x161; "Hello" as you passed. I was wearing a bright pink ski jacket and a pink/ purple bobble hat. As I then turned around to see you walk past I also saw you turning back around. Like we had just missed that moment where we both look back. Maybe you will see this. Either way its a good lesson for me to be more confident and follow my intuition...

SAUNTERING DOWN HOLLYBURN SUNDAY AM

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 10, 2019 WHERE: Cypress Mountain You were near the bottom of Hollyburn, strolling quickly, alone, with your thermos in hand. My friend and I were snowshoeing up. My dog liked you and said hi, you seemed to like him too. I liked you but didn't say hi, we passed each other too quickly. Regret! I was all bundled up in green, 5'7", athletic.

BRAZILIAN BUS BEAUTY

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 10, 2019 WHERE: Granville and Robson We got off the #14 at Granville and Robson around 6:25-ish. You made me guess your accent and I failed miserably. You have a Russian name, apparently, though you donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t speak Russian, to my knowledge. I should have asked you out face-to-face, but was too worried about being late for work. In the unlikely event that you see this, would you like to join me for a coffee sometime?

REALLY TALL GUY ON SEABUS

You and I were sitting a seat or two apart and met eyes through the window. I got off at the last stop.

I saw you two beautiful women at the Century Plaza Hotel. I had just made a delivery and hopped on the elevator with you two. You both looked absolutely amazing and you asked me if I could tell where you were going. My brain was barely working but I still managed to stutter out Harry Potter. Hope you two had an amazing time at the party. Maybe one, or both of you can teach me about Harry Potter over a coffee one day?

TALL MAN WITH BACKPACK AT PORTO CAFE

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 9, 2019 WHERE: Porto Cafe Cambie Between 3 and 4pm, you came in, grabbed a coffee and promptly left. You had a big textbook in your arms. You were so attractive and I regret not saying anything...

PACIFIC CENTRE - YOU SAID I HAD A NICE JACKET!

EXCHANGED SMILES OUTSIDE INNO FOODS

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 7, 2019 WHERE: Inno Foods in Coquitlam

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 9, 2019 WHERE: Century Plaza Hotel

I saw the most handsome and SUPER tall guy on the seabus. Black cap, tattoos in his arms, green jacket. Where are you?!

TWO HARRY POTTER HOTTIES

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 8, 2019 WHERE: Seabus to North Van

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 10, 2019 WHERE: Canada Line, Vancouver to Richmond

We exchanged a long smile outside of Inno Foods on Ridgeway. I was in a car and you went in the store. I wanted to talk to you and exchange numbers but you left shortly after. I regret not doing it.

ASIAN WOMAN SOUTH ON WILLOW AT 12TH TO ICORD FEB 7TH

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 6, 2019 WHERE: Willow and 12th Asian woman going South on Willow ME: BLACK SKI JACKET (12th and Willow) "Hello". We both stood at the stop light at north and west intersection of Willow and Broadway you said hello. We both walked up the hill going south towards ICORD... talked about weather and I mentioned skiing. You had glasses a black hat and an amazing smile and wonderful manner. Stylish black jacket and skinny jeans. I am NEVER shy like that... I hope you see this. As you approached ICORD... you smiled over your right shoulder and said good bye... I turned right going west on tenth.

AT PARQ CASINO

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 4, 2019 WHERE: Pacific Centre

Hi! You approached me in front of the Bose at Pacific Centre. I was the girl with glasses and the blue beanie. You told me I looked good in my jacket. You were really cute but I think we were both a bit awkward so we ended our interaction at that. Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s your name? Do you want to grab a coffee with me sometime? :)

I SAW A: I AM A: WHEN: FEBRUARY 2, 2019 WHERE: Parq Casino Hi Darren, I do regret not responding better to you introducing yourself. I have so many questions, and you said youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d go back inside, but itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a big place, and where did you go? I would like to know you. Please universe help him find this message and respond...

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arts

DIY spirit strong in Armisen’s Music by Mike Usinger

o get a window into Fred Armisen’s ability to multitask, consider how the famously busy comedian and musician wraps up his interview with the Georgia Straight. To say he’s been enthusiastically engaged during the chat is understating things: the 52-year-old starts out gushing about legendary West Coast punk antiheroes NoMeansNo and then holds forth on topics ranging from the ever-shifting sands of youth culture to how comedy changed everything for him at a time when he felt lost. At the outset of the call, it’s made clear he’s on a tight schedule. Projects Armisen has on the go include the hit Amazon Prime TV series Forever, his Spanish-language HBO series Los Espookys, and of course his time-permitting gig as the house-band drummer on Late Night With Seth Meyers. More immediately, there’s the last-minute tweaking of his upcoming Comedy for Musicians but Everyone Is Welcome tour, which is heading to Vancouver for the JFL NorthWest comedy festival. But despite all he’s juggling, Armisen isn’t totally done when the interview is over. “One more thing, really quick,” he says on the line from his hometown of Los Angeles. “Um, are you from Vancouver?” When the answer is yes, Armisen continues with “Okay, I’m just trying to hear your accent, so if I do an accent on-stage, I’m doing it correctly.” When asked if he needs the Straight to continue talking, perhaps rattling off an on-the-fly list of the greatest drummers of all time, Armisen says that won’t be necessary. Even as he’s been answering all questions, he’s been busy working. “No, I’m good now,” he responds. “There’s one key to your accent, and I’ve just put it in my head.”

THE ACCENT-GATHERING is a sign that Comedy for Musicians but Everyone Is Welcome will draw on bits from Armisen’s Netflix hit Standup for Drummers. The one-hour special has him, brilliantly, doing the accents of folks in every state in America. Other highlights include segments where he claims to be completely baffled by jazz and zydeco, and a demonstration of how timekeeping has changed over the decades, from the big-band ’30s to the

which he loves, Armisen reflects that he wasn’t serious enough about the craft of making music.

Fred Armisen’s JFLNW show Comedy for Musicians reflects his love of punk, drummers, and surreal humour. Photo by Lance Bangs

synth-fixated ’80s. Along the way, there are detours into the sadness of 18thcentury leech-wielding doctors, decomposing foxes, and having to be Burger King in a world ruled by McDonald’s. A gifted drummer, Armisen also slides behind the kit to do eerily accurate impersonations of legends like Keith Moon, Ringo Starr, and Meg White. What’s different about Comedy for Musicians is that it’s aimed at more than amateur Topper Headons and Grant Harts. “I’m going to do some more guitar-based comedy,” Armisen says. “There will be observations on types of guitar players, chord structures, types of guitar effects. I’m still doing drummer stuff, but adding more of a guitar element.” It was Armisen’s affection for music, specifically punk (starting with Hüsker Dü, Big Black, the Clash, and the Damned), that launched him on a roundabout path to comedy. Before landing on Saturday Night Live for an 11-season run, he spent years toiling in the American underground as the drummer for Chicago alternative agitators Trenchmouth.

His affection for punk is obvious right from when he begins the interview by singing the praises of Vancouver and the old Hungry Eye, which he played numerous times, dating back to when it was known as the Cruel Elephant. “One of my favourite bands ever is NoMeansNo—we played with them one time in Houston,” he recalls. “Is there a better beginning to a song than ‘It’s Catching Up?’ It’s so good, it’s paralyzing.” Back in the day, punk was something kids turned to because they hated the government, teachers, parents, and soccer coaches. That wasn’t the case for Armisen. “I liked the pleasantness of it,” he says with zero irony. “The version of punk that I saw was very colourful and positive. All the melodies were happy. Even with hardcore bands I saw, like Hüsker Dü, they still had a poppy element. The reason I hung on to punk wasn’t because of anger. My revolution wasn’t against my parents. It was against the kids in my high school who were so into cliché rock. They were into every cliché of rock ’n’ roll that you saw on TV—the long hair, blue

jean jackets, and lyrics about castles. I thought that we were supposed to be changing things, to go for an aesthetic that was cooler. As soon as I saw Devo and Talking Heads, I was like, ‘This is the opposite of what’s around me— why aren’t we all doing this?’ ” To do his part in changing the cultural landscape, he got into the punkrock trenches as a drummer. Armisen travelled North America and made records with Trenchmouth for eight years, from 1988 to the postgrunge mid-’90s. During that time he watched fellow Chicagoans like Smashing Pumpkins become superstars, and Windy City renegades like the Jesus Lizard land major-label deals. Eventually, it started to seem like everyone was doing better than Trenchmouth. “When the Smashing Pumpkins got big I was fine with it,” he says. “It was like, ‘That’s not the kind of music we make, so this is how it should be.’ Then Jesus Lizard and even Tortoise—which wasn’t on a major label—was bigger than us. I remember going, ‘This band [Trenchmouth] is not working.’ And that’s what changed it all for me.” Rather than begrudge those acts,

AFTER SPINNING HIS wheels as a drummer with the Blue Man Group, and getting little joy from a Second City improv class, he decided to take a DIY approach to comedy. In 1998 he shot a man-on-the-street-style guide to Austin’s fabled South by Southwest music festival. Fred Armisen’s Guide to Music and SXSW ’98 had him interviewing Siouxsie and the Banshees while dressed as a nightmarishly mute bucktooth rabbit, asking insane questions at sparsely attended “How to Make It” seminars, and doing what many thought was impossible: making famously misanthropic alternativerecord producer Steve Albini (Nirvana’s In Utero) crack up. The tape led to work on HBO, followed by the call from Saturday Night Live, where he made his name with such oddballs as Venezuelan nightclub comic Fericito and Valley Girl–accented Stuart from The Californians. Eventually, he created the wildly successful DIY sketch show Portlandia with Sleater-Kinney’s Carrie Brownstein; there, he forever etched on people’s brains such warped caricatures as the customer-hostile women’s-bookstore owner Candace Devereaux. If he took a life lesson from his time in Trenchmouth, it was that being anything less than meticulous in his comedy work wasn’t an option. Which brings him to where he is today, as one of the busiest people in the game, with a schedule that shows no signs of slowing down. Luckily, Armisen is proof once again that no one minds working double time—including during interviews—when they love what they do. “I’m not, like, an overly mystical or spiritual person, but you need to look around you at the signs in life,” Armisen says. “It was like, ‘This band with your friends is not working out, but whenever I do comedy, a million things work out.’ So I took the clues of life, and figured ‘This is the direction you go.’ It was as simple as ‘Let me try a little standup, let me try some characters.’ And then, boom, everything changed.” g Fred Armisen brings Comedy for Musicians but Everyone Is Welcome to the Vogue Theatre on Saturday (February 16), as part of JFL NorthWest.

JFL’s Mandel is in it for more than the money by Mike Usinger

f Howie Mandel has learned to accept anything over the course of his 63 years on planet Earth, it’s that few things in life are more dangerous than being left alone with your own thoughts. Keeping himself occupied at all times is, therefore, not just a sound financial decision, but a way to get through life. It doesn’t take long for the veteran standup, game-show host, talent-show judge, Just For Laughs part owner, and father of three to acknowledge that he’d rather have numerous balls in the air than be sitting around on the couch. The amiable and decidedly calm-sounding comedian calls the Straight from Denver, which has of course become a post-pot-prohibition mecca for those who live to light up. Casually mention that partaking in that particular pastime is usually followed by a paranoid bout of self-loathing, and Mandel is quick with a response. “Standing in front of a mirror and asking myself ‘What’s wrong with you?’ isn’t something that I need pot for,” he says with a wry laugh. “That’s something I do almost every day without pot. That’s why I’m so medicated.” That he’s able to see the humour in this speaks volumes about where he finds himself today. There’s a good reason that Mandel is one of the faces of Bell Canada’s high-profi le

For all Howie Mandel has accomplished—from game shows to films—standup remains his first love.

mental-health initiative Let’s Talk. Easygoing as the comic appears on-stage and on TV, in private he famously wages a number of battles on different fronts, including ADHD, depression, anxiety, and OCD. Best-known is his germophobia—which makes something as simple as checking into a hotel room an elaborate procedure in which beds are stripped and clean towels laid on the floor to make pathways around the room. After surprising himself by revealing his

struggles during a 2006 Howard Stern interview, Mandel has made some kind of peace with his various issues. “Right from when I open my eyes, things are a struggle, but I now know that I’m not alone,” he says. “And I’m helping remove the stigma of talking about it. Getting help is part of the battle.” And for Mandel, so is making sure that he doesn’t have time to listen to the voices causing an endless cacophony in his mind. For almost a decade, he’s been a regular judge on the Simon Cowell–created America’s Got Talent. This past December brought a reboot of Deal or No Deal to CNBC, Mandel once again holding down duties as the game show’s host. Last month saw the premiere of his first standup special in two decades, with Howie Mandel Presents Howie Mandel at the Howie Mandel Comedy Club airing on Showtime. Despite everything he’s accomplished during his five decades in show business (doing drama on the critically adored ’80s TV hit St. Elsewhere, hosting his own talk and sketch-comedy shows, dabbling in feature films, including Gremlins), standup remains his first love. Such is his passion for the craft that he admits to being worried about where it’s headed. Mandel grew up on boundary-exploding revolutionaries like Richard Pryor. Today, in the wake of

#MeToo and scandals like Louis C.K.’s masturbation debacle, pushing buttons has become dangerous. Veteran Norm Macdonald discovered that last December, when he got a firestorm of blowback on social media after defending C.K., and then defending his defence by making a joke involving Down syndrome. Clean as Mandel keeps his routines, he’s concerned about a new wave of PC police sanitizing comedy. Put forth that comics are rock stars who, once money is no longer a concern, are technically at liberty to bust down whatever limits they want to, he says: “No, hip-hop is where the new rock stars are. Hip-hop is the only place where you have artists pushing boundary lines and changing culture.” Follow that up by suggesting Mandel is at a point in his life where he doesn’t have to worry about offending anyone, and he counters that’s not the case. The last thing he wants to do is something that will lead to him losing any gig like America’s Got Talent or Deal or No Deal. “This isn’t about money,” he says. “It’s never been about money for me. It’s about keeping busy, so I’m not listening to all the noise in my head.” g JFL NorthWest presents Howie Mandel and Friends on Thursday (February 14) at the Orpheum.

FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 11

ARTS

Three to see at JFL NorthWest fest

by Guy MacPherson

here are over 100 shows and 180 comedic artists playing all around town in the next two weeks at JFL NorthWest. We canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t highlight everything, obviously, but here are three performers who wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t disappoint: The Daily Showâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Roy Wood Jr., a 20-year standup vet; DeAnne Smith, who kicks off the Canadian portion of Netf lixâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Comedians of the World; and the improv-minded Rory Scovel.

I want more than that little Canadian passport. GS: Really? That is so backwards. DS: Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s so backwards! I know, but thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the way I am. I think that with my general demeanourâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and I take it as a complimentâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;people think Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m Canadian anyway, I guess. I defer and Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m kind of polite. More and more, comedy and entertainment truly is such a global experience. With all the streaming networks and the Internet, thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just so many platforms, it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t really matter where youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re based anymore, I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t think.

ROY WOOD JR. (At the Orpheum on Thursday [February 14])

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Georgia Straight: Being on The Daily Show has really helped your career. Is it in any way a hindrance? RW: No, I think the only hindrance is that because a lot of what we talk about on the show dabbles in politics and world issues, people expect you to talk more about politics, and I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t that much. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m no Lewis Black, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m not Jon Stewart, Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m not Dennis Miller. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have 60 minutes of full analysis top to bottom of every bureaucratic issue. Sometimes I just want to talk about why Street Fighter is the greatest video game of all time. You know, mix it up. If The Daily Show is a five-on-five basketball game, my comedy is more like watching oneon-one. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s still basketball; itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just a different speed. GS: Big standup fans understand the difference, but the masses who might only know you from television wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t. RW: Yeah. And I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t think the people leave disappointed; I just think they come with preconceived notions of what they think Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m going to talk about on-stage. But at the end of the day, as long as people laugh and have a good time, I feel like Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve done my job. GS: When did you realize you could make it in comedy? RW: I never felt like Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve made it. That paranoia of failure is always there for me. I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know if thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s healthy or not, but it existsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;even now, on The Daily Show. Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s still the idea of â&#x20AC;&#x153;Okay, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re on The Daily Show. Well, now, donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t screw it up.â&#x20AC;? For all that people talk about The Daily Show being a great institution that springboarded the careers of so many people, thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s far more people that it didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t do shit for. And I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t want to be one of those people. So in order to not be one of those people, you gotta bust your ass; you gotta work hard.

RORY SCOVEL (At the Rio Theatre next Thursday and Friday [February 21 and 22]) Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t let his The Daily Show gig make you think Roy Wood Jr. talks politics.

DEANNE SMITH (At the Orpheum on Thursday [February 14] and the Rio Theatre on Friday [February 15])

GS: Has your Netflix special given you a boost? DS: I think so. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m definitely getting the feeling that a lot of people are, quote, â&#x20AC;&#x153;discoveringâ&#x20AC;? me. I know Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve been around for a while, but not everybody does. So Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m definitely getting a lot of positive feedback from people who hadnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t heard of me and hadnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seen my comedy before. And I think it does help to be the first up in that queue, because sometimes it just starts playing automatically, I think. GS: So you can say youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re number one. DS: Oh, you know what? I will, now that youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve said it. If you put it in print, forget about it, thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s it. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s my pull quote on all my materials going forward. GS: In your special you talk about the fluidity of gender and all the language that goes with it. Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re also pretty fluid when it comes to nationality, it seems, because youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re American but youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re on the Canadian special. DS: Yes. I feel so gratified that that worked out. I started comedy in Canada; Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve made Canada my home and I really love it. Despite mounting pressure telling me to get to the States for my career, I keep choosing Canada. So to have a big moment in my career be labelled as Canadian and be distinctly Canadian just makes me so happy. GS: There are avenues you could take to become fully, or legally, Canadian. DS: Right now Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m just a permanent resident, but I guess thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s citizenship in the works. Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nothing

GS: How improvised are your shows? RS: Last year in Atlanta I did six shows in a row fully improvised and we shot it for a documentary. Just recently, a friend said, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve got to put some text at the beginning, because your fans think thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s what you do anyways.â&#x20AC;? And I was like, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Oh shit, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re right. We have to make sure thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s some kind of text that this is not my usual thing.â&#x20AC;? I would say my usual act is probably 60 to 80 percent written material that was born out of improvised, spontaneous moments. I try to keep it loose and play around when I can. GS: Youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve compared what you usually do to jazz. RS: I also reference Phish a lot, just because they also start a song and then four minutes into the song they do a 20-minute improvised jam, and then they come back and close out the song. I think my attraction to that kind of music is that, when you canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t predict what the music is about to be, you have a better chance of getting lost in it, because your brain doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t grow numb to knowing when the beat will come or when the changes are going to come. GS: I know a lot of times youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll start your sets using an accent, whether itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a southern one or vaguely Germanic or Scandinavian. It must be harder to fool people now, the more known you are. RS: I think anyone who is a fan gets excited knowing â&#x20AC;&#x153;This isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t who he is, but I guess this is what heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s going to do tonight.â&#x20AC;? And then I think people who havenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t seen me who show up at a club or wherever, they just assume thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s who I am, so they still pay attention. I still just do my act anyways. I have a feeling that if I wrote an act for those characters, it wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be as appealing to people who liked what I did. g

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ARTS

Standup Attell masters fine art of dick joke

by Guy MacPherson

his February 14, take your sweetheart out for a night of fine lines. There’s no better way to say “I love you” to that special person than a date spent watching the Shakespeare of dick jokes. Standup veteran Dave Attell has been composing elevated, depraved punch lines for over 30 years, becoming known as one of the best ever at his craft. “I think everybody likes a dick joke. I’m going to go out on a limb here,” he says on the phone while opening mail in his New York City home. “I’ll be there on Valentine’s Day. I’ll be up there sad so you can look at me as the road not taken.” The self-deprecating master will always choose to deflect praise. He

acknowledges that the masses will inevitably claim “If it’s funny, it’s funny,” but adds, “That’s usually followed up with ‘Whatever you said was not funny.’ Not ‘You know what? I thought it over and you’re right: that is funny.’ ” Attell is playing the Vogue Theatre as part of the JFL NorthWest comedy fest, but he claims to be nothing more than a greasy club comedian. “There’s a whole other world of comedy now, like arena comedy, theatre comedy, Twitter comedy,” he says. “There’s all these different mediums for comedy, but I’m just really a club comic.” He excels anywhere, but it’s in the rough-and-tumble world of nightclubs that he’s most comfortable. And he was even more so back in the

Dave Attell is not into personal storytelling.

day when the audience wasn’t distracted by technology. “That was the beauty of club comedy,” he says. “It was a wilder experience. I used to call it like a knife fight. Now they’ll sit there quietly. You don’t know if they’re having a good time,

and then you have to read the tweets and go, ‘Oh, I guess I did okay.’ ” The performances are what keeps him going, though. He still enjoys the stage time, even if the ancillaries don’t thrill him. “I think about quitting all the time,” he says. “Not because I’m not having fun doing it. It’s just the actual promotion and the travel, I get stressed-out more, I have to take care of my mom, there’s no fun to the road. Doing the shows is the fun. But I think about it a lot. Like, I do feel like I’m not relevant. I could care less about speaking to power and all that stuff. That’s not my job. I feel like I’m there to be funny. A lot of my jokes, I think, cross the line. I’m definitely not

Wen Wei Dance presents

as dirty as I used to be, but I would say it’s still not a PG-13 act; it’s an R act.” Politics doesn’t interest him. Nor does personal storytelling. “There’s this whole generation of audience where they’re like, ‘Oh, this is not the truth,’ ” he says. “I feel bad for them. Because I’ve seen comics that only talk about the reality of their life and it’s boring. I really feel like I’ve heard your story about going to a Jamba Juice with a girlfriend. When I used to watch Wrestlemania, I was never like, ‘I wonder what the Iron Sheik is like when he’s not up there in a full-tilt death throe.’ ”g Dave Attell kicks off JFL NorthWest at the Vogue Theatre on Thursday (February 14).

YING YUN

英云

FEBRUARY 19 - 23 | 2019 | 7PM SCOTIABANK DANCE CENTRE 677 Davie Street Tickets | $37 | wenweidance.ca WORLD PREMIERE Choreography by Wen Wei Wang

Ying Yun performers by Emily Cooper

“…one of the most exciting choreographers in the city” – Georgia Straight

FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 13

ARTS Wen Wei Dance honours the strength of women by Janet Smith

Sarah Formosa is one of the dancers who will perform in Wen Wei Dance’s Ying Yun, which is named after choreographer Wen Wei Wang’s mother. Photo by Emily Cooper

stylized moon rises over five dancers, all dressed in white, moving together on an equally white stage. There’s a reserve and a quiet grace to the women as they move and breathe in unison, yet also an unmistakable strength. None of this gifted group of young dancers—Stéphanie Cyr, Eowynn Enquist, Sarah Formosa, Daria Mikhaylyuk, and Eden Solomon—is supposed to be a stand-in for local choreographer Wen Wei Wang’s late mother. But in his new work Ying Yun, named for and dedicated to her, they capture something akin to her essence. “She was the most beautiful, powerful human being in my life,” the Chinese-born artist tells the Straight, on a rehearsal break in the lobby of the Scotiabank Dance Centre. “I wanted to bring the kind of power I remember with women, and the emotional control. So each dancer showcases who she is as a woman, as an individual, and as a human being.” Wang recalls his mother as a tireless supporter of his career in dance, even when his teacher father disagreed with his choice. Long before coming to Canada and starting a dance journey that would take him from Ballet BC to his own eastern-inflected choreography, Wang grew up amid China’s Cultural Revolution, immersed in the rigours of regional and army-run dance companies. When he travelled to army bases and factories to perform, he would come home late each night to find her waiting. “Cooking oil was really expensive— there was, like, a half-pound for my whole family for a month,” says Wang, who has talked in past interviews about how hungry he remembers being during those times. “But she would take a little bit and she would dab it like this to take the makeup off,” he explains, miming the way she would gently wipe it away. Her ardent support for his artistic life may have come from the fact Ying Yun, a strong singer, never had the chance to pursue the arts. Her own mother died when she was one, and she was raised by a grandmother who couldn’t afford to send her to school. It was only at 12, after public education became free, that she first set foot in a classroom, and she went on to teachers’ college. “I have that visual of her, of that kind of control,” he explains. “Mom was really quiet; she didn’t say much. But she was a beautiful singer—an artist herself, but she couldn’t have that life.”

14 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

Four years ago, Wang returned to his home city of Xi’an to be with her as she was dying from ovarian cancer, and the experience was traumatic. “She passed away at 75, and she went through chemo,” he relates. “That was my first real dealing with death.” He’s in a better place now, ready to honour not just her spirit, but women in general at a pivotal time in history— when everything from #MeToo to women’s marches is bringing females to the forefront. To create the work, Wang explored his emotional connection to his mother, shared stories with his all-female cast, and integrated subtle elements of tai chi—including intentional breathing. Interestingly, Ying Yun comes directly after Wang’s pummelling all-male piece, Dialogue, for six dancers. At the same time that he’s creating Ying Yun, he’s also preparing Dialogue to go out on the road. So he finds himself rehearsing with guys all day, and women from late afternoon into the evening. “You know, everybody says women talk a lot, but the ladies are really quiet and just working,” he says, laughing. “It’s the boys who are always talking and arguing and making jokes.” It’s a busy time for Wang, who not only is building this new work for his own Wen Wei Dance, but has recently become artistic director of Ballet Edmonton (formerly Citie Ballet). He is shepherding the small company to the next level, launching regular threeshow seasons, securing its first Canada Council grant, and taking it in a firmly contemporary direction. This means ample back-and-forth between the two provinces, creating new work there, as well as here on the West Coast for Wen Wei Dance—the latter an outlet for his more personal choreographic voice and for his melding of eastern and western ideas. Wang agrees it’s the most prolific time in his career—a career he might never have had without the support of his mother in China. “It’s kind of crazy. But I’m more confident in a way,” he allows. “When we’re young, we want to be the best. But now I don’t compare myself. I let it happen and not try to please anyone.” g Wen Wei Dance presents Ying Yun at the Scotiabank Dance Centre from Tuesday to next Saturday (February 19 to 23) as part of the Vancouver International Dance Showcase.

FEBRUARY 14 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 15

LIZT ALFONSO DANCE CUBA

CUBA VIBRA!

ARTS

Yoga Play is a deft blend of farce and darkness

“Amazing… striking… dazzling” - The New York Times

Lois Anderson, Derek Chan, and Chirag Naik star in Gateway Theatre’s production of Dipika Guha’s laugh-out-loud-funny satire, Yoga Play. Photo by Tim Matheson

Eduardo Patino

THEATRE

MAR 8 7:30PM ticketsnw.ca

$60 / $50 plus service charges

16 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

masseytheatre.com

star-making turns. The full extent of Raj’s journey is staggering, and Naik digs into it as if he’s been waitYOGA PLAY ing for a role like this his whole life. By Dipika Guha. Directed by Director Jovanni Sy’s warmth and Jovanni Sy. A Gateway Theatre wit shine through in Yoga Play’s production. At Gateway Theatre on physical comedy, and complement Friday, February 8. Continues until the sparkling, frenetic energy of February 16 Guha’s writing. Yoga Play is a hilarious indictment of our times, one d “WE’RE NOT JUST a clothing that manages to galvanize the audiline. We’re a place. We’re a space. ence rather than demoralize us. by Andrea Warner We’re a hope.” This is the ethos of the Lululemon-esque athleisure giant at the TRUE CRIME centre of playwright Dipika Guha’s Created by Torquil Campbell and funny and biting Yoga Play. The Chris Abraham, in collaboration company—or “the family”, as its with Julian Brown. Directed by Chris cult-leader-like cofounder insists Abraham. A Castleton Massive it be called—has hired Joan (Lois production, presented by the Arts Anderson) to help it bounce back Club Theatre Company and Crow’s from a recent fat-shaming scan- Theatre. At the Goldcorp Stage dal in which the cofounder argued at the BMO Theatre Centre on it was the size of women’s thighs Wednesday, February 6. Continues making its yoga pants see-through, until February 24 not the quality of the product. Raj (Chirag Naik) and Fred (Derek d “I’M DOING IT for you,” Torquil Chan) are long-time employees of Campbell says near the end of his the company who have internalized new solo show, True Crime. Well, aspects of the brainwashing. They a version of Campbell says this. only drink green smoothies for Throughout the play’s 95 minutes, lunch rather than eat solid food, the audience engages with multiple and instead of calling it “yoga”, versions of Campbell, which is apthey refer to it as their “practice”. propriate since the inspiration for But after a second scandal breaks— True Crime is a man of many aliases this time it’s rampant child labour who, most infamously, spent more and unsafe working conditions in than a decade passing himself off as one of the company’s Bangladesh Clark Rockefeller. Rockefeller was actually Chrisfactories—Joan goes into damage control. People aren’t really tian Karl Gerhartsreiter, an aspirangry because of the exploitation, ing actor from Germany with a but because they’re feeling guilty, fixation on his version of the AmerJoan says, so the focus needs to be ican dream. Gerhartsreiter is in on “self-forgiveness” and “authen- prison now, convicted of both kidticity”. If they hire the right guru, napping and murder, but he spent decades scamming and scheming their PR crisis will be over. Of course, it doesn’t go quite as his way through life and eventuplanned, but to say more would be ally into New York City’s most afto give away some significant plot f luent circles. He wanted money points that deserve to go unspoiled. and power, and in 1995, few names What I can say is that Guha’s pitch- in America’s capitalist-colonizer perfect skewering of modern cor- royalty carried as much cachet as porate culture and commodified Rockefeller. Campbell draws parallels be“wellness” will likely resonate deeply with Lower Mainland audi- tween himself and Gerhartsreiter as ences. But Yoga Play is not simply a foundation for his obsession with a satire; it’s also a laugh-out-loud the con man, identifying the narcomedy that manages to be both cissism and engaging with it, but farcical and pretty dark. Guha never quite fully owning it. The two addresses themes of cultural ap- men look alike, right down to the propriation, ethics, privilege, and square glasses. They’re both big fans power. At one point, Joan, a white of Patricia Highsmith’s writing—of woman, blackmails Raj and Fred, course—and they lived in New York her two younger employees, both at the same time in the ’90s, aspiring racialized men, one of whom is also actors who were trying to reinvent gay and an immigrant anxiously themselves. Campbell, who comes awaiting his visa renewal. It’s a from an acting family that goes back testament to Naik’s and Chan’s more than a century, hoped to live powerful performances and Guha’s up to his legacy, while Gerhartsreiter nuanced command of satire that was desperately in search of one. “I lived in fear of that city revealing Yoga Play works so well. Overall the cast is great. Ander- me as a fake and sending me away,” son is a delight, and Christine Quin- Campbell says. “And in a way it did.” True Crime marks Campbell’s retana is thoroughly charming as the plucky yoga instructor Romola. turn to the theatre, after he stepped Chan does a beautiful job conveying away in the early aughts to be the Fred’s very real and very complicat- co–lead singer and songwriter of ed story with compassion and heart. the successful Canadian indie-pop see next page Naik’s performance is one of those

band Stars. He’s a dynamic and engaging presence on-stage and this is an ambitious production. It’s funny and thought-provoking, and it successfully builds tension and suspense. There are some truly chilling moments, which is what we want when Highsmith’s name is invoked numerous times. True Crime is at its best when it’s taut and creepy and self-aware. But then it goes past the 70-minute mark, and things drag. In part, this is because it presents three or four false endings, and is at its most meta and unnecessarily moralistic. Campbell’s writing and performance are compelling, though, especially when he’s interrogating himself, his motivations, and his relationship to the story of Gerhartsreiter. by Andrea Warner

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

By William Shakespeare. Adapted and directed by Rebecca Patterson. A Classic Chic production. At the Cultch Historic Theatre on Thursday, February 7. Continues until February 16

d CLASSIC CHIC Productions has a specific mission to produce works with all-female casts. If there’s ever been an important time for all-female productions of William Shakespeare’s work, it’s now. So many of his plays are ultimately about the importance of believing women. Much Ado About Nothing, Classic Chic’s newest production, provides plenty of opportunity for analysis through both a contemporary and a historical-context lens. For the love of feminism, death by slut-shaming is an actual plot point in this play, which was written around 1598. Benedick (Corina Akeson) and Beatrice (Christina Wells Campbell) are stubbornly single and constantly locked in a battle of barbed wits. After Benedick’s friend Claudio (Adele Noronha) and Beatrice’s cousin Hero (Sereana Malani) fall in love, the young couple agree to help trick

Benedick and Beatrice into falling for each other. But chaos ensues after Claudio is duped into believing Hero has been unfaithful to him the night before their wedding. He shames her at the altar, as does Hero’s own father, although she insists she’s innocent. Hero collapses, the Friar convinces her to fake her death until things calm down, and Beatrice demands that Benedick kill Claudio. Eventually, the truth comes out and both couples marry, and yes, this is supposed to be a comedy. In fact, there are many funny moments, and some really wonderful performances by the large cast. The two standouts, though, are Akeson and Campbell, who not only are gifted comedic actors, but also have great chemistry. The heat between them could be felt up in the balcony, which is also a great vantage point from which to appreciate Akeson’s brilliant physical comedy, as the actor nimbly climbs over and across several rows of the audience while Benedick eavesdrops on his friends discussing Beatrice’s supposed love for him. There are some missteps. The various music selections range from pop to world to punk to new wave to Latin (to name a few) without any real connection between them. The pacing is also inconsistent. Some scenes f low perfectly while others lag, which is also distracting and jarring. But I’m grateful for any disruption of and challenge to the Shakespeare sausage party that’s ruled the stage for over 400 years. I don’t blame the Bard himself, but rather the directors, producers, and companies that have rigidly reinforced the binary and contributed to massive gender inequity in the theatre. Classic Chic’s Much Ado About Nothing isn’t perfect, but it does have a higher purpose, and I’m eager to see how the company continues to deepen its artistic and professional development in relationship to its mandate. by Andrea Warner

The endlessly inventive artists of Manual Cinema tell the life story of beloved Chicago poet Gwendolyn Brooks, the first African-American to win the Pulitzer Prize.

February 27 — March 9, 2019

LE SOULIER BY DAVID PAQUET

STUDIO 58 / LANGARA COLLEGE PRESENTS

Book by Joe Masteroff | Music by John Kander | Lyrics by Fred Ebb Based on the play by John Van Druten and Stories by Christopher Isherwood

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“a darkly satirical delight” - Vince Kanasoot, The Georgia Straight

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18/19 FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 17

CHOR LEONI

ARTS Solo pieces seek to humanize and to haunt

ERICK LICHTE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

by Janet Smith

DANCE

BLOOD ON THE DANCE FLOOR An Ilbijerri Theatre production. Presented by DanceHouse, the Talking Stick Festival, and SFU Woodward’s Cultural Programs. At SFU Woodward’s on Wednesday, February 6. No remaining performances

IN FICTION

March 1,2,3 | 8pm March 2 | 4pm

An explosion of choral, jazz, and pop music!

VANCOUVER PLAYHOUSE

chorleoni.org | 1.877.840.0457

2 019 VA NCOU V E R INTERNATIONAL DA NCEFE S T IVA L

An Action at a Distance production. At the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts on Thursday, February 7. No remaining performances

d AUSTRALIAN ARTIST JACOB BOEHME mixes a lot into his new dance-theatre work, from vivid multimedia projections to contemporary dance, from poetic memoir to emotional confession. At its core, though, the show feels like a heart-to-heart with a bloke you’ve gotten to know. Boehme’s gift is in building a safe, intimate, and somehow casualfeeling space. Through movement, and spoken sections, Boehme tells his life story, sometimes embodying other characters, sometimes confiding his deepest secrets to us. Half Aboriginal, a descendant of the Narangga and Kaurna nations of South Australia, Boehme found out he was HIV-positive at the young age of 24, and he’s been living with it for almost 20 years now. Blood on the Dance Floor tracks the struggles he’s gone through, from finding acceptance as a gay man from his own father to trying to strike up a long-lasting partnership despite his disease, to the racism he and his siblings faced as children.

Heartfelt sequences like these give way to headier dance expression, most memorably in a passage where Boehme dances in front of a screen projected with red, bubbling blood in close-up. He lightens all of this with plenty of swear-laced, self-effacing comedy in his storytelling, including a hilarious diatribe on the tyranny of IKEA—“the place couples go to die!” In Burnaby on the following night, local dance star Vanessa Goodman reaffirmed not only her unique gift for conjuring strange new worlds out of theatre spaces, but also her ability to hold a room’s attention. Audience members walking into the space felt a bit like they were entering a sci-fi nightmare, with its floor-set pinkish-red light, rising fog, and a dance floor angled to exaggerate perspective. In the new solo piece, she riffs on the idea of caul birth, a rare occurrence when a baby is born cloaked in the amniotic sac. But the concept doesn’t play out literally at all, the magnetic Goodman moving fluidly between the real and the unreal. She often looks alien, encased in plastic hoods and raincoats, writhing, bending broken, and sometimes moving mechanically to Loscil’s industro-electronic soundscape. At times spoken text about the history and science of caul (the sac was once used as a talisman against drowning, for instance) overlaps and loops. But as you watch it unfold, Goodman feels more like some unearthly being—a phantom? a mutant? an extraterrestrial?—trying desperately to thrive under her wraps. The surreal piece is made all the more haunting by the throbbing lighting of James Proudfoot. g

MARCH 4-30

TAIWAN’S TJIMUR DANCE THEATRE Vancouver Playhouse 8pm, March 29 & 30

“Faced with such excellence, a mere critic can only abandon paper and pencil and listen to this heroic but deeply moving artist with awe and amazement” — Gramophone

Featuring: 10 Gates Dancing · Daina Ashbee · Dairakudakan· Harbour Dance Centre ITP Jeanette Kotowich · Kelly McInnes · Lesley Telford · Manuel Roque · Olivia C. Davies Raven Spirit Dance · Vision Impure · V’ni Dansi · Tjimur Dance Theatre 27 Days of World-Class Dance Performances, Free Events, Classes & Workshops, and More

Info & Box Office: VIDF.CA 604.662.4966

Venues include the Roundhouse, Vancouver Playhouse, KW Studios and Woodward’s Atrium

Tickets start at

PAUL LEWIS

$25

PIANO

SUN MAR 3 at 3pm I VANCOUVER PLAYHOUSE The brilliant British pianist returns with a fascinating program that juxtaposes music by Haydn and Brahms with Beethoven’s iconic Diabelli Variations, “the greatest piano piece ever written” according to Paul’s mentor, Alfred Brendel.

TICKETS: 604 602 0363 I VANRECITAL.COM

SEASON SPONSOR:

CONCERT SPONSOR:

Elaine Adair

Tjimur Dance Theatre photo by Maria Falconer

18 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

SUPPORTED BY:

ARTS LISTINGS ONGOING A HANDFUL OF DUST From Marcel Duchamp, to Man Ray, to Bruce Nauman, ‘a Handful of Dust’ offers a rare opportunity to view a remarkable diversity of photographs from the last 100 years, focusing on the theme of dust, unified in a visual journey through the unlikeliest imagery. To Apr 28, Polygon Gallery. By donation, info thepolygon.ca. THE MATCHMAKER The Arts Club Theatre Company presents Thornton Wilder’s uproarious play of forbidden young love and mistaken identity. To Feb 24, Stanley Industrial Alliance Stage. Tix from $29. TRUE CRIME The Arts Club Theatre Company and Crow’s Theatre present a mindtwisting encounter created by Torquil Campbell and Chris Abraham, in collaboration with Julian Brown. To Feb 24, Goldcorp Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre. Tix from $29. CABARET Studio 58 presents a play set in 1929 Berlin at the notorious Kit Kat Klub. To Feb 24, 8-3 pm, Studio 58. From $12.50. ANNIE: THE MUSICAL Align Entertainment presents the escapades of orphan Annie. To Feb 16, 8 pm, Michael J. Fox Theatre. From $29. CAG ARTIST TALK Artist Diyan Achjadi speaks about her work aboard her wrapped bus as it tours through the city. To Mar 3, 3-4 pm, Contemporary Art Gallery. Free. ROMANCE WEEK Vancouver TheatreSports performs the Valentine’s-related improv shows Love Matches, Love Unscripted, Red Hot Improv, and My Funny Valentine. To Feb 14, The Improv Centre. From $15.75. MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING Vancouver’s Classic Chic Productions presents an evening of Shakespeare featuring an all-female cast. To Feb 16, 8 am, Cultch Historic Theatre. Tix $24-$51. ART EXHIBIT FEATURING ELIZABETH CROSS An art exhibit featuring Elizabeth Cross’ work is on display and for sale at the Hollyburn Country Club. Elizabeth’s art is exquisite with brightly colored flowers, faces and abstracts. 26 art pieces on display. Contact the Hollyburn Country Club for your private viewing at (604) 9220161. To Mar 5, Hollyburn Country Club. A COMEDY OF TENORS Playwright Ken Ludwig’s comedy of mistaken identities and bedroom hijinks. To Feb 23, 8 pm, Coast Capital Playhouse. $22/19. SEEN Nonlinear physical-theatre experience directed by Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg. To Feb 17, Studio 58. By donation. YOGA PLAY Satirical play asks what it takes to find authenticity in a world determined to sell enlightenment. To Feb 16, Gateway Theatre. $20-$55

THE SHOPLIFTERS The Arts Club Theatre Company presents Morris Panych’s play about a shoplifter whose life of petty crime is halted by an overzealous security guard. To Mar 9, Granville Island Stage. Tix from $29. DOUGLAS COUPLAND’S VORTEX Douglas Coupland’s radical art installation takes an imaginative journey to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, immersing viewers in the ocean-plastic pollution crisis. To April 30, 2019, Vancouver Aquarium. $22/$39. 34TH ANNUAL CHERIE SMITH JCC JEWISH BOOK FESTIVAL Writers from Canada, US, Israel and New Zealand. To Feb 14, Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. Free to $24. MUSEUM OF ANTHROPOLOGY AT UBC aIN A DIFFERENT LIGHT: REFLECTING ON NORTHWEST COAST ART to spring 2019 aMARKING THE INFINITE: CONTEMPORARY WOMEN ARTISTS FROM ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIA to Mar 31 aSHAKEUP: PRESERVING WHAT WE VALUE to Sep 1 MUSEUM OF VANCOUVER aWILD THINGS: THE POWER OF NATURE IN OUR LIVES to Sep 30 aHAIDA NOW: A VISUAL FEAST OF INNOVATION AND TRADITION to Dec 1, 2019 VANCOUVER ART GALLERY aA CURATOR’S VIEW: IAN THOM SELECTS to Mar 17 aTHE METAMORPHOSIS to Mar 7 aFRENCH MODERNS: MONET TO MATISSE, 1850–1950 Feb 16–May 20 aAFFINITIES: CANADIAN ARTISTS AND FRANCE Feb 16–May 20 VANCOUVER ART GALLERY’S OFFSITE aPOLIT-SHEER-FORM OFFICE to Mar 31 CONTEMPORARY ART GALLERY aKAMEELAH JANAN RASHEED to Mar 17 POLYGON GALLERY aKEVIN SCHMIDT: RECKLESS to Mar 10 a10,000 SHIPS to Mar 17 MORRIS AND HELEN BELKIN ART GALLERY aHEXSA’AM: TO BE HERE ALWAYS to Apr 7 DR. SUN YAT-SEN CLASSICAL CHINESE GARDEN aSUK-FONG, HOW ARE YOU? to Feb 24 SFU GALLERY aANN BEAM AND CARL BEAM: SPACES FOR READING to Apr 18 TECK GALLERY aEYE EYE to Apr 27

Tickets from $25—Students get $15 tickets with TD All Access Pass

Date Night at the VSO! HEAR THE LOVE WITH THIS SELECTION OF CONCERTS MAR 23 LOUD & QUEER

SYMPHONY AT THE ANNEX Featuring works by Ann Southam (one of Canada’s first prominent female composers), Allison Cameron, Jared Miller and Gabriel Dharmoo, this concert recognizes the fiftieth anniversary of homosexual rights in Canada and celebrates the many, many vibrant voices that make up our queer community. vancouversymphony.ca/loud-and-queer

APR 26/27

DANCING & ROMANCING

LONDON DRUGS VSO POPS A romantic evening featuring Broadway veterans Joan Hess and Kirby Ward, as they sing and dance their way through a program filled with all your favourites. I Could Have Danced All Night, Singing in the Rain, All That Jazz, In the Mood, and much more - all in the grand historic beauty of the Orpheum Theatre. vancouversymphony.ca/dancing-romancing

MAY 11 TRAGIC LOVE: WAGNER & PROKOFIEV

DEBBIE REYNOLDS & GENE KELLY IN SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 13 THANK YOU FOR BEING A FRIEND The Golden Girls reunite in puppet form for a live tribute show. Feb 13, Vogue Theatre. $34.50. ON BEING BLACK IN VANCOUVER 2: LADIES NIGHT Writers Chantal Gibson, Chelene Knight, Juliane Okot Bitek, and Whitney French present stories on being black in Vancouver. Feb 13, 6:30 pm, Alice MacKay Room. Free. STORY STORY LIE: FOOL FOR LOVE Storytelling game show featuring Julie Kim, John Cullen, Lola Leaf, Johnny Trinh, Lindi Nolte, and host Jo Dworschak. Feb 13, 7-8:30 pm, Rio Theatre. $10/$12.

.ca

604-876-3434

JOHN FLUEVOG SHOES PRESENTS INSIDE THE SYMPHONY Maestro Otto Tausk takes the podium in a concert all about two of the greatest love stories in symphonic music. This concert is part of VSO’s fun new afterwork series – Join us for Happy hour with drink specials at 5:30, post-concert mix & mingle with the musicians, then head over to John Fluevog Shoes for a shopping party where 50% of sales is donated back to the VSO. vancouversymphony.ca/tragic-love

MAY 31 DEBUSSY & RAVEL: COLOUR & IMAGE JUN 1/2 Maestro Tausk conducts an exquisite, Romantic French program

MEDIA SPONSOR

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featuring Debussy’s impressionist masterpiece Images, Ravel’s vibrant and rhapsodic Tzigane, and symphonic poems by Lili Boulanger, a young composer whose life was short but exceptional. vancouversymphony.ca/debussy-and-ravel

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“This is one of the best quartets before the public today.”

“Cultivating a new landscape of ballet.”

— The Washington Post

—NEW YORK TIMES

Program 2 Feb 28 Mar 1 2 ALMOST SOLD OUT!

DANISH STRING QUARTET SUN FEB 24 at 3pm I VANCOUVER PLAYHOUSE

BEETHOVEN & MUSIC FROM THE NORDIC COUNTRIES With their shaggy hair and seafarer beards, the strapping members of the Danish String Quartet could be mistaken for 21st-century Vikings. But unlike their marauding forebears, this supremely gifted group of thirty-something Scandinavians is out to conquer the world through sheer musical charisma.

Choreography Jorma Elo 1st Flash Adi Salant New Work Crystal Pite Solo Echo

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Joyce and Tony

FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 19

from previous page THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 14 TRIO CELESTE Chamber music ensemble performs works by Dvořák and Beethoven. Feb 14, 10:15-11:30 am, Vancouver Academy of Music. $20/$38/$42. HOWIE MANDEL & FRIENDS Standupcomedy show as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 14, 6 pm, Orpheum Theatre. $39.50-$69.50. MORGAN MURPHY American writer and comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 14, 6 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50. BURLESQUE DUOS Burlesque show for Valentine’s Day. Feb 14, 7 pm, Rio Theatre. $25/30. MY FUNNY VALENTINE Vancouver TheatreSports presents a “love battle” where three improv couples duke it out in an audienceinspired competition. Feb 14, 7:30 pm, The Improv Centre. $34. LA BOHÉME Vancouver Opera presents Puccini’s work. Feb 14, 7:30 pm; Feb 16, 7:30 pm; Feb 19, 7:30 pm; Feb 21, 7:30 pm; Feb 24, 2 pm, Queen Elizabeth Theatre. $50-$175. SUPERMEGA LIVE Podcasters Matt Watson and Ryan Magee perform as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 14, 8:30 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50. DAVE ATTELL Standup comedian, actor, and writer performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 14, 9 pm, Vogue Theatre. $45.50.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 15 CIRCLE GAME The music of Joni Mitchell reimagined. Feb 15-16, Kay Meek Arts Centre. $19-48. AZIZ ANSARI Standup comedian and actor performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 15, 6 pm, Queen Elizabeth Theatre. $45.50-$89.50. GIRLS GOTTA EAT Podcasters perform as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 15, 6 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50.

IVAN DECKER Comedian from Vancouver performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 15-16, 7 pm, The Comedy MIX. $20. COPPELIA Canada’s Ballet Jörgen performs one of its most popular family ballets. Feb 15, 7:30 pm, The ACT Arts Centre. $36/$33/$29.

Arts HOT TICKET

Now, ever watchful for exciting new talent, the Vancouver Recital Society brings him to town, for a program that should show off both his smarts and his expressive power: there are two Ludwig van Beethoven sonatas, a bit of Béla Bartók, and—here’s the “fearless” part—an unexpected hit of Karlheinz Stockhausen.

MATTEO LANE: STREISAND AT THE BON SOIR New York–based comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest Feb 15, 8:30 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 16 WHITNEY CUMMINGS Actor, writer, and comedian performs as part of JFL Northwest. Feb 16, 6 pm, Vogue Theatre. $39.50. GIRLS GOTTA EAT Podcasters perform as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 16, 6 pm, Fox Cabaret. $22.50. MAZ JOBRANI Iranian-American comedian performs a standup show. Feb 16, 8 pm, Chan Centre for the Performing Arts. Tix on sale Nov 30, 10 am, $42.50. SOLO FLAMENCO Kasandra Flamenco Ensemble presents fiery flamenco with a Cuban twist. Feb 16, 8-9:30 pm, Presentation House Theatre. $20-25. FRED ARMISEN American comedian, actor, and musician performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 16, 9 pm, Vogue Theatre. $45.50. THE COMIC STRIP STANDUP COMEDY Standup comedy by Peter Hudson, Darcy Boon Collins, and headliner Levi McCachen. Feb 16, 9 pm, Tyrant Studios. $18.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 17 JNT COMEDY Marijuana-themed comedy show hosted by Andrew Packer. Feb 17, 8 pm, Cannabis Culture Lounge. $10. MR. JACKSON & MR. TOMPKINS: A TWOGENTLEMAN IMPROV SHOW Comedians Marc Evan Jackson and Paul F. Tompkins perform as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 17, 6 pm, Vogue Theatre. $32.50.

FILIPPO GORINI (February 17 at

the Vancouver Playhouse) At just 22, the Italian pianist comes here trailing effusive praise from his gigs around Europe. The Guardian didn’t hold back when reviewing his debut disc, Diabelli Variations, calling it “fearless” and “breathtaking”. NATE BARGATZE American standup comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 17, 6 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50. MARLON JAMES Author of A Brief History of Seven Killings speaks. Feb 17, 7:30-9 pm, Waterfront Theatre. $15-$30. THE SCRAWNY SHOW Cory Lupovici and Jo-el Oxales host a comedy show featuring headliner John Cullen. Feb 17, 8 pm, ANZA Club. $10/$7. STEVE-O Stunt comic of Jackass fame performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 17, 9 pm, Vogue Theatre. $32.50. STOP PODCASTING YOURSELF Podcast show as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 17, 9 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50.

MASTERPIECE (February 16 at Shaughnessy Heights United Church) Call it podium power: this Vancouver Chamber Choir concert features five visiting maestros from the company’s 39th annual National Conductors’ Symposium, alongside its own tried-and-true leader, Jon Washburn. Pianist Stephen Smith is also on hand as the ensemble MONDAY, FEBRUARY 18 GABRIEL IGLESIAS American comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 18, 6 pm, Queen Elizabeth Theatre. $55.75-$85.75. NATE BARGATZE American standup comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 18, 6 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50. NASTY WOMEN COMEDY Improv group featuring Vancouver comedians performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 18, 7:30 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $10.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19 KEN JEONG Actor and comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 19, 6 pm, Orpheum Theatre. $32.50-$54.50. CHRIS FLEMING Actor and comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 19, 6 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50. YING YUN Ying Yun pays homage to mothers and womanhood. Feb 19-23, 7-8 pm, Scotiabank Dance Centre. $37.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 20 THE AMISH PROJECT Jessica Dickey’s play about compassion in the wake of a school shooting. Feb 20-23, Studio 1398. $35. CIRCLE GAME: REIMAGINING THE MUSIC OF JONI MITCHELL Musical reinterprets Mitchell’s iconic songs through a new generation. Feb 20–Mar 2, Surrey Arts Centre. $49/$39. TODD GLASS Comedian from Philadelphia performs standup as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 20, 6 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50. ANTONI POROWSKI Live cooking demo with Queer Eye food & wine connoisseur as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 20, 6 pm, Vogue Theatre. $39.50-$66.50. SAM JAY Writer and comedian from Boston performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 20, 6 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50. SIRIUSXM TOP COMIC SHOWCASE Two nights of standup hosted by Ben Miner as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 20-21, 7:30 pm, The Comedy MIX. $16. COASTAL DANCE FESTIVAL The Dancers of Damelahamid present ancestral and innovative performances from B.C., the Yukon, Quebec, Alaska, Washington state, and Australia. Feb 20-24, Anvil Centre. From $25. YELLOW FEVER A night of comedy by Asians, for non-Asians, and also Asians. Feb 20, 8 pm, Red Gate. $5-10. KIDD PIVOT: REVISOR Kidd Pivot artistic director Crystal Pite and Electric Company Theatre cofounder Jonathon Young create a dance/theatre hybrid. Feb 20-23, 8 pm, Vancouver Playhouse. From $35.

lends its vocal power to famous choruses by composers from Bach and Haydn to Wagner, Poulenc, and Orff. Think oratorios, operas, and requiems galore—all led by conductors who know their peers are listening.

MY FUNNY VALENTINE

(February 14 at the Improv Centre) Forget that box of chocolates: take your sweetie or, better yet, go with pals to Vancouver TheatreSports League, where they’ll be serving up welcome, nonsyrupy jokes. In this one-night show, hosted by Cupid and Aphrodite, expect everything from improvised love sonnets to whacked-out romantic astrology. We see laughs in your future. g CHILDREN OF GOD Musical about the children of an Oji-Cree family who are sent to a residential school in northern Ontario. Feb 20–Mar 10, 8 pm, York Theatre. Tix $10-$51. LIZA TREYGER Chicago-bred standup comic performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 20, 8:30 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 21 MICHELLE BUTEAU American comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21, 6 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50. NICK SWARDSON Actor, writer, and comedian performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21, 6 pm, Vogue Theatre. $39.50. RORY SCOVEL Actor and comedian performs standup as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21, 6 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50. IMPROV VOYAGE Vancouver TheatreSports presents the maiden voyage of the “comedy cruise ship”. Feb 21, 7 pm, The Improv Centre. $45.99-$59.99. STEVE RANNAZZISI Comedian performs three nights of standup. Feb 21-23,, Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club. $26.25. LAS CULTURISTAS: I DON’T THINK SO HONEY Podcasters Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang perform as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21, 8:30 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $22.50. BRYAN CALLEN Actor, comic, and podcaster performs as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21, 9 pm, Vogue Theatre. $32.50. AND THAT’S WHY WE DRINK Podcasters Christine Schiefer and Em Schulz perform as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21, 9 pm, Rio Theatre. $26.50. THE ALTERNATIVE SHOW WITH ANDY KINDLER Three nights of alternative-comedy anarchy as part of JFL NorthWest. Feb 21-23, 9:30 pm, Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club. $20.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 24 THE KLEZMER COMMUNITY PROJECT Come celebrate Yiddish music and dance! Learn traditional line and circle dances with Claudia Bulaievsky or join an ensemble led by Itamar Erez and Mike Braverman to play Klezmer tunes with your instrument. Three Sundays with a live music community party on last session. If you want to add more soul to your skill set consider registering! Feb 24; Mar 3, 10, 4-6 pm, Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture. Individual $62, family $80, all 3 dates. ARTS LISTINGS are a public service provided free of charge. Submit events online using the event-submission form at straight. com/AddEvent. Events that don’t make it into the paper due to space constraints will appear on the website.

Paula Kremer, Artistic Director

MUSICA UNIVERSALIS

MUSIC OF THE SPHERES

SATURDAY FEBRUARY 23, 2019 7:30PM Blusson Spinal Cord Centre 818 W 10th Ave. Vancouver, BC

Tickets: vancouvercantatasingers.com or 604-730-8856

20 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

MOVIES

FEBRUARY

Men come up short at Oscars 23 Toxic masculinity is the key theme in this year’s batch of nominated films

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6 BRAND NEW SHORT FILMS MADE IN JUST 8 DAYS BY VANCOUVER’S HOTTEST NEW FILMMAKERS!

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Marta Nieto stars as a divorced mom in the haunting Oscar-nominated short, “Madre”, from director Rodrigo Sorogoyan.

REVIEWS

OSCAR SHORTS 2019: LIVE ACTION

In English, French, and Spanish, with English subtitles. Rating unavailable

In “Detainment”, two 10-year-old boys don’t need much encouragement to hurt others for no reason at all. Irish filmmaker Vincent Lambe, who has mostly told tales of the Troubles, here relies on hours of taped testimony from the pair of otherwise unremarkable Liverpool lads who kidnapped two-year-old James Bulger in 1993 and tortured him to death in a crime that still resists all explication. Thankfully, the violence is not shown, but the story is so brutal that you must remind yourself to marvel at the veracity of the child actors (and the people who play their permanently broken parents) in order to endure it.

d A BUBBLING BOUILLABAISSE of toxic masculinity is this year’s serving of live-action narrative shorts. Hard to say if it’s mere coincidence or a veritable zeitgeist menu, but this sitting is certainly not for the faint of heart, or stomach. One of the slickest shorts here— all of them run from 17 to 30 minutes each—is called “Madre”, but it’s haunted by the voice of a six-year-old boy, stranded on a beach in France while his divorced mother (Blanca Apilánez) goes nuts back in Spain, and her own mother helplessly c SWEET SWEETBACK’S BAADASSSSS SONG From watches. The kid’s father has van1971 and newly restored, the ished and no one else is around but “first truly revolutionary Black some scary-looking guy. The movie film” (according to Huey is masterful in building tension in P. Newton) comes to the a confined space, but it plays like a Cinematheque for four nights, teaser for a longer film by Rodrigo starting Friday (February 15). Sorogoyen, who already has two feac FREE SOLO Alex Honnold tures behind him. scales Yosemite National Written and directed by IsraeliPark’s El Capitan without a American Guy Nattiv, “Skin” also rope in this Oscar-nominated resembles an elaborate trailer, documentary, getting two about a family of neo-Nazis led by screenings at the Rio Theatre a tattooed dad who beats up one on Saturday and Monday (February 16 and 18). black man too many. This leads the story into Jordan Peele terri- c PIN CUSHION Bullied by the tory, with mixed results, but it’s locals, an eccentric mother anchored by a fine cast of familiar and daughter retreat from faces, and the child actors are espereality in Deborah Haywood’s cially good. The grandson of four acclaimed U.K. feature, getting its Vancouver premiere at the Holocaust survivors, Nattiv also Cinematheque on Wednesday has a feature called Skin, although (February 20). it stars Jamie Bell as a neo-Nazi who recants his violent past.

Movies

TIP SHEET

The French-Canadian “Fauve” also centres on a pair of boys about the same age as the killers, but they are just regular, if chest-beatingly macho, kids (played by superb first-timers) on a summer lark in an abandoned quarry. The story, and its most harrowing turn, take on more significance when you know that pits around the town of Thetford Mines—dehumanizing in their otherworldly scale—were once North America’s greatest producer of asbestos. The loss of friendship, childhood, and hope hangs over the tale, which is this program’s lone exercise in pure filmmaking. Young director Jérémy Comte uses spectacular camera angles, disorienting montage techniques, dissonant music, and small swaths of resurgent natural beauty to create an experience that operates on levels both symbolic and literal. The show’s most emotional respite comes from another Quebec effort—its only total break with maleness, and the sole film directed by a woman. Actor turned filmmaker Marianne Farley’s “Marguerite” is a two-hander like “Madre”, but here the age difference is greater, since the title character (TV veteran Béatrice Picard, nearing 90) is a failing diabetic who depends on a caregiver (Sandrine Bisson) for her daily needs. When Marguerite realizes that the much younger woman is a lesbian, this triggers memories of unfulfilled elements of her own long life. The tale is perfectly acted and handsomely shot, but the lugubrious piano music actually undermines its otherwise poignant assertion of self-discovery at any age. Or gender.

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A Perfect 14 explores the world of plus-size models fighting to reshape the fashion industry and the beauty standards of society. March 7th, 8:30pm

ONCE THERE WAS A WINTER

In the frigid North, a young woman dangerously treads the line between defiance and disappearance in a game fueled by isolation, loss and jealousy. March 7th, 6pm

by Ken Eisner

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A gritty and gory tale begins on the night of Alejandro ‘s 15th birthday, when her life changes for ever and her thirst for revenge awakens.

A FILM BY ASTRA TAYLOR

March 9th, 9:30pm

Free documentary screening and post-show Q&A with the director

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cinema Kabuki Kabuki Theatre in high definition on the big screen

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Cineplex Odeon International Village Cinemas, Vancouver

Direct from Japan - Subtitled in English. 12:30pm: 2:45pm:

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Presented by The Japan Foundation

MOVIES

From alcoholic comic to standup guy

by Adrian Mack

atch the documentary Never Be Done: The Richard Glen Lett Story, and you’ll see a man hit rock bottom. It’s an agonizing, uncompromising chronicle of the Vancouver-based comedian’s gruesome plummet from touring Yuk Yuk’s headliner to psychotic, homeless addict. And then on— mercifully—to recovery. “I think the brain deliberately blurs and obscures trauma so that we don’t really have a vivid recollection of what that was like,” Lett tells the Straight during a break in shooting the indie film All Joking Aside. “Fortunately for me, Roy was there to film every motherfucking second of it.” Roy is Roy Tighe, former Vancouverite and, at one time, an aspiring comic intrigued by Lett’s reputation. In 2009, they agreed to collaborate on a documentary. On the very first night of filming, Lett was ejected from the second-to-last club that would still book the increasingly out-of-control comic. Over the next few months, Tighe chronicled his subject’s accelerating decline, ending with a mysterious 10-day disappearance after Lett’s exasperated neighbours forced the abusive, out-of-work entertainer out of their building. “It’s sort of like seeing your own ghost,” says Lett, who finally saw the finished film when it premiered at the Whistler Film Festival in late 2018. “And I’m embarrassed by some things, certainly some of the language that I used, the various forms of bigotry I expressed, whether it’s dropping an N-bomb or saying ‘fag’, I dunno, what, 30 times?” In fairness, the truth is a little more complex. As a comedian, Lett set out to offend, but generally from a position of righteous outrage and disgust. Eagle-eyed viewers might catch a Bill Hicks quote scrawled on the wall of his apartment, and he reveals that his career aspirations began when he read Albert Goldman’s bio Ladies and Gentlemen—Lenny Bruce!!. “Like Bertolt Brecht said, ‘Art is

Vancouver comedian Richard Glen Lett’s recovery is chronicled in Never Be Done.

not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it,’ ” Lett remarks about one of his most notorious bits, the seethingly ironic “The Ballad of Bobby Pickton”. “Addiction, though, doesn’t care if you’re on point or not, and that’s the thing that crept up on me.” Indeed, by the time Tighe’s camera is rolling, Lett’s satirical edge has curdled into nonspecific hostility and, well, saying “fag” 30 times. The ambivalent relationship between a brilliant man consumed by his demons and an industry that pours gas on the fire—until it dispenses with him—is one of the implicit themes of Never Be Done, which makes for a powerful closing-night addition to the Vancouver Just For Laughs Film Festival, where the doc receives its local premiere at the Vancity Theatre on Wednesday (February 20). More positively: Lett has nothing but gratitude for the filmmakers who, at one of his lowest points, and right on camera, became yet another target for his viciously wounding invective. “My friend Kathleen said that she prayed for extra angels for me during that time. To me, those angels were Roy and [DOP] Graeme [Morgan],” he says. “Addiction is brutal, and we’ve lost a couple of people just in the time it took to have this conversation. It’s an epidemic out there, and it really does require a team. For me, the biggest thing that I want

from this film is for people to see that collectively there is hope. To see all those people that were involved in getting Richard Lett to live.” Tighe reunited with Lett seven years after his final flame-out, when he spent those 10 AWOL days dropping harrowing phone calls on his remaining friends while suffering a full-blown psychotic episode. What came next, he says, was an encounter with grace. “There was a moment when I woke up in my car and I needed a cigarette, and like I said, ‘If you can’t bum a cigarette outside of an AA meeting, you have no skills at all.’ So I went there, and someone helped me. I almost died, but I didn’t. It was just that moment. There are so many turning points in people’s lives where they just go, ‘I go zig or I go zag.’ ” Lett zigged, and now, nine years into sobriety, “I’m on set.” As it happens, Lett’s role in All Joking Aside is “the best and only friend to an alcoholic, washed-up comedian” played by Brian Markinson. Presumably, he’s offering some technical advice on the side? “I consult on the funny, yeah,” he answers. And what about the “alcoholic, washed-up” part? “No, I think a lot of people have experience in that area,” Lett replies, with a hoarse chuckle. “It’s being a recovered alcoholic where we see there’s a shortage of knowledge.” g

Schilling kills at the JFL Film Festival

by Adrian Mack

unning at various venues, the second annual Vancouver Just For Laughs Film Festival broadens its schedule with a variety of events including a screenwriters’ panel, a pitch showcase, two programs of shorts, the Gentlemen Hecklers taking on The Notebook at the Rio Theatre (February 13), a night with Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg at the Vogue (February 15), and Ken Jeong in conversation at the Vancity Theatre (February 19). All this comes with a strong lineup of features like Pork Pie, Sorry for Your Loss, and the return of Jim Cummings’s excruciatingly hilarious Thunder Road. Read on for three that we liked, and find out all you need to know at www.jflnorthwest.com/.

FAMILY Thanks to its performances and well-honed screenplay, JFLFF’s opening-night film squeezes a lot of pleasure from its well-worn premise, in which an emotionally bereft professional becomes whole again thanks to a family crisis and the unwelcome intrusion into her life of a 13-year-old niece. The best scenes here involve Taylor Schilling’s buttoned-up office bitch, Kate, unloading all her adult “wisdom” on Bryn Vale’s gloomy eighth-grader, Maddie. “It’s your ass or your face, kid,” she grieves, between glasses of red. “You don’t get to keep both.” Schilling is a proven comic talent, but she gets great support from everyone here, especially Kate McKinnon as a passive-aggressive suburban mom and Fabrizio Zacharee Guido in the kind of blindingly original character part that Jason Mewes made a career out of. He plays Dennis, who’s so sweet on Maddie that he takes her to the Gathering of the Juggalos, bless his idiot heart, which is where Family touches down, quasi guerrilla-style, for its last 10 minutes. It’s a weird but welcome kink in Laura Steinel’s impressive debut as writer-director. Vancity Theatre, February 15 (7 p.m.)

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22 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

BERNADETTE Horny 15-year-old Archie goes to Lloyd Dobler High, a tip-off that we’re in early John Cusack teencom territory with this energetic, nostalgia-powered effort, although Bernadette is far more Better Off Dead than it is Say Anything. That extends right to its basic setup, in which Archie fantasizes about the older French exchange student of the title, and even gets an unlikely shot once he’s been humiliated in a thousand tried-and-tested ways, including having his single mom hook up with a legendary dirtbag (and Archie’s boss), Dixon, played with midriffbaring glee by producer James Psathas. Set in 1994, the

Angry mom Kate McKinnon gets all up in Taylor Schilling’s face in the impressive Vancouver JFL Film Festival opener, Family.

film unconsciously adopts the sexual politics of 25 years ago, so there’s that, plus a lot of goofball padding between some hit-and-miss jokes. But Bernadette is easy to like all the same, especially thanks to Sam Straley’s eternally putupon Archie. If distant memories of stoned hilarity are stirred by the lines “I want my two dollars!” or “Gee, I’m really sorry your mom blew up, Ricky,” then this one’s for you. Vancity Theatre, February 15 (9:15 p.m.) AN INNOCENT KISS Credit where it’s due: Jason Shirley’s South Carolina–set comedy doesn’t have a mean bone in its body, and avoids the cheap shots it could easily take with its cast of neighbourly small-town folk. Four kids and money strife are putting a strain on Ellie and Billy Barnes’s marriage, and it doesn’t help when Billy’s supermulleted brother Randy crashes at the family’s modest home for reasons related to his former life as a wrestler. The film’s gentle rhythms and slow-burn humour maybe aren’t fashionable right now, and Randy would be cynically depicted as a “deplorable” in the hands of something like SNL, but An Innocent Kiss loves its characters, and the actors respond in kind, with Whitney Goin’s Ellie giving the film an especially warm centre—even if she’s prey to that troublesome innocent kiss. Beyond that, it sure doesn’t hurt to have Burt Reynolds making a sweetnatured second-to-last screen appearance as Grandpa Barnes. Vancity Theatre, February 20 (6 p.m.) g

Fan Expo returns with lineup of A-listers (This story is sponsored by Fan Expo Vancouver.)

antasy fanatics, comic-book crusaders, anime aficionados, and sci-fi supporters can rejoice as Fan Expo Vancouver returns to the Vancouver Convention Centre from March 1 to 3. Now in its eighth year, more than 25,000 eager fans are expected to attend the renowned popculture event. Featuring some of the biggest names in movies, television, and cosplay, visitors can enjoy a three-day schedule jam-packed with opportunities to get up close with their favourite celebrities. But as anyone familiar with Fan Expo knows, it’s not just about the famous guests, as there are a number of fun activities and attractions taking place for the duration. Kandrix Foong, managing director of Fan Expo HQ in Western Canada, ensures that there’s something for everyone—no matter what you’re into. “This event, by design, is not just about comic books. It’s about entertainment in whatever form that may be,” he says. “It’s a visual spectacle. You have people in costumes, you can take pictures with celebrities, there are panels…there’s a lot to see and do. And everybody can enjoy it in their own way.” But even for those who have been before, this year’s Fan Expo Vancouver promises a few new surprises. There will be a costume contest for fans, which will give participants their shot at performing while showing off their ensembles on stage. And for the first year ever, Fan Expo Vancouver has partnered with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada to host the Geekiest Citizenship Ceremony. At 11 a.m. on March 1, this very special event will welcome 50 new Canadians in a celebration of the global community of fandom—

The legendary Mr. Sulu on Star Trek, George Takei (centre), will be at Fan Expo Vancouver from March 1 to 3 along with stars from locally filmed TV shows.

and that’s just one of the ways that Fan Expo Vancouver hopes to honour inclusivity and diversity. In December the show’s organizers announced that legendary actor and human rights activist George Takei would be joining the starstudded lineup of guests. Takei rose to fame in the ’60s as Hikaru Sulu in Star Trek, but has since become an advocate for the LGBT community, Asian Americans, and social-justice causes. Another icon in attendance will be American actor, artist, and singer Billy Dee Williams. Best known for his role as Lando Calrissian in the Star Wars movies, Williams originally performed in The Empire Strikes Back in 1980—making him one of the first black actors to appear in the franchise. For newer fans, a younger version of the character was most recently played by Donald Glover in the stand-alone Solo: A Star Wars Story. But in July 2018 it was announced that

2019

FEB 22

Williams would reprise his role in Star Wars: Episode IX. Celebrities from locally filmed shows Riverdale, Supernatural, The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, and Arrow will also be in attendance. Guests will appear at a spotlight panels and be available for a photo opportunities and autograph signings. Don’t miss the chance to meet your favourites! Tickets, which start at $30, and the event’s full schedule are available online at fanexpovancouver. com/ and through the Fan Expo Vancouver app. g Fan Expo Vancouver takes place Friday to Sunday (March 1 to 3) at the Vancouver Convention Centre West Building (1055 Canada Place). Go to straight.com/contest/ and enter to win two VIP packages (valued at $229 each) for the ultimate fandom experience. Prize includes admission to all three days of the expo, a celebrity photo opportunity, and exclusive priority access, plus a ton of other amazing perks.

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FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT 23

MUSIC

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The Georgia Straight Confessions, an outlet for submitting revelations about your private lives—or for the voyeurs among us who want to read what other people have disclosed.

Scan to confess Snow Tires Rule! To all the turkeys slowly crawling around Vancouver in the snow with the wrong tires get off the road! You’re a danger to yourselves and holding everyone up. And don’t be honking at those of us with proper snow tires on that cruise past you in a hail of blowing snow. It’s not our fault you don’t care enough to be safe.

FFS I never realized how stupid people are, until I entered the wonderful world of retail.

I can’t sleep, awake for hours, Because today I sell my trusty bike. Nuts huh? We have done so much together, so many beautiful days, building lifetime memories, achievements, laughter. There is a new best friend waiting in the basement for the ice to go away... (con’t @straight.com)

I don’t feel safe in crosswalks It seems every time I cross the street a car enters the intersection ridiculously close to me. Drivers are in such a rush to get to wherever that they put human safety at risk. My question to the city is why are you not flexing traffic... (con’t @straight.com)

Men at work I don’t know how they do it. Those guys on construction sites who are doing backbreaking labour on a daily basis. I am a healthy, fit guy in my 30’s but I don’t think I would be able to hack a job like that. The manual labour, the noise, working outdoors, etc. To those of you who are building the infrastructure of civilization, I salute and thank you!

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24 THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT FEBRUARY 14 – 21 / 2019

Josée Caron and Lucy Niles of Partner outgrew their hometown music scene, realizing there’s no point being the biggest band in Sackville.

onsidering how crazily accomplished Josée Caron and Lucy Niles sound on Partner’s Polaris Prize–nominated debut album, In Search of Lost Time, it’s no shocker they aren’t new to the business of making music. Do some digging, and you’ll discover that the two singer-guitarists spent years playing in bands— Yellowteeth, the Mouthbreathers, Go Get Fucked—in and around the exotically named town of Sackville, New Brunswick. Hop on YouTube and you’ll see the two future partners in Partner bridging grungesmeared punk and riot-grrrl garage with the Mouthbreathers thumper “No Fear”. Partner is a whole different animal, with Caron and Niles displaying a complete and impressive understanding of classic ’90s-crunch alterna-pop. Sweetening the mix is Caron’s shithot guitar work, which suggests that she’d hold her own playing beer pong with Dean Ween, Rivers Cuomo, and Heart’s Nancy Wilson. Caron and Niles have joked that they first met in the meal hall at college, bonding over being two “dykes” who were likely cooler than everyone around them. At some point they finally decided they wanted to be more than the biggest fish in Sackville, leading to Partner. “I guess everything changed when all the people we used to play with in bands moved away,” Niles says, on a conference call with Caron from back east. “In the beginning, it was always ‘We’ll get four people together and play in a shed.’ Eventually, we decided to reconceptualize things as just the two of us. That was a huge difference. “Suddenly we were free to write songs, and then really work on them, instead of having to write songs and bring them to a band. Also we set our sights really high. It was like, ‘Fuck it—why not try to be huge instead of trying to be the biggest band in town?’ ” On its Bandcamp page bio, the now Windsor-based Partner describes itself as follows: “Partner is unf linching in its exploration of intimacy, friendship, sexuality, drugs, and the existential predicament of being a lesbian barista in the year 2017.” Consider the existential predicament/lesbian barista part a heads-up that, as serious as Caron and Niles are about songwriting, they also have a wickedly funny and cleverly subversive side. That manifests itself all over In

Search of Lost Time, which they worked on and tweaked for a good couple of years before the album’s release. One of the big strengths of Caron and Niles is how they recognize it’s the little details that separate good from great. Witness the spiky-sweet In Search of Lost Time ode to getting blazed that is “Everybody Knows You’re High”, with its lyrics “I found myself all alone in the grocery store, more stoned than I think I’ve ever been before/Decided after 13 bong hits I needed chips.” That’s right, not one bong pull, but a fully incapacitating 13.

Everything changed when all the people we used to play in bands with moved away. – Lucy Niles

On the just-released “Long and McQuade” off Partner’s upcoming EP Saturday the 14th, the joke is drawn out for four fantastic minutes, Caron and Niles delivering an extended love letter to the crossCanada music-store chain. Anyone who’s ever found themselves waiting for some amateur John Bonham to get the fuck off the electronic drums will have zero trouble relating to “There is a child waiting patiently/By the electric drums, to take them from me/Well too bad for them, ’cause I am not done.” Cleverly, a lot of times the funny lines also have a deeply bittersweet side. Consider, from “Play the Field”, “Staring at the tile floor of the gym class changing room/And trying not to look at you/’Cause even though I’d really like to/It’s not worth being called a dyke to see you in your sports bra.” Both Niles and Caron credit smart-ass cult faves Ween with teaching them that there’s no idea too bizarre to be turned into a song. That was driven home by “Fluffy”, a molasses-slow acoustic number off the band’s shitkicker-themed 12 Golden Country Greats. (Sample

lyrics: “Fluffy, furry buddy, chewed his leg on the porch/Why’d you do it Fluffy, on the porch?”) “A big thing for us was embracing our sense of humour,” Caron offers. “The song that showed me it was okay to do that was on the Ween country album—the one about Fluff y. I listened to that and I was like , ‘Oh my god, I can say anything.’ That brought a lot of confidence—it was like being let in on a secret.” Just as important for Caron was not being afraid to unleash her inner guitar hero. Like Niles, she’s friendly and outgoing on the phone. But when the tape’s rolling, Caron is a monster, adding a metallic-KO kick to the twiceremoved grunge-pop of “Ambassador to Ecstasy”, and unleashing her inner ’70s-blues sister on the slinky “Gross Secret”. “I started when I was in about Grade 7,” Caron says. “My dad really wanted me to play guitar, and he gave me a lot of positive reinforcement. That was key—someone giving me the belief that I could do this. Th at was a huge reward. It turned into a way for me to belong and to connect with people, so I kept doing it. It also helped that I have a certain predisposition to detail—it’s one of my traits.” For Niles, the path to Partner started with the kitchen parties that were a huge part of her upbringing. From there, punk rock would prove life-changing. “I got really into punk in Grade 8 and started going to all the shows,” she says. “I remember thinking that all the people on-stage were really cool, but then also thinking that some of them were people from my class who were also my friends. That was where things got like, ‘Oh, shit— being in a band is not as unobtainable as I thought. If those guys are in a band, then I can be in a band.’ ” Except that pretty much no one from Sackville ended up in a band as great as Partner. “We’ve both been playing since we were 12 or 13,” Niles says. “And everything good that’s ever happened to me has happened because of music— whether it’s been acceptance or popularity. It’s been consistently paying off for both of us since we were kids. I mean, where the hell would we be without guitars? It’s like, ‘Would our girlfriends even like us?’” g Partner plays the Fox Wednesday (February 20).

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MUSIC LISTINGS

CONCERTS JUST ANNOUNCED BRAZILIAN CARNAVAL 2019 Music by Sambacouver, Bloco Sambatá, Samba Fusion, and DJ Nanda. Mar 1, 9:30 pm, Harbour Event Centre . $15-30. FIONN & JILLIAN LAKE Acoustic session includes originals, covers, and collaborations. Mar 1, 10 pm, Havana Theatre. $15-$20. BHAD BHABIE American rapper and Internet personality. Mar 2, 7 pm, Venue. $30/35. JUST SINGIN’ ROUND Synergy Collective Society a singer-songwriter showcase benefiting New View Society. Mar 5, 6-10 pm, Vancouver Rowing Club. $35. STRONG WOMEN STRONG MUSIC Women jazz musicians perform in support of Atira Women’s Resource Society on International Women’s Day. Mar 5-7, 7-10 pm. $30. BEDWETTERS ANONYMOUS Hardcorepunk band, with guests Laverne and Maneater. Mar 7, 7:30 pm, ANZA Club. $10. DAVID GRAFF & BAND Album release show for Supposed to Fly. Mar 8, 8 pm, Buckerfield’s. $25. CARLOS DEL JUNCO & THE BLUES MONGRELS Blues harmonica player. Mar 8, 8 pm, The ACT Arts Centre. $25/$22. ABRA CADABRA All-ages tribute to the music of ABBA. Mar 9, 7:30 pm, Massey Theatre.

Music

TIP SHEET

c DETHDAY METAL MASSACRE (February 16 at the Astoria) Aggression, Expain, Gross Misconduct, and Blackwater Burial crank the Marshalls. Don’t forget the day-after neck brace. c THE TOASTERS (February 16 at the Rickshaw) Nothing says “hot, sunny, and ready for a Red Stripe” like ska. And, admit it, right now you’d rather be anywhere than snow-packed Vancouver.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 13 PARKER GISPERT Lead singer-guitarist from the Whigs performs tunes from solo album Sunlight Tonight. Feb 13, 8 pm, LanaLou’s Restaurant. Tix $10. AURORA Pop singer-songwriter from Norway. Feb 13, 8 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $25.

c PETUNIA & THE VIPERS (February 18 at the WISE Hall) If Hank Williams were still making daily runs to the liquor store, “Lonesome” would top the mostplayed list on his coal-powered iPod.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 14

c COLD CAVE (February 20 at the Imperial) Expect “romantic existential anthems for the disenchanted daydreamers” off the new EP You & Me & Infinity. c TEENAGE FANCLUB (February 21 at the Commodore) Kurt Cobain’s gone, but the band he once called the best in the world is still kicking, celebrating 30 years of power pop.

PORTEAU Album release show for Water’s Gate, with guests Harley Small and ursidae. Mar 15, 7-10:30 pm, Fox Cabaret. $10. THE BOOM BOOMS Local indie-soul band draws on funk, soul, and Latin styles. Mar 16, 8 pm, The ACT Arts Centre. $32/$27/$22. SUSANNAH ADAMS QUARTET Victoriabased jazz vocalist. Mar 17, 8-10 pm, Frankie’s Jazz Club. $16. THE POLYRHYTHMICS Instrumental eightpiece soul-funk band from Seattle. Mar 23, 8 pm, Rickshaw Theatre. $18.50. KODAK BLACK Rapper from Florida, with guests YNW Melly, 147 Calboy, and Sniper Gang. Mar 26, 8 pm, PNE Forum. Tix on sale Feb 15, noon, $49.50. JANE SIBERRY Canadian pop singer-songwriter, with guest kele fleming. Apr 3, 7 pm, WISE Hall. $25. OLD IRON Seattle metal band, with guests MESS, Ape War, and Nehushten. Apr 5, Pat’s Pub & Brewhouse. $12.

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DIRTY RADIO Vancouver electronic music group. Apr 5, 8 pm, Fortune Sound Club. Tix on sale Feb 13, 10 am, $17.50. MOON VS. SUN Collaboration between singer-songwriter Chantal Kreviazuk and Our Lady Peace frontman Raine Maida. Apr 9, Rio Theatre. Tix on sale Feb 15, 10 am. SASAMI L.A.–based singer-songwriter. Apr 13, 9 pm, WISE Hall. Tix $15. ONYX Hardcore hip-hop group from Queens, New York. Apr 18, 8 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $20-$25. TURNOVER Rock band from Virginia Beach, Virginia. Apr 26, 6 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $26. WEYES BLOOD American indie-pop singersongwriter. May 17, 8 pm, St. James Hall. Tix on sale Feb 15, 10 am, $17.50. JORJA SMITH & KALI UCHIS American pop/R&B artists perform on a coheadlining tour. May 22, 7 pm, PNE Forum. Tix on sale Feb 15, 10 am, $49.50. TIM BAKER Hey Rosetta! frontman performs tunes from debut solo album, with guest Charlotte Cornfield. Jun 1, 8 pm, Imperial Vancouver. Tix on sale Feb 15, 10 am, $28.50. THE HEAVY Indie-rock quartet from England. Jun 13, 9:30 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $30. JOSH RITTER Americana singer-songwriter and author performs with the Royal City Band. Jun 22, 7 pm, Vogue Theatre. $35-$199. PENTATONIX A cappella group from Arlington, Texas, with guest Rachel Platten. Jul 2, Rogers Arena. Tix on sale Feb 15, noon, $29.50-$129.50. FVDED IN THE PARK Two-day music festival featuring headliners Khalid and Zedd. Jul 5-6, Holland Park. $189.99/$299.99. THE MOUNTAIN GOATS Indie-folk band from Claremont, California. Sep 6, 7 pm, Commodore Ballroom. Note: moved from original venue of Imperial Vancouver. $30.50. GARY CLARK JR. American blues-rock singer-songwriter and guitarist. Sep 10, 8 pm, PNE Forum. Tix on sale Feb 15, 10 am, $62/72. THE CHAINSMOKERS American EDM-pop duo, with guests 5 Seconds of Summer and Lennon Stella. Dec 6, 7 pm, Rogers Arena. Tix on sale Feb 15, 10 am, $129.50/109.50/99.50/ 79.50/59.50.

JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE American pop–R&B singer-songwriter and former NSYNC member performs on his Man of the Woods Tour. Feb 14-15, Rogers Arena. Note: POSTPONED from original dates of Nov 8-9. VENUS AND MARS: A LOVE STORY Valentine’s Day event features drinks, appetizers, activities, and a musical performance by Jody Glenham. Feb 14, 6:30 pm, H.R. MacMillan Space Centre. $35. ROEDDE HOUSE JAZZ SERIES Christie Grace, Dan Reynolds, Conrad Good, and Buff Allen perform jazz and Joni Mitchell tunes for Valentine’s Day. Feb 14, 7-9 pm, Roedde House Museum. $15/$12. BLACK GARDENIA Vintage-inspired jazz featuring Daphne Roubini. Feb 14, 8 pm, Frankie’s Jazz Club. $20. STUPID CUPID! The Party Timers perform rockabilly tunes by Wanda Jackson. Feb 14, 8-11 pm, WISE Hall. $10. THE BOOTS AND BABES BALL Featuring country artists Madeline Merlo, the Reklaws, and Shawn Austin. Feb 14, 8:30 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $27.75. CHALI 2NA & THE HOUSE OF VIBE American rapper, with guest the Gaff. Feb 14, 9 pm, Imperial. $25.

FRIDAY JAZZ Jazz trio Slinki performs standards, pop crossovers, and original compositions. Feb 15, 6-8 pm, Bar Moorings Restaurant. Free. ALEX CAMERON AND ROY MOLLOY Indiepop duo from Australia plays two shows. Feb 15, 6:30 (all ages) & 10:15 pm (19+), WISE Hall. $25. IISSAMBA Ninety-minute show showcases

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WE FOUND A LOVEBIRD DELUXE HOTEL

“I pressed the button, so I get the credit,” sings Larry Lechner on “Never Would Have Guessed”, the track that opens We Found a Lovebird’s latest long-player, Deluxe Hotel. While it’s not entirely clear that this is what Lechner’s referring to, the singer-guitarist is, in fact, credited with pressing all the buttons (and sliding all the faders) on the album, which was recorded at his own studio, Church of Larry. You’d have to be something of a Vancouver-music-scene trainspotter (I’m looking at you, Allan MacInnis) to figure out that the song’s title is a reference to Never Would Have Guessed We Were All Blessed, a 2006 release by Conrad—a band that was also fronted by Lechner. The guy has been around long enough to have honed a well-defined sound. Specifically, that sound is a classic, sixstring-driven indie-rock attack.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 16 DETH DAY METAL MASSACRE Performances by metal bands Aggression, Expain, Gross Misconduct, and Blackwater Burial. Feb 16, 7 pm, Astoria Pub. $15/20. THE TOASTERS NYC ska legends, with guests Los Furios and Cawama. Feb 16, 7:45 pm, Rickshaw Theatre. $15. AIR MAIL SPECIAL Swing dance to live jazz music. Feb 16, 7:55-11:55 pm, Roundhouse Community Arts & Recreation Centre. $15. ROBERT CRAY BAND Blues band from the States. Feb 16, 8 pm, Hard Rock Casino Vancouver. $71.25/81.25. THE ELEVEN TWELVES Sixties-inspired garage band, with guests Massy Ferguson and Provincial Champion. Feb 16, 8:30 pm, LanaLou’s Restaurant. $10/15. SATURDAY NIGHT SOUL PARTY Ardent Tribe performs Top 40, classic soul, and worldbeat music. Feb 16, 9 pm, Backstage Lounge. $10. A BOWIE CELEBRATION: DAVID BOWIE ALUMNI TOUR Tribute to David Bowie featuring his former bandmates Mike Garson (keyboards), Earl Slick (guitar), Gerry Leonard (guitar), and Carmine Rojas (bass), with vocalists Bernard Fowler and Corey Glover. Feb 16, doors 8 pm, show 9:30 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $52.50. THE ORIGINAL GROWN FOLKS PARTY A night of disco, R&B, and Motown sounds. Feb 16, 10 pm, The Morrissey Lounge . $10.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 17 BOBBY MCFERRIN: CIRCLESONGS Concert features McFerrin’s newest band of veterans from his Voicestra group and choral ensemble musica intima. Feb 17, Chan Centre for the Performing Arts. SOUTH VAN BIG BAND Local jazz group performs with guest Dr. Greg Johnson. Feb 17, 4:30 pm, Fairview Pub. $10. JIM CAMPILONGO & LUCA BENEDETTI GUITAR DUO Two of New York’s most unique and acclaimed guitarists team up for a rare West Coast appearance. Together, Jim Campilongo and Luca Benedetti collaborated on the Honeyfingers’ 2015 album, Last Night, This Morning, which was hailed as “a hoedown throw down that looks to be one of the top guitar records of the year.” [Guitar Player Magazine] Feb 17, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $25/$30. MOTRAIN: MOTOWN MEETS SOUL TRAIN MEETS VOGUEING Black History Month event celebrating black culture in Vancouver. Feb 17, 9 pm, Eastside Studios. $10-$20

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 20 PARTNER Rock duo from New Brunswick, with guests Dude York. Feb 20, Fox Cabaret. $13.50. DANNY MICHEL The Rogue Folk Club presents Canadian folk-pop singer-songwriter. Feb 20, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $20/16. COLD CAVE American synth-pop/dark-wave act. Feb 20, 8 pm, Imperial. $26.50. MIXTOPHONICS Trippy, ambient, grooveoriented improv. Feb 20, 8-11 pm, LanaLou’s Restaurant. $10.

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 21 TEENAGE FANCLUB Alt-rock band from Scotland. Feb 21, doors 7 pm, show 8 pm, Commodore Ballroom. $29.50. ROOT DWELLERS MUSIC SHOWCASE Performances by local musicians Ivan Hartle, Sam Balson, and Sleepy Gonzales. Feb 21, 8-11 pm, Kings Cafe. $15.

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 22 MEN I TRUST Electro-pop trio from Montreal. Feb 22, 7 pm, Biltmore Cabaret. $17. MY BRIGHTEST DIAMOND American singer–songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Feb 22, 8 pm, Fox Cabaret. $17.50.

A WINTER ROMANCE IN NO FUN CITY 2019 Featuring David M., Lester Interest, Dave Dedrick, and Pete Campbell. Feb 18, 8:30 pm, Princeton Pub & Grill. Free.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19

by John Lucas

JEFF LANG Blending rock, roots, folk, blues, ballads, instrumentals, improvisation and a high level of musicality, Australia’s Jeff Lang is an incomparable singer/ songwriter with virtuosic guitar chops including his signature slide. Feb 22, 8 pm, St. James Hall. $25/$30. SNOOP DOGG & FRIENDS American rapper, with guests Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, Warren G, Kurupt, and Luniz. Feb 22, 8 pm, Rogers Arena. $109.50/99.50/89.50/69.50/54.50/39.50. FOREIGNER Anglo-American rockers from the ‘70s. Feb 22-23, 8 pm, Hard Rock Casino Vancouver. $131.25/141.25. CHAMPIAN FULTON Jazz vocalist and pianist from New York City. Feb 22-23, 8 pm, Frankie’s Jazz Club. $25. WINTER JAZZ ON GRANVILLE ISLAND Three days of free concerts. Feb 22-24, 8 pm, Performance Works. Free. SHARON VAN ETTEN American indie songwriter and musician, with guest Nilüfer Yanya. Feb 22, 9 pm, Imperial Vancouver. $28.50. MUSIC LISTINGSare a public service provided free of charge. Submit events online using the event-submission form at straight. com/AddEvent. Events that don’t make it into the paper due to space constraints will appear on the website.

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Trades

Lechner and his bandmates— guitarist Kerry MacPherson, bassist-vocalist David Charan, and drummer Allan Collins—clearly don’t believe in sanding down the rough edges, either. If the vocals on “Loose Lips” aren’t always on key, for example, that’s more than made up for by the tune’s CBGBcirca-’77 energy. That’s another way of saying that it kinda sounds like Television. Which I suppose makes the awesomely epic 10-minute-long “They Came From the Caves” We Found a Lovebird’s “Marquee Moon”, with a side trip in the direction of Connie Francis—although, again, you would probably have to be some sort of pop-culture obsessive to pick up on that last bit. I have a feeling, though, that Lechner and company would have no complaints about having their band’s output described as music for trainspotters.

Sunday, February 24th

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 18

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 15

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African roots, rhythms, and music, Feb 15-16, 7:30-9:30 pm, Scotiabank Dance Centre. $30. LOOT Tribute to Tool raises money for Covenant House Vancouver, with guests Alice Hardy and Holy Tokes. Feb 15, 8 pm, Rickshaw Theatre. $15. BARRY GREENFIELD: PASSION IN THE ROUND Barry is at the Yaletown Roundhouse, for what promises to be an unforgettable night. Join Barry for an intimate music and storyteller evening, highlighted with wonderful original songs. Partial proceeds to WIGS FOR KIDS BC. Info and tix at www.barrygreenfieldmusic. com $25. Feb 15, 8 pm, Yaletown Roundhouse Exhibition Hall. $25. DAD THIGHS Local emo band plays its final show, with guests Pudding and Prxncxss Apxrxntly. Feb 15, 8 pm, Red Gate Arts Society. $10. STEFFANIE DAVIS AND JEREMY WONG QUARTET Jazz double-bill features vocal jazz and Broadway classics. Feb 15, 9 pm, Tyrant Studios. $15. GUSTER Alt-rock band from Boston, with guest Henry Jamison. Feb 15, 9 pm, Imperial Vancouver. $25.

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SAVAGE LOVE

Discussing disabilities and devotees by Dan Savage

b I AM A 56-year-old heterosexual man, and I have lived with ALS for the past six years. I am either in a wheelchair or in a hospital bed, and I have very little motor ability in my limbs. Like most or all male ALS patients, I still have full sensory ability, including a fully functioning penis. Are there safe websites or groups I can connect with that deal with helping paralytics like me find people who are interested in hooking up? I’m talking about people who have a fetish for paralytics. I know that some people have a thing for amputees; I imagine there’s a fetish for any number of diseases or afflictions. When I was healthy, I was into light bondage. That seems like a redundancy now, but I can still get into dress-up and role-play. I would be cool if someone was into the whole bathing, grooming, dressing thing, and whatever baby-doll fantasy they might have. Hell, I’d be happy if someone just wanted to give me a pity fuck! - Realistic About Getting Dominated Or Lustfully Laid “I struggled to fi nd any specific online groups with respect to ALS and sexuality,” said Andrew Gurza, a disability-awareness consultant and the host of Disability After Dark, a terrific podcast that explores and celebrates the sexual agency and desirability of people with disabilities. “But what RAGDOLL is looking for might not be directly related to his specific disability. It sounds like he is looking to engage with a community of people called ‘devotees’. These individuals are attracted to people primarily because of their disabilities, and that might be what he is looking for. I know a couple who used a devotee website to fi nd each other, who

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dated and eventually married.” If you’re open to playing with a devotee, RAGDOLL, Gurza suggests checking out Paradevo (paradevo.net), a website for “female devotees and gay male devotees” of disabled men. “Many disabled people have also set up profi les on sites like FetLife to explore not only their fetishistic sides, but also how their disabled identities can complement and play a role in that,” said Gurza. Now, many people, disabled and otherwise, look down on devotees, who are often accused of fetishizing disability and objectifying disabled people. But people who are exclusively attracted to the able-bodied and/or the conventionally attractive are rarely accused of fetishizing the able and ambulatory or objectifying the facially symmetrical. Which is why it has always seemed to me—and Gurza agrees with me on this point—that if being with someone who is turned on by your whatever-the-fuck is good enough for the able-bodied, it’s good enough for people with disabilities. Provided of course that, able or disabled, we’re appreciated for everything we bring to the table or the chair or the bed. Ryan Honick, a disability advocate and public speaker, doesn’t think you should limit your search to websites aimed exclusively at the disability community. “It’s estimated that one in five people have a disability,” said Honick. “And when I think about how challenging dating can be anyway— disability notwithstanding—my immediate thought is that RAGDOLL shouldn’t exclude 80 percent of the population from his search. So I would encourage him to use some of the mainstream apps—like Tinder,

OkCupid, Bumble, or Match—and put what he’s after front and centre.” Honick would caution other disabled people that putting your disability front and centre—even on mainstream dating apps—is likely to attract the attention of devotees. “RAGDOLL doesn’t seem like he would mind being with a devotee,” said Honick. “But those of us who do mind need to be a little more discerning. I’ve inadvertently attracted a fair number of people with a devotee fetish, and it honestly squicked me out.” Zooming out for a second: safety is always a concern when inviting a stranger over for sex, RAGDOLL, even for the nondisabled. In addition to attracting the attention of a few good and decent people, devotees or not, your relative helplessness could attract the attention of a predator. So before inviting anyone over, get their real name and their real phone number. Then share that information with a trusted friend—someone who can check in with you before and after a date—and let your potential new fuck buddy know you’re sharing their info with a trusted friend. Second-to-last word goes to Honick: “Another option, if it’s available to RAGDOLL and he’s open to it, would be hiring a sex worker.” And the last word goes to Gurza: “RAGDOLL shouldn’t resign himself to the idea that he’s a ‘pity fuck’. His desires as a disabled man have full value and worth. And I want him to know, as a fellow disabled man, that he can have a fulfi lling sex life and that someone out there does find him attractive.” Follow Andrew Gurza on Twitter @AndrewGurza, and follow Ryan Honick on Twitter @RyanLHonick.

SE X Y

b I’M A 44-YEAR-OLD woman living in the [Washington] D.C. area. I divorced my husband last year, and I haven’t had sex in seven years. Despite my premenopausal age and daily antidepressant, I’m horny as fuck. How do you recommend I find someone to do me? I am a BBW and ready to get fucked. But I also want to protect my privacy and I’m reluctant to post pics online. I’m aware I am a fetish for some, and I’ve been something of a “crazy-person magnet” in the past, and that’s a concern. I’m not looking for love. I just want to get done without meeting a psycho.

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On the Lovecast, Dan chats with Eric Leue from the Free Speech Coalition: savagelovecast. com. Email: mail@savagelove.net. Follow Dan on Twitter @fakedansavage. ITMFA.org.

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which these days means putting some pics up on dating apps. There are lots of dating and/or hookup apps and websites for bigger folks, some more fetishizing than others. (I did a little digging, and WooPlus.com seems to be legit and not overrun with feeders.) And who cares if someone spots your photo on a dating site? If Jeff Bezos refuses to be shamed by his dick pics—or blackmailed with them—you don’t have to be ashamed to show your face on a dating or hookup app. As for avoiding “psychos”, LAVA, there are shitty, toxic people everywhere. Learn to recognize the signs and take those red flags seriously. If you have a terrible track record—if you’ve found yourself with (or married to) a lot of shitty/toxic people—then you need to make sure you’re not the problem. Because if everyone you’ve ever dated was shitty or toxic, LAVA, there’s a better than even chance you were the shitty or toxic common denominator in a lot of failed relationships. Do the work—risk being introspective and self-critical—and if you’re not the problem and you are incapable of spotting red flags, confide in a friend whose judgment you trust when you’re screening potential FWBs. g

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the app you’re using is Recon, WRAP, as it’s the most popular hookup app for kinky gay and bi men. There are “friends” listings in the lower right-hand corner of each profi le. Contact the friends of anyone you’re interested in playing with and ask for a reference. Is this guy skilled, can he be trusted, does he respect limits, et cetera. If the answers are yes, yes, and yes, you can most likely trust him.

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