The Georgia Straight - Spring Arts Preview - February 24, 2022

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022 | FREE

Volume 56 | Number 2819

EMERGENCIES ACT Jenny Kwan explains her position

COLOUR THE TRAILS

VIMFF focuses on diversity

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

James Yi plays Appa in Ins Choi’s Kim’s Convenience; plus, dance, visual arts, comedy, classical music, and theatre picks

BURNABY HOUSING

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LIQUOR RECIPES

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BACKYARD SHEDS

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STEVEN PAGE

CHILL.

Enjoy stress-free reading without the noise on CreatorNews.

ARTS | CULTURE | LIFESTYLE ,QWURGXFLQJ WKH ŦUVW QHZV DJJUHJDWRU GHGLFDWHG WR WKH DUWV JOREDO FXOWXUH OLIHVW\OH DQG FUHDWLYH QHZV /HDYH GLYLVLYH SROLWLFV FULPH DQG IDNH QHZV EHKLQG ZLWK H[SHUWO\ FXUDWHG UHOD[LQJ UHDGV

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THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

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THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

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NEWS

NDP MP rejects claims that Ottawa protest was peaceful

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CONTENTS 12

By Steve Newton

he NDP MP for Vancouver East has accused Conservative MPs of cheering on the Ottawa protesters while the Liberals “sat on their hands”.

In the recent parliamentary debate over the imposition of the Emergencies Act, Jenny Kwan also ripped into the leaders of the so-called Truckers Convoy 2022, dismissing their claims that it was peaceful.

Moreover, Kwan said that until February 19, police were reluctant to tow vehicles in Ottawa “out of fear of confrontation” with those occupying the national capital.

“Indigenous, Black, and other people of colour from coast to coast to coast looked at this situation and rightfully asked how heavy-handed those same police forces would have cracked down on them if they attempted a fraction of what they were witnessing,” Kwan said on February 20.

Kwan accused the prime minister of adopting a “do-nothing approach” in response to the disruptive downtown Ottawa occupation and of using vaccination as a wedge issue in the election.

But she was equally harsh on Conservatives. She said that they used a dog whistle on conspiracy theorists and chose to be interviewed in front of images of swastikas.

In addition, Kwan said that the Conservatives have said nothing about 4,800 complaints by truckers over the last three years about lost wages—suggesting that they don’t really care about these workers.

Some of Kwan’s most searing language was saved for the protest leaders and their most avid followers. She accused them of having “entirely upended” the lives of downtown Ottawa residents, making some feel too intimidated to leave their homes.

“Retail workers have been assaulted,” Kwan said. “A building had an attempted arson where the doors were taped shut.”

She also pointed out that a large amount of fi rearms was confiscated at a

Cover photo by David Cooper

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REAL ESTATE

Burnaby high school teacher Daniel Tetrault is seeking a seat on city council so he can help provide a diversity of housing to all residents.

By Carlito Pablo

20 MOVIES

This year’s Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival is celebrating cultural diversity with short films on BIPOC adventurers.

Vancouver East’s Jenny Kwan has spoken out against the conduct of Ottawa demonstrators.

border protest in Coutts, Alberta.

“Yet the main organizers of this illegal occupation—with a long history of posting white-supremacy rants about ‘AngloSaxon replacement theory’—like to call it a peaceful protest,” Kwan said.

“Let’s be clear: hurling racist insults, harassing outreach workers to take food meant for the homeless, entering businesses and refusing to follow publichealth guidelines and intimidating workers, brandishing symbols of hate like the Confederate flag and swastikas, yelling at schoolchildren, assaulting journalists, deputizing themselves with unlawful authority to detain people, using international money—or cryptocurrency—to help fund this illegal occupation, issuing a pseudolegal document to overthrow a democratically elected government, and to install in a governing coalition with this group with the governor general and Senate is not peaceful protest,” Kwan said.

Kwan ended up voting in favour of bringing in the Emergencies Act. But she also said that the NDP will not “give a blank cheque to the Liberals”, noting the need for “a series of thorough examinations on how every level of government” played a role in this protest lasting as long as it did. g

By Charlie Smith

e Start Here

7 22 16 18 18 6 21 4 21 15 17

ARTS CLASSIFIED ADS COMEDY CLASSICAL MUSIC DANCE LIQUOR MUSIC NEWS SAVAGE LOVE THEATRE VISUAL ARTS

Vancouver’s News and Entertainment Weekly Volume 56 | Number 2819 #300 - 1375 West 6th Avenue, Vancouver, B.C. V6H 0B1 T: 604.730.7000 E: gs.info@straight.com straight.com DISPLAY ADVERTISING: T: 604.730.7020 E: sales@straight.com

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EDITOR Charlie Smith

SECTION EDITORS Mike Usinger (ESports/Liquor/Music) Steve Newton SENIOR EDITOR Martin Dunphy STAFF WRITERS Carlito Pablo (Real Estate) SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT Jeff Li

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

e Online TOP 5

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

1 2 3 4 5

Steve Fonyo dies at the age of 56 in a Burnaby hotel room.

Two women shot dead in vehicle in West Point Grey neighbourhood.

As Emergencies Act goes to a vote, rebels plan crosscountry “freedom chain”.

Will the Emergencies Act survive a challenge from Alberta’s Jason Kenney?

Free event celebrates those who made biking better in Metro Vancouver.

DISTRIBUTION: 604.730.7032

GENERAL MANAGER Sandra Oswald

THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

COVER

James Yi says that starring as Appa in Ins Choi’s Kim’s Convenience has been the greatest experience of his life.

by Charlie Smith

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February 24 - March 3 / 2022

@GeorgiaStraight

ART DEPARTMENT MANAGER Janet McDonald GRAPHIC DESIGNER Miguel Hernandez PRODUCTION SUPERVISOR Mike Correia ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVES Glenn Cohen, Luci Richards, Catherine Tickle, Robyn Marsh, David Pearlman (On-Leave) MANAGER, BRANDED CONTENT AND MARKETING LEAD Rachel Moore CREDIT MANAGER Shannon Li ACCOUNTING SUPERVISOR Tamara Robinson

REAL ESTATE

Teacher out to make a change in booming Burnaby

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by Carlito Pablo

epending on the area, a typical detached home in Burnaby cost between about $1.6 million to $2 million in January 2022.

This marks an increase of more than 31 percent in prices since the last municipal election in 2018.

As well, the benchmark prices of townhouses and condos in the city have increased by about 20 percent.

It demonstrates that—like other municipalities in the Lower Mainland—Burnaby is seeing homes becoming more unaffordable.

Meanwhile, the city is one of the top 10 fastest growing municipalities in the region. Based on the results of the 2021 census, Burnaby’s population grew seven percent during the past six years.

The city now has 249,125 people, representing an increase of 16,370 from 2016.

It is against this backdrop that Daniel Tetrault will be seeking a seat on city council.

Tetrault is a high school teacher and president of the Burnaby Teachers’ Association. He was a member of the Mayor’s Task Force on Community Housing that engaged residents of the city around the issue of housing in 2019.

The task force came up with recommendations that were later endorsed by city council. Those proposals formed a foundation for the city’s 10-year HOME: Burnaby’s Housing and Homelessness Strategy, which council approved on December 6, 2021.

In an interview, Tetrault said that

Burnaby had a reputation of demovictions and not looking after renters…

– Daniel Tetrault

Daniel Tetrault is running for Burnaby city council to deliver a diversity of housing for all.

the housing plan is “headed in the right direction”.

“It’s responding to the need for more housing,” Tetrault told the Straight by phone. He noted that the plan serves renters as well as prospective homeowners.

“Burnaby had a reputation of demovictions and not looking after renters, and this plan provides support and policies for tenants who are facing displacement and other challenges,” Tetrault said.

The strategy also lays out directions for the creation of more rental units, particularly nonmarket rentals and supportive housing.

As for affordable homeownership, Tetrault said that a “lot of it comes down

to creating a diversity of housing options across different neighbourhoods”.

Burnaby’s HOME strategy document notes that 73 percent of the city’s land area is devoted to single-family homes and duplexes.

“The value of these properties has skyrocketed in recent years, making them unattainable for many households,” the paper states.

Tetrault explained that creating a diversity of housing options means that new developments need to happen in places not just near SkyTrain stations. These include transit corridors and other neighbourhoods along major roads.

“Through the housing task force, we saw there was openness to these changes,” Tetrault said.

He pointed out that many residents in

Burnaby want to continue living in the city and see their kids and grandchildren able to stay as well.

Tetrault grew up in East Vancouver, where his family continues to live. He moved to Burnaby in 2009 and met his future wife there in 2016. In December 2021, Tetrault and his wife welcomed their first child, a boy. (Tetrault is the son-in-law of former B.C. NDP premier Glen Clark.)

In the interview, Tetrault—who is seeking a nomination with the Burnaby Citizens Association for the October 2022 municipal election—noted that the city has done its consultation with residents about housing through the task force created by Mayor Mike Hurley. He stressed that now the need is to actually get the plan done.

The first phase of the HOME strategy runs up to 2023. It includes a plan to facilitate the introduction of laneway homes and secondary suites in areas zoned for duplexes.

Tetrault described this move regarding infill housing as a “necessary step” in creating more housing choices.

“I am running to not only see these policies implemented but also to go further and support innovative ways to provide housing for all,” Tetrault said. g

N ovella’s BACKYARD OASIS

d A LONGSTANDING FRIENDSHIP started between two Vancouver families because of a shared affection for the outdoors.

Along the way, David Maranda and his wife, Colleen, would talk with Angelito Camaclang and Laurel James about starting a company together.

Camaclang and James founded Novell Design Build in 2005, delivering custom-built homes, laneway houses, and residential renovations. The Marandas have extensive experience in hospitality, business, and marketing. When COVID-19 struck, the idea for a business crystallized.

“Together, we are uniquely qualified to craft outdoor environments that work for people,” David Maranda told the Straight by phone.

In the summer of 2020, Novella Outdoors was born, with its core product being its “signature sheds”. Available in various sizes, the huts can be used for practically any purpose.

The first Novella Outdoors shed was installed for recreational purposes at a North Vancouver home. The client pays his guitar in the shed, and the family had video-gaming equipment installed.

Novella Outdoors’s signature sheds are “plug and play” installations, powered by an electrical extension cord from the main house.

Made of western red cedar, they come with a metal roof, two casement windows, skylight, designer lights and dimmer switches, and USB ports.

“It gives you a tranquil place where you can live, work, and play outdoors without the distractions of the home,” David Maranda said.

by Carlito Pablo FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

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LIQUOR

Stir Crazy benefits bartenders across the country

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by Mike Usinger

iven the amount of time spent at home these past two years, chances are that you’ve picked up some skills when it comes to DIY bartending.

In before-times, letting the pros do all the work was something you were happy to do. Then everything changed overnight, and suddenly it was time to learn on the fly, which involved making plenty of rookieon-the-job mistakes.

Like finally clueing in that no human being on the face of the earth has ever made a decent Margarita with ReaLime and unrefined corn syrup. And that ice that’s been sitting in the back of the freezer for nine months next to the raw Thailand prawns and northern Ontario whitefish is the reason your last Old Fashioned tasted like the tide had just come in at high noon in Mexico.

Now that you’ve got pretty decent at making everything from a deliciously herbal Rosemary Gimlet to a potent Zombie to a Smoked Cedar Sour, it’s time to expand your repertoire. No one likes being stuck in a rut. But at the same time, improvising doesn’t always lead to greatness, as you discovered the last time you mixed three teaspoons of matcha tea powder

with chili-pepper-infused gin, fresh pickle juice, Galliano liqueur, maple syrup, whipping cream, muddled garlic, and a whisper of absinthe with a durian garnish.

Sometimes it’s best to turn to the professionals.

To that end, Campari Group Canada has stepped up to help out not only the likes of you, but bartenders across the country who’ve been impacted by two years of forced closure, capacity limits, and all the other devastation that’s come with COVID-19.

When the pandemic first hit in the spring of 2020, shutting down the world, Campari Group Canada began hiring suddenly out of work bartenders across the country to come up with original cocktail recipes. (Brands under the Campari umbrella include Skyy vodka, Appleton rum, Aperol, Wild Turkey, Grand Marnier, and Espolón tequila).

Recognizing the industry was still hurting as the pandemic dragged on into 2021 and 2022, Campari Group, in conjunction with Bartender Atlas, restarted the program, this time hiring over 140 coast-tocoast bartenders to create custom cocktails.

Those recipes have now been collected into the Campari Stir Crazy Recipe Catalog, and made available for purchase here.

Olivia Povarchook of Tocador contributes the Golden Hour to the Campari Stir Crazy Recipe Catalog.

VOTE NOW! MAY 26, 2022

Visit STRAIGHT.COM to vote for your favourites from Vancouver’s thriving culinary scene Ballot closes March 17 6

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FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

All proceeds will go directly to the out-ofwork and underemployed Canadian bartenders who created the cocktails.

Purchase options start at $25 for the basic catalog, and go up to $100 for what’s being called the “I really want to help the bartenders” edition. There’s also the option to purchase Campari Stir Crazy single recipes for $5 to $15.

Cocktails include original offerings like Dream a Little Dream of Me (overproof rum, Campari, spicy guava syrup, pineapple, lime), Strawberry Kiwi Parfait (Forty Creek Barrel Select Whisky, strawberry simple syrup, lemon, egg white, kiwi), and Grandma’s Whisper (SKYY Vodka, peppermint candy syrup, orgeat, lemon, rose water, egg white). In other words, and at risk of stating the obvious, no one’s going to have you mixing lemon gin with a heaping tablespoon of Tang and then calling it a day.

Representing Vancouver in the Campari Stir Crazy Recipe Catalog is Olivia Povarchook of Tocador, who contributes a drink called Golden Hour. Described as “a bitter aperitif cocktail for the sweetest part of the day,” the creation includes Campari, Espolón tequila, pineapple, and orange marmalade.

As you ponder whether to spend an hour or two’s wages on an initiative that does a world of good for those who continue to need the help, here’s a drink below I’ve been working on during the pandemic that you can make. After you take one sip dump it down

the drain, and then order the Campari Stir Crazy Recipe Catalog. There’s no shame in admitting that, sometimes, you get the best results by following a recipe. Not to mention the instructions of a professional.

THE DETONATOR

3 oz ghost pepper-infused gin 1 oz Galliano 1 oz Mrs. Butterworth’s simulated maple syrup 3/4 oz whipping cream (the white-trash kind in a canister) 1/2 oz dill pickle juice (preferable Polishstyle with extra garlic) 3 tablespoons No-Name Brand™ matcha powder 1 giant Russian garlic clove absinthe in an unwashed spray bottle that used to contain Chloraseptic cherry sore throat spray 1 overripe durian

After you’ve muddled the garlic, dump all ingredients in a cocktail shaker and stir, then spritz with absinthe. Don’t bother adding ice—you want to drink this flavour-bombed bad boy straight. Serve with freshly-crackedopen whole durian, preferably in an enclosed space like a Finnish-style sauna, a packedwith-unwashed-13-year-old-boys Evo automobile, or a construction-site Porta Pottie that’s been baking in an asphalt parking lot on a scorching-hot sunny day. g

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Steven Page gets Barenaked with the symphony

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by Steve Newton

teven Page garnered a lot of attention last November when a video produced by the Governor General’s Awards started making the rounds on social media. The Canadiana-packed clip, for a song titled “Canada Loves You Back”, showed Page serenading Vancouver actor Ryan Reynolds, who was being honoured with the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award. It’s been viewed more than three million times via Reynolds’s YouTube channel.

Page and Reynolds first met in 1999, when Page’s old band, Barenaked Ladies, were guests on Reynolds’s sitcom Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place. As Page explains from his home in Syracuse, New York, Reynolds was a BNL fan, and their paths crossed multiple times over the years until, a few years ago, Reynolds showed up at a Steven Page Trio show in New York City. Since then, they’ve been good buddies.

“The Governor General’s Awards knew that we were friends,” Page says, “and they came to me and said, ‘Would you be interested in writing this song for Ryan?’ I mean, it was a little bit terrifying, because his whole brand is funny, clever, and heartfelt, and so you kinda have to write something that touches all those bases. But he does it so well, how do you compete with that? Luckily, he liked it.”

Page will be heading out to Vancouver next month, but it won’t be to hang out at his celebrity pal’s mansion, trying on Deadpool costumes and guzzling Aviation gin. He’s got a gig with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, where he’ll be performing a selection of Barenaked Ladies hits and songs from his solo career.

Page first got the call to play with the VSO before the pandemic started, and the concert was supposed to happen last year.

With COVID running rampant, though, the best they could do was record a sixsong miniconcert in front of an audience of 50—with everyone wearing masks and completely distanced onstage—that was posted on YouTube. Now Page is looking forward to returning to the Orpheum for a full show in front of a full crowd.

“I’ve done a few orchestra shows,” he says, “but to do it with the VSO is pretty awesome.

Just even the few songs we got to do last time shows what a quality organization they are.”

Page reveals that the setlist will include the two Barenaked Ladies songs performed last year, “Call and Answer” and “Brian Wilson”, as well as “The Old Apartment” and “Jane”.

He feels that certain BNL songs work particularly well with the full symphonic treatment.

“Oh, for sure. One of the problems sometimes with pop or rock shows with an orchestra is the orchestra just kinda becomes eye candy, because when a rock band plays a song, basically they’ve already arranged

Steven Page will perform Barenaked Ladies hits and songs from his solo career with guitarist Craig Northey, cellist Kevin Fox, and the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra next month.

it, right? Between the bass and the drums and the guitar and the keyboards, they cover all the bases of the song. So what you end up normally doing is assigning those same parts to instruments in the orchestra and they play along with you, but you can’t often hear what the orchestra’s doing.

“But I travel with a trio, so it’s myself, Kevin Fox—who’s kind of our musical director—on cello, and Craig Northey from the Odds on guitar. So it’s much more stripped back, and we allow the orchestra to really be the band in these situations. The songs get that much more dynamic and exciting, so something like ‘Call and Answer’ or ‘Brian Wilson’ really has a lot of power in the orchestra.”

Many Vancouverites will be familiar with Northey, who’s been making great music for decades, including with the Odds, Northey Valenzuela (with Jesse Valenzuela from Gin Blossoms), Stripper’s Union (with Rob Baker from the Tragically Hip), and as a solo artist. Page first met him in the early ’90s, when the Barenaked Ladies were touring behind the Gordon album.

“We ended up going and hanging out with those guys at the Roxy when they [the Odds] had become the house band there,” Page recalls. “They would tour with us a fair bit in the ’90s, especially in the U.S.—they would open for us a lot—and we became great friends with them. And then when I left BNL in 2009, Craig and I started writing together, so we’ve been writing songs together ever since and playing live together as a duo, and then now as the Steven Page Trio.”

Page points out that “Nothing Beautiful”, a song from the 1996 Odds album Nest, might be his favourite Northey song ever, but there isn’t much chance that it will make the setlist in March. (That might have to wait for a special night titled Craig Northey with the VSO. Hands up everyone

who wants to see that!)

Page and Northey have also performed— along with Moe Berg from The Pursuit of Happiness and Chris Murphy from Sloan— as the Trans-Canada Highwaymen, a Canadian supergroup that performs select songs

of their four bands and shares stories from the road. Before Page hangs up the phone, there’s a two-part question for him. Is there any chance of getting back with Barenaked Ladies, and, more importantly, any chance of getting back with the Trans-Canada Highwaymen?

“Question number one, probably not,” Page replies. “I’m a never-say-never kinda person, but I don’t think they’re too keen on having me around. And, actually, I quite enjoyed doing what I’ve been doing since I left the band. I didn’t think it was possible at the time, but now I realize it is.

“As far as the second question goes—yes, absolutely! The Trans-Canada Highwaymen, we talk all the time. The Trans-Canada Highwaymen’s joke/chat thread has gotten me through this pandemic. We’ve actually been making new music together, very quietly—so, hopefully, there will be an album in the next year. We’ve only done a small amount of touring, and it’s always been in eastern Canada, so we’d love to get on the road from coast to coast.” g Steven Page performs with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra on March 12 and 13 at the Orpheum Theatre.

A FIREHALL ARTS CENTRE production

Directed by

DONNA SPENCER

by STEPHEN

MASSICOTTE

“A delicate exploration of the excitement, beauty and purity of the first flush of romance.”

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FIREHALL ARTS CENTRE 2021-2022 | REUNION SEASON

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

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SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Bamford loves it when the show doesn’t go well

M

by Steve Newton

aria Bamford’s first memories of comedy came from listening to her dad’s Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy records and taking in the comical Canuck stylings of SCTV’s Bob and Doug McKenzie. Later on, in high school, she found other ways to entertain herself.

“I enjoyed getting up and doing speeches,” Bamford recalls on the line from her home in Altadena, California. “I would run for office if there was a student-council position so that I could do the funny speech. Then, of course, once I was elected, everything sort of fell apart—as it does with most leaders.”

Falling apart—and trying to keep yourself together—is something that the 51-year-old comic knows only too well. Growing up in Duluth, Minnesota, she suffered from severe bouts of anxiety and depression, and she was later diagnosed with bipolar II disorder and OCD (obsessive–compulsive disorder). Her response was to build a successful and fulfilling career as a comedian addressing issues of mental health.

“Some people do their comedy about things that are more everyday,” she says, “and I think that can be just as valuable. I think it’s a totally valid point for comedians to say,

Maria Bamford turned an early love of comedy, inspired by Steve Martin and Eddie Murphy, into a fruitful career in standup and acting that sees her confronting her own mental-health issues.

‘Oh, even if I had something serious to talk about, why burden the audience with it?’

“But I like talking about things that are meaningful to me,” she stresses. “I like the feeling of talking about something onstage and then if people laugh that means

The Biting School presents

Melon Piece + Blue Space Bold solos by Arash Khakpour & Kelly McInnes

March 3-5, 2022

The Roundhouse

www.bitingschool.com

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THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

they know what I’m talking about. If they don’t, well, then we’re all in a pickle.”

Bamford’s self-deprecating efforts to use comedy as a therapeutic tool has brought praise from the likes of Stephen Colbert, who told her on his show in 2016 that she was his “favourite comedian on planet Earth”.

“I could not believe it,” Bamford says. “I still—even when you say it—I almost can’t believe it. But it’s on tape somewhere, so there it is. His feelings may have changed since then, but at that moment in time, that was pretty wonderful. I kind of went, ‘Wow, he’s a pretty gracious person to put himself out there for me, at risk.’ ” Colbert’s compliment came the same year that Netflix launched Lady Dynamite, a subversive comedy show based loosely on Bamford’s life. The series only lasted for two seasons (20 episodes), but Bamford wasn’t surprised—or saddened—by that fact.

“It was the perfect amount for me,” she explains. “I don’t know if you’ve ever worked on a television production, but it turns out I did not realize that it involves 16- to 18-hour workdays, every day. You’re extremely well paid, but it’s a bit of a big deal. And the medications that I’m on made it extremely difficult, so I am grateful that it’s only two seasons. It was fun while it lasted, and it bought me a house. So thank you, Netflix, for a house.”

Other highlights of Bamford’s career include doing voiceovers for animated shows like Adventure Time, BoJack Horseman, Big Mouth, and HouseBroken. She also played Debrie Bardeaux, Tobias Fünke’s love interest, on 15 episodes of Arrested Development.

“I really enjoyed that show,” she says. “It was creative and unpredictable and bananas and then had great wordplay. Most of the time, I was acting like a methamphetamine user or someone who was withdrawing from

some sort of heroin addiction, laying down with my eyes kind of half-shut half the time, so it wasn’t too off my normal state.”

These days Bamford is mostly performing standup—as she will be doing on May 25 at the Vogue Theatre. She suggests people check her act out on YouTube to see if they have any interest in what she does.

“Right now I do a bunch of material about my mother,” she says. “My mom passed this year. I do a bunch on cults that I am a member of, and mental-health issues.

Suicide hotline is talked about in my act, and really anything about what I’ve tried to do to cheer myself up in the last few years.”

As well as immersing herself in standup, Bamford runs an open mike in her neighbourhood once a month.

“It is so good!” she raves. “It’s six to nine hours of three-minute timed segments of people shouting into a mike. It’s a learning experience with some laughs, and also moments of great discomfort, which is quite possibly my favourite part of comedy, when the show isn’t going well.”

Besides working hard to overcome the stigma of mental health, Bamford shows her big heart in other ways. She donates 11 percent of the net profits of her company,

It was fun while it lasted, and it bought me a house. So thank you, Netflix, for a house.

– Maria Bamford

Bamfooco, to the Downtown Women’s Centre in L.A.’s Skid Row neighborhood, which provides housing, health care, and other services to women there.

“We give 11 percent,” she says, “because I grew up Christian, and I want to give one percent better than my mother did.”

Bamford’s concern for the plight of others is also evident on her current Twitter feed, which includes this bio message to her more than 230,000 followers: “See me live! Tix are usually $30! If low on $ and can’t afford, email me at ariamaamfordba@gmail.com I’ll get you on list if not sold out!””

Humble to the end, Bamford even paints that atypical act of generosity as being somehow self-serving.

“Uh, well, I just want it to be a good show,” she reasons. “I mean, it’s really sort of a selfish thing. It only works out in my favour that I have people who are truly delighted to come see a show.” g Maria Bamford performs standup comedy at the Vogue Theatre on May 25 as part of Just For Laughs Vancouver.

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

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FEB

25/26

Chooi Plays Mendelssohn Fri, Sat, 8pm | Orpheum

THIS WEEKEND! Internationally acclaimed violinist Nikki Chooi makes his VSO debut. Robert Schumann’s Symphony No. 2, and a new VSO co-commission

by Linda Catlin Smith are paired with BC-born Chooi’s performance of Mendelssohn’s exciting Violin Concerto in E minor.

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Ballet BC’s Walerski opens the door to dancers’ creativity

by Charlie Smith

Nikki Chooi

Hear it. Feel it.

Peer Gynt MAR

Thu, 2pm | Orpheum

3

Christopher Gaze

Edvard Grieg’s charming suite is now more famous than the Ibsen play it was written to accompany. Discover the full connection and the thrilling story behind the music.

Prokofiev & Grieg MAR

Fri, 7pm | Orpheum

4

Anna Rakitina

The next generation of symphony stars! Russian-born conductor Anna Rakitina leads an exciting performance featuring two beloved works: Grieg’s Peer Gynt, and Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2. Ms. Rakitina is a Dudamel Fellow at the LA Philharmonic, and the current Associate Conductor at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She will be joined on the Orpheum stage by violinist Blake Pouliot, twice featured on the CBC’s “30 Hot Canadian Classical Musicians under 30” list.

MAR

Steven Page with the VSO

12/13 Sat, 8pm | Orpheum

Sun, 7pm | Orpheum

•

Steven Page

Acclaimed Canadian singer-songwriter Steven Page returns to the VSO for a heartfelt performance of his solo works as well as iconic hits from his Barenaked Ladies days, as only he can sing them.

VancouverSymphony.ca FEB 25, 26 MASTERWORKS DIAMOND SERIES SPONSOR

BROADCAST MEDIA PARTNERS

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Ballet BC dancer Zenon Zubyk and the rest of the company’s 19 dancers will all be on-stage in artistic director Medhi Walerski’s just BEFORE right AFTER. Photo by Marcus Eriksson.

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early 19 months after becoming Ballet BC’s artistic director, Medhi Walerski will finally have one of his choreographic works presented live to a local audience.

The North American premiere of just BEFORE right AFTER at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre will be only the company’s second live show since the pandemic descended on the world back in 2020.

“We are thrilled to go back on-stage,” Walerski tells the Straight by phone.

This production, which includes all 19 Ballet BC dancers, is set to original music

by Belgian composer Adrien Cronet. Walerski’s just BEFORE right AFTER is part of a program called Reveal + Tell, running from March 3 to 5, that includes The Statement by Vancouver’s Crystal Pite and Woke Up Blind

by German choreographer Marco Goecke.

Walerski explains that the name, just BEFORE right AFTER, resulted from a recent Ballet BC residency in Luxembourg.

The first part of the work was choreographed beforehand. The second half took shape right after the residency.

“There’s a moment where things shift in the work and I wanted to highlight that in the title,” Walerski says.

There’s not a story, per se, but he allows that the production reflects a willingness of people to be together.

“It’s about letting go and abandoning,” the choreographer adds. “It’s about silence and pause and the necessity to find space within.”

He says the dancers demonstrate a “beautiful unity” in the production. And they’ve also been eager to bring their own voices into the process.

“I find that really overwhelming, to witness their creativity in the studio,” he says.

Walerski adds that he was eager to allow them to have a voice. As the choreographer of just BEFORE right AFTER, he was keen to “open doors” to provide more space for dancers to demonstrate their chops.

“Not every work allows that,” he concedes, “and not every choreographer is open to that.

But with this process, it’s such a pleasure to actually witness their artistry.”

Several times during the interview, Walerski praises the talent of the new generation of dancers. That prompts the Straight to say that it sounds like he’s enjoying his job as Ballet BC’s artistic director.

“Yes, I do,” he replies. “Very much. I’m so curious about each artist. And they’re all so unique that there is so much beauty in each individual.”

He’s also feeling good about the two other works being shown, describing Pite’s The Statement as a “masterpiece”.

The script, which includes a heated conversation around a conference table, was written by her longtime collaborator, playwright Jonathon Young.

“It’s about control; it’s about moral conflicts and responsibility,” Walerski says. “I think you could almost consider the piece a play. And it’s very much linked, I think, to our time and the current events we are facing right now.”

Goecke’s’s piece is set to two songs by Jeff Buckley: “Dream of You and I” and “The Way Young Lovers Do”.

“It’s touching,” Walerski says. “It’s intense. It’s an exploration of love.” g Ballet BC presents Reveal + Tell March 3 to 5 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre, which includes Woke Up Blind by Marco Goecke, The Statement by Crystal Pite, and just BEFORE right AFTER by Medhi Walerski.

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Playwright explores limits of modern storytelling

by Charlie Smith

He’s not one of these chair-throwing directors.

– playwright Jason Sherman

After two decades, Jason Sherman (above) has reunited with Touchstone Theatre artistic director Roy Surette with Ominous Sounds at the River Crossing; or, Another Fucking Dinner Party Play.

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or Governor General’s Award– winning playwright Jason Sherman, it’s imperative to tell a good story. That’s because as far back as when cave dwellers were sitting around a campfire, he says, the one with the best tale captured everyone else’s attention.

It’s a similar situation in modern theatre—only nowadays, audiences are taken on a ride for 90 minutes or two hours. “My instinctual interest is in big stories—and then to put characters into high-stakes situations and see how they respond,” Sherman tells the Straight by phone from Toronto.

He’s drawn to archetypal characters and archetypal stories that have been told through the ages. “What’s today’s version of that?” he asks. “And so I do try to see kind of big-pattern stuff.”

This was on display in his 1998 play Patience, which recast the story of Job in modern times through a Yuppie character named Reuben Field who loses everything over the course of 24 hours. Reading Hebron, produced in 1996, focuses on a Jewish character from Toronto pondering his role in the oppression of Palestinians. One of his more recent plays, Copy That, explores systemic racism in entertainment through a group of TV cop-show writers.

His newest play, which Touchstone Theatre is presenting as a world premiere, also aims high. Ominous Sounds at the River Crossing; or, Another Fucking Dinner Party Play revolves around six actors coming to terms with appropriation and authentic storytelling.

Sherman says that one of the actors suddenly breaks out of her character and declares that she is no longer interested in doing formulaic plays anymore. Instead, she wants to perform in productions that

address major issues facing the world.

“There’s a discussion, a conversation, and a kind of a tug of war ensues over what kind of stories should they tell,” Sherman reveals. “It’s the younger cast member who keeps interrupting as they try to tell…the epic-theatre type of stories that the other character wants to tell.”

Directed by Roy Surette, Ominous Sounds features Kerry Sandomirsky, Monice Peter, Alex Poch-Goldin, Allan Morgan, Nicola Lipman and Angela Chu as the actors. In the script, their characters don’t have names—they’re simply numbered—but Sherman says that they do have names when they’re playing their roles in a play within the play.

According to Sherman, Ominous Sounds inquires into self-imposed limits of storytelling through the dialogue.

“The actions of the play are very much based on the outcome of those discussions,” he adds.

As a teenager, Sherman discovered how much he enjoyed playwrighting when a teacher asked him to write a script for a school production in an Ontario drama festival. It earned him the first of many awards that he’s received over the years. That led him to study playwrighting at York University.

Sherman is not the type of playwright who sends his script to the director and then checks out. Rather, he prefers to “use the great brains and talent that you have assembled around you to improve the story you’re trying to tell”.

“I’ll be writing until the cows come home and I’ll keep rewriting when they’re home,” Sherman says. “I don’t ask them to write the play. I just ask them to help me make it better.

“Roy is good at that,” he adds. “His cast is great at that.”

Moreover, Sherman describes Surette as a “wonderful collaborator”. He has a gentle manner, Sherman says, while still knowing where he wants to go with a show. And sometimes he gets there by employing the “Socratic method” to get the most out of the people around him.

“He’s not one of these chair-throwing directors,” Sherman quips.

Ominous Sounds at the River Crossing; or, Another Fucking Dinner Party Play was written prior to both the police murder of George Floyd and the COVID-19 pandemic. Sherman discloses that it’s

since been updated with a couple more drafts based on workshops with the cast and discussions with Surette. And there may even be more revisions after Sherman watches the previews live and sees how his lines land.

“I’m always amazed how much a play can change over the course of three days once it’s before an audience,” Sherman says. “You can make changes to make a world of difference.”

In 2000, Surette directed Sherman’s Patience at Victoria’s Belfry Theatre.

The playwright is thrilled that they’ve reunited.

“The production blew me away,” Sherman says. “I came out to see it and it was so sensitive to the materials, so smart, so involving, and beautifully designed.”

Patience under Surette’s direction also had a coherence that Sherman describes as “incredible”.

“So I said to him after that, ‘I want to work with you again,’ ” Sherman recalls.

“It took 20 years, but here we are.” g Touchstone Theatre presents Ominous Sounds at the River Crossing; or, Another Fucking Dinner Party Play at Performance Works from March 6 to 13.

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

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SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

James Yi could play Appa in Kim’s Convenience forever

by Steve Newton

James Yi (left, with Kim’s Convenience costar Maki Yi) has been in five different productions of Ins Choi’s show, and he says it has been the best experience of his life. Photo by David Cooper.

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ames Yi first played Appa, the Korean Canadian shop owner of Kim’s Convenience, back in 2018 when Pacific Theatre mounted the play. He portrayed the character again that same year for another production at the Chemainus Theatre Festival, and then one more time in 2019 for Seattle’s Taproot Theatre.

In early 2020, Yi was set to star in the Arts Club Theatre Company’s touring version of Kim’s Convenience, but that was cut short due to COVID-19.

Now Yi is back for another kick at the Kim’s can, as the Arts Club is set to open a four-week run at the Stanley Industrial Alliance Stage on February 24.

He must be real sick of Kim’s Convenience by now, right?

“Never!” Yi proclaims on the phone from rehearsals at the BMO Theatre Centre. “I love this show.”

The latest production of playwright Ins Choi’s 2011 work is being directed by Kaitlin Williams, who also helmed the Pacific Theatre version. Yi can’t say enough good things about her.

“Oh, she’s fantastic,” he raves. “She is such a kind, loving human being, and I really love how she works with actors— she gives them so much time to be able to discover things by themselves. And she’ll move us along at just the right pace to be able to discover, and then also be able to take on direction. She’s just a wonderful director.”

Yi notes that Williams approaches the play somewhat differently than the other Kim’s directors he’s worked under, such as Mark DuMez in Chemainus and David Hsieh and Scott Nolte in Seattle.

“I think every director has a different understanding of the text,” he explains, “a different interpretation of the moment.

They all have their own thing, but I can’t say that I’ve ever worked with anyone that’s not a great director when it comes to Kim’s.

Every director I’ve worked with, they were just so generous in how they went about working with the actors. It’s just been the greatest experience of my life.”

Born in Korea and raised in Cleveland before moving to Alaska, Yi dabbled in acting in Anchorage before heading to Vancouver with his wife and two kids.

He’s happy that he ended up here instead of Hollywood, which he was considering.

“I remember feeling overwhelmed in L.A. when I wanted to try a little bit of background acting. I thought, ‘How do you even get started in this town?’ With Vancouver it was like, you know, it’s a smaller market, maybe it’ll be a little easier to get started. And I actually feel that I made the right choice.”

Now settled in Surrey, Yi works parttime there as an associate pastor at Guildford’s New Joy Church, where he oversees the men’s ministry and helps shepherd the congregation. So are there any similarities between the jobs of providing spiritual leadership and pretending that you’re someone else?

“I would say the similarity is that you have to really know people,” Yi offers. “As an actor, you have to understand people, to understand humanity. You have to study and observe people well, and as a pastor I would hope that I’m doing the same thing.”

Dedicated Kim’s Convenience followers may also know Yi from his recurring role see next page

…every once in a while, there’s this really juicy part that comes along…

– James Yi

The Kim’s Convenience TV series has won numerous ACTRA Awards and Canadian Screen Awards, and Yi thinks he knows what the main attraction is to Choi’s creation, whether it’s experienced on the small screen or the theatre stage.

“Anybody who watches it can relate

to it,” he says, “that’s what makes it such a good show. ’Cause whether it’s about a Korean family or not, it’s really about a family. Everybody comes from a family; everybody has a family. Even if they don’t have their own family, everybody is connected to some family at some point in their lives, so I think anyone can relate to the characters.

“And there’s so much of the universal struggles that humans go through in relationships that’s dealt with,” he adds. “It’s such a heartwarming story of redemption and reconciliation that I think that’s why people love the show so much. It feels good watching it, and they feel hopeful about their own family when they walk out of the theatre.”

Playing Appa in five different productions of Kim’s Convenience still isn’t enough for Yi, who will be heading down to Tacoma to perform in Taproot Theatre’s remount of the play in May and June. He plans on playing Appa as long as he possibly can.

“It’s such a great role,” he stresses. “As an actor, you’re always looking for work—trying to do theatre or film or TV—and every once in a while, there’s like this really juicy part that comes along, and it’s just right up your alley. And I’m very fortunate that it’s such a specifically ethnic role, too. It’s not like just anyone can hop up there and play it.” g

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as Jimmy Young on the TV version of the play, which aired for five seasons on CBC and is also available on Netflix.

“He was a very fun character to play,” Yi recalls, “but he’s very different from Appa.

He was more of a fringe character on the show, so there’s not as many layers to the character. But this guy is quite wealthy, chauvinistic, someone who is not very selfaware. I guess Appa can be a little bit like that sometimes too, but I feel like Appa has some very strong principles, and he’s very honest. I think he’s trying to be true to himself.”

The Arts Club Theatre Company presents Kim’s Convenience at the Stanley Industrial Alliance Stage from February 24 to March 27.

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SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Creative worlds collide in Biting School showcase

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by Charlie Smith

ancouver contemporary dancers Kelly McInnes and Arash Khakpour feel that their careers have been on parallel tracks.

Many years ago, they trained together in the Modus Operandi dance program for young emerging professionals. Back then, McInnes and Khakpour were eager to get their careers underway, which led them to collaborate on a duet.

“We’ve been growing alongside each other as artists,” McInnes tells the Straight over Zoom. “Definitely for me, I’ve been really inspired by the work that Arash has been doing.”

Khakpour is cofounder, along with his brother Aryo, of The Biting School, which

they describe as “a meeting ground for dance, theatre, and performance art”. With the return of live performances, it seemed natural for Khakpour to present a double bill of solos of works by him and McInnes.

“I have a history of…learning from her work and her bravery and openness,” Khakpour says on the same Zoom call.

Khakpour will present Melon Piece, a bewitching work in which the very bendable dancer struggles—almost like a puppet on a string—to reach an elusive watermelon on the other side of the floor.

It premiered a decade ago, but Khakpour has reworked it to reflect how he has evolved since then. He describes Melon Piece as being like a movable painting with

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Arash Khakpour’s Melon Piece reflects the fact that both watermelons and people are very different, with far more interesting interiors than their exteriors. Photo by Luciana D’Anunciação.

multiple characters.

“There are all these layers of myself that I want to share,” Khakpour says. “And I want to have a short story for each layer, or each perception, of myself in the world.”

To him, Melon Piece is a commentary on how human beings communicate in the world by presenting different facets of themselves. The performance reflects this in the relationship that his characters have with the watermelon.

He points out that watermelons, like people, are very different and usually far more interesting on the inside than they appear to be on the surface.

Khakpour actually has a cultural and emotional connection to this fruit. At the age of 14, he immigrated to Canada from Iran, where he recalls staying up on the longest night of the year, eating watermelons and pomegranate seeds and sharing stories and reciting poetry. He still misses those occasions.

“It’s got that aspect to it as well,” Khakpour says. “That longing and the extreme loss that I felt is part of the piece.”

Extreme loss also bubbles to the surface in McInnes’s Blue Space, which she choreographed in 2019. It was born out of grief for the state of a planet in turmoil due to runaway greenhouse gas emissions.

“I think a lot about extinction and just the fact that [many] animals literally don’t exist anymore,” McInnes says. “I was feeling a lot of complexity of emotions around that.”

She points out that there’s a constant onslaught of media coverage about the climate breakdown, but she doesn’t feel that there are many spaces where people can absorb the magnitude of this. And that, she feels, is leading to a great deal of disassociation.

“There was a long time when what was being made about climate change was really activismy art,” McInnes says. “And sometimes I think it was really cheesy and it was hard to connect to.”

This isn’t McInnes’s first exploration

of the ecological crisis. Another show, Mine, explored consumption and memory through the clothes that we wear. Two° revolved around humanity’s inability to make the necessary changes to keep the average global temperature increase since pre-industrial times at a livable level.

McInnes says that she vocalizes how she’s feeling in Blue Space, which includes a big piece of plastic on-stage that transforms into different things.

“One other thing is I am kind of shapeshifting between woman and animal and child and womb,” she adds. “I feel like there’s a lot of different things I’m embodying in the work.”

McInnes worked on Blue Space as she was beginning training in craniosacral therapy. And that has helped her move toward a more hopeful outlook on the world.

“There’s a lot of really beautiful things in the practice relating to the embryological processes and the ways that we are fluid bodies,” she states. “We are constantly evolving and changing.”

She also feels that craniosacral therapy helps people connect to the fact that we are all, ultimately, animals.

“I’m also doing research about how being around water is very healing for us as animals,” McInnes adds. “It kind of puts our brains—our nervous system—into a more regulated and introspective place.”

This manifests itself in the show in the transition from intense moments of exploring the reality of the climate crisis to shifting to calmer states in which the audience hears the sound of the ocean or sees images of water.

“It’s sensation-based,” McInnes emphasizes. “It feels very sensorial.” g The Biting School presents A Dance Double Bill of Personal, Bold Solo Works, featuring Kelly McInnes’s Blue Space and Arash Khakpour’s Melon Piece, from March 3 to 5 at the Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre.

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Theatre companies ready stages for live shows

by Martin Dunphy

Jason Sherman’s latest, Ominous Sounds at the River Crossing; or, Another Fucking Dinner Party Play at Granville Island’s Performance Works from March 6 to 13.

The company describes the play—directed by its acclaimed two-time artistic director, Roy Surette—as “Pirandello meets Brecht meets the Twilight Zone”.

Touchstone is presenting another world premiere at spring’s end, June 10 to 19, at the Russian Hall. From writers Claire Love Wilson and Peter Lorenz, Morag, You’re a Long Time Deid is the result of a five-year “transnational collaboration” and is produced in association with Touchstone and with support from the frank theatre. The production, about a granddaughter who

inherits both her grandmother’s piano and her mysterious history, is described as an experimental musical that “warps, disrupts, and reconfigures traditional Scottish storytelling, ballad singing, and participatory community dance”—and all from a queer perspective.

And Vancouver’s largest theatre company, the Arts Club, is putting on its version of Pacific Theatre’s 2018 production of Kim’s Convenience, the Ins Choi play that became a popular Canadian TV show with the same name. The classic play about a Korean shopkeeper in Canada dealing with his children and their changing neighbourhood will run at the Stanley Industrial Alliance Stage from February 24 to March 27. g

TOUCHSTONE THEATRE PRESENTS

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Alexandra Lainfiesta (left) and Genevieve Fleming perform in Neworld Theatre’s production of Clean/Espejos, which is at the Cultch as part of its Femme Festival. Photo by Sewari Campillo.

he seasonal sense of renewal that comes with spring seems to be tied this year to an anticipation of a return to “normal”.

Whatever the course of the pandemic in the near future, some of Vancouver’s theatre companies are banking on live audiences returning in front of stages.

(Please be aware that some theatre companies are still offering digital performances of select productions and that COVID-19 protection protocols can vary between venues. Check before you attend or purchase tickets.)

Here are some of the local in-person theatrical events in the offing for the next few months.

The Cultch’s ongoing fifth annual Femme Festival showcases works by and about “female-identifying voices and experiences” from Vancouver companies and others. According to the Cultch, its use of the word femme is inclusive of “all selfidentifying female, trans, and non-binary folxs”.

Still on tap for February and March are Pi Theatre’s Beautiful Man (February 24 to March 5 at the Historic Theatre), Little Thief Theatre’s In Response to Alabama (March 3 to 12, Vancity Culture Lab), Neworld Theatre’s Clean/Espejos (March 10 to 19, Historic Theatre), the Search Party’s Bunny (March 17 to 27, Vancity Culture Lab), and, from Montreal, RD Creations’ Bow’t Trail Retrospek (March 23 to 29, Historic Theatre).

The Cultch is presenting two shows at the nearby York Theatre on Commercial Drive as well. The Savage Society’s Little Red Warrior and His Lawyer—by company artistic director and Governor General’s

Award-winning playwright Kevin Loring—plays from March 3 to 13 after a February run at Victoria’s Belfry Theatre. And Edmonton’s Catalyst Theatre brings The Invisible: Agents of Ungentlemanly Warfare to the York from April 29 to May 7.

East Vancouver’s only cultural centre housed in a renovated 1909 church is also hosting two world premieres at its Historic Theatre in April and May. The first, Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre’s Bad Parent—by playwright Ins Choi (Kim’s Convenience)—runs April 21 to May 1. Then Theatre Conspiracy’s Himmat, by Gavan Cheema, is scheduled from May 6 to 15.

Not to be outdone in historical significance, Strathcona’s Firehall Arts Centre boasts possibly the oldest venue for a performing-arts organization in the city: Vancouver’s first firehall, constructed in 1906.

Those venerable walls will house audiences for its production of the multiple-awardwinning Mary’s Wedding from February 25 to March 13, followed by Zee Zee Theatre’s culture-and-hockey comedy, Men Express Their Feelings, from March 18 to April 3. (Men will feature one performance with ASL interpretation and three paywhat-you-can dates, as well as a relaxed performance.)

The Firehall follows those two events with a Savage Society coproduction about internalized racism, White Noise, from April 16 to May 1, and its own production of Yellow Fever—a detective story set in Vancouver’s Firehall-adjacent postwar Japantown—from May 14 to 28.

Meanwhile, Vancouver’s almost halfcentury-old producer and presenter of Canadian works, Touchstone Theatre, is offering the world premiere of playwright

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FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

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SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Live comedy blossoms in Vancouver this spring

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by Steve Newton

American comedian, actor, and podcast host performs a standup show.

uring the past couple of years, the pandemic has caused most Vancouverites to hold in their belly laughs. With COVID-19 waning and happier days on the horizon, it’s time to let those chuckles run wild.

Fortune Feimster (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, April 10) Comedian and actor from North Carolina, known for her work on Chelsea Lately and The Mindy Project.

East Van Laugh Riot (Rio Theatre, February 25) Charlie Demers hosts comedy performances by Yumi Nagashima, Jacob Samuel, Dave Harris, and Andrea Jin.

Heather McMahan (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, April 1) American comedian, actor, and podcaster performs on her Farewell Tour.

Donnell Rawlings (Hollywood Theatre, April 11) Comedy Here Often? presents the American comedian and actor, best known as a cast member on Chappelle’s Show, performing a standup show.

Trevor Noah (Rogers Arena, February 26) Just for Laughs Vancouver presents South African comedian and host of The Daily Show With Trevor Noah performing a standup comedy show as part of his Back to Abnormal Tour.

David Sedaris (Vogue Theatre, February 28) Innovation Arts & Entertainment, MRG Live, and the Vancouver Writers Fest present American humorist, comedian, author, and radio contributor.

Bianca Del Rio (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, March 8) American drag queen and comedian, winner of the sixth season of RuPaul’s Drag Race, performs on new comedy tour Unsanitized!

Maz Jobrani (Vogue Theatre, March 25) Iranian-American comedian, also known as the Persian Pink Panther.

Kyle Kinane (Vogue Theatre, March 24) American comedian known for his appearances on Drunk History, Workaholics, Not Safe With Nikki Glaser, and Comedy Bang! Bang! performs a standup show.

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THE GEORGIA STR AIGHT

Kanan Gill (Massey Theatre, April 16) Indian stand-up comedian, actor, and YouTuber performs on his Is This It? Tour.

Just for Laughs Vancouver presents Trevor Noah at Rogers Arena on February 26.

Ronnie Chieng: The Hope You Get Rich Tour (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, March 31) Just for Laughs Vancouver presents standup comedian, actor, and correspondent on The Daily Show With Trevor Noah.

Russell Howard (Vogue Theatre, April 1) English comedian and actor best known for his TV shows Russell Howard’s Good News and The Russell Howard Hour, performs two standup shows.

Girls Gotta Eat (Vogue Theatre, April 2) Comedic duo composed of podcasters Ashley Hesseltine and Rayna Greenberg.

Nikki Glaser (Vogue Theatre, April 9)

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

Dave Chappelle (Rogers Arena, April 22 and 23) Controversial comedian, 2019 recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, performs two standup shows.

T. J. Miller (Rick Bronson’s House of Comedy, April 22 and 23) American comedian and actor best known for his roles in HBO’s Silicon Valley and the Deadpool films.

Taylor Tomlinson (Vogue Theatre, April 30) American comedian known for her Netflix special Quarter-Life Crisis performs two standup shows on her Deal With It tour.

Dave Attell (Rick Bronson’s House of Comedy, April 26 and 27) Stand-up comedian, actor, and writer, probably best known as the host of Comedy Central’s

Insomniac With Dave Attell.

Andrew Schulz: The Infamous Tour (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, May 6) Just for Laughs Vancouver presents standup comedian from New York City performing two shows.

Laughter Is the Best Medicine (Red Gate Revue Stage, May 6) Charity improv show hosted by TMP Improv, with all proceeds to the Richmond Food Bank’s school meals program.

Whitney Cummings (Vogue Theatre, May 7) American comedian, known for her standup-comedy specials for HBO and Netflix, performs on her Touch Me Tour.

John Cleese: An Evening of Exceptional Silliness (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, May 17) Legendary British comic, best known for his work with the famed comedy troupe Monty Python and for his starring role in the TV series Fawlty Towers.

Sebastian Maniscalco (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, May 19 and 20) American standup comedian and actor, known for the 2019 comedy special Stay Hungry.

Just for Laughs Comedy Night in Canada (Orpheum Theatre, May 21) Rick Mercer hosts standup comedy by Ramy Dave Merheje, Eman El-Husseini, and Ivan Decker.

Just for Laughs Vancouver (various Vancouver venues, May 25 to 29) Comedy festival features performances by Nicole Byer, Andrew Santino, Marc Maron, Maria Bamford, Natasha Leggero, Moshe Kasher, Jimmy O. Yang, and Chris Redd. g

SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Shakespeare and Serrano add sizzle to visual arts

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by Carlito Pablo and Charlie Smith

his is shaping up as quite a memorable year for lovers of visual arts in Vancouver. And we’re not even through February yet.

There’s a first edition of William Shakespeare’s Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies already on display at the Vancouver Art Gallery, which is also hosting an exhibition of Yoko Ono’s work. The Museum of Anthropology at UBC has the blockbuster Sankofa exhibition, which weaves together the works of African and Black Canadian artists, along with a large serving of context. Anyone interested in exploring the complex relationship between contemporary art by Black Canadians and pieces created in Africa needs to see this show, which is cocurated by MOA curator Nuno Porto, UBC PhD candidate Titilope Salami, and Nya Lewis, founder of BlackArt Gastown.

Over at the rennie museum in the Wing Sang Building in Chinatown, works from three influential photographers—Larry Clark, Katy Grannan, and the often controversial Andres Serrano—will be presented in a single show in March. Serrano actually never called himself a photographer; he studied painting and sculpture and considers himself an artist with a camera. He has generated outrage at different times with his images of sex, burn victims, and the morgue, to name a few subjects that have attracted his eye.

We seek beauty in things, places, and people, almost as if we’re hardwired to do so.

The visual arts is one domain where beauty often thrives. And there’s a lot of that in the city this spring, including at the upcoming Capture Photography Festival, which is at many locations around the city in April.

Here’s just a snapshot of what’s available around town over the next couple of months.

Sankofa: African Routes, Canadian Roots (Museum of Anthropology at UBC, until March 27) Sankofa derives its name from the Ghanaian Akan language, incorporating the notion of moving forward while reaching back to connect to one’s heritage.

It’s the ideal name for this exhibition, which draws connections to historical contributions and the growing vitality of Canadians of Black heritage through works by contemporary artists from Africa and Vancouver.

Yoko Ono: Growing Freedom (Vancouver Art Gallery, running until May 1) This show features two parts. “The instructions of Yoko Ono” delves into Ono’s artistic process, ref lecting her radical and unconventional approach.

The exhibited works include pieces that require visitors to actually complete the work, according to the VAG, in pieces such as MEND PIECE, 1966; PAINTING TO HAMMER A NAIL, 1966; and MY MOMMY IS BEAUTIFUL, 1997.

March 20) Text and image play off each other in this collection of drawings, paintings, collage, sculptures, photocopies, silkscreen prints, and films spanning more than five decades of the late Canadian artist Panchal Mansaram, who liked to write his name without a space, thus P.Mansaram.

Shawn Hunt: The First Moonrise (Equinox Art Gallery, until March 19) The show continues Shawn Hunt’s exploration of Heiltsuk cosmologies through shapeshifters and supernatural figures that move between the human and spirit realms.

I am Queen Idia, the Angel of Kings, by Victor Ehikhamenor, is included in Sankofa at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC. Photo by Sarah Rice, courtesy of the Museum of Anthropology at UBC.

For All Time: The Shakespeare FIRST FOLIO (Vancouver Art Gallery, running until March 20) This exhibition offers Vancouverites a chance to not only take a peek at the first edition of Shakespeare’s comedies, histories, and tragedies, but it also offers insights into what life was like in London more than 400 years ago.

and amateurs have been able to capture the endless variability of clouds.

P.Mansaram: The Medium is the Medium is the Medium (Surrey Art Gallery, until

Dan Starling: Unsettled Histories (Burnaby Art Gallery, until April 17) Interdisciplinary artist Dan Starling showcases drypoint prints with Rembrandt’s renowned work Christ Crucified Between the Two Thieves: The Three Crosses (1653) as starting point.

Capture Photography Festival (April 1 to 29, many venues) With public art, exhibitions at many locations, and various events, this annual festival offers a wide variety of choices for anyone with an interest in lens-based art. g

Canadian Historical Work: Romancing The Landscape (Petley Jones Gallery, until February 24) The 2245 Granville Street gallery celebrates the works of Canadian artists who have shared their love of the country’s breathtaking landscapes with the world through their works: Clarence Gagnon, Arthur Lismer, J. E. H. Macdonald, A. Y. Jackson, Henri Masson, Llewellyn Petley-Jones, and Robert Pilot.

Collected Works (rennie museum, March 12 to May 28) Dozens of images from three celebrated American artists—Larry Clark, Katy Grannan, and Andres Serrano—are going to generate a lot of chatter this spring. This exhibition carries a warning: some of the content may be offensive, including images of suffering related to torture, death, adolescent drug use and gunplay, sex, religious references, and white supremacism.

Nourish (Richmond Art Gallery, until April 3) Artist duo Mizzonk (Wan-Yi Lin and Roger Chen) and Jane Wong explore themes around the very basic human compulsion to seek nourishment in order to survive.

Cloud Album (Polygon Gallery, March 11 to May 1) The exhibit features 250 photographs, image albums, and books that present a history of how scientists, artists, FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

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SPRING ARTS PREVIEW

Five dance shows to help you forget the pandemic

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by Charlie Smith

March 3 to 5). The Biting School presents this pair of shows by two local dancers in their prime. Kelly McInnes’s Blue Space offers her take on climate grief as she transforms from a human into other life forms. Arash Khakpour’s Melon Piece shows the many facets of his identity while paying homage to his roots in Iran.

magine that. After extended periods of attendance restrictions at cultural events, there are now no longer any capacity limits in B.C. Audiences can fill up the Queen Elizabeth Theatre, the Vancouver Playhouse, the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, and the Orpheum.

It means the arts are truly back live, if not exactly in your face. But keep in mind you still have to show proof of vaccination to enter theatres and other venues. Plus, you must wear a mask to reduce the spread of COVID-19.

With all of that in mind, here are some big events on the dance card in Vancouver during the next three months.

Reveal + Tell (Queen Elizabeth Theatre, March 3 to 5) Ballet BC is back with its second live show of the season.

And it’s a doozy of a triple bill. German choreographer Marco Goecke’s exploration of love, Woke Up Blind, will include seven dancers on-stage accompanied by Jeff Buckley songs. It’s his first show with Ballet BC. Also in the lineup is The Statement, by Crystal Pite, with a script from Jonathon Young. It features four dancers, a boardroom table, and a whole lot of tension. Pite and Young are the dynamic Vancouver duo behind Betroffenheit, which blew audiences away on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean with its riveting exploration of trauma. If that’s not enough to rock any dance fan, there’s also just BEFORE right AFTER

by Ballet BC’s artistic director, Medhi Walerski. He’ll do what was unthinkable in 2021: put the entire company of 19 dancers on the stage of the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

Revisor (Vancouver Playhouse, March 30 to April 2) Kidd Pivot’s Revisor, also created by Crystal Pite and Jonathon Young, premiered to spectacular reviews in Vancouver in 2019. It’s back for another run.

BODYTRAFFIC (Vancouver Playhouse, May 5 and 6) Founded by Lillian Rose Barbeito and Tina Finkelman Berkett in 2007, BODYTRAFFIC has won rave reviews for its sizzling and daring contemporary dance shows.

In 2015, the Obama administration named the troupe as cultural ambassadors. Soft power, indeed.

Alvin Erasga Tolentino and Sujit Vidya will bring a pan-Asian flavour to Passages of Rhythms. Photo by Yasuhiro Okada.

It’s proof that miracles can still happen in the arts world, notwithstanding the Omicron variant.

A Dance Double Bill of Personal, Bold Solo Works (Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre,

Passages of Rhythms (PAL Studio Theatre, May 19 and 20) Vancouver choreographer Alvin Erasga Tolentino is back with a cross-cultural collaboration to celebrate Asian Heritage Month. He’s merging three duets for three artists, bringing together f lamenco, bharatanatyam, and voices for the body in a pan-Asian production. Jonathan Bernard and Ronald Stelting will provide live percussion music for Tolentino and fellow performers Kasandra La China, Sujit Vaidya, and Gabriel Dharmoo. g

Classical music is live and well in Vancouver this spring

L

by Steve Newton

ive music is back big-time in Vancouver this spring with a wide range of in-person performances presented by companies like the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, Early Music Vancouver, Music on Main, the UBC School of Music, the Friends of Chamber Music, and the Vancouver Recital Society.

David Gillham and Chiharu Iinuma (Highlands United Church, February 23) Violinist Gillham and pianist Iinuma perform works

by Mozart, Franck, and Wieniawski.

March 9-12, 2022 | 8pm

Scotiabank Dance Centre Info and tickets: thedancecentre.ca

Photo: Stéphanie Paillet

Presented with

18

GLOBAL DANCE CONNECTIONS SERIES

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VSO/Chooi Plays Mendelssohn (Orpheum Theatre, February 25 and 26) Music director Otto Tausk leads the VSO and violinist Nikki Chooi in a program of works by Mendelssohn (Violin Concerto, Op. 64, E Minor), Linda Catlin Smith (Tableau, VSO commission 2021), and Robert Schumann (Symphony No. 2, Op 61, C Major).

Rhapsody and the Blues (Kay Meek Arts Centre, February 26) Vancouver premiere of a new arrangement of George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with Jazz Big Band, plus music of Duke Ellington,

Oscar Peterson, and Nat King Cole.

Safia Nolin (Studio 16, February 26) As part of the Nouvelle Scène concert series, Le Centre culturel francophone de Vancouver presents Québécoise indie-folk singer-songwriter.

Inhale/Exhale (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, February 26 and 27) The Turning Point Ensemble presents major new works by composers Taylor Brook and Nova Pon, plus music by Arcade Fire multi-instrumentalist Richard Reed Parry.

Rufus Lin (Lulu Island Winery, February 27) International jazz concert pianist Rufus Lin performs as part of the Live Jazz at the Winery recital series.

Sisters in Jazz Day (VSO School of Music, February 27) Jazz workshops and jam sessions with Jodi Proznick, Amanda Tosoff, Laura Anglade, and Virginia Frigault-MacDonald.

Cellobration! (Anvil Centre, February 27) see next page

VSO/Prokofiev & Grieg (Orpheum Theatre, March 4) Conductor Anna Rakitina and violinist Blake Pouliot join the Vancouver Symphony in Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 and Grieg’s Peer Gynt: Incidental Music (selections).

Music on the Point: Stephen Chatman 70th Birthday Celebration (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, March 6) The Canadian Music Centre, Vancouver Chamber Choir, and the UBC School of Music present performances by the Vancouver Chamber Choir, under conductor Kari Turunen, and Vetta Chamber Music.

Isata Kenneh-Mason (Vancouver Playhouse, March 6) The Vancouver Recital Society presents British pianist in a program of works by Mozart (Sonata No. 14 in C minor, K. 457), Beethoven (Sonata No. 1 in F minor, Op. 2, No. 1), and Rachmaninov (excerpts from Études-Tableaux, Op. 39).

Conductor Anna Rakitina joins violinist Blake Pouliot and the VSO at the Orpheum March 4.

The Vancouver Chamber Music Society presents Israeli-American cellist Amit Peled performing with pianist Noreen Polera.

Castalian String Quartet (Vancouver Playhouse, February 27) The Vancouver Recital Society presents London-based quartet in a program of works by Haydn (String Quartet in D minor, Op. 76, No. 2 “Fifths”), Fanny Mendelssohn (String Quartet in E-flat major), and Schubert (String Quartet No. 15 in G major, D. 887).

VAMSO: Brahms’s Symphony No. 3 (Orpheum Theatre, February 27) The Vancouver Academy of Music Symphony Orchestra presents performances of Wagner’s symphonic poem Siegfried Idyll, Sibelius’s Violin Concerto in D minor, and Brahms’s Symphony No. 3, conducted by Ian Parker.

Benewitz Quartet (Vancouver Playhouse, March 1) The Friends of Chamber Music present a program of works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (String Quartet No. 4 in C major, KV157), Felix Mendelssohn (Quartet No. 2 in A minor, Opus 13), and Antonín Dvořák (String Quartet No.13 in G major, Opus 106).

VSO/Peer Gynt (Orpheum Theatre, March 2) Conductor Anna Rakitina and host Christopher Gaze join the Vancouver Symphony in Edvard Grieg’s charming suite from the Ibsen play.

Aljoša Jurinić (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, March 2) Croatian classical pianist performs works by Ludwig van Beethoven (Sonata No. 21 in C major “Waldstein”) and Frédéric Chopin (Ballade in F major, Op. 38; Nocturne in D flat major, Op. 27, No. 2; and Ballade in G minor, Op. 23).

musica intima (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, March 9) Vancouver vocal ensemble presents a selection of choral works by Kathleen Allan, Andrew Balfour, Lane Price, and Leslie Uyeda.

performances of Bach and Handel’s early choral works.

Jakub Józef Orliński (Vancouver Playhouse, March 20) The Vancouver Recital Society presents Polish countertenor in a program of works by Purcell, Schubert, Handel, Naginski, and Copland.

VSO/The Magic Toyshop (Orpheum Theatre, March 24) Vancouver Symphony Orchestra associate conductor Andrew Crust and host Christopher Gaze join the VSO in the ballet score by Ottorino Respighi, inspired by a set of Rossini piano pieces.

VSO/The Celtic Tenors (Orpheum Theatre, March 25 and 26) The Celtic Tenors join associate conductor Andrew Crust and the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in a program of Celtic songs, classics, and a capellas.

VSO/The Composer Is Here (Orpheum Theatre, March 27) Vancouver Symphony

Orchestra principal percussionist Vern Griffiths returns as conductor and host for a kids’ concert on composers who aren’t dead.

Stephen Waarts and Gabriele Carcano (Vancouver Playhouse, March 27) The Vancouver Recital Society presents violinist Waarts and pianist Carcana in a program of works by Debussy (Sonata for violin and piano in G minor, L. 140), Schumann (Violin Sonata No. 2 in D minor, Op. 121), Sibelius (Four Humoresques, Op. 89, complete), and Enescu (Sonata No. 3 in A minor, Op. 25).

Leslie Dala: Philip Glass Etudes for Piano (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, March 30) Pianist Leslie Dala perform selections from 20 Glass études that he recorded on the Redshift Label during the pandemic.

Yuja Wang (Orpheum Theatre, March 30) The Vancouver Recital Society presents a performance by the Chinese classical pianist. g

Stephen Page with the VSO (Orpheum Theatre, March 12 and 13) Canadian singer-songwriter Steven Page joins the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra for a performance of his solo works and hits from his Barenaked Ladies days.

A Sound Like This: Chor Leoni and the Leonids (St. Andrew’s-Wesley United Church, March 12 and 13) Debut performance by all-star choral group the Leonids, who have been handpicked by Chor Leoni artistic director Erick Lichte.

Music on the Point: Trio Canada (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, March 13) Violinist David Gillham, cellist Eric Wilson, and pianist Chiharu Iiluma perform works

by Antonin Dvořák (Piano Trio No. 4 in E minor, Op 90 Dumky) and Dmitri Shostakovich (Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op 67).

Chatman, Chopin, and Schumann (Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, March 16) Pianist and UBC faculty member Patricia Hoy performs a program of music by Stephen Chatman (Etudes Book 1), Frédéric Chopin (Four Mazurkas, Op. 24), and Robert Schumann (Carnaval, Op. 9).

VSO/Rocketman Live in Concert (Orpheum Theatre, March 18 and 19) Screening of the film Rocketman, about the life and music of Elton John, with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra performing the score live.

The Joe Cocker Experience (Massey Theatre, March 19) Nine-piece band featuring vocalist Larry Brennan performs its tribute to legendary blues rocker Joe Cocker.

Dixit Dominus (Orpheum Theatre, March 20) The Vancouver Chamber Choir presents FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

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MOVIES

Mountain film fest speaker zooms in on inclusion

A

by Charlie Smith

cross North America, it’s routine to find white people at campgrounds and on hiking trails and ski hills. It’s not nearly as common to encounter Black folks, Indigenous people, or people of colour in those spaces.

It doesn’t have to be this way, according to antiracism researcher Larissa Crawford.

The 27-year-old founder of the Indigenous and Black-owned Future Ancestors Services tells the Straight that there are many reasons behind why Black and Indigenous people don’t always feel welcome engaging with the outdoors.

“We see so many people told that you don’t belong out there—or being questioned, or seeing racism on the trails—all

things I’ve experienced as well,” Crawford says by phone from Toronto.

There’s also traditionally been a dearth of BIPoC people in advertisements highlighting camping equipment and winter sports.

Crawford, an avid outdoor enthusiast, says groups like Colour the Trails—a collective of BIPoC and LGBTQ2S+ adventure seekers— are trying to change this, advocating for inclusive representation in outdoor spaces.

However, Crawford, who’s of Jamaican and Métis heritage, also points out that there’s a historical basis behind the exclusion. According to her, coming to terms with “ancestral accountability” can put people in a better position to understand how actions and inactions are shaping

Outdoors enthusiast Larissa Crawford says there’s a reason why there are so many white people on Canadian trails and ski hills—and it has a lot to do with the country’s colonial history.

their current reality.

“For example in Canada, our relationship to land as Indigenous peoples was a threat to the colonial state,” Crawford explains. “Holding land as a collective was a threat to the colonial state. So our relationship to land has been and continues to be very intentionally attacked.”

From her examination of history, she’s well aware that Indigenous people in Canadian history were systematically removed from the land and placed on reserves under the Indian Act. She also points out that the colonial state encouraged private property ownership and granting people and companies access to resources. That’s not as easy to do when land is owned collectively, as it was by Indigenous peoples.

Crawford says that ancestral accountability involves giving a great deal of thought to the various actions and inactions of our personal ancestors, our collective ancestors, the ancestors of the original caregivers of the land we exist on, and the ancestors of the settlers of this land.

“By doing so, we are better positioned to understand how our actions and inactions are shaping reality not only today but for future generations,” she says.

She emphasizes that the colonial state also forcibly removed people of African ancestry from their ancestral lands.

“In this case, we were stolen from our land and brought to completely new land,” Crawford says. “And so I find it very empowering to understand that history.”

The living legacy of colonialism, she says, is that many Black people can feel that they still don’t belong in nature even though people in Africa are deeply connected to the land.

“We aren’t told we belong there,” she says of Black people in North America. “We don’t 20

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FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

see ourselves reflected in those spaces.”

On March 2, the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival is drawing attention to this issue at an event called Colour the Trails at the Rio Theatre. Crawford will be the keynote speaker. At Colour the Trails, the festival will also screen three films focusing on people of different backgrounds enjoying the outdoors, including the world premiere of “The Black Foxes”. Director B. Monét’s 15-minute short film celebrates the“unapologetically Black” international cycling collective known as the Black Foxes.

Also playing that night is “Ascend: Reframing Disability in the Outdoors”, a 10-minute film directed by Faith E. Briggs focusing on one-legged outdoorsman Vasu Sojitra. He’s striving to bring an intersectional perspective to the outdoors. He’s also a wickedly successful climber, having ascended Wyoming’s Grand Teton unassisted. He also skis in the mountains of Montana unassisted, even pulling off a 720-degree spin.

The third film is director Anne Cleary’s 35-minute “The Approach”, an actionoriented skiing and snowboarding movie shining a light on people of colour, women, and adaptive athletes.

In addition, Crawford will be on a virtual VIMFF panel on March 6 focusing on diversifying storytelling. “It’s going to be really relevant to this idea of telling stories— communicating stories in authentic ways but also in decolonized ways,” she promises.

“So that’s going to be a really good session for anyone interested in that.” g The Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival runs in person from February 25 to March 6 and online from February 25 to March 27. Colour the Trails takes place at 7:30 p.m. on March 2 at the Rio Theatre.

Diversity in Storytelling is at 10 a.m. on March 6 over Zoom. For more information, visit VIMFF.org.

MUSIC / SAVAGE LOVE

Dear Rouge makes a case that small talk is hellish Stop asking, “Got any vacation plans?” and accept that staying home definitely has its advantages

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by Mike Usinger

ime can sometimes be a funny thing, mostly for the way that it constantly changes one’s outlook on the world.

Dive into Dear Rouge’s new and brilliantly mix-tape-worthy “Small Talk” and you’ll have to think about whether you’ve enjoyed the past 24 months. Was it a blessing to have a ready-made excuse for declining all invitations to potluck dinners, Christmas parties, and birthday bashes for coworkers at TGI Friday’s?

Or has spending endless days, weeks, months, and now years on the couch watching The Crown, Better Call Saul, Yellowjackets, Landscapers, and The White Lotus finally lost its appeal?

Such questions are doubly important if you’re one of those people who’s extra-gifted at kick-starting a conversation when things start to get silent and awkward. All you have to do is ask about vacation plans, favourite movies, and dream places to have sex.

But here’s the thing: it’s tiring having to make every interaction seem meaningful (especially those with strangers you’ll likely never meet again).

And given that, Danielle McTaggart couldn’t nail things more perfectly in the electro-washed soft-banger “Small

Dear Rouge doesn’t have time for your bullshit. Or vacation stories. Photo by Lindsey Blane.

Talk”. Especially when, in a deliciously world-weary voice, she sings “Walk into the party/Chills in my blood/I don’t wanna small talk/Feels like cheap love”.

The video switches between neon-lit full-band action in a subterranean bunker and scenes from a modern-dance gathering in an all-white living room.

Winningly there are also not only pinball machines, but a whole goddamn seductive row of them. And seriously, if there’s one thing that might actually get us excited about leaving the house today, tomorrow, next week, or next month, it’s the promise of being able to play pinball, even if that means bringing extra handsanitizer. Especially if Williams’ classic Terminator 2: Judgement Day table is in the mix.

What are the odds of McTaggart being there with a stack of loonies, a custommade Dear Rouge facemask, and an attitude that suggests that, while she doesn’t mind people, she usually feels better when they aren’t around.

Well, consider these “Small Talk” lines: “Everyone around me faking a vibe/Wanna cut the bullshit”. Or “I’m a-wishing I was home/La-la-la-la-la-lala/I’d be better on my own.”

If you can relate, there’s a good chance that the past two years haven’t been nearly as horrible as they’ve been for some.

After all, you haven’t had to spend seemingly endless nights with dinner-party strangers asking “So, got any vacation plans coming up?”

Dear Rouge’s new album, Spirit, is out April 22. g

A totally sad sub isn’t necessarily a bad role model

by Dan Savage

d I’M A SUBMISSIVE GAY MAN with a 15-year-old nephew.

Through his actions and words, both his parents and I have gathered he might be gay, which is absolutely no issue. However, we’ve also recently discovered that he seems to be interested in D/s themes with him as the sub.

Besides the occasional veiled comments and sketchy online searches, he’s also described situations where he’s convinced other boys to subtly Dom him, both in vanilla ways and some decidedly more borderline. We’re being careful to teach him about healthy boundaries and appropriate behaviours, but I have an additional struggle with all this.

As a gay sub, I’ve been a bit of a failure. I’ve had no lasting relationships. I’ve never found a man who wanted me as both a partner and his slave. I know that there are success stories out there—sub guys with partners and families— but I’m not one of them. I want to be a good gay uncle but, honestly, I’m an objectively poor role model. If this is the path he ultimately takes, I want him to be safe, happy, and loved. But I don’t know how to do this if I’m advising from my own collection of saddo experiences. Any suggestions?

- Uncle Good Heart

“By emphasizing the importance of consent, UGH is already getting the most important thing right,” said Hadrian Temple, a dominant gay leatherman, blogger, and erotica author. “UGH’s nephew needs to know he has a

right to say no to any form of play he feels uncomfortable with. He should also know that until he has agreed to some sort of power exchange with a potential Dom, they are interacting as equals. He doesn’t have to start obeying the Dom until he’s agreed to start obeying, and he can withdraw his consent at any time and stop the play.”

Your nephew also needs to be told that “convincing” other boys to “subtly dominate him” isn’t ethical. If these boys don’t realize what your nephew is doing—and what they’re doing for your nephew—then they haven’t consented to playing D/s games with him. And just as your nephew wants to avoid bad Doms lurking on the other end of sketchy online searches— and any adult Dom willing to play with a 15-year-old boy is by definition bad and untrustworthy—your nephew needs to avoid being a bad/creepy/manipulative sub.

“And besides, pushing vanilla guys to dominate him is not a great long-term strategy for finding a Dom,” said Temple. “One of the hardest things for novice subs to understand is that vanilla guys don’t like to be dominant— if they did, they wouldn’t be vanilla. Sure, there are some guys who don’t realize they’re kinky until a sub comes along, but he shouldn’t assume every hot guy he likes is a potential Dom. In most cases, attempting to ‘convert’ vanilla guys is a waste of time.”

And while exploring his sexuality with an age-appropriate partner who shares your nephew’s kinks would be safer, more

appropriate, and legal, finding someone his own age who’s not just gay but also attracted to him and into dominating someone—and someone your nephew is attracted to in turn—is a tall order. Instead of searching for someone to play with right now, reading about, thinking about, fantasizing about, and masturbating about his kinks would be a far better and less frustrating use of his time.

As for whether your nephew needs to know about your saddo experiences…

“In one sense, it doesn’t matter if UGH is a ‘poor role model’ where long-term relationships are concerned,” said Temple. “He can still offer his nephew good advice without going into sad or sordid details. He can answer questions and promise to be nonjudgemental. And UGH shouldn’t assume he’s a bad sub—or a bad role model— because he hasn’t found a long-term kinky partner. There are lots of reasons why a sub might not have met the right Dom, and only a few of those reasons really come down to being a bad sub. Most kinksters feel there are more subs out there than there are Doms, so there are good subs who haven’t been able to get the partner they deserve because the Dom-to-sub ratio is skewed.”

And while kinks can complicate a person’s search for a partner, being vanilla—or pretending to be vanilla—does not guarantee someone a partner. Just as there are lots of

FEBRUARY 24 – MARCH 3 / 2022

see next page

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21

year, my partner has really gotten into cunnilingus. He spends a lot of time down there. Are there any tricks or toys that can make it less boring for me so I can stay in the mood?

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d I’M A LESBIAN in her 30s located in San Francisco. I am in a pretty healthy relationship with my partner of three years. During quarantine, sex has become less frequent and less exciting, and we’ve talked, but still no solution. I think we can turn things around and I’m in love with her and see myself with her in the future, but I would like to open our relationship. I think we’d both enjoy and be excited by new prospects. On the flip side, I’m not sure this will make things better. I have brought this up to her directly, but it never goes well. I have a solo work trip coming up and I can’t stop thinking about how easily I can have a one-night stand and some meaningless, fun sex. I feel bad about this, but also feel as though it could help me figure things out. I’ve brought up how I want to open our relationship, and she’s entertained the idea, but we haven’t come to a mutual agreement. What can I do? I am not sexually fulfilled and can’t live like this forever. Help!

you’ve made while continuing to be honest with your partner about your desire to renegotiate the terms of your commitment and slowly move toward the openness you want while making sure your partner feels safe, secure, and prioritized at every moment along what is likely to be a long journey, and one that may never get you to your desired destination… And then there’s the thing a lot of people wind up doing, which is to have impulsive sex with some rando on a business trip and then get caught or confess, thereby creating the kind of crisis that forces a rapid renegotiation of the terms of your commitment. The former approach might never get where you want to be—your partner might never agree to open the relationship—while the latter approach almost always (but not always) gets you dumped.

You say that things can’t go on like this forever. You aren’t sexually fulfilled, and it doesn’t sound like you ever will be, unless your partner agrees to open the relationship*. Since that’s the case, DL, you could opt for a variation on the right thing to do: demand a rapid renegotiation without cheating. She’ll feel pressured, yes, but better to feel pressured than betrayed and pressured.

Not everyone in an open relationship is sexually fulfilled. Just saying. g

to do… which is to honor the monogamous commitment

Follow Dan on Twitter @FakeDanSavage. Email: questions@savagelove.net. Podcasts, columns, books, merch, and more at www.savage.love!

- Bored Over Ravenously Eating Dude

Let him play the harmonica while you pluck that banjo.

A Dan Savage expert says that making kinky friends is as important as having kinky partners.

most fulfilling part of my journey.”

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To get a young sub’s perspective, UGH, I shared your question with Gimpboy95, a 26-year-old gay sub in Chicago. (Gimpboy95 is his handle on Instagram, and it’s how he wanted to be identified in the column.) Not too long ago, Gimpboy95 was in your nephew’s shoes: another gay, kinky, inexperienced teenager scouring the Internet for information, porn, and connection.

“There are some shady/sketchy people out there, of course, but there’s a lot of good out there too,” said Gimpboy95, who had his first sexual experiences at age 18. “UGH’s nephew can do his research, figure out what he likes, and ultimately find his community, just like I did. And finding community is, in my opinion, absolutely crucial.”

Finding community means making kinky friends, not just matching with kinky sex partners.

“Having a shoulder or boot to lean on has helped me tremendously,” said Gimpboy95.

“So once UGH’s nephew is old enough, he shouldn’t be afraid to put himself out there— and not just on the internet. Meeting other people in the kink community at local events who were open and accepting—whether their identities were centred around kink or kink was more of a hobby—really has been the

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