Washington City Paper (March 15, 2019)

CITYPAPER WASHINGTON

FREE VOLUME 39, NO. 11 WASHINGTONCITYPAPER.COM MARCH 15-21, 2019

NEWS: D.C. WILL REVIEW MATERNAL DEATHS 4 FOOD: THE RESTAURANT ACCOUNTING MAVEN 18 ARTS: PLAYS ABOUT WEALTH AND EXCESS 21

Our reviews from D.C.’s annual Environmental Film Festival P. 12

Spring Ahead.

ADVANCED ACADEMIC PROGRAMS

Advance Your Career Here.

Join Us! DC Open H ouse

MAR. 27

JOHNS HOPKINS IN DC 40+ GRADUATE PROGRAMS FOR WORKING PROFESSIONALS IN DUPONT CIRCLE & ONLINE

Join us for an OPEN HOUSE March 27th at the Washington DC Center. Enjoy refreshments while meeting faculty and staff as well as the director of your program of interest.

We will answer questions and provide more information on our graduate degree programs during your 11am-1pm lunch break.

1717 MASSACHUSETTS AVE. NW, SUITE 101 WASHINGTON, DC 20036 1.800.847.3330 | 202.452.1940

LEARN MORE ADVANCED.JHU.EDU/OPENHOUSE

2 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

INSIDE

ADVERTISEMENT

COVER STORY: GREEN NEW REELS

12 Our reviews of the offerings in this year’s Environmental Film Festival

DISTRICT LINE 4 Mothers Know Best: The District has finally established a maternal mortality review committee. What happens next?

6 First Aid: A desperately needed urgent care facility will open in Ward 7.

8 Housing Complex: DC Central Kitchen loses the majority of its homeless shelter contracts, placing its finances in jeopardy.

9 Indie in D.C.: Photographer and illustrator Veronica Melendez

SPORTS 10 Not Throwing Away Their Shots: Maryland’s women’s basketball team prepares to make waves in this month’s NCAA tournament.

11 Gear Prudence

FOOD 18 Accounting for Taste: Answers from the accountant helping D.C.’s restaurants organize their finances

DARROW MONTGOMERY

ARTS 21 Theater: Ritzel on Vanity Fair at the Lansburgh Theatre and Confection at the Folger 23 Speed Reads: Ottenberg on Laurie Loewenstein’s Death of a Rainmaker

CITY LIST 25 Music 30 Theater 32 Film

DIVERSIONS 33 Savage Love 34 Classifieds 35 Crossword On the cover: Illustration

by Stephanie Rudig

100 BLOCK OF 4TH STREET NW, MARCH 12

EDITORIAL

EDITOR: ALEXA MILLS MANAGING EDITOR: CAROLINE JONES ARTS EDITOR: MATT COHEN FOOD EDITOR: LAURA HAYES SPORTS EDITOR: KELYN SOONG CITY LIGHTS EDITOR: KAYLA RANDALL LOOSE LIPS REPORTER: MITCH RYALS HOUSING COMPLEX REPORTER: MORGAN BASKIN STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER: DARROW MONTGOMERY MULTIMEDIA AND COPY EDITOR: WILL WARREN CREATIVE DIRECTOR: STEPHANIE RUDIG CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: MICHON BOSTON, KRISTON CAPPS, CHAD CLARK, RACHEL M. COHEN, RILEY CROGHAN, JEFFRY CUDLIN, EDDIE DEAN, ERIN DEVINE, CUNEYT DIL, TIM EBNER, CASEY EMBERT, JONATHAN L. FISCHER, NOAH GITTELL, SRIRAM GOPAL, HAMIL R. HARRIS, LAURA IRENE, LOUIS JACOBSON, CHRIS KELLY, STEVE KIVIAT, CHRIS KLIMEK, PRIYA KONINGS, JULYSSA LOPEZ, NEVIN MARTELL, KEITH MATHIAS, PABLO MAURER, BRIAN MCENTEE, BRIAN MURPHY, NENET, TRICIA OLSZEWSKI, EVE OTTENBERG, MIKE PAARLBERG, PAT PADUA, JUSTIN PETERS, REBECCA J. RITZEL, ABID SHAH, TOM SHERWOOD, MATT TERL, SIDNEY THOMAS, DAN TROMBLY, JOE WARMINSKY, ALONA WARTOFSKY, JUSTIN WEBER, MICHAEL J. WEST, DIANA MICHELE YAP, ALAN ZILBERMAN

ADVERTISING AND OPERATIONS

PUBLISHER: KATY MCKEGNEY ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER: ERIC NORWOOD SALES MANAGER: MELANIE BABB SENIOR ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES: RENEE HICKS, ARLENE KAMINSKY, MARK KULKOSKY ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE: CHAD VALE SALES OPERATIONS MANAGER: HEATHER MCANDREWS OPERATIONS DIRECTOR: JEFF BOSWELL SENIOR SALES OPERATION AND PRODUCTION COORDINATOR: JANE MARTINACHE PUBLISHER EMERITUS: AMY AUSTIN

LELAND INVESTMENT CORP. OWNER: MARK D. EIN

LOCAL ADVERTISING: (202) 650-6937 FAX: (202) 650-6970, ADS@WASHINGTONCITYPAPER.COM FIND A STAFF DIRECTORY WITH CONTACT INFORMATION AT WASHINGTONCITYPAPER.COM VOL. 39, NO. 11 MARCH 15–21, 2019 WASHINGTON CITY PAPER IS PUBLISHED EVERY WEEK AND IS LOCATED AT 734 15TH ST. NW, SUITE 400, WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005.

CALENDAR SUBMISSIONS ARE WELCOMED; THEY MUST BE RECEIVED 10 DAYS BEFORE PUBLICATION. U.S. SUBSCRIPTIONS ARE AVAILABLE FOR $250 PER YEAR. ISSUE WILL ARRIVE SEVERAL DAYS AFTER PUBLICATION. BACK ISSUES OF THE PAST FIVE WEEKS ARE AVAILABLE AT THE OFFICE FOR $1 ($5 FOR OLDER ISSUES).

BACK ISSUES ARE AVAILABLE BY MAIL FOR $5. MAKE CHECKS PAYABLE TO WASHINGTON CITY PAPER OR CALL FOR MORE OPTIONS. © 2019 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION MAY BE REPRODUCED WITHOUT THE WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE EDITOR.

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 3

DISTRICTLINE Mothers Know Best After years of suffering and months of waiting, the District finally establishes a maternal mortality review committee.

Darrow Montgomery

John, Hugo, and Dorie Nolt

By Kayla Randall It’s been 15 months since nearly 20 doctors, midwives, and maternal health experts testified about childbirth in D.C. at a public hearing on maternal mortality.

They described the dire need for a committee to review the deaths of pregnant and new mothers in the District, which is home to an enduring, decades-long maternal mortality crisis.

Some told tales of the horrors they’d seen, the extreme illnesses and deaths of women shortly after giving birth, beholding babies who would never meet their mothers. Some spoke at length about health disparities, that in the U.S. black women are three to four times more likely to die from childbirth than white women, a figure that holds true in D.C. They hoped the commit-

tee and the reports it would produce could help decrease maternal deaths here.

The District’s maternal mortality rate was 36.1 per 100,000 live births in 2018, while the national rate was 20.7, according to an analysis of data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

On Thursday at the Wilson Building, more than a dozen women—some of whom spoke at the 2017 hearing—will testify again about D.C.’s need for the committee. But this time, they’ll be speaking as committee nominees, set to be officially confirmed on April 6.

The District will finally have a maternal mortality review committee, joining nearly 30 other jurisdictions in the United States. Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen introduced the bill, in October 2017, to form “a multi-dis-

4 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

ciplinary committee to review all pregnancyassociated deaths occurring during pregnancy, childbirth, or in the year after.” It passed the following June.

Most committee positions are confirmed, but a key seat remains empty: the lived-experience position, reserved for someone who has lost a loved one to maternal mortality. And the committee’s work will not include one of the bill’s original components: the study of morbidity. Definitions of maternal morbidity vary, but at its worst it’s a near miss, when a woman has a life-threatening illness. Allen said that studying morbidity was beyond the office of the chief medical examiner’s current capacity, and so this piece is not in the final bill.

Dr. Connie Bohon, an OB-GYN, will serve on the committee as its American College of

Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) representative. She has been instrumental in the creation of the committee, a process she began working on eight or nine years ago when she and ACOG met to discuss maternal mortality and she was able to get the death statistics for the D.C. region. “I managed to get the numbers and then realized that nothing was being done,” she says. “As a community, we weren’t doing anything.” Unlike D.C., she says, Maryland and Virginia had robust maternal mortality review committees.

The raw maternal death numbers can appear deceptively low. “We could have two maternal deaths in a year, we could have six maternal deaths in a year, and if you look at the raw numbers it seems that’s not very many,” she says. “But we only do 10,000 deliveries a year in D.C., and the way the numbers are reported out is per 100,000 live births. So you take any of our numbers, you have to multiply it by 10. If we have two, it’s 20, and if we have six, it’s 60.

The U.S. maternal mortality rate, the goal is to be less than 20. So obviously, if we have a year where we have six, we’re very high.”

Bohon says she and ACOG tried to work with the Department of Health to start a review committee but was told the department didn’t have the time or capability. She persisted, and a few years ago, after turnover in the department, D.C. Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Roger Mitchell Jr. agreed to take on the committee.

As it is currently constructed, the committee is diverse and equipped to discuss the many shapes the issue takes—racial, social, economic. Mitchell said at the December public hearing that 75 percent of the maternal deaths D.C. recorded between 2014 and 2016 were black women. “We have a lot of cultural barriers that we’re not really discussing,” Ebony Marcelle told City Paper last year, speaking about black maternal health. Marcelle is the director of midwifery at Community of Hope’s Family Health and Birth Center, which primarily serves black women from wards 7 and 8, and will be a member of the review committee.

Councilmember Allen says he expects additional people to be nominated to serve on the committee, which he hopes will result in even greater geographic representation and racial diversity.

The committee must dig into the lives of mothers who have died, looking at hospital charts and patient health histories, figuring out what kind of environments the patients lived in, how difficult it was for them to get to their providers, and what could’ve been done differently to prevent death.

But what about the morbidity cases?

The OB-GYN community has not yet ac-

DISTRICTLINE cepted a universally agreed upon definition of maternal morbidity, Bohon explains. Some say morbidity is when any woman who is pregnant gets admitted to an intensive care unit, others say it’s when a pregnant woman has a transfusion of four or more units of blood. In the committee print, morbidity was defined as when a woman receives four or more units of blood products or is admitted to an intensive care unit while pregnant or within one year of giving birth.

“The mortality numbers, if you multiply those by 100, many people would say that’s the morbidity,” Bohon says. “If we can get those morbidity statistics down, that’s going to really help prolong the lives of these women and help them avoid crisis. If we can decrease the morbidity, we definitely will decrease the mortality.”

She says that the creation of the committee had to move forward, even as the bill lost the morbidity study component, so it could eventually work toward expanding to include morbidity.

The maternal morbidity that Bloomingdale resident Dorie Nolt experienced has changed her life. The 39-year-old gave birth to her son Hugo in May of 2017 at Sibley Memorial Hospital. Her water broke two weeks early. She labored for two days before doctors told her it was time for a cesarean section. She says she had multiple doctors, and it always felt like there was someone new in the room. “My epidural never really worked very well, so I could feel everything. It was terrible.” (City Paper published a recent cover story featuring women who had similar experiences across the city.)

Following a successful C-section, she and her new baby were eventually released from the hospital. But after 30 hours at home, Nolt felt strange in the night. She says she called her doctor and was told to come into the office in the morning. The next morning, she began vomiting, blacking out, and feeling significant pain. She was eventually taken to the emergency room.

She says there was a hole in her uterus stitches, and because of that, everything in her uterus was leaking into her abdominal cavity, which was then filled with E. coli. She spent Mother’s Day, her first as a mother, in a hospital operating room. “They ended up having to split open my stomach and drain out all the infection,” she says. She was in the hospital for two and a half weeks, missing moments in her newborn’s life, too sick to hold him for long.

Nolt says doctors failed her: “I don’t feel like they listened to me at the beginning when I called and told them I wasn’t feeling well.”

(A spokesperson for Sibley says, “as the hospital that delivers the most babies in D.C., we strive to provide the best care possible for mothers and their babies during this very special time of their lives,” and “we listen to all patient concerns in order to address and resolve

concerns as well as improve the quality of our care.” The hospital has a formal process for responding to concerns through its Patient Relations Department.)

Nolt now works from home in education communications consulting, still coping with her agonizing birth experience and the stress that followed her trauma. “There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about the hospital stay.”

She took classes, she had a doula, she had good health care, and her birth still went sideways. It’s no wonder then, she says, that “black women, low income women, and women in rural parts of the country are dying.” Nolt wants action to save these mothers and the mothers who have survived birth trauma.

“There are women walking around who have been through hell,” she says.

At a panel on maternal health this February, Nolt stood up and told her story as a diverse room full of women thanked her for sharing it. A staffer at Councilmember Allen’s office was present at the panel, and approached Nolt about possibly serving as a lived-experience committee member. But she says the mayor’s office told her that she didn’t fit the description in the legislation because she hadn’t lost a loved one to maternal mortality.

“It’s hard to find someone,” says Dr. Bohon.

“We’ve been trying forever. It’s just so painful to discuss it and every time you sit on that committee and hear the discussion, you feel it again.”

Bohon anticipates that the meetings will commence in May at the latest. If the livedexperience role is not filled by then, it will remain open.

Bohon says the group will begin with older cases, reviewing contemporary cases when available, as is typical for such committees.

She expects meetings to be quarterly and closed to the public—at least in terms of case review. Its findings and recommendations will be released to the public in annual reports.

“We were certainly ready to go in October of last year, that didn’t happen, obviously,” says Allen. “We did send a letter to encourage the nominations to come down.” He believes the upcoming hearing will put the issue on the front burner and jumpstart the committee so its experts can “begin to go at the loss of life with the degree of urgency it really needs—really try to focus on the disparity in maternal mortality outcomes, make concrete recommendations on where we should be investing our money and what laws should be changed.”

Though it has come later than those involved would have liked, Bohon says the bottom line is that the committee is here. “We finally got success,” she says. “I’m just glad we’re there.”

She hopes the city pays more attention to pregnant women, whose health impacts entire communities. One of the signs of an unhealthy city, she says, is a high maternal mortality rate.

CP

DINE & DRINK

EXPERIENCE DC’S FASTEST GROWING NEIGHBORHOOD

CAPITOLRIVERFRONT.ORG

CAPITOLRIVERFRONT

CAPITOLRVRFRONT

CAPITOLRIVERFRONT

Get Inspired!

Make YOUR Next Step Count!!

EXECUTIVE MASTER OF PUBLIC MANAGEMENT

NOW ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR FALL 2019 This Unique Program provides: ❂ A path to earn your Master of Public Management degree in as little as fifteen months with our convenient two Friday afternoons and two Saturdays per month schedule.

❂ Challenging leadership and management curriculum designed specifically for mid-career public service professionals.

To request more information regarding this and other School of Public Policy degree programs, please visit us at publicpolicy.umd.edu or please contact Michael Goodhart at 301.405.9715 or goodhart@umd.edu. washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 5

DISTRICTLINE

First Aid

The first urgent care center east of the river will open in the coming months. Advocates say the center is a major step forward in the fight for health equity, and long overdue.

Darrow Montgomery

Marie Morilus-Black

By Joshua Kaplan RemetteR FReeman is 89 years and 2 months old, and she’s been in D.C. for all but three of those months. She can’t be quite as involved in community affairs as she used to be—she only makes it to ANC meetings “sometimes” now—but she’s still a presence, sharp as ever.

A couple weeks back, Freeman woke up with a nasty stomach virus and called her doctor. He told her that she needed to go to the emergency room. So she did what she always does in situations like this: She had one of her sons take her to Doctors Community Hospital way up in Lanham.

She’s lived in Ward 7 for over 60 years,

and when her blood pressure is too high or she has some other emergency, Maryland has long been where she goes. There aren’t really other options. If her sons aren’t available to drive her, she calls a private ambulance since the District ambulances don’t go up there. Her brother-in-law used to go to Providence Hospital in Ward 5, but “Providence never had any room. You just wait and wait. I wouldn’t take anyone to Providence.” Thankfully, she’s has insurance that will cover her in Lanham, where she says there are only ever a few people waiting and there’s “no one pushing you around.”

“It is a bit far,” she says, “but if you don’t have a choice, what do you do?”

This lack of options east of the river has

6 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

been the status quo for decades, but that’s about to change. In February, the Department of Health gave MBI Health Services the final regulatory approval to open an urgent care center a five minute walk from Freeman’s house on Grant Street NE, near the Minnesota Ave. Metro stop. It will be the first urgent care center east of the river.

Once the center opens, it will be a 24/7 site for any acute problem that doesn’t truly require a trip to the emergency room. Advocates have long been fighting to build a proper health care system in Wards 7 and 8, and they say this is a major step forward, long overdue.

Currently, the health system east of the river is broken into two parts: the United Medical Center hospital, and a scattering of prima-

ry care clinics, like those operated by Unity Health Care. Unity CEO Vincent Keane says that to increase health care access, Unity takes walk-in appointments and keeps its clinics open late and on weekends. However, he emphasizes, this only works for more minor problems. Urgent care facilities are necessary because they have the equipment and expertise to handle routine emergencies like broken bones and wounds that requires sutures. If a child wakes up in the middle of the night with a high fever, or if someone thinks, “I have a terrible headache. It could be a migraine or it could be a tumor,” Keane says an urgent care is the appropriate place.

MBI hopes to finish building out its center by November of this year. As far as their doctors are concerned, it couldn’t open soon enough. MBI is currently one of the District’s largest providers of mental health treatment, with clinics scattered across the east side of the city. MBI CEO Marie Morilus-Black says that “at least once a week, sometimes more, we have to call an ambulance for one of our patients because their [blood] pressure is so high as to be at a stroke level.” She wants to send them to an urgent care rather than to the ER, but there aren’t any east of the river. So she decided to start her own.

She made that decision about two years ago.

The process of getting regulatory approval has been long and arduous. It took roughly a year for MBI to put together their application for the Certificate of Need, a months-long regulatory process that evaluates whether a proposed health facility is needed in a particular area.

Then, once they submitted their application last spring, it took almost another year for the Department of Health to actually finalize the approval. Only then could they start the necessary renovations. (MBI says that while the process was certainly burdensome, they “understand the oversight and think it’s needed.”

Ward 7 Councilmember Vince Gray, however, is a little less patient: “The health disparities that exist in the city are too pronounced for us to have any time to waste. Two years is much too long.”)

But this is one victory in a much larger struggle, and MBI didn’t do it alone. ANC 7D chair Sherice Muhammad has been intimately involved in the process of getting MBI approved by the city, and she is part of a band of ANC commissioners she says are “working hard to improve the system” in Ward 7 and east of the river. It’s a massive, desperately needed task. “We have a myriad of health issues throughout the ward, and it’s a travesty that we don’t have a health system that is ward-based,” she says. Many in Ward 7, which has no hospital of its own, currently go to Providence, and when that shuts down in April, “Where are they going to go? That’s going to add to the famine of our health sys-

DISTRICTLINE

It also majorly drives up wait times. At the UMC ER, spending 12 or 13 hours in the waiting room is not uncommon.

This in turn makes it so that, for many, going in to UMC is a last resort—or not an option at all. “I don’t go to UMC. Let’s be clear about that,” says Regina Pixley, a longtime activist in Congress Heights and newly elected ANC 8C commissioner. Between the wait times and the reputation of the overburdened, scandalplagued hospital, she says, “If I cut up my finger badly, I’m going to wrap it up and wait until I can go somewhere reputable.” Instead of going to UMC, says Pixley, when people have health problems, “a lot of people just deal with it. They try home remedies.”

ANC 7F chair Tyrell Holcomb, who lives on Minnesota Avenue NE, says, “If something comes up and I need urgent care, I go to Inova [in Fairfax] or the urgent care in Alexandria. We’re looking at a 20, 25 minute drive.” It was worse before he had a car, taking two or three buses as a kid to get treatment. He emphasizes that this distance affects people’s health: The long trip is something “people make the decision to do or not do, based on access.” Friends of his often wait a few days to get care until they can get a ride somewhere like Inova; others forgo treatment entirely. When that happens, health outcomes can get worse.

Furthermore, when people always take their health problems to the emergency room or to distant urgent care centers, it creates is-

gent go hand in hand,” says Muhammad, who fought to push MBI’s applications along. “The community is depending on you—you have to be able to provide both.”

Unity’s Keane echoes that urgent care doctors and nurses must connect their patients to primary care for follow-up. “You might ask, ‘Why haven’tDwe done it?’” he says. “We’d love C LOT T E RY to do urgent care. But as a nonprofit, we just don’t have the capital to start it up.” Opening an urgent care center requires a large investment to build out the space and buy expensive equipment like X-ray machines—on the order of a million dollars up front. While Unity is positioned to provide the care, they would need help from the city. “If we had subsidies to start it up, we’d be able to staff and run it.” (MorilusBlack says that MBI is funding its new urgent care center through a combination of loans and reinvested profits.)

Pixley is appalled by what she sees as a lack of investment by the city in a proper health care system east of the river. “[The District] could’ve put money into anything they wanted to, with the money they give developers,” she argues. “They could’ve already opened an urgent care.” Pointing to the millions of dollars Mayor Muriel Bowser put toward building the Wizards practice facility in Ward 8, she thinks the arena demonstrates the Mayor’s priorities. “We didn’t need that,” she says. “They chose entertainment over health care. Over saving people’s lives.”

CP

ara &S

“If I cut up my finger badly, I’m going to wrap it up and wait until I can go somewhere reputable.”

HANDCRAFTED

am

sues down the line. Neither of those places can make the connection to primary care physicians closer to home, so people often don’t get follow-up treatment. It’s a cycle that keeps people from seeing physicians for more routine matters, leaving them to wait to get care until their problems become acute.

Knowing how important it is for urgent cares to then connect their patients to regular physicians, MBI also applied for regulatory approval to open up a walk-in primary care clinic, which would be connected to their urgent care. This application, however, was denied.

“We don’t understand that. Primary and ur-

B y Ad

tem. Now, with one less provider, we need to double down.”

Right now, without alternatives for urgent treatment, the weight of supporting that health system falls on the sagging shoulders of United Medical Center. Because they don’t see other viable options, people who don’t truly need to be in the ER often still end up in the UMC emergency room.

Since emergency room visits are much more expensive than just about any alternative, this is a major waste of resources, both for patients and for the District government, which often ends up footing much of the bill.

SHOP

hS pe cto r

300+ AMERICAN MAR 22, 23, 24 ARTISTS Dulles Expo Center LIVE! CHANTILLY, VA • RT. 28 AT WILLARD RD FREE PAINTING CLASS!

•Exciting Demos •Tasty Treats •Kids’ Entertainment DISCOUNT TICKETS, show info, exhibitor lists, directions and more at:

Admission: $8 online; $10 at the door Admission good all 3 days Children under 12 & parking are FREE Fri. & Sat. 10-6, Sun. 10-5

SugarloafCrafts.com SUGARLOAF MOUNTAIN WORKS, INC. • 800-210-9900

LOTTERY C D

TAKE YOUR

SHOT AT

D C LOT T E RY

$10,000!

PLAY 3/19/19-4/8/19

Our DC Lottery games are going head to head for you to get chances to win! $10,000

TOP PRIZE

dclottery.com

DCL2016 | Bracket Bucks |washingtoncitypaper.com Wash City Paper | 4C | 4.666x5.1455 march 15, 2019 7

DISTRICTLINE

Kitchen Consequential

DC Central Kitchen faces layoffs and financial turbulence after losing the bulk of its homeless shelter contracts.

A storied d.C. institution faces financial trouble after losing out on a long-held contract to provide meals to residents of nearly all the city’s homeless shelters.

The nonprofit community kitchen DC Central Kitchen serves 10,000 meals per day, by its count, between its varying meal service operations. But it received an offer last fall to provide the meal service at half the shelters it has typically served, reducing the scope of its contract to five sites.

Its contract is managed by an organization called The Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, a social services group that D.C. pays over $80 million annually to operate a number of local homeless shelters. TCP has long paid DC Central Kitchen to serve the majority of meals provided to sheltered homeless residents in the District. And the kitchen has consistently done so “for pennies on the dollar,” according to a brief its chief of operations Andy Finke wrote in its 2017 bid to TCP. “Because we’re a mission-driven actor, we never let contracting issues affect people experiencing homelessness. But we backfill the cost of [our service] by $400,000 per year. We do everything we do on a six-week operating reserve. It’s a huge drain on our resources,” says Alexander Moore, DC Central Kitchen’s chief development officer.

In recent years, the organization’s annual contract with TCP has covered 10 shelters and was worth about $2.2 million, a number that decreased slightly to $1.8 million as District agencies wound down and eventually ceased operation of the DC General shelter last year. Moore tells City Paper this figure represents a per-meal reimbursement of $1.56 to $1.72.

But after the District finalized its master contract in 2018 with TCP and the group in turn reopened the bidding process for its subcontracts, TCP didn’t award DC Central Kitchen what has typically been the full scope of its service.

Contracts to provide roughly half a million meals per year at the city’s largest shelter sites— including the Days Inn, Quality Inn, 801 East Men’s Shelter, and New York Avenue shelter, which DC Central Kitchen used to serve—were awarded to Henry’s, a small restaurant and catering business. It is a registered Certified

HOUSING COMPLEX

Business Enterprise with D.C.’s Department of Small and Local Business Development, and is listed as a Ward 8 business with a registered address in Congress Heights. The Henry’s website does not list this address, instead advertising a location on U Street NW and in Oxon Hill, Maryland. (Henry’s co-owner Bernard Brooks did not respond to multiple requests for comment. A member of TCP’s contract procurement staff deferred comment to the Department of Human Services.)

In response to a detailed list of DC Central Kitchen’s concerns, a DHS spokesperson emailed this statement: “The process for selecting food vendors is an open, competitive process which included a bidder’s conference to review the solicitation and proposal requirements for greater transparency. Vendors for each shelter site were selected based on knowledge of food safety best practices, demonstrated experience with quality control protocols and meal preparation in large quantities, and other solicitation criteria such as past performance.”

Last year wasn’t the first time Moore heard of Henry’s. “Back in 2011 DC General’s meal service contract changed,” Moore says. DC Central Kitchen “had been delivering lunch, but

Under its new agreement with TCP, DC Central Kitchen serves only 800 meals per day across five shelters, including Blair House and Emery Work Bed. All of these shelters, with the exception of the Patricia Handy Place for Women, serve fewer than 100 people. It is reimbursed at a lower rate per meal than Henry’s—at $3.05 for breakfast and $3.50 for dinner, compared with Henry’s’ $3.20 and $5.18, respectively— according to budget documents submitted to the D.C. Council by DHS. Henry’s will also receive $3.75 for a “specialty breakfast,” $5.18 for lunch, and $7.50 for “specialty dinner.” DC Central Kitchen will not be reimbursed for these offerings, according to the same documents.

City Paper asked Moore whether DC Central Kitchen received a justification from TCP for the change in the contract’s scope, or the discrepancy in reimbursements between it and the other vendor. “Absolutely not,” he says. “The decision making process was extremely opaque.”

Moore also describes the contracting process as “really flawed.” “We were informed in the spring and early summer that meal counts had been given to a different vendor, but it wasn’t communicated in an official way. And we were given one-and-a-half business days’ notice [last

then that contract was cancelled. It was awarded to Henry’s without a public [bidding] process. We were told that providing lunch wasn’t necessary, and then it was awarded to another vendor. That was the choice that was made.”

fall] that we had to reduce our shelter meals,” he says. “All along we’ve had fundamental concerns [about the process]. And repeated followups to get guidance haven’t been answered.”

In all, the current value of DC Central Kitch-

Darrow Montgomery/File

By Morgan Baskin

8 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

en’s contract sits at just over $1 million. The total amount available, according to The Community Partnership’s solicitation, was $10 million.

Consequently, Moore now says the organization, which was already operating at about a $400,000 annual loss it compensated for with private donations and grants, faces a $1 million annual revenue shortfall.

“It’s jeopardized more than a dozen jobs we’re fighting to keep. These are men and women we’re honored to train and employ. We’re trying to be as creative as we can to pursue additional contracts. That’s hard work, and we’re committed to doing right by them, [but the contract] hasn’t made it easy for us,” Moore says.

(DC Central Kitchen trains and employs formerly and currently homeless residents, paying them full-time salaries with benefits.)

Moore regards the contract’s handling of specialty meals, which are ostensibly to accommodate residents with varying health needs, with skepticism. “It’s totally unclear what standards are being met,” he says, especially considering that some residents would only be given one “special meal” per day.

DC Central Kitchen also received “no guidance from TCP about specifically what they want from those meals. Nor do we have a count from TCP about how many shelter clients need them,” Moore says. “There has not been a holistic approach to saying, this is what a shelter meal costs, this is what the expectation is around calorie count, across sites, across vendors.”

The Community Partnership’s request for proposals and finalized contract with DC Central Kitchen also includes a mandate that prospective subcontractors use the “food pyramid” as a guideline to prepare healthy and balanced meals.

But the U.S. Department of Agriculture abandoned the idea of the food pyramid, which was created in 1992 and last revised in 2005, nearly a decade ago. Since 2011 it has adopted a different standard for what’s considered a healthy meal, called “MyPlate.”

Taken together, the frustrations of navigating the landscape of shelter service in D.C. have prompted Moore to advocate for greater transparency in the bidding process. “It’s a structural problem because it’s a sub-vendor relationship,” he says. “[The city] is not in a position to drive meaningful change. This is an opportunity to rethink whether food service should be part of TCP’s master shelter contract, or managed separately.”

CP

INDIEIND.C. You’re focused on illustration now, but you studied photography. Do you still do that?

I did photojournalism for undergrad and fine art photo for grad school. I felt like after grad school I needed to take a little break, so I decided to do some illustration just for fun, but that became this whole other thing. I actually just got the darkroom residency at Capitol Hill Arts Workshop. I proposed this project about photographing my seven aunts. So I’m going to take portraits of them, and hear their migration stories, and do some found family photographs and make a photo book. I’m excited to do photography again.

Was that photography break the first time you did illustration, or have you always done it?

I’ve always doodled. It was never really serious, so it was a leap of faith to see if I could really do it. I think my technique has improved since I started. I used to do them by hand, then scan them in and make a digital copy, and color them in Photoshop. I finally got a Wacom tablet and used that for two years. I hate it now, and started using Procreate. I didn’t study illustration or graphic design or anything like that, so I’m trying to teach myself.

It’s interesting that you have this photography background, because your work is so representational.

I feel like it does have a photography compo-

sition. I go into a store and take a photograph of what inspires me, then bring that photograph into the computer and use that as the base of the illustration.

The ones of the people I’ve done are usually found photographs of family members. I use that as the base and take them out of the backgrounds. There’s always photography in some aspect within the process.

HABIB KOITÉ

There’s a pop art quality to the food ones, but you also make the brand names totally illegible. What’s that about?

The project is called “Iconic,” because all the products are very iconic to my upbringing as a Central American Washingtonian. They’re so iconic that even without their brand names on it, you can identify what they are, because it’s more about the feeling the object gives you, the nostalgia that it invokes. But also I felt that taking away the branding let me make it my own. I took away the names and writings and put my own doodles where the text was, and that way I kind of took control of it.

A lot of your work has a social activism current running through it. How do you use your art to further activism?

The zine [La Horchata] very much has that running right through it. For me, it’s making sure people know this Latinx community is

Illustrations by Verónica Melendez

Verónica Melendez is an illustrator and photographer who grew up in D.C. and Wheaton.

She’s the co-founder of the collaborative zine La Horchata, which features artists of Central American heritage. You can follow her work @veromelen on Instagram and see her photos in “Surfacing,” a group show at the Mansion at Strathmore, on view through March 31.

MAR 14 | TONIGHT

LARRY CAMPBELL & TERESA WILLIAMS MAR 15 | TOMORROW

THE SECOND CITY IT’S NOT YOU, IT’S ME

MAR 20–23

here in D.C. As much as it’s getting gentrified and pushed away, I get a lot of motivation to make space for us within the art world. It’s a shame that in D.C. there’s a huge Latinx community, but you don’t see that much representation in the fine arts world.

You made a bunch of posters against ICE. Can you tell me more about those?

It’s out of necessity, and a responsibility. It’s kind of to show solidarity, like there’s other people out there that feel the same way. So if you’re out there and feel alone and you see people are putting up posters to support my people, it’s a little comforting to see that. Especially here in the nation’s capital, where decisions are being made and Homeland Security was given birth, it’s to make sure people know that this is not OK. And maybe if you don’t know what ICE is and you see a poster, you look it up and find out what’s going on.

There’s such a huge Central American community here, and we’re so affected by what’s going on at the border and in our communities. It’s also just me feeling helpless too, because I can’t quit my job and help people at these detention centers or refugee camps that are outside of the States. I can’t go there and be there, and sometimes that feeling is so overwhelming that I have to just go outside and wheatpaste posters around the city, because it helps me deal with all that.

—Stephanie Rudig

SITKOVETSKY TRIO SEAN LEE, VIOLIN

VIENNA TO HOLLYWOOD

CHAMBER MUSIC AT THE BARNS

MAR 24

MOUNTAIN MAN

JAKE XERXES FUSSELL MAR 29

TOM PAXTON & THE DONJUANS APR 4

THE SWINGLES APR 5

A BANDHOUSE GIGS TRIBUTE TO XTC APR 6

CALIDORE STRING QUARTET JUHO POHJONEN, PIANO SCHUPPANZIGH & THE BIRTH OF CHAMBER MUSIC CHAMBER MUSIC AT THE BARNS

APR 7

ROBYN HITCHCOCK APR 11

THE SECRET SISTERS APR 19

AND MANY MORE!

WOLFTRAP.ORG

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 9

Darrow Montgomery/File

SPORTS

Azzi Fudd of St. John’s College High School is the first sophomore to win the Gatorade National Girls’ Basketball Player of the Year award. washingtoncitypaper.com/sports

Not Throwing Away Their Shots The future is bright for the Maryland women’s basketball team—and so is the present.

By Lindsay Gibbs On paper, the University of Maryland women’s basketball team has the potential to be dangerously good in the near future.

Maryland will welcome four 5-star high school recruits to College Park next fall. (ESPN ranks the Terps’ incoming freshman class as the third best in the country.) Only one player, Brianna Fraser, will graduate this season. Leading scorer Kaila Charles will return for her senior year, and this year’s freshman starters, center Shakira Austin and guard Taylor Mikesell, will have a year of experience and a full offseason of conditioning under their belts when the 20192020 season begins.

But with no clear favorite in the upcoming NCAA tournament, the current Terps squad has a chance to make noise during the Big Dance.

“There’s so much competitiveness on this team,” says coach Brenda Frese. “I mean, they love to win and hate to lose, and they just continue to keep wanting to get better every day.

They’ve got really high goals for themselves.”

The Terrapins, ranked ninth in the AP Top 25, are projected to be a No. 3 seed when the NCAA unveils the tournament bracket on March 18. The young team struggled at the start of Big Ten conference play, dropping games to Rutgers and Michigan State, but won 13 of its final 15 games, and captured the Big Ten regular season title along the way. Both losses came to Iowa, first on Feb. 17, and again on March 10 in the Big Ten Tournament championship game. The Hawkeyes won 90-76.

As disappointing as the losses to Iowa have been, Frese isn’t worried about her team’s ability to bounce back. All season long, she’s been impressed with her team’s resiliency.

“Any time we’ve had a bump in the road or

Stephanie Jones and Kaila Charles

Courtesy of Maryland Athletics

BASKETBALL

a set back, we don’t hang our heads, we don’t feel sorry for ourselves,” she says.

That mindset should help the team as they prepare to face teams who have encountered similar challenges.

“We’ve talked about it here and there,” says Charles. “There’s not just one team, or a couple of teams.”

The University of Connecticut lost two games during the regular season, and other potential No. 1 and No. 2 seeds in the NCAA tournament—Baylor, Notre Dame, Oregon, Stanford, Mississippi State, Iowa, and Louisville—have all shown vulnerabilities.

If Maryland is playing its best basketball and everyone is healthy, the team has the talent and tenacity to bust some brackets.

Charles, a First Team All-Big Ten selection and one of 15 candidates for the John R. Wooden Award, given annually to the nation’s best college basketball players, leads the charge for the Terps. The stingy defender has a le-

10 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

thal midrange jumper and an uncanny ability to dodge and dribble her way through traffic and attack the basket, no matter how many opponents swarm around her.

She kept the Terrapins in the Big Ten championship game against Iowa, scoring 16 points in the second quarter alone. A fast-break layup early in the third quarter momentarily tied the game at 53. Over the course of the tournament, she averaged 26.3 points per game, including a careerhigh 36 points, nine rebounds, two steals, and one block in the championship game, and was named to the All-Tournament team.

Charles can take over games; she’s the player that everyone on both teams knows will have the ball at the end of the game, and yet she finds a way to make the shot anyway.

She is not doing it alone. Freshmen Mikesell and Austin add to the team’s grit.

Mikesell led all freshmen in the country with 86 3-pointers in the regular season on her way to being named the Big Ten Freshman of

the Year. Every day before practice, she forces herself to make 1,000 shots. (On game days, she cuts her routine down to 500 shots.)

“She’s always in the gym trying to get better,” Charles says. “And I love that it’s translating on the court. She’s getting opportunities because she’s worked for it.”

Mikesell’s classmate, Austin, set a Maryland freshman record with 77 regular season blocks and made the All-Big Ten defensive and allfreshman teams. She averages 10.5 rebounds and 8.4 points per game.

The two freshmen have established themselves as go-to playmakers capable of making game-changing plays.

“They want to make plays, they want the responsibility,” Frese says. “I trust both them.”

Maryland’s depth extends beyond Charles, Mikesell, and Austin, who have captured most of the headlines this season. If necessary, the team can rely on an eight- or nine-person rotation of starters and bench players.

Junior Stephanie Jones—the younger sister of former Maryland star and current WNBA player Brionna Jones—averaged 13 points and 6.2 rebounds during the regular season, which earned her Second Team AllBig Ten honors from the media and an honorable mention selection from the coaches.

Point guard Channise Lewis, a sophomore, has the second best assist rate (32.4 percent) and assist-to-turnover ratio (3.41) in the conference.

Junior Blair Watson, who has spent this year reacclimating after an ACL tear interrupted her breakthrough sophomore season, can score consistently from beyond the arc, as can Sara Vujacic, sister of former L.A. Laker Sasha Vujacic. Even freshman Olivia Owens, who didn’t play frequently during the season, has provided Maryland with crucial points in the paint the last couple of weeks.

Then there’s Fraser, the lone senior on the team, who averages 7.6 points and 4.2 rebounds in just 16 minutes of play this season. She’s still recovering from an ankle injury last month, and performed at about 60 percent during the Big Ten tournament, according to Frese, but the team hopes she will be back to full strength soon.

Her passion and physicality are contagious.

“She just hypes us all up,” Jones says. “She brings so much energy to our team.”

The prospect of a wide-open tournament, and the team’s potential in the future excites the players. It should excite fans, too.

“I just think if we stick to Maryland basketball, play together, like how we played this last couple of games, we can go really far,” Charles says. “We’ve just got to take it game by game, minute by minute.”

CP

Gear Prudence: It seems like scooters aren’t going away and we’re probably going to get even more of them. Come springtime, the bike lanes will be flooded and it doesn’t seem like I’ll have much choice but to peacefully coexist before bike lanes are rebranded as scooter lanes. How do I learn to stop griping and come to terms that it’s a scooter world and we’re just biking in it? —Guess Everybody Traveling Around Loves Only New Gadgets Dear GETALONG: RIP bicycles: 18??–this question. They had a good run, but their time has passed. Electric scooters are the tiny mammals and bicycles are the dinosaurs. Venture capitalism is the meteor. GP’s basement is the Museum of Natural History, where these relics of a bygone area are stored, no longer fearsome, potent, and menacing the earth. Perhaps e-bikes are some of those dinosaurs with feathers. But the regular old pedal bicycle is the sad brontosaurus, baying forlornly in an uninhabitable new world, overrun by the next new thing.

Strained metaphors aside, let’s suppose that bicyclists have a few more trips around the sun before complete extinction, and that we’re trying to be conscientious sharers of limited street space. Generally speaking, one should act around a scooterist the same way one would behave near a bicyclist. Signal passes, give ample room, be nice, etc. The distinctions between the two conveyances are fairly minimal. Whether you like it or not, bikes and scooters are far more like each other than either is like a car. And if you’re the kind of person who cares about safe streets or the planet not dying (There are dozens of us! Dozens!), you can take solace in the fact that the scooterist is choosing a way to get around the city that’s both space-efficient and resource-light.

Nevertheless, there are differences and acknowledging these can lead to better coexistence. Shared scooters in D.C. are capped at 10 mph, so don’t expect any extra oomph once the top speed is reached. If you’re inclined to go faster than that, you’ll need to pass (which almost invariably means leaving a bike lane).

And with any shared vehicle, it’s best to not assume that the person operating it is intricately acquainted with its controls, such as steering and braking. (Though if you’ve been biking in D.C. for any amount of time, it’s likely you’ve long given up assuming that anyone doing anything has any idea of what they’re doing.)

Like every other novelty, after time you’ll adapt. It’s best not to be too stodgy about these things, both because stodginess wears poorly and because the next few years are poised to see all kinds of on-street “innovations.” No, it’s not fair, in a cosmic sense or otherwise, that more vehicle types are being shoved into the same limited street space (and the people in charge should do something about this), but being patient is probably better than being mad all the time.

—Gear Prudence

Spring Fling

A pp D Ju ea lica ly dl tio 5, ine n 20 19

Gear Prudence

Thursday, March 21st 6:00-9:00

FULL DINNER FROM 6:00-8:30 Silent Auction 6:00-8:00 Live Jazz All Night

Silent Auction will include 70 items:

gifts, hotels, restaurants, and more!

Tickets

$20 in advance/$30 at the door.

Wa s h i n g t o n h i lt o n 1919 connecticut avenue, nW www.SpringFlingDupont.org

DEVELOP YOUR ENGLISH SKILLS FOR A CAREER IN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

Native speakers of critical languages are in high demand in the US government. EHLS trains advanced English speakers to be effective communicators and strong candidates for federal jobs.

Full scholarships for US citizens who are native speakers of Arabic, Azerbaijani, Balochi, Bambara, Dari, Hausa, Hindi, Kazakh, Korean, Kurdish, Kyrgyz, Mandarin, Pashto, Farsi, Punjabi, Russian, Somali, Tajik, Tamashek, Thai, Turkish, Urdu, Uzbek, or Vietnamese.

Find out more at these events:

Friday, March 22, 12:00 - 2:00 pm Georgetown Book Hill Library 3260 R St NW, Washington, DC 20007 Tuesday, March 26, 12:00 - 2:00 pm West End Library 2301 L St NW, Washington, DC 20037 Saturday, April 27, 1:00 - 4:00 pm Georgetown University SCS Campus 640 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20001

PODCAST Every week, City Paper reporters interview someone who helps tell the story of D.C. Subscribe at washingtoncitypaper. com/podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.

English for Heritage Language Speakers at Georgetown University ehlsprogram.org 202-687-4455

PODCAST

The EHLS Program is an initiative of NSEP. washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 11

The films playing at the 27th annual Environmental Film Festival are an aweinspiring and sobering look at a planet in peril.

Our planet is fucked. We have 12 years to limit climate change before irreparable damage sets in, according to the authors of a sobering 2018 report commissioned by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

If we don’t keep global warming to a maximum of 1.5 degrees Celsius, extreme and devastating weather will worsen. We’ve seen the signs: California’s largest wildfire ravaged the state last year; deadly heat waves are becoming more frequent across the world; and hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, and floods are happening with more power and frequency.

The apocalyptic future climate scientists warn us about is avoidable, but significant changes to our everyday lives must be made.

It would be easy for the Environmental Film 12 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

Festival to program a bunch of films designed to scare you into living a more sustainable life. But this festival—now in its 27th year—is too smart for that. Instead, this collection includes more than 100 films from all over the world that portray how beautiful, precious, and remarkable our planet is, and the dangers it faces—from the threat of extinction of sharks to one Japanese family’s 100-year-old oyster farm.

At a time when global tensions are increasingly taut and agenda-setting governing bodies manipulate our fear and anxiety, the Environmental Film Festival doesn’t take a scared-straight approach to sharing its message. It instead aims to inspire. Because Earth is pretty damn awe-inspiring—and these films show that.

—Matt Cohen

The River and the Wall Directed by Ben Masters U.S.

The Rio Grande stretches along the Texas/ Mexico border from El Paso to the Gulf of Mexico. There are parts where you cannot see the river because of the border wall already in place. This is one of the many simple, practical details in The River and the Wall, a political documentary that doubles as a travelogue of

the Texas border. By focusing on the physical realities/challenges of the river, not presidential rhetoric, the filmmakers make a practical case for why the wall is a bad idea.

Director Ben Masters, along with a team of guides and scientists, decides to make sense of the river by traveling its entire length.

They start in El Paso on bicycles, switching to horseback, and eventually settle on canoes.

Throughout the journey, the team thinks about what the river offers the surrounding area, and how a wall would get in the way of its many benefits. There is abundant biodiversity along the river, for example, with many animals crossing it without much thought about the country on either side. They also speak to

The River and the Wall probably won’t change any minds, but it offers an engaging, effective point of view on what Trump’s bullshit ideas would functionally mean. —Alan Zilberman Screens Thursday, March 14 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, March 24 at 2 p.m. at National Geographic.

The Fisherman and the Forest Produced by NHK World-Japan Japan

Shigeatsu Hatakeyama can see himself in his grandson. The pair explore nature together in Kesennuma in Japan’s Miyagi Prefecture so

stretch on inch after inch and the oysters inside approach the size of tight fists. The perfect specimens are a reward of sorts for the love that Hatakeyama puts into caring for Mone Bay where he makes his home.

In 1964, the nearby Kesennuma Bay was at its worst. It became polluted as a result of Japan’s rapid economic growth in the aftermath of World War II. Hatakeyama remembers the year because it was also when Tokyo hosted the Olympics. The bay was swarming with red tide. Hatakeyama was determined to restore the bay to its original splendor and tapped a professor from Hokkaido to be his research partner. Together they learned that the sea and the forest are intrinsically linked.

tion for the planet’s fragile symbiotic relationships as well as the Japanese culture of mastery.

—Laura Hayes Screens Friday, March 15 at 6:30 p.m. at the Japan Information and Culture Center, Embassy of Japan.

A Modern Shepherdess Directed by Delphine Détrie France

Plenty of people fantasize about leaving their nine-to-five doldrums behind and escaping to a farm somewhere off the grid, but Stéphanie, The River and the Wall

locals and politicians about the wall, including Beto O’Rourke, and while many of them want border security, none want a wall.

If The River and the Wall runs the risk of being too repetitive, Masters breaks up the argument with a sense of adventure. There are some stretches where the film unfolds like a Western, like when everyone hops on horses the first time. This also leads to throwaway comedy, since the team falls into Western archetypes, and one has to be the comic relief.

Hatakeyama can pass on his love of all living things. Culturally, their adventures feel like a father-and-son fishing trip, but instead of discussing the birds and the bees, Hatakeyama is passing on wisdom about the forest and the sea. If his grandson takes over his oyster farm, Hatakeyama calculates that his family business will be a century old.

Hatakeyama’s oysters aren’t anything like the bivalves from the Mid-Atlantic or New England that Americans slurp. The shells

“They’re locked in an eternal embrace,” Hatakeyama says. “The forest is the sea’s lover.” That’s because the forest produces phytoplankton that are vital to underwater ecosystems. Hatakeyama’s research proved critical again following the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami of March 11, 2011. After the disaster, 25,949 people were reported dead or missing, including Hatakeyama’s mother. For a movie principally about phytoplankton, The Fisherman and the Forest imparts an apprecia-

the subject of A Modern Shepherdess actually did it. A single mother and former graphic designer, she left her life in Paris to try her hand at running a farm and breeding sheep. Turning a profit in agriculture is a tall order in the best of circumstances, but Stéph- anie’s been going it alone since her partner left, and since many in the community con- tinue to see her as an interloper, she doesn’t have much of a support network.

What she does have is boundless optimism

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 13

and a genuine love for what she does. Stéphanie offsets her sheep operations by educating groups of schoolchildren and agri-tourists, and in one such demonstration, she explains that her profession is technically designated as a “smallholder farmer,” but she prefers the quainter term “shepherdess.” The part of Normandy where she resides is an urban commune, which means she’s under stringent regulations, and isn’t allowed to put up fencing around her property, leading to the pilfering of her flock. Bristling against the bureaucratic interference in her pastoral life is a theme throughout the film.

A Modern Shepherdess is primarily a hangout doc—not a whole lot happens, but we slowly glean the details of how she works and the struggles she’s up against, which include random acts of vandalism from disgruntled neighbors and nonsensical decrees from local governing bodies. The film could benefit from emphasizing these stakes a bit more, or perhaps a bit more context of how farmers are regulated on an urban commune. Nevertheless, it’s an intimate portrait of a winning heroine, and though there’s not a clear conflict, audiences will be rooting for Stéphanie to come out on top by the end. —Stephanie Rudig Screens Friday, March 15 at 7 p.m. at the Embassy of France and Sunday, March 24 at 7 p.m. at National Geographic.

When Lambs Become Lions Directed by Jon Kasbe U.S.

Following the success of animal wildlife docs like The Cove, Blackfish, and Trophy, When Lambs Become Lions arrives with the most titillating scenario. It is a crime drama examining the ivory trade in Kenya through the lives of two men on opposite sides of the law: Asan, a National Reserve Game Ranger who uses brutal tactics to discourage poaching, and the anonymous “X”, who manages an illegal and dangerous poaching operation.

Instead of choosing sides, it seeks commonalities. Viewers who love animals will want the poacher demonized and the ranger praised, but instead director Jon Kasbe sees them as brothers who have chosen different paths out of the same problem. Both are stricken with poverty, must risk their lives in a dangerous vocation to feed their families, and are traumatized by the trade. “Out here we are all hunters,” says Asan, and the film at its best examines the broken culture that has forced decent men to find dignity on either side of a monstrous situation.

It’s an irresistible hook, so why does so much of When Lambs Become Lions feel inert?

Much like a military operation, there is a lot of waiting around before a sudden burst of action. As X’s team embarks on a hunt in the final minutes, there is finally some real tension—as well as a revelatory kicker—but with its brief 80-minute runtime, it shouldn’t drag so much.

All the elements are there for a thrilling wildlife documentary with a strong human compo-

nent, but a crime drama needs an actual crime.

—Noah Gittell Screens Saturday, March 16 at 7 p.m. and Sunday, March 24 at 4 p.m. at National Geographic.

Into the Canyon

Directed by Peter McBride U.S. You would expect the Environmental Film Festival to offer its fair share of dispatches from the eternal battle between man and nature. But if one of the perils of the documentary format is the tendency of a director to make themselves part of the story, that goes double for nature docs. Such is the conflict in this celebration of nature as a buddy movie travelogue. Photographer Pete McBride, who directed, documented his journey with Kevin Fedarko, who teamed up (with the help of seasoned guides) to make a 750-mile hike across the length of the Grand Canyon. Unfortunately, the end product is less about a natural wonder than about the friends they made along the way.

The movie is best when McBride turns the camera away from his team to document various crises that threaten the national park, from Navajo land endangered by developers to uranium mines that contaminate ground water to a thriving industry of helicopter tours whose constant whirring has turned the region’s peaceful vistas into a noisy tourist trap. Only when McBride just lets you see the “river of stars” and bask in its majesty does he truly let you... into the Canyon.

—Pat Padua

The Fisherman and the Forest

Screens Saturday, March 16 at 4 p.m. at National Geographic.

Wildland

Directed by Kahlil Hudson and Alex Jablonski U.S. The world watched in horror last year as Camp Fire—the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California’s history—laid waste to 1,893,913 acres of the state. It would have been far worse without the tireless efforts of hundreds of wildland firefighters, who put their lives on the line to control the flames. Kahlil Hudson and Alex Jablonski’s meditative documentary, Wildland, chronicles a single firefighting crew—from the day of their first interview to become firefighters to their training to the moment they’re shipped out to the frontlines of a raging wildfire in California.

The cinematography of Wildland is gorgeous. The sweeping, slow-motion shots of the Oregon wilderness and the scorched earth California vistas are haunting, and give the film a poetic quality. But as far as documentaries go, Wildland falls flat when it tries to get viewers to engage with its subjects. Each of the people they profile has their own reasons for wanting to become a firefighter—from a young kid from Maine who’s looking for adventure

14 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

to returning citizens and former addicts on the road of recovery—but the film’s lyrical nature doesn’t really allow you to connect with them. They’re presented more like characters floating in and out of the narrative than people whose lives you’re invested in. —Matt Cohen Screens Saturday, March 16 at 7 p.m. at Landmark E Street Cinema.

Meow Wolf: Origin Story Directed by Jilann Spitzmiller and Morgan Capps U.S.

A recurring festival theme is one of a envi-

ronment contaminated—by nuclear power, uranium mining, garbage. But can the environment be contaminated by art? That is the inadvertent lesson of this feature-length infomercial about the art collective Meow Wolf, who has set its sights on D.C. The group began as a response to the commercial art gallery scene in Santa Fe, New Mexico, which one Meow Wolf co-founder lambasts as “a bunch of marketing bullshit”—a complaint that becomes awfully prescient. A group of friends got together and rented cheap abandoned real estate for what amounted to a more intense version of Artomatic. The early days of Meow Wolf were anarchic and, as its members boast, “radically inclusive”—which leads one to ask why, then, does it seem like

taineer Jim Whittaker, ascended the mountain for the first time. Return to Mount Kennedy is not about that specific journey, but an identical one undertaken 50 years later by Whittaker and Kennedy’s sons.

Bob Whittaker, Jim’s son, is a strange guy.

Before life as conservationist, he was a tour manager for rock bands like Mudhoney, R.E.M., and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. He had a hard-partying lifestyle, which is why his desire to climb the mountain represents such a growth in character. Director Eric Becker makes no attempt to stay objective with this material: He feels like he’s pals with his subjects and talking heads, including Eddie Vedder, so the film has the polish and charm of well edited home movie.

Unlike most environmental films that focus on a specific issue, Return to Mount Kennedy is a look at how adventure and family can dovetail with conservation efforts.

The Whittakers and the Kennedys found the outdoors as the source of their friendship, and their desire to honor the mountain highlights the rugged, austere beauty that only the natural world can provide.

Mountains are one of the few things that will stick around long after we are gone, so making sense of their permanence is a way to reflect on the past, and what we owe our future generations.

—Alan Zilberman

The Woman Who Loves Giraffes

Screens Sunday, March 17 at 4 p.m. at National Geographic.

Yellow Magic Orchestra, and won an Oscar for the score to Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1987 film The Last Emperor. But in 2014, a cancer diagnosis led the electronic music legend to appreciate the sounds of nature more than ever.

Director Stephen Nomura Schible’s 2017 profile charts his subject’s passion, not just for music but for the environment (Sakamoto is a longtime opponent of nuclear power).

Coda immerses us in a creative process that doesn’t always begin at the keyboard. Inspired by Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris, Sakamoto finds music in the sound of rain falling, and has even travelled to the Arctic to record the sound of melting snow. He makes haunting music out of a grand piano that was washed away by the massive tsunami that caused the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

Musing over the decay rate of a single piano note that quickly fades, Sakamoto suggests that a perpetual music machine would be a metaphor for eternity.

But as we see vintage footage of the younger composer with jet-black hair, the artist’s now-white hair and grizzled face make one wonder about the very purpose of decay—and if the piano’s decay rate is no less than a metaphor for mortality.

—Pat Padua

good story about a wide array of activists working to end the criminal practice. The film by Mariah Wilson is a lyrical nature documentary and a powerful issue movie at once. It profiles a female eco-guard in Cameroon who speaks of the “joy in [her] heart” when she sees an elephant; a Czech activist training puppies to sniff out ivory and other protected species; and a former poacher who has given up his life of crime to run a cocoa farm with his family, and nows speaks out against his former trade.

These are stories determinedly designed to inspire, but the hopefulness never feels contrived. Wisely, the filmmakers let the beauty of nature speak its own message. There is an unforgettable sequence halfway through in which a family of elephants emerges under the cover of night to drink from a river. The group includes a juvenile still young enough to nurse from its mother. Other films would create tension and force us to fear for their safety, but Silent Forests gives us the space to open our hearts and let our compassion out. Instead of trying to shock us into action, it organizes its story around the principles of love, family, and community.

—Noah Gittell

Screens Sunday, March 17 at 4:30 p.m. at the National Gallery of Art, East Building Auditorium.

Harvest Season

everybody involved is white?

But as the projects grew and began to make money, Meow Wolf needed structure, and this pull between chaos and order may well be a metaphor for man and the environment. While the installations are cool enough, Origin Story feels like hagiography; nobody questions their motives and priorities, such as convincing Game of Thrones author and Santa Fe resident George R.R. Martin to donate more than a million bucks to convert an abandoned bowling alley into a dazzling playground. (Doesn’t anybody need affordable housing in Santa Fe?) Still, directors Jilann Spitzmiller and Morgan Capps aren’t afraid to reveal what really drives these one-time DIY pioneers; by the end of the movie, Meow Wolf CEO Vince Kadlubek freely admits he wants to turn it into a billion- dollar corporation. Yay environment!

—Pat Padua

Screens Monday, March 18 at 7 p.m. at Landmark E Street Cinema.

Directed by Bernardo Ruiz Mexico

When Lambs Become Lions

Screens Sunday, March 17 at 2 p.m. and Sunday, March 24 at 2 p.m. at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.

Return to Mount Kennedy Directed by Eric Becker U.S.

After President John F. Kennedy’s death, the Canadian government honored him by naming a previously unclimbed mountain in his honor. In 1965, Robert Kennedy, with moun-

Ryuichi Sakamoto: Coda

Silent Forests

Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto came to fame in the 1970s with synth-pop pioneers

The issue of ivory poaching gets a second perspective at the festival in Silent Forests, a feel-

Directed by Stephen Nomura Schible U.S., Japan

Directed by Mariah Wilson U.S.

“All winemakers should be able to offer something about the grape that is hidden,” says one of the principles of Harvest Season, a documentary that examines the vineyards of Napa Valley through the prism of the Latinx experience.

Such wisdom should also apply to documentarians, and while the film by Bernardo Ruiz

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 15

offers its share of hidden stories, it is missing a consistency that would tie its flavors together.

Harvest Season shines a light on successful Hispanic winemakers, including a young female vintner who is proving herself in a male-dominated world. It also chronicles the journey of a Mexican laborer who comes to California for a summer of work, and tours the housing units he lives in set up by a coalition of vineyards. In the final third, it documents the crippling wildfires that destroyed more than 200,000 acres in 2017, and its tragic impact on the region and its inhabitants.

There are profound moments scattered throughout, such as the conversation between old-timers who recall having to sleep in the fields when they first arrived to work the land.

I could have spent an hour with them, but the film moves on too quickly. Perhaps none of its subjects were quite compelling enough to stick with; the immigrant laborer seems like a sweet guy, but the smile never leaves his face, and the tale of hardship that the filmmakers were seeking never materializes. Something about Harvest Season feels unfinished, as if the product was bottled too soon, when it really needed time to breathe.

—Noah Gittell

The Human Element

Screens Wednesday, March 20 at 7 p.m. at the Malsi Doyle & Michael Forman Theater at American University.

LOBSTER WAR: The Fight Over the World’s Richest Fishing Grounds

Directed by David Abel and Andy Laub U.S. When you think of border disputes your mind may not jump to the boundary between the United States and Canada, but that’s exactly where LOBSTER WAR brings us. Thanks to a quirk of history, both the U.S. and Canada claim a patch of sea in the Gulf of Maine.

And thanks to climate change, this “gray zone” is now home to a record number of lobsters, leading lobstermen from both nations to the spot—and thus into conflict.

LOBSTER WAR takes a while to get started. Or rather, it gets started a bunch of times.

The doc keeps hammering home the story’s stakes—both Americans and Canadians rely on the crustaceans caught in these contested seas—to the point that it gets redundant.

Even if it’s slow going, the doc is full of beautiful shots of boats and the sea and morbidly engrossing footage of lobster butchering. The story picks up when we meet the communities for whom the gray zone is a daily reality.

Although the characters talk a lot about conflict, it doesn’t come across as particularly warlike. Fishermen recount things like cut lines, which may not mean much to land lubbers but amount to thousands of forfeited dollars to lobstermen, and thumbs lost to accidents caused by overcrowding—the impact of which should be obvious, even to non-seafaring folk.

The film ultimately pivots to climate change, noting that lobsters will likely disap-

pear from these waters. What will happen to these communities then? it wonders. It’s a good question, but I’m more interested in the bit that comes before. As the globe continues to warm and ecosystems transform, people will increasingly be pushed against one another, struggling over scarce and valuable resources. The film gives us a glimpse of what’s to come, but the next war won’t be over lobster.

—Will Warren Screens Sunday, March 17 at 7 p.m. at the National Museum of Natural History.

The Human Element Directed by Matthew Testa U.S.

Water, air, fire, earth—the four elements that comprise life on our planet. The Human Element adds one more to the list: people. “People are changing the other elements,” says nature photographer James Balog, the central talking head in this documentary. “At the same time, the elements are changing us.” Of course, he’s mostly talking about climate change, and visits places that have been particularly affected by it. There’s Tangier Island, Virginia, whose water levels are increasing so dramatically that one resident says, “We’re one storm away from becoming part of history.”

Balog takes photos at a school in Denver that has a special program for students with asthma. And he embeds with a group of firefighters who are battling “megafires” in California, with one firefighter remarking on the unnaturalness of fires burning in 91 percent humidity:

16 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

“You’re getting wet, but the fire’s still burning.

It’s not something that’s supposed to happen.”

The chapter that gets the least amount of attention is Earth, with Balog traveling to Pennsylvania coal mines and talking to his father about his grandfather’s mining death, as well as touching on how “our quest for coal has reshaped the landscape,” according to an expert.

Throughout, one tenet rings clear, says Balog: “People are the only element that can choose to restore balance.”

—Tricia Olszewski Screens Sunday, March 17 at 7 p.m. at the Carnegie Institution for Science.

This Mountain Life

Directed by Grant Baldwin Canada Before we see the mountains, we hear the wind.

“75 percent of British Columbia, Canada, is mountains,” reads the film’s opening text, as the sound of snowy gales builds in the background.

“Few people truly experience them.” The purpose of This Mountain Life—a documentary by director, cinematographer, and editor Grant Baldwin—is to amend that last claim, immersing us within shot after transcendent shot of the immense elevations that reign over Canada’s horizon. We follow Martina Halik and her 60-yearold mother Tania as they attempt a six-month, 2,300 kilometer journey from Canada to Alaska, the narrative diverting at points to introduce us to a handful of compellingly offbeat characters who live on the precipice. From the halcyon convent nestled within a valley to the perils of an avalanche, This Mountain Life is a breathtaking ode

to nature’s most sublime metaphor.

Gorgeous visuals are this film’s bread and butter, but Baldwin is wise to pair aerial views with gritty handheld camera footage that archives the sometimes bitter struggle that occurs when people and nature converge to meet each other in hostile environments. Still, This Mountain Life feels like going to church, especially when the alpinists and artists who give the landscape voice are so eloquent, so philosophical about their communion. Mountains are “a return, a well-spring, or fountainhead;” places where men “can become heroes.” In one particularly heavenly shot, a nun paraphrases T.S. Eliot as she spins pottery in slow motion. “At the still point of the turning world, there the dance is,” she says. “If there was no still point, there’d be no dance.” The mountains are one of the grandest still points of life, this film seems to say. To experience them as such for 77 minutes is a wonder.

—Amy Guay Screens Monday March 18 at 12 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. at the Embassy of Canada.

The Green Lie

Directed by Werner Boote Austria Werner Boote just wants to eat his M&Ms. But when the director of The Green Lie puts a few in front of activist Feri Irawan to gauge his reaction, Irawan says, “They were made with the blood of Indonesians.” Scratch that. This documentary investigates what Boote and research partner Kathrin Hartmann call “greenwashing,” or the act of corporations stating

that their products are sustainable. Though “investigates” is a generous term; Boote and Hartmann do travel around the world and meet various people who are involved in or protesting against manufacturing, but mostly they talk amongst themselves, with Boote acting naïve and Hartmann setting him straight.

The sin most frequently discussed here is palm oil, whose production necessitates rainforests being destroyed. Hartmann repeatedly says that, unlike what labels on many products claim, there is no such thing as sustainable palm oil, and though a few interview subjects push back on this idea, she sounds like she knows what she’s talking about. Hartmann’s soapboxing gets a little tiresome, but Boote calls her out on it: “If your indignation could generate power, we’d all have light,” he says. She may be “a real killjoy,” as Boote says, but it’s enough to make you think twice about those M&Ms. —Tricia Olszewski Screens Tuesday, March 19 at 7 p.m. at the Carnegie Institution for Science.

tats where people and critters live in fascinating proximity. The film itself, though, has a deeply corny side, most of which comes from the “narration” by a common house cat. Yeah, a cat. (With a human voiceover, duh.) The kitty is photogenic and cooperative—if that’s even the right word—and there’s some solid logic in the idea of showing rats and pigeons from a feline’s vantage point. But the real star here isn’t the animals. It’s Amsterdam itself, with its canals and spring sunlight, beckoning the viewer to come and revel in the cuteness of it all. There’s weird stuff, of course, including the escaped parakeets that have learned how to survive the winter, the bachelor toads that smother breeding females, and the invasive U.S. crayfish that thrive in the canals. But the city is the real stunner. I mean, why wouldn’t an animal want to call it home?

—Joe Warminsky Screens Wednesday, March 20 at 7 p.m. at the Royal Netherlands Embassy.

Directed by Ian Cheney, the film is a reminder that just beneath the surface of seemingly mundane surroundings, there is so much intrigue—and nothing is mundane when the surroundings are being described by passionate scientists, nature lovers, and creatives.

There is talk of lichens and vole tunnels, as well as racism and sexism, and there is even paragliding. The forest is home to snow-covered tree branches in the winter, as well as the sounds of bustling insects in the warmer months. The eccentric, diverse cast of characters makes for wonderful eyes to see the woods through. And the four seasons, Thirteen Ways’ central characters, are most enchanting in this little part of Maine. Vivaldi would be proud.

—Kayla Randall Screens Thursday, March 21 at 7 p.m. at Landmark E Street Cinema.

The Woman Who Loves Giraffes

Thirteen Ways

Directed by Alison Reid Canada

Wild Amsterdam

Directed by Ian Cheney U.S.

It’s pointless for a classic-style nature documentary to aim for anything less than BBC-level cin-

Thirteen Ways is unlike anything else. It gets its name from the Wallace Stevens poem Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, and after seeing it, you’ll never look at the natural world

In the 1950s, a young Canadian zoologist left for Africa to study giraffes in the wild. Anne Dagg traveled the continent alone in her small, shaky car. There were no cell phones, there was no infrastructure. She fought steep odds as a woman explorer pushing back against the

Directed by Mark Verkerk Netherlands

Silent Forests

ematography, given that our high-def tastes have been locked-in since Planet Earth debuted in 2006. In that respect, Wild Amsterdam gets the job done: It trains the camera on urban vermin with the same level of care that a more snobby film might give to majestic sea mammals. The underbelly of the Dutch metropolis will look familiar to anyone with a taste for content about common rodents, birds, aquatic creatures, and their predators; like any city, Amsterdam is an archipelago of micro-habi-

the same way. The entire premise of the film is an experiment: 12 scientists and nonscientists walk the same piece of Maine land and describe it, through winter, spring, summer, and fall. Nowhere is the power of the natural world more apparent than in this plot of land, with these people. Not one of them sees the natural world in the same way, and we are taken on a ride through each of their minds, exploring this world, our world, through them and their quirks and idiosyncrasies.

scientific and academic community’s sexist resistance to her, and she would go on to be considered the world’s first giraffologist. Her story isn’t widely known, her boldness relegated to the footnotes of history—until now.

The Woman Who Loves Giraffes is director Alison Reid’s love letter to Dagg, her life, and her work, and in this documentary, Dagg’s boldness comes through in spades.

A journey through Dagg’s past and present, the film paints a picture of a woman who is ex-

ceptionally knowledgeable about the longnecked apples of her eye. She admires their long necks, tails, and tongues, and is an endless wealth of giraffe expertise. After all, she’s loved them since she was 3 years old. But the film isn’t just about a woman who loves giraffes, it is about a woman who is a pioneer.

She co-wrote what is today considered the bible on giraffes. Before Jane Goodall and the chimpanzees, there was Anne Dagg and the giraffes. Featuring lovely voice work by actors Tatiana Maslany and Victor Garber, The Woman Who Loves Giraffes gets to the heart of who this fascinating, peculiar scientist is, and why her own heart belongs to the giant endangered African grassland dwellers. With sweeping overhead shots of giraffes galloping in African plains and closeups of their beauty and quiet elegance, the stunning visuals take the viewer right into the savanna. At the end of this film, it’s easy to come away loving giraffes as deeply as Dagg does.

—Kayla Randall Screens Thursday, March 21 at 7 p.m. at the Malsi Doyle & Michael Forman Theater at American University and Friday, March 22 at 7 p.m. at Eaton DC.

Sharkwater Extinction Directed by Rob Stewart Canada

To a shark, especially a great white shark, humans seem like adorable sacs of meat that do not swim very fast. Part of the reason that they’re so fun to eat is that, in the ongoing human/shark wars, humans are handily winning.

According to the conservation documentary Sharkwater Extinction, millions of sharks are slaughtered every year for shark fin soup and miscellaneous fish products. As a great white shark, I find this infuriating.

Rob Stewart, the director and star of the film, is one of the good ones. Over many years, he has exposed illegal shark poaching that still happens all over the world. This film follows his efforts, whether it’s going undercover or catching poachers in the act. His point is a simple one: The mass killing of sharks is immoral, and will cause irreparable harm to our ecosystem. Maybe remember that before you buy a ticket to another dumb movie that demonizes sharks, you assholes.

Sharkwater Extinction is a hodgepodge of footage, with Stewart jumping from one activist campaign to another, strung together with admittedly gorgeous footage of sharkkind at our most graceful and serene. The reason for this approach is tragic: Stewart died in a diving accident in 2017. The film handles his death delicately, and while his spirit lives in the film, its unfinished quality diminishes its overall power. It’s a shame in multiple ways. If humans were more like Rob Stewart, sharks wouldn’t be so eager to devour you like some of you are eager to devour shark fin soup.

—A Great White Shark Screens Saturday, March 23 at 7 p.m. at National Geographic and Sunday, March 24 at 2 p.m. at the Carnegie Institution for Science.

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 17

Laura Hayes

DCFEED

Punjab Grill is now open at 427 11th St. NW. The opulent, fine dining Indian restaurant from Karan Singh serves a mix of traditional and innovative dishes.

Accounting for Taste

Meet the woman helping D.C. restaurants stay afloat in a competitive industry full of financial land mines.

By Laura Hayes In a cIty like D.C. where roughly 96 percent of restaurants are independent small businesses, many chefs double as owners and lean leadership teams run popular eateries. They don’t have the same safety net as major chain enterprises or restaurant groups that can hire in-house talent to suss out traps and balance the books.

Recognizing an opportunity to help smaller restaurants stay afloat, MaryEllen Georgiadis founded her own small business, Finance A La Carte.

Some of D.C.’s top hospitality groups have hired her as a consultant, including Drink Company, which operates Columbia Room and Pop-Up Bar; Fat Baby Inc., which is behind Doi Moi; Astro Doughnuts; and Todd Gray of Equinox and Manna at the Museum of the Bible.

Georgiadis, who went into public accounting after college, got her first taste of managing the books for a food operation at the restaurant inside Louis Boston, a legendary luxury clothing store that lasted 85 years.

“They had just brought up a new chef to operate the cafe,” she says. “His name was Michael Schlow.”

The restaurateur, who Washingtonians know from his local restaurants like Alta Strada, The Riggsby, and Tico, tapped Georgiadis to be the treasurer at his first restaurant, Radius, in Boston. His cooking there earned him a James Beard Award in 2000.

Georgiadis stayed on as Schlow opened more restaurants in greater Boston. After a short break when Georgiadis moved to Florida, Schlow brought her back as he grew his empire over a decade.

Having learned the ins and outs of financially managing a restaurant with Schlow, Georgiadis set out on her own in 2017. “I’ve had a ball doing it,” she says.

As the D.C. restaurant industry sits in a period of turmoil that’s likely to continue—the fourth quarter of 2018 and the first quarter of 2019 brought a rash of closures—City Paper sat down with Georgiadis to understand some

Darrow Montgomery

YOUNG & HUNGRY

common pitfalls and best practices related to running a restaurant.

I struggle with my clients. They don’t find the time to do what they need to do.

City Paper: What types of services do you offer and why?

MaryEllen Georgiadis: My company wants to take the controls and the accounting off of the hands of the creative side of the business.

I have some clients who say I want everything.

We do day-to-day accounting, month-end closes, creating financial reports, tax returns, recording sales, paying all the bills, doing cash flow, reconciling bank statements, budgeting, and planning. It’s one thing to talk about the past. There’s some use to that. I want to focus on, “How do we fix it going forward?” In this industry, finding time to do that is where

CP: How can restaurants best position themselves for longevity?

MG: Really look at your numbers. Know your numbers. Whether it’s someone else preparing them or you preparing them, they can’t just be digits on a page. They need to mean something. All chefs and beverage directors know margins and know what they want. But are you looking at payroll as a percentage of sales? Operating costs as a percentage of sales? A lot of things can fall through the cracks. When you’re doing well and sales are up, don’t neglect all of this or it will bite you one day. People say, “We had plenty of money so we didn’t worry.” Well,

18 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

you should have worried because this person was taking a little bit for themselves or these sales weren’t recorded correctly.

CP: Restaurants are throwing events to stand out from the competition and welcome diners into their spaces for new reasons. Are they a good idea?

MG: Events are a scary little sidebar that restaurants need to keep a better eye on. That money is the best margin in the business.

You’re controlling everything. You’re controlling the menu, you have no waste, you know how many people are coming, you know what they’re going to eat and drink. Through hospitality, if you can earn 10 to 15 percent new customers out of it it’s all upside. But you have

DCFEED to make sure all of the money comes in. You need to have someone controlling the process to make sure that’s good cash.

CP: Through previous reporting we learned that restaurants sometimes make cents off of their most popular dishes. How is that sustainable?

MG: Doi Moi has a dish like that. You don’t want to change it because everyone loves it.

Your menu can be designed to have some of those low-margin items, but you have to watch out if it becomes the most popular dish.

CP: Diners seem to accept price creep when it comes to appetizers. They used to be $7 to $8 and now land closer to $12 to $14. Yet it feels like $30 has been the defining price for entrees for decades. You’re either a $30-and-over or $30-and-under restaurant. Are we crazy?

MG: This is a real thing. If you have a $30 entree you can only have one or two. You have to have that average. At upscale casual restaurants, you can have one or two dishes over $30, but the majority have to be in the twenties. And don’t put the $30 on the top line. It has to be buried. You also can’t have a wide variety. You have to find your niche.

CP: Restaurants make the most off of alcohol because of the higher profit margins, but is there anything that can trip a restaurant up behind the bar?

MG: Make sure your inventory numbers are never too high in booze. Having too much booze is cash on your shelves, not in the bank.

Just because you can get a deal on a case of Bombay Sapphire gin, if you’re not going to sell it for two months, it wasn’t worth the cost of money to have it sit.

CP: Restaurants have a love and hate relationship with delivery services like Uber Eats and Caviar that can take a fee as high as 30 percent.

Should restaurants participate?

MG: That is a really important thing to look at. If you record a sale for a $10 item, [the delivery service] is only going to give you $6 or $7. You have to record that expense regularly. We do it every week to make sure nothing’s missing. You can lose dollars and every dollar counts. But delivery can be incremental business. Even if [the companies] take 30 percent and your cost of goods is 30 percent, that’s 40 percent still that you have to play with. Let’s say your labor and take out paper goods cost you another 10 percent. That’s still 30 cents you didn’t have before. If your calculation brings that to zero you shouldn’t do it. But if you can make an incremental 10, 20, 30 cents on the dollar, why not? You build your brand.

It’s brand exposure.

CP: What are some of the most common fi-

nancial missteps new restaurants make that can get them into trouble quickly?

MG: The main reason businesses close quickly is because they undercapitalized. They thought they could open a restaurant for $1 million, but they end up spending $1.1 million.

The business didn’t take off at the beginning.

Now they have all these creditors coming after them. The construction guy didn’t get his final payment. The architect didn’t get his final payment. Everyone’s getting nervous. You’re scraping every dollar that comes in. There are a lot of businesses that can’t weather that.

That’s the reason a restaurant turns in three years or less.

CP: Are changes in labor policies top of mind for your clients? Are they looking at new models?

MG: We did when Initiative 77 passed in the summer. As some of my clients were looking at new projects, they were asking, “What can we do that’s not table service?” They were looking at fast casual or counter service with table delivery. Something that’s a blend, so front-ofhouse labor is much lower. A lot of the payroll systems are not advanced enough to do some of these crazy manipulations. I think after the D.C. Council voted it down in October, everyone went back to, “OK, what we’re doing works for us.” Most of my clients, we are paying everyone way over minimum wage. The price point my clients are at, they were frustrated by it. And I feel like it’s going to come back around in some form.

CP: How far in advance should restaurants plan?

MG: When you open your place, most investors are going to require a five-year plan. But an investment deck is so subjective. Some are going to be more conservative with it, some people are going to be way too aggressive.

Five years is a long time in this industry. I recommend budgets, which a lot of restaurants and bars don’t do. Budgeting so you have a plan of action so you can see when your plan isn’t working in months one, two, and three. I have a number of clients who have never had one. A one-year plan for this industry makes more sense.

CP: Some D.C. restaurants are celebrating their 25th and 30th anniversaries. Is there hope for restaurants opening in 2019 to have that kind of lifespan?

MG: It’s rare. One percent of openings last that long. I think a 15-year run is something to be damn proud of. I would love if any of my clients or people I know in the business have a good 10 years with a five-year option.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

HAPPY KNIFE, HAPPY LIFE!

PROFESSIONAL KNIFE SHARPENING AT UNION MARKET

855-685-0011

www.districtcutlery.com

Visit us at UNION MARKET | 1309 5th Street NE, Washington DC

Injured?

You only get one chance to get the settlement you deserve.

HoffmanPersonalInjuryFirm.com

CALL NOW FOR A FREE CONSULTATION 703.684.4986

Auto Accidents | Slip & Falls | Medical Malpractice | Product Liability | Additional Claims 1615 Rhode Island Ave NW, Washington, DC 20036

202-872-1126 • WWW.BBGWDC.COM For reservations, please call 202.872.128 or visit OPENTABLE.COM

WE SUPPORT

LOCAL FARMS! Try our new Farm-to-Table, organic menu with several Avocado based dishes!

SPECIAL ALL DAY PROMOTION

15

Beer, Wine or Soft Drink Paired with a $ Half Sandwich with Soup, Salad or Fries

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 19

“A photograph of someone making a great shot or a great move takes place in a fraction of a second, but an image of that same court taken without people is about a period of time in the layered history of a place.”

–Bill Bamberger 401 F Street NW Washington, DC 20001 Red Line Metro, Judiciary Square 202.272.2448 | go.nbm.org/HOOPS

Public school playground, Sedona, Arizona (2009). Photo by Bill Bamberger.

GREAT PERFORMANCES AT MASON 2018/2019 SEASON

KODO Saturday, March 16 at 8 p.m.

Danú ff

Sunday, March 17 at 7 p.m.

Aquila Theatre ff

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

EN AR JO TS Y A AT LL CF THE A!

Pablo Sáinz Villegas Americano

Friday, April 12 at 8 p.m.

ff

Sunday, March 31 at 7 p.m.

ff

Family Friendly performances that are most suitable for families with younger children

TICKETS ON SALE NOW! 703-993-2787 OR CFA.GMU.EDU 20 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

Located on the Fairfax campus, six miles west of Beltway exit 54, at the intersection of Braddock Road and Rt. 123.

Courtesy Blight Records

CPARTS

On their new album, Loi Loi explores the darker side of pop and electronica. washingtoncitypaper.com/arts

Pie in the Sky

Societal excesses become theatrical inspiration in new productions at Shakespeare Theatre and the Folger.

Vanity Fair

By Rebecca J. Ritzel

Vanity Fair

Adapted from William Makepeace Thackeray’s novel by Kate Hamill Directed by Jessica Stone At the Lansburgh Theatre to March 31

Confection

Conceived and written by Zach Morris Directed by Zach Morris, with Tom Pearson and Jennine Willett At the Folger Theatre to March 24 How do you convey the trouble with decadence to theater audiences already alarmed by Mar-a-Lago parties and Fyre Festival documentaries? That’s a question two theaters are grappling with—with modest success—in shows about the perils of excess and the bygone days of the English upper class.

Both Vanity Fair, at Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Lans-

burgh Theatre, and Third Rail Projects’ Confection, at the Folger, have their delectably frothy moments, but the central themes are challenging to convey in 2019, when audiences are less sympathetic to the one percent and those struggling to get there, including the decadent diners of Confection and Becky Sharp, British literature’s most maligned social climber. One play is a visual feast; the other is a case study in minimalist staging gone awry.

Kate Hamill’s Vanity Fair debuted two years ago at the Pearl Theatre, one of New York’s minor off-Broadway venues. The stage adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray’s novel marked Hamill’s second attempt to recast a classic, and it came on the heels of her hilarious and moving adaptation of Sense and Sensibility. D.C. audiences were among the first outside of New York to sit in awe of what Hamill and her collaborators could do with just a handful of actors, minimal accoutrements, and a Jane Austen novel. Eric Tucker, fresh off directing a long run of Sense and Sensibility at New York’s Bedlam Theatre, also helmed the play’s run at the Folger, with local actress Erin Weaver replacing Hamill in the role of Marianne Dashwood.

Hamill also played her first Becky Sharp. Watching the Pearl’s production in April 2017 was like watching super-talented New Yorkers put on a show with the resources of a college drama department. Minimal costume changes were performed in plain sight, and the onstage narrator frequently broke the fourth wall in scripted attempts to chastise audience members seated on risers.

It’s quite a leap to see a bigger budget version of the same play at the Lansburgh, which has been converted into a theater-within-a-theater. It’s a smart idea by West Coast director Jessica Stone, but the metatheatricality doesn’t always hold up, such as when the moral condemnations of narrator Dan Hiatt are addressed broadly to the entire audience instead of as precise comedic bits singling out unlucky theatergoers, or when, on multiple occasions, he makes derogatory comments about the shabby “best we can afford” costumes.

As will be obvious to anyone who admires these Regency gowns and military uniforms, Shakespeare Theatre Company can afford the very nice costumes.

The original scrappy aesthetic, meant to match not only the Pearl Theatre’s black box space and limited resources but the scrappiness of orphan Becky Sharp, has been stripped away.

And what’s left—which is a lot, since the source novel is around 700 pages—doesn’t entirely work in an adaptation that was problematic from the start.

Vanity Fair: A Novel Without a Hero is the full title of Thackeray’s 1848 novel, and that clause after the colon is key. Readers were not supposed to root for Becky, the orphan who schemes and dreams her way to the English upper classes, only to be brought low again by her husband’s gambling, her shopping habits, bad luck, and a seedy marquis looking for sex.

Instagram influencers seem to get away with so much worse.

It’s easier to adapt a non-judgemental version of the novel for film, like the 2004 Mira Nair extravaganza, in which Reese Witherspoon rides an elephant, or last year’s seven-part ITV adaptation. But Hamill’s Vanity Fair keeps intact many trappings of Thackeray’s cautionary tale, and asks a 21st century audience to concede Becky Sharp has made poor 19th century life choices. By contrast, Hamill’s adaptations of Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Little Women all feature heroines authors and audiences are rooting for.

Complicated baggage aside, there are still reasons to recommend Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Vanity Fair. Rebekah Brockman plays the unhero with spunk, although her Act II transition from enterprising orphan to materialistic bitch is tough to swallow. Stone cast almost entirely West Coast actors in this production. Most are fine, but it would have been lovely to see a D.C. regular like Bobby Smith, Thomas Adrian Simpson, or Harry Winter bring more panache to the narrator’s role. The lone local in the show does the District proud, however. Alyssa Wilmoth Keegan entertains in a supporting role that requires her to play a rogue Redcoat soldier, a puppeteer preacher, and other characters of varying genders.

450 7th St. NW. $49–$125. (202) 547-1122. shakespearetheatre.org.

ImportIng performers makes much more sense at the Folger Shakespeare Library, which commissioned one of New York’s top immersive theater troupes to create the washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 21

CPARTS first-ever production set in the library’s opulent reading rooms rather than the actual theater. Confection is a highminded treat. Arrive early and enjoy a drink while checking out First Chefs, the exhibition of early modern cookbooks and other ephemera that served as source material.

The star of the show is actually the space, which creates an inherent cognitive dissonance. Viewers are asked to contemplate the horrors of the slave trade and the English class system while marveling at North America’s largest collection of Shakespearean books and beautifully dressed performers.

Back in the Bard’s day, they remind us, the wealthy enjoyed ostentatious feasts while some commoners went hungry. Imagine that.

Confection works best when the performers function as timeless eye candy, rather than as early modern moralists. In the opening sequence, a trio of actors dance on a long banquet table in the central reading room, alternately lifting each other and feeding each other rice paper “torn” from pages of books they hold. It’s a gorgeously ethereal scene, and more follow, punctuated by moments when the dialogue, however well deliv-

ered, is horribly banal. Each 50-person audience is split up into three groups and ushered into smaller spaces. There’s a particularly odd situation in the tiny card catalog room where Elizabeth Carena goes on an anthropological ramble about

WED, APR 10, 8pm • SIXTH & I

By turns fiery and reflective, this Danish acoustic trio (featuring Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen of the Danish String Quartet) blends Scandinavian folk music with classical accents and other global influences on violin, accordion, and cittern (a cousin of the mandolin).

SAT, MAR 23, 7pm & 9:30pm SIXTH & I The sitar virtuoso and cross-genre adventurer returns to her roots in North Indian classical music.

Special thanks: Galena-Yorktown Foundation; Honorary Patron: His Excellency Navtej Sarna, Ambassador of India

7pm LIMITED AVAILABILITY!

22 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

201 East Capitol St. SE. $60. (202) 544-7077. folger.edu.

DREAMERS’ CIRCUS

ANOUSHKA SHANKAR

PODCAST

how societies discover their values, and then distributes jelly beans via a game called “Keep or Share.” (My date and I kept, everyone else shared. Theater critics are hungry misers.)

Words and food are mashed up best in a sequence where Carena, standing once again on a table in the main reading room, delivers a monologue that consists entirely of edible animals and verbs for serving them—“barb that lobster,” “wing that partridge.” Less satisfying: Carena pondering aloud “When does a cow become beef? When does a pig become ham?” and then rolling a fellow actor—who throughout the show is portrayed as a sugar-hauling slave—onto a serving dish.

The final scene finds all 50 theatergoers seated at the long table after a courtly ritual, and presented with a sweet morsel from local pâtissiers to enjoy while a baroque arrangement of “Sugar, Sugar” plays from hidden speakers. It’s a moment to savor, and to convince theatergoers they should tour the Folger’s reading rooms soon, without immersive theater actors as guides.

CP Confection

TICKETS: WashingtonPerformingArts.org

(202) 785-9727

Special thanks: Galena-Yorktown Foundation; Honorary Patron: His Excellency Lars Gert Lose, Ambassador of Denmark

Every week City Paper reporters interview someone that helps tell the story of D.C. Subscribe at washingtoncitypaper.com/podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.

PODCAST

DUST IN THE WIND Death of a Rainmaker

By Laurie Loewenstein Kaylie Jones Books, 312 pages There’s an expecTaTion for mystery novels to exude atmosphere. Maybe that’s because of Dashiell Hammett’s cool and hard-edged San Francisco, Raymond Chandler’s lush and corrupt Los Angeles, or George Simenon’s lively Paris side streets and bistros. A city especially lends itself to the genre’s atmospheric requirements. Death of a Rainmaker, Columbia, Maryland-based writer Laurie Loewenstein’s new mystery novel, instead does the opposite: It expertly evokes the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression. Lacking the more typical urban pizazz, Loewenstein’s novel sometimes reads like a combination of a Western and a mystery. But that genre mishmash works.

“Not an iota of rain had dribbled into the parched mouth of Jackson County for 240 days,” Loewenstein tells us about the town of Vermillion, Oklahoma, where Temple Jennings is sheriff. Everything is dry as dust, and farmers are so desperate they fall for the snake oil of a rainmaker, who claims that a truck full of TNT can open the heavens. Before he has much of a chance to prove his claims, however, he turns up dead.

During Jennings’ investigation, life in the Dust Bowl goes on, which means, mostly, foreclosures. The sheriff dislikes participating on the bank’s side—“foreclosures sickened him”—but accepts it as part of his job.

His wife dislikes foreclosures even more, because she thinks the banks don’t play fair. Ev-

erywhere, farmers become destitute. Crops won’t grow. “Dunes rippled across the highway, as if the denuded land were trying to draw a blanket over its naked limbs,” Loewenstein writes.

In addition to dust, wandering hobos dot the landscape. They settle briefly at a homeless encampment called “the jungle,” just outside town. One teenage boy tells how he had to leave home because there were too many mouths to feed. The sheriff ’s wife, Etha, “had read about young men cast out, set loose because there were no jobs, no food.” The jungle’s inhabitants live in tents and makeshift lean-tos, while luckier vagabonds squat in abandoned sod houses. A step up from this are the boarders at the local rooming house.

The crime at the center of the novel occurs during the sheriff ’s re-election campaign, so he’s eager to wrap up the case in a speedy manner, to impress voters. He quickly pushes his investigation to a Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC, as the Roosevelt-era program was known) camp, filled with young, former vagabonds, now at work in the government program. The sheriff ’s deputy, Ed, a loyal former CCCer, admits that “some in the corps are nothing but young toughs.” Still, Ed believes “that a CCCer wouldn’t kill a man. Not when life was looking so much better for him.”

The CCCers live in barracks outside town under a nearly military discipline. Of the CCC boys, half “got told to leave home by their ma or pa—some nicely, some not—because the family couldn’t afford to feed them.” This program and the hope it instills in the young homeless characters wrap the story in a Depression ambiance.

The desiccated landscape hovers over everything. “In Oklahoma the palette was nothing but brown. Brown bridal trains of dust billowed behind tractors. Curtains turned from white to strong coffee. Folks spit river mud after a duster. Washes of beige, cinnamon and umber bled into the blue sky.” Loewenstein vividly describes enduring a dust storm, and how easy and fatal it is to be trapped in one.

She portrays the drought’s effect on everything from the price of stunted livestock at a foreclosure auction to the rising incidence of pneumonia caused by dust.

The novel alludes to farmers in some counties banding together against the banks. In Vermillion this does not occur, despite lots of grumbling, because the bank, like the sheriff, is seen as a pillar of local society. It would have been interesting to read more than a mention of one of these rebellions, when farmers refused to accept their dispossession meekly.

Death of a Rainmaker does portray a local effort to outsmart a foreclosure, and the sheriff, sympathetic to it, does not intervene. But it stops short of portraying any full-blown revolt against destitution, which would have added much to the story, since destitution is, after all, this compelling mystery’s encompassing environment.

—Eve Ottenberg

LA PALOMA

AT THE WALL adapted from

LA VERBENA DE LA PALOMA MARCH 23 & 30 at 8pm MARCH 24 & 31 at 2pm GALA HISPANIC THEATRE

Photo by Griselda san Martin

BOOKSSPEED READS

A story of struggle, survival, and hope at the border told in song, poetry, and dance - featuring music from the world famous zarzuela, traditional Mexican melodies and folk-dance.

WWW.INSERIES.ORG w 202 204-7763

[BATSHEVA] MODLIN ARTS PRESENTS

DANCE COMPANY

PERFORMING THE NEW WORK

VENEZUELA

SATURDAY MARCH 23 • 7:30PM

600 E. Grace St. Richmond, VA

Get tickets at etix.com or by phone at (800) 514-ETIX Presented in partnership with the E. Rhodes & Leona B. Carpenter Foundation

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 23

24 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

CITYLIST

3701 Mount Vernon Ave. Alexandria, VA • 703-549-7500

For entire schedule go to Birchmere.com Find us on Facebook/Twitter!

Tix @ Ticketmaster.com 800-745-3000

Mar 14

Music 25 Theater 30 Film 32

Music

15 16

CITY LIGHTS: FRIDAY

CLASSICAL

KENNEDY CENTER CONCERT HALL 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. National Symphony Orchestra: Baroque & Beyond. 11:30 a.m. $15–$89. kennedy-center.org.

24

COUNTRY

25

BARNS AT WOLF TRAP 1635 Trap Road, Vienna. (703) 255-1900. Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams. 8 p.m. $25–$30. wolftrap.org.

FUNK & R&B

FILLMORE SILVER SPRING 8656 Colesville Road, Silver Spring. (301) 960-9999. Ella Mai. 8 p.m. Sold out. fillmoresilverspring.com.

JAZZ

BLUES ALLEY 1073 Wisconsin Ave. NW. (202) 3374141. Eddie Palmieri. 8 p.m.; 10 p.m. $55–$60. bluesalley.com.

KENNEDY CENTER TERRACE THEATER 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Nicholas Payton. 7 p.m. $30– $40. kennedy-center.org.

MONTPELIER ARTS CENTER 9652 Muirkirk Road, Laurel. (301) 377-7800. Mark Wade Trio. 8 p.m. $25. arts.pgparks.com.

ROCK

9:30 CLUB 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. All Good Presents Mike Gordon. 8 p.m. $30. 930.com.

DC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Tokyo Police Club. 8 p.m. $25. dcnine.com.

THE HAMILTON 600 14th St. NW. (202) 787-1000. 19th Street Band. 10:30 p.m. Free. thehamiltondc.com.

U STREET MUSIC HALL 1115 U St. NW. (202) 588-1889.

Stella Donnelly. 7 p.m. $15. ustreetmusichall.com.

SATURDAY BLUES

BIRCHMERE 3701 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria.

(703) 549-7500. Tom Rush. 7:30 p.m. $45. birchmere. com.

CLASSICAL

KENNEDY CENTER CONCERT HALL 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. National Symphony Orchestra: Baroque & Beyond. 8 p.m. $15–$89. kennedy-center.org.

TODD SNIDER

Sally Fingerett, Debi Smith, Deirdre Flint, & Christine Lavin

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS COOLIDGE AUDITORIUM First Street and Independence Avenue SE. (202) 7075507. Ensemble Signal. 8 p.m. Free. loc.gov.

SONGBYRD MUSIC HOUSE AND RECORD CAFE 2477 18th St. NW. (202) 450-2917. Sean McConnell. 8 p.m. $12–$15. songbyrddc.com.

att akoa

Seen on WE THREE As“AGT”!

20 LUNASA 22 OHIO PLAYERS 23 THE FOUR BITCHIN' BABES

AMP BY STRATHMORE 11810 Grand Park Ave., North Bethesda. (301) 581-5100. Loston Harris. 8 p.m. $25– $40. ampbystrathmore.com.

FOLK

TOM RUSH NM

19

CABARET

HILL COUNTRY LIVE 410 7th St. NW. (202) 556-2050.

Wynchester. 9:30 p.m. Free. hillcountrywdc.com.

DEL & DAWG

(Del McCoury & David Grisman)

Reed Foehl Cash Cabin Sessions Vol. 3, Album Release Tour!

18

FRIDAY

BIRCHMERE 3701 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria.

(703) 549-7500. Del & Dawg. 7:30 p.m. $55. birchmere.com.

KINKY FRIEDMAN & DALE WATSON "Long Tales & Short Songs

THE MILLENNIUM TOUR

Check the schedules of your favorite music venues and you’re sure to find plenty of nostalgia, with artists celebrating anniversaries, playing classic albums front-to-back, and DJs dedicating nights to an entire decade. But what about nostalgia for a more specific experience, say, the prom afterparties and college bacchanals of a certain subset of millennials? For those who hit dancefloors and clubs in the first half of the aughts, there’s the appropriately named Millennium Tour, featuring the rap-and-R&B hitmakers who defined the era with syncopated beats, sing-along melodies, and oversexed lyricism. Leading the way is B2K (pictured), the Y2K-punning boy band of the new millennium that got us to “Bump, Bump, Bump” in the night, and Mario, the crooner who begged to “Let Me Love You.” Anyone alive in 2003 has a soft spot for Chingy’s party rap smashes “Right Thurr” and “Holidae In,” and who could forget sexplicit Miami rap group Pretty Ricky (“Grind With Me,” “Your Body”) and kings of crunk Ying Yang Twins (“Get Low,” “Salt Shaker”)? Celebrating just an album or a decade is for chumps—from now on, demand a concert that repackages the specific moments of your past. The show begins at 8 p.m. at EagleBank Arena, 4500 Patriot Circle, Fairfax. $79.50–$142.50. (703) 993-3000. eaglebankarena.com.

—Chris Kelly

THE RIPPINGTONS RUSSfeaturing FREEMAN 26 ROBERT EARL KEEN 27 DAVID ARCHULETA 28 BIG BAD VOODOO DADDY 29

COUNTRY

U STREET MUSIC HALL 1115 U St. NW. (202) 588-1889.

Maggie Rose. 6:30 p.m. $22. ustreetmusichall.com.

ELECTRONIC

BLACK CAT 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Michael Brun presents BAYO. 8 p.m. $15–$20. blackcatdc.com.

ECHOSTAGE 2135 Queens Chapel Road NE. (202) 503-2330. Tritonal. 9 p.m. $30. echostage.com.

SONGBYRD MUSIC HOUSE AND RECORD CAFE 2477 18th St. NW. (202) 450-2917. tsimba and Ives. 11 p.m. $10–$15. songbyrddc.com.

FOLK

BARNS AT WOLF TRAP 1635 Trap Road, Vienna. (703) 255-1900. Seamus Egan. 8 p.m. $22–$27. wolftrap. org.

HIP-HOP

SONGBYRD MUSIC HOUSE AND RECORD CAFE 2477 18th St. NW. (202) 450-2917. Lil Tracy. 8 p.m. $15–$50. songbyrddc.com.

JAZZ

BLUES ALLEY 1073 Wisconsin Ave. NW. (202) 3374141. Eddie Palmieri. 8 p.m.; 10 p.m. $55–$60. bluesalley.com.

SIXTH & I HISTORIC SYNAGOGUE 600 I St. NW. (202) 408-3100. Dr. Lonnie Smith Trio. 8 p.m. $42. sixthandi.org.

POP

KENNEDY CENTER ATRIUM 2700 F St. NW. (202) 4674600. Nate Smith and Van Hunt. 9 p.m. $29. kennedy-center.org.

ROCK

9:30 CLUB 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Teenage Fanclub. 8 p.m. $30. 930.com.

Mo' Fire

In Gratitude: Tribute to EWF and Motown & More!

30

HARMONY SWEEPSTAKES Mid-Atlantic Regionals 2019

31

National ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL TheReserve

Apr 5

An Evening with

DON McLEAN

9

BODEANS Nicholas David KEIKO MATSUI TAB BENOIT

11

LIZZ WRIGHT

6 7

LINCOLN THEATRE 1215 U St. NW. (202) 888-0050.

Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington. 4 p.m.; 8 p.m. $25– $65. thelincolndc.com.

JIM"Share BRICKMAN The Love"

12&13 14 18

SGGL & THE SHERPAS THE CHURCH

"Starfish" 30th Anniversary Tour

DC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Tokyo Police Club. 8 p.m. $25. dcnine.com.

FILLMORE SILVER SPRING 8656 Colesville Road, Silver Spring. (301) 960-9999. The Interrupters. 8 p.m. $24. fillmoresilverspring.com.

THE HAMILTON 600 14th St. NW. (202) 787-1000.

Barry & The Combustibles. 10:30 p.m. Free. thehamiltondc.com.

APRIL 2, 2019 - 8PM with Jon McLaughlin

TICKETS ON SALE NOW AT TICKETMASTER.COM/800-745-3000. presents

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 25

CITY LIGHTS: SATURDAY

GAY MEN’S CHORUS OF WASHINGTON: LET FREEDOM SING

March 24–April 7, 2019 Be a part of today’s art—and tomorrow’s transformation.

For a full listing of events, plug in at direct-current.org

Brooklyn Youth Chorus, Photo by Julienne Schaer

Provocative, innovative, electrifying performances

Highlights include:

Moon Medicin, Photo by Tim Trumble

Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company Analogy/Ambros: the Emigrant Photo by Andrew Jernigan

Gabriel Kahane—Book of Travelers - March 27

Du Yun—Where We Lost Our Shadows - March 31

Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company: Analogy Trilogy - March 28–30

Brooklyn Youth Chorus: “Silent Voices”: Lovestate

Mason Bates’s KC Jukebox: Chanticleer - April 2 Moon Medicin - April 4

April 1

Kennedy-Center.org/DIRECTCURRENT (202) 467-4600 Groups call (202) 416-8400

For all other ticket-related customer service inquiries, call the Advance Sales Box Office at (202) 416-8540

DIRECT CURRENT is presented as part of The Irene Pollin Audience Development and Community Engagement Initiatives.

26 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

The Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington will be singing Whitney Houston’s enduring queer anthem “I Wanna Dance With Somebody,” and that’s pretty much all you need to know. Let Freedom Sing is the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington’s exultant, multi-genre musical tribute to African-American culture and its impact on the LGBTQ+ community. From one of the oldest and largest LGBTQ+ chorales in the nation comes a medley of stories and songs that emphasizes the specifics of the black American experience as well as our common humanity. The GMCW will interpret artists like Prince, The Temptations, Duke Ellington, and writer Maya Angelou to create a concert of gorgeous harmonies and intertwined histories, uplifting the rhythms and tunes of jazz, gospel, R&B, and Broadway in shining euphony. The shows begin at 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. at The Lincoln Theatre, 1215 U St. NW. $25–$65. (202) 888-0050. thelincolndc.com.

—Amy Guay

CITY LIGHTS: SUNDAY

TRANSCENDENCE

Olivier Messiaen’s “Quartet for the End of Time” is the greatest chamber music work of the 20th century, arguably the century’s best classical work overall, and certainly its most dramatic composition story. Messiaen wrote the work in a German prisoner of war camp after the French composer, who had been drafted into the French army as a medic, was captured by the Nazis. There it debuted in 1941, Allied prisoners playing it with decaying instruments in the rain. The war marked a critical juncture in Messiaen’s music, which after his release took a turn to the abstract as well as incorporating Asian influences.

This piece reflects Messiaen’s two pre-war fixations—birds and Jesus—and is notable for its unusual quartet instrumentation: clarinet, violin, cello, and piano. The Chiarina Chamber Players will interpret this rarely performed work, which will be accompanied by Bartók and Pärt pieces, as well as a new documentary on Messiaen by D.C. filmmaker H. Paul Moon, debuting under far less dire circumstances than Messiaen experienced. The event begins at 6:30 p.m. at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 301 A St. SE. $10–$20. (202) 543-0053. stmarks.net.

—Mike Paarlberg

UNION STAGE 740 Water St. SW. (877) 987-6487. The Flesh Eaters. 8 p.m. $25–$50. unionstage.com.

SUNDAY CLASSICAL

MONTPELIER ARTS CENTER 9652 Muirkirk Road, Laurel. (301) 377-7800. The Axios Trio. 3 p.m. Free. arts.pgparks.com.

MUSIC CENTER AT STRATHMORE 5301 Tuckerman Lane, North Bethesda. (301) 581-5100. Maryland Classic Youth Orchestras of Strathmore's Philharmonic and Chamber Strings: Destino. 4:30 p.m.; 7:30 p.m. $15–$25. strathmore.org.

PHILLIPS COLLECTION 1600 21st St. NW. (202) 3872151. Pavel Haas Quartet. 4 p.m. $5–$45. phillipscollection.org.

GOSPEL

9:30 CLUB 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Jonathan McReynolds. 7 p.m. $20. 930.com.

JAZZ

BLUES ALLEY 1073 Wisconsin Ave. NW. (202) 3374141. Eddie Palmieri. 8 p.m.; 10 p.m. $55–$60. bluesalley.com.

POP

SONGBYRD MUSIC HOUSE AND RECORD CAFE 2477 18th St. NW. (202) 450-2917. Ten Fé. 8 p.m. $15. songbyrddc.com.

Merriweather Post Pavilion • Columbia, MD M3 ROCK FESTIVAL FEATURING

THIS WEEK’S SHOWS ALL GOOD PRESENTS

Mike Gordon ......................................................................................... F MAR 15 Teenage Fanclub w/ The Love Language .................................................. Sa 16

Whitesnake • Dokken with original members Don Dokken, George Lynch, and Mick Brown • Extreme • Warrant • Skid Row • Vince Neil • Kix and more! ............................................................................MAY 3-5 Single-Day Tickets On Sale Friday, March 15 at 10am.

For a full lineup and more info, visit M3rockfest.com

Slayer w/ Lamb of God • Amon Amarth • Cannibal Corpse ................................... MAY 14 Jason Aldean w/ Kane Brown • Carly Pearce • Dee Jay Silver ..................... MAY 17 DC101 KERFUFFLE FEATURING

MARCH

APRIL (cont.)

BENT:

ALL GOOD PRESENTS

Railroad Earth w/ Lindsay Lou Two-night passes available. ..F 22 & Sa 23 AN EVENING WITH

Nils Frahm .............................Su 24 TRILLECTRO PRESENTS

Lil Mosey w/ Polo G .................W 27 Failure & Swervedriver w/ Criminal Hygiene ..................Th 28

The New LGBTQ Dance Party Returns featuring Tezrah, Sippi, Lemz, Bratworst, Too Free (Live!), JJ202, Jacq Jill, DJ Abby, Diyanna Monet, and Hosted by Pussy Noir Late Show! 11:30pm Doors ...............Sa 6

Florence + The Machine * w/ Blood Orange ................................. JUNE 3 Brandi Carlile w/ Lucius ........................................................................ JUNE 14 Willie Nelson & Family and Alison Krauss w/ Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real ............................................................. JUNE 19 Jason Isbell and The 400 Unit & Father John Misty

Charlotte Gainsbourg ............M 8

Phish ........................................................................................................ JUNE 22 & 23 Thomas Rhett w/ Dustin Lynch • Russell Dickerson • Rhett Akins ............. JULY 18 Third Eye Blind & Jimmy Eat World * w/ Ra Ra Riot ..... JULY 19 Train/Goo Goo Dolls * w/ Allen Stone ...........................................AUGUST 9 Chris Stapleton * w/ Margo Price & The Marcus King Band ................ AUGUST 11 Heart* w/ Joan Jett and The Blackhearts & Elle King........................... AUGUST 13 The Smashing Pumpkins & Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds* w/ AFI ......... AUGUST 17 Beck & Cage the Elephant * w/ Spoon & Sunflower Bean . AUGUST 22 Pentatonix * w/ Rachel Platten ........................................................... AUGUST 26

STEEZ PROMO PRESENTS

Jai Wolf ....................................W 10 Ella Vos w/ Clara Mae ..............Th 11

D SHOW ADDED! FIRST SHOW SOLD OUT! SECON

U STREET MUSIC HALL PRESENTS

Big Wild w/ Robotaki & Mild Minds

ALL GOOD PRESENTS

Early Show! 6pm Doors ....................F 29

Turkuaz w/ Aqueous .................F 12

STEEZ PROMO PRESENTS

AEG PRESENTS

Adam Conover- Mind Parasite LIVE

Boogie T.rio w/ Mersiv & Vampa ...................Sa 30

Early Show! 6pm Doors ..................Sa 13 U STREET MUSIC HALL PRESENTS

Droeloe w/ FYTCH • DUSKUS • TAILS

APRIL

Let’s Eat Grandma ..................M 1

Late Show! 10pm Doors ..................Sa 13

BASS NATION PRESENTS

Bad Suns w/ Carlie Hanson ......M 15

Getter ........................................Tu 2 Patty Griffin w/ Ruston Kelly ....W 3 Emily King w/ Jennah Bell ........Th 4

ALL GOOD PRESENTS

The Claypool Lennon Delirium w/ Uni .........................................W 17

The Infamous Stringdusters w/ Jon Stickley Trio .......................F 5

Foals w/ Preoccupations & Omni .........Th 18

ALL GOOD PRESENTS

ALL GOOD PRESENTS AN EVENING WITH

Lotus .............................F 19 & Sa 20 Tom Odell w/ Lucie Silvas Early Show! 6pm Doors ....................Sa 20

Beats Antique w/ Axel Thesleff

Early Show! 7pm Doors .....................Sa 6

MANY MORE SHOWS ON SALE!

930.com

The best thing you could possibly put in your mouth Cupcakes by BUZZ... your neighborhood bakery in Alexandria, VA. | www.buzzonslaters.com

9:30 CLUB PRESENTS AT U STREET MUSIC HALL

Stella Donnelly w/ Faye Webster ................... F MAR 15 Maggie Rose w/ Them Vibes .........Sa 16 Token w/ Kur .............................Tu 19 Mansionair w/ Beacon .................W 20

w/ Jade Bird ............................................................................................................ JUNE 21

The Chrysalis at Merriweather Park

LORD HURON w/ Bully ....................................................................... JULY 23 Ticketmaster • For full lineup & more info, visit merriweathermusic.com • impconcerts.com *Presented by Live Nation

SECOND NIGHT ADDED!

ALL GOOD PRESENTS

9:30 CUPCAKES

Greta Van Fleet • Young The Giant • The Revivalists • Tom Morello • SHAED • THE Blue Stones ................................................. MAY 19

The Comet Is Coming w/ Raindeer ................................Th 21 The Barr Brothers w/ La Force ...Sa 23 Shing02 & The Chee-Hoos: A Tribute to Nujabes w/ Substantial..Tu 26

Capital One Arena • Washington, D.C.

MUSE w/ SWMRS................................................................................................. APRIL 2 Ticketmaster

Lincoln Theatre • 1215 U Street, NW Washington, D.C.

Whindersson Nunes .......... MAR 23 Meow Meow + Thomas Lauderdale (of Pink Martini) .............................. MAR 25 Spiritualized ............................APR 16 Citizen Cope .............................APR 17 D NIGHT ADDED! FIRST NIGHT SOLD OUT! SECON

Imogen Heap with special guest Guy Sigsworth of Frou Frou ............... MAY 4

Josh Ritter & The Royal City Band w/ Penny & Sparrow ............MAY 17 Yann Tiersen (Solo In Concert) .........................MAY 24 AN EVENING WITH

Apocalyptica Plays Metallica By Four Cellos Tour .MAY 28

AN EVENING WITH

Glen Hansard ...........................JUN 3 AEG PRESENTS

Bianca Del Rio JOHNNYSWIM .........................MAY 15 It’s Jester Joke ........................ OCT 18 • thelincolndc.com • U Street (Green/Yellow) stop across the street!

• Buy advance tickets at the 9:30 Club box office • 930.com

TICKETS for 9:30 Club shows are available through TicketFly.com, by phone at 1-877-4FLY-TIX, and at the 9:30 Club box office.

9:30 CLUB BOX OFFICE HOURS are 12-7pm on weekdays & until 11pm on show nights, 6-11pm on Sat, and 6-10:30pm on Sun on show nights.

HAPPY HOUR DRINK PRICES impconcerts.com AFTER THE SHOW AT THE BACK BAR!

PARKING: THE OFFICIAL 9:30 parking lot entrance is on 9th Street, directly behind the 9:30 Club. Buy your advance parking tickets at the same time as your concert tickets!

930.com washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 27

CITY LIGHTS: MONDAY

ALL WORK, NO PAY: A HISTORY OF WOMEN’S INVISIBLE LABOR

Photo by Scott Suchman

Regret is the most heartbreaking tragedy of all.

Eugene Onegin

March 9–29 | Opera House Music and libretto by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Based on the novel by Alexander Pushkin Sung in Russian with projected English titles. Casting available at Kennedy-Center.org/wno

Kennedy-Center.org (202) 467-4600

Major support for WNO is provided by Jacqueline Badger Mars.

Groups call (202) 416-8400 For all other ticket-related customer service inquiries, call the Advance Sales Box Office at (202) 416-8540 WNO’s Presenting Sponsor

David M. Rubenstein is the Presenting Underwriter of WNO. WNO acknowledges the longstanding generosity of Life Chairman Mrs. Eugene B. Casey.

Additional support for Eugene Onegin is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts.

28 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

Though there has been progress for women in the paid labor force, women are still overwhelmingly expected to be responsible for the never-ending unpaid work at home. This is the theme of the National Museum of American History’s new display, All Work, No Pay: A History of Women’s Invisible Labor. The display, which is part of the Smithsonian’s American Women’s History Initiative, #BecauseOfHerStory, showcases domestic work outfits and objects from colonial America to the 1990s—like aprons, house dresses, irons, and buttons from the 1970s Wages for Housework movement. All Work, No Pay unites working women throughout time, explains all facets of the gender pay gap, and gets to the heart of the implied expectation that women will take care of the household. What better way is there to celebrate Women’s History Month than to learn about women’s hard labor? Toward the end of the exhibition is a wall of quotes, and one stands out: Silvia Federici, in 1975, said, “They say it is love. We say it is unwaged work.” The exhibition is on view to Feb. 2020 at the National Museum of American History, 14th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. Free. (202) 633-1000. americanhistory.si.edu.

—Abigail Cruz

ROCK

Arts Vocal Music Department. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org.

WORLD

WEDNESDAY

DAR CONSTITUTION HALL 1776 D St. NW. (202) 6284780. Roberto Carlos. 7 p.m. $59–$199. dar.org.

GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY CENTER FOR THE ARTS 4373 Mason Pond Drive, Fairfax. (888) 9452468. Danú. 7 p.m. $30–$50. cfa.gmu.edu.

MONDAY COUNTRY

BIRCHMERE 3701 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria.

(703) 549-7500. Todd Snider. 7:30 p.m. $29.50. birchmere.com.

POP

SONGBYRD MUSIC HOUSE AND RECORD CAFE 2477 18th St. NW. (202) 450-2917. Tender. 8 p.m. $12–$14. songbyrddc.com.

ROCK

UNION STAGE 740 Water St. SW. (877) 987-6487.

CHAI. 7:30 p.m. $15. unionstage.com.

TUESDAY FOLK

SONGBYRD MUSIC HOUSE AND RECORD CAFE 2477 18th St. NW. (202) 450-2917. J.S. Ondara. 8 p.m. $12. songbyrddc.com.

HIP-HOP

THE ANTHEM 901 Wharf St. SW. (202) 888-0020.

Massive Attack. 8 p.m. $55–$95. theanthemdc.com.

JAZZ BLUES ALLEY 1073 Wisconsin Ave. NW. (202) 3374141. Spencer Day. 8 p.m.; 10 p.m. $25. bluesalley.com.

POP U STREET MUSIC HALL 1115 U St. NW. (202) 588-1889.

Mansionair. 7 p.m. $15. ustreetmusichall.com.

ROCK LINCOLN THEATRE 1215 U St. NW. (202) 888-0050.

José González & The String Theory. 8 p.m. $45. thelincolndc.com.

THURSDAY CLASSICAL

KENNEDY CENTER TERRACE THEATER 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Benjamin Beilman. 7:30 p.m. $45. kennedy-center.org.

COUNTRY

HIP-HOP

U STREET MUSIC HALL 1115 U St. NW. (202) 588-1889.

Token. 7 p.m. $15. ustreetmusichall.com.

FILLMORE SILVER SPRING 8656 Colesville Road, Silver Spring. (301) 960-9999. Walker Hayes. 8 p.m. $20–$81. fillmoresilverspring.com.

VOCAL

FOLK

KENNEDY CENTER MILLENNIUM STAGE 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Duke Ellington School of the

UNION STAGE 740 Water St. SW. (877) 987-6487. Josh Garrels. 8 p.m. $25–$50. unionstage.com.

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 29

CITY LIGHTS: TUESDAY

PANGAEA

SATURDAY, MARCH 23, 7 p.m.

“FAST-PACED and FUN.”

Linette Tobin’s devilish smile makes it hard not to believe in her utopian visions. Like her music, the Pangaea frontwoman (pictured) and percussionist is difficult to peg.

Vivid, buoyant, and a bit unpredictable, the band’s emotionally rich melodies provide a gracious sampling of cross-cultural elements. Tobin, an immigration lawyer turned conga extraordinaire, formed Pangaea to celebrate pluralism. The group’s music and performances often feature songs in a minimum of four languages, with sound clips, like the pouring of water, and spoken word interludes. Pangaea’s Latin, Afro-Cuban, and West African influences reflect a desire to traverse the world’s spaces. Tobin’s project embodies the ideals of romanticism: the return to nature, the pursuit of diversity, the quest for creative self-actualization, and most intensely, in philosopher Isaiah Berlin’s words, a “new and restless spirit.”

Today, softness is often considered a form of subversion. And Pangaea’s unapologetic innocence is a refreshing subversion to encounter. Pangaea perform at 9 p.m. at Songbyrd Music House, 2477 18th St. NW. $7 suggested donation. (202) 450-2917. songbyrddc.com.

—Tori Nagudi

“DYNAMIC...a breath of fresh air.”

HIP-HOP

GMU Jazz Fest George Mason University Harris Theatre 4400 University Drive Fairfax, Va.

City Paper 1-6 DB horizontal 2-23.indd 1

2/22/2019 14:15:26

“A MARVEL and A DELIGHT.”

–MD Theatre Guide

–DC Metro Theater Arts

–BroadwayWorld

“CHARMING.”

THE ANTHEM 901 Wharf St. SW. (202) 888-0020.

Meek Mill. 8 p.m. $49.50–$73. theanthemdc.com.

POP

THE HAMILTON 600 14th St. NW. (202) 787-1000. Kat Edmonson. 7:30 p.m. $19.75–$49.75. thehamiltondc.com.

–Talkin’ Broadway

ROCK

9:30 CLUB 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Jungle. 7 p.m. $25. 930.com.

ROCK & ROLL HOTEL 1353 H St. NE. (202) 388-7625.

Anvil. 7 p.m. $15–$20. rockandrollhoteldc.com.

U STREET MUSIC HALL 1115 U St. NW. (202) 588-1889.

The Comet Is Coming. 7 p.m. $15. ustreetmusichall.com.

Vanity Fair

By KATE

HAMILL

Based on the novel by William Makepeace Thackeray

Directed by JESSICA

STONE

Photo of the cast of Vanity Fair by Scott Suchman.

NOW PLAYING S u p p o r t by S h a re F u n d .

ORDER TODAY! ShakespeareTheatre.org 202.547.1122

Re st a u ra n t Pa r t n e r :

30 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

Theater

BLOOD AT THE ROOT Inspired by the tensions and protests surrounding the 2006 Jena Six case in Louisiana, Blood at the Root centers a fictional Black student who occupies a traditionally white space and inadvertently triggers hateful violence in her community. Anacostia Playhouse. 2020 Shannon Place SE. To March 24. $30–$40. (202) 290-2328. anacostiaplayhouse.com.

THE DOYLE AND DEBBIE SHOW A musical by Bruce Arntson, The Doyle and Debbie Show is a parodic send-up of country music’s tradition of iconic duos and their battle of the sexes. DC Arts Center.

2438 18th St. NW. To March 30. $50. (202) 462-7833. dcartscenter.org.

HANDS ON A HARDBODY Hands on a Hardbody adapts the acclaimed 1997 documentary of the same name to chronicle a contest in which ten Texans compete to keep one hand on a brand-new truck in order to win it. The production combines hope and humor, and showcases Western society's unwavering, sometimes unnerving, resolve to achieve the American Dream. Keegan Theatre. 1742 Church St. NW. To

April 6. $20–$62. (202) 265-3767. keegantheatre.com.

INTO THE WOODS Stephen Sondheim’s Tony-winning musical is a blackly comic medley of well-known fairy tale characters like Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, and Jack (of the Beanstalk). At the heart of the story is The Baker and his Wife, their quest to reverse a witch’s curse and have a child of their own the driving force behind this twisted tale of wish fulfillment and the relationship between parents and children.

Ford’s Theatre. 511 10th St. NW. To May 22. $27–$81.

(202) 347-4833. fords.org.

JQA Written by award-winning playwright Aaron Posner and the recipient of the Edgerton Foundation New Play Award, JQA imagines the confrontations between the intelligent, eloquent, and fiery sixth President of the United States and a collection of America’s most influential figures including George Washington, Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and John Adams. Arena Stage. 1101 6th St. SW. To April 14. $92–$115. (202) 488-3300. arenastage.org.

QUEEN OF BASEL Strindberg’s Miss Julie mixed with the hedonistic excess of Miami’s Art Basel, Queen of Basel sees recently humiliated Julie hiding in the kitchen of her father’s hotel. Studio Theatre. 1501 14th St. NW. To April 7. $20–$90. (202) 332-3300. studiotheatre.org.

RESOLVING HEDDA A reimagining of Ibsen’s classic, this Hedda refuses to play along with her daily, prescribed death at the end of each performance. What follows is a “boisterously funny” (according to the LA Times) romp. Washington Stage Guild at Undercroft Theatre. 900 Massachusetts Ave. NW. To April 14. $25–$60. (240) 582-0050. stageguild.org.

VAMPIRE COWBOY TRILOGY This live comic book anthology of three comedies skewers three genres: hard-boiled crime fiction, the war story, and monster fantasy. DC Arts Center. 2438 18th St. NW. To March 30. $50. (202) 462-7833. dcartscenter.org.

VANITY FAIR From The Wall Street Journal’s 2017 Playwright of the Year comes an irreverent dance hall pageant that stars two complicated and vivacious women. Becky Sharp and her friend Amelia climb social ladders and test fate to reclaim and reshape their destinies. Shakespeare Theatre Company Studios. 610 F Street NW. To March 31. $44–$118. 202547-1122. shakespearetheatre.org.

Say What?!

Friday Night with Reese Waters

March 28–30 Eisenhower Theater

3 unique programs over 3 nights

featuring Nore Davis

Analogy/Lance: Pretty aka the Escape Artist

Dora: Tramontane (March 28 at 8 p.m.)

Based on an oral history that Jones conducted with his mother-in-law, a French Jewish nurse and social worker, the work tells her story of survival during World War II.

Lance: Pretty aka the Escape Artist (March 29 at 8 p.m.)

Friday, March 22 at 9 p.m. | KC Jazz Club Reese Waters, comedian, DC native, and host of Get Up DC! on WUSA 9, curates a new comedy series in the KC Jazz Club. On the fourth Friday of every month, Reese will headline and present an evening of stand-up comedy and intimate conversations with his friends from the comedy community. Yannis Pappas guest stars on April 26.

Kennedy-Center.org (202) 467-4600

Groups call (202) 416-8400 For all other ticket-related customer service inquiries, call the Advance Sales Box Office at (202) 416-8540

Jones shares the emotional struggle and hardships that his nephew Lance faced in the underworld of the late ’80s and early ’90s club culture and sex trade.

Ambros: The Emigrant (March 30 at 8 p.m.)

Inspired by W.G. Seblad’s historical novel The Emigrant, Jones creates a fictionalized narrative for the character Ambros Adelwarth to explore the impact of trauma on the psyche.

Kennedy-Center.org (202) 467-4600

Groups call (202) 416-8400 For all other ticket-related customer service inquiries, call the Advance Sales Box Office at (202) 416-8540

PART OF

Comedy at the Kennedy Center Presenting Sponsor

VISIT KENNEDY-CENTER.ORG/DIRECTCURRENT

This event is part of The Human Journey, a collaboration between the Kennedy Center, National Geographic Society, and the National Gallery of Art. To learn more visit Kennedy-Center.org/festivals/human-journey

DIRECT CURRENT is presented as part of The Irene Pollin Audience Development and Community Engagement Initiatives.

washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 31

CITY LIGHTS: WEDNESDAY

MANSIONAIR

Colonel Don Schofield, Commander and Conductor

9

FREE CONCERT!

Rachel M. Schlesinger Concert Hall and Arts Center Northern Virginia Community College Alexandria Campus

MARCH 22 AT 8 P.M.

RANDY BRECKER jazz trumpeter extraordinaire for FREE tickets, please visit: www.usafband.eventbrite.com

take your wine to-g0 with growlers & retail wine!

RESTAURANT | BAR | MUSIC VENUE | FULLY FUNCTIONING WINERY | EVENT SPACE

* BECOME A CITY WINERY VINOFILE MEMBER *

EXCLUSIVE PRESALE ACCESS, WAIVED SERVICE FEES, complimentary valet & MORE! MAR 14

MAR 14

MAR 15

MAR 17

MAR 17

Crystal Bowersox

Wylder, Strong Water, Eli Lev & The Fortunes Found in the wine garden

“A Celebration of Rory Gallagher feat. Davy Knowles, Gerry McAvoy, Ted McKenna”

Band of Friends

The Mundial Band: Maná vs.

Hombres G

Rare Essence

MAR 20

MAR 22

MAR 22

MAR 23

MAR 18

in the wine garden

Luther Dickinson, Amy Helm and Birds of Chicago present

Sisters of the Strawberry Moon

Scott H. Biram, The God Damn Gallows

Luther Dickinson, Amy Helm & Birds of Chicago

Anders Osborne Solo

The Currys CD release

in the wine garden

(2 shows!)

“This Side of the Glass” w/ special guest: Matthew Fowler in the wine garden

ft. members of The Band & The Levon Helm Band, Kerri Powers

MAR 24

MAR 24

MAR 25

MAR 25

MAR 26

Blind Boys of Alabama

Mary Gauthier

Jimmy Vivino & Bob Margolin Just 2 Guitars and 200 Stories

Briclyn Ent. Presents

Emmanuel Withers

w/ Special Guest Amy Black

19th Annual

at

w/ Jaimee Harris in the wine garden

DOWNTOWN SEDER

BEFORE PASSOVER CITY WINERY DC • APRIL 7 (12 DAYS ACTUALLY STARTS)

in the wine garden

A Tribute to Nina Simone

ft. michelle d. bennett

The Weight Band

FEAT. 16 SPECIAL GUESTS INCLUDING DAVID BROZA, JILL SOBULE, GAY MEN’S CHORUS OF WASHINGTON DC, BETTY, JUDY GOLD, & MORE!

1350 OKIE ST NE, WASHINGTON DC | CITYWINERY.COM/WASHINGTONDC | (202) 250-2531

32 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

CITY LIGHTS: THURSDAY

THE REDRESS PROJECT

www.usafband.af.mil VALET & SECURE PARKING aVAILABLE

The ethereal, multi-layered synthpop sounds of Australian trio Mansionair are almost as soothing as the lyrics that accompany them. On “Astronaut (Something About Your Love),” lead singer Jack Froggatt sings, “Right now, I’m feeling like an astronaut. I fade into the thought of coming back to you.” His falsetto shines on the slowed-down song “Easier,” with the refrain, “Tell me it gets easier, that I’ll figure it out.” The words are powerful in their simplicity, describing emotions to which we can all relate. That collective feeling permeates their live shows, where guitarist Lachlan Bostock and drummer Alex Nicholls join Froggatt on stage. “Easier” verges into sounding like a melodic future bass track, a pattern that shows up consistently in their music, like in the track “Wake Up Call,” a 2018 partnership with DJ and producer Manila Killa. Mansionair perform at 7 p.m. at U Street Music Hall, 1115 U St. NW. $15. (202) 588-1889. ustreetmusichall.com.

—Avery J.C. Kleinman

Stunning red dresses sway just outside of the National Museum of the American Indian. The dresses are part of The REDress Project, an installation from Métis artist Jaime Black showing in the U.S. for the first time. Black’s installation, created in 2011, was designed to raise the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women through the hanging of red dresses—collected from community donations—in public spaces.

The racialized, gendered violence against Indigenous women, particularly in the U.S. and Canada, has been recognized as a crisis and yet there remains little awareness of the issue. This Thursday, in concurrence with the installation, NMAI will host a symposium from 2 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. called Safety for Our Sisters: Ending Violence Against Native Women, where speakers will explore the causes and effects of abuses Native women suffer, including disproportionately high rates of domestic violence, rape, and stranger attacks. The panel features an assemblance of Indigenous women—lawyer and professor Sarah Deer, law partner Mary Kathryn Nagle, advocate and board chair of the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center Cherrah Giles, student and Save Our Sisters walk creator Marita Growing Thunder, and installation artist Jaime Black. As Washington Post reporter Sari Horwitz moderates, these women will keep up the fight for the survival of their sisters. The exhibition is on view to March 31 at the National Museum of the American Indian, 4th Street and Independence Avenue SW. Free. (202) 633-1000. americanindian.si.edu.

—Kayla Randall

Film

CAPTIVE STATE Years after an alien occupation in Chicago, humans deal with the fallout. Starring Vera Farmiga, Machine Gun Kelly and John Goodman. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) FIVE FEET APART Teenagers with the same lifethreatening illness fall in love at the hospital. Haley Lu Richardson, Cole Sprouse, and Claire Forlani. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information)

GLORIA BELL Julianne Moore stars as a carefree woman looking for love in the Los Angeles dance club scene. Co-starring Alanna Ubach and Sean Astin.

(See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) THE MUSTANG Matthias Schoenaerts stars as a prisoner who must help train wild mustangs. Co-starring Jason Mitchell and Bruce Dern. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) WONDER PARK A creative girl named June finds her imagination coming to life at a grand amusement park. Starring Sofia Mali, Jennifer Garner, and Ken Hudson Campbell. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information)

SAVAGELOVE My grandfather was a pillar of the community and beloved by his family. He was also sexually abusive. He died when I was a child. I remember only one incident happening to me—during a cuddle session, he encouraged me to put my mouth on his penis, and then told me to let it be our little secret. I heard rumors as an adult that he molested other kids in the neighborhood. He also had a sexual relationship with my mother.

She says nothing happened as a child. But as an adult, he started telling her he loved her in a romantic way. He told her he wanted to take nude Polaroids of her, and she let him. And she loved him—she and her sisters all pretty much idolized him. My one aunt knew (she said nothing happened to her), and I asked her how she reconciled that. She said she compartmentalized it—she thought he was a wonderful father and didn’t really think about the other stuff. I did lots of therapy in the late 1980s and early ’90s. I read books, I journaled, I talked to my mom and tried to understand what she experienced. And I moved on as much as anyone could. So now it’s 2019 and I’m almost 50. My mom just moved into a nursing home, and while cleaning out her drawers, I found the Polaroids my grandfather took of her.

I know it was him because he is in some of them, taken into a mirror as she goes down on him. They were taken over a period of years. She had led me to believe he never really did anything sexual with her besides taking photos. But he did. And here’s the thing, Dan: In the photos, she looks happy.

I know she was probably acting, because that’s what he wanted from her. But it just makes me question my assumptions. Was it terrible abuse or forbidden love? Both? What am I looking at?

What would I prefer—that she enjoyed it or that she didn’t? She kept the photos. Were they fond memories? I know she loved him. She kind of fell apart when he died. Was he a fucking manipulator who had a gift for making his victims feel loved and special as he exploited them for his own selfish needs? I don’t know if I’m going to bring this up with my mom. She’s old and sick, and I dragged her through these types of conversations in my 20s. So I’m writing you. This is so far out of most people’s experience, and I want someone who has heard more sexual secrets than probably anyone else in the world to tell me what he thinks.

—Whirlwind Of Emotions I think you should sit down and watch all four hours of Leaving Neverland, the new HBO documentary by British filmmaker Dan Reed. It focuses on the experiences of Wade Robson and James Safechuck, two now-adult men who were sexually abused by pop star Michael Jackson when they were boys. Allegedly. It’s an important film to watch, WOE, but it’s not an easy one to watch, as it includes graphic descriptions of the sexual abuse both men claim to have suffered as boys.

The second most disturbing part of the film, after the graphic descriptions of child rape—or the third most disturbing part after the credulity/culpability of Robson’s and Safechuck’s parents—may be what the men have to say about Jackson. Both describe their abuser in romantic terms. They both say they loved Jackson.

And they both remain deeply conflicted about their feelings for Jackson then and their feelings for him now. It was their affection for Jackson—their desire to protect him and to safeguard what Jackson convinced them was a secret and a bond they shared—that led both men to lie to law enforcement officials when Jackson was accused of sexually abusing different boys.

You should also listen to Reed’s interview on The Gist, Mike Pesca’s terrific daily podcast.

Reading your letter the morning after I watched Leaving Neverland reminded me of something Reed said to Pesca: “What the film is about is the reckoning. It’s two families coming to terms with what happened to their sons. And a big part of understanding that, you know— so why the silence? Why did the sons keep silent for so long? Why did they keep the secret?

And the key really is to be able to explain why Wade gave false witness and perjured himself on the witness stand. And the reason for that, of course, has to do with how survivors of sexual abuse experience that. And how they keep a secret and how they sometimes form deep attachments with the abuser and how that attachment persists into adult life.”

By telling the truth, you’re shattering the silence that allowed an abuser to groom and prey on children across multiple generations of your family.

Your mother, like Robson and Safechuck, lied to protect her abuser, a man who abused her and abused you and probably many others. She may have held on to those photos for the same reason Robson and Safechuck say they defended Jackson: She loved her father, and she was so damaged by what he did to her—she had been so expertly groomed by her abuser—that she felt “loved” and “special” in the same way that Jackson’s alleged abuse once made Robson and Safechuck feel loved and special. So as horrifying as it is to contemplate, WOE, your mother may have held on to those photos because they do repre-

sent what are, for her, “fond memories.” And while it would be a comfort to think she held on to those photos as proof for family members who doubted her story if she ever decided to tell the truth, her past defenses of her father work against that explanation.

Leaving Neverland demonstrates that sexual abuse plants a ticking time bomb inside a person—shit, sorry, no passive language. Leaving Neverland demonstrates that sexual predators like your grandfather and like Jackson—fucking manipulators with a gift for making their victims feel loved and special—plant ticking time bombs in their victims. Even if a victim doesn’t initially experience their abuse as a violation and as violence, WOE, a reckoning almost inevitably comes. One day, the full horror of what was done to them snaps into focus.

These reckonings can shatter lives, relationships, and souls.

It doesn’t sound like your mother ever had her reckoning—that day never came for her— and so she never came to grips with what was done to her and, tragically, what was done to you. And your aunt wasn’t the only member of your family who “didn’t really think about the other stuff.” Just as denial and compartmentalization enabled Jackson and facilitated his crimes (and allowed the world to enjoy Jackson’s music despite what was staring us all in the face), denial and compartmentalization allowed your “pillar of the community” grandfather to rape his daughter, his granddaughter, and scores of other children. Like Robson and Safechuck, WOE, you have a right to be angry with the adults in your family who failed to protect you from a known predator. That some of them were also his victims provides context, but it does not exonerate them.

I’m glad your grandfather died when you were young. It’s tempting to wish he’d never been born, WOE, but then you would never have been born, and I’m glad you’re here. I’m particularly glad you’re there, right now, embedded in your damaged and damaging family. By telling the truth, you’re shattering the silence that allowed an abuser to groom and prey on children across multiple generations of your family. Your grandfather can’t victimize anyone else, WOE, but by speaking up—by refusing to look the other way—you’ve made it harder for other predators to get away with what your grandfather did.

P.S. There’s a moment in the credits for Leaving Neverland that I think you might want to replicate. It involves some things one of Jackson’s alleged victims saved and a fire pit.

You’ll know what I mean when you see it.

—Dan Savage Email your Savage Love questions to mail@savagelove.net.

LIVE MUSIC | BOURBON | BURGERS

MARCH TH 14 BLUES SPEAKEASY NIGHT AT THE WHARF FEATURING MOONSHINE SOCIETY FR 15 ALL GOOD PRESENTS ANDY FRASCO & THE U.N. w/ WILD ADRIATIC SA 16 ST. PATRICK’S DAY CELEBRATION FEATURING ICEWAGON FLU SU 17 JORDAN BROOKER TH 21 THE JACOB JOLLIFF BAND (OF YONDER MOUNTAIN STRING BAND) FR 22 AN EVENING WITH THE NIGHTHAWKS SA 23 FLASHBAND PRESENTED BY 7DRUMCITY SU 24 SOUTHWEST SOUL SESSIONS w/ ELIJAH BALBED & ISABELLE DE LEON TU 26 SMITHSONIAN FOLKWAY PRESENTS AN EVENING WITH LULA WILES WE 27 MIKE AND THE MOONPIES w/WHISKEY REVIVAL FR 29 NAH. ALBUM REALEASE! w/THE DUSKWHALES, SKAII SA 30 CHOPTEETH SU 31 LILLY HIATT w/KAREN JONAS

APRIL TH 4

THE REVELERS

FR 5

VACATION MANOR w/ BRISTON MARONEY

SA 6

NEW ORLEAN FUNK & SOUL NIGHT FEATURING FUNKY MIRACLE

SU 7

JOURNEYMAN (ERIC CLAPTON TRIBUTE)

TH 11 FEELFREE ROOTS OF A REBELLION w/ SHAMANS OF SOUND

pearlstreetwarehouse.com

FOLLOW US @PEARLSTREETLIVE 33 PEARL ST SW DC •THE WHARF washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 33

filed with the Register of Wills, D.C., 515 5th Street, N.W., Building Adult . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 SUPERIOR COURT A, 3rd Floor, WashingOF THE DISTRICT OF ton, . D.C. or Auto/Wheels/Boat . . . .20001, . . . . .on . 42 COLUMBIA before September 14, Buy, Sell, Trade . . 2019. . . . . Claims . . . . . against . . . . . . .

PROBATE DIVISION 2019 ADM 000135 Marketplace . . . . the . . .decedent . . . . . . shall . . . .be42 Name of Decedent, Marpresented to the undergery Rosemary Gam- . . . . . signed Community . . . . .with . . . a . copy . . . . to42 brell. Name and Address the Register of Wills or Employment . . . . to . .the . . .Register . . . . . of . . Wills . 42 of Attorney, John W. Thomas, Lange, Thomas with a copy to the unHealth/Mind . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . & Assoc, LLP, 6849 Old dersigned, on or before Dominion Drive, Suite . . . September Body & Spirit . . . . . . . . .14, . . .2019, . . 42 225, McLean, VA 22101. or be forever barred. . . . . . .believed . . . . . .to . be 42 NoticeHousing/Rentals of Appointment, Persons Notice to Creditors and heirs or legatees of the Legal Notices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

42 Notice to Unknown decedent who do not Heirs,Music/Music Ruth Trevarrow, Row . receive . . . . a . .copy . . . of . .this . 42 whose address is 1789 notice by mail within 25 . . .#43, . . . . . . . days . . . .of . its . . publication . . . . . . 42 LanierPets Place, .NW, Washington, DC 20009 shall so inform the RegReal Estate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 was appointed Personal ister of Wills, including Representative the Shared of Housing . name, . . . . .address . . . . . and . . . re42 estate of Margery Roselationship. Date of first . . . . . publication: . . . . . . . . 3/14/2019 . . . . . 42 mary Services .

Gambrell who . .died on October 24, 2018, Name of Newspaper with a Will and will serve and/or periodical: with Court Supervision.

Washington City Paper/ All unknown heirs and Daily Washington Law heirs whose whereReporter abouts are unknown Name of Personal shall enter their appearRepresentative: Patricia ance in this proceedAnn Bush ing. Objections to such TRUE TEST copy appointment shall be Anne Meister

Contents:

Search classifieds at washingtoncitypaper.com

Classified Ads Print & Web Classified Packages may be placed on our Web site, by fax, mail, phone, or in person at our office: 734 15th Street, NW Suite 400 Washington, D.C. 20005 Commercial Ads rates start at $20 for up to 6 lines in print and online; additional print lines start at $2.50/ line (vary by section). Your print ad placement plus up to 10 photos online. Premium options available for both print and web may vary.

Register of Wills Adult 14, Phone Pub Dates: March Entertainment 21, 28.

Livelinks HICAPS- Chat andLines. its Flirt, chat and date! Talk toaffiliates sexy real singles controlled in your area. Call now! (844) propose to construct a 359-5773 206-foot-tall communications lattice tower Legals in the vicinity of 12750 Layhill Road, Silver GIVEN NOTICE IS HEREBY Spring, Maryland. Public THAT: comments regarding poTRAVISA OUTSOURCING, INC. (DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA DEtential effects from this PARTMENT OF CONSUMER site on historic properAND REGULATORY AFFAIRS ties may be submitted FILE HAS withinNUMBER 30 days271941) from the DISSOLVED EFFECTIVE NOVEMdate of this publication BER 27, 2017 AND HAS FILED to: Geo-Technology As-OF ARTICLES OF DISSOLUTION sociates, Inc., ATTN: CORMs. DOMESTIC FOR-PROFIT Shiehan Chou, 14280 PORATION WITH THE DISTRICT Park Center CORPORATIONS Drive, Suite OF COLUMBIA DIVISION A, Laurel, Maryland 20707 or submitted by Atelephone CLAIM AGAINST TRAVISA to Ms. Chou OUTSOURCING, INC. MUST at 410-792-9446.

INCLUDE THE NAME OF THE DISSOLVED CORPORATION, SUPERIOR INCLUDE THE COURT NAME OF THE OF THE DISTRICT OF CLAIMANT, INCLUDE A SUMMACOLUMBIA RY OF THE FACTS SUPPORTING PROBATE DIVISION THE CLAIM, AND BE MAILED TO 1600 2019 INTERNATIONAL ADM 000128 DRIVE, SUITE VA 22102 Name600, of MCLEAN, Decedent, Charles Sylvester Bush.

ALL CLAIMS WILL BE Name and AddressBARRED UNLESS A PROCEEDING of Attorney, Brian K. TO ENFORCE THE CLAIM IS COMMcDaniel, 1920 Street, MENCED WITH IN 3 LYEARS OF N.W., Suite OF 303, WashPUBLICATION THIS NOTICE ington, D.C. 20036.

IN ACCORDANCE WITH SECTION Notice ofOFAppointment, 29-312.07 THE DISTRICT OF Notice to Creditors and COLUMBIA ORGANIZATIONS ACT. Notice to Unknown Heirs, Patricia Ann Bush, Two Rivers PCS is soliciting whose address is 6222 proposals to provide project manOtis Street, agement servicesCheverly, for a small conMD 20785 was struction project.

For appointa copy of the RFP, please emailRepresenprocurement@ ed Personal tworiverspcs.org.

Deadline tative of the estate of for submissions is DecemberBush 6, 2017.

Charles Sylvester who died on February 20, 2017, without a Will and will serve without Court Supervision. All unknown heirs and heirs whose whereabouts are unknown shall enter their appearance in this proceeding. Objections to such appointment shall be filed with the Register of Wills, D.C., 515 5th Street, N.W., Building A, 3rd Floor, Washington, D.C.

Print Deadline The deadline for submission and payment of classified ads for print is each Monday, 5 pm.

You may contact the classifieds rep by emailing classifieds@washingtoncitypaper.com or calling 202-650-6941.

For more information please visit www.washingtoncitypaper.com

34 march 15, 2019 washingtoncitypaper.com

20001, on or before Legals September 7, 2019.

Claims against the deceDC SCHOLARS PCS REQUEST dent shall be presented FOR PROPOSALS – Moduto the undersigned with lar Contractor Services - DC a copy to theCharter Register of Scholars Public School Wills to the for Register solicitsor proposals a modular of Wills with a copy to contractor to provide professional the undersigned, on management and construction services to construct a modular or before September building to house four classrooms 7, 2019, or be forever and one faculty offi cebelieved suite. The barred.

Persons Request for or Proposals (RFP) to be heirs legatees specifi cations can be obtained on of the decedent who and after Monday, November 27, do not a copy 2017 fromreceive Emily Stone via comof this notice by mail munityschools@dcscholars.org. within 25 days of its All questions should be sent in publication shall so calls writing by e-mail.

No phone regarding this Register RFP will be inform the of accepted. must bename, received by Wills, Bids including 5:00 PM on Thursday, December address and relation14, 2017 at DC Public ship.

Date of Scholars first publiCharter School, ATTN: Sharonda cation: 3/7/2019 Mann, 5601 E. Capitol St. SE, Name of Newspaper Washington, DC 20019. Any bids and/or periodical: not addressing all areas as outWashington City cations Paper/ lined in the RFP specifi will Daily Washington Law not be considered.

Reporter NameApartments of Personalfor Rent Representative: Patricia Ann Bush TRUE TEST copy Anne Meister Register of Wills Pub Dates: March 7, 14, 21.

FRIENDSHIP PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOL NOTICE OF REQUEST Must Spacious semi-furFOR see!

PROPOSAL nished 1 BR/1 BA basement Friendship Public Charapt, Deanwood, Sep. enter School is $1200. seeking trance, W/W carpet, W/D, kitchbids from prospective en, fireplace near Blue Line/X9/ candidates to provide: V2/V4. Shawnn 240-343-7173. * INTERGRATED FINANCIAL PROCESS Rooms for Rent SYSTEMS, (ACCOUNTING SOFTWARE) -for furHoliday Special- Two business process nished rooms for shortanalyor long sis in-house termwith rentalan ($900 and $800 per software/hardware month) with access tosoluW/D, WiFi, Kitchen, and Den. Utilition. Solution must ties included.with Best Microsoft N.E. location integrate along H St. Corridor.

Call Eddie Dynamics GP (Advanced 202-744-9811 for info. or visit Management Edition) www.TheCurryEstate.com accounting software, ADP Payroll and ADP Employee soft wear.

Currently there is one central office and 9 remote campuses and approximately 20 users.

Software should have

capability of expanding Construction/Labor to accommodate future growth.

The full scope of work will be posted in a competitive Request for Proposal that can be found onDESIGN FPCS NOW website POWER HIRatING http://www.

ELECTRICAL APPRENTICES OF ALL SKILL LEVfriendshipschools.

ELS! org/procurement /.

Proposals are due no aboutthan the position… later 4:00 P.M., Do you love April working with EST, Friday, 12th, your hands? Are you inter2019. proposals will ested No in construction and bein accepted after the becoming an electrician? deadline.

Then the electrical apprentice Questions can position could bebe perfect for addressed to Procureyou! Electrical apprentices are able to earn a paycheck mentInquiry@friendand full benefi ts while learnshipschools.org ing the trade through firsthand experience.

SUPERIOR COURT

OF THE DISTRICT OF what we’re looking for…

COLUMBIA Motivated D.C. residents who PROBATE DIVISION want to learn the electrical 2019 000202 trade ADM and have a high school Name of orDecedent, diploma GED as well as reliable transportation.

William David Stewart Fraser. Name and Ada little bit about us… Anne dress of Attorney, Design P.O. is oneBox of the H.Power S. Fraser top electrical contractors in 40690, Washington, the U.S., committed to our DC 20016.

Notice values, to training and of to givAppointment, Notice to ing back to the communities Creditors Notice in which weand live and work. to Unknown Heirs, Anne H. details…

S.more Fraser, whose address powerdesigninc.us/ isVisit 5310 Manning Pl. NW, careers or email Washington, DC careers@ 20016 powerdesigninc.us! was appointed Personal Representative of the estate of William David Stewart Fraser who died Financial Services on February 1, 2019, Denied to Rewith a Credit??

Will andWork will serve pair Your Credit Report With The without Court SuperviTrusted Leader in Creditheirs Repair. sion. All unknown Call Law for a FREE and Lexington heirs whose wherecredit report & credit abouts aresummary unknown repair consultation. 855-620shall enter 9426. John C. their Heath, appearAttorney at ance in this Law, PLLC, dbaproceedLexington Law ing.

Objections to such Firm. appointment shall be filed with the Register Home Services of Wills, D.C., 515 5th Street, N.W., Building Dish Network-Satellite TeleA, 3rd Floor, Washingvision Services. Now Over 190 ton, D.C. 20001, on or channels for ONLY $49.99/mo! before 9/14/19.

Claims HBO-FREE for one year, FREE against theFREE decedent Installation, Streaming, shall be presented to FREE HD. Add Internet for $14.95 undersigned with a athe month.

1-800-373-6508 copy to the Register of

Wills or to the Register Auctions of Wills with a copy to the undersigned, on or before 9/14/19, or be forever barred. Persons believed to be heirs or legatees of the decedent who do not receive a copy of this notice by mail within 25 days of its publication shall so inform the Register of Wills, name, Wholeincluding Foods Commissary Auction and relationaddress DC Metro Area ship. Date of first publiDec. 5 at3/14/2019 10:30AM cation: 1000sofS/S Tables, Carts Name Newspaper & Trays, 2016 Kettles up and/or periodical: to 200 Gallons, Urschel Washington City Paper/ Cutters & Shredders inDaily Washington Law cluding 2016 Diversacut Reporter 2110 Dicer, 6 Chill/Freeze Name Personal Cabs, of Double Rack RepOvens & Ranges, (12) Braising resentative: Anne H. 2016 (3+) Stephan S.Tables, Fraser VCMs, 30+ Scales, TRUE TEST copy Hobart 80 qt Mixers, Anne Meister Complete Machine Shop, Register of Wills and much more! View the Pub Dates: catalog at March 14, 21, 28. www.mdavisgroup.com or 412-521-5751 Briya PCS solicits proposals for the folGarage/Yard/ lowing: Sales * Rummage/Estate Consulting (Research and Policy Flea MarketServices) every Fri-Sat Full RFP available

by Rd. 10am-4pm.

5615 Landover request.

Proposals Cheverly, MD. 20784. Can buy shall emailed as PDF in bulk.beContact 202-355-2068 documents noforlater than or 301-772-3341 details or if intrested in being a vendor.

5:00 PM on Tuesday, March 26, 2019. Contact: bids@briya.org SUPERIOR COURT OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA PROBATE DIVISION 2019 ADM 000197 Estate of Ione M. Lockhart (AKA Ione Mary Lockhart).

Notice of Standard Probate Notice is hereby given that a petition has been filed in this Court by Thomas S. Goldbaum for standard probate, including the appointment of one or more personal representatives. Unless a responsive pleading in the form of a complaint or an objection in ac-

cordance with Superior Miscellaneous Court Probate Division Rule 407 is filed in NEW Court COOPERATIVE this within SHOP! 30 days from the date FROM EGPYT THINGS of first publication of AND BEYOND this notice, the Court 240-725-6025 may take the action www.thingsfromegypt.com hereinafter set forth. thingsfromegypt@yahoo.com Admit to probate the will dated December SOUTH AFRICAN BAZAAR Craft 1992 Cooperative 21, exhibited with 202-341-0209 the petition upon proof www.southafricanbazaarcraftcoo satisfactory to the Court perative.com of due execution by afsouthafricanba z a ar @hotmail. fidavit of the witnesses com or otherwise.

Date firstWOODWORKS publication: WEST of FARM 3/7/2019 Custom Creative Furniture Name of Newspaper 202-316-3372 info@westfarmwoodworks.com and/or periodical: www.westfarmwoodworks.com Washington City Paper/ Daily Washington Law 7002 Carroll Avenue Reporter Takoma Park, MD 20912 Attorney: John M. Mon-Sat 11am-7pm, Bryan, 2311 Wilson Sun 10am-6pm Boulevard, Suite 500, Arlington, VA 22201 Motorcycles/Scooters TRUE TEST copy Anne Meister 2016 Suzuki TU250X for sale.

1200 miles.ofCLEAN. Register Wills Just serviced.Dates: Comes March with bike Pub 7, cover and Asking $3000 14, saddlebags.

21.

Cash only.

Call 202-417-1870 M-F between RFP for Foreign Lan6-9PM, or weekends. guage Programming One School RFP for forBands/DJs for Hire eign language programming. To obtain copies of full RFPs, please visit our website: www. centercitypcs.org. Full RFPs contain guidelines for submission, applicable qualifications and deadlines.

Contact Person Get WitPassante It Productions: ProfesAlicia sional sound and lighting availapassante@centerable for club, citypcs.org corporate, private, wedding receptions, holiday events and much more. Insured, SUPERIOR competitive rates.COURT Call (866) 531OF 6612THE Ext 1,DISTRICT leave messageOF for a COLUMBIA ten-minute call back, or book onPROBATE DIVISION line at: agetwititproductions.com 2019 ADM 000129 Name of Announcements Decedent, Makiyah Wilson. Name and Address of -Attorney, Announcements Hey, all you lovers of erotic and bizarre Brian K. McDaniel, romantic fi ction!

Visit www.

Esq./The McDaniel Law nightlightproductions.club Group, P.L.L.C., 1920 and submit your N.W., stories to me Happy L Street, Suite Holidays! James K. West 303, Washington, D.C. wpermanentwink@aol.com

20036. Notice of Appointment, Notice Events to Creditors and Notice to Christmas inHeirs, Silver Spring Unknown DonSaturday, Decemberwhose 2, 2017 netta Wilson, Veteran’s Plaza address is 1414 Canal 9:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Street, S.W., Apt #12, in Come celebrate Christmas Washington, the heart of SilverD.C. Spring at our 20024Village was appointed Vendor on Veteran’s PlaPersonal Representative za. There will be shopping, arts of the ofpictures Makiyah and craftsestate for kids, with Santa, entertainment Wilsonmusic whoand died on July to spread holiday cheer and more.

16, 2018, without a Will Proceeds thewithout market will and will from serve provide a “wish” toy for children Court Supervision.

All in need. Join us at your one stop unknown heirs and heirs shop for everything Christmas. whose whereabouts are For more information, contact unknown shall enter Futsum, their appearance in thisor info@leadersinstitutemd.org proceeding.

Objections call 301-655-9679 to such appointment shall be filed withGeneral the Register of Wills, D.C., Looking Rent yard space for 515 5thtoStreet, N.W., hunting dogs.

Building A, Alexandria/Arling3rd Floor, ton, VA area only. Medium sized Washington, D.C. dogs will be well-maintained in 20001, oncontroled or before temperature dog hous8/28/2019.

Claims es. I have advanced animal care against the experience and decedent dogs will be rid shall be presented to oder. free of feces, flies, urine and Dogs undersigned will be in a ventilated kennel the with a so they to willthe not beRegister exposed toof wincopy ter and or harsh etc. Space Wills to weather the Register will be needed as to possiof Wills withasasoon copy ble. for dogs muston be Metro theYard undersigned, or accessible. Serious callers only, before 8/28/2019, be call anytime Kevin, 415-or846forever barred.

Persons 5268. Price Neg. believed to be heirs or legatees of the decedent Counseling who do not receive a copy thisCALL notice MAKE ofTHE TO by START mail within 25TODAY. days ofFree GETTING CLEAN 24/7 Helpline for alcohol its publication shall &sodrug addiction the treatment.

Get help! inform Register of It is time toincluding take your life back! Call Wills, name, Now: 855-732-4139 address and relationship.

DateConsidering of first publiPregnant?

Adopcation: tion?

Call 2/28/2019 us first. Living expenses, housing, medical, and continName of Newspaper ued support afterwards. Choose and/or periodical: adoptive family City of your choice.

Washington Paper/ Call 24/7.

877-362-2401.Law Daily Washington Reporter Name of Personal Representative: Donnetta Wilson TRUE TEST copy Anne Meister Register of Wills Pub Dates: February 28, March 7, 14.

paper.com/

PUZZLE Out with the old, In with the new Post your listing with Washington City Paper GET IN LINE Classifieds

22 Stop working 23 Crude dudes?: Abbr.

24 Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum city

25 "You can't

make me" 29 Spot for a belt

33 Expected soon 34 Capital to spend

kroner in

36 Indian tea http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/ 37 Short denial

39 Method of cooking that

involves FINDsubmerging YOUR in

a plastic bag OUTLET. RELAX, 40 ReasonREPEAT to

UNWIND, stop talking CLASSIFIEDS

41 Result of a bad HEALTH/MIND, night's sleep BODY & SPIRIT

42 Middling http://www.washingt47 Blouse with a

oncitypaper.com/ sailor collar 49 Chicago

newspaper,

briefly 51 Davis of

Hollywood 52 Tennis star Osaka http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com / 53 Page of 2 Ruler's sphere?

44 Probably the only Across Hollywood soccer star most 3 Tank's contents 1 Youngest son 54 Mil. defense people can name 4 Piles on Alaskan acronym that's who played 50 Bush People an anagram 5 Parade detritus years ago of 55-Down 5 Goods carrier 6 Toy's sound 45 RR stop 55 Clog opener 9 Forbids 7 Flinch, say 46 "Let me think" that's an 13 Captain America 8 Chest area Moving?

Find A 48 Breast Cancer anagram of star Larson 9 Specialized Helping Hand Today Awareness Mo. 54-Down 14 Treats that equipment?

50 Bordeaux bro 57 Bars on trucks come in Thins 10 Its capital is 51 *Slip 62 Peoria-to-Des and Double Oranjestad Moines dir.

56 Jerry's neighbor Stuf varieties 11 Swedish prize 63 Live and breathe 58 Weirdo Dali 16 Do a pressing 12 Hair tangle job?

64 Cancel 59 Instagram posts 15 Mixes things up 17 *Have 65 Door opener 60 Songs for one 18 It's just a opera singer 19 Miguel Díazthought Out with the Canel's island 61 Be unable to old, In with the remember, 20 Adobe export new Post your and what you 21 TV procedural LAST WEEK: WICKED GAME must do to that starred listing with make sense of Patricia Arquette , % 0 + 8 6 . Washington 6 5 3 0 6 this puzzle's and Ted Danson ' 2 2 8 6 7 ( City 1 Paper ( / $ / theme clues 23 "Now that ' 2 8 % Classifieds / ( % $ ' 8 $ / 7 66 Typed over makes sense!"

Hangouts ) 5 $ http://www.washington' 5 < ( 5 + $ + $ 26 *Fail citypaper.com/ 67 One-named 2 1 ( / / $ 0 % $ ' $ 27 Rabbit's foot? singer with 28 It's east of NC 5 % , / < 1 / ( < the Live at the 30 Pharmacist's = , 3 8 3 ' 2 1 2 6 < 6 Acropolis album word for salt ( 0 % 5 $ & ( 7 + ( 6 8 & .

68 Buffalo's lake 31 Keyboard 69 Die Zeit article $ 7 ( $ 0 , 6 2 7 + 2 8 noodler Brian 70 Kinda bummed , 5 6 6 $ < 6 $ + 32 Heading on a list 71 Arousing 6 , 1 % $ ' 7 $ ; ( 6 35 Napster creator Parker ( 1 2 ( 9 $ 1 ( / ' ( 5 Down 38 *Lose , 7 2 & $ 5 / 6 % $ ' - 5 1 Giannis Ante43 Langston Hughes ( / 5 2 < , 2 8 2 9 $ / tokounmpo's poem about league * ( ( 6 ( , 1 7 / $ : 6 racial equality

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

By Brendan Emmett Quigley

FIND YOUR OUTLET. RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT CLASSIFIEDS HEALTH/MIND, BODY & SPIRIT

MOVING? FIND A HELPING HAND TODAY Out with the old, In with the new Post your listing with Washington City Paper Classifieds

KIPP DC PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS Classroom and Office Furniture KIPP DC is soliciting proposals from qualified vendors for Classroom and Office Furniture.

The RFP can be found on KIPP DCâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s website at www.kippdc.org/ procurement. Proposals should be uploaded to the website no later than 5:00 PM EST, on March 29, 2019. Questions can be addressed to jessica.gray@kippdc. org.

Moving?

Find A Helping Hand Today

HICAPS and its controlled affiliates propose to construct a 209-foot tall communications lattice tower in the vicinity of 15903 Somerville Road, Rockville, Maryland 20855. Public comments regarding potential effects from this site on historic properties may be submitted within 30 days from the date of this publication to: Geo-Technology Associates, Inc., ATTN: Ms. Shiehan Chou, 14280 Park Center Drive, Suite A, Laurel, Maryland 20707 or submitted by telephone to Ms. Chou at 410-792-9446.

Resources @ 301-3922500 to schedule an appointment.

AIRLINE CAREERS begin here â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Get started by training as FAA certified Aviation Technician.

Financial aid for qualified students. Job placement assistance.

Call Aviation Institute of Maintenance 800725-1563 Earn your Hospitality Degree Online at CTI! Restaurant, Travel, Hotel &amp; Cruise Ship Management! A Degree can take you to the next level! 1-844-519-6644 TrainCTI.com (Not Available in CA)

MOVING?

FIND A HELPING HAND TODAY

Maria psychic witch FIND YOUR OUTLET. helps all problems spells RELAX, UNWIND, preformed love, money, REPEAT sudden CLASSIFIEDS illness. Call me open 24hrs. CallBODY 202HEALTH/MIND, 883-2390 Out with the & SPIRIT

old, In with the new Post your listing with Washington City Paper Classifieds

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

FIND YOUR OUTLET. RELAX, Need a roommate?

Roommates.com will UNWIND, REPEAT help you find your PerCLASSIFIEDS fect Matchâ&#x201E;¢ today!

HEALTH/MIND, Rooms rent BODYfor & SPIRIT Landover MD call 202 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

355 2068

Offices & Meeting room for rent call 240 542 8518

http://www.washingtonciMichael F Beatson, CPA typaper.com/

Tax preparation and bookkeeping services michael.beatson@beatsoncpa.com 301-602-7470 Beatsoncpa.com

Looking for full time Elderly Care job, flexible hours. I have experience, good references, CPR/first aide certified.

Ask about including light housekeeping, laundry and meal prep. Have own car. Please call and leave a message, call 240-271-1011.

* Valid driverâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s license * CPR/First Aid certification (online certification not accepted)

Out with the old, In with the * Complete required training(s) prior your to hire new Post listing with * Med Certified within 6 months of hire Washington City Paper * Background check prior to hire Classifieds * Able to lift 50-75 lbs.

FIND YOUR OUTLET. RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT CLASSIFIEDS HEALTH/ FIND YOUR OUTLET. MIND, BODY RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT CLASSIFIEDS HEALTH/ & SPIRIT MIND, BODY & SPIRIT

PENIS ENLARGEMENT PUMP. Get Stronger & Harder Erections Immediately. Gain 1-3 Inches Permanently & Safely.

Guaranteed Results.

FDA Licensed. Free Brochure: 1-800354-3944, www.DrJoelKaplan.com Suffering from an ADDICTION to Alcohol, Opiates, Prescription http://www.washingtonhttp://www PainKillers orwashingtother citypaper.com/ oncitypaper.com/ DRUGS? There is hope!

Call Today to speak with someone who cares. Call NOW 1-855-266-8685

FIND YOUR OUTLET. RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT CLASSIFIEDS HEALTH/MIND, BODY & SPIRIT http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

Hand Today

Out with the old, In with the new Post your listing with Washington City Paper Classifieds FIND YOUR

http://www.washingtOUTLET. oncitypaper.com/ RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT FIND YOUR OUTLET. CLASSIFIEDS RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT HEALTH/HEALTH/ CLASSIFIEDS MIND, BODYBODY & SPIRIT MIND, http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/ & SPIRIT http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

Moving?

Out with the old, In with the new Moving?

PostAyour listing Helping Out with the old, In Find with Washington with the new Post Find A Helping City Paper Hand Today Classifieds your listing with DISH TV $59.99 For 190 Channels + $14.95 High Speed Internet.

Free Installation, Smart HD DVR Included, Free Voice Remote. Some restrictions apply. Call Now: 1-800-373-6508

Washington City Paper Classifieds

Moving? Find A Helping Hand Today

Bibliophile Seeking Friends I love books, including Folio Society and Easton Press books,and I am looking to make friends with the same interest. I work at a major research institution and live at Dupont Circle.

Contact: Stevenstvn9@ aol.com

Moving?

Find A Helping Moving?

Find A Helping Hand Today

Wholistic Services, Inc. is looking for dedicated individuals to http://www.washingtoncityRobert Beatson II work as Direct Support paper.com/ Attorney/Accountant Professionals assisting Former IRS Attorney intellectually disabled Admitted to DC, MD, adults with behavVA, NY Bars. All types of ioral health issues in our Federal, State, Local, & group homes and day Foreign taxes services throughout the 301-340-2951 District of Columbia. www.beatsonlaw.com Job requirements: * Experience working with intellectually disabled adults with behavioral health issues is preferred

as having extensive research experience in the subject. . I live at Dupont Circle.and work for a major research firm. Contact: Stevenstvn9@aol.com

CASH FOR CARS! We buy all cars! Junk, highend, totaled â&#x20AC;&#x201C; it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t matter! Get free towing and same day cash! NEWER MODELS too! Call 1-866535-9689

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

Hand Today

PODCAST

Out with the old, In with the new Post your listing with Washington City Paper Classifieds

Out with the old, In with the new Post your listing with http://www.washingtEvery Paper Washington Cityweek, City oncitypaper.com/ Paper Classifieds reporters interview

Find A Helping tell the story of D.C. Subscribe atHand washingtoncitypaper.

Today com/podcast

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/ someone who helps

Attention Viagra users: Generic 100 mg blue pills or Generic 20 mg yellow pills. Get 45 plus 5 free $99 + S/H. Guaranteed, no prescription necessary.

Call Today 1-844-8795238

Gay? Are you depressed or confused or have other issues? I can help with over 30 years experience being gay as well

or wherever you get your podcasts.

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/

* High School Diploma/ GED Please contact Human

P

http onci

Moving?

FIND YOUR OUTLET. RELAX, UNWIND, REPEAT CLASSIFIEDS HEALTH/MIND, BODY & SPIRIT

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/ Education requirement:

FIN OU RE UN RE CL HE MI &S

Out with the old, In with FIND YOUR OUTLET. RELAX, the new washingtoncitypaper.com march 15, 2019 35 Post your UNWIND, REPEAT CLASSIFIEDS with HEALTH/MIND, BODYlisting & SPIRIT Washington

MOVING? FIND A

M

MH

F H

T

T:9.5”

T:10.46”

The Fosters available on Xfinity Stream app

Dreams reflected.

On X1, it’s pride all year, only with Xfinity.℠ There’s power in seeing yourself on screen, and that’s why Xfinity created a first-of-its-kind community endorsed LGBTQ Film & TV Collection. With Xfinity On Demand, you have access to thousands of TV shows and movies at home and on-the-go. Simply say, “LGBTQ” into the X1 Voice Remote to easily immerse yourself in an awesome, diverse collection of content that reflects all of you. Simple. Easy. Awesome.

0

Restrictions apply. Not available in all areas. No celebrity endorsement implied. ©2018 Comcast. All rights reserved.

DIV031-Q4-NED-A2-V1

Find yourself at xfinity.com/LGBTQ