CITYPAPER Washington
politiCs: Brandon todd Coasts in Ward 4 7
Free Volume 35, no. 17 WashingtonCityPaPer.Com aPril 24–30, 2015
Up in the Heir Ward 8 picks Marion Barry’s successor.16 By Will Sommer Photographs by Darrow Montgomery
Food: d.C. CheF plays another tune 25
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2 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
INSIDE
16 Up in the heir Ward 8 picks Marion Barry’s successor.
By Will Sommer PhotograPhS By darroW montgomery
4 Chatter DistriCt Line
7 Loose Lips: Todd’s poised to nab the Ward 4 seat. 9 City Desk: Who has D.C.’s low-number license plates 10 Housing Complex: Development stalls at Lincoln Heights. 12 Savage Love 14 Straight Dope 15 Gear Prudence 23 Buy D.C.
D.C. FeeD
25 Young & Hungry: What happens when a restaurateur takes on live music 27 Grazer: Fast-casual pizza abounds. 27 Are You Gonna Eat That? A bone-stock cocktail—stocktail? 27 Brew in Town: Bardo’s Zeus IPA
arts
29 Galleries: Capps on “The Divine Comedy” at the African Art Museum 31 Arts Desk: Make your own pinhole camera. 31 Piece of Work: A backstage photo from Chris Suspect 32 Curtain Calls: Lapin on Mariela en el desierto, Klimek on very still & hard to see, and Graham on Murder Ballad 36 Film: Olszewski on Blackbird and 5 to 7 38 Discography: Moore on Beauty Pill’s Beauty Pill Describes Things As They Are and Hodges on the North Country’s There Is Nothing To Fear
City List
41 City Lights: Transformative soul-pop from Ava Luna 41 Music 48 Galleries 49 Theater 52 Film
54 CLassiFieDs Diversions 53 Crossword 55 Dirt Farm
on the Cover Photograph by Darrow Montgomery
“
Not a siNgle oNe of them is goiNg to talk to you. they doN’t trust you. —Page 10
”
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 3
CHATTER
In which readers mock and defend a possibly historic parking lot
Park It
The sTory from last week’s issue that generated the most on-
line chatter was not City Paper’s fantastic package on Filmfest DC. Nor was it the column on go-go in the digital age or the piece on investing in a restaurant “pop-up megaplex.” No, what readers really wanted to discuss was Aaron Wiener’s column (“A Lot to Lose,” April 17) on a parking lot in Spring Valley that some neighbors want designated a historic landmark. The war on cars never fails to attract an audience. There were jokes to be had, as Dan Berman of National Journal showed on Twitter: “Someone wants to declare random suburban parking lot as historic. Would only old cars then be allowed use it?” Jamelle Bouie of Slate tweeted, “We could build more retail and bring more tax revenue into the city, or we can declare a parking lot ‘historical!’” while the Atlantic’s Yoni Appelbaum wrote, “Historic preservation laws were intended to stop landmarks from being turned into parking lots. The irony; it burns.” Kenya Downs, who reports on race for NPR, had a grimmer reaction: “When you don’t want outsiders moving into your community, declare a parking lot as a historical landmark.” @URFloorMatt just wanted to know, “Seriously, why does being a homeowner in a major urban market turn you into a goddamn despicable piece of shit?” The active conversation in the comments section included ten (!) uses of the term “NIMBY,” includ-
ing in Jeff’s comment: “I really don’t understand NIMBYs or what motivates them. It seems at time to be pure selfishness, since they are obviously motivated only by what what is good for extremely narrowly defined communi-
ties. However, that doesn’t really describe it since these are people that are active in the community and do appear to at least care on some level what happens to the people around them. I just don’t get why this is where they choose to spend their resources. Go tutor a poor kid or help put handicapped accessible things on a veterans center or ....anything.” NOT NIMBY, who lives in the area, stepped in to provide a different neighborhood perspective: “Most of you are woefully wrong. Those of us in the neighborhood who like walking and have younger families want this to happen in the worst way. The problem is that the ANC is full old-school croney-ism and a lack of thinking. They sit there and complain about a perceived parking issue when all they want is no change and to protect their ‘free’ subsidized DC street parking.” Lance added a comment to defend the parking lot’s honor: “It’s not that the parking lot in and of itself is historic, it’s that this midcentury building complex, as a whole, was built around having convenient parking. As such, the parking lot is an integral part of a historical complex, and is no more separable from that complex than gables and turrets are from a Victoriah mansion.” Sorry, Lance, but a new staff report from the Historic Preservation Review Board indicates that the April 30th vote will go against your position. Finally, we must apologize: The word “an” was used in front of the word “historic” in the column’s headline when we should have used “a” like good Americans. It was an historic mistake, and we promise it will —Sarah Anne Hughes never happen again. Want to see your name in bold on this page? Send letters, gripes, clarification, or praise to mail@washingtoncitypaper.com.
pUBLISHeR: Amy Austin MANAgINg eDITORS: emily q. hAzzArd, sArAh Anne hughes ARTS eDITOR: christinA cAuterucci FOOD eDITOR: jessicA sidmAn CITY LIgHTS eDITOR: cAroline jones STAFF WRITeRS: will sommer, AAron wiener STAFF pHOTOgRApHeR: dArrow montgomery CONTRIBUTINg WRITeRS: john Anderson, mArtin Austermuhle, jonettA rose BArrAs, ericA Bruce, sophiA Bushong, Kriston cApps, riley croghAn, jeffry cudlin, sAdie dingfelder, mAtt dunn, sArAh godfrey, trey grAhAm, louis jAcoBson, steve KiviAt, chris KlimeK, ryAn little, christine mAcdonAld, dAve mcKennA, BoB mondello, mArcus j. moore, justin moyer, triciA olszewsKi, miKe pAArlBerg, tim regAn, reBeccA j. ritzel, Ally schweitzer, tAmmy tucK, joe wArminsKy, michAel j. west, BrAndon wu INTeRNS: jAmes constAnt, morgAn hines ONLINe DeveLOpeR: zAch rAusnitz DIgITAL SALeS MANAgeR: sArA dicK BUSINeSS DeveLOpMeNT ASSOCIATe: Kevin provAnce SALeS MANAgeR: nicholAs diBlAsio SeNIOR ACCOUNT exeCUTIveS: melAnie BABB, joe hicKling, AliciA merritt ACCOUNT exeCUTIveS: lindsAy BowermAn, chelseA estes, mArK KulKosKy MARKeTINg AND pROMOTIONS MANAgeR: stephen BAll SALeS eveNTS MANAgeR: heAther mcAndrews SALeS AND MARKeTINg ASSOCIATe: chloe fedynA CReATIve DIReCTOR: jAndos rothstein ART DIReCTOR: lAuren heneghAn CReATIve SeRvICeS MANAgeR: BrAndon yAtes gRApHIC DeSIgNeR: lisA deloAch OpeRATIONS DIReCTOR: jeff Boswell SeNIOR AD COORDINATOR: jAne mArtinAche DIgITAL AD OpS SpeCIALIST: lori holtz INFORMATION TeCHNOLOgY DIReCTOR: jim gumm SOUTHCOMM: CHIeF exeCUTIve OFFICeR: chris ferrell INTeRIM CHIeF FINANCIAL OFFICeR: glynn riddle CONTROLLeR: todd pAtton CHIeF MARKeTINg OFFICeR: susAn torregrossA CReATIve DIReCTOR: heAther pierce DIReCTOR OF CONTeNT/ONLINe DeveLOpMeNT: pAtricK rAins CHIeF TeCHNOLOgY OFFICeR: mAtt locKe CHIeF OpeRATION OFFICeR/gROUp pUBLISHeR: eric norwood DIReCTOR OF DIgITAL SALeS AND MARKeTINg: dAvid wAlKer LOCAL ADveRTISINg: wAshington city pAper, (202) 332-2100, Ads@wAshingtoncitypAper.com vOL. 35, NO. 17, ApRIL 24-30, 2015 wAshington city pAper is puBlished every weeK And is locAted At 1400 eye st. nw, suite 900, 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. © 2015 All rights reserved. no pArt of this puBlicAtion mAy Be reproduced without the written permission of the editor.
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DISTRICTLINE
Here’s what to expect at one of former
CounCilmember Jim Graham’s strip shows: washingtoncitypaper.com/go/stripshow
Loose Lips
Mr. Todd’s Wild Ride
Darrow Montgomery
Muriel Bowser’s candidate coasts in Ward 4.
Brandon Todd wants to bring a “millennial’s perspective” to the Council. By Will Sommer Leon T. Andrews Jr. advances on Brandon Todd. They both want the same job. This could get ugly. “I love this guy!” Andrews says, turning to the crowd at a recent debate. “He’s a good guy!” Somehow, LL doesn’t think Andrews is sincere. Along with the nine other people in the race to replace now-Mayor Muriel Bowser in the Ward 4 D.C. Council seat, Andrews should feel the opposite of love toward Todd. Barring some catastrophic
change in the race, Todd will handily win the Ward 4 special election on April 28. It should be a victory so resounding, his rivals will wonder why they even wasted four months of their lives campaigning. One candidate has already thought better of it: Immediately after the debate began, candidate Doug Sloan announced that he was quitting the race to support an antiTodd candidate. He hasn’t yet said who he’ll back. Todd, 31, owes much of his success to Bowser, who has been his patron for nearly his entire career. After working on Bows-
er’s Council staff and as the chief fundraiser for her mayoral bid last year, Todd won Bowser’s endorsement to replace her on the Council. That brings with it the organization and fundraising lists from the “Green Team” she inherited from former Mayor Adrian Fenty, who himself endorsed Bowser to replace him in Ward 4 in 2007. Along with Andrews, Todd’s main opponents boil down to attorney Dwayne Toliver, who earned a late and likely unimportant endorsement from former Mayor Vince Gray, and lefty Renée Bowser, who has garnered the support of some
unions and progressive groups. Former at-large candidate A.J. Cooper, who announced his intentions for the Ward 4 seat even before Bowser won the mayoral race, could perhaps have offered Todd a challenge. But Cooper died last December at 34, leaving the field wide open for Bowser’s replacement. Walking with Todd as he canvasses, LL can’t imagine a scenario in which any of the other candidates wins next week. The Green Team just out-hustles everybody. Todd jogs back and forth across the street, dodging cars, while his campaign staff look for voters for him to talk with. Todd happily points to the holes in his shoes and his loose suit, which no longer fits after he lost 22 pounds campaigning. “Guess how many of them I’ve seen knocking on doors?” Todd says of his opponents. “Zero.” Todd has avoided what little mud has been thrown at him during the campaign. There was a bankruptcy, in part for debts owed to retailers including J. Crew and Saks Fifth Avenue, but that occurred too long ago to affect his chances. Todd dodged an oddball residency challenge at the D.C. Board of Elections and explained away his early registration with the Republican Party—generally a no-no in the heavily Democratic District. “I was 18, and I literally just wanted to be different,” Todd tells LL. The District’s fundraisers aren’t concerned. As of Monday, Todd had raised $364,962. His best-funded opponent, Andrews, has raised less than half of that, $144,225—and that includes a $90,000 loan from himself. “My opponents are literally just pulling at straws to make me look bad,” Todd says. In February, Todd was sued in small claims court for allegedly damaging a man’s bike with his Jaguar while pulling up to his campaign office. The aggrieved party, who listed his address at a building that provides services to the homeless, refused to speak with
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 7
DISTRICTLINE “Guess how many of them I’ve seen knocking on doors? Zero.” LL. The case was dropped after the plaintiff failed to serve Todd, but imagine what that Judge Judy episode would be like. “It was complete BS,” Todd says, before asking LL not to write that he used the acronym. The best Todd’s opponents have on him is the claim that, once elected, he’ll be a “rubber stamp” for whatever his old boss tells him. As you’d expect, Todd disagrees. “I’m going to be a rubber stamp for the residents of Ward 4,” Todd says.
But Todd owes Bowser big time. At a late January fundraiser, Bowser brought together the sort of business and union types who rely on her goodwill. They gathered to fete her candidate in the backyard of former atlarge councilmember and Green Team godfather Bill Lightfoot. Fundraising checks were accepted at the door. After a rah-rah intro from Lightfoot, Bowser took the stage to name Todd, her former constituent services director, as her heir.
“You think I would recommend just anybody to keep that progress going?” Bowser asked the crowd. If elected, Todd would be the second millennial on the Council. The Petworth resident promises to bring a “millennial’s perspective and a millennial’s voice” to the Wilson Building. And heads up for female LL readers: He’s single. “I am taking applications for a beautiful wife who’s successful,” Todd says. Like any good millennial, Todd has a weakness for his own image. For his 30th birthday, Todd sat for a professional photo shoot and got the image framed. Standing outside his campaign office (also plastered with his face), Todd thinks of his descendants gazing at the portrait decades from now. “That’s your great-grandfather, Brandon Tristan Todd,” he imagines they’ll say. Also in a very millennial way, Todd wants something he may not be ready for. At the debate, Todd seemed confused when asked about Bowser’s attempt to award the D.C. Jail healthcare contract to controversial Ten-
nessee-based operator Corizon. The contract went down 6-5 at the Council, meaning that, if elected, he’ll likely play a pivotal role if Bowser decides to push it again. But Todd, after first providing a nonsensical answer to the question, says he’ll oppose the contract. LL would love to see that postelection meeting with Bowser. During the debate, LL saw something that Todd’s campaign refuses to discuss: After one of the moderators asked the candidates which historical figure their leadership styles most resembled, Todd quietly started Googling “historical figure” on his phone. When Todd’s turn at the mic came, he opted for Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Not a bad choice, but also one of the first Google results for “historical figure.” That won’t stop Todd from winning what could be a landslide in Ward 4. Besides, CP councilmembers can use Google too. Got a tip for LL? Send suggestions to lips@ washingtoncitypaper.com. Or call (202) 6506925.
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DISTRICTLINE City Desk
Tomorrow’s history today: This was the week the Nats ditched “Bustin’ Loose” as the default home run celebration song.
Is there a perk more pointless than the low-number license plates handed out by the mayor and the D.C. Council? One year, the plates that look only slightly different from the ones handed out at the DMV were decorated with red roses; now, they have Muriel Bowser’s “We Are Washington D.C.” logo. Besides showing off how tight you are with a District pol, the plates serve no practical purpose. They don’t stop cops from pulling you over, and, unlike councilmembers’ own plates, they don’t provide immunity from parking tickets. And yet, people want them. Marijuana legalization activist Adam Eidinger mellowed considerably on the mayor after she gave him the “420” plate. While new At-Large Councilmember Elissa Silverman refused to hand out plates, her fellow ethics-minded freshmen couldn’t follow suit—their constituents love them too much! City documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act reveal who has the rate for a plate. The lists include at least one convicted felon (Tony Cheng, a restaurant owner who was busted two years ago by the feds), and a whole lot of developers and churches. Meanwhile, a new administration means turnover at the top of the plate hierarchy. Bowser’s brother gets No. 7, while Bowser’s mom rolls with plate No. 1. See the stats on the District’s oddest license plates below, and check washingtoncitypaper.com/go/lownumber for the full list of recipients. —Will Sommer
1: Number of plates given to Pepco 2: Number of plates given to Wilson Building lobbyist David Wilmot’s law firm 9: Number of plates given to churches 6: Number of plates given to United House of Prayer 2: Number of Bowsers who have plates 1: Number of plates given to the Smithsonian Institute 3: Number of plates given to Kastles owner Mark Ein 5: Number of current Council candidates with plates (Eugene Kinlow, Anthony Muhammad, Brandon Todd, Keita Vanterpool, and Trayon White)
2: Number of plates given to Bowser ally at center of Park Southern scandal, Phinis Jones
1600 block of park road nW, april 17. by darroW MonTgoMery
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 9
DISTRICTLINE
Five maps and charts that explain D.C.’s growth: washingtoncitypaper.com/go/growth
Housing Complex
Withering Heights
The city’s commitment to mixed-income development has run aground at lincoln Heights. Anacostia Metro station, have nearly turned violent. At Park Morton, in No one lives at Lincoln Heights. Park View, the stagnation got so bad It doesn’t appear that way at first that last year the city canceled its conglance. On a recent afternoon, there tract with the project’s developers, the are plenty of people outside. A few Linthicum, Md.-based Landex Corp. children play in one of the courtyards and District-based Warrenton Group, formed by U-shaped triads of lowand effectively hit the reset button. rise apartment buildings. Two womBut Lincoln Heights has been arguen sit outside one of the apartments. ably the hardest of them all. With the But when I approach them and incity having delivered on so few of its troduce myself, one quickly says she’s promises, residents who might have not a resident. The other one? Nope, initially jumped at the prospect of upshe isn’t either. graded housing have grown suspicious Across the courtyard, a young of interlopers coming to talk about woman fumbles with her keys to lock New Communities. People like me. an apartment door as she wheels out As it turns out, the woman I find at a baby stroller with the other hand. the top of the hill is exactly the right She pushes the stroller into the small person to discuss New Communities’ courtyard and walks around in cirshortcomings. A 35-year resident of cles, trying to coax the baby to sleep. Lincoln Heights, Patricia Malloy serves as the advisory neighborhood Does she live at Lincoln Heights? She commissioner for the area and as the shakes her head. chair of the resident council for the I exit the courtyard and hike up a Lincoln Heights New Communities small hill to another row of garden project. She’s been involved in the efapartments, where a woman is sitting fort since it began in 2006. But the outside in purple T-shirt advertising excitement she had at the start of the the 2014 Lincoln Heights pre-July 4 project has turned to cynicism. celebration. I tell her that I’m hoping to “Talk to the damn Housing Auspeak with Lincoln Heights residents. thority,” she says, referring to the “They’re not gonna talk to you,” agency that runs D.C.’s public housshe interrupts. “Not a single one of ing, including Lincoln Heights, and them is going to talk to you. They shares responsibility for the redeveldon’t trust you.” opment with the mayor’s office. (Like Residents of the Lincoln Heights her neighbors, Malloy is initially less public-housing complex have ample than thrilled to discuss New Commureason to distrust outsiders who come nities, although she grows more talkthrough the neighborhood peddling Stall and Response: Lincoln Heights was supposed to be demolished by now, but all 440 units ative with each successive opportunistories. By this year, the city was supare still standing. ty to critique the New Communities posed to have demolished all 440 dilapidated apartments and relocated the resi- apartments, where they complain of a host of bricks and mortar. At Northwest One, the ini- process.) “They don’t want to redevelop this. dents to new units under the signature New maintenance issues, in a neighborhood plagued tiative’s inaugural project located near NoMa, They want us living like slaves.” Last week brought a rare instance of tangiCommunities program to replace distressed by crime, poor planning, and neglect. the city’s been unable to figure out how to build public housing with mixed-income communiThe stalled progress is not unique to Lin- new housing, so a giant parking lot currently ble progress for the Lincoln Heights project. ties. Instead, all 440 apartments remain intact, coln Heights. The other three New Communi- sits where low-income apartments once stood. Pennrose Properties of Philadelphia and the if barely, and just 32 families have received ties projects have also reached a near-standstill, Attempts to plot out with community mem- Warrenton Group filed a zoning application to new housing. The rest remain in their aging with missed deadlines piling up faster than bers the redevelopment of Barry Farm, by the build 150 apartments in a new complex called Darrow Montgomery
By Aaron Wiener
10 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
Deanwood Hills, on a vacant lot at 5201 Hayes St. NE. Fifty of those units will go to Lincoln Heights residents as the city demolishes their current homes. The developers submitted renderings that show an undulating four-story apartment building with green courtyards and plenty of surface parking. Count Malloy unimpressed. “Pennrose bullshit,” she mutters when I bring up Deanwood Hills. As for Warrenton: “Warrenton had Park Morton, too. You got rid of them once; you should have gotten rid of them twice.” Progress hasn’t come quickly to Deanwood Hills, either. Pennrose and Warrenton won the rights to develop the site after the District acquired it in 2008. Nearly seven years later, it’s still a vacant lot, surrounded by a barbed-wire fence with thoroughly superfluous “Hard Hat Area” signs. Warrenton’s website continues to anticipate a 2013 groundbreaking. Warrenton and Pennrose did not return calls for comment. But it’s not the glacial pace of development surrounding Lincoln Heights that’s frustrated residents; it’s the complete lack of movement at the public-housing site itself. Looming over Malloy’s apartment is a strip of low-rise buildings whose windows bear the signature red plywood boards of long-term vacancy. Malloy says they’ve been that way since 2009— at a time when tens of thousands of D.C. households are waiting to receive public and other subsidized housing. What progress has occurred around Lincoln Heights serves as a reminder of what’s not happening. One of the core principles of New Communities is building housing for a mix of incomes in order to deconcentrate poverty. But the 150 apartments at Deanwood Hills will all be reserved for families making under 60 percent of area median income. The only major Lincoln Heights New Communities project that’s been completed, half a mile northwest of the public housing at 4800 Nannie Helen Burroughs Ave. NE, is also 100 percent affordable. Building low-income housing around Lincoln Heights makes plenty of sense for developers. Because market rents are low, they can charge about as much at income-restricted properties as they could at market-rate buildings. But by capping the incomes of the tenants, the developers are eligible for federal tax credits, upping their bottom line. For the city officials in charge of New Communities, however, the proliferation of low-income housing and complete absence of marketrate units represent a concession to reality. Last year, the city commissioned a study of the troubled New Communities program from D.C.based Quadel Consulting and Training. Quadel delivered a report in September that recommended rethinking some of the initiative’s mantras, like creating a mix of incomes. Lincoln Heights was the prime candidate for this rethinking. While the other three sites are near Metro stations, Lincoln Heights is about a mile from the closest station, isolated in a poor section of town that has none of the development buzz the other areas do. The city’s literature on the Lincoln Heights New Communities project from 2006 specifies that one-third of the new units should go to households making more than 80 percent of area median income (in oth-
er words, upward of $86,000 a year for a family of four). But for the foreseeable future, marketing condos and townhouses at Lincoln Heights to middle-class families remains a fantasy. “What you all fail to realize is that Park Morton and Barry Farm are totally different from Lincoln Heights,” says Malloy. “The demographics are totally different.” Lincoln Heights was only included in New Communities after political pressure from thenWard 7 D.C. Councilmember Vince Gray, who wanted his ward to get some of the action. Under his mayoral administration, progress at the site he lobbied for was virtually nonexistent. These days, it’s a little hard to figure out who’s in charge of the project. The Office of the Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development is ostensibly leading the way, but the official responsible for New Communities there departed earlier this year, and the position remains unfilled. DMPED spokesman Joaquin McPeek noted that the use of federal tax credits for Deanwood Hills saves the city from having to subsidize the project and that income-restricted housing does still contain a mix of incomes, if a limited one. A Housing Authority spokeswoman declined to comment, citing the lack of progress to comment on. As things stand, the 2006 plan for Lincoln Heights (which also includes the smaller public-housing complex of Richardson Dwellings, just to the east) reads like the Christmas wish list of an unrealistic child. It called for a 40 percent increase in full-time employment and a 25 percent increase in wages and salaries; in reality, the area remains one of the city’s very poorest. It envisioned a “robust, mixed-use Town Center” at the corner of Nannie Helen Burroughs and Division avenues, with 566 residences above offices and 30,000 square feet of retail that could include a “bookstore, coffee shop, or restaurant.” Today, the intersection features a boarded-up old theater, a gas station, an empty lot, and plenty of speeding cars. At Lincoln Heights itself, renderings show neat rows of suburban-style townhouses in place of the crime-ridden, scattered garden apartments that dot the hilly landscape. If a plucky tourist more interested in history than in present-day attractions ventured into the Lincoln Heights area, he’d find a sign near 5201 Hayes, part of the Greater Deanwood Heritage Trail, bearing the headline “A SelfReliant People.” The text begins, “Largely ignored by city officials and isolated from downtown D.C., Deanwood remained semi-rural until around World War II.” After the war, it continues, “the National Capital Housing Authority tore down old houses to build fully modern apartment complexes.” The story ends in the postwar era. Since then, those modern apartment complexes have ceased to feel so modern. The attention lavished by the Housing Authority seems to have vanished. And the residents again feel largely ignored by city officials. It’s as if, to those in charge, no one lives at CP Lincoln Heights. Got a real-estate tip? Send suggestions to housingcomplex@washingtoncitypaper.com. Or call (202) 650-6928.
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I’m an American woman living abroad and have started a relationship with a wonderful man from a Middle Eastern country. We are having a great time exploring what is a foreign country for both of us. The looming issue is sex, of course. He is a moderate Muslim, but he grew up in a strict conservative family and country. He’s 25 and has never even held hands with a woman. He is excited to change this now that he has broken away from his family. I have had many partners, both men and women, and am quite sexually experienced. I am curious about what to do when the time comes. Do you have advice on how to best go about taking a man’s virginity? I want to avoid as much insecurity on his part as I can. —Going To Be His First Be gentle, GTBHF. Also, make it clear beforehand that you’re his girlfriend and not his counselor or spiritual adviser. If he’s still struggling with the sex-negative, woman-phobic zap that his upbringing (and a medieval version of his faith) put on his head, he needs to work through that crap before he gets naked with you. He may have some sort of post-climax meltdown or crisis—like the ones so many repressed gay dudes have the first time they have sex with a man—and you’ll be kind and understanding, of course, but you won’t allow him to lay responsibility for the choice he made on you. As for the sex itself… Take the pressure off him by letting him know that this—his first time, your first time together—is about pleasure and connection, not about performance and mastery. Let him know that you don’t expect him to know what he’s doing at every moment, that a little fumbling and adjusting are normal even with more experienced folks, and that you’re both allowed to stop the action, talk about whatever’s going on, and then start again. And finally, GTBHF, let him know that you’re going to take the lead and reassure him that there’s nothing emasculating about being with—and being led by—a sexually empowered woman. Quite the opposite: A truly masculine straight man isn’t afraid of a woman who knows what she’s doing and —Dan Savage what she wants. I am a 37-year-old man, and I sometimes get unbidden erections in public. They aren’t glaringly obvious unless maybe I’m wearing a swimsuit at the pool, but of course, regardless of the situation, I feel like everyone can see it. I’ve heard people say it’s rude or could even be perceived as predatory to sport a visible woody under your clothes in public. There are countless websites devoted to shaming men with boners in public, and that doesn’t help the situation. Despite being mortified, deep down I want to believe that it should be okay to go about my business as long as I’m not being creepy. Is it okay to just
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go about my business until my hard-on subsides? —Bummed Over Normal Erotic Raisings The only people who’ll notice (or linger over) your unbidden erections are the ones staring at your crotch—and they’re the creeps, BONER, not you. So go about your business… unless you’re at the pool, in which case find an open poolside lounger and lie on your stomach until the crisis passes. —Dan I have an open FWB thing going with a guy. He is my primary sex partner. We recently stopped using condoms when we’re together because we both passed STI tests several months ago and neither of us has been with anyone else since. But we are both free to have sex with other people, and it’s bound to happen sooner or later. If we always use condoms with the other people, is it safe for us to continue having condom-free sex —What’s The Risk? with each other?
They’re the creeps, BONER, not you. Condoms—when used consistently and correctly—greatly reduce your risk of acquiring a sexually transmitted infection. They provide excellent protection against HIV infection, gonorrhea, and chlamydia (diseases spread by genital secretions); they’re slightly less effective at protecting you against herpes, HPV, and syphilis (diseases spread by skin-to-skin contact). The condom-free sex you’re currently having with your fuck buddy can be regarded as risk-free because you’ve both been tested, you’re both STIfree, and you’re both not having sex with other people. But some risk will creep into your condom-free sex after you start having sex with other people, WTR—even if you’re using condoms. Your risk of getting an STI will be much, much lower if you use condoms—consistently and correctly—with those other partners, but sex with other part—Dan ners will introduce some risk.
I’m in a BDSM-centered relationship with my Master/boyfriend and wear his collar. We have a tumultuous relationship and argue often. The center of these arguments seems to be that I see myself as a strong female and in control of many aspects of my life, and he’d rather have me just go along with whatever he says. I like some BDSM play in the bedroom, but he wants me to be submissive to him 24/7. I’ve wanted breast augmentation for many years. He joined me at the first consult and was talking about the smallest implants possible. I have a small chest, and he is attracted to small chests, but I knew I wanted something more substantial—especially since I am paying for it and it’s my body. I ended up going bigger than what he wanted without telling him, and he’s expressed anger about what I did to “his body” (he believes he owns my body) without his consent. I couldn’t be happier with my boobs. He hates them. Now I just don’t know about my boyfriend. I love him, but I feel like he can’t remove himself from decisions I make for myself. —Tits In Trouble Your Master/boyfriend wants a slave/girlfriend—he wants (and seems to think he’s in) a total power exchange relationship. But you want a guy who’s your equal out of the bedroom (and can’t dictate implant sizes to you because it’s not “his body,” it’s yours) and a fun BDSM play-partner/Master in the bedroom. You two need to have an outof-role conversation/renegotiation about your interests in kink, and your limits and his expectations—and if you can’t get on the same page (if he can’t dial it way back), —Dan you’ll have to end things. I agreed with most of your response to ADULT, the woman whose boyfriend has a thing for diapers. She said she didn’t enjoy diaper play but mentioned that she got wet wearing a diaper. You wrote: “Something about being put in a diaper turns you on.” I have to disagree. I just finished a great book called Come as You Are by Emily Nagoski, and she cites some compelling science in support of the idea that what our genitals do is NOT always indicative of what we find sexually appealing. It’s called “arousal non-concordance.” Nagoski uses the example of a college boy who witnessed a rape: He was physically aroused by what he saw but emotionally disgusted. In the case of ADULT, it may be important to understand that just because your genitals are responsive, that doesn’t mean that you are “into it” on some level. —Longtime Reader And Fan Thanks for writing, LRAF—and I’m going to pick up Emily Nagoski’s book! —Dan Send your Savage Love questions to mail@savagelove.net.
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At what point on the career ladder do most industries stop mandating drug testing? I just picked up cat food at PetSmart, where they proudly display on their doors that they test their employees. Does this include the CEO? Why test nurses, but not doctors? Why bank tellers but not the “masters of the universe”? Testing might serve a public-safety function for airline pilots and selected others, but for the folks that stock the bags of kitty crunchies? It seems like a subtle form of control over people in —Ken lower social and economic levels. Asking somebody to pee in a cup is subtle? Maybe compared to being chained to an oar. You raise a good point about drug tests, though— there’s definitely a low-grade class war going on here. However, the subset of the proletariat being lashed into submission isn’t minorities or the poor (not for lack of trying). Rather, it’s a demographic so oppressed even defenders like the ACLU dare not speak its name: stoners. OK, technically store clerks. But big business is seeing lots of overlap. Workplace drug testing, like the war on drugs generally, was and is motivated by a tangled web of impulses—some legitimate, some pretty sketchy. The one few quarrel with is safety. Following the 1981 crash of a U.S. Marine jet on the carrier Nimitz, killing 14 and injuring 47, it came out that six of the dead tested positive for marijuana and that drug use was common on the ship and in the military overall. Although drugs didn’t cause the crash (the plane’s crew, or what could be found of it, tested clean), the Reagan administration established a zero-tolerance drug policy for U.S. military personnel, to be enforced by testing. Things spread from there. Prodded by the feds, people all over were soon peeing into cups: civilian federal workers in sensitive jobs, federal contractors, employees in federally-regulated industries such as transportation. Many private companies started testing on their own. By 1990, surveys by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics found, 46 percent of worksites with more than 250 employees were administering drug tests. The prevalence of testing varied widely by industry, the BLS discovered. At the top of the range with 72 percent was communications, transportation, and utilities, followed by construction and mining at 70 percent. At the bottom was finance, insurance, and real estate, with 23 percent. Aha, you say, the masters of the universe get a pass! I guess, but face it: While financial and other white-collar oopsies can cost you your retirement money, the blue-collar version can get you killed now. And that’s the thing: Drug testing evident-
Slug Signorino
When I interview for a professional job, the company usually has me sign a statement saying drug use is against company policy. Yet when I apply for a low-wage job they want to test me for drug use. What gives? Does drug testing work? —J.P.
ly does result in fewer people getting killed or hurt. General Motors reported a 50 percent reduction in workplace injuries after implementing a testing program. Southern Pacific Railroad saw an 86 percent reduction in worker injuries within five years after its program began. A nationwide study of truck drivers found a 24 percent reduction in alcohol-related fatalities. But here’s something else. According to the BLS figures, one industry was an exception to the rule that the likelihood of drug testing correlates with the potential for mayhem: wholesale/retail. The worst that can happen to the average stock clerk is you drop the jumbo Tide off the top shelf. But 54 percent of wholesale and retail worksites test for drugs. Why? Browse around on drug-testing websites and you get a sense of the executive mindset: We don’t trust these thieving peons. One drug-test equipment supplier says flatly, “80 percent of drug abusers steal from their workplace.” (Source for this preposterous claim: a single small study published in 1994.) Others are less blatant, making noises about helping the afflicted get treatment and so on. Reducing workplace accidents is in there, but mostly what you see is stuff like this: “To convince ‘casual users’ that the cost of using is too high” and “establish grounds for discipline or firing.” Translation: Drug testing helps keep the slackers in line. Big Brotherish? Yeah. A violation of your civil rights? Not unless you can make the case that you’re part of a group that’s being unfairly singled out. Civil liberties advocates are happy to whale on knuckleheads who propose drugtesting programs that are too obviously discriminatory—to cite one egregious example, mandatory testing for welfare recipients. One page from the ACLU site features a beef from a 40year-old mother of three who was humiliated by being forced to produce a urine sample while an attendant watched; they contend such things are intrusive and bad for workplace morale, which gets no argument from me. But let’s be clear: Nobody’s defending your right to be stoned on the job. Still, we want to be fair, right? I wrote PetSmart asking if their CEO had submitted to drug testing. So far no response. If I hear something —Cecil Adams I’ll let you know. Have something you need to get straight? Take it up with Cecil at straightdope.com.
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Gear Prudence: I bought my girlfriend a brand new bike for her birthday (one that she picked out and was quite expensive), and she seemed really excited about it at the time. Now that the weather is nicer, I’m really stoked to go on rides with her—except for the past few times I brought this up, she didn’t really seem that into the idea. I asked her why not, and she hasn’t really given me any specific reasons. How do I convince her to ride her new bike with me? —Please Explain Reasonable Strategies Using Ample Different Examples Dear PERSUADE: Let’s say you finally convince her. Will it go something like this? At mile 3: “Hey honey, how’s that bike I bought you riding? Pretty great, right?” At mile 10: “Wasn’t it a great decision for me to buy you this bike?” At mile 21: “You sure look fast on that expensive bike that I bought you for your birthday.” At mile 27: “What do you mean ‘ride with other people?’ I bought you this bike!” Bicycling with your partner can be a great experience, but your compatibility off the bike is no guarantee of your compatibility on it. Maybe you ride at different paces or maybe have different expectations of what makes for a reasonable weekend jaunt. Or perhaps, as suggested above, she’s preemptively fatigued by your quid pro quo gifting strategy, wherein your primary motivation for the birthday present was your fulfillment, not hers. That’s why you’re going to need to trick her. Ride out to a place on the C&O Canal towpath that’s inaccessible by car. Send a text indicating that you’re grievously injured, and she needs to get to you as soon as possible and that she’ll need to ride her bike to get there. When she arrives, surprise her by explaining that it was all an elaborate ruse and that you’re perfectly hale. Then you’ll get to ride home together! The icy silence will make the ride seem that much longer. You should really savor it too, since it’s likely the last time that you’ll be cycling (or doing anything else) in each other’s company. Conversely, you could not rely on subterfuge (it’s a terrible idea). Instead, the next time she suggests a couples activity, politely inquire if she’d be interested in arriving there via bicycle. Rather than putting biking together as the forefront purpose of your activity, it’ll serve as ancillary one. If she agrees, use the trip to demonstrate how courteous and charming you are as a riding partner. That might invite repeat excursions and soon you’ll be pedaling everywhere together. Ultimately though, it’s possible that you and your girlfriend will never become bicycling buddies. This is OK! You don’t need to make it —GP a bigger deal than it is. Gear Prudence is Brian McEntee, who tweets @sharrowsDC. Got a question about bicycling? Email gearprudence@washcp.com.
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Up in the
Heir
Ward 8 picks Marion Barry’s successor. By Will Sommer PhotograPhS By DarroW montgomery
Before you see the candidate, you hear her voice. over a grim beat, natalie Williams intones from an rV blocks away about her life of “survival and service.” and she’s brought some backup from beyond the grave. With the RV still out of sight, Marion Barry—dead now for five months—talks up Williams on a recording made years ago. There’s a wealth of less glowing Barry quotes about Williams to choose from, but the campaign has gone with one of the nicer ones. A minute later, you see Williams’ face, four feet tall and plastered on the side of the RV. Then Williams’ name appears on the shirts of a dozen volunteers who spill out of the vehicle, hyping Williams like she’s come to this corner of Anacostia to claim the title belt. At last, minutes after the speakers announce her arrival, the real Williams appears. “We call them ‘jump-outs,’” Williams says, making a play on the police rush tactics that activists say terrorize the ward. Metropolitan Police Department officers in jump-out units look for guns and drugs, but Williams’ squad only wants votes. Williams, a former Barry staffer and the president of the Ward 8 Democrats, has been competing with ten other candidates in the special election to fill the ward’s D.C. Council seat. On a Wednesday afternoon two weeks before the April 28 election, the Williams road show rolls up to a laundromat parking lot in Anacostia that’s strewn with broken glass. About 30 people mill around the lot, but not many of them look like they’re there to do laundry. A sign on a needle exchange van nearby urges them to “ask us about Hep C.”
Williams volunteers hustle out of the RV. Two run across Good Hope Road SE to stick a campaign sign to a barbed wire fence. Others start rounding up people to talk to Williams. The whole operation is a show of force in a race that will come down to campaign organization, and it works well enough that one man jokes to Williams that it frightened him. Williams’ tour doubles as an impromptu social work blitz for the District’s poorest ward. In two hours of campaigning, Williams encounters a catalogue of woes: a woman discovering her car window was smashed during a burglary attempt; a homeless lesbian couple who, estranged from their parents, takes their daughter to a park to sleep at night. On 18th Street SE, Williams comes upon a man who has just been evicted from his apartment. Surrounded by the remains of his life on the curb, the man, who says his name is Leonard, praises Williams for her connection to the late mayor. “That’s the seed that you came out of,” he tells her. Not that everyone thinks so well of Williams and Barry: At the laundromat, Anacostia resident Hermener Brown tells Williams that she doesn’t like her or her old boss. “The only time we see him was when he wanted a vote,” she says. Brown won’t vote for Williams or anyone else. She turns away, warning others
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washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 17
off the campaign. Back on the RV, though, Williams grins. Aside from Brown, the laundromat crowd loved her. One man asked for her autograph. Another pestered her through the gladhanding. I figured he was a crank; it turns out he wanted help feeding his four kids. Williams plans to find his family a meal at a church that night. “That’s why they loved Barry,” Williams says. “And that’s why they’re going to love me.” This is all happening because of what occurred on Nov. 23, 2014. That’s when Barry—four-term mayor, four-term Ward 8 councilmember, and perennial late night TV punchline—collapsed in front of his house. He arrived at United Medical Center in cardiac arrest. By then, the 78-year-old politician couldn’t be saved. Barry had been the mayorfor-life, but now he was dead. Barry’s death set off weeks of official mourning and the most unpredictable Council race in recent memory. His final post as Ward 8 councilmember was a humbler one than his time as the city’s globe-trotting may-
or. In 2014, it was hard to remember the Barry who taunted prosecutors and hobnobbed with world leaders. The U.S. Attorney’s Office hounded Barry when he was mayor, but toward the end no prosecutor could be bothered with his antics as councilmember. Even the 2014 book tour to promote his memoir couldn’t help but reveal how diminished Barry had become. Asked about a proposed “yoga tax” on gym services, a confused Barry went on to announce his opposition to the nonexistent “yogurt tax,” filibustering on the nutritional benefits of cottage cheese. Barry’s Council tenure earned a record two censures from his colleagues. When Barry died, he didn’t control any committees. Officially, the District’s most storied politician had about as much power as a newly elected freshman. Despite a dismal legislative record and mishaps of almost every kind, Barry managed to keep a lid on the ward’s tumultuous politics. When he died, that lid blew off. If someone wanted the seat, you could see it in the way they talked at the Barry memorial, an event that would help bring the District government’s tab for public grieving to
18 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
natalie Williams counts her time working as Barry’s spokeswoman not in years but in travails: his kidney transplant, his 2009 arrest for stalking an ex-girlfriend, the loss of his committee after the Council discovered that he had steered an earmark to that ex-girlfriend and taken a cut for himself. nearly $100,000. Mourners interred Barry at Congressional Cemetery after a lengthy ceremony at the Walter Washington Convention Center, effectively firing the starting gun on a covert race that could finally move from living rooms and text messages to the D.C. Board of Elections. By the beginning of January, 23 candidates had picked up nominating forms to enter the race. Thirteen of them made the ballot for April 28, although two candidates dropped out earlier this month. It’s a lot of hopefuls to keep track of, but who can blame them for running? For the
first time since Barry retook his Council seat in 2004, Ward 8 pols don’t have to measure their ambitions against the most significant politician in District history. “Marion was like the Goliath of politics, and no one except for a very few had the courage to stand up and run against him,” says Rev. Oliver “O.J.” Johnson, a former advisory neighborhood commissioner in the ward. “Once he died, all of those have come out now who basically didn’t have the courage to challenge a political Goliath.” Barry’s would-be replacements represent
nearly every stream of District politics in the last 40 years of Home Rule. Mayor Muriel Bowser has her champion in LaRuby May, a businesswoman who has crushed her opponents in fundraising. Representing the remains of ex-Mayor Vince Gray’s administration is former mayoral deputy chief of staff Sheila Bunn, who has received her old boss’ endorsement but little of his fundraising success. They’re joined by a cast worthy of an eastof-the-river Game of Thrones. There’s Trayon White, a Barry protégé whose sizable organization and ties to the street evoke Barry’s origins as a young agitator. He’s facing longtime activist Eugene D. Kinlow and Williams, a one-time Barry confidante who became one of his most dedicated foes. Sandra Seegars, a distinguished political knife-fighter in a ward with no shortage of them, is testing how far decades of community work will take her. And there’s Barry’s son Christopher, who since his father’s death has been going by the more politically advantageous “Marion C. Barry.” He’s looking to make good on a legacy that he’s spent much of his life avoiding. (In this piece, I’ll call the former mayor “Barry” and his son, Marion C. Barry, “Marion.”)
Five months after his death, Barry’s reputation and the voters who guaranteed him reelection are still here. A campaign isn’t a truth and reconciliation commission, but it’s striking how positive all the candidates are about Barry, whose legacy on actual improvements for the ward is, at best, mixed. As Ward 8 tries to define its politics without the mayor-for-life, even his old enemies want to tap into that Barry magic. Activist Philip Pannell says some of the candidates will stop at nothing for a piece of Barry. “If they thought that possibly going to Congressional Cemetery and getting in the grave with him would help them get votes, they would do that.” Eugene Kinlow has come to this Fairlawn door to scrounge up votes. Instead, he’s getting another story about the mayor-for-life. “I know him personally,” the man who opens the front door says, pulling out his flip phone to show Kinlow that he has the nowuseless number on speed dial. “I hate to see he’s gone.” It’s yet another door for Kinlow, the 53-
year-old activist and failed political candidate looking for some electoral luck after going a while without it. After successfully campaigning against a private prison and trash transfer station in the ward more than a decade ago, Kinlow now wants to take his work to the Council. Kinlow has a vision for Ward 8, but driving around with him, it’s not easy to picture. As he passes by vacant storefronts and a drug market, Kinlow envisions the change rumbling east across the river from Southwest. He knows all the best views, where the
trees open up and the whole District appears in panorama. They’re places that would make a condominium tycoon salivate, if not for the crime rate and lack of stores and restaurants. “With all these views, we still have the lowest-priced property in town,” Kinlow says. Depending on your point of view, Ward 8 has either been spared from or missed out on the wave of development that’s sweeping the rest of the District. Last year, the ward led the District in murders, with 35 homicides, eight more than in 2013. Two years ago, Anacos-
Kinlow has a vision for Ward 8, but driving around with him, it’s not easy to picture. as he passes by vacant storefronts and a drug market, Kinlow envisions the change rumbling east from Southwest. he knows all the best views, where the trees open up and the whole District appears in panorama.
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 19
tia’s crime rate earned a travel warning from the French government. An Urban Institute study released this month found that, even as the number of areas “challenged” by poverty dropped west of the Anacostia River, they’ve increased in Ward 8. More businesses and higher-priced apartments could reverse those numbers, but they will also likely mean pricing decades-long residents out to the suburbs, replacing them with moneyed, often white, new residents. “I’m one of the only candidates letting people know, ‘Look, your rents are going to double or triple in the next five to ten years,’” Kinlow says. That anxiety about change hangs in the air during the race. Twice while I reported this story, people assured me that they didn’t have anything against white people. After decades of work in the ward, Kinlow is an encyclopedia of missed opportunities. He takes me to a Metro parking garage, where he looks out over Poplar Point. It was the proposed site for a D.C. United soccer stadium, but eventually lost out to Buzzard Point on the other side of the river. “Man, they were almost there, but they still missed it by a half-a-mile,” Kinlow says. Kinlow envisions a town center-style complex on the Anacostia in the stadium’s place, but it seems like he won’t get a chance to guide it. Despite some success in fundraising, his campaign still lags far behind May’s. Historian and occasional Washington City Paper contributor John Muller pegs Kinlow as a representative of the ward’s middle class— and thus, not likely to do well on Election Day. “Just look at the Census statistics or the demographics or whatever. That’s not going to be enough to carry him to victory,” Muller says. At Ballou High School in early April, each of the Ward 8 candidates has one of their last shots to prove that they can beat May. But the candidate of the hour isn’t here yet. Instead, May is a few blocks away at a cookout, where she and her mayoral patron are pumping up (and feeding) straw poll voters. Bowser waves a May sign on the corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE, although the more than $200,000 May has raised with Bowser’s help has been more valuable. Without any public polling in the race, May, with a financial advantage and Bowser’s sizable campaign machine behind her, looks like the likely winner. With gobs of big business cash, May has become a target for voters and candidates who fret that May and Bowser want to turn the ward into a developers’ playground. Perhaps more worryingly for rivals, the young Florida transplant looks poised to win a Council seat that others have waited decades for. “There’s an incredible amount of resentment towards LaRuby May,” Muller says. Still, May has her fans. When she yells out her “So 8 May Rise” campaign slogan at forums, they stand up, dressed in her signature purple and waving their arms like they’ve been hit by a shockwave.
Judging by his frequently heated interactions with police, trayon White isn’t willing to be anyone’s puppet.
A May defeat by Bunn, the Gray-endorsed candidate in the race, would give the ex-mayor, still facing a federal investigation into his 2010 mayoral campaign, some satisfaction at foiling Bowser’s plan to put an ally on the Council. The defensiveness of the late-stage Gray administration has carried over in part to Bunn’s campaign. A page posted on a wall in her headquarters lays out “The Machen Plan”—that’s Machen as in ex-U.S. Attorney Ron Machen, the man Gray supporters blame for his primary re-election loss to Bowser last year. “Get Rid of Vince Gray,” the page reads in part. “You know why? So 8 May Rise.” It continues: “Handpick a puppet, LaRuby May. You know why? So 8 May Rise.” Judging by his frequently heated interactions with police, Trayon White isn’t willing to be anyone’s puppet. White, a former State Board of Education member, is suing the city, alleging that an MPD cop slammed a car trunk on his head during one of Barry’s annual turkey giveaways. White, an organizer who styles himself with the nickname “WardEight” for the ballot, knows the street. After arguing with a cop last year, police took him to a station to ask him questions about a murder. (Police
20 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
records don’t suggest that White was a suspect, and he’s never been charged with a serious crime.) “His is more than a campaign,” Pannell says. “It’s a crusade.” White, Kinlow, Williams, and Bunn make up the most viable field of opponents for May. At the straw poll, she arrives late to boos from the diehards who have already cast their ballots and stuck around for the forum. Their disdain isn’t enough to stop her. She beats her nearest opponents, led by White and Williams, by nearly 100 votes. In a ward where a 1995 special election came down to a single vote, that’s a big deal. Weeks after the straw poll, Williams finds herself face-to-face with the power of May’s food giveaways. At a bus stop on Good Hope Road SE, she meets a man who promises to vote for “LaRo” because her campaign gave him food. “You don’t even know her name?” Williams says, incredulous. Later, she’ll complain to me about May’s belly-centric campaign style. “That’s one-time feeding,” Williams says. “That’s tricking the people.” Williams has her own mayoral connections. She counts her time working as Barry’s
spokeswoman not in years but in travails: his kidney transplant, his 2009 arrest for stalking an ex-girlfriend, the loss of his committee after the Council discovered that he had steered an earmark to that ex-girlfriend and taken a cut for himself. Williams’ campaign office includes a Barry calendar and a propped-up copy of his memoir. He features prominently in her literature, which comes in handy at a gas station, when Williams meets a woman who insists that only a man can hold the seat. “Don’t do that to the sisters,” Williams says, pulling out her campaign hand card and pointing at a picture of Barry. “I learned from the very best.” Since he’s dead, Barry can’t complain about his starring role in Williams’ campaign. But there was a time when Williams found herself on the outs with her former boss. When she tried to run against him in 2012, Barry blasted Williams as a newcomer ignorant to the ward’s needs. Williams, who came in fourth in the Democratic primary, was reduced to holding a sit-in in Barry’s Council office as a campaign stunt. Eventually, security came and asked her to leave city hall. As a member of one of the ward’s most prominent political families, Bunn has her own complicated past with Barry. Her late father, James Bunn, rose to prominence alongside Barry as a ward businessman and played a minor role in his earmarks scandal. But now, Sheila Bunn says she’s offering the ward a “different type of leadership.” “No one can be Marion Barry,” Bunn says. “And I’m not trying to be Marion Barry.”
Marion C. Barry isn’t exactly Babysitter’s Club material. In 2005, an unsuspecting cop found himself trapped in a headlock while Marion punched his head. In 2011, he jumped out of an apartment window in a botched attempt to escape police, leaving behind a vial of PCP, sandwich bags of pot, and a spray of blood. More recently, Marion approached police officers with a clenched fist during a neighborhood dispute. Last year, a Secret Service officer discovered the younger Barry zoned out in a car downtown with synthetic marijuana on his clothes. The incident earned him probation and a suspended sentence. Unless he takes a plea deal, Marion will face trial next month for allegedly threatening a bank teller and destroying a security camera in a fit of rage. But on Easter Monday, Marion and a handful of campaign staffers find themselves at the National Zoo in charge of two dozen kids, some as young as two years old. Soon after the Marion crew arrives, one boy tears off after spotting the buffaloes, yelling that he’s going to score “some buffalo wings.” Marion’s campaign has brought the kids from impoverished Wellington Park to enjoy Easter Monday at the zoo, an AfricanAmerican tradition in the District that dates back to segregation. But Marion, who has both his father’s reputation and pending criminal charges weighing on him, seems less interested in zebras or toddlers than his own political prospects. “If they walked in my shoes, I don’t think they would make it,” Marion says of his critics. (Two weeks later, at a press conference organized to insist that Marion won’t drop out
[laruby] may has her fans. When she yells out her “So 8 may rise” campaign slogan at forums, they stand up, dressed in her signature purple and waving their arms like they’ve been hit by a shockwave. of the race, one of his campaign staffers will tell me that his rivals are trying to “set up” the candidate—an accidental echo of his father’s famous exclamation, “Bitch set me up.”) On paper, Marion’s father didn’t leave much behind. Along with royalties from his memoir, Barry’s assets totalled roughly $16,000, with much more than that waiting in tax debts. Another Barry creditor recently filed a claim for more than $20,000. But Barry did leave his son something that can’t be litigated away: his name. Within weeks of his father’s death, he started going by Marion, his legal first name, instead of Christopher, the middle name he used for the first 34 years of his life. Marion says he’s just trying to honor his father with the switch, but it’s hard not to consider the benefits on the ballot. No one works more under Barry’s shadow than his own son, and no one is more eager to claim his mantle. In a campaign handout dominated by a picture of Marion standing in front of a new mural of his father, Marion makes clear that he wants to lay the strongest claim to the family legacy, whatever that is. Other candidates tout their connections to Marion’s father, according to the handout,
“but only I can truly carry the great responsibility of upholding the Barry Tradition.” Ever since his introduction to District politics at 6 pounds, 7 ounces, Marion has been scrutinized. He may be the only baby in the city’s history whose birth required the Columbia Hospital for Women to create an impromptu press room. Months later, Marion’s father and mother, Effi Barry, brought out their infant at a diplomatic function to be coddled by the first lady of Egypt. Marion was born into the District’s most famously tumultuous home life. Effi, a former model who shunned public life even as her husband wallowed in it, described her first year as the city’s first lady as a “nightmare.” The world outside the house, the elder Barry once told a reporter, was a “fishbowl” filled with “barracudas” and “piranhas.” By 1986, things soured further in the Barry household. A bizarre Washington Post profile written at the time, apparently organized by Barry to put down rumors about his partying and philandering, featured the mayor insisting that his sex life with his Effi was going well while a six-year-old Chris Barry tore around the house.
“Put your brakes on, Christopher!” Effi yelled. Marion played a cameo role in his father’s mounting scandals. Now chaperoning kids around the zoo, he once had his own cityfunded chaperones at a theme park birthday party, a flap that caused a mini-scandal for his father’s administration. On trips to the Caribbean islands where Marion’s father would reportedly use drugs, the mayoral bodyguard babysat Marion, sometimes across town from his hard-partying father. On one trip to the Bahamas, according to a government witness against Barry, a city employee took care of Marion while his dad enjoyed his eponymous “M.B. special”—a joint laced with cocaine. “We were more like brothers than father and son,” Marion says. City-funded babysitters would look like a lark compared to what was to come. On Jan. 18, 1990, the FBI finally caught up with Barry at the Vista Hotel. Barry’s on-and-off mistress convinced him to hit a crack pipe, and then gave agents in the next room the cue to burst in. In a 2007 Post interview conducted months before her death from leukemia, Effi described getting a late-night phone call telling her that her husband was in custody. Stunned, Effi went and looked in on her son, sound asleep. “I just stood there and cried,” she said. With the help of a family friend, Effi smuggled Marion, face covered, past a growing crowd of news reporters. The mayor’s supporters created a fund to keep his son at the tony St. Albans School, but the money wasn’t necessary: Marion was soon pulled from school after classmates teased him over his father’s now infamous problems with women and drugs. After divorcing her husband, Effi moved to Hampton, Va., taking her son with her. He didn’t return to live with his father until high school. When Marion thinks about his father’s drug use, he doesn’t dwell on the Vista and “bitch set me up.” Instead, he remembers the time between 1999 and 2004, when Barry had finished his final term as mayor but had yet to regain the Ward 8 Council seat. U.S. Park Police arrested Barry in 2002 at Buzzard Point after finding cocaine and marijuana in his car. Barry claimed the drugs were planted, and he was never charged. Marion, looking for help from his father as he entered his 20s, instead found him “really off the deep end” with drugs. “When I really needed his guidance, he was off on his own thing,” Barry says. Marion developed his own drug problems in 2011 and 2012. His life foundered, he claims, after he became the victim of identity theft and a series of burglaries. Work slowed for the contracting company he had started and named after his mother. With his life falling apart, Marion started using PCP, a drug that causes numbness, detachment, and sometimes mania. “Everything in my life was just chaos, and you put something in your body that makes
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 21
chaos seem normal,” Marion says. As Marion’s addiction grew, it became obvious to people who would see him scoring or getting high in the ward his father represented. Despite not even being the most famous drug addict in his family, Marion found his father unsympathetic to his problems. “Him having struggled with drugs, I would have wished he was there more,” Marion says. “But he was more concerned about politics.” Marion says he’s now sober, thanks in part to help from former Ward 1 Councilmember Jim Graham. Barry asked Graham to help take care of his son, according to the excouncilmember. Even with Marion’s legal and personal problems, Barry apparently wanted his son to succeed him in the Council seat, a plan that, despite his death, has thus far worked out. In 2011, political hopeful Jacque Patterson met with Barry. During their conversation, according to Patterson, Barry laid out his plans to win re-election in 2012, then resign the seat two years later and endorse Marion for the ensuing special election. If Barry had lived and stuck to this succession scheme, it would be going into effect right about now. “He would have liked to see his son, during his lifetime, ascend to that seat,” Patterson, who ran against Barry in 2012, says. When the Post reported on the dynastic plan, Barry claimed that it was just “bait” to test who in his inner circle would leak to reporters. Still, he kept pushing his son toward the office. Two weeks before last year’s primary, Barry organized a press conference at a church to endorse Gray. Barry and Gray were on stage, of course, but so was Marion, who said nearly nothing during the endorsement. Marion’s surprising appearance seemed just short of an anointing with oil. Now, Marion says his dad included him on the stage as part of the succession process. Just as important to Marion and his supporters, though, is Marion’s claim that his father, from his death bed, told him to run for the seat. Marion has inherited his father’s gift for making a political point. As the zoo tour winds on, he stops by the elephant house to point at the kids he’s leading, all African American. They’re targeted, he claims, by Bowser, May, and the coterie of developers who fund their campaigns. “They don’t want these children to be raised in Southeast,” Marion says. “They want them to be displaced.” Barry could make as many signals as he wanted about posthumous plans for the seat, but he couldn’t control his son. After a politically momentous appearance at his father’s memorial, Marion made what could still be a fatal mistake for his campaign: He went to the bank. On Jan. 13, Marion, who says he’s distrustful of banks because of his identity theft, walked into the PNC Bank’s Chinatown branch to make a $20,000 withdrawal. There, he says, he encountered a teller who had hassled him in the past.
“you have people sometimes that take advantage of their positions,” marion says, adding, “i just think that when she sees the name ‘marion Barry,’ she for some reason doesn’t like me.”
“You have people sometimes that take advantage of their positions,” Marion says, adding, “I just think that when she sees the name ‘Marion Barry,’ she for some reason doesn’t like me.” Court records tell a less sympathetic story. Marion, according to police, found his account overdrawn by $2,000. When Marion reduced the size of his withdrawal and was still refused, he allegedly threatened the teller.
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“I’m going to have someone waiting for you when you get off, you bitch,” Marion told the woman, according to a police report. In a rage, Marion allegedly grabbed a trash can and threw it over a bulletproof barrier at another teller, destroying a security camera. “I don’t think I had realized how much I was still mourning,” Marion says as he herds kids past the zoo’s panda cub. Making yet another arraignment appear-
ance at D.C. Superior Court a week after the bank incident, Marion seemed less like a viable candidate and more like Marion Barry’s volatile son. Marion, who says he was “disappointed in myself” after the incident, pleaded not guilty to three charges. After rejecting a plea deal offered by the prosecution, he faces trial in May. For the son of a man who seemed physically grafted onto the Council dais, Marion has had a hard run for his father’s seat. After the alleged bank outburst, Marion lost his experienced campaign manager and turned in a dismal campaign finance report. At the ward’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade, Barry rode a horse and appeared in cowboy gear. It was a decision that Marion says honored his father’s love for horses, but also an eye-catching one for a candidate who had just been accused of bizarre behavior. Marion, undeterred, quips that he’s 6 feet three inches tall—or 6’8” with his cowboy hat on. While higher recent fundraising totals suggest a recovering campaign, he still hasn’t successfully rallied all of Marion’s faithful (stepmother Cora Masters Barry, for example, hasn’t maxed out her contributions to him). Given the potential power of the Barry name, his upcoming trial raises the fascinating prospect of a newly elected councilmember being sent to prison after winning election. “He could win, and then he has a trial or something,” says Muller, who wrote a oneman show about Marion’s father. “I mean, that’s crazy.” As Marion circles the zoo, talking about his love of going off alone to a park to be away from people, I think of the advice Effi offered him in her Post interview near the end of her life. “You don’t have to be Marion Barry, you are Christopher Barry,” Effi said. “You don’t have to fill the shoes of your father.” But now he wants to be called “Marion Barry,” and his campaign quickly reminds reporters who think otherwise. After two hours at the zoo, Team Barry heads to a bustling park barbeque in Congress Heights. While the candidate hovers by the grill, I talk to a crowd of people clustered around a bench. They hold forth on their love for Barry—both of them. “If he’s anything like his father, man,” says Congress Heights resident Carl Magruder, before qualifying his support. “Look, I don’t know a lot about him.” Congress Heights resident Sandra Smith is on board with Marion based on his family name alone. She won’t truck with candidates like “LaRay,” whom she describes as a “cutthroat.” Smith’s benchmates pull on cans of Natty Light secreted in a black grocery bag, while men pass the time around a nearby convenience store. The west-of-the-river District boom seems very far away, even as it inches closer to Smith and the park. For now, though, it still feels like Barry town in Ward 8. “Marion Barry paved the way for us,” she says. “And he’d want us to stay right here.” CP
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Sound Check, Please Robert Wiedmaier is the latest restaurateur to take on live music with his new venue, Villain & Saint.
space to nightly live music performances. Republic became the first live music venue in Takoma Park when it opened just over a year ago with open mic nights, blues nights, and jam sessions. Sotto—located in the former home of jazz club HR-57 on 14th
Restaurateur Robert Wiedmaier has abandoned his chef’s whites from Marcel’s by the time opening night of his new Bethesda music venue, Villain & Saint, comes to a close. He hops on stage in a tightish black tee and jeans and takes the lead singer’s post with the full band behind him. “Everybody! Oh my God! Was that not unbelievable?” Wiedmaier blurts into the microphone. “The Lloyd Dobler Effect, did they not kill it here tonight?” While Wiedmaier is used to being center stage in the kitchen as the owner and chef behind Marcel’s, Brasserie Beck, Mussel Bar, and other restaurants, this is a new, more literal kind of stage for him. Inspired by HaightAshbury, the San Francisco hippie haven where many rock ’n’ roll greats like the Grateful Dead and Janis Joplin played in the 1960s, his music hall will focus on blues and jazz, indie rock, sixties classics, and heavy metal. Before the crowd goes home, “American Pie” plays as lights flicker between pinks, blues, greens, and yellows. The song, a favorite of Wiedmaier’s mother, will close Villain & Saint every night. People have been saying “food is the new rock ’n’ roll” for years. But at Lloyd Dobler Effect a growing number of local establishplays opening night ments, they’re not mutually exclusive. at Bethesda’s Villain & Saint. Most notably, there’s the Hamilton, the state-of-the-art dining and music hall Clyde’s Restaurant Group opened in 2011. More recent- Street NW—pays tribute to its predecessor with solo artists or ly, Neighborhood Restaurant Group’s catering company, 550 small groups performing jazz, soul, blues, and go-go. “I’ve always wanted to do a music venue,” says Wiedmaier. Events & Provisions, partnered with AMP by Strathmore to provide food and drinks for the 2,800-square-foot perfor- “I love music.” When he first opened Mussel Bar in Bethesmance and event space in North Bethesda. And while D.C. is da, he’d hoped to make that more music-centric, but the space certainly no Nashville, a number of restaurants have dedicated was too small and it just didn’t fit, the chef says. So when the
space formerly occupied by Markham’s Bar and Grill recently became available in Bethesda, not far from his Kensington home, he jumped on it. Wiedmaier is joined in the venture by his fellow partners in RW Restaurant Group: chef Brian McBride, COO Frank Shull, and CFO Joe Lively. Wiedmaier has dabbled in playing drums and the harmonica. “But I wouldn’t say I’m any good. My son thinks I suck.” His 16-year-old, Marcel (the namesake of his Foggy Bottom restaurant), plays the bass in a jazz band, which performed at Villian & Saint during last Sunday’s brunch. Marcel Wiedmaier will also be working at the venue doing sound and lighting checks for the bands that come in. He wants to go to the Berklee School of Music in Boston, according to his father. Villain & Saint is about as different as can be from Wiedmaier’s hushed fine dining temple, Marcel’s. He’s got the moxie to bring back lava lamps, whose green and pink orbs light up a wall near the entrance. Another wall pays tribute to deceased rock ’n’ rolllegends with portraits of musicians including Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon. Wiedmaier’s even put some of his personal memorabilia on display, including a bass guitar signed by all the members of Aerosmith that he got years ago. “[My wife] Polly was pissed at me. She’s like, ‘How much did you get that guitar for?!’” he recalls. It’s attached high enough on the wall to prevent theft. The food, too, is a far cry from the boudin blanc and caviar diners found at Marcel’s. The Americana menu is split into meaty “villain” dishes (smoked pork ribs, a cheeseburger) and vegetarian “saint” dishes (grilled asparagus, zucchini pancakes). But it’s not just that Wiedmaier is playing anPhotographs by Jessica Sidman
By Jessica Sidman
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 25
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w w w. a rc ur i d c . c om
26 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
other tune with Villain & Saint. (Mussel Bar has more casual food, too.) Rather, Villain & Saint is a whole new genre for him. After all, Wiedmaier is quick to point out that Villain & Saint is a music venue, not a restaurant. He doesn’t consider it in the same category as Republic, which, he notes, doesn’t have a stage like his place. “That’s $45,000 you’re looking at right there—just in equipment,” the chef says, pointing to the stage on the afternoon leading up to opening night. TVs that line the bar live stream whoever is playing. You can even watch the shows in real time from your phone or computer. Villain & Saint has its own full set of instruments, including electric guitars and a drum set. Most bands bring their own equipment, but Wiedmaier wants to keep the stage set up at all times to emphasize that it’s a music venue. Still, he is a chef at the end of the day, so the bar and kitchen play prominently. “Most music venues that you go to, it’s hard to get a drink, the food’s mediocre. And we didn’t want to do that here.” Running a music venue that serves food and drinks presents some unique challenges that don’t necessarily exist in typical bar and restaurant. Neighborhood Restaurant Group founder Michael Babin has found that the concert dictates the flow of food for 550 Events at AMP. Most of the orders come in during a narrow window of time, which is tough on the kitchen. As a result, 550 Events has tailored its menu, which includes dishes like mushroom risotto fritters and rockfish sliders, to be able to support that. 550 Events also plans to work with artists interested in customizing the menu offerings. Neighborhood Restaurant Group Bar & Spirits Director Jeff Faile, Beer Director Greg Engert, and Wine Director
Brent Kroll will also partner with artists on drinks. “We are excited to explore that more,” Babin says. Many restaurateurs feel there’s already a special affinity between the restaurant and music worlds. “The restaurant business attracts a lot of creative people, and creative people often have strong feelings about or interest in music,” Babin says. Wiedmaier adds that being a chef can be kind of like being a rocker. Having cooked with fellow chefs at charity events, “we’re kind of like a band. I’m doing first course. He’s doing second course. You’re doing third course. You’re doing dessert.” That sometimes means encountering the same kind of frustrations as a band. “A lot of times you show up to these venues, and there’s no one to help us,” Wiedmaier says. “No one to help us carry our stuff in. There’s no place to go get something to drink… I’ve found it’s the same thing with bands. A lot of these bands don’t get treated very well.” Wiedmaier hopes to change that at his own venue. Villain & Saint is a small place with a capacity for only 138 people indoors, but it does have a green room for artists downstairs that’s outfitted with a refrigerator, TV, and couches. “They can go down there and chill out between sets instead of just standing here,” he says. After all, it’s no longer just diners he has to worry about taking care of. “I want people to understand that this is about the musicians. This is all about the music,” Wiedmaier says. “Yes, we have a great bar. Yes, we have great CP food. But it’s about the music here.” Eatery tips? Food pursuits? Send suggestions to hungry@washingtoncitypaper.com.
DCFEED
what we ate last week:
Scrambled eggs banh mi, $9, Doi Moi brunch. Satisfaction level: 4 out of 5
what we’ll eat next week:
Fried whole belly clams, $16, All Set Restaurant & Bar. Excitement level: 3 out of 5
Grazer
brew in town The fast-casual pizza scene is officially hotter than a 900-degree oven. At least seven local shops now serve customizable pies baked in two minutes or less. SpinFire Pizza, co-founded by Washington football team wide receiver Pierre Garçon, opened last week in Rosslyn. &pizza now has a dozen shops and counting. Pizza Studio, which already has a presence in 10 states, debuts in Dupont on April 23. And the owner of Pizzeria Paradiso will open Veloce in early May. Take a —Jessica Sidman look at how the prices per pie stack up. PRICe
LoCaTIonS
SIze
12 locations in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia
$8.86-$8.96 for unlimited toppings
$3 (where available)
17-by-6 inches
Veloce
1828 L St. NW (coming soon)
$9 for lunch and dinner pizzas with up to four toppings
$2
8-inch circular
Custom fuel Pizza
2301-L Georgia Ave. NW; 1747 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
$7.97 for up to four toppings
$2.50
13-by-7 inches
1501 Wilson Blvd., Arlington; 20552 Easthampton Plaza, Ashburn
$8.99 for up to four toppings
$2
10-inch circular
DC Pizza
1103 19th St. NW
$8.69 for up to four toppings
$2
12-by-7 inches
Blaze Pizza
College Park, Bethesda, Laurel
$7.65 for unlimited toppings
$3
11-inch circular
Pizza Studio
1333 New Hampshire Ave. NW
$7.99 for unlimited toppings
$2
11-inch circular
The Drink: Double Dragon
Are you gonnA eAt that?
Where to Get it: Dram & Grain, 2007 18th St. NW, (202) 607-1572 Price: $15 What It Is: A hazy, amber-colored whiskey cocktail made with Wild Turkey Rare Breed and turkey
bone-infused Cynar artichoke liqueur with Becherovka bitters. It’s topped off with Angostura and “dark age” bitters. What It Tastes Like: Bartender Lukas Smith says his goal was to impart the drink with “a ramen-esque, bone stock quality.” The flavor profile is reminiscent of an old fashioned and includes notes of caramel, vanilla, citrus, leather, and aromatic herbs. The 112proof whiskey gives the drink a spicy kick, and the fat from the bone-washed liqueur creates a nice, smooth feel. The Process: Cynar, Becherovka, bitter herbs (cassia bark, gentian, and angelica root), and a wild turkey leg—which is smoked at the restaurant—are placed into a vacu-
Where in Town: Bardo Brewpub, 1200 Bladensburg Road NE Price: $5/12 oz.
GLuTen-fRee CRuST
&pizza
Spinfire Pizza
Bardo Zeus IPA
Down by the River When D.C.’s Bardo Brewpub was announced in 2012, local beer geeks rejoiced that owners Bill and Andrew Stewart were returning to craft beer. The brothers pioneered several of Clarendon’s most beloved watering holes—the legendary brewpub Bardo Rodeo (which turned into Dr. Dremo’s Taphouse before closing in 2008) as well as the bars that became Iota and Galaxy Hut. Enthusiasm was renewed last month when the Stewarts unveiled plans to open a two-acre beer garden and brewery on the Anacostia riverfront near Nationals Park. Following their unapologetically eclectic, offbeat approach, the new venture will feature a floating movie screen, massive child and dog play areas, a bike shop, and perhaps best of all, reasonably priced beer. Crowdsourced funds raised through Indiegogo will go toward a new brewhouse and flush toilets (instead of portable ones). Regardless of the campaign’s success, Bill Stewart says beer will start flowing as soon as July.
um-sealed bag and spend 24 hours cooking in a sous vide water bath at 173 degrees. The bag is then removed and cooled to room temperature before the bones are strained out. The liquid is then frozen, allowing the excess fat to be skimmed off. What’s left is ready to be used in the drink. The Story: The cocktail’s name is a nod to the hunting tradition in Smith’s family. “Some say that natural beauty is sometimes commingled with and impossible to separate from that which is most ugly,” he says. “In that case, wild turkeys must be profoundly beautiful in some way, because they are ugly enough that we used to call them dragons.” The drink features “turkey” two ways, hence the name Double Dragon. It’s also the name of a video game, Smith points out. —Travis Mitchell
The Gods Must Be Crazy Back at the Trinidad brewery, not all of Bardo’s 15 brews are hitting the mark just yet. But a visit to the beer garden—with its salvage yard-meets-Burning Man aesthetic, regular movie nights, and ample space for dogs and humans of all sizes to play—is a fun way to spend a few sunny hours. A solid beer choice for such an occasion is the Zeus IPA. The refreshing, six percent alcohol, dark amber brew is made with only Zeus hops, not a variety often used on its own. Hopheads who enjoy the earth, spice, and subtle citrus flavors of pungent hops like Columbus and Tomahawk will dig this intensely bitter hop bomb. Those up for some of Bardo’s funkier offerings should check out the Smoked and Oaked Bacon IPA or the Double Black 7 Grain Imperial IPA. Just remember: If it weren’t wacky, it wouldn’t be Bardo. —Tammy Tuck
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 27
The National Museum of African American History and Culture presents
SATURDAY, APRIL 25 9:45AM - 8:30PM A Symposium Examining the Use of Deadly Force by the Police and the Reaction to it.
Rasmuson Theater National Museum of the American Indian 4th Street & Independence Avenue, SW Washington, DC 20024
PANEL 01 FERGUSON:
PANEL 02 CIVIL RIGHTS 3.0:
PANEL 03 #WORDS MATTER:
What Does This Moment Mean for America? The evolution of the media, community leadership, and activism.
Ferguson & Faith in the 21st Century The past, present, future role of faith organizations as advocates for social change.
Mobilization & Expressive Culture The response of the creative community to excessive police violence.
9:45AM – 12:30 PM
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM
6:00 PM – 8:30 PM
Juan Williams Author and journalist, moderator Lisa Crooms, J.D. Howard University School of Law Opal Tometi Founder of Black Lives Matter Willis Johnson Pastor, Wellspring Church, Ferguson
Rex Ellis Assoc. Director Curatorial Affairs, NMAAHC Jeff Johnson Journalist, motivational speaker Renee Harrison Prof., Howard University School of Divinity, former LAPD officer Lerone A. Martin Asst. Prof. of Religion and Politics, John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics Rev. Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou Pastor, author, organizer Stephanie Wolfe John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics
Jared Ball Moderator, Associate Professor, Communication Studies, Morgan State University Mark Bolden Co-moderator, psychologist Jasiri X Rapper, community activist Jamila Lemieux Senior editor, digital, Ebony Jef Tate DJ: Words, Beats, and Life
SPECIAL GUEST 1:30 to 2:30 PM Ava DuVernay Director of Selma
Admission free. For more information call (202) 633-1000 or visit nmaahc.si.edu
28 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
#HRRlive #WordsMatter
CPARTS
Budget cuts could squeeze GW’s music department by 50 percent.
Here’s how students are protesting: washingtoncitypaper.com/go/protest
Galleries
Saved by the Hell
Cleaving too close to a theme spells damnation for broad exhibitions. “The Divine Comedy: Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell Revisited by Contemporary African Artists” At the National Museum of African Art to Aug. 2
“Prism 10 (Dead Laocoön)” by Wim Botha (2014)
By Kriston Capps Surely the plum spot in an art exhibition built around Dante Alighieri’s cosmology is the Gateway to Hell. “Paradiso” and “Purgatorio” have their virtues, but it’s Dante’s “Inferno” that’s known the world over, and for good reason: The fates that await the irredeemable are far more titillating than what’s in store for the morally praiseworthy, or worse still, folks who did just fine by life. In an exhibit subdivided by Dante’s three celestial realms— Heaven and Hell with Purgatory in between—visitors should start where the sign reads, “All hope abandon, ye who enter here.” That’s where the National Museum of African Art is keeping the good stuff in “The Divine Comedy: Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell Revisited by Contemporary African Artists.” In fact, viewers who want to get the most out of this sprawling exhibit should go straight to Hell—and maybe stay there. Greeting people at the gate to perdition is Wim Botha’s “Prism 10 (Dead Laocoön),” a wondrous and dreadful bronze sculpture, a piece that could be a show by itself. Botha, a South African artist, is quoting “Laocoön and His Sons,” one of the great marble works of antiquity. After seeing the original at the Vatican, Botha carved his own take in polystyrene, casting the final work in bronze. The story of Laocoön, a Trojan priest, has several indirect connections to Dante’s “Inferno.” It is principally laid out in The Aeneid by Virgil, the poet who guides Dante through the underworld. In The Aeneid, Poseidon kills Laocoön and his sons when the priest tries to warn the city of Troy that the great wooden horse sent by the Greeks is a trap. (Dante later assigns Sinon, the undercover Greek agent who convinces Troy to accept the Trojan Horse, to the Tenth Bolgia of the Circle of Fraud in “Inferno.”) Citing the Laocoön Group sculpture is a bold move for an artist, to say the least. It pays off for Botha: He manages to invert everything that is noble and tragic about the story and its ancient depiction. The figures of the sons and the serpents that descend upon them are merged and fractured; it is impossible to tell snake from self. While the original Laocoön Group is an aching testament to beauty and the human form, Botha’s “Prism 10” looks machine-cut. One can almost see in the angular, geodesic protrusions of Botha’s sculpture the jagged outwashingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 29
CPARTS Continued
lines of the City of Dis at the center of Dante’s Hell—all sharp towers, ramparts, gates, and minarets of severe stone. The weight of Botha’s sculpture is enough to cause the whole exhibit to collapse around it. That’s the problem with such a literal curatorial conceit as what Simon Njami has come up with for “The Divine Comedy” (which opened at the Museum für Moderne Kunst in Frankfurt last year). One work may resonate with the source material as much as Botha’s, but an entire show cannot hope to sustain the same level of intensity. From there, it becomes an exercise of questioning the systematicity of Njami’s metaphor. Nicholas Hlobo’s floor-spanning, intestine-shaped “Tyaphaka” belongs in Hell, but then a giant black snake is almost too literal for the room. Whereas the Inferno selections include abstraction and installation, the Paradise rooms trend toward the figurative—surely a conscious decision, but not one in keeping with Dante’s depiction of an upward trajectory into perfect light at the end of “Paradiso.” At a certain point, some of the joy of seeing the artworks gets lost in worrying too much about the logic connecting them. Yet the interplay is there: The exhibition depends on it. What if Njami’s “Divine Comedy” was conceived as something more like a plain-old biennial and less like an immersive narrative experience drawing on Dante? A challenging piece like Mwangi Hutter’s “In a Pure Land”—a project that combines dance and fabric art (via video) with installation text
“Fragment” (detail) by Julie Mehretu (2008-2009) art—might get the room of its own that it deserves. Julie Mehretu’s painting is heavenly (even if her piece, called “Fragment,” is another entry from Hell), but her work shouldn’t be in an exhibit of bleeding-edge African artists at all. She is simply too well known. Several works with explicit connections to Dante’s poems (Maurice Pefura’s “The Silent Way Beatrice”
or Berry Bickle’s “Beatrice and Virgil,” both from 2013) are too narrow to survive in a broader exhibition. Most importantly, though, lifting the art from the “Divine Comedy” theme would rescue those poor artworks stuck in Purgatory—for the most part, the space around the stairs. It’s hardly the fault of the curator that so much of the National Museum of African Art is given over to the vast descending atrium. But it’s hard to take in Kiluanji Kia Henda’s splendid, uproarious, five-act photo series, “Othello’s Fate,” in the inbetween spaces. (Hard, but worth it.) It’s tempting to guess that Henda’s photographs and Edson Chagas’s obscured portraits wound up in Purgatory simply because they were photos that could be displayed as a series along the museum’s least welcoming viewing spaces. All the works should enjoy the pride of place that Myriam Mihindou’s “La robe envolée ou (The Dress Flew Off)” does—at the top of the Stairway to Heaven, as it were. Few could challenge Botha for the right to the Gateway to Hell, but none should have to work so hard to be seen. While the heaven-and-hell approach is a convenient way to organize all kinds of experiences, from nightclubs to frat parties to eternal resting places, when it comes to curating art, this scheme is a sin. CP
950 Independence Ave. SW. Free. (202) 633-4600. africa.si.edu
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CPARTS Arts Desk
Racism, homophobia, teen pregnancy—D.C.’s young poets have a lot to say about that. washingtoncitypaper.com/go/youthslam
PIeCe OF WOrk
YOU’LL NEED:
Because these photos use long exposure times, they tend to be haunting, blurry, and ghostlike. “It has a unique look,” Breslin says. “A lot of the fun of a pinhole camera is the crazy experimentation.” But quality pinhole photos don’t require a professional camera (or photographer!). You can make your own pinhole camera at home, and this is the time to do it: April 26 is Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day. The best part? With no viewfinder, your results may be a surprise. “You tend to get a lot more than you think with a lot of these cameras,” Breslin says. “You want to get closer to things than you otherwise might think.” —Tim Regan
StEp 1: Cut a hole in the box. Use a knife, and make it 1 square inch. For a metal container, drill a hole with a large bit. StEp 2: Cut a 2-inch square out of the
soda can. Poke a single hole in the center with the pin.
StEp 3: Make the box light-tight by cover-
ing its seams in electrical tape. For a better camera, line the interior with black construction paper, but don’t cover up the pinhole.
Lauren Heneghan
Never mind what Apple wants you to believe—there’s more to taking a cool-looking photo than choosing which Instagram filter to apply. Few photographers know that better than Nancy Breslin, a local artist nationally renowned for her contributions to the pinhole photography scene. What the heck is pinhole photography, you ask? It’s a simple method of taking pictures using a tiny hole in a box instead of a conventional lens. When light strikes the pinhole, it’s inverted and projected onto film or photo paper inside the box. Depending on the medium used, a pinhole photo can require anywhere from a few minutes to several hours to take.
- A box, tin, or can for the body of the camera. The thicker the material, the better. Coffee cans, shoeboxes, and oatmeal containers work well. Anything with an opaque lid is a plus, since you’ll need to load the camera with photo paper later. - A soda can or thin piece of metal to make your pinhole on - A needle - A knife or drill - Electrical tape - Photo paper and, if developing your photo at home, darkroom chemicals. Embassy Camera in Dupont Circle should carry what you’ll need. Don’t open the box of paper except in complete darkness or under a darkroom safelight.
StEp 4: Tape the metal piece over the hole
in the box. Place a piece of electrical tape over the pinhole. This is your shutter.
StEp 5: In a completely dark room, tape
your photo paper to the inside of the box, light sensitive side up. (Lick your fingertip and touch the paper’s edge; the sensitive side should be a little sticky.)
StEp 6: Test whether your camera is truly
light-tight by taking it outside during the day with the shutter closed for a few minutes. If the photo paper isn’t pure white after you’ve put it in the chemical developer, it’s been exposed to light.
StEp 7: When you’re ready to take a pho-
to, open the shutter and wait. “Try a oneminute exposure. If the paper negative is overexposed—too much black—try 30 seconds,” Breslin says. “If it is underexposed— too much white paper where there should be stuff to see—then try two minutes. Always halve or double the time that didn’t work last time, and take notes.”
Chris Suspect “Backstage, Ottobar, Baltimore, MD”
Standout Piece: Unlike many of the images in “Suspect Device,” photographer Chris Suspect’s current exhibition at the Leica Store on F Street NW, “Backstage, Ottobar, Baltimore, MD” doesn’t depict the raging mosh pits or screaming vocalists of the D.C. punk and hardcore scenes. Across a backdrop scrawled with graffiti, a woman takes a masked man’s face in her hands and plants a kiss on one of his cheeks, while the man watches the camera from behind oversized glasses. See and Be Seen: Instead of focusing on bands’ onstage antics, Suspect often prefers to turn his attention to the audiences attending the shows he shoots, attempting to capture the quirkier personalities and interactions. Here, the man and woman are actually his friends Carrie and Enrique, posing for the picture in Ottobar’s massive backstage area. D.C. and Baltimore music is about much more than the brief flashes of catharsis that take place onstage, and everything about this image––from Carrie’s pronounced lips to Enrique’s smirk from behind the luchadorstyle mask to the marked-up walls––embodies the goofy moments of togetherness that often make up the space between shows. Recollected Memories: Although “Suspect Device” documents D.C. area punk and hardcore shows over the last four or five years, Suspect’s style—high-contrast blackand-white images—recalls the look and feel of the scene’s rise in the 1980s. Since he didn’t take photos when attending shows back in the ‘80s, Suspect says he uses these images as a way to approximate glimpses of —Keith Mathias those memories. Suspect Device is on display at the Leica Store through the end of April.
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 31
Handout photo by C. Stanley Photography
Handout photo by LonnieTague
TheaTerCurtain Calls
GALA gives a prolific District playwright’s decade-old work the language it deserves. Spooky, macabre, but a little too mystifying to thrill audiences.
Just Desert Mariela en el desierto By Karen Zacarías Directed by Abel López At GALA Hispanic Theatre to May 10 Local playwright Karen Zacarías has been busy. Five of her works are premiering next season around the country, including three at local venues. She’s awash in fellowships, including Arena’s Resident Playwright program, and spearheading local initiatives like the Young Playwrights’ Theater. Zacarías hasn’t let her talent wither. Funny timing, then, for GALA’s reupping of her decade-old play Mariela en el desierto, about a woman who keeps her artistic promise under wraps. This is the District premiere of the Spanishlanguage version of this play, after a local run several years ago in its original English format at the Theater of the First Amendment. But the material seems like it was always meant to be performed in Spanish, with its heady discussions of Mexican artistic identity and excavation of a specific brand of Latino romanticism. The language feels more streamlined, more befitting its setting. When the protagonist argues with an American-born art history professor over beauty versus truth in Mexican painting, how could that conversation unfold in any language but Spanish? We’re in the desert, where the stoic Mariela (Luz Nicolás) and her painter husband José (Roberto Colmenares) retreated during the height of Mexico’s mid-century modern art movement. Palling around with Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo convinced José that his art would be best served by raising his family among the sand and coyotes; as he constantly reminds us, the desert is “God’s canvas.” Perhaps, but it’s also where God exiled the Israelites for 40 years after they angered
him. Now José lays dying, with a lukewarm artistic legacy, and Mariela, the silent engine that from behind the scenes kept her self-exiled family running, is once more left to pick up the wreckage. Mariela has shades of the “strong embattled woman” figure dramatists love so much— she gives up her own promising artistic talent for the good of her family, specifically for the good of her husband’s career, while keeping her reservations bottled up deep inside. But Zacarías makes wrinkles. José isn’t a monster, and Mariela, whose strategy consists of lying to her family when it suits her, isn’t just a long-suffering saint. As Mariela, the wonderful Nicolás gives a precise, measured performance, heavy but not suffocating. She works especially well with Alina Collins Maldonado as Mariela’s daughter, who’s living the life her mother never could as a successful painter in Mexico City. Director Abel López keeps the pacing pleasantly brisk for a story set in a stifling desert hacienda that’s mostly about remembering things. The brown-heavy production design channels the setting’s arid majesty, and there are nice pivots between family tragedy, arty dialogue, and some telenovela silliness (one character mugs to the audience at the act break). Much of the play revolves around the history of José’s best-known painting, an abstract autobiographical piece called “The Blue Barn” that is so different from his other works there’s an obvious buried secret. The painting becomes too convenient of a dramatic device, lacking the subtlety present in the rest of the play. In any language, Mariela’s presence is enough to communicate the heartbreak of sac—Andrew Lapin rifice and lost promise. 3333 14th St. NW. $20–$50. (202) 234-7174. galatheatre.org.
32 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
rough magic very still & hard to see By Steve Yockey Directed by Randy Baker At Atlas Performing Arts Center to May 10 very still & hard to see is an anthology of spooky stories from the macabre-minded scribe behind Forum Theatre’s 2014 Pluto and other morbid curiosities. It begins when a man falls through a hole in the floor at a construction site. That inciting incident offers a pre-fab metaphor for Rorschach Theatre’s characteristically ambitious enterprise, one I’m afraid I’m just too literal-minded and unimaginative to resist: It’s a marvelous haunted house erected on the shaky foundation of Yockey’s opaque script, which seems to depict a series of horrific events occurring in different eras on the grounds of a hotel that is cursed by the sins of the architect who designed it. But I’m not even certain of that much. All work and no play makes me a dull boy, to paraphrase another guy who spent too much time in a creepy hotel. “Magic in rough spaces” has been a motto of Rorschach Theatre throughout its 14-year existence. Scenic designer Brian J. Gillick, lighting designer Robbie Hayes, and sound designer Frank DiSalvo Jr. have pulled off a fine trick in recasting the Atlas Performing Arts Center’s staid 260-seat Lang Theatre as an unfamiliar, threatening environment, one that almost seems to breathe in soft, unholy pulses. The audience is let up in small groups via elevator, where an artificially pallid, uniformed bellhop (James Finley) warns us not to take photos and a pair of sleepwalkers in featureless white masks bump among us. Entering the cavernous Lang, we’re seated on risers on what is usually the
stage, while the rows of permanent seats are left unoccupied. Through one scene, a woman sits knitting in the back, flanked by two figures in those same porcelain-like masks. Is she the same witchy-woman (Yasmin Tuazon) the architect encountered after he fell down that hole? It’s too dark to tell. But it sure is eerie, the way she’s just sitting there watching us. Even if you can decode the cryptic tale with which Yockey intends to bridge these (apparently) disconnected vignettes, the show feels hit-and-miss: Some moments are visually arresting, some are powerfully acted, too many are merely confounding. When a woman recounts a beach getaway gone nightmarishly wrong, tarps covering the rows of empty seats behind her rise on strings, approximating a swelling sea. That you can see the people standing in the balcony pulling the strings up does nothing to diminish the otherworldly effect. Elsewhere we hear the tale of a an affection-starved husband (Peter Finnegan) whose depressed, heavily medicated wife stirs from her slumber on the evening he brings home a prostitute. Farrell Parker has a fun scene as a femme fatale in a gold lamé ball gown (Debra Kim Sivigny did the costumes) who has a nasty habit of… eating the people her two clipboard-wielding, flip-up-specswearing attendants procure for her, I think? She sings a verse of “Dream a Little Dream of Me” and dances with Kari Ginsburg a little, injecting some desperately-needed movement and color into a piece that by then has grown ponderous, though it’s only 90 minutes long. The scenes are punctuated by recorded songs, not identified in the program, that swing in the vein of jaunty melancholia from which Tom Waits has mined most of his career. They seem to portend the good time we’re all about to start hav—Chris Klimek ing, any minute now. 1333 H St. NE. $15-$30. (202) 399-7993. atlasarts.org.
colD-BlooDeD Murder Ballad Book and lyrics by Julia Jordan Music and lyrics by Juliana Nash Directed by David Muse At Studio Theatre to May 16 Trust musical theater to take bonafide down-home folk art and turn it into one more story of life lived too hot and too fast in downtown Manhattan. That’s what’s happened with Murder Ballad, another effort to convince audiences that passion burns more urgently on the Lower East Side than anywhere else—except that as imagined by the songwriting and storytelling team of Julia Jordan and Juliana Nash, urban tragedy
CUAdrama
“IMAGINATIVE, FAST-PACED, IRRESISTIBLY FUNNY… A SHOW THAT WILL ENTRANCE THE WHOLE FAMILY”
presents
By Lauren Gunderson
, Sororité tÉ li
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Liberté, Ég a
—The Seattle Times
PHOTOS BY BRETT COOMER/HOUSTON GRAND OPERA
April 23-26, 2015 Drama.cua.edu 202-319-4000
To request accommodations for individuals with disabilities, please call 202-319-5358.
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MAY 9–21 OPERA HOUSE Tickets on sale now!
(202) 467-4600 kennedy-center.org
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Tickets also available at the Box Office Groups (202) 416-8400 In Italian with projected English titles
Major support for WNO is provided by Jacqueline Badger Mars. David and Alice Rubenstein are the Presenting Underwriters of WNO. General Dynamics is the proud sponsor of WNO’s 2014-2015 Season. WNO acknowledges the longstanding generosity of Life Chairman Mrs. Eugene B. Casey. Generous support for WNO Italian opera is provided by Daniel and Gayle D’Aniello.
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TOP PRICES PAID
TheaTerCurtain Calls
for your Records (33S or 45S) CD’s or DVD’s
stevebuysrecords@gmail.com
Find out what ToDo Today online. The Inter-American Development Bank Staff Association Art Gallery
IDB Staff Association Art Gallery
Presents U R U G U A Y A N
A R T I S T
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OLGA ARMAND UGON THE SOUTH
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Handout photo by Vithaya Phongsavan
Call STEVE at 301-646-5403 or e-mail:
S an ara th o ’s sh rea ld fl life e e te am is m xplo trea nin e per us s su g re fe ica ive re eve tur ct, l. ro s i ry ns un ck n th , til th in is g
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OK BO AN Y ITH RD B W O S H D A J RIC AS Y AN LI LY N D B E BY JU D NA TE S D Y AN IA EC MU VE B IC L R D EI ICS US JU DI VI NC YR M DA CO D L
NO COLLECTION TOO SMALL or LARGE WE BUY EVERYTHING!
CLOSING MAY 1, 2015
NW G ST R P E.O & TR TH EA 14 OTH I UD ST
This exhibit assembles numerous artworks produced in different moments, using different techniques, depicting personal experiences, and her own sensibility to her native land.
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Monday through Friday 12 P.M. – 6 P.M. 1300 New York Avenue, NW (13th Street entrance) Two blocks from Metro Center galeriaISAAG@iadb.org 202-623-2217/3635
Murder Ballad is a fun rock romp, but falls short of a compelling ensemble piece. becomes trite. That’s a shame, because in real murder ballads—songs as timeless as Johnny Cash’s “Cocaine Blues,” the Appalachian standard “Tom Dooley,” Cher’s “Dark Lady,” and even Cole Porter’s smart-set parody “Miss Otis Regrets”—the essentials of character, situation, tragic conflict, and rough justice typically get mapped out in a few lean and pungent stanzas. The result is a three-minute cautionary tale about what to look out for in lovers’ lanes, gypsy tearooms, or Juárez jail cells. Jordan and Nash, by contrast, take 75 minutes to spin a not particularly complicated tale involving a club kid (who later becomes a housewife), the stubble-chinned drink slinger who makes her pulse pound, and the soft-spoken poet who helps put her heart back together after the barman inevitably dumps her. The songs that map out this love triangle’s edges and (not-too-sharp) corners are propulsive enough when required, with a few melodies that strike the ear gracefully, but plenty of lyrics that sit uneasily on the musical phrase or crowd heedlessly into an otherwise foursquare bar. Imagery is prosaic at best, nonsensical at worst: A kiss burns like “a mouth tattoo” and “hurts so good.” (Oy.) Our heroine is “petrified” at one point, “and I’m not wood.” (“Or clay,” she continues helpfully, because the line needs to rhyme with “every day.”) Songs are strongest when they’re most plaintive, as in the yearning “Sara,” which sits handsomely on the clear tenor of lonely bartender Cole Burden, and Nash’s musical writing is most interesting when it’s playing with the harmonic possibilities of the show’s four-voice casting. (Yes, four: There’s a Narrator, played by Anastacia McCleskey, on hand to help explain motivation and step predictably in to assist when the writers decide, ultimately, that they don’t want you to
dislike any of the primary characters.) Like the Manhattan Theater Club before them, Studio Theatre and director David Muse have staged Murder Ballad immersively, converting the company’s Stage 4 black box space into something resembling the Black Cat with marginally better hygiene. There’s a long bar glittering with glassware and bottles, a raised stage at one end for Darren Cohen’s four-piece band, tables and chairs wedged tightly together, and a pool table so brightly spotlit you know it’s going to see more than merely eight-ball action. It all makes for a reasonably convincing vibe—and some regrettably cluttered sightlines. Studio’s cast is appealing enough, but more winsome than animally magnetic; Burden’s Tom is less dangerous downtown loner than scruffy, flannel-clad moper, while Christine Dwyer’s Sara seems engagingly sweet but never quite comfortable in her painted-on leather pants and punk boots. Tommar Wilson, by contrast, is entirely at home as the affable, bespectacled Michael, reader of Keats and maker of a happy Upper West Side home. McCleskey delivers all the requisite goods as a jaded nightclubsinger presence who knows before the others do what dark things lovers will contemplate when they’re dealt a losing hand. The basic chemistry is still off, though, and without the sizzle and swoon a tighter ensemble might have brought to the story’s central conflicts, Murder Ballad seems less a saga about inevitable crimes of passion than a collection of increasingly improbable choices made among people with no particular claim on our attention. As a rock-lite concert, it’s an OK excursion; as a $50 top ticket at what’s ostensibly a theater, it’s nothing to get all hot —Trey Graham and bothered about. 1501 14th St. NW. $20–$50. (202) 332-3300. studiotheatre.org.
Take Metrobus and Metrorail to the...
DC JAZZFESTIVAL JUNE 10 –16, 2015 Events DC Presents:
DCJAZZFESTATTHEYARDS
355 Water Street, SE
6/12: The Soul Rebels, Cubano Groove and Sharón Clark. Gates open at 5:00 PM.
6/13: Marshall Keys, Esperanza Spalding Presents: Emily’s D+Evolution, COMMON and Femi Kuti & The Positive Force. Gates open at 2:00 PM.
For tickets visit Ticketmaster.com For tickets, artists, and complete schedule visit DCJAZZFEST.ORG PLATINUM, GOLD & SILVER SPONSORS
The DC Jazz Festival®, a 501(c)(3) non-profit service organization, is sponsored in part with major grants from the Government of the District of Columbia, Muriel Bowser, Mayor; and, in part, by major grants the National Endowment for the Arts and the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, an agency supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts. ©2015 DC Jazz Festival. All rights reserved.
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 35
Film
If the Love Don’t Fit...
Forbidden affairs torment a gay Christian and a married French couple. This illicit match-up is tough to buy.
Blackbird Directed by Patrik-Ian Polk 5 to 7 Directed by Victor Levin By Tricia Olszewski If Blackbird were a drinking game, your state of influence would depend on the parameters you chose. Knocking one back every time a character said words akin to “acceptance” and “unconditional love” would leave you nearly sober. Pick “Jesus,” “God,” “pray,” and “sin,” however, and you’re en route to alcohol poisoning within the first 10 minutes. So it’s a relief when a high-school girl named Leslie (Wanita “‘D. Woods” Woodgett) says, “It might be nice to take a break from Jesus for a while,” right after those opening scenes. From then on, director Patrik-Ian Polk (who co-adapted a novel by the same name with Rikki Beadle-Blair) reins in the God talk, at least enough to tame the dialogue from power drill to small hammer. That doesn’t mean Blackbird is subtle. The present-day story takes place in a small Mississippi town, where 17-year-old Randy (Julian Walker) is the lead of the school choir and, like most of his neighbors, a strict Christian. But he’s struggling with his sexuality, having nightly wet dreams about his friend Todd (Torrey Laamar) and denying that he’s gay whenever his other friends encourage him to open up. But it doesn’t matter whether Randy’s inner circle would be accepting—as he tells a confidant, “I wake up soaked in... sin.” The apparent conflict between religion and queerness is Blackbird’s central story. But while the well-intentioned Polk eventually metes out talk of the former more judiciously, he then guns it to Full Gay Ahead: The theatrical Randy not only ends up as one of the leads in his school’s envelope-pushing production of Romeo & Julian, he’s hired for a student film in which his character is raped by a man. The actor playing the rapist is Marshall (Kevin Allesee), and wouldn’t you know it—he’s gay, assertive, and cute. Blackbird is praiseworthy for tackling an as-
Mo’Nique delivers a wrenching portrayal of a hyper-religious mother. pect of coming out that burdens many of the faithful—their anxiety isn’t only about social ramifications, but the common belief that the Bible says homosexuality is a sin. (Randy jumps out of bed after one dream to pray for the fantasies to stop and is later subjected to a trippy and just plain bizarre “deliverance” ritual, performed by his pastor and mother.) But then Polk overstuffs the 99-minute film with other issues, including teen pregnancy, abortion, and sexually transmitted infections. Randy’s four friends sure are unlucky. A meatier subplot—one that actually factors into Randy’s angst—involves his younger sister, who’s been missing for six years. The girl’s disappearance has crippled their mother, Claire (Mo’Nique, by far the most memorable of the cast), into a delusional, occasionally psychotic shell who has only brief touches with reality. Her husband, the kids’ father (Isaiah Washington, known for his use of homophobic slurs IRL), left. When Claire sees Randy kissing a boy, her rage is palpably wrenching as she fires hateful thoughts at her son, essentially blaming him for his sister’s kidnapping. In addition to the hot-words overkill, Blackbird offers some gut-busting exchanges (“So you do believe in God?” “I do when I’m with you”) and unrealistic, obvious behavior (Randy shoots daggers at Todd’s girlfriend when she joins them while rehearsing a song). But along
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with Mo’Nique and Washington’s performances, the film’s message about the toxicity of selfdenial redeems it, if just barely. Like Randy, Blackbird is safe from condemnation. Do you believe in love at first sight? How about love at first sight of Anton Yelchin? Not to be superficial, but let’s be superficial. Among thespians, there are those who are pegged as leading men and others who are classified as character actors. Some are able to morph into either, but Yelchin, who’s probably best known for playing Chekov in 2009’s Star Trek, really isn’t the morphing kind. So in 5 to 7, television writer Victor Levin’s feature directorial debut, a rather significant suspension of disbelief is required to buy the setup. Brian (Yelchin), a 24-year-old aspiring writer, and Arielle (Bérénice Marlohe), a 33year-old French former model, lock eyes across a New York street with an instant and mutual attraction. Even before they have a conversation, they each seem to have decided that a romance is about to begin. Notice that I mention conversation—I’m not so anti-Anton that I think his characters could never interest a beautiful woman. (Like Crazy, his film with Felicity Jones, is one example of Yelchin more believably getting the girl.) But in 5 to 7, which Levin also wrote, Arielle is really beautiful and very much a wom-
an, and therefore unlikely to give the boyish Brian a second glance. And the bulk of their relationship is physical: She’s available to see him only from 5 to 7 p.m., which in French culture is actually a thing. The reason? Arielle is married with children, and that two-hour window is when people in committed relationships are said to conduct their affairs. No matter how hard Marlohe smiles, however—and boy does she force ’em—you never feel the couple’s chemistry. But Arielle is allegedly so smitten that her husband, Valery (Lambert Wilson), has noticed her newfound sparkle and invites Brian to their home for dinner along with his young mistress, Jane (Olivia Thirlby). Buried in the script are ideas worth exploring, largely surrounding the cultural differences between Americans and the French. When they surface, though, these ideas are simply stated instead of discussed. (“Maybe there’s another way of looking at life,” Arielle suggests to Brian, failing to engage the thought.) The film also teaches that love leads to professional success, in case you didn’t know. In addition to its lack of heat, 5 to 7 suffers from painfully stiff dialogue: “Life is a collection of moments. The idea is to have as many good ones as you can.” “We’ll go to the movies. Something from a big American studio.” (Both lines courtesy of the very American Jane.) There’s a whole lot of gimmickry, too, and endless purple voiceovers that are accompanied by a score with varying degrees of treacle. (In one scene, it seems as if the sound is mixed so the music is louder, to extra emphasize the moment.) Frank Langella and Glenn Close, playing Brian’s respectively grouchy and slightly batty father and mother, are by far the best things about the film, bringing more life and personality to their small roles than all of the main characters combined. Whenever they’re onscreen, it’s clear that Levin focused on the wrong couple. Blackbird opens April 24 at the Angelika Pop-Up at Union Market. 5 to 7 opens April 24 at E Street Cinema.
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Is the Glass half full? Is the Glass half empty? how about half off! realdeal.washingtoncitypaper.com
BEAUTY PILL
APRIL 30, MAY 1 + 2 AT 8PM / BLACK BOX
In celebration of the release of its new double album, Beauty Pill Describes Things As They Are, Washington, D.C.-based rock band Beauty Pill returns to Artisphere for three shows in the Black Box Theatre, the same setting where the group recorded the album during its Immersive Ideal residency.
THE MEASURE OF ALL THINGS SAT MAY 9 AT 7PM + 9PM / DOME THEATRE
Inspired in part by The Guinness Book of Records, this live documentary features the poignant stories of several record-setters from around the world. Director Sam Green will narrate the film live on stage, accompanied with live film score by Todd Griffin, Catherine McRae and Brendan Canty (Fugazi).
www.artisphere.com
1101 Wilson Boulevard, Arlington, VA 22209 Free parking weekdays after 5pm + all day on weekends Two blocks from the Rosslyn Metro Follow us: @Artisphere Like us: ArtisphereVA washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 37
MusicDiscography Alive And Ticking I can’t imagine what Chad Clark felt when, in 2007, he thought he was going to die. That year, the Beauty Pill frontman was diagnosed with viral cardiomyopathy, a rare infection that caused his heart to swell. He had open-heart surgery in 2008 and spent a long time in recovery; the uncertainty must’ve been frightening. But a great thing happens when you face mortality: You don’t stress as much about nonsense. The will to thrive is still there, but you view life in peace, accepting it as it is. That might explain the euphoric vibe of Beauty Pill’s new album, Beauty Pill Describes Things As They Are, the band’s first LP in 11 years. Much of this album was recorded in 2011 in public view at Artisphere’s Black Box Theatre, just three years after Clark’s surgery. So when he opens the recording with a line from 1982 movie Blade Runner—“I want more life, fucker”—it feels like a strong push to move past the setbacks. The line, and the album as a whole, forcefully declares Clark’s resurgence and the band’s: Despite the health struggles and the group’s radio silence, their sound is very much alive. To that end, Beauty Pill is full of introspective one-liners that are mostly hidden among the album’s dense rhythms. The words don’t directly address Clark’s condition, but they come in waves to reaffirm the musician’s vitality. On “Afrikaner Barista,” Clark’s repetition of the opening statement (“Here again, here again, I’m here, again”) is a form of spiritual praise. As it plays, the LP moves from standard rock fare—“Drapetomania” and “Afrikaner Barista”—to a surreal aesthetic illustrating the limbo between life and death. Beauty Pill depicts the feeling of purgatory and describes what Clark might have felt in his lowest moments. A track like “Ann the Word” speaks plainly about submitting to fate: Two lovers are trapped in a water-filled car, “and you and I are kissing just the same,” singer Jean Cook croons gently. There’s no panic, she coos, just the freedom of letting go. The same sentiment holds on “Dog with Rabbit in Mouth, Unharmed,” the album’s gorgeous centerpiece. Clark’s pet dog, Lucy, who died of cancer, influenced the song: She came to him in a dream to let him know things would be okay. The track, using stacked percussion, is a transformative reminder to keep life in perspective. No matter your circumstance, Cook sings, “the body’s just cosines and vectors; love is the real health.”
Stefano Giovannini
Beauty Pill Describes Things As They Are Beauty Pill Butterscotch Records
Beauty Pill’s first LP in over a decade is thick with melody and emotion. Much like Flying Lotus’ recent album, You’re Dead!, which also examined purgatory, Beauty Pill tackles heavy themes without sounding melancholic. On “Near Miss Stories,” where Clark offers a tongue-in-cheek glance at death and how close we all are to it, a distracted driver fixes her makeup and enjoys the view. “In two miles, she’s gonna die,” Clark sings, “and almost take you with her, too.” Beauty Pill’s melodies are thick and layered, making for a heavy listen. But while the band risks digging too deeply, it ultimately achieves a great balance of esoteric serenity. Life is full of mystery, but Clark is happy in the moment. —Marcus J. Moore Listen to Beauty Pill Describes Things As They Are at washingtoncitypaper.com/go/describesthings. Beauty Pill plays a three-night residency at Artisphere April 30-May 2.
Folk And Mirrors There is Nothing to Fear The North Country Self-released Pretty, pop-tinged Americana acts get a bad rap these days, and it’s not hard to see why. The past few years have seen a surge in the popularity of twangy troubadours, each more cookie-cutter than the last. Remember the Mumford & Sons song with the banjos and the clapping? Or was that the the Lumineers? On its debut LP, 2012’s You Can Never Go Home Again, D.C.’s the North Country fell comfortably into the folk-rock genre, crafting rootsy tracks that leaned on soaring violin solos and bittersweet strums. The result was a strong collection of songs whose heavier, rock-reminiscent moments hinted
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The album is full of dramatic swells and bursts but still manages to accommodate plenty of breathing room. It opens with “The Cross We Bear,” a lush, atmospheric number that leads off with hushed fingerpicking and builds into a jubilant release of cavernous choruses, bouncy guitars, and shimmering violin. “It’s the things we say and the games we play that get washed away when we remember to forget,” sings Grossman, heeding the song’s playful aura. “Sharing Our Alone” counters the opener’s big crescendos with breezier shades of summer. Echoing oohs and ahhs call to mind the smartly arranged harmonies of Fleet Foxes, while steady percussion keeps the whole swirling ordeal moving along. The front end of There is Nothing to Fear recalls the band’s previous work, but a few tracks in, the psych-rock explosion of “Never There Part II” makes it clear that the North Country has gone all-in on its penchant for paisley pop. Delay-ridden guitar and an overload
at a departure from the band’s Americana inclinations, but didn’t offer anything concrete. Compositions would flirt with psychedelic elements, then pull away. But on its latest release, There is Nothing to Fear, the band embraces the trippy textures and kalei- There’s more to the North Country than rootsy Americana tracks. doscopic vibe that lurked beneath the surface of its older of textures slink and slide around an unsteady tunes, keeping the folk elements its members beat, pairing with subtle electronics before goexcelled at and ditching the ones that felt stale. ing full-on stoner. The track’s effortless instruLed by singer-songwriter Andrew Grossman mentals segue into one of the LP’s weaknesses: and bassist Shaun Dubick, the North Coun- While Grossman’s lyrics are sharp, they sometry—which also counts Ilia Kobrinsky, Mi- times unnecessarily cut into otherwise excelchael Hernandez, Jonathan Parker, and Leah lent instrumental runs. On tracks like “NoGage in its lineup—formed three years ago as vember Criminals,” his uber-dramatic croons a quintet. (The band recently recruited Park- feel forced and a little overblown when paired er to play sax.) Brass parts add a jazzy, jubilant with the composition’s delicate strings and laygroove to the six-piece’s poppier moments, ered guitars. The song could easily stand sans with the sax’s smooth tenor tone injecting a any vocals, which is a feat in itself. hint of melancholy into slow-moving ballads. The North Country hasn’t completely Live, it’s clear that the North Country is a ditched its folk-rock roots; the band’s ability product of D.C.’s DIY scene; the band mix- to mine clean structures from even its trippies up styles and tempos on the fly, radiating the est tracks hints at its verse-chorus-verse beexplosive enthusiasm that’s become a pillar of ginnings. There is Nothing to Fear is a somehouse shows at spots like Paperhaus and Bath- times muted, sometimes powerful, always tub Republic, the band’s home base. This abil- adventurous affair. That cool versatility is ity to hone in on a song’s emotional core, build- what makes its dizzying flurry of harmonies ing arrangements around a feeling rather than a and guitar riffs even more of a head rush and —Carey Hodges fixed sound, is definitely one of the band’s sweet just really fun. spots. There is Nothing to Fear’s unexpected crescendos and breakneck pivots in pace put the Listen to There is Nothing to Fear at washingtoncitypaper.com/go/nothingtofear. skill on full display.
GW LISNER PRESENTS
GILBERTO
GIL GILBERTOS SAMBA
APRIL 24 | 8PM
LILA
DOWNS MAY 1 | 8PM
TICKETS ON SALE NOW Visit lisner.gwu.edu or call 202.994.6800 for more information or to purchase tickets. /GWLISNER
@GWLISNER
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washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 39
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CITYLIST Music
Friday Rock
9:30 Club 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. They Might Be Giants. 7:30 p.m. (Sold out) 930.com. blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Hank Green, Driftless Pony Club, Harry and the Potters. 7:30 p.m. $18–$20. blackcatdc.com. Comet Ping Pong 5037 Connecticut Ave. NW. (202) 364-0404. Dot Dash, Jake Starr and the Delicious Fullness, the Combs. 10 p.m. $12. cometpingpong.com. Howard tHeatre 620 T St. NW. (202) 803-2899. Jarabe de Palo. 9 p.m. $40–$75. thehowardtheatre.com. roCk & roll Hotel 1353 H St. NE. (202) 388-ROCK. Justin Jones and the B-Sides, Susto, Down Dexter. 8:30 p.m. $15. rockandrollhoteldc.com. warner tHeatre 513 13th St. NW. (202) 783-4000. 2Cellos. 8 p.m. $47–$67. warnertheatre.com.
ElEctRonic u street musiC Hall 1115 U St. NW. (202) 5881880. What So Not, Nadus, I.V. 10:30 p.m. $20. ustreetmusichall.com.
Jazz kennedy Center millennium stage 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Berklee College of Music. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org. mr. Henry’s 601 Pennsylvania Ave. SE. (202) 5468412. Kevin Cordt Quartet. 8 p.m. Free. mrhenrysdc.com.
BluEs montPelier arts Center 9652 Muirkirk Road, Laurel. (301) 377-7800. Ian Walters. 8 p.m. $25. arts. pgparks.com. Zoo bar 3000 Connecticut Ave. NW. (202) 2324225. Swamp Keepers. 9 p.m. Free. zoobardc.com.
WoRld artisPHere 1101 Wilson Blvd., Arlington. (703) 8751100. Plena Libre. 8 p.m. $20–$35. artisphere.com. gw lisner auditorium 730 21st St. NW. (202) 994-6800. Gilberto Gil. 8 p.m. $45–$75. lisner.org.
opERa ClariCe smitH Performing arts Center Stadium Drive and Route 193, College Park. (301) 4052787. Maryland Opera Studio Crime and Punishment: Operas in One Act. 7:30 p.m. $10–$25. claricesmithcenter.umd.edu.
classical barns at wolf traP 1645 Trap Road, Vienna. (703) 255-1900. Sybarite5. 8 p.m. $35. wolftrap.org.
Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41 Galleries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 8 Theater . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 9 Film . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .52
SearCh LISTIngS aT waShIngTonCITYpaper.Com
CITY LIGHTS: FRIDAY
GILBERTO GIL
2461 18th St., NW Washington, DC 202-667-5370
Some veteran acts tour every few years with a greatest-hits package, but Brazilian singer/guitarist Gilberto Gil prefers to change things up on each trip around the world. In 2010, Gil, who once served as Brazil’s Minister of Culture, played with a cellist and modified the tempos of some of his best-known songs; in 2012, he toured in support of his Fé na Festa album, which featured the forró rhythms common in rural parts of his country. On his current tour, Gil highlights a mostly acoustic effort from 2014, Gilbertos Samba, a tribute to bossa nova creator João Gilberto. While the album is filled with Gil’s pretty vocal melodies and emotive guitar, this legendary participant in Brazil’s radical Tropicália movement of the late ’60s and early ’70s sneaks in some revolutionary elements, befitting a guy once jailed by Brazil’s former military government. On the sweet “Desafinado,” for example, Gil and his band (which includes his multi-instrumentalist son Bem) add teakettle noises and synth washes. That combination of beautiful, wispy melodies and occasional instrumental edginess remains a Gil constant worth hearing every time he comes to town. Gilberto Gil performs at 8 p.m. at the Lisner Auditorium at George Washington Uni—Steve Kiviat versity, 730 21st St. NW. $45–$75. (202) 994-6800. lisner.gwu.edu.
dJ nights blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Us vs Them with DJ Steven Faith. 10 p.m. Free. blackcatdc.com. dC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Discnothèque with DJs Sean Morris and Bill Spieler. 10:30 p.m. $2–$5. dcnine.com.
saturday Rock
9:30 Club 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Iritation, Stick Figure, Hours Eastly. 5:30 p.m. 930.com. Comet Ping Pong 5037 Connecticut Ave. NW. (202) 364-0404. Jeff Rosenstock, Chumped, Qualms. 10 p.m. $12. cometpingpong.com. dC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Tei Shi, Pleasure Curses, Champagne Fever. 9:30 p.m. $12. dcnine.com.
“Where the Beautiful People go to get
Ugly.” “One of the 25 best bars in America” - Playboy Magazine
Redheads always drink 1/2 price Shiner Bock!
LIVE MUSIC EVERY NIGHT Thu: Ladies Night (No Cover For Ladies)
Patrick Alban & Noche Latina Latin & World Beats
Fri: Ursula Ricks Project Rock & Blues
Madam’s House Party On The Second Floor-Featuring DJ India 10:00pm
Sat: TheRock, Johnny Artis Band R&B & Reggae Saturday Opening Act: Rico Amero Soulful Blues 7:00pm - 9:00pm Madam’s House Party On The Second Floor-Featuring DJ India 10:00pm
tHe Hamilton 600 14th St. NW. (202) 787-1000. Vienna Teng, The Bollands. 8:30 p.m. $25–$35. thehamiltondc.com.
Sun: Stacy Brooks Down Home Blues
u street musiC Hall 1115 U St. NW. (202) 5881880. Smallpools, Grizfolk, Vinyl Theatre. 6 p.m. (Sold out) ustreetmusichall.com. VelVet lounge 915 U St. NW. (202) 462-3213. The Heavy Watts, Carbon Mirage, Loons. 9:30 p.m. $8. velvetloungedc.com.
Funk & R&B
Mon: One Nite Stand Reggae, Funk & R&B Tue: TheRock, Johnny Artis Band R&B & Reggae Wed: The Human Country Jukebox Band featuring JACK GREGORI from the
!
Howard tHeatre 620 T St. NW. (202) 803-2899. Keith Sweat. 7:30 p.m. $42.50–$80. thehowardtheatre.com. Keith Sweat. 7:30 p.m. $42.50–$80. thehowardtheatre.com.
Open Mic-8pm Second Floor
Sun, Tues & Thurs
ElEctRonic
Second Floor: Drunkaoke
u street musiC Hall 1115 U St. NW. (202) 5881880. Bliss with Will Eastman, Caleb L’Etoile, and Outputmessage. 10:30 p.m. $10. ustreetmusichall.com.
(Karaoke with Two Drink Minimum)
www.madamsorgan.com
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 41
Jazz
dJ nights
mr. Henry’s 601 Pennsylvania Ave. SE. (202) 5468412. Imani-Grace Cooper. 8 p.m. Free. mrhenrysdc.com.
blaCk Cat 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Springtime Freakout 80s Dance Party with DJs Steve EP, Killa K, Missguided, and Krasty McNasty. 9:30 p.m. $10. blackcatdc.com.
BluEs Zoo bar 3000 Connecticut Ave. NW. (202) 2324225. Bruce Ewan. 9 p.m. Free. zoobardc.com.
Folk Jammin JaVa 227 Maple Ave. East, Vienna. (703) 255-1566. The Nields. 7 p.m. $18. jamminjava.com.
WoRld barns at wolf traP 1645 Trap Road, Vienna. (703) 255-1900. Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar Festival. 7:30 p.m. $27–$30. wolftrap.org.
go-go Howard tHeatre 620 T St. NW. (202) 803-2899. Backyard Band. 11:30 p.m. $10–$45. thehowardtheatre.com.
blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Gay/Bash with DJs Dean Sullivan and Donna Slash. 10 p.m. $7. blackcatdc.com. roCk & roll Hotel 1353 H St. NE. (202) 388-ROCK. Citizen Select. 5 p.m. Free. rockandrollhoteldc.com.
Vocal sixtH & i HistoriC synagogue 600 I St. NW. (202) 408-3100. Ute Lemper. 8 p.m. $38. sixthandi.org.
sunday Rock
9:30 Club 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Houndmouth, Dylan LeBlanc. 7 p.m. $20. 930.com.
classical
blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. The NRIs, The Working Effective. 7:30 p.m. $10. blackcatdc.com.
kennedy Center millennium stage 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Oberlin Conservatory of Music. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org.
Comet Ping Pong 5037 Connecticut Ave. NW. (202) 364-0404. Low Cut Connie, Great Cities, Thee Lexington Arrows. 9 p.m. $12. cometpingpong.com.
montPelier arts Center 9652 Muirkirk Road, Laurel. (301) 377-7800. Keesun Kwon. 1 p.m. Free. arts.pgparks.com.
dC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Six Organs of Admittance. 9 p.m. $12. dcnine.com. Six Organs of Admittance, Elisa Ambrogio. 9 p.m. $12. dcnine.com.
CITY LIGHTS: SATURDAY
MEGHAN DAUM
Does it seem like all your female friends are attending prenatal yoga classes or can only talk about ergonomic baby carriers? Do you feel like the only person left who would rather spend the morning at the gym than at Gymboree? Essayist Meghan Daum is here for you. Few people who choose not to have children would relish being labeled shallow or self-absorbed, but that’s exactly what Daum leaned into when she brought together several boldfaced authors to write essays on the topic of not having children in Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids. When Daum discusses the book at Politics & Prose, expect a candid conversation; in her previous collection, The Unspeakable, she wrote about topics that women are hesitant to bring up, even during ladies’ night gossip. While D.C. message board users get caught up in breastfeeding wars and the right to free-range parent, come spend a kid-free night with Daum, local poet and memoirist Sandra Beasley, and local author and essay contributor Elliott Holt as they debunk the myths and dirty words attached to women who opt out of motherhood. Meghan Daum reads at 6 p.m. at Politics & Prose, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. —Diana Metzger Free. (202) 364-1919. politics-prose.com.
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washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 43
---------3701 Mount Vernon Ave. Alexandria, VA • 703-549-7500
1811 14TH ST NW
www.blackcatdc.com @blackcatdc UPCOMING SHOWS
APR 23
MARROW
APR 24
HANK GREEN
APR 24
US VS THEM
HARRY & THE POTTERS HIP HOP / INDIE / DANCE PARTY
APR 25
EIGHTIES MAYHEM
APR 25
GAY//BASH!!
APR 26
THE NRIS
APR 28
DANCE PARTY
DANCE NIGHT / DRAG SHOW
COUP SAUVAGE & THE SNIPS
APR 29
FREE PINBALL 5:30 - 8PM
APR 29
THE SOFT WHITE SIXTIES
APR 30 MAY 1 MAY 1 MAY 2 MAY 6 MAY 8
MITTENFIELDS RECORD RELEASE EX HEX SOLD OUT BURLESQUE (21+)
POKEY LAFARGE
SPEEDY ORTIZ PREE (RECORD RELEASE)
EVERY WEEKEND AT 7PM
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
TEN FORWARD SICK SAD WORLD A HAPPY HOUR "HAPPY" HOUR 1 STAR TREK:TNG TWO DARIA EP. PER WEEK
ROMULAN ALE SPECIALS
EPISODES PER WEEK MYSTIK SPIRAL DRINK SPECIALS
NOW OPEN at 5pm M-F!
RED ROOM & LUCKY CAT PINBALL
TAKE METRO!
WE ARE LOCATED 3 BLOCKS FROM THE U STREET/CARDOZO STATION
TO BUY TICKETS VISIT TICKETFLY.COM
For entire schedule go to Birchmere.com Find us on Facebook/Twitter! Tix @ Ticketmaster.com 800-745-3000 JUST ANNOUNCED! June 16 & 17
THEMARSHALLTUCKERBAND 24 FREDDIE JACKSON 25 BODEANS w/SAM HAWKSLEY 26 ALAN DOYLE
Apr 23
‘So Let’s Go Tour’
An Acoustic Evening with
28
MARC ROBERGE
29 May 2
DR. RALPH STANLEY with Family & Friends feat. NATHAN STANLEY
and the CLINCH
MT BOYS
DELBERT McCLINTON 9 GARY TAYLOR 14 TODD RUNDGREN 8
‘GLOBAL TOUR 2015’
15 16
17 18
IRIS DEMENT IAN TYSON RISING APPALACHIA BOB JAMES ‘75th Anniversary’
JOHNNYSWIM 21 ALEX BUGNON ‘Byrdland’ 19
Tribute to Donald Byrd
feat. TOM BROWNE & ELAN TROTMAN
Carolyn ERIC ROBERSON Malachi 27 THE SECRET SISTERS & STRIKING MATCHES 28 DOWN TO THE BONE 29 JONATHA BROOKE 30 WALTER BEASLEY 31 ROAMFEST 2015 7pm June 1 JOE ELY 2 SAMANTHA FISH & ANDY POXON 3 MARC BROUSSARD 5 OTTMAR LIEBERT & Luna Negra
22&23
6
w/Shannon Whitworth & Barrett Smith
7
44 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
THE SELDOM SCENE In the
!
KEVIN FOWLER
CITY LIGHTS: SUNDAY
OPHIRA EISENBERG Canadian comedian Ophira Eisenberg has a name perfect for public radio, packed with vowels and syllables that roll cleanly off the tongue. It suits her role as host of NPR’s weekly trivia show Ask Me Another perfectly. But before Eisenberg was challenging contestants to name that tune or asking minor celebrities to solve anagrams, she made her name telling serious stories with the Moth (most famously about a car accident she was involved in as a child) and performing stand-up comedy routines about her sexual misadventures. When she comes to the Kennedy Center, expect riffs on marriage, relationships, and why having an unusual name makes it hard to meet people at parties. Urban dwellers of a certain age will find her stories effortlessly funny and relatable. Ophira Eisenberg performs at 6 p.m. at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater, 2700 F St. NW. Free. (202) 467-4600. —Caroline Jones kennedy-center.org.
Jazz boHemian CaVerns 2001 11th St. NW. (202) 2990800. Tim Berne’s Snake Oil. 7 p.m. $15–$20. bohemiancaverns.com.
tuesday Rock
Folk
9:30 Club 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Spandau Ballet. 7 p.m. $45. 930.com.
sixtH & i HistoriC synagogue 600 I St. NW. (202) 408-3100. Lowland Hum, Laura Tsagarris. 8 p.m. $10–$12. sixthandi.org.
blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Coup Savage and the Snips, Olivia NeutronJohn. 7:30 p.m. $10. blackcatdc.com.
opERa
dC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Adam Kyle, Nyteowl, DJ Money Jungle. 8:30 p.m. $8. dcnine.com.
ClariCe smitH Performing arts Center Stadium Drive and Route 193, College Park. (301) 4052787. Maryland Opera Studio Crime and Punishment: Operas in One Act. 3 p.m. $10–$25. claricesmithcenter.umd.edu.
WoRld
classical
Vocal
ClariCe smitH Performing arts Center Stadium Drive and Route 193, College Park. (301) 4052787. The Nile Project. 7 p.m. $10–$25. claricesmithcenter.umd.edu.
kennedy Center millennium stage 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Seneca Valley High School Chamber Choir and the Luther Jackson Concert Choir. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org.
PHilliPs ColleCtion 1600 21st St. NW. (202) 3872151. Zhang Zuo, piano. 4 p.m. $15–$30. phillipscollection.org.
Wednesday
Monday Rock
Howard tHeatre 620 T St. NW. (202) 803-2899. O-Town. 7 p.m. $20–$45. thehowardtheatre.com.
Jazz boHemian CaVerns 2001 11th St. NW. (202) 2990800. Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra. 8 p.m. & 10 p.m. $10. bohemiancaverns.com.
classical kennedy Center millennium stage 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. The Youth Symphonic Orchestra and Choir “Polígono Don Bosco”. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org.
bossa bistro 2463 18th St NW. 202-667-0088. Cheick Hamala Diabate. 9 p.m. Free. bossproject.com.
Rock
9:30 Club 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. Toro y Moi, Vinyl Williams. 7 p.m. (Sold out) 930.com. birCHmere 3701 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria. (703) 549-7500. War. 7:30 p.m. $45. birchmere.com. blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. The Soft White Sixties. 7:30 p.m. $12. blackcatdc.com. dC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. Water Liars, Hatfield McCoy. 9 p.m. $10. dcnine.com. fillmore silVer sPring 8656 Colesville Road, Silver Spring. (301) 960-9999. Sixx A.M., Apocalyptica. 8 p.m. $36. fillmoresilverspring.com. sixtH & i HistoriC synagogue 600 I St. NW. (202) 408-3100. Dustin Kensrue, Andy Hull, Tanner Merritt. 8 p.m. $17–$20. sixthandi.org.
I.M.P. PRESENTS Merriweather Post Pavilion • Columbia, MD
JUST ANNOUNCED!
ALABAMA SHAKES w/ Drive-By Truckers .......................FRI SEPT 18 On Sale Friday, April 24 at 10am
THIS WEEK’S SHOWS
Houndmouth w/ Dylan LeBlanc ............................................................................. Su 26 Spandau Ballet All 2/9 Spandau Ballet tickets honored. .................................Tu 28
Joe Pug w/ Field Report (solo) ......................................................................................Sa 2 Butch Walker w/ Jonathan Tyler & The Dove and The Wolf .................................. Th 7 The Maine w/ Real Friends • Knuckle Puck • The Technicolors ......................... Su 10 Aaron Watson .............................................................................................................. Th 14 ALL GOOD PRESENTS
Papadosio ....................................................................................................................... F 15
AN EVENING WITH
Walk Off The Earth ................................................................................................... Sa 16
U STREET MUSIC HALL PRESENTS
Kilngande ..................................................................................................................... Sa 23 The Story So Far w/ Four Year Strong • Terror • Souvenirs.............................. Su 24 Patrick Watson w/ The Low Anthem ........................................................................ W 27 FIDLAR and METZ ...................................................................................................... Th 28 STEEZ PROMO PRESENTS
12th Planet w/ Loudpvck & Kove ............................................................................. Sa 30
JUNE ALL GOOD PRESENTS
Rusted Root w/ Adam Ezra Group .............................................................................. W 3
9:30 CUPCAKES
Kix • Europe • Queensrÿche and more!............................... MAY 1 & 2
Two-day and Single-day tickets on sale now. For a full lineup, visit m3rockfest.com.
DC101 KERFUFFLE
MAY
MANY MORE SHOWS ON SALE!
feat.
930.com
The best thing you could possibly put in your mouth Cupcakes by BUZZ... your neighborhood bakery in Alexandria, VA. | www.buzzonslaters.com
FEATURING
Incubus • The Offspring • Panic! at the Disco • Dirty Heads and more! .......MAY 3 Kenny Chesney w/ Jake Owen & Chase Rice ................................................. MAY 27 FEATURING
Kendrick Lamar • Banks and more! ........ MAY 30 Calvin Harris • The Weeknd and more!... MAY 31
Single-Day tickets on sale now. For more info, visit sweetlifefestival.com.
The Decemberists w/ Father John Misty.................................................. JUNE 4 CAPITAL JAZZ FEST FEATURING
Kenny G • George Clinton and Parliament/Funkadelic and more!.............JUNE 5-7 Florence + The Machine w/ Empress Of ....................................................... JUNE 9 Mumford & Sons w/ The Maccabees.................................................................. JUNE 10 Hozier w/ The Antlers .................................................................................................... JUNE 20 Fall Out Boy | Wiz Khalifa w/ Hoodie Allen & DJ Drama ............................... JUNE 27 VANS WARPED TOUR
FEATURING
Asking Alexandria • Black Veil Brides • Riff Raff and more! .................... JULY 18 Sam Smith .....................................................................................................................JULY 24 My Morning Jacket w/ Jason Isbell .............................................................JULY 26
FAITH NO MORE w/ Refused ........................................................ AUGUST 2 CDE PRESENTS 2015 SUMMER SPIRIT FESTIVAL FEATURING
ERYKAH BADU • ANTHONY HAMILTON and more! .................... AUG 8
PHISH .........................................................................................................AUGUST 15 & 16
Willie Nelson & Family and Old Crow Medicine Show............ AUG 19 Darius Rucker w/ Brett Eldredge • Brothers Osborne • A Thousand Horses .... AUG 22 Death Cab For Cutie w/ Explosions in the Sky ..................................SEPT 13 • For full lineups and more info, visit merriweathermusic.com • 930.com
9:30 CLUB PRESENTS AT U STREET MUSIC HALL Footwerk w/ Trevor Young & DJ Heat
Sam Prekop w/ Mountains.................... F 15 and Twinkdrumz ........................... Th APR 23 William Fitzsimmons Shy Girls w/ Young Ejecta.................... Th 30 w/ Dension Witmer ............................... Th 21 Oh Land w/ I Am Strikes ................ Su MAY 3 Geographer w/ Empires & Idlehands .. Sa 23 Stu Larsen & Natsuki Kurai
w/ Matt Sanders...................................... Th 7
Nick Hakim w/ Ben Talmi........................ F 8 Tennis w/ Kuroma ................................ Tu 12 Lo-Fang ................................................. W 13
Avan Lava............................................. Th 28 Ivan & Alyosha w/ Kris Orlowski.......... F 29 Seinabo Sey ......................................... Su 31 Jedi Mind Tricks ............................ W JUN 3
• Buy advance tickets at the 9:30 Club box office
DAR Constitution Hall • Washington D.C.
ABC’S NASHVILLE IN CONCERT
FEATURING
Clare Bowen • Chris Carmack • Charles Esten and more!.. MAY 3
Echostage • Washington, D.C. JUST ANNOUNCED!
BRANDON FLOWERS ...................................................... JULY 29 On Sale Friday, April 24 at 10am
Atmosphere w/ B Dolan • deM atlaS • DJ Adatrak ...................................................MAY 2 TV On The Radio w/ Bo Ningen ...............................................................................MAY 19 Hot Chip w/ Sinkane ........................................................................................................ JUNE 5 Tame Impala w/ Kuroma .............................................................................................. JUNE 6 Belle and Sebastian w/ Alvvays........................................................................... JUNE 11 Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros ................................................ JUNE 16 Milky Chance w/ X Ambassadors ..............................................................................JULY 27 Interpol ..............................................................................................................................JULY 28 SEPT 8 SOLD OUT! SECOND NIGHT
ADDED!
Twenty One Pilots w/ Echosmith.................................................................. SEPTEMBER 9 Stromae ............................................................................................................... SEPTEMBER 16 2135 Queens Chapel Rd. NE • Ticketmaster
For full lineup, visit abc.com/nashvilletour. Ticketmaster
1215 U Street NW
Pimlico Race Course • Baltimore, MD
ARMIN VAN BUUREN w/ Childish Gambino .... SAT MAY 16 All day event! For more info, visit preakness.com/infield.
RFK Stadium • Washington, D.C.
20th Anniversary Blowout!
Buddy Guy • Gary Clark Jr. • Heart • and more! For full lineup, visit 930.com ... JULY 4
Daughtry STRIPPED - ACOUSTIC SHOW!
Washington, D.C.
w/ Lucie Silvas.................................................. MAY 2
JUSTICEAID PRESENTS MUSIC FOR THE MID-ATLANTIC INNOCENCE PROJECT & INNOCENCE PROJECT NEW ORLEANS
The Blind Boys of Alabama & Ani DiFranco .................................... MAY 17 Lisa Lampanelli .................................................................................................... MAY 29 LIVE NATION PRESENTS
T.J. Miller ...........................................................................................................JUNE 20
AEG LIVE PRESENTS
Jim Jefferies ...............................................................................................NOVEMBER 7 • thelincolndc.com •
U Street (Green/Yellow) stop across the street!
Ticketmaster
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 Weekdays & Until 11PM on show nights. 6-11PM on Sat & 6-10:30PM on Sun on show nights. 9:30 CUPCAKES The best thing you could possibly put in your mouth. Cupcakes by BUZZ... your neighborhood bakery in Alexandria, VA. www.buzzbakery.com
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!
HAPPY HOUR DRINK PRICES
AFTER THE SHOW AT THE BACK BAR!
930.com
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 45
Jazz
Funk & R&B
kennedy Center millennium stage 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Maris Briežkalns Quintet. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org.
Howard tHeatre 620 T St. NW. (202) 803-2899. Sheila E. 8 p.m. $37.50–$75. thehowardtheatre.com.
twins JaZZ 1344 U St. NW. (202) 234-0072. Nicole Saphos. 8 p.m. & 10 p.m. $10. twinsjazz.com.
kennedy Center millennium stage 2700 F St. NW. (202) 467-4600. Rebellum. 6 p.m. Free. kennedy-center.org.
Folk
ElEctRonic
bossa bistro 2463 18th St NW. 202-667-0088. The Plankstompers. 9 p.m. $5. bossproject.com.
u street musiC Hall 1115 U St. NW. (202) 5881880. Shy Girls, Young Ejecta. 7 p.m. $15. ustreetmusichall.com. Bag Raiders, Bckwtr. 10:30 p.m. $15. ustreetmusichall.com.
tHe Hamilton 600 14th St. NW. (202) 787-1000. Tyrone Wells, Dominic Balli, Emily Hearn. 7:30 p.m. $18–$30. thehamiltondc.com.
thursday Rock
9:30 Club 815 V St. NW. (202) 265-0930. The Wombats, Cheerleader. 7 p.m. (Sold out) 930.com. blaCk Cat baCkstage 1811 14th St. NW. (202) 667-4490. Mittenfields, Greenland, Magnetar Flares, Night Streets. 7:30 p.m. $12. blackcatdc.com.
Jazz blues alley 1073 Wisconsin Ave. NW. (202) 3374141. Kenny Garrett. 8 p.m. & 10 p.m. $30. bluesalley.com.
countRy mr. Henry’s 601 Pennsylvania Ave. SE. (202) 5468412. Notes from the Underground. 8 p.m. Free. mrhenrysdc.com.
hip-hop
Comet Ping Pong 5037 Connecticut Ave. NW. (202) 364-0404. Ava Luna, Young Rapids, Wing Dam. 9 p.m. $12. cometpingpong.com.
barns at wolf traP 1645 Trap Road, Vienna. (703) 255-1900. Black Violin. 8 p.m. $25–$27. wolftrap.org.
dC9 1940 9th St. NW. (202) 483-5000. The Apache Relay, Great Peacock. 9 p.m. $10–$12. dcnine.com.
classical
Jammin JaVa 227 Maple Ave. East, Vienna. (703) 255-1566. Ewan Dobson. 7:30 p.m. $15–$18. jamminjava.com.
freer gallery of art Jefferson Drive & 12th Street SW. (202) 633-1000. Shanghai Quartet. 7:30 p.m. Free. asia.si.edu.
CITY LIGHTS: MONDAY
“WATCH THIS! REVELATIONS IN MEDIA ART”
The American Art Museum last celebrated the work of pioneering Korean-American video artist Nam June Paik with a career-spanning retrospective in late 2012. Now, the museum’s curators use Paik’s work as a jumping-off point for an exhibition that highlights advances in multimedia art in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Among the items that blur the line between art and entertainment are two video games (Jenova Chen and Kellee Santiago’s Flower and Ed Fries’ Halo 2600), as well as digital animations and two newly found pieces by Paik. Several 16mm films and closed-circuit installations will also be on view, helping visitors comprehend the genre’s breadth. Technically, the masterpieces you created using Microsoft Paint and KidPix in the elementary school computer lab would also qualify, but the precision and invention these practicing artists apply to their work would blow your line drawings out of the water. The exhibition is on view daily 11:30 a.m. to 7 p.m., to Sept. 7, at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, 8th and F streets NW. Free. (202) 633-7970. —Caroline Jones americanart.si.edu.
46 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 47
Galleries
www.bethesdabluesjazz.com
A
P
R
I
L
THURSDAY APRIL 23
FREDA PAYNE
FRIDAY APRIL 24
CLUB NOUVEAU
PLUS CALVIN RICHARDSON AND CASE SU 26
SLOW CREEK
M 27
MONDAYS W/ DARYL DAVIS THURSDAY APRIL 30
INTERNATIONAL JAZZ
EAT. DAVE DAMIANI, SPENCER DAY AND MAIYA SYKES M
A Y
MAY 1ST
EDDIE MONEY
TWO SHOWS! SA 2
BE’LA DONA
S3
GIRMA YIFRASHEWA
F8
LUTHER RE-LIVES FEAT. WILLIAM “SMOOTH” WARDLAW
SA 9
SHADOWS OF THE 60’S: A TRIBUTE TO THE FOUR TOPS
S 10
(MOTHER’S DAY BRUNCH & EVENING SHOW) WIL HART OF THE ORIGINAL DELFONICS
SA 16 KING SOUL S 17
SOULCIAL HOUR BAND
TH 21
MICHAL URBANIAK
F 22
A SOUTHERN SOUL TRIBUTE: THE MUSIC OF MUSCLE SHOALS & STAX/VOLT
S 23
JOE CLAIR & FRIENDS SUNDAY MAY 24
CRYSTAL GAYLE F 29
GRAINGER AND THE NEW POCKETS FEAT MERIXTELL SUNDAY MAY 31
THE HIT MEN
FEAT. ORIGINAL MEMBERS OF THE FOUR SEASONS J
U
N
E
TUESDAY JUNE 5
MARY WILSON OF THE SUPREMES
7719 Wisconsin Ave., Bethesda, MD (240) 330-4500
Two Blocks from Bethesda Metro/Red Line Free Parking on Weekends 48 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
imaginary birds, while Beverly Ress presents large-scale drawings and constructions of birds. April 16–May 31.
adamson gallery 1515 14th St. NW, Suite 202. (202) 232-0707. adamsongallery.jimdo.com. OngOing: “Gordon Parks: A Segregation Story” Photographs chronicling racial segregation throughout America by the late Life magazine photographer Gordon Parks. April 11–June 27.
brentwood arts exCHange 3901 Rhode Island Ave., Brentwood. (301) 277-2863. arts.pgparks.com. OngOing: “Brentwood Arts Exchange 5th Anniversary Show” Artists who’ve presented work at the center over the years return to celebrate at this anniversary show. March 16–May 9.
anaCostia arts Center 1231 Good Hope Road SE. anacostiaartscenter.com. ClOsing: “Eternal Spring” Artist Matt Hollis affixes hundreds of artificial flower petals to his canvases to both mimic and celebrate the changing seasons in this exhibition of assemblages. March 27–April 25.
CaPitol skyline Hotel 10 I St. SW. (202) 4887500. capitolskyline.com. ClOsing: “Upward Mobility” Photographer Avi Gupta presents a large-scale photograph of the Corcoran Gallery of Art’s staircase printed on a banner on the side of the Capitol Skyline Hotel to close the WPA’s South Capitol Skyscape series. Feb. 2–April 30.
arlington arts Center 3550 Wilson Blvd., Arlington. (703) 248-6800. arlingtonartscenter.org. OngOing: “2015 Spring SOLOS” Former AAC curators Andrea Pollan and Jeffry Cudlin judge this annual exhibition of work by emerging artists. Featured participants include Bradley Chriss, Nichola Kinch, Kate Kretz, Ariana Lamb, Nate Larson, Dan Perkins, and Paul Shortt. April 18–June 27. artisPHere 1101 Wilson Blvd., Arlington. (703) 8751100. artisphere.com. ClOsing: “Infinitesimal” Artist Monica Stroik explores the limits of perception and memory in this immersive new exhibition of oil paintings that draws inspiration from Artisphere’s architecture. Feb. 4–April 25. OngOing: “Bruised” Local animator Safwat Saleem and WAMU’s Rebecca Sheir curate this new participatory art project that invites visitors to share their stories of defeat. Saleem will then animate the stories and display them on screens throughout the building. April 15–July 31. atHenaeum 201 Prince St., Alexandria. (703) 5480035. nvfaa.org. OngOing: “Rara Avis” Martin Tarrat and Langley Spurlock present “The Abcdearium of Birds,” a collection of illustrations and verses about
Cross maCkenZie gallery 2026 R St. NW. (202) 333-7970. crossmackenzie.com. ClOsing: “Blast Off!” Flight-themed works by artists Eve Biddle & Joshua Frankel, Matthew Courtney, David Favrod, Maxwell MacKenzie, Philip Slagter, and Trevor Young. April 3–April 25. tHe fridge Rear Alley, 516 Eighth St. SE. (202) 6644151. thefridgedc.com. OngOing: “Rose Jaffe.” New colorful portraits by local artist Rose Jaffe. April 4–May 3. gallery Plan b 1530 14th St. NW. (202) 234-2711. galleryplanb.com. OngOing “Africa” Landscape paintings inspired by artist Freya Grand’s travels around the continent. March 25–May 3. goetHe-institut wasHington 812 7th St. NW. (202) 289-1200. www.goethe.de/washington. OngOing: “gute aussichten: new german photography 2014/2015” The eight winners of this annual photography competition display more than 300 images chronicling everything from life in Haiti and the Dominican Republic to the Matterhorn. March 5–May 1.
CITY LIGHTS: TUESDAY
SPANDAU BALLET
In 1984, a 40-second clip in a John Hughes film made Spandau Ballet’s imprint on popular culture permanent. The British new-wave band’s most famous tune, “True,” achieved broad popularity in 1983, but once it soundtracked Molly Ringwald’s teen angst during Sixteen Candles’ dance scene, it adopted new significance, especially among suburban teens. That assist forever linked singer Tony Hadley’s earnest, lounge-singer vocals and funereal attire to a specific era, and it continues to influence contemporary artists—in addition to appearing in dozens of commercials over the past 30 years, the infectious hook (“Ha-hah-hah-hahhh-hahhh/I know this much is true”) can be heard on P.M. Dawn’s “Set Adrift on Memory Bliss” and Lloyd’s “You.” “True” propelled Spandau Ballet from Live Aid to London’s O2 Arena for the band’s 2009 reunion tour. The live response to other hits like “Gold” is always warm, but “True” is a karaoke essential that should ignite the crowd and revive everyone’s inner teenager. Spandau Ballet performs at 7 p.m. at 9:30 Club, 815 V —Julian Kimble St. NW. $45. (202) 265-0930. 930.com.
greater reston arts Center 12001 Market St., Ste. 103, Reston. (703) 471-9242. restonarts.org. OngOing: “Installation” Sculptor Patrick Dougherty installs a new piece in Reston’s Town Square Park and the Arts Center showcases images of his other large-scale works around the world. April 16–July 3. OngOing: “Patterson Clark” The Washington Post’s “Urban Jungle” columnist presents a series of works printed on wood carved from invasive tree species. April 16–July 3. Hillyer art sPaCe 9 Hillyer Court NW. (202) 3380680. artsandartists.org. ClOsing: “CircuitScapes” Paintings of computer circuits styled to look like landscapes by painter Glen Kessler. April 3–April 25. ClOsing: “J.D. Deardourff” Colorful screenprints inspired by comic books by graphic designer and artist J.D. Deardourff. April 3–April 25. Honfleur gallery 1241 Good Hope Road SE. (202) 365-8392. honfleurgallery.com. OngOing: “User Error” Larry Lairson references op-art in his large paintings that frequently incorporate materials like glue and linen. March 20–May 1. long View gallery 1234 9th St. NW. (202) 2324788. longviewgallery.com. OngOing: “Networks” Abstract paintings by Long View regulars Sondra N. Arkin and Eve Stockton. April 2–May 3. mosaiC 2910 District Ave., Fairfax. OngOing: “Transcendence” Muralist James Walker creates a largescale installation and painter James Bullough installs a 30-foot mural inspired by break dancers at this outdoor exhibition presented by Art Whino. March 7–July 26. tate gallery of CHrist Congregational CHurCH 9525 Colesville Road, Silver Spring. (301) 585-8010. ccsilverspring.org. OngOing: “Exploring Abstracts” Eighteen members of the Silver Spring Camera Club, the D.C. area’s oldest camera club, display their abstract works in this exhibition. April 20–June 12.
A FILM BY TEDDY CHAN
UPTOWN BLUES
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Fri & Sat, April 24 & 25 at Midnight!
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transformer gallery 1404 P St. NW. (202) 483-1102. transformergallery.org. ClOsing: “Before the Law” Raul Romero and Jane Carver use Kafka’s “before the law” parable as inspiration for this multimedia show that explores the relationship between absolutism and relativity. March 14–April 25. Visarts 155 Gibbs St., Rockville. (301) 315-8200. visartsatrockville.org. ClOsing: “Jeffrey Cooper” New wood carvings and sculptures by artist Jeffrey Cooper. March 27–April 26.
4/25 KEITH SWEAT
4/28
5/1 ILOVEMAKONNEN, KEY! & SONNY DIGITAL
ALBUM RELEASE SHOW
COMEDY AT THE HOWARD:
DONNELL RAWLINGS
4/30 SHEILA E
BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND
5/2 LEE FIELDS & TROUBLE FUNK
5/3 ERICA CAMPBELL OF MARY MARY
5/8 TEEDRA MOSES: ALBUM RELEASE SHOW
ViVid solutions gallery 1231 Good Hope Road SE. (202) 365-8392. vividsolutionsdc.com. OngOing: “Anacostia River Photography” D.C. residents share their photos and memories of the Anacostia River in this open-call group show. March 20–May 1.
theater
tHe blood Quilt Katori Hall, author of The Mountaintop, presents the world premiere of this story about four sisters who come together to create a quilt in honor of their deceased mother. When the talk turns to inheritance, they must decide whether to strengthen their family bonds or pull away from each other once and for all. Arena Stage. 1101 6th St. SW. To June 7. $45-$110. (202) 488-3300. arenastage.org. Carousel A carousel barker gets a second chance at love in this Rodgers and Hammerstein musical that features classic songs like “You’ll Never Walk Alone” and “If I Loved You.” Olney Theatre Center. 2001 OlneySandy Spring Road, Olney. To May 10. $18-$75. (301) 924-3400. olneytheatre.org. dame edna’s glorious goodbye Barry Humphries’ cross-dressing dame bids her fans farewell and recounts stories from over the years in this musical one-man show. National Theatre. 1321 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. To April 26. $48-$98. (202) 628-6161. nationaltheatre.org. tHe fire and tHe rain Contemporary Indian playwright Girish Karnad turns the Indian epic The Mahabharata into this play about a man who prays for rain to save the earth and the romantic entanglements of his family. Constellation Theatre at Source. 1835 14th St. NW. To May 24. $20-$45. (202) 204-7741. constellationtheatre.org.
5/10
COMEDY AT THE HOWARD:
TOMMY DAVIDSON
MOTHER’S DAY SPECIAL
UPCOMING SHOWS FRIDAY APRIL 24TH
JARABE DE PALO ZAKKE
SATURDAY APRIL 25TH
METANIUM
TUESDAY MAY 5TH
LATE-HIP HOP LIVS PRESENTS:
BACKYARD BAND:
FAN APPRECIATION PARTY MONDAY APRIL 27TH
DEVIN WHITE WEDNESDAY MAY 6TH
TIERRA SANTA WHITE FORD BRONCO TRIBUTE TO PHYLLIS HYMAN FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS: CELEBRATING THE LEGACY OF CHUCK BROWN WITH THE CHUCK BROWN BAND FEAT. FRANK SIRIUS (AKA SCOOBY) & KK WITH SPECIAL GUESTS SUGAR BEAR, MS. YENDY, SUGAR BEAR + MORE! 5/17 AFRISONORE PRESENTS LÁGBÁJÁ 5/19 TECH N9NE
SUNDAY MAY 10TH
COMEDY AT THE HOWARD:
TOMMY DAVIDSON
2 SHOW MOTHER’S DAY SPECIAL
MONDAY MAY 11TH
HEAVEN ADORES YOU: A DOCUMENTARY ABOUT THE LIFE & MUSIC OF ELLIOTT
RAW DC PRESENTS
WEDNESDAY MAY 13TH
LOCAL ARTIST SHOWCASE
RARE ESSENCE, JEREMY ELLIS, STARSHIP CONNECTION + MORE!
SENSORY: DC’S LARGEST
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5/20 PUMPSTATION & THE HOWARD THEATRE PRESENT: ETANA 5/22 MOBB DEEP 5/23 KINKY / DANIELA SPALLA 5/23 LATE-MEGA WOMEN’S EVENT UNLEASHED DC PRESENTS: EMPIRE 5/24 A DRAG SALUTE TO THE DIVAS GIRL GROUPS & LADIES OF HIP HOP 5/25 ANTHONYKEN, LLC. & SHERYL LEE RALPH THE D.I.V.A. FOUNDATION PRESENT
FORWARD PRESENTS:
5/27 JAZZ AT THE HOWARD: YELLOWJACKETS FEAT. BOB MINTZER, FELIX PASTORIUS, RUSSELL FERRANTE & WILLIAM KENNEDY 5/28 LOUIS WEEKS: ALBUM RELEASE SHOW 5/29 TWEET WITH ORLANDO DIXON 5/29 LATE - BARRINGTON LEVY ALBUM RELEASE SHOW 5/30 CLOUDS IN MY COFFEE THEATER PRESENTS SENSUALITY II 5/31 BRENCORE ENTERTAINMENT PRESENTS A TRIBUTE TO THE MUSIC OF MOTOWN
WITH THE HARLEM GOSPEL CHOIR EVERY SUNDAY !
ADMISSION GETS YOU ALL YOU CAN EAT BUFFET + ENTRANCE TO THE SHOW!
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CONCEIVED BY AND WITH BOOK AND LYRICS BY JULIA JORDAN MUSIC AND LYRICS BY JULIANA NASH DIRECTED BY DAVID MUSE
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BAR OPENS AT 6PM SHOW AT 7PM AFTER PARTY AT BLACK WHISKEY BAR OPENS AT 9PM SHOW AT 10PM
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WED 29 BAR OPENS AT 7PM
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CITY LIGHTS: WEDNESDAY
METAMORPHOSIS Waking up to discover that you’ve turned into an insect overnight sounds q u i t e f r i gh t ening, but the problems you’d encounter— opening doors without opposable thumbs, figuring out how to eat with a differently formed mouth—sound quite silly. In its new stage adaptation of Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis, the Alliance for New Music-Theatre aims to highlight the humor in the Czech author’s dark tale through movement, song, and story. Animator Janet Antich and designer Joey Wade will liven up the set by incorporating animations based on Kafka’s original drawings. The troupe is bound for the Prague Fringe Festival in late May, but before the cast and crew depart, they’ll present it to D.C. audiences at a venue that’s also undergone a metamorphosis of sorts: Capital Fringe’s new Trinidad Theatre. While the experience of seeing the play might be transformative, rest easy knowing you (probably) won’t return with a thorax and two extra appendages. The play runs April 29 to May 17 at the Capital Fringe Trinidad Theatre, 1358 Florida —Caroline Jones Ave. NE. $20–$30. (202) 341-0254. newmusictheatre.org.
freedom’s song Abraham Lincoln’s life and words come to life in this musical that tells the stories of individuals’ highs and lows throughout the Civil War. Ford’s Theatre. 511 10th St. NW. To May 20. $27-$69. (202) 347-4833. fordstheatre.org. tHe island This South African play, devised by Athol Fugard, John Kani, and Winston Ntshona, explores the physical and psychological torture suffered by black political prisoners during Apartheid through the guide of a performance of Antigone. MetroStage honors the play’s 30th anniversary with this production directed by Thomas W. Jones II. MetroStage. 1201 N. Royal St., Alexandria. To April 26. $50-$55. (703) 548-9044. metrostage.org. lettiCe and loVage An eccentric tour guide leads visitors on a tour of an English estate and embellishes the truth to liven the experience. Peter Shaffer’s comedy explores what happens when these little lies put the tour guide at odds with a tough inspector from the Preservation Trust. Quotidian Theatre Company at The Writer’s Center. 4508 Walsh St., Bethesda. To May 17. $15-$30. (301) 816-1023. quotidiantheatre.org. ligHts rise on graCe An African-American young man and a daughter of Chinese immigrants fall in love in an inner-city high school. They reconnect after six years, during which the man is swallowed by the system, and struggle to figure out their altered relationship in Chad Beckim’s new play about love, faith, and family. Woolly Mammoth Theatre. 641 D St. NW. To April 26. $40-$68. (202) 393-3939. woollymammoth.net. man of la manCHa Don Quixote’s epic journey past windmills and monsters comes to life in this classic musical that features songs like “I Really Like Him” and “The Impossible Dream.” Sidney Harman Hall. 610 F St. NW. To April 26. $20-$110. (202) 547-1122. shakespearetheatre.org. mariela in tHe desert Playwright Karen Zacarías’ draws inspiration from the lives of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo to tell this story about Mexican art patrons who find their inspiration lacking when their family and friends move away. GALA Hispanic Theatre. 3333 14th St. NW. To May 10. $20-$50. (202) 234-7174. galatheatre.org.
murder ballad A woman revels in her perfect life until her ex-lover returns to turn everything upside down. David Muse directs Julia Jordan and Juliana Nash’s exciting rock musical. Studio Theatre. 1501 14th St. NW. To May 10. $20-$50. (202) 332-3300. studiotheatre.org. old wiCked songs A young American piano prodigy moves to Vienna in order to conquer a case of writer’s block and meets a tough and traditional Austrian teacher. As the two very different characters interact, it’s unclear whether they’ll suffer or survive working together. 1st Stage. 1524 Spring Hill Road, McLean. To May 3. $15-$28. (703) 854-1856. 1ststagespringhill.org. on aPProVal Two wealthy women have picked out suitable husbands but aim to test the goods out before they commit in this witty comedy from the ‘20s. Washington Stage Guild at Undercroft Theatre. 900 Massachusetts Ave. NW. To May 17. $20-$50. (240) 582-0050. stageguild.org. tHe originalist Arena Stage Artistic Director Molly Smith directs the world premiere of John Strand’s drama about cantankerous Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia. Helen Hayes Award winner Edward Gero stars as Scalia, who spars with a stubborn, liberal law clerk as they prepare for an important case. Arena Stage. 1101 6th St. SW. To April 26. $70-$110. (202) 488-3300. arenastage.org. tHe reVolutionists A playwright, an assassin, a free woman of color, and a former queen come together in the aftermath of the French Revolution in this new comedy by acclaimed playwright Lauren Gunderson. Catholic University of America. 620 Michigan Ave. NE. To April 26. $5-$15. (202) 319-5000. cua.edu. soon In this world premiere by composer and lyricist Nick Blaemire, all of earth’s water is due to evaporate in a few months, which sends aimless 20-something Charlie into hibernation on the couch. Her mother, friend, and boyfriend try to encourage her to take advantage of what time is left but she soon reveals past events that have kept her confined physically and emotionally. Signature Theatre. 4200 Campbell Ave.,
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Bohemian Caverns Tuesdays Artist in Residency
Herbert Scott r ap
Elijah Balbed
DC’s Legendary Jazz Club
Established in 1926 2001 11th ST NW - (202)299-0800
Legends of Jazz Series NEA Jazz Master
Benny Golson
Jamie Broumas Sunday
May 3rd
Frank Lacy
Legacy Band
Fri & Sat Apr 24th & 25th
Tim Berne Snake Oil
Thur Apr 30th Album Release Lessons From The Streets
Sat & Sun May 9th & 10th
Sun 4/26
presented in conjunction w/ Transparent Productions
Fred Wesley
(JB’s, James Brown, Parliament)
The Harry Bells Thur May 14th
Todd Marcus
Sine Qua Non
Fri & Sat May 1st & 2nd Single Release Make It Feel Good
Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra Mondays @ 8pm
"This group is something special." ~ Mike West (CityPaper)
Jazz Orchestra Friday May 15th
Matt Stevens
Fri & Sat May 22nd & 23rd
www.BohemianCaverns.com
washingtoncitypaper.com april 24, 2015 51
Arlington. To April 26. $39-$94. (703) 820-9771. signature-theatre.org. sunset baby A political prisoner reunites with his daughter and his life changes irrevocably in this play by award-winning playwright Dominique Morriseau. Rep Stage at Howard Community College. 10901 Little Patuxent Parkway, Columbia. To May 17. $15-$40. (443) 518-1500. repstage.org. swing time—tHe musiCal Enjoy the music of Benny Goodman, Glen Miller, and Duke Ellington in this comedic wartime musical set during a war bond radio drive broadcast. Arleigh & Roberta Burke Theater at the U.S. Naval Heritage Center. 701 Pennsylvania Ave. NW. To June 24. $19-$49. (202) 573-8127. swingtimethemusical.com. tHe tyPograPHer’s dream A typographer, geographer, and stenographer discuss their careers in this comedy that questions what happens when your job is your life and you happen to hate your job. The Hub Theatre at John Swayze Theatre. 9431 Silver King Court, Fairfax. To May 3. $20-$30. (703) 674-3177. thehubtheatre.org. unCle Vanya Round House presents the area premiere of playwright Annie Baker’s adaptation of Chekhov’s classic about a blended family that fights over the value, both sentimental and monetary, of a country estate. Round House Theatre Bethesda. 4545 East-West Highway, Bethesda. To May 3. $10-$50. (240) 644-1100. roundhousetheatre.org. Vanya and sonia and masHa and sPike Playwright Christopher Durang satirizes Chekov’s characters and premises in this Tony-winning play about two dreary siblings whose lives are upended when their sister comes to visit with her new boyfriend and makes a big announcement. Aaron Posner, whose Chekov adaptation Stupid Fucking Bird impressed local audiences in 2013, directs. Arena Stage. 1101 6th St. SW. To May 3. $55-$100. (202) 488-3300. arenastage.org.
FilM
5 to 7 An aspiring novelist and a married woman begin an affair but can only meet between 5 and 7 p.m. in this romantic comedy starring Anton Yelchin and Bérénice Marlohe. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information)
n
adult beginner Nick Kroll stars as a entren preneur who blows his big launch and ends up working as a nanny to his estranged sister in this comedy directed by Ross Katz. (See washingtoncitypaper. com for venue information)
age of adaline In the early 20th century, n tHe an accident eliminates a woman’s ability to age. As she advances through the decades, she remains content but when she meets a charming stranger, she realizes that love might be worth giving up immortality. Starring Blake Lively and Michiel Huisman. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) Clouds of sils maria Juliette Binoche, Kristen Stewart, and Chloë Grace Moretz star in this drama about an aging actress who is forced to confront her own fears of aging and irrelevancy when a younger actress is asked to play the part that made the older woman famous. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) ex maCHina A computer coder and the CEO of the company he works for fight over the behavior and affection of the a female humanoid artificial intelligence in this thriller directed by Alex Garland. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) boy A young boy vows to bring his father n little home from World War II through whatever means necessary in this touching historical comedy directed by Alejandro Gómez Monteverde. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) monkey kingdom Tina Fey narrates this Disneynature documentary about a group of toque macaques that has to find a new home when a neighboring tribe takes over their space. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) Paul blart: mall CoP 2 The Segway-riding New Jersey security guard returns in this sequel, which finds him chasing down bad guys and stumbling through Las Vegas casinos. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) true story Michael Finkel, a journalist (Jonah Hill), follows the story of a murderer wanted by the FBI who uses Finkel’s name as an alias, in this thrilling drama also starring James Franco and Felicity Jones. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) unfriended A group of friends are terrorized by an anonymous person online in this thriller directed by Levan Gabriadze. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information) tHe water diViner Russell Crowe directs and n stars in this historical drama about a man who travels from Australia to Turkey in search of his missing sons in the aftermath of World War I. (See washingtoncitypaper.com for venue information)
Film clips are written by Caroline Jones.
CITY LIGHTS: THURSDAY
AVA LUNA Dreamy, restless, and dripping with cool, Brooklyn-based soul-pop act Ava Luna transformed itself from a grand seven-piece group to a fivepiece ensemble between its first two albums. Following that transition, the group’s ever-inventive tunes have evolved from experimental piano and acoustic guitar to gilded hi-fi vocals and accessible melodies. That’s not to say Ava Luna’s music was ever over-complicated— the roughness and complexities on its debut album, Lemming, made for a charming 2007 release, and the eccentric New Yorkers added a bit more rhythm on 2014’s Electric Balloon. Now, the group oozes confidence and sounds ready to find its new frontier on this month’s Infinite House. Drums boom on “Billz,” a percussion-heavy jam that incorporates mellow guitar with oldschool soul vocals from singer Carlos Hernandez. Expect the crowd at Comet Ping Pong to bounce the band’s endless energy right back to the stage. Ava Luna performs with Young Rapids and Wing Dam at 9 p.m. at Comet Ping Pong, 5037 Connecticut Ave. NW. —Jordan-Marie Smith $12. (202) 364-0404. cometpingpong.com.
52 april 24, 2015 washingtoncitypaper.com
ALTERNATE ENDINGS
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41 Like They Might Be Giants 43 Some lab burners 44 Digital camera type 45 “Is this thing on?”, e.g. 47 Farther Off from Heaven playwright 51 Words to go on? 52 Chicago P.D. actor 55 “I Will Never Let You Down” singer Rita 56 Ancient 57 Lewis Black’s alma mater 58 Anyone running for president, e.g. 60 Tease relentlessly 62 3.785 liters of the universal donor type? 65 Piano piece 66 Sausage 67 Broad sts. 68 Does some emailing 69 Whirlpool 70 Time off
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OF GOMORRAH AND THE GODFATHER...THRILLING.”
“SHADES
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ANIME NERE
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Or cut/paste to your internet browser: www.charityauctiono r g a n i z e r. c o m / a u c t i o n / H G S2015Auction Bidding is open now till May 4 at 10:00 p.m. Bid Early, Bid Often or Buy It Now! Start bids are as low as $5. Popular items include: Campbell & Ferrara Nursery, Walt Disney, SeaWorld, The Smithsonian Institute (SCBI), Flight Trampoline, Lasertag, Olde Towne Pet Resort, ZPizza, International Spy Museum, lots of theater tickets (“Shrek”, ballet, Wolftrap “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me”...), Reno’s Atlantis Casino Resort, DC Bike Tour, Bowl America, McCormick & Schmicks, PlayStation, Otterbox, Clyde Restaurant lots more...
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Imagine a world free of war, poverty and injustice, where sharing and cooperation have replaced greed and competition. What could bring about such a change? Join us for a free and inspiring talk on May 2, 2015 @ 2 pm All Souls Church Unitarian, 1500 Harvard Street NW. Mark your calendar now! The Hall of Fame and Distinguished Service award program will be held May 28th from 5:30 to 8 pm at Knight Hall, University of Maryland, College Park. The reception immediately prior to the program will feature our Reese Cleghorn interns.
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FIND A HELPING HIRE AN INTERN CHANGE A LIFE. HAND To sponsor an intern, contact Jetheda Warren, TODAY jwarren@theurbanalliance.org, 202-459-4308 http://www washingtoncitypaper.com/
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Urban Alliance empowers under-resourced youth to aspire, work, and succeed through paid internships, formal training, and mentoring. www.theurbanalliance.org
washingtoncitypaper.com April 24, 2015 55
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