NEWS SACKING AN IRVINGTON TEARDOWN. HEADOUT BEEZUS WALKS. MOVIES A GREAT NEW GREY GARDENS. P. 21
P. 39
WWEEK.COM
VOL 41/29 05.20.2015
BY BETH SLOVIC PAGE 13
P. 10
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
CourteSy brett SterN
FINDINGS
PAgE 44
WHAT WE LEARNED FROM READING THIS WEEK’S PAPER VOL. 41, ISSUE 29.
As of now, the zoo has no plans to make Packy wear a tutu. 6
Growing up, Ndamukong Suh just wanted to pet the rabbits. 10 Growing up, Steve Novick dreamed of being overlord of the robot universe. (Allegedly.) 13 Ladies love Todd Haynes’ butt. 20
ON THE COVER:
Slipknot once sued Burger King over an ad campaign. Burger King responded by suing the band for sucking. 23 If you want a martini made with pickle juice, there is a place. 32 If you want to read Timbers Army fan fiction, there is a comic. 37
OUR MOST TRAFFICKED STORY ONLINE THIS WEEK:
Portland City Commissioner Steve Novick.
oregon has the cheapest weed in America.
STAFF Editor-in-Chief Mark Zusman EdiToriAl Managing Editor for News Brent Walth Arts & Culture Editor Martin Cizmar Staff Writers Nigel Jaquiss, Aaron Mesh, Beth Slovic Copy Chief Rob Fernas Copy Editors Matt Buckingham, James Yu Stage & Screen Editor Enid Spitz Web & Projects Editor Matthew Korfhage Music Editor Matthew Singer Books Penelope Bass Dance Enid Spitz
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INBOX DIFFERENT VIEWS ON THE HOMELESS Create legal campsites with sanitary facilities—toilets, showers, sinks. There’s a cost to doing that, but the city has a “surplus,” doesn’t it? [“Decamped,” WW, May 13, 2015.] Establishing legal campsites is a far better solution than having people camped all over the city, being forced to urinate and defecate outdoors, with no way to take a shower. There is a simple solution here, but it requires leadership to implement it, and there is a huge vacuum of leadership in this town. —“Skepti-Cal”
STATE CAPITOL REMODEL
“The plan also includes…(1) a 4,700-square-foot cafe, (2) a 2,500-square-foot hangout space for lobbyists, and (3) a 3,000-square-foot ‘legislative lounge.’” [“Thunder Dome,” WW, May 13, 2015.] (1) Not needed; we already have plenty of restaurants and coffee shops in Salem. (2) Get rid of the lobbyists; we’d be better off without most of them. (3) The legislators are supposed to be working, not “lounging.” I can’t begin to fathom this brainchild of Sen. Peter Courtney’s, especially given the half-billion dollars that Gov. John Kitzhaber managed to flush down the sewers while he was in office. I think it’s past time for Courtney to retire. —“J E Nielsen”
EVERYONE’S A (MUSIC) CRITIC
It’s not like Divers are bad—they aren’t offensive, and like all of Portland, they are just merely mediocre [“Best New Band,” WW, May 13, 2015]. But to trumpet them as the best Portland’s got? And no, don’t compare them to the Replacements. They have no songs that would last. None. —“Alex V” LETTERS TO THE EDITOR must include the author’s street address and phone number for verification. Letters must be 250 or fewer words. Submit to: 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Fax: (503) 243-1115. Email: mzusman@wweek.com.
Portland has a large and beefy bike score on Walkscore.com. But I was stunned by our walk and transit scores. We’re below Seattle, and even Los Angeles! What gives? —Troy
But I can see that you don’t want to hear about our A+ in bikes or our A in transit, Troy—it’s all about that disappointing B in walkability. Luckily, drilling down into the neighborhood data provides a clue as to what went so terribly wrong. The Pearl District, for example, has a walk score of 96 out of 100. Hollywood comes in at 91. Buckman draws an 88. If Walkscore were assigning scores to Portlandia—the highly visible, overwhelmingly white portions of the city that get all the media attention—we’d have it nailed. Unfortunately, while central-city residents have been enjoying their light rail, streetcar, frequent bus service, ubiquitous bike lanes, and a goddamned aerial tramway, plenty of folks in poorer neighborhoods—East Portland, say—are still waiting for sidewalks. In fact, the walkability of many of our neighborhoods seems eerily proportional to their median income. Come to Portland, where as long as you can afford a car, you won’t need one!
I realize we’ve all gotten used to seeing Portland near the top of every “Most Awesome Cities” list, but sack up, people. So we didn’t win Best Looking, Class Clown, and Mostly Likely to Succeed all at once—I bet they feel real sorry for us in Fort Wayne, Ind. For the uninitiated, Walkscore.com is a site that uses rigorous-sounding algorithms to arrive at “walk,” “transit,” and “bike” scores for all addresses, then compiles them by municipality. Of America’s 55 largest cities, Portland ranks No. 3 for bikes, No. 10 for transit, and No. 14 for walkability. Given that Walkscore’s raison d’être is realestate ads, we might wish we’d done even worse. As far as I’m concerned, they can tell the world our streets are pools of toxic sludge from which tentacles emerge to ensnare the unwary traveler. Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
Pacific Partnership [Hotseat: Earl Blumenauer and Peter DeFazio, WW, May 13, 2015]. I’m disappointed that Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Earl Blumenauer are siding with corporate interests and private shareholders instead of middle-class Oregonians. —“Gabriel T. Erbs”
THE DEBATE OVER FREE TRADE
I’m really proud to be an Oregonian when Rep. Peter DeFazio and Sen. Jeff Merkley stand up for our jobs and our future by opposing the Trans-
4
The camping situation on Portland’s streets is completely absurd. I’m sure word has gotten out up and down the West Coast that if you’re tired of those pesky “rules” your local city has about where you can camp and dispose of garbage, grab the nearest bus to Portland, where you can camp out pretty much anywhere you want, and won’t get hassled by the cops. —“Dave J.”
QUESTIONS? Send them to dr.know@wweek.com
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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THE COURTS: State DOJ legal blunders—at $405 an hour. NEIGHBORHOODS: A teardown plan stomps on Irvington. COVER STORY: The trials—and appeals—of Steve Novick.
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GOVERNMENT TRANSPARENCY, AT $18,000 A POP. Elephant rights activists are getting under the not-so-thick hides of Oregon Zoo officials. Last summer, regional government Metro, which runs the zoo, quoted The Northwest Examiner an $18,000 bill for public records the community newspaper requested on the zoo’s elephant-breeding program (“Tusk, But Verify,” WW, Dec. 12, 2012). Examiner publisher and watchdog journalist Allan Classen says he’ll file a new request and pay the costs with money from elephant welfare activists and longtime zoo critics Barbara Spears and Jon Gramstad. “We hope to bring [the cost] down from the stratosphere,” Classen says. Meanwhile, activists at a May 14 hearing accused Metro of exploiting elephants to boost zoo attendance. “We couldn’t get any more people in if we had elephants dancing in tutus,” Metro Council President Tom Hughes shot back—and then added, “We don’t intend to do that, by the way.” As first reported at wweek.com, Portland Community College’s board voted unanimously May 18 to fire President Jeremy Brown, who took over PCC less than two years ago. For weeks, WW has been reporting on Brown’s pursuit of other jobs and behind-closed-door turmoil at PCC over his future. Brown, whose annual salary was about $200,000, will get a $300,000 settlement, plus $11,000 in attorney costs. Frank Goulard, president of PCC’s faculty union, called the vote “a chance for the college to move on and get past rumors.” A Multnomah County hearings officer April 23 upheld a finding that Phyllis and Ed Thiemann, owners of Brickhaven Bed and Breakfast in Corbett, violated the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area Act’s prohibitions against commercial activity when they hosted a July 2014 wedding on their property. Former county compliance officer Michael Kennedy claims he was later fired because he cited the Thiemanns, who are friends of County Commissioner Diane McKeel (“McKeel-Hauled,” WW, Jan. 21, 2015). McKeel has denied any involvement in Kennedy’s firing. Kennedy could not be reached for comment. The hearings officer did reduce the Thiemanns’ fine from $720 to $540. Nonprofits don’t have to disclose everything about their spending, but Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s recent financial disclosures reveal she pocketed $250,000 from the World Affairs Council of Oregon for an April 2014 speech at Keller Auditorium. That’s nearly one-fifth of the organization’s annual budget. Portland financial adviser Bill Parish brought the speaking fee to WW’s attention. World Affairs Council president Maria Wulff says ticket sales plus individual and corporate sponsorships more than covered Clinton’s fee. “Doing something this big was really a hard decision,” Wulff says. “But it was worthwhile.” There’s a lot more news at wweek.com.
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KRISTEN SOLECKI
NEWS
MAKING THE LAW PAY THE ATTORNEY GENERAL’S FAVORITE PORTLAND LAW FIRM IS CLEANING UP FINANCIALLY. IT’S ALSO RUN AFOUL OF A FEDERAL JUDGE. BY NIGEL JAQUISS
njaquiss@wweek.com
Nearly 3,000 Oregonians with disabilities have waited more than three years for their day in federal court on a potentially groundbreaking civil rights case. In a sweeping class action lawsuit, they accuse the state of Oregon of illegally denying them the chance to work outside of socalled “sheltered workshops” that pay them a fraction of minimum wage. The case has dragged on because of the many parties involved and the complexity
of the legal arguments. On May 13, however, U.S. Magistrate Judge Janice Stewart sanctioned Oregon’s attorneys in District Court for causing unnecessary delays. The sanctions by Stewart, first reported by The Oregonian last week, are unusual, even in complicated civil cases. The action could have consequences as Oregon attorneys prepare to defend the state at trial. But what hasn’t been reported is the role of the private law firm hired by the Oregon Department of Justice to handle the case, and its connections to Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum. The firm, Markowitz Herbold, earned Stewart’s courtroom smackdown after it failed to hand over to plaintiffs 770,000 pages of evidence that should have been disclosed long ago. Stewart issued the sanction after Markowitz’s lead attorney, John
Dunbar, acknowledged the failure to produce the massive cache of evidence. “It’s a black eye for the law firm to make this mistake,” says John Parry, who teaches civil court procedure at Lewis & Clark Law School. The Markowitz firm has billed the state $2.2 million so far on the case. The firm has won other big legal contracts from the Justice Department under Rosenblum. Among them: the state’s high-profile litigation against Oracle Corp. over the $300 million failure of the Cover Oregon health insurance exchange. Rosenblum, who is married to WW coowner and publisher Richard Meeker, has benefited politically from the Markowitz firm. The Oregonian’s Steve Duin reported in a column last August—and state records show—the Markowitz firm has contributed $15,000 to Rosenblum’s campaign coffers
since January 2012, more than any other Oregon law firm. Rosenblum referred political questions to her campaign consultant, Dan Kully. Kully says political contributions don’t influence Rosenblum, and she doesn’t get involved in deciding which law firms her agency hires. “Her deputies make those decisions,” he says. The Markowitz firm has worked on contract for the Oregon Department of Justice for more than a decade. The amount the firm has received from the state DOJ since Rosenblum took office in June 2012 has gone up. In 2013, for example, the state paid Markowitz $1.85 million, about twice the average of what it paid the firm under Rosenblum’s predecessor, John Kroger. Between Oracle and the disabilities case, CONT. on page 8 Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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NEWS
POLITICS
the state will likely pay Markowitz in excess of $4 million this year. “The firm has had a long and successful record of working with the Oregon Department of Justice,” DOJ spokeswoman Kristina Edmunson said in a statement to WW. “Each of the three previous attorneys general has trusted the firm with significant, complex cases.” Edmunson says she can’t comment on Rosenblum’s political activity. The Markowtiz firm didn’t respond to WW’s calls for comment. Paula Lane, a 51-year-old Aloha woman with intellectual and developmental disabilities, filed the federal class action against the state of Oregon in 2012. Right away, lawyers saw it could have national implications. In Oregon, as elsewhere, state agencies provide employment opportunities in settings where people with disabilities are segregated and where they often perform menial tasks for far less than minimum wage. The federal government pays to support that work. Lane, for instance, has worked in a Beaverton sheltered workshop earning about 50 cents an hour for packing boxes and folding bags. Lane and other plaintiffs allege the state of Oregon has illegally prevented them from working in integrated settings where they could earn more money and have a wider range of work experiences. The U.S. Department of Justice joined the suit, taking sides with Lane and the other plaintiffs against the state of Oregon. Bob Joondeph, executive director of Disability Rights Oregon, which represents some plaintiffs in the case, says it could potentially affect the rights of people with disabilities in all 50 states. Joondeph says the case is a test of the Americans With Disabilities Act, which has not been applied when people with disabilities are employed in federally subsidized
“IT’S COSTING THE STATE A TON OF MONEY, AND NOW IT’S GOING TO COST A TON MORE.” —JOHN PARRY, LEWIS & CLARK LAW SCHOOL sheltered workshops. “People with disabilities want to live lives that are meaningful,” Joondeph says. “For most of us, that means earning money and living a life that is productive. We’ve set up segregated institutions that suggest the lives of people with disabilities don’t have meaning.” The Oregon Department of Justice originally assigned one of its staff lawyers, John Dunbar, to take the lead on the case. In March 2014, Dunbar quit the state DOJ and went to work for Markowitz Herbold. The case, and its billings, went with him. As a senior DOJ lawyer, Dunbar earned about $134,000. At the rate he charges in private practice—$405 per hour— the Markowitz firm could bill the equivalent of his state salary in a little more than two months. Edmunson, the spokeswoman for Rosenblum and the Oregon DOJ, told WW it made sense for the case to stay with Dunbar when he left the state’s employment. “Mr. Dunbar stayed on this case after he left DOJ because everybody involved with the state’s litigation agreed that keeping his expertise and knowledge of the lawsuit, and the regulatory background, would be advantageous,” Edmunson told WW in an email. “This case is the first of its kind in Oregon, and given its magnitude and the unique aspects of this case, there are very large financial and structural implications for the state—both now and in the future.”
Court filings show that Dunbar essentially blamed his client for the screwup. According to court papers he filed, the problem occurred when the two sides agreed on a set of keywords the state would use to search its computers for documents related to the case. Dunbar said IT workers at the Oregon Departments of Human Services and Education—the agencies that administer the sheltered workshop program—failed to search for all the terms. That resulted in the omission of hundreds of thousands of documents. “The state mistakenly excluded certain search terms during its collections of documents after March 2014, but it has pinpointed and remedied the issue,” Dunbar wrote in a May 1, 2015, court filing. “The state has been forthright in acknowledging its mistake.” The plaintiffs and the U.S. Justice Department saw it differently. In court documents, they said the failure by the state and the Markowitz lawyers was “extraordinary” and “was not only immense in scope and prejudicial, but likely the result of inexcusable mistakes committed by defendants and/or their counsel.” Dunbar didn’t respond to WW’s requests for comment. The sanctions will only add more costs to taxpayers. Judge Stewart’s ruling will mean the defendants could pay out another $100,000 or so to repair the damage done by the firm’s failure to produce documents. The case is set for trial in December. In her ruling last week, Stewart stressed that, despite all the additional work the late document dump will entail, she wants to keep to that schedule. Parry, the Lewis & Clark professor, says the Markowitz firm’s failure to produce documents on time does a disservice to the plaintiffs and taxpayers. “You do expect when you pay for the best, you get the best work,” Parry says. “It’s costing the state a ton of money, and now it’s going to cost a ton more. It’s egg on their faces.”
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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NEWS
NEIGHBORHOODS
A HOUSE NAMED SUH THE PLANNED TEARDOWN OF A FOOTBALL STAR’S FAMILY HOME IN IRVINGTON RAISES DOUBTS ABOUT NEIGHBORHOOD PRESERVATION. BY AN TH O N Y M AC UK
amacuk@wweek.com
From the looks of it, the house at 2602 NE 13th Ave. is nothing special. It’s a two-story home, white with red trim and a brick arch over the front porch. The grass is scruffy, the shrubs rangy and the venetian blinds drawn tight. It’s also doomed. The 1,400-square-foot home, built in 1922, is scheduled to be torn down to make way for a new house nearly three times its size. Neighbors want to stop it. The proposed teardown in Irvington is just another skirmish in the widening fight against ripping out old homes and replacing them with new ones that neighbors consider monstrosities, out of scale and out of place with their surroundings. But this teardown is different for two big reasons. First, neighbors say they thought historic protections in Irvington would prevent any more demolitions there. Turns out they were wrong. Second, the house to be torn down is the family home of Ndamukong Suh, the all-pro defensive tackle for the Miami Dolphins who two months ago became the highest-paid defensive player in the history of the National Football League. The home appeared in a 2011 Chrysler television commercial featuring Suh. And it’s still owned by his mother, Bernadette. The designer of the new house planned for the lot says Bernadette Suh will move in when the project is finished. Peter Cole, who lives on Northeast 14th Avenue behind the Suh house, calls the new design “architecturally a bad neighbor. In sheer scale, it is essentially the biggest possible thing that you could fit on that piece of ground.”
Neighbors say the Suh house teardown will be a test case to see whether special historic protections for Irvington have any meaning. The celebrity nature of the teardown only adds to the public attention it’s received. “Remodels have maintained the character of the neighborhood,” says Frank McNamara, who also lives on Northeast 14th Avenue behind the Suh house. “I’m surprised they gave permission.” Irvington received a historic designation in 2010, which means any major changes to homes have to undergo review to ensure they fit the character of the neighborhood. “There haven’t been any demolitions since the district was approved,” says Dean Gisvold, chairman of the Irvington Community Association’s land-use committee. He says nobody has even tried. Then the plans for the Suh house entered the picture. The neighborhood’s historic status makes it all but impossible to tear down most of Irvington’s homes, but there’s a loophole. About 15 percent of Irvington’s houses are considered “non-contributing” to the neighborhood’s historic character. It’s not exactly clear why the Suh house falls under this exemption, but alterations made to a home’s exterior can mean it no longer adds to the neighborhood’s character. The Suh house was put on the non-contributing list by the neighborhood itself at the time the historic designation was granted. Gisvold and others in the neighborhood won’t necessarily mourn the demolition of the current house and say they probably can’t stop it. What they hope to do is block construction of another structure like the one neighboring the Suh house to the south, a $1.2 million 5,800-square-foot house that went up in 2007. McNamara, who lives directly behind the three-story house, says he had to redesign his backyard because of the shadow the new home cast. McNamara says the Suh family objected strenuously when the bigger house went
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up next door to them. “They were very upset with that building,” McNamara says. “They complained a lot. Bernadette, she was not happy.” Bernadette Suh didn’t respond to WW’s calls asking for an interview. The new house’s designer, Rich Eisenhauer, says the Suh family isn’t getting entangled in the debate. He hopes to alter the house’s design so it fits the neighborhood’s character and meets the city’s criteria. When asked if he thought he could come up with a design that would make all of the neighbors happy, Eisenhauer replied: “No. Never.” McNamara says Bernadette Suh moved out of her house a year ago. The Suh family lived there while Ndamukong was growing up. He eventually played football at Grant High School. Ndamukong Suh went on to an AllAmerican career at the University of Nebraska, where he led the team in tackles, won the Associated Press Player of the Year Award and was a finalist for the 2009 Heisman Trophy. The Detroit Lions picked him No. 2 overall in the 2010 NFL draft, and at 6-foot4 and 305 pounds, Suh became one of the leading defensive players in the league. In March, the Miami Dolphins signed him to a six-year, $114 million contract. Suh has also had his share of controversy. According to news reports, he’s been fined more than $420,000 by the NFL for
unsportsmanlike play, including stomping on one quarterback’s leg and kicking another in the groin. A 2013 Sporting News survey of NFL players named Suh the “dirtiest player in the league.” Neighbors say the connection to Suh has no relation to their concerns about what is happening to his mother’s house. McNamara, for example, has fond memories of Ndamukong, whom he says kept pet rabbits and asked permission to come into McNamara’s yard to look for them when they got loose. While the home’s designer isn’t optimistic about reaching a compromise, neighbors hope they can work something out with the Suhs. “I think the Suh family is trying to do the right thing,” Cole says. “The family had good intentions, but the development team has proposed a structure that is sideways with the rules.”
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
BY B ETH SLOVIC
STEVE NOVICK CHARMED VOTERS WITH HIS PRICKLY BRILLIANCE, GUMPTION AND WIT. THE BLOOM IS OFF.
bslovic@wweek.com
Back when Steve Novick was in grade school, teachers were still allowed to spank troublesome students. Novick was in fifth grade when his teacher asked his mother for permission to paddle the boy. “He just disrupts the class with too many questions,” the teacher said. His mother said no. Bill Trotter, a family friend who recalls the episode, says the young Novick was supremely confident in his own abilities. “Things would be a lot better if I were emperor of the universe,” Trotter remembers Novick, who was about 12 at the time, telling him. “We’d be much better off if people were robots and did what they were supposed to.” Today, Novick, 52 and a first-term Portland city commissioner, is no less confident. He’s also often frustrated when others don’t follow his lead. Novick remembers the teacher wanting to swat him. He also remembers having preadolescent thoughts about wanting to be emperor of the universe. As he often does, however, Novick quibbles with the fine print of the narrative: He denies ever saying people should be robots. “I refuse to believe that’s an accurate quote,” he says. But one denial isn’t enough. After an initial interview, Novick called WW again to insist that the 12-year-old him would have never, ever made the robot comment. “That makes me sound like a Bond villain,” he says. “I am not now nor have I ever been a Bond villain.” And then he again denied having ever wished other people could act like robots. It was a classic Steve Novick moment: He’s at once brilliant, vexing, grandiose, disarmingly witty, argumentative and pedantic—and insistent on having the last word. Always. CONT. on page 14
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NOVICK
CONT.
AFTER THE STREET-FEE FIASCO, POLLS SHOWED NOVICK’S UNFAVORABLE RATING WITH VOTERS HAD JUMPED TO 40 PERCENT.
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ovick’s progressive ideals, rabbitquick wit and willingness to speak his mind charmed a lot of voters when he came from nowhere to run a strong campaign for the U.S. Senate in 2008. He lost the Democratic primary but set himself up for his successful City Council run in 2012. A Harvard-educated lawyer, Novick brought a wealth of policy work, campaign experience and strong relationships in politics. He campaigned for the City Council, calling for affordable health care, better preparation for a big earthquake and smarter investments in public schools. He established an offbeat, winning brand: Steve Novick, the anti-politician, gutsy and nervy, looming large at 4-foot-9 and with a hook for a left hand. Today, however, the Novick brand is in trouble. In his first 2½ years in office, Novick has taken on some of the city’s most stubborn and vexing problems and scored some small victories, and he remains one of the few politicians to speak his mind, whatever the cost. (See sidebar, page 15.) He has also ignited voter anger, antagonized colleagues, lowered policy debates into personal attacks, brushed off simple political niceties and lectured citizens on why they need to pay more taxes. Novick’s manner might be all right if he were also effective. Despite a few small successes, he hasn’t been, and the style that defined him is wearing thin. No one at City Hall advocates that government plays a bigger role in our everyday lives more than Novick. Yet no one has done more in the past two years to generate antipathy toward city government—and seems more unaware of his impact. While Portlanders are still sore about his efforts to pass a street fee to pay for fixing roads, one of his bureaus is considering requiring parking permits for all Portland streets without meters. (State law would need to change first.) “He waded in and made big proposals,” says Jewel Lansing, a former city auditor and author of a book on Portland history. “He’s had a hard time showing what he can do.” Three months ago, according to political insiders, polls showed Novick’s unfavorable rating with voters had jumped to more than 40 percent—an almost unheard of degree of unpopularity for an incumbent city commissioner, and numbers that make him vulnerable as he seeks re-election in 2016. In an interview with WW WW, Novick acknowledged polls show his popularity is falling, largely because he and Mayor Charlie Hales bungled their plan for a street tax to finance road repairs and maintenance. His slide comes just as he is building a re-election campaign, and his long-time backers—primarily unions and progressive activists—wonder what’s happened to him. He fought the invasion of Uber, the ride-sharing app giant, likening the company’s name to the Nazis. Then he flipped and sided with Silicon Valley billionaires. “I have a lot of respect for his intellect and his accomplishments,” says Mark Sturbois, legislative chairman with Communication Workers of America Local 7901, which represents drivers for Union Cab. “I don’t understand how he can turn his back on working people, as he has on this Uber deal.” A year ago, Novick
told WW he could not think of anything he would have done differently in office, and saw no need to change. Since then, he’s been sipping humility to see if he can acquire a taste for it. Novick acknowledges he has a habit of needing to win every argument, making him difficult to work with. He says he made a New Year’s resolution to control his anger. At the same time, he doesn’t think his intemperate outbursts—often witnessed by those around him—have been the problem. “I stew about things too much,” he says. “It’s about controlling the anger in the world inside my brain.” Novick says the real issue for him is that he has taken on long-standing, even intractable problems, such as street repairs and budget inefficiencies. “I’ll just keep on doing my job,” he says. “Hopefully we will have enough accomplishments to keep me in the job.”
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n Novick’s second-floor City Hall office hangs a portrait of Robert F. Kennedy. Disheveled stacks of newspapers fill a window seat, and thick, open binders with policy papers cover his meeting table. A note from conservative radio host Lars Larson, calling Novick his “favorite pinko,” dangles from a bookshelf. In a back corner, a small dog bed awaits Novick’s two corgis, Pumpkin and Checkers (the latter named for Nixon’s cocker spaniel). From this perch, Novick spends his days mulling city problems: the lack of affordable housing, poor academic achievement among high-school students, and the threat posed by greenhouse gas emissions. Novick studies up for most issues as if preparing legal briefs. Staffers get emails sent at 2 am with links to newspaper articles or studies about whatever is on his mind. Colleagues respect his desire to tackle big issues. “He’s a very smart person,” says City Commissioner Nick Fish, “who is often most comfortable at 30,000 feet looking at policy issues.” The City Council may be the wrong fit for a political activist who, in the words of one city official, “clearly has enjoyed being a one-man band.” In Portland’s unusual form of government, commissioners run bureaus in addition to casting votes. And that’s also been difficult for Novick, who for years as a political activist and consultant talked about his ideas but rarely had to be responsible for making them work. “It went from him yelling at people,” says his chief of staff, Chris Warner, “to people yelling at him.” Novick acknowledges his limitations in the position. “Any kind of political job is a struggle between the things you want to work on and the things you have to work on this minute,” he says. “I knew that was going to be a struggle, no matter what. There’s always the crisis of the day.” Novick oversees the Bureau of Transportation as well as the Bureau of Emergency Management and the Bureau of Emergency Communications, the agency that runs 911. Those are nuts-and-bolts assignments for a man more accustomed to writing white papers and designing partisan electoral strategy. Novick, in effect, now has to make sure the streetcar runs on time. Carmen Merlo, director of the Bureau of Emergency Management, says Novick has never canceled one of their every-other-week meetings, no matter how immersed he was in other matters. “He cares deeply about the work that we do,” she says. “He’s always made time.” That was clear on a recent, gloriously sunny Sunday afternoon, when Novick came to Friendly House in Northwest Portland to talk with residents in the Willamette Heights neighborhood about earthquake
preparedness. The neighborhood is prone to landslides and has few options for getting emergency vehicles in or out. Novick was scheduled only to make opening remarks, but he stayed and listened for two hours. “He wanted to hear neighbors’ concerns,” Merlo says. (Novick’s wife, Rachel, whom he married last year, works as a staff assistant in Multnomah County’s Office of Emergency Management.) Novick’s playful sense of humor comes through in press releases. After Gov. Kate Brown took office in February, Novick blasted the news media with a message for Brown: “Get a corgi.” “Governor Jerry Brown of California owns a Pembroke Welsh corgi, Sutter, who has played a key role in his administration,” Novick wrote. “The lesson is clear: If you’re the governor of a Pacific Coast state, and your name is Brown, you’d be crazy not to get a corgi.” Earlier this month, Fish announced he’d hired Michael Jordan, a career Oregon bureaucrat and former director of the state Department of Administrative Services, to run the city’s Bureau of Environmental Services. Novick didn’t miss a beat. He sent a press release urging Fish to hire Scottie Pippen to run the Water Bureau. “The utilities should work together as a team, and with Jordan and Pippen you get a championship team,” Novick said. On May 6, the City Council held a perfunctory vote to issue permits for this year’s Rose Festival. Ten Rose Festival princesses, wearing identical gray suits and colorful blouses, arrived and stood before the council, each giving a brief speech about her interests. Hales smiled. So did City Commissioners Fish, Amanda Fritz and Dan Saltzman, all attentive and polite. On the far left, Novick stirred. He looked away. He yawned. When it came time to vote on the permits, Novick suddenly engaged and used a tough-guy tone with the festival’s CEO, Jeff Curtis. “I want you to take note these are revocable permits,” Novick said. “If the Rose Festival starts acting up and causing trouble, we can take them away.” He was joking. “It was just me being silly,” Novick says now. At the time, only a few people laughed.
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t’s the street fee, however, that has defined Novick. And it’s an ugly tale. Novick and Hales last year pushed to introduce a street fee to raise as much as $46 million a year for the Transportation Bureau. The battle Novick took on was enormous and difficult. Portland streets face a $1 billion backlog in repairs. Yet even a city willing to tax itself to put art teachers in schools has resisted paying more for roads. A previous transportation commissioner, Sam Adams, beat down doors across the city in 2007, explaining in exhaustive detail the benefits a transportation tax would bring. He didn’t succeed. Still, Adams’ failure left the door open for another try, in part because Adams had worked to build a base of support for the idea. Not Novick. In a series of town-hall meetings, Novick lectured as much as he listened. Len Bergstein, a longtime City Hall lobbyist, described Hales and Novick’s attitude this way: “We need money, and who cares if you’re not going to come along on this? We’re going to do it. Here’s your spinach. Eat it.” Hales and Novick made a political mistake that politicians with their experience shouldn’t have made: You need three votes on the five-member City Council to get anything passed. They launched into their campaign for a street fee without that third vote. Fish and Saltzman said they would support a plan that went to the voters. Fritz wanted a fee that didn’t unfairly hit low-income Portlanders. Adding either provision would have given Novick his majority. Instead, he and Hales proposed a flat $144 annual residential fee with no referral to voters. The move all but guaranteed they wouldn’t get the third vote. “They were a little too timid about not trusting voters,”
NOVICK K E N T O N WA LT Z ; W W S TA F F
CONT.
PITCH MAN: Novick was out front on the city’s failed effort, with Mayor Charlie Hales, to raise $46 million for road repairs. He’s led successful efforts to allow the ride-sharing app Uber to operate in Portland and to discourage abuse of disabled-parking permits in Portland. It’s not all been about the street-fee fiasco for City Commissioner Steve Novick. He’s had some modest success, and some other struggles, during his 29 months in office.
VISTA BRIDGE
People have been jumping to their deaths from the Vista Bridge ever since the West Hills span was built in 1926. The Northwest Examiner in 2011 drew attention to the need for the city to do something about it. Nothing happened. In 2013, four people jumped to their deaths off the Vista Bridge, and Novick took action. “It is time— past time—to do what we can to stop the dying,” he said at the time. The Portland Bureau of Transportation that Novick oversees built a 9-foot-tall suicide barrier— black fences with a curved overhang at a cost of $236,000. Some admirers of the historic bridge decried the aesthetics of the barrier. Novick stood firm. Months later, a suicidal man was able to get around the barrier, but emergency responders talked him down. Novick credits the barrier with giving them time to coax the man to safety.
911
Novick charged into office vowing to make health care services less expensive. That’s not something a city commissioner has lots of control over. However, Novick does oversee the city’s 911 system. “I have this little piece of the health care system,” he says. “It would be nice to make it more efficient.” How? “When we get a medical call, the priority is to send out fire and ambulance right away, and then the ambulance only gets paid if they send someone to the emergency room,” he says. “There’s sort of an incentive to go to the emergency room. In some jurisdictions, they have a nurse triage system when somebody calls 911.” Novick would like to replicate this. “You ask a couple of questions, and if someone’s not in immediate danger, you might say, ‘Do you mind if I pass you on to a nurse?’” So far, the idea remains just that—an idea.
DISABLED PARKING PERMITS
Motorists with disabled parking permits enjoyed limitless free parking on metered downtown streets when Novick took office.
And disabled parking permits were about as easy to get as medical marijuana cards, making it easy to abuse the system. The Oregonian reported on thousands of placards statewide issued to dead people but being used by non-disabled drivers in 1999. And in July 2013, the Portland Tribune highlighted the problem and suggested a simple fix: charge disabled motorists for the placards, eliminating cheaters and freeing up parking for drivers with true disabilities. Novick took note of the Tribune story. “I had no idea this was such a big issue that other cities were dealing with,” he says. “Then I went on a walk with our parking enforcement officers, and I was like, ‘Good Lord, this is amazing.’” City Hall officials had been looking at the problem for at least six years, and former Mayor Sam Adams had created a task force. No one could agree what to do. “I said, ‘We’re going to do something. Let’s figure out what we can do,’” Novick says. Five months later, in December 2013, the Portland City Council unanimously approved a resolution that required permit holders to pay for parking. The new rules also made accommodations for disabled drivers, including letting them exceed posted time limits in some cases. “This is something that had been languishing for six years,” Novick says, “and we were able to get council to approve a framework within six months.”
UBER
When the San Francisco ride-sharing giant crashed the gates of Portland, announcing Dec. 5, 2014, it would offer its services in Portland without city approval, Novick was incensed. As the commissioner overseeing the Bureau of Transportation, Novick had the taxi industry under his purview, and he hated the idea that a billion-dollar bully was pushing its way into the city illegally. Novick was on the Dec. 5 conference call Mayor Charlie Hales had with David Plouffe, Uber’s senior vice president of policy and strategy. Plouffe was stunned when Novick roared into the speaker phone, “If you come in and break the law, we’ll throw the fucking book at you.” (“Drive,” WW, Dec. 31, 2014.) Novick’s outrage helped prompt Uber to back off, but the company essentially got its way. Critics complained that allowing Uber to flood the market would hurt existing taxi drivers. Novick disputes that, saying the city’s approach to regulating cabs was arcane. “It doesn’t seem like the existing system is working for the little guy,” he says. BETH SLOVIC.
CONT. on page 16 Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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CONT.
Saltzman says. (Hales declined to be interviewed for this story.) Novick and Hales had failed to do other important groundwork. When businesses objected to their fee, Novick and Hales suggested imposing one on homeowners and adding businesses later—an idea that struck many as unfair. They quickly retreated. “It was premature to roll something out,” says Corky Collier, executive director of the Columbia Corridor Association and among 24 members of Portland’s street fee advisory committee. “It wasn’t cooked yet.” Novick himself was ill at ease with what he had signed on to. “For me to support something that’s regressive is kind of astonishing,” he told WW last July. “I object to this idea with 96 percent of the fibers of my being. But I object to letting the streets continue to deteriorate—and continue to have inequality in terms of pedestrian safety within the city— with 100 percent of my being.” It soon became clear Hales and Novick were improvising. Novick quickly switched to a plan that would base the street fee on income. He says he had a three-vote majority for that plan but lost it when small businesses complained. (Novick won’t say which commissioner pledged to support the plan, but it was Fritz. She declined to be interviewed for this story.) “The lesson is,” Novick says today, “we need to have people sign in blood.” The Portland Business Alliance, essentially the city’s chamber of commerce, also didn’t like an income tax and threatened to refer the street fee to the ballot. Hales and Novick gave up after that. The street-fee debate revealed Novick’s tendency toward personal attacks when he doesn’t get his way. When Saltzman appeared to question the need for road funding, Novick threatened to pull his endorsement in Saltzman’s 2014 re-election. Novick used some wit when he went after Fish, who complained that Novick’s street-fee plan lacked low-income discounts. Novick sent Fish a letter that starts “Dear Captain Renault.” It was a reference to the film Casablanca, in which the hypocritical, corrupt French officer Renault pockets his roulette winnings and then shuts down Humphrey Bogart’s bar because he is “shocked—shocked—to find that gambling is going on in here.” Novick’s point in labeling Fish as a corrupt and hypocritical Vichy official was to highlight that Fish’s own bureaus, water and environmental services, also lacked low-income discounts. “I was not going to let Nick get away with making arguments against the street fee that applied equally to his bureaus,” Novick says. Fish wonders about Novick’s willingness to make policy debates personal. “You don’t burn bridges,” Fish says. It was Novick’s response to the Portland Business Alliance that made people at City Hall wonder if he had lost his way. “The Portland Business Alliance and its allies,” Novick said on Dec. 17, 2014, “would rather burn the city to the ground” than adopt anything remotely resembling an income tax. Novick says the remark looked off the cuff but was a calculated quote aimed at getting attention. It did, further alienating business leaders. “When people are oppos16
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
ing me on something, I might use more colorful language,” Novick says. He now regrets the statement—after his mother took him to task for it. “Even if it’s true,” Novick recalls his mother telling him, “you don’t want to sound like you’re at war with people all the time.”
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ovick spent many years a lone champion of his best causes and as someone who became accustomed to standing out. He was born Steven Sobol— no middle name—in 1963 to Becky and Isaac Sobol, students at Antioch College, an Ohio liberal arts school whose motto is: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” Novick spent the first six weeks of his life in Newark, N.J., where his parents had gone for a college work-study program. He was born without a left hand or fibulas in his legs. He underwent surgery at age 3 to straighten one leg. When he was about 4, the Sobols divorced, and Novick rarely had contact with his father. Novick’s mother later married Bob Novick, founder of an underground newspaper in San Francisco. Bob Novick says his adopted son has always figured out how to deal with his physical limitations. “It’s given him a lot of will and determination,” he says. “He’s been a fighter in that way.” His mother, who now goes by Becky Harmon, taught Head Start and had Novick in her classroom. She recalls that period as the only time other children teased him about his physical differences. Novick, then 4, decided he had had enough of the other boys’ bullying. “He chased them all, brandishing his hook,” Harmon says. “They were laughing, but they were running.” She says Novick, who doesn’t remember the incident, later befriended the taunting boys, wrote a play for the class and gave them all parts. The family moved to Cottage Grove, Ore., when Steve Novick was 10. In 1976, the South Lane School District shut down after local voters rejected a tax levy. Novick— who’d been allowed to skip sixth grade— enrolled at the University of Oregon, using federal money available to him because of his disability. He was 14. He graduated four years later and earned a diploma from Harvard Law School when he was 21. Novick insists he was never made to feel different, despite his standing out, physically and intellectually. If kids made disparaging remarks, Novick says he didn’t hear them. “I don’t know that I was really all that different,” he says. “I was treated well.” As a lawyer in Washington, D.C., Novick spent nine years with the U.S. Department of Justice suing polluters. He returned to Oregon in 1997 and bounced between political jobs, working as a policy aide on statewide campaigns for Govs. John Kitzhaber and Ted Kulongoski. In 2007, he wrote a cover story for WW called “If I Ran,” in which he made the case against then-U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Ore.). He took himself up on the challenge, and lost a highly spirited race against Jeff Merkley, who went on to defeat Smith in the fall. His experience running in the 2008 U.S. Senate race showed Novick enjoyed the spotlight. He considered running for governor, state treasurer and Multnomah County
chair. He took up causes—the financial cut bars get from lottery games that he considers excessive was a favorite target—and became a go-to source for reporters who needed an informed, witty quote. But a political mentor, then-City Commissioner Randy Leonard, effectively handed Novick his council seat in 2012. Leonard says City Hall isn’t the easiest place for a first-time politician to learn to be effective. Newbie city commissioners face much more public scrutiny than rookie state legislators, for example, and city commissioners work with only four other elected officials, not dozens. “It is just so critical to go out of your way to work well with people,” Leonard says. It’s unusual for Portland City Council members to lose re-election. It’s happened only four times since 1984, and not at all since 1992, when a homebuilders lobbyist named Charlie Hales knocked out incumbent Commissioner Dick Bogle. No big-name opponents have surfaced yet to run against Novick in 2016. Nick Caleb, a Concordia University instructor, challenged Saltzman last year when he campaigned on the $15-an-hour minimum wage and won about 20 percent of the vote. Charles McGee, co-founder of the Black Parent Initiative, is also considering a bid. It’s not yet clear if the unions that backed Novick in 2012 will do so again or go looking for another candidate. Novick has repeatedly called into question the amount of money spent on the Portland Police Bureau, sometimes lumping
in the city’s fire department with the police budget. He once mulled the possibility of closing some fire stations at night when they get fewer calls. That irks Alan Ferschweiler, president of the Portland firefighters’ union, which endorsed Novick in his first City Council race. “You don’t have to attack the other departments in the city to get where you want to go,” Ferschweiler says. “There was a hope we would have more of a champion.” Novick says the fire station idea came during a time of necessary budget cuts, adding it wasn’t something he wanted to do. “If you have to cut something, you should look at the data to see where it’s the least irresponsible to cut,” he says. Novick says he knows there are people he worked with as an advocate whom he has let down. “It’s hard to have to disappoint my natural allies and say, ‘I actually agree with you, but I have to explore other options because I’m not sure that’s going to work,’” Novick says. “It’s also hard when your natural allies disappoint you.” But Novick says he will not change one thing: His determination to talk about and try to resolve some of the city’s more stubborn issues—fixing streets, making Portlanders safer from natural disaster, fighting inequality brought on by increased development and other forces. “If that costs me re-election,” Novick says, “then getting people to think about these issues will be my legacy.”
“YOU DON’T WANT TO SOUND LIKE YOU’RE AT WAR WITH PEOPLE ALL THE TIME,” NOVICK RECALLS HIS MOTHER TELLING HIM. TOM OLIVER
NOVICK
BOAT ROCKER: “I’m the guy who refuses to kick the can down the road,” Novick says. “Instead, I put my foot on the can and say, ‘We have to deal with this can.’”
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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Keeping Kids Healthy, Naturally NCNM Clinic Open House • Saturday, May 30, 2015 FREE PRESENTATIONS • Free plush mini-microbes for the first 25 children • Make your own granola • Medical equipment 101: use a real stethoscope • Weather permitting: herbal scavenger hunt, labyrinth walk, qigong
1:30 p.m. Focus Tables: Nutrition, Fitness, and More 2:00 p.m. What to Have on Hand for Common Childhood Complaints 3:00 p.m. Focus Tables: Dental Health and More 3:30 p.m. Children’s Health: Gentle Options in Chinese Medicine 4:15 p.m. Children’s Health Panel (“Ask the Doctor”)
SPECIAL KID’S WELLNESS EXAM VOUCHER! * Entitles children ages 0–12 to a free wellness exam/check-up (valued at $65). *For exams scheduled 6/1/15 – 8/31/15 The NCNM Clinic is located at the west end of the Ross Island Bridge. For directions, visit ncnm-clinic.com and click on “Directions.” 3025 SW Corbett Avenue, Portland, OR 97201 • 503.552.1551 18
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
STREET
LOOKS WE LIKE SNAPSHOTS FROM THE PARK BLOCKS. PHOTOS BY KATIE DEN N IS
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Shandong
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FOOD: The first annual Haute-N-Ready Awards. MUSIC: Five Sasquatch survival tools. THEATER: The Simpsons after the apocalypse. BOOKS: Portland Timbers gumshoe noir.
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CANNED: Two of Portland’s most iconic film directors, Gus Van Sant and Todd Haynes, premiered new films last week at the Cannes Film Festival, with highly varied results. The screening of Van Sant’s The Sea of Trees was booed, while Haynes got celebratory ass grabs from Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara after the screening of Carol. The Sea of Trees, in which a suicidal Matthew VAN SANT McConaughey wanders Japan’s mysterious forest with Ken Watanabe, was largely panned. Variety critics Justin Chang and Scott Foundas called it a “profound cultural insult” and “one for nobody,” respectively. Haynes’ Carol, a 1950s lesbian romance based on a Patricia Highsmith novel, received praise across the board, and is a favorite for the festival’s Palme d’Or top prize. “REINVENTING FAST FOOD”: Bend’s Next Level Burger will open an all-plant-based, non-GMO, sustainable burger and hot-dog joint at the former Pita Pit at Southeast 41st Avenue and Hawthorne Boulevard. It’s the second location of a planned fast-food empire—Next Level is already shopping locations on Portland’s westside for another location, and plans to use the city as a springboard for a nationwide expansion. “My goal is to reinvent fast food here in America,” says co-owner Matt de Gruyter. “I’m looking to grow over the next 10 to 20 years as quickly as we can, without sacrificing the values that I started out with.” >> Meanwhile, Burgerville’s Hawthorne Boulevard location has applied for a license to serve beer with its Tillamook cheeseburgers and fried asparagus. RADIO HEADS: Portland’s low-wattage radio revolution didn’t end when XRAY.FM got a strong enough signal to reach downtown, or when KISN returned oldies to the local dial a few weeks ago. A volunteer group is attempting to get a format-free station on the air by 2016. Freeform Portland (KFFP) is modeled after WFMU, New Jersey’s famously independent free-form station, according to board president Jessica Ponaman. And unlike XRAY, Freeform Portland is planned as an all-music station. And as opposed to that station’s “curated” format, the DJs will “not be limited at all” in what they can play (within the parameters of the Federal Communications Commission). There is an Indiegogo fundraising campaign through May, and the station will begin transmitting a test signal in the summer. BURNING ’SPEARE: Northwest Classical Theatre Company is dissolving after 17 years in Portland. Artistic director Grant Turner is moving to La Grande and taking the company name with him to start a Shakespearean company there under the same moniker. Turner and the Portland NWCTC actors will reunite to stage one show a year in Portland, according to company manager Clara Hillier. After its final play, Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), which opens May 22, the company will leave its space at Southeast’s 38-seat Shoebox Theater.
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
HEADOUT
GO: Ramona Quimby is at the Newmark Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway, 228-9571. 2 pm and 5 pm Saturdays, 2 pm Sundays through May 31. $26-$30. I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y M AT T P H E L A N WILLAMETTE WEEK
WHAT TO DO THIS WEEK IN ARTS & CULTURE
Beezus devotes herself to baton lessons every Saturday. She has lofty dreams of twirling in Portland’s yearly paragon of juvenile marchingband artistry. Northeast Sandy Boulevard and 52nd Avenue, rosefestival.org.
Creative writing class is the bane of Beezus’ existence. But there’s a whiff of Whitman in her attempt: “See the bird in the tree. He is singing to me.” 1915 NE 33rd Ave., 916-6480, beverlyclearyschool.org.
RAMONA IS A PAIN IN THE ASS. WE ASK, WHAT DID BEEZUS DO? Ramona Quimby is the Portland child-lit equivalent of a Kardashian. She operates in a self-centered bubble and then gets guide-book chapters written about her.Heck, Portland built a life-sized bronze statue in her likeness and Oregon Children’s Theater is revisiting Beverly Cleary’s books onstage. But Ramona’s older teen sister, Beezus, is the real badass, with brains, a heart of gold and a willingness to share gummy bears. Where is Beezus’ statue? In honor of the series’ true hero, we give you this tour of the Quimby legacy, in the name of Beezus. ENID SPITZ.
Beezus plays the Blessed Virgin Mary for the Christmas Nativity play. Jealous of her sister, Ramona ruins the rest of a fine Christmas evening by bitching about her sheep costume. 1624 NE Hancock St., 287-1289, westprespdx.org.
Both sleuthy and selfless, Beezus spends her time at home eavesdropping through the ventilation pipes and feeding the family cat, Picky-Picky. Beezus theoretically lived on Klickitat Street, but the real house is Cleary’s old place on Hancock. 3340 NE Hancock St.
Beezus lives for crispy-outside, mealy-inside fries at Whopperburger, likely based on the gloriously greasy Hollywood, which opened in 1954. 4211 NE Sandy Blvd., 288-6422, hollywoodburgerbar.com.
Portland always stole bikes. Beezus and hunky Henry Huggins went to a police auction featuring enough lost or stolen bikes “to equip half a company of soldiers.” 4735 E Burnside St., 221-0415, portlandoregon. gov/police/30559.
When Mr. Quimby loses his job at the storage company, Beezus takes umbrage with her father’s cigarette habit, launching an adamant anti-smoking campaign. 1130 NE 28th Ave., 284-8111, ustorenw.com.
I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y N I C K PAT TO N
Somewhere in this vicinity, Beezus and her little red wagon helped dreamy Henry Huggins haul 49 boxes of gum, dumped in a vacant lot by a vendingmachine magnate who went bust. 3030 NE Weidler St., 280-1300, fredmeyer.com.
WILLAMETTE WEEK
WEDNESDAY MAY 20
THURSDAY MAY 21
FRIDAY MAY 22
SATURDAY MAY 23
THE HOLYDRUG COUPLE [ELECTRO-PSYCH POP] If this Chilean duo’s early material was a volcanic eruption of bluesy psychedelia, 2015’s Moonlust is the billowing aftermath. The dreamy sophomore LP plumes and swells with synth and bass grooves and verbed-out tenor vocals, hitching the Gulf Stream to France and lifting inspiration from Serge Gainsbourg and Air. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $9. 21+.
COSMOSIS [DANCE] This is classic BodyVox dance, where classic means offcenter contemporary choreography, mashed with film and set to an Elliott Smith-inspired soundtrack from the Amphion String Quartet. It’s like traditional chamber music grew legs and hip-hopped into the 21st century. BodyVox Dance Center, 1201 NW 17th Ave., 2290627. 7:30 pm. $25-$64.
EX HEX, DIARRHEA PLANET [GARAGE SHREDDERS] What better counterbalance to the quadguitar, dudes-night-out sausage fest of Diarrhea Planet than the flawless, Mary Timony-fronted garage pop of Ex Hex? Whoever dreamed up this pairing deserves a medal. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $15 tickets available online day of show. 21+.
VINLANDIA [WINE] This is Portland urban wineries’ debutante ball, with 24 spring releases from the 10 Southeast Wine Collective wineries. Tickets at vinlandia.eventbrite.com. Southeast Wine Collective, 2425 SE 35th Place, 208-2061. 3-6 pm. $20.
SUNDAY MAY 24 SLOW POKE RIDE [BIKE RIDE] Roll easy through National Bike Month with a flat 25-miler topping at 10 mph between plentiful pit stops, like Madrona Hill
Cafe. TriMet Park & Ride, Northeast 96th Avenue and Sandy Boulevard, pwtc.com. 10 am. Free.
TUESDAY MAY 26 HOT CHIP [DANCE POP] It’s been seven years since the British electro-jammers’ breakthrough Made in the Dark, the album that introduced its infectious blend of disco, synth pop and house. Hot Chip has nonetheless accrued a steady discography of clever, feelgood electronica since, including its latest offering, the spacey Why Make Sense? Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., 971-230-0033. 8 pm. $28. All ages.
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FOOD & DRINK
Monday–Saturday 4–6pm & 8pm–close
= WW Pick.
EAT MOBILE W W S TA F F
Happy Hour
Highly recommended. By MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Editor: MARTIN CIZMAR. Email: dish@ wweek.com. See page 3 for submission instructions.
FRIDAY, MAY 22
WE SELL DRINKS
Brunch Saturday & Sunday
La Calaca Comelona
OPEN TILL 2:30AM DAILY
2304 SE Belmont | 503-239-9675 4-10pm Mon–Sat
libertyglassbar.com
Marta NYC Pizza Party
Joe Tarasco, of New York’s Romanstyle cracker-thin spot—Marta NYC—will roll into Portland to serve up his pizzas out of the Roman Candle kitchen, not to mention veggies, Roman-inspired street food and gelato. No reservations, no lists. Roman Candle, 3377 SE Division St., 971-302-6605. 5-11 pm.
SATURDAY, MAY 23 Escargot Day at Cocotte
There’s a day for everything, even snails. But observe this one heartily: Cocotte has made the finest escargot we’ve had in Portland, and during the entire weekend of National Escargot Day, Kat LeSueur will be making a snail flight: escargot pate, escargot in hazelnut tomato romescu and Cocotte’s very fine escargot in herb pistou. All for a cool $10. Through Sunday. Cocotte, 2930 NE Killingsworth St., 227-2669. 5 pm.
Vinlandia
!
Where to eat this week. 1. Holdfast Dining
537 SE Ash St., Ste. 102, holdfastdining.com. Sure, you’ve got to book it in advance like a Ticketmaster show. But the $95 Holdfast pop-up prix fixe dinners at Fausse Piste winery are worth it, with a revelation on every plate—from marshmallowy halibut to broth made with jamón ibérico bones. $$$$.
an
2. The Portland Mercado
7238 SE Foster Road, portlandmercado.com. Eight Latin food carts from Argentine to Colombian to Salvadoran to multiple versions of Mexican, plus a bar to eat them in. Heaven. $.
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Southeast Wine Collective will be throwing an open house for all its vintners’ spring releases, with new vintages from Jackalope, Division, Fullerton, Helioterra, James Rahn, Jasper Sisco, Ore, Vincent, Willful and 5Q. Admission includes Korean food, including braised beef and pork belly. Tickets at vinlandia. eventbrite.com. Southeast Wine Collective, 2425 SE 35th Place, 208-2061. 3-6 pm. $20.
3. Wicked Wiches
Southeast 28th Place and Division Street (Tidbit pod), 706-6344, pyropizzacart.com. Portland’s best food-cart pizza makers have branched out into sandwiches. Get the ABC bacon and avocado melt, with Nueske’s bacon thick as cardboard. $.
4. Noraneko
1430 SE Water Ave., 238-6356, noranekoramen.com. You want the mushroom ramen with two-way chasyu and egg at Biwa’s new ramen-ya spinoff on an industrial corner by the train tracks. $.
2225 NE Broadway Open Daily 11-9,closed Mondays Our trikes still roam the streets! Book us for your next event, party, lunch, wedding or any other catering needs www.tacopedalerpdx.com Email tacopedaler@gmail.com or follow us
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5. Ya Hala
8005 SE Stark St., 256-4484, yahalarestaurant.com. At Ya Hala’s new Lebanese weekend brunch, you can get both lamb bacon and sausage, not to mention a beautiful vegan houmous balila— but still, the most consistent offerings are baked goods and drinks, including a yogurt vodka blend. $$.
BOK BOK: Chicken biryani and curry roti, with sides.
THE 9 I’d almost given up hope. After years of bone-dry biryanis, curries like oil-slicked dirt and bricked heat-lamp naan that could chip paint off a car, I had all but resigned myself to long drives to Hillsboro to get decent curry. Well, thank God that’s over. In maybe the saddest food-cart pod in Portland—a seemingly uncurated compost bin of doubled Thai carts and day-drunks using Wi-Fi—“The 9” food cart serves my favorite chicken biryani in Portland, the richest and most balanced curry, the most sumptuous fried roti bread. The 9 is a blend of the world’s great curry cultures, a fiery mix of Thai, Burmese and Indian influences offering up recipes from the two owners’ families. The chicken biryani ($8.50) is in short supply—they make only so much—but it is heaven in a cardboard box, topped with fried scallions, moist within and pungently spiced, served with honeyed chicken-stock Thai-Burmese soup. I was so excited after my first bite of chicken that I literally jumped in place on the sidewalk and scared an old lady. And yet, the roti ($7) is even better—a cloud of gluten and Order this: Roti ($7) or biryani ($8.50). fat that is unendingly delicious whether tofu or chicken, served with curry that delicately balances heat, oil and sweetness. It requires no embellishment, but nonetheless you get a plasticcupped side dish of sweet-acidic cucumber salad that’s kind of like a pickleback to hot, buttery bourbon. The dish is a tumult, a perfect blend of coconut-milky Thai and densely layered Indian spice that is like a birthday party for your mouth. The pair that runs this cart just moved here from San Francisco last month. Eat their food, and make them stay. Amid hell and exhaust, between the Shell and the Taco Del Mar, the 9 is a goddamn 10. MATTHEW KORFHAGE. SEE IT. The 9, 510 SE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 415-335-8475. 10:30 am-7:30 pm Monday-Friday, noon-5 pm Saturday.
DRANK
SNAKEBITE (GIGANTIC/CIDER RIOT) Mixing cider and beer makes you crazy, the legend goes. Maybe this came from London goths downing blood-red cider-beer drinks mixed with blackcurrant, maybe from working stiffs tempering the beer’s bite to go down smooth on the seventh pint. But Bill Clinton was refused a snakebite—cider and lager—in 2001 in Harrogate, England, on the grounds it was illegal to serve. (It’s not.) “Too rowdy,” the British will tell you. Well, now Portland’s Gigantic Brewing and Cider Riot are making a kolsch mixed with cider and a dash of black as the spirit of punk rock in a bottle. It’s a confounding concoction at first. The kolsch is smooth, the cider sweet, the blackcurrant bitterer than hops. It’s a drink with flavor components that come from funny places, a sweet beer built like a Lego house. It’s odd, but addictive. And 15 minutes later, you notice that, oh hell, your pint is gone at the Belmont Inn and you’re somehow on your second, and you now have strong feelings about Dwight Howard. And they’re not good. No, not good at all. MATTHEW KORFHAGE.
FOOD & DRINK The
ual First Ann
Best New Food Item
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Best Fast k Food Drin
Best Handheld Breakfast
Wendy’s Bacon and Blue Burger Blue cheese, bacon and arugula atop a burger in a brioche bun—it was the paragon of faux artisanal (“fartisanal,” if you will) movement. It also happened to be delicious. Unexpectedly so. Wendy’s has been a fickle chain of late, briefly embracing pulled pork and currently in the throes of ghost pepper tremens. But it struck gold with the Bacon and Blue Burger. Where so many attempts by fast-food chains to re-create a good pub burger taste like pale shadows of their inspiration, sassy Wendy’s pulled it off. Congratulations, Wendy’s International Inc.
Taco Bell California A.M. Crunchwrap Breakfast is an intentionally simple meal, at least as presented by fast-food chains. There are eggs. There are fried potatoes. There’s bacon or sausage. With the California A.M. Crunchwrap, Taco Bell added ambition to the formula—also, guacamole. The guacamole and pico de gallo add a slight hint of flavor from south of the border. The Crunchwrap’s shape also prevented the leaky backside that plagues so many burritos.
thiest Steal ic Calore Intak
Best Co-Option of Weird Twitter to Sell a Product
Little Caesars $12 Bacon Hot-N-Ready Chipotle Margaritaaah This is an admittedly small field. Sonic has gone all-in with beverages, Taco Bell features exclusive MTN DEW flavors, and A&W has inexplicably decided to make a float with MTN DEW in lieu of the house root beer. Instead, I opted for the drink that helps you forget where you are. Chipotle has a truly obnoxious ambience, but the margaritas make it somewhat bearable. Also, more fast-food and fastcasual chains should have liquor licenses.
Dating back to my college days, I’ve long been a Hot-N-Ready man. Adding bacon to the time-tested Deep! Deep! Dish Pizza seemed like a no-brainer. But at $12—more than twice the cost of the original Hot-N-Ready—the Bacon Deep! Deep! Dish, Hot-N-Ready only after 4 pm, marked a strong betrayal of everything Detroit-style that pizza stands for.
Best Chicken Nugget
Wendy’s There’s a special kind of cojones required for a chain that constantly has to fend off rumors that its meat is liquid-based to change its slogan to “We have the meats.” We at Haute-N-Ready salute that chutzpah.
You wouldn’t guess staring at the modestly sized and priced Bacon & Swiss Buttery Jack that it contained nearly 1,000 calories. But I guess the bacon and butter really add up.
Most On-Brand Menu Addition
Panera Bread’s Lentil Quinoa Broth Bowl with Cage-Free Egg
Ballsiest Rebranding Effort
Arby’s Meatcraft
Jack in the Box Buttery Jack Burger
Rather than bore you with the many charts, scientific research and other work I’ve done tasting chicken nuggets this year, I’ll just ask you to trust me on this one.
As an unabashed suburbanite with little regard for his health and well-being, I am the ideal target for most fast-food chains. Panera Bread, on the other hand, is aimed at someone else. From the Bublé on the speakers to the 99-cent confections, Panera is one of the most on-brand chains in the nation. Its new Lentil Quinoa Broth Bowl with Cage-Free Egg (with kale and sofritos) is less a well-constructed meal than a series of words designed to lure eco-conscious yuppies.
BK Chicken Fries Burger King set the bar for weird advertising very high when its Chicken Fries were first introduced by creating a chickenheaded hard-rock band named Coq Roq. (Slipknot sued Burger King for the campaign. BK’s countersuit included the charge that Slipknot was itself a parody of heavy-metal bands.) But through the hypnotic graphics, Bolshevik revolutionary images and bizarre chicken-potato dating commercials, Chicken Fries were reintroduced with the same spirit and vigor.
Most Inexplicable Use of Ranch Dressing or Mayonnaise
McDonald’s Pico-Guacamole Burger Seriously, what the hell?
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MUSIC
MAY 20–26 PROFILE
= WW Pick. Highly recommended.
TIM ROTH
Prices listed are sometimes for advance ticket sales. At-the-door increases and socalled convenience charges may apply. Event lineups are subject to change after WW’s press deadlines. Editor: MATTHEW SINGER. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, go to wweek.com/ submitevents and follow submission directions. All shows should be submitted two weeks or more in advance of event. Press kits, CDs and especially vinyl can be sent to Music Desk, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Please include show or release date information with all physical mailings. Email: msinger@wweek.com. Fax: 243-1115.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 20 Grant-Lee Phillips, Steve Poltz
[SINGER-SONGWRITER] Grant-Lee Phillips was the proud owner of one of pop music’s most versatile singing and songwriting voices in the mid-’90s, just as pop music discovered that neither singing nor songwriting had much to do with album sales. Hearing Phillips’ old band, Grant Lee Buffalo, today, it’s a wonder anyone ever thought this was the sort of thing fit for radio airplay. The group played introspective, sepia-toned folk pop with a bit of a glam streak. His latest, Walking in the Green Corn, is a majestic, strippeddown little release that’s gone criminally underheard. Tonight, Phillips is on hiatus from a recording session at Dan Auerbach’s Easy Eye Studio in Nashville, so it could get loud or it could get quiet—best to just trust the man. CASEY JARMAN. Alberta Rose Theatre, 3000 NE Alberta St., 7196055. 8 pm. $18. Under 21 permitted with legal guardian.
The Holydrug Couple, the Hugs, Bestie
[ELECTRO-PSYCH POP] If this Chilean duo’s 2011 material was a volcanic eruption of bluesy psychedelia, 2015’s Moonlust is the billowing aftermath. Its dreamy sophomore LP, released via Sacred Bones, plumes and swells with synth and bass grooves and Ives Sepúlveda’s verbed-out tenor vocals. Manuel Parra’s drums are the band’s last tether to traditional psychedelic rock, while the rest of the record hitches the Gulf Stream to France, lifting inspiration from Serge Gainsbourg and Air. TED JAMISON. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $9-$30. 21+.
Ex-Cult, Private Room, Dark/Light
[MEMPHIS MASSIVE] Like the best punk and garage rock, Memphis’ Ex-Cult seems full of self-hate and uncaring. Since 2012, the band has been spewing Goner Records’ sanctioned screeds of death and confusion. For its latest, the Cigarette Machine
THE HEART IN DARKNESS
TOP FIVE CRUCIAL BUYS FOR SASQUATCH 1. Flannel The biggest rookie mistake is not packing the appropriate layers. Grab a Pendleton or Woolrich buffalo plaid for high fashion in the high desert of the Gorge, which gets quite chilly at night. Available at: Portland Outdoor Store. 2. Collapsible water pouch with carabiner clip Sussing out the scrutiny level of security at the entryway can be a nerve-wracking experience. Fill one of these cheapo water bottles with the bottom-shelf intoxicant of your choice and hook the carabiner to the interior of your pants zipper. That way, you won’t have to plunk down $12 for Bud Light Lime-a-Ritas all day long. Available at: Next Adventure. 3. Earplugs Unless you shelled out for a Gold camping package, the likelihood that you’re stationed within earshot of a group of frat dudes is high. Join them for a game of beer pong as a peace offering before asking them to turn it down, or face the wrath of their Beats Antique playlist until the crack of dawn. Available at: Fred Meyer, CVS, etc. 4. Edibles from New Vansterdam Take a quick detour up I-5 to the other Vancouver—our Vancouver—for some tasty treats that will keep you primed on the happenings at the Uranus tent without having to light up every hour. Available at: newvansterdam.com. 5. A cheap serape More stylish than your ratty Budweiser beach towel, it’ll get your butt dry while the sun sets over the Sasquatch stage. The Pendleton outlet near Acropolis has some authentic, highly discounted remnants that will keep you and that cute girl with the Indiana Jones hat you met during Milo Greene’s set warm until the plug is pulled for the night. Available at: Pendleton Woolen Mills Outlet. PETE COTTELL. SEE IT: Sasquatch Music Festival is at the Gorge Amphitheater, 754 Silica Road NW, Quincy, Wash., on Friday-Monday, May 22-25. See sasquatchfestival.com for complete schedule.
W W S TA F F
CONT. on page 26
BEFORE SHE COULD LOVE AGAIN, CORRINA REPP HAD TO SUFFER. SHE’S USED TO IT, THOUGH. BY MATTHEW SIN GER
msinger@wweek.com
When Corrina Repp finishes a project, she is truly finished with it. Nine years ago, after completing her last solo record, she and her boyfriend, 31Knots’ Joe Haege, formed the noir-pop group Tu Fawning, mostly to detach from the drain of making music on her own. Seven years later, when the band ran its course, along with her relationship, she moved into a tiny apartment, and didn’t sing a note or touch an instrument for 14 months. “I’ve had a very conflicted relationship with music for a very long time,” says Repp over tea at Miss Zumstein Bakery near her home in Northeast Portland. “I put all my fucking heart into it, and when I’m done, I’m like, ‘I’m tired. I need to rebuild my life and recharge.’” Something always lures her back, though. With The Pattern of Electricity, her first album in almost a decade, it was the need to pull herself out of the abyss. She describes the period after the end of Tu Fawning as the “darkest” of her life. She hadn’t only lost a band but a great love, and wasn’t sure if she’d experience either ever again. Repp didn’t go back to writing songs just to feed her muse. It was all she could do to figure out how to move forward. To see her now, in this quaint little bakery, laughing at the yippy Ewok of a dog tied up out front, Repp seems to be living in the light again. Getting there wasn’t easy. But then, it’s not like any of her previous albums were a stroll through the tulips. On record, Repp has often seemed to be crawling out from under some form of emotional wreckage. Though defined by their pervasive quiet, the hush of her older recordings is hardly comforting: A highly laudatory Pitchfork review of 2006’s The Absent and the Distant begins with the author declaring he doesn’t get paid enough to bear listening to the album ever again. “It’s funny, because I’m a pretty happy, positive person,” she says. “But when I’m feeling dark, I feel it.”
But at age 41, Repp’s way of processing those dark feelings has evolved. For one thing, she sings them much louder. During her time in Tu Fawning, she learned to open her voice and emote in a way that used to embarrass her. When she committed to doing another solo record, she couldn’t go back to fragile whispering, so she wrote in places where the volume wouldn’t be encumbered: an isolated cabin, a mansion she was housesitting. The instrumentation on The Pattern of Electricity is still ghostly—barely-there guitars and strings and organs washed with electronic textures—but more than before, Repp sounds like she’s confronting anguish rather than letting it consume her. And that’s the other thing that’s different about this album: For once, the light at the end of the tunnel is brighter than the shadows surrounding it. There are as many references to release and rebirth as death and pain; in the end, Repp embraces despair as a means of renewal. “A lot of this record is also just about believing in love again,” she says. “I was navigating hope and love and death and magic and light, and everything I feel like I want to have in my life that I felt like I had lost.”
“I’M A PRETTY HAPPY, POSITIVE PERSON. BUT WHEN I’M FEELING DARK, I FEEL IT.” Coming out the other side, Repp has recovered a lot of those things. She’s got a new band, a threepiece backed by a small choir, to help her translate the songs live. And she’s back in love. She recently reconnected with someone from her past, and is soon moving to Richmond, Va., to be with him. Leaving Portland, her home of 20 years, is a major change. But Repp is used to starting over. “I’m not moving so I can eat at another great restaurant,” she says. “I’m going, again, for love, but to also annihilate everything, and have a clean slate and see what that feels like—to walk down the street and not know a single person.” SEE IT: Corrina Repp plays Bunk Bar, 1028 SE Water Ave., with Ava Luna and Sama Dams, on Friday, May 22. 9:30 pm. $8. 21+. Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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WEDNESDAY–THURSDAY
tape, Ex-Cult doesn’t revel in anything new, sticking to a single tempo and a well-worn guitar attack. Regardless, the troupe’s capacity to insinuate Memphis’ garage history into its music without the influence becoming overwhelming shows that Ex-Cult is more than just another band that can play fast and tough. DAVE CANTOR. The Know, 2026 NE Alberta St., 473-8729. 8 pm. Call venue for ticket information. 21+.
Smallpools, Grizfolk, Hunter Hunted [WAGES OF SYNTH] Bubbling up into existence with 2013 summerjam par excellence “Dreaming,” Smallpools carries a backstory almost as frothily triumphant. Two Oregon music vets, Beau Kuther and Joe Intile, meet each other after moving to Los Angeles, fiddle around in the studio with a pair of New Jerseyans, and grab a major-label deal before their first live performance. Justreleased debut Lovetap may not sail far from the Passion Pitched electro bliss of their backwardsleaning signature single, but a certain shallowness should be forgiven any group so loathe to make waves. JAY HORTON. Wonder Ballroom, 128 NE Russell St., 2848686. 8 pm. $17-$19. All ages.
THURSDAY, MAY 21 The War on Drugs
[AMBIENT HEARTLAND ROCK] Philly rockers the War on Drugs are making their third trip to Portland in just over a year, still hard at work touring the excellent 2014 record, Lost in the Dream, a spaced-out, trad-rock epic that sounds like Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen road-tripping in an ’84 Chrysler with a trunk full of digital effects pedals. You may also remember them more recently as the band that Mark Kozelek hated so much he decided to write a song about it. But while some may hate the War on Drugs, your dad probably loves them, and this time, your dad is right. CASEY HARDMEYER. Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W Burnside St., 225-0047. 8 pm. Sold out. All ages.
Fuzz, Old Light, Grandparents
[SO MUCH FEEDBACK] All you need to know about Fuzz is basically in the name—unless you didn’t know that Ty Segall is involved, in which case you should now be even more excited. As if Segall wasn’t already associated with all things gloriously fuzzy, the overly prolific San Francisco native decided to form yet another
INTRODUCING CAT HOCH Sounds like: The sirens of Homer’s The Odyssey if it were adapted to film by Alejandro Jodorowsky. For fans of: The Brian Jonestown Massacre, the Black Angels, St. Vincent, Celebration.
Cat Hoch is anxious. She’s due to be at the dentist in 30 minutes. It’s not the financial obligations she is worried about, or the procedure. She just can’t find the place. Her musical endeavors are also the product of lost meandering. After a few semesters at the Pacific Northwest College of Art, Hoch, a drummer by training, went to Europe and had an epiphany. “That’s when I knew what I wanted to do,” she says. “I knew I wanted to put all my effort into music.” She returned to Portland, holed up in the basement of an old house she shared with several other musicians and began writing. Her housemates started Sex Ghost, a fuzzy, lo-fi indie outfit, but it quickly fell apart. She then formed another group, Tender Age, with songwriter Tauna Leonardo. But if Sex Ghost suffered from a lack of direction, the new project had too much ambition. “We were playing too much,” Hoch says. “Five hours a day, five days a week, not getting paid or anything. I was really sad, but I quit.” It was then that Hoch decided going solo might be the best path for personal satisfaction. She met Unknown Mortal Orchestra drummer Riley Geare, who suggested she bring him the songs she had been working on and fine-tune them for a record. “He just knew all the sounds I liked that I had in my head and couldn’t really express,” she says. First single “Look What You Found” is a dreamy, slightly dirty groover, perfect for the burgeoning summer season. Geare’s pounding backbeat drives a screeching blues lead into the stratosphere before Hoch’s elegant, swirling voice croons the title as if it were a message from the mountaintop. Hoch and Geare are putting the finishing touches on what will be her first solo EP, while also preparing for her first local show. “I’d like someone bigger to take an interest, but I also think putting it out with a local label might be good,” she says of the record. “I guess we’ll see.” Just then, she arrives at the address she’s been looking for. Once again, by circumstance and accident, she’s found her way. CRIS LANKENAU. SEE IT: Cat Hoch plays the Know, 2026 NE Alberta St., with Crocodiles and Vice Device, on Monday, May 25. 8 pm. $8. 21+. 26
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C O U R T E S Y O F C AT H O C H
MUSIC
THURSDAY–FRIDAY
Merchandise, Nothing, Cloakroom
[POST-POP] In 2013, Tampa, Fla., post-punkers Merchandise made a single promise: to become a new band. Subsequently, it signed with British behemoth 4AD, and the members preened themselves into pop stars with the release of their fourth record, 2014’s After the End. Since then, they’ve strutted stages alongside such dirgemeisters as Title Fight and Parquet Courts, crooning Morrissey-esque vocals over upbeat strummers. It’s punk gone pretty—art pop beneath a mainstream mask. TED JAMISON. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $15. 21+.
Real Estate, Woods
[SPACE-ECHO INDIE ROCK] Real Estate is the band version of those people you meet at a party who are so gregarious and effortlessly cool that you want to call their parents and ask them what set of rules they implemented to raise such a perfect person. On Atlas, the band’s latest LP, it has embraced and perfected the combo of steady backbeat plus shimmery guitar soloing that piqued our interest with its previous record, Days. Like many great indie acts, several members keep busy with side projects, so when you’ve committed every nuance in its catalog to memory, take solace in knowing there’s a lot more where that came from. CRIS LANKENAU. Revolution Hall, 1300 SE Stark St., Suite 110, 288-3895. 8 pm. $20. Under 21 permitted with legal guardian.
Little Dragon, Dpat
[BIG LITTLE BAND] How far Swedish quartet Little Dragon has come. It seems like only yesterday that the band was a critically overlooked darling, struggling to achieve the sort of acclaim that similarly minded electronic pop acts like Caribou and Phantogram earned in spades. Slowly but surely, Little Dragon has found a winning audience, its rep as an awesome live band cemented last year with the band’s strongest album to date, Nabuma Rubberband. A moody and meditative work, it sees the group capitalizing on its strengths as rhythm merchants (jaunty single “Klapp Klapp”) while still leaving time for singer Yukimi Nagano to dive into a series of velvety slow jams. MICHAEL MANNHEIMER. Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., 230-0033. 9 pm. $25. All ages.
the global stage have only underlined how little we know about the former Elizabeth Grant—and how little her rabid fanbase cares. Last summer’s Ultraviolence debuted atop the Billboard charts despite largely eschewing the playful hip-hop elements and sunnier pop artistry of breakthrough Born To Die, doubling down upon that painstakingly curated pose of battered sultriness and codependent ennui. For this current all-conquering tour of smokeless torch songs, installing Courtney Love as opener seems either exploitative counter-programming, meta-commentary on image enhancement or wry trolling of shared nemesis Kim Gordon. JAY HORTON. Amphitheatre Northwest, 17200 NE Delfel Road, Ridgefield, Wash., sleepcountryamphitheater. com. 7:30 pm. $25-$79.50. All ages.
Father John Misty, Temples
[BEARD GARBAGE] Band-dude dickbaggery reaches its sad apotheosis with Joshua Tillman’s work as Father John Misty. While it’s easy to hate the casual misogyny and vapid, hepcat bon mots dished out on the singer-songwriter’s most recent album, I Love You, Honeybear, Tillman shields the vileness at Misty’s center with a thick carapace of irony that keeps the shtick safe from criticism. Tillman’s performance of self-regard is a joke, sure, but it’s delivered with a disdainful sneer by a comedian who’d rather laugh at his audience than enter the fray of real human feeling. CHRIS STAMM. Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W Burnside St., 225-0047. 9 pm. Sold out. All ages.
Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, Atriarch, Rabbits, Mane of the Cur
[NORTHWEST DOOM] Grunge forefather Tad Doyle is heavier than ever—sonically speaking, though these days he does resemble latter-day Orson Welles if he was the leader of a biker gang. The dude’s always been imposing, but his current project, Brothers of the
Cloth, is downright fearsome, delivering dense slabs of straight-up doom metal alongside his drummer Dave French and his wife, bassist Peggy Doyle. It’s moody and dirgelike, the sound of the world being smashed apart by sledgehammers— which might just be what the world deserves right now. MATTHEW SINGER. Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St., 226-6630. 9 pm. $10. 21+.
Kate Tempest, Coco Columbia
[HIP-HAUTE] An accomplished playwright, Kate Tempest spent her youth squatting along the U.K. battle rap circuit, and her recent debut album rather decidedly celebrates the poetry of The Streets. Everybody Down follows a few damaged millennials around London publife, and while expository passages may resemble Lily Allen or Kate Nash at peak chattiness, Tempest’s flow darkens as beats slow and supra-dense lyrical fusillades layer harrowing observations over the sort of committed narrative usually called “novelistic”— which just sounds odd now that she’s writing an actual novel about the same characters and events. JAY HORTON. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $13. 21+.
Diarrhea Planet, Ex Hex, Summer Cannibals
[GARAGE SHREDDERS] What better way to counterbalance the raucous, riff-heavy sausage fest of Diarrhea Planet than with the flawless, female-fronted garage pop of Ex Hex? While the former shreds for the stars with four-part guitar harmonies and dude’s-night-out vocals, the latter is a fun-in-the-sun adaptation of the tasty licks and airtight packaging of Dazed & Confused’s more aimless, feel-good scene-setters. PETE COTTELL. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $15 tickets available online day of show only. 21+.
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PREVIEW COURTESY OF GROUND CONTROL TOURING
heavily noisy band, this time with a rather aptly self-descriptive title. Its 2013 self-titled debut is made up of tightly packed electric smoke, just as you’d expect. SHANNON GORMLEY. Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St., 226-6630. 9 pm. $14. 21+.
MUSIC
FRIDAY, MAY 22 The Waterboys, Connor Kennedy and Minstrel
[ROCK] Far from the pastoral, acoustified extremes of 1988’s classic Fisherman’s Blues,Waterboys leader Mike Scott is definitely in city-mouse mode on the new Modern Blues, his 13th studio album overall. He shows he still has a fresh sonic trick or two to pull as opener “Destinies Entwined” peals forth, flanking a lone trumpet with fat electric guitar harmonies to conjure glam mariachi. The album’s sound isn’t exactly expansive, but rest assured that, in concert, longtime fiddler Steve Wickham will keep tugging the proceedings back into the mystic. JEFF ROSENBERG. Aladdin Theater, 3017 SE Milwaukie Ave., 234-9694. 8 pm. $35. Under 21 permitted with legal guardian.
Lana Del Rey, Courtney Love
[“NARCO SWING”] Inspiration for a dizzying swirl of lacerating faux-exposés, navel-gazing critical reassessments and post-feminist dissertations, the three short years since Lana Del Rey’s emergence on
Speedy Ortiz, Alex G, Broken Water [BRIGHTEN THE CORNERS] Speedy Ortiz’s music is knotty and intricate, sure, but you don’t need a Ph.D. in musicology to untangle its many pleasures. On both a physical and lyrical level, the band’s sophomore record, Foil Deer, hits you immediately—the first words to come out of singer and guitarist Sadie Dupuis’ mouth on the arresting “Raising the Skate” are, “Heaven, have mercy on the hypnic jerk.” The rest of Foil Deer is just as disarming, whether Dupuis is spinning tales about shoddy boyfriends (“Mister Difficult”) or perpetually feeling like a runner-up (the jaunty single “The Graduates”). These 12 songs are blunt, fierce and catchy, filled with intertwined guitar lines and an increased emphasis on a grinding low end that has earned the record more comparisons to Big Black than Pavement. I wouldn’t go quite so far: This is still prime “indie rock,” harking back to the halcyon early ’90s when that genre tag really meant something. Step back, imitators: Speedy Ortiz has seized the throne and isn’t ready to relinquish it anytime soon. MICHAEL MANNHEIMER. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N. Mississippi, 288-3895. 9 pm Monday, May 25. $12 advance, $14 day of show. 21+.
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MUSIC
SATURDAY–TUESDAY
SATURDAY, MAY 23 Sly & Robbie & The Taxi Gang, Bitty McLean
[DRUMS AND BASS] Like the Funk Brothers to ‘60s soul or Dr. Dre to ‘90s gangsta rap, the rhythm section of Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare have defined the sonic textures of reggae stretching back to the 1970s. Even a cursory glance at their 200,000-song discography reads like a history of Jamaican music, including collaborations with Black Uhuru, Peter Tosh, Bunny Wailer and Ini Kamoze, not to mention Westerners such as Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger, Madonna and Serge Gainsbourg. It’s hard to know what precisely they’ll be playing here, but it hardly matters: If you go to one reggae show this year, this should probably be it. MATTHEW SINGER. Alhambra Theater, 4811 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 610-0640. 9 pm. $20. 21+.
Casey Neill & The Norway Rats, Hook & Anchor, Annalisa Tornfelt & the Sound Outside
[POWER-POP] Tonight, veteran Portland songwriter Casey Neill celebrates a new EP, available here on limited-edition cassette in advance of its vinyl release in September, which contains a ripping cover of PJ Harvey’s “The Sky Lit Up” and a cowpunk rendering of his own “Dancing on the Ruins (of Multinational Corporations).” Arrive early to catch Black Prairie’s Annalisa Tornfelt, who put out an excellent solo debut earlier this year, backed by displaced members of Sallie Ford’s former band, the Sound Outside. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $12 advance, $14 day of show. 21+.
Hutch and Kathy, S (Jenn Ghetto), Allie Goertz
[PRE-PUNK] The Thermals’ Hutch Harris and Kathy Foster were a few years out of their teens when their Hutch and Kathy album first found daylight in 2000, but I bet listening back on it is, at times, a cringe-inducing experience. It’s a document of the duo’s learning curve, and the songs tend to get overly repetitive or uncomfortably twee—and Harris is still shaking a cartoonish SoCal accent. Still, there’s something startlingly original about these quaint home recordings that hints at the Thermals’ lo-fi masterpieces to come. You can hear the future of Portland music in the midst of an awkward growth spurt—and at this reunion show, you can see it in the present. CASEY JARMAN. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $12. 21+.
SUNDAY, MAY 24 Ed Schrader’s Music Beat, Lost Cities
[THE CLASH FOR KIDS] According to Ed Schrader (formerly an altweekly freelancer from the great city of Baltimore), his music can be enjoyed by Clash fans and children alike. I can confirm the first part of that theory, but after testing it out on the 4-year-old I nanny, I’m not so sure about the last part. Sure, Schrader’s 2014 album, Party Jail, is full of uncurling energy and screaming to match the tantrums of any angsty toddler. Unfortunately, though, most toddlers I’ve dealt with don’t seem to handle punky abrasiveness very well, even if it’s cut with bouncy, primal percussion and Schrader’s cool, deep lake of a baritone. Maybe 6 is a better age to start getting kids into this kind of stuff. SHANNON GORMLEY. Bunk Bar, 1028 SE Water Ave., 894-9708. 9:30 pm. $8. 21+.
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Will Butler, the Domestics
[ECLECTIC INDIE ROCK] Doug Fir’s website isn’t kidding when it touts Will Butler as indierock royalty. He’s been a pivotal member of Arcade Fire since the band’s inception (he’s brother to frontman Win), serving as an ace multi-instrumentalist, when he wasn’t soundtracking Spike Jonze’s Her and issuing his debut solo album. Policy is an eightsong concoction that haphazardly touches upon every element of his main project’s past. Piano ballads and acoustic jabs sit alongside raucous punk numbers and danceable bouts of electro-funk, though they all fall short when compared to the sprawling catalog he forged alongside the better-known Butler. BRANDON WIDDER. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 2319663. 9 pm. $14. 21+.
Boone Howard, New Move, Us Lights Â
[NOT TYPHOON] Boone Howard, former frontman of the We Shared Milk, and a seven-member A-Team of Portland’s craftiest musicians have joined forces to create a formidable superband. Howard’s crew of self-proclaimed “weirdos” includes members of the Domestics, Minden, Hustle and Drone, and a portion of the WSM crew. While the tone and production are said to differ from Howard’s previous projects, we can probably count on soulful croons, a psychedelic fringe and undeniable coolness. ASHLEY JOCZ. Rontoms, 600 E Burnside St., 236-4536. 8 pm. Free. 21+.
MONDAY, MAY 25 Paramore, Copeland
[PERFECT POP] Paramore is making a small fuss about wrapping up its “self-titled era” with a short run of theater shows, but damn if the band’s victory lap isn’t totally deserved. 2013’s Paramore is a masterful demonstration of contemporary pop prowess, and the midalbum run composed of “Still Into You,” “Anklebiters” and “Proof” stands as one of the great 10-minute pop stretches of this decade, right up there with every time a radio station has played “I Knew You Were Trouble,” “Call Me Maybe” and “Some Nights” back to back to back. It is party music for rush-hour commutes, and it rules so hard it hurts. CHRIS STAMM. Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 8 pm. Sold out. All ages.
TUESDAY, MAY 26 Petunia and the Vipers
[HONKY-TONKISH] A lot of artists who have come to be regarded as essential pieces of the country music canon—Hank Williams Sr., Ferlin Husky, Buck Owens—have absolutely batshit-crazy voices. Petunia, the mononymous frontman of Vancouver, B.C.’s Petunia & the Vipers, may have the craziest voice of all, if only because he has soaked up inspiration from the aforementioned giants, as well as cowboy yodelers like Jimmie Rodgers and Kenny Roberts. This gives Petunia a huge vocal toolbox to pull from on everything from country waltzes to chugging honky-tonk barn-burners strewn with traces of gypsy jazz. CASEY JARMAN. Duff’s Garage, 2530 NE 82nd Ave., 234-2337. 8 pm. $10. 21+.
Wire, Mild High Club
[POST-PUNK GODFATHERS] Wire was one of the most taut, minimalist, electric bands to emerge from London’s seminal punk scene. Always original, Wire has been more influential than actually popular. The band just released its self-titled 14th studio album, which is the first to feature creative contributions from new young gun guitarist Matt Simms. Musically,
TUESDAY/CLASSICAL, ETC. Wire harks back to despondent classics like 154 and Chairs Missing, drawing less on overt moroseness than aged bitterness. NATHAN CARSON. Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St., 226-6630. 9 pm. $20. 21+.
PHOX, Yoya
[WISCONSIN MELANCHOLY] For the past decade, there has been hauntingly beautiful music coming out of the cheese woods. PHOX, the latest Wisconsinites to make a vocal-heavy folk record at Bon Iver founder Justin Vernon’s April Base studios, has something magical going on. With perfect intonation and a harmonized, breathy take on speech-song, the six-piece band takes you on a journey through small-town despair with equal parts cute Midwestern beat and heart-throbbing melody. PARKER HALL. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $15. 21+.
Hot Chip, Slow Magic
[DANCE POP] In 2008, British electro-jammers Hot Chip turned out a landmark album in Made in the Dark. It combined dance, disco, synth pop, house and textured vocals that could turn on a dime from serious to sarcastic. While the group arguably overachieved, it has nonetheless accrued a steady discography of clever, feel-good electronica since. Hot Chip’s sixth and latest release, Why Make Sense?, incorporates a bit more spacey funk, drawing on some guest vocals and Alexis Taylor’s signature falsetto. MARK STOCK. Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., 224-2038. 8 pm. $28. All ages.
CLASSICAL, JAZZ & WORLD Beethoven’s Odyssey
[LIFE IN BLACK AND WHITE] There’s more to Beethoven than his Symphony No. 9. From virtuosic beginning to heroic middle, through to its powerful and introverted end, 22 of Beethoven’s piano sonatas will be performed in chronological order by acclaimed classical pianist Gregory Partain. It’s a rare opportunity to listen as the complexity of Beethoven’s music increases, despite his utter lack of auditory function towards the end of his life. It’ll make you rethink wearing those earbuds all the time. PARKER HALL. The Old Church, 1422 SW 11th Ave., 222-2031. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Thursday, May 20-21. $5-$15 sliding scale. All ages.
An Appalachian Spring
[AMERICAN ORIGINALS] The version we usually hear of Appalachian Spring, one of the most beloved works of American music, isn’t the original. The orchestra pit in the venue where Martha Graham’s company was performing Aaron Copland’s ballet score could hold just 13 musicians, so that’s what he wrote it for. Copland considered his later orchestral arrangement to be definitive, but the more transparent, original chamber version offers its own, perhaps superior, delights, and that’s what musicians from the Oregon Symphony, Third Angle and other major Portland ensembles will perform. BRETT CAMPBELL. Marylhurst University, 17600 Highway 43, 699-1814. 7:30 pm Friday, May 22. Free. All ages.
Paul Creighton Project
[FUNK SUPERHEROES] If The Avengers was a film about funkjazz musicians from Portland who really kicked the ass of super-difficult-to-play music instead of aliens or whatever, it would star the Paul Creighton Project. The local singer, whose key to success seems to be surrounding himself with every local virtuoso he can find, brings Tower of Power energy to the Pearl District, with a band that levitates over Jimmy Mak’s stage like true progfunk masters. PARKER HALL. Jimmy Mak’s, 221 NW 10th Ave., 295-6542. 8 pm Saturday, May 23. $11 general admission, $12 reserved. 21+.
For more Music listings, visit
MUSIC
ALBUM REVIEWS
THE HELIO SEQUENCE THE HELIO SEQUENCE (SUB POP) [INTERNET ROCK] Like a proud father, Portland has watched the Helio Sequence grow over the years, from Beaverton startups playing the 24-hour Starbucks to Sub Pop darlings. Throughout, the duo of Benjamin Weikel and Brandon Summers has amassed one of strongest discographies in the Northwest. For its sixth album, the duo wrote 26 songs in a month, the best of which— as voted by friends and family—ended up on the record. Expectedly, Weikel’s unerring drum work and Summers’ dreamlike vocals and guitar effects are in full bloom. More surprisingly, the record demonstrates a coolness and composure you wouldn’t expect from an album that came together so quickly. Standout tracks include the heaving, psych-tinged “Upward Mobility” and “Inconsequential Ties,” which fuses Revolver-era Beatles with pristine garage rock. Tracks such as the hazy, majestic “Seven Hours” pull the heartstrings, while the concluding “Never Going Back” showcases Summers’ folky leanings with a song that sounds like atmospheric Dylan. It blows the candle out on another fine effort from Portland’s most reliable duo. MARK STOCK. SEE IT: The Helio Sequence plays Music Millennium, 3158 E Burnside St., on Wednesday, May 20. 7 pm. Free. All ages.
POISON IDEA CONFUSE & CONQUER (SOUTHERN LORD) [HARDCORE PUNK] Poison Idea is too often neglected in discussions of seminal American hardcore acts, which might be due to the fact that the band waited 10 years to make its masterpiece, 1990’s Feel the Darkness. But it has managed a rare and remarkable feat: releasing at least one very good album in every decade of its existence. The Portland band keeps the streak alive with Confuse & Conquer, its first LP since 2006’s Latest Will and Testament, which functioned as both a comeback album and an epitaph for longtime guitarist Tom “Pig Champion” Roberts, who passed away before the record’s release. While Confuse & Conquer is padded with unfortunate digressions into midtempo barroom rock (“Hypnotic”) and country (“Dead Cowboy”), the rest of it is a raging triumph that splits the difference between Black Flag’s splenetic blasts and Discharge’s proto-thrash. Which is what Poison Idea has always been so good at, and what Poison Idea will probably always be so good at. Here’s to another 35 years of this beautiful and bitter noise. CHRIS STAMM. SEE IT: Poison Idea plays Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St., with the Derelicts and the Exacerbators, on Saturday, May 23. 9 pm. $13. 21+.
THE EARNEST LOVERS THE EARNEST LOVERS (SELF-RELEASED) [HOMEGROWN HONKY-TONK] The Earnest Lovers are aptly named, and not just for the pun on seminal Opry star Ernest Tubb. There’s no ironic remove in their material, just sincere love for traditional country music and an “if it ain’t broke” approach to its composition and recording. Pete Krebs’ and Leslie Beia’s wellbehaved vocals demonstrate real country reserve. One tune’s title, “No Songs Came By Today,” might hint at the decade-plus wait for new Krebs tunes, and it’s fortunate that this collaboration provided sufficient inspiration to slake the dry spell. The EP features a half-dozen originals, leaving the covers to the live sets. It’s nice to recognize Krebs’ familiar, smart-but-unfussy lyrical voice, where “plainspoken” doesn’t mean lacking in complexity or uniqueness, as when “Angel of Sunrise” finds Beia “Sittin’ in the back of an empty car/Takin’ this shit just a little too hard” but still makes time for a quickie geology lesson: “Seismic shift up on the divide/ Broken-tooth mountains built by violence and time.” Let’s hope the creative timescale for Krebs’ next batch of originals is not quite so protracted. JEFF ROSENBERG. SEE IT: The Earnest Lovers play Secret Society, 116 NE Russell St., with Cahalen Morrison & Country Hammer and Doug & Dee, on Friday, May 22. 9 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+. Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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MUSIC CALENDAR = WW Pick. Highly recommended. Editor: Mitch Lillie. TO HAVE YOUR EVENT LISTED, send show information at least two weeks in advance on the web at wweek.com/submitevents. Press kits, CDs and especially vinyl can be sent to Music Desk, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Please include show or release date information with all physical mailings. Email: music@wweek.com. For more listings, check out wweek.com.
CHRISTOPHER ONSTOTT
LAST WEEK LIVE
[MAY 20-26] Kells Brewpub
Jimmy Mak’s
Laurel Thirst Public House
Kelly’s Olympian
210 NW 21st Ave. Sami Live
2958 NE Glisan St. Scratchdog Stringband, the Moonshine (9:30 pm); Lewi Longmire and the Left Coast Roasters (6 pm)
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Nothing, Merchandise
Plews Brews
8409 N. Lombard St. Richard Colvin and The Standard Keys
Revolution Hall
1300 SE Stark St, #110 Real Estate, Woods
Roseland Theater
8 NW 6th Ave. Little Dragon
The GoodFoot Lounge 2845 SE Stark St. Farnell Newton’s Electric Miles
The Know
2026 NE Alberta Street The Dovecotes, Months, Comfort Zone
The Old Church
1422 SW 11th Ave. Beethoven’s Odyssey
The Secret Society 116 NE Russell St. Pink Lady & John Bennett Jazz Band
BANDS OF BROS: It was the best of polls, it was the worst of polls. This year’s Best New Band issue contained multitudes. Our annual survey of Portland’s local-music connoisseurs produced a list with great bands, more hip-hop artists than ever before—and only a single woman. It’s a gross aberration, given how well female artists have been represented in the past, but regrettable nonetheless. It’s especially unfortunate because, outside of the overwhelming sausage-fest, this was a very strong year, particularly where the Top 3 are concerned. In fact, if you ask me, Divers might be the best band to ever top the list. If you disagree, chances are you weren’t at Mississippi Studios on May 15 for our annual Best New Band showcase. After two superlative performances from runners-up the Domestics and Máscaras, the quartet laid waste to a packed house, delivering a set of quaking punk anthems with a sweaty urgency developed through formative years spent playing dives and house shows. As I said, they’re a band so good onstage that if I was a teenager, I’d be shocked to learn that they’re from my hometown—it still kind of surprises me today, in my 30s. Best New Band is an imperfect process, I admit. But if one person in that club discovered that their new favorite band lives down the street from them, I still think it’s worth doing. MATTHEW SINGER. See more photos from the 2015 Best New Band showcase at wweek.com/lastweeklive.
The Waypost Coffeehouse & Tavern 3120 N Williams Ave. Woodwinds, Strange Ideas, Spirit Award
White eagle Saloon
836 N Russell St. Goldenboy, Last Giant and The Breaking
FRi. May 22 al’s den
303 SW 12th Ave. Garcia Birthday Band
aladdin Theater
3017 SE Milwaukie Ave. The Waterboys, Connor Kennedy, Minstrel
alberta Rose Theatre 3000 NE Alberta St. Lindsay Lou & The Flatbellys, Patchy Sanders
alhambra Theatre
Wed. May 20 al’s den
303 SW 12th Ave. Garcia Birthday Band
alberta Rose Theatre
3000 NE Alberta St. Grant-Lee Phillips and Steve Poltz
alberta Street Public House 1036 NE Alberta St. Cripple Hop, Perk Portland
Blue diamond
2016 NE Sandy Blvd. The Fenix Project
doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. The Holydrug Couple, the Hugs, Bestie
duff’s Garage
Jimmy Mak’s
221 NW 10th Ave. The Christopher Brown Quartet, Mel Brown Quartet
Kells
Kelly’s Olympian
The Lodge Bar & Grill
426 SW Washington St. Ladywolf, Bath Party, Pearl Earl, and Abacaba, Rose City Round
Laurel Thirst Public House
2958 NE Glisan St. Down Home Music, Perola (9 pm); Redwood Son (6 pm)
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Albatross, There is No Mountain, Ghost Towns
Holocene
The GoodFoot Lounge
2620 SE Powell Blvd. Fred Van Vactor Show
The Liquor Store
112 SW 2nd Ave. Pat Buckley
Roseland Theater
Homebase Coffee
8775 SW Canyon Ln. Curley Taylor & Zydeco Trouble 3341 SE Belmont St. Darkswoon, PWRHAUS, Swansea
2530 NE 82nd Ave Arthur Moore’s Harmonica Party 1001 SE Morrison St. Asss & Ghost Dub, Antecessor, DaVideo Tape
The Lehrer
8 NW 6th Ave. Of Monsters and Men 2845 SE Stark St. La Rivera, Screens
The Know
2026 NE Alberta St. Ex-Cult, The Estranged, Dark/Light
6605 SE Powell Blvd. Pete Ford Band Jam
The Old Church
1422 SW 11th Ave. Beethoven’s Odyssey
White eagle Saloon 836 N Russell St. Focus! Focus!, Reverb Brothers
Wonder Ballroom
128 NE Russell St. Smallpools, Grizfolk, Hunter Hunted
THuRS. May 21 al’s den
303 SW 12th Ave. Garcia Birthday Band
alberta Street Public House
1036 NE Alberta St. Olivia Awbrey, Ezza Rose, Mount Joy
analog Cafe
720 se Hawthorne Blvd Subtle City, Famous Last Words, Farewell My Love, Sycamour , It Lives It Breathes, Simon Says Die
4811 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Gift of Gab, Auptic, Dalton
ash Street Saloon
Bunk Bar
225 SW Ash St. This Patch Of Sky, Amos Val, I/O, Wellwalker
Crystal Ballroom
1028 SE Water Ave. Ava Luna
dante’s
1332 W Burnside Street Father John Misty
1028 SE Water Ave. The Minders 1332 W Burnside Street The War On Drugs 350 West Burnside Fuzz, Old Light and Grandparents
doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. Holiday Friends, The Weather Machine, the Hoot Hoots
duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave Davenport Brothers, Tough Love Pyle
Holocene
1001 SE Morrison St. Dot & Ellie Herring
Jimmy Mak’s
221 NW 10th Ave. Mel Brown B3 Organ Group
Kells
112 SW 2nd Ave. Pat Buckley
Bunk Bar
Crystal Ballroom
dante’s
350 W Burnside St Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, Atriarch and Rabbits
doug Fir Lounge 830 E Burnside St. Kate Tempest
duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave Mitch Kashmar
Hawthorne Theatre
1507 SE 39th Ave. Blairmont, Andromeda Sun, The Disagreement, Dead At His Desk, Sisyphean Conscience, Velaraas, Chronological Injustice, A World Without
Hotel Oregon
310 NE Evans St. Coyote Willow
221 NW 10th Ave. Johnny Boyd 426 SW Washington St. Rasheed Jamal, Lang, Maze Koroma, Slapz
Laurel Thirst Public House
2958 NE Glisan St. Lynn Conover and Gravel (9:30 pm); Old Flames (6 pm)
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Diarrhea Planet, Ex Hex, Summer Cannibals
Panic Room
3100 NE Sandy Blvd. Y&T, Sintax
Jimmy Mak’s
The Know
Kells
White eagle Saloon
221 NW 10th Ave. Paul Creighton Project 112 SW 2nd Ave. Pipes & Drums 210 NW 21st Ave. Sami Live
Laurel Thirst Public House
2958 NE Glisan St. Jimmy Boyer Band (9:30 pm); Sour Bridges (6 pm)
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Hutch and Kathy
Panic Room
Sleep Country amphitheater
Star Theater
10350 N Vancouver Way Andy Griggs, Carrie Cunningham
The Firkin Tavern
2800 SE Harrison St. Modern Music: Mostly Winds
The Horse Radish
1937 SE 11th Ave. Land of the Living, Dark Oz, Ed Cohen
13 NW 6th Ave. New Wave Tribute Night: Glass of Hearts, Candy O, Wanna Be-52’s 1937 SE 11th Ave. The Outer Space Heaters, Blacks Beach, Blue Fauna 211 W Main St. The Yamhill Billies
The Know
2026 NE Alberta St. Sons of Huns, Blackout, Slow Season
The Muddy Rudder Public House
8105 SE 7th Ave. The Sportin’ Lifers Trio
The Secret Society 116 NE Russell St. Pete Krebs and his Portland Playboys
Turn! Turn! Turn!
8 NE Killingsworth St. Spare Arrow, Guilded, Ian Christiansen Quartet
White eagle Saloon 836 N Russell St. Evangenitals, The Git Right Gospel Review
SaT. May 23 al’s den
303 SW 12th Ave. Garcia Birthday Band
alhambra Theatre
4811 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Sly & Robbie & The Taxi Gang, Bitty McLean, J Ras, IrieFuse, Highdro, Burnell Washburn
artichoke Music
3130 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Goh Kurosawa, Andrew Goncalves
dante’s
350 W Burnside St Poison Idea, The Derelicts and The Exacerbators
doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. Casey Neill & The Norway Rats, Hook & Anchor, Annalisa Tornfelt (of Black Prairie)
duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave Pin and the Hornits
Hawthorne Theatre Lounge
1503 SE Cesar E Chavez Blvd. Jordan Biggs, Cellar Door, Rachelle Debelle, Peter Cornett
Jade Lounge
2342 SE Ankeny St. Joseph Waya, Benny Gilberts, Will St John, Jack Maybe, Farrie, JD Dawson’s Songwriters Showcase
836 N Russell St. Rob Johnston
Kells Brewpub
3100 NE Sandy Blvd. The Drip & Chemical Warfare
17200 NE Delfel Rd. Lana Del Ray, Courtney Love
2026 NE Alberta St. Needs, Polst, High Praise
Ponderosa Lounge
St. david of Wales episcopal Church
The Firkin Tavern
The Know
2026 NE Alberta St. Sol, The Helm, The Siege Fire
The Lehrer
8775 SW Canyon Ln. The Ben Jones Band
MOn. May 25 al’s den
303 SW 12th Ave. Sam Fowles (of the Parson Red Heads)
arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall
1037 SE Broadway Paramore, Copeland
dante’s
350 West Burnside Karaoke From Hell
doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. Jackson Boone, Bike Thief, Hildergard
Jimmy Mak’s
221 NW 10th Ave. The Dan Balmer Trio
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Speedy Ortiz, Alex G, Broken Water
The Know
2026 NE Alberta St. Crocodiles, Vice Device, Cat Hoch
Wonder Ballroom 128 NE Russell St. Royal Blood, Mini Mansions
TueS. May 26
The Muddy Rudder Public House
al’s den
The Secret Society
alhambra Theatre
8105 SE 7th Ave. James Clem
116 NE Russell St. Life During Wartime, Butterfly Breakdown, The Jenny Finn Orchestra, The Shanghai Woolies & The Midnight Serenaders
Tony Starlight Showroom
1125 SE Madison Neil Diamond Experience
Turn! Turn! Turn!
8 NE Killingsworth St. Cedar Teeth, Lowlight, Ali Ippolito
White eagle Saloon
836 N Russell St. Dedric Clark and the Social Animals, Three for Silver
Sun. May 24 al’s den
303 SW 12th Ave. Sam Fowles (of the Parson Red Heads)
Bunk Bar
1028 SE Water Ave. Ed Schrader’s Music Beat, Lost Cities
doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. Will Butler, Jo Firestone
Hawthorne Theatre
1507 SE 39th Ave. Blairmont, Andromeda Sun, The Disagreement, Dead At His Desk
Laurel Thirst Public House 2958 NE Glisan St. Freak Mountain Ramblers, Pagan Jug Band Blugrass Lunch
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Bob Dylan’s 74th Birthday, The Quick & Easy Bos, Ural Thomas, Kory Quinn
303 SW 12th Ave. Sam Fowles (of the Parson Red Heads) 4811 SE Hawthorne Blvd. The Supervillains, Steady Riot!
Crystal Ballroom
1332 W Burnside Street Glass Animals, Gilligan Moss
dante’s
350 W Burnside St Wire
doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. The Knocks, Phoebe Ryan
duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave Petunia and the Vipers
Holocene
1001 SE Morrison St. Jesse Marchant
Jimmy Mak’s
221 NW 10th Ave. Beaumont Middle School Jazz Night
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. PHOX
Panic Room
3100 NE Sandy Blvd. Fit for an Autopsy & Aborted, Archspire, Dark Sermon, Boudica
Roseland Theater
8 NW 6th Ave. Hot Chip, Slow Magic
Star Theater
13 NW 6th Ave. Black Pistol Fire
The GoodFoot Lounge 2845 SE Stark St. Radula
The Know
2026 NE Alberta St. Discourse, Blistered, Unrestrained, Failure Pact
Rontoms
600 E. Burnside St. Boone Howard, New Move, Us Lights
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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MUSIC CALENDAR
may 20–26
Emma BrownE
BAR REVIEW
Where to drink this week. 1. Solae’s Lounge
1801 NE Alberta St., 206-8338, solaeslounge.com. If you could bottle human joy and sell it out of a couple taps, it’d come out something like new northeast Portland jazz-blues bar Solae’s Lounge. at Snoop Lion’s uncle reo Varnado’s birthday party may 17, the band sang him an extended version of “Happy Birthday” in a minor key, and then reo stepped up to sing it to himself, just for good measure. It is wonderful here.
2. Killingsworth Dynasty
832 N Killingsworth St., 234-5683, killingsworthdynasty.com. Like a north Portland Holocene from the guy who made rotture and the Tube, the deeply queerfriendly Dynasty is a muchneeded dance-party venue for the art kids who’d rather not bike over the alameda ridge to get home.
3. Sandy Hut
1430 NE Sandy Blvd., 235-7972. The shufflebaord is gone. The stage is gone. But, holy shit, they brightened the corners on the dingiest old dive bar in Portland, it’s still dirt cheap, still stiff drinks, and suddenly pretty as hell. God bless.
4. Portland Cider House 3638 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 206-6283, portlandcider.com. Finally, a cider bar in the central city, with 24 rotating taps of almost all-local cider (with a little English thrown in), and six-cider flights for a mere $7. The best recently? a hopped apple outlaw, just released to the world.
5. Brooklyn Park Pub
3400 SE Milwaukie Ave., 234-7772. Go for the excellent whiskey, and stay as long as you can without inadvertently insulting someone from Jersey and making it awkward.
NO STOOGES: For a place with nowhere to sit, Devil’s Dill sandwich shop is already an institution in its Hawthorne ’hood. It’s the last stop for the drunks at 3 am, and the first respite of the lazy or shy, one of Portland’s only non-pizza spots to deliver late. But you couldn’t hang out and eat—that is, until two weeks ago. Now, one by one, the people walking by poke their head into Devil’s Dill’s new no-frills side bar, No Fun (1711 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 236-8067, devilsdill.com). “You’ll be seeing us real soon,” they say. It isn’t the simple décor—although the friendly owner says he insisted on a classic deco-style pressed tile ceiling—or the blankgeneration music playing from a laptop behind the bar. No, in a neighborhood short on solid hangs, No Fun sells itself without even seeming to try. Because you can now get your favorite tasty-ass, five-spice pulled pork or a ridiculously hearty meatloaf sandwich in an amiable, sunny bar, with one of five craft taps, a reasonably priced $8 Negroni, a Pickleopolis pickle plate with beets, or especially the $8.50 house martini—gin and vermouth dirtied up not with olives but with pickle juice. Screw olives, this is much better. Y’all will be seeing me real soon. MATTHEW KORFHAGE.
The GoodFoot Lounge
2845 SE Stark St. Soul Stew with DJ Aquaman
saT. May 23 Wed. May 20 dixie Tavern
NS 3rd & Couch St. Hump Night
Plews Brews
8409 N. Lombard St. Wiggle Room
Pub at the end of the Universe 4107 SE 28th Ave. Wicked Wednesdays
ThUrs. May 21 dixie Tavern
NS 3rd & Couch St. Throwback Thursdays
Moloko Plus
3967 N Mississippi Ave. Natural Magic
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
The Lovecraft
421 SE Grand Ave. Shadowplay
Fri. May 22 holocene
1001 SE Morrison St. DJ Cooky Parker, DJ Gregarious
Lovecraft Bar
421 SE Grand Ave Turnt Up! W/Body Academics
Milwaukie elks
13121 SE McLoughlin Blvd Baby Boomers Social Club with ‘KOOLTONES’
Moloko Plus
3967 N Mississippi Ave. Monkeytek & Friends
dig a Pony
736 Southeast Grand Ave. Freaky Outty
holocene
1001 SE Morrison St. Roy Davis Jr., Ben Tactic, Nathan Detroit, Maxx Bass
Moloko Plus
3967 N Mississippi Ave. Lamar LeRoy
roseland Theater
8 NW 6th Ave. The Glitch Mob, EPROM and Danny Corn
The Whiskey Bar 31 NW 1st Ave Bassjackers
Mon. May 25 Cadigan’s Corner Bar 5501 SE 72nd Ave. Fight Church TV, Jessie
Ground Kontrol Classic arcade
511 NW Couch St. Metal Mondays, Metal Kyle and DJ Shreddy Krueger
The Lovecraft
421 SE Grand Ave. Departures, DJ Waisted and Friends
TUes. May 26 Kelly’s olympian
426 SW Washington St. KPSU DJ’s
The Lodge Bar & Grill 6605 SE Powell Blvd. DJ Easy Finger
The Lovecraft
421 SE Grand Ave. Bones with DJ Aurora
may 20–26
= WW Pick. Highly recommended. Most prices listed are for advance ticket sales. At-the-door increases and so-called convenience charges may apply, so it’s best to call ahead. Editor: ENID SPITZ. Theater: ENID SPITZ (espitz@wweek.com). Dance: ENID SPITZ (dance@wweek.com). TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, submit information at least two weeks in advance to: espitz@wweek.com.
THEATER OPENINGS & PREVIEWS Cottonwood in the Flood
This Fertile Ground Festival favorite earned surprisingly rave reviews for being a staged reading of racial history from one tiny Oregon town. Damaris Webb, lost-time Portland dramatist and African-American arts proponent, directs the tale of the rapid rise and demise of Vanport, Ore., as lived by its African-American population. Westminster Presbyterian hosts a barbeque lunch and talk with former Vanport residents after the show. Westminster Presbyterian Church, 1624 NE Hancock St., 287-1289. 2 pm Monday, May 25. $5.
Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet)
Northwest Classical Theatre Company is going out with an extravagant bang. The company will be dissolving after this last production, a comic re-imagination of its usual Shakespearian source material. Bard scholar Constance Ledbelly falls headfirst into her trash can, only to find it a rabbit hole into Shakespeare’s plays. She encounters morbid Juliet, sexuallyconfused Romeo and a whole folio of comic edits in this directorial first from NWCTC actress Brenan Dwyer, who also created the online sketch-comedy show Potty Talk. Northwest Classical Theatre Company, 2110 SE 10th Ave., 971-244-3740. 7:30 pm ThursdaySaturday, 2 pm Sunday, May 22-June 21. $22.
Three Days of Rain
This meditative drama spans 35 years and two generations of a Manhattan family. The children of two famed architects stumble across their parents’ journal from before the couple got their big break, and reading it takes them back, literally, through their parents’ struggles to build New York’s Janeway House and to maintain more personal affairs. The tiny cast is Broadway songstress Lisa Datz and Grimm stars Silas Weir Mitchell (who plays horologist Monroe and cameos in cop shows such as CSI and NYPD Blue) and Sasha Roiz (a sci-fi regular who plays half-creature police Captain Sean Renard). Richard Greenberg, a New York screenwriter-turned-prolificplaywright, regularly twists time in his plays. Here he transports the actors from 1995 in Act I to 1960 for Act II, when they play their own parents and untangle the drama firsthand. Gerding Theater, 128 NW 11th Ave., 445-3700. 7:30 pm Tuesday-Friday, 2 pm and 7:30 pm Saturday-Sunday, through June 21. $25-$64; ages 14 and older.
NEW REVIEWS The Misanthrope
Richard Wilbur’s English translation of Molière’s The Misanthrope is a skillfully-performed satire of 17th-century aristocratic society and all its snootiness. The cast members, dressed in big wigs, colorful clothes and over-the-top makeup, take on a script composed entirely in rhyme for this timeless society drama. Flirtatious Célimène (Hannah Patterson) two-times her lover, the sassy Alceste (Colin Kane), with none other than Alceste’s sworn enemy, Oronte (Devon Roberts). And the characters’ hoard of gossiping, fake friends only make matters worse. Bitter and jaded Alceste debates with his sidekick Philante (Zachary Carey) whether it’s better to be overly affectionate or brutally honest with acquaintances. Spectacle aside, the engaging acting is enough to make you think its about your own life. AMY WOLFE. Lincoln Hall, Portland State University, 1620 SW Park Ave., 725-
3307. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday, May 17. Opens May 15; through May 30. $15.
The Winter’s Tale
Anon It Moves’ newest production of Shakespeare’s familial drama is both a complex psychological study and a light-hearted comedy. In the first half, director Caitlin Fisher-Draeger crafts a sparse world dominated by Leontes (Glen McCumber), who alternates between attacking his wife for imagined infidelity and displaying tender affection for his young son. Leontes’ raw emotion hits hard thanks to the bleak setting and an eerily beautiful live soundtrack. The second half flips, transforming the drama into a comedy bursting with song and vibrant colors. You can’t avoid cringing when Leontes screams at his wife during her trial in the first half, and it’s impossible not to laugh when Polixenes (Brian Demar Jones) and Camillo (Paul Susi) disguise themselves as old men and attend a riotous party. Ironically, The Circus Project bogs it all down. Their acrobatic acts stall the plot, instead of advancing it. The acting’s the thing, like the final scene, in which Leontes and Hermione gaze longingly at one another from opposite ends of the stage. IAN CLARK. Shaking the Tree, 823 SE Grant Ave., 235-0635. 7:30 pm Friday, May 15, Thursday-Sunday through June 13. Additional performance June 8. $15.
Grant Ave., Tigard, 620-5262. 7:30 pm Thursday-Friday, 2 pm and 7:30 Saturday, 2 pm Sunday through May 24. $30-$42.
Grounded
Despite its one-woman cast and minimalist set design, George Brant’s Grounded is a play of epic proportions. It follows a female fighter pilot (Rebecca Lingafelter) who is reassigned to fly drones after she gets pregnant, putting her into a new, more personal battle. Initially elated by her godlike power, the pilot unravels as time wears on, unable to connect with her husband and daughter in the suburbs after waging war at work every day. As Grounded grapples with technology that can kill from 8,000 miles away, playwright Brant repeatedly references Homer and the Bible to interject ancient worlds of gods and plagues into the modern action. It
all seamlessly comes together thanks to Lingafelter’s muscular and heartfelt performance. Far from grounded, the play charts human savagery all the way from ancient heroes and monsters, to 21st-century, robotic buzzards packing enough firepower to decimate a city. IAN CLARK. CoHo Theater, 2257 NW Raleigh St., 220-2646. 7:30 Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday, through May 23. $25.
How to Stop Dying
Sarah, who has a ghost-hunting reality show, is mourning the death of her father when she gets a call from a rural Oregon funeral home claiming to have a photo of his ghost. This comedic hunt for meaning in the great beyond is the culmination of director Noah Dunham’s year-long pondering and five-month workshop with the cast, which is substantial for a troupe accustomed to improv. But then,
death is kind of a big thing. Action/ Adventure Theatre, 1050 SE Clinton St. 8 pm Thursday-Saturday through May 30. $18.
Mame
Depression-era eccentric Mame Dennis introduces her nephew to a free-wheeling lifestyle of parties with washed-up actresses and unfortunate Southern gents like Beauregard Jackson Pickett Burnside. We’re supposed to find that “life’s a banquet” in this encouraging musical from the Lake Oswego theater, which will pelt you with famous jingles like “We Need a Little Christmas” and “Bosom Buddies.” Lakewood Center for the Arts, 368 S State St., Lake Oswego, 635-3901. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm and 7 pm Sunday, through June 14. $37.
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REVIEW M AT T H E W M u R P H Y
PERFORMANCE
ALSO PLAYING American Night: The Ballad of Juan José Richard Montoya’s play is an inventive satire about Juan José (Osvaldo González), a lovably innocent Mexican immigrant who falls into an imaginative dream world when he falls asleep in the middle of studying for his American Citizenship exam. José journeys through a comedic re-imagining of American history, strung together like Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. Montoya’s writing uses side-splitting humor to deliver his social critique, and the play is at its best when it is thoroughly outlandish. When the production attempts earnest emotion, like in the cheesy ending musical number, it feels awkward and flat. The dream trip is an entertaining premise, but the production’s forced emotion doesn’t quite satisfy. IAN CLARK. El Centro Milagro, 525 SE Stark St., 236-7253. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday, through May 23. $24.
Buffy
From the comedy crew that brought you Flair: An Office Space Parody comes Buffy: A Parody Musical, Funhouse’s newest illogical repurposing of something you really loved in the ’90s. The original is still enticing, do we need more? Funhouse Lounge, 2432 SE 11th Ave., 841-6734. 7 pm Thursday-Saturday through June 6. $16-$20.
Grease
As over the top and ostentatious as you’d expected from Broadway Rose Theater, this production maintains all the Pink Ladies and T-Birds drama, plus bursts from its tiny stage with athletic dance routines. From its beginning ode to the play’s fictional alma mater, Grease gives the audience pure and simple entertainment. Stars Peter Liptak (Danny Zuko) and Claire Rigsby (Betty Rizzo) ham it up with deafening musical numbers but are also convincing in their angsty teenage vulnerability. Despite its campy tone and dated subject material, Grease can still convince you to take a joyride back to the ’50s greasers, proms and pom-poms, soda fountains and burger joints. Like an irresponsible spin in a flashy car, it’s pretty innocent, overly-optimistic, and really just fun. IAN CLARK. Broadway Rose New Stage Theatre, 12850 SW
PHantom Passion: Katie travis and Chris mann.
THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (PORTLAND OPERA) The iconic white mask is still there. So, too, the crystal chandelier that famously crashes at the end of the first act. And those histrionic, undeniably memorable tunes are all intact. But veteran impresario Cameron Mackintosh’s new production of The Phantom of the Opera lacks vital intrigue. The production boasts slicker sets, moodier lighting and a lot more fog and pyrotechnics than Hal Prince’s 1986 original. The new sets rotate, unfold like dollhouses and shoot flames at the rafters, making for a satisfyingly over-the-top series of coups de théâtre. Among these, the production’s tenderest romantic moment coincides with its most impressive eye candy. During the duet “All I Ask of You,” two lovers sing on the roof of the Parisian Opéra Populaire, beneath a gargantuan statue of a goddess holding a harp. Rays of light rain down between the harp’s strings like sunbeams parting the clouds of a Wagnerian forest. It’s a perfect, poignant bit of stagecraft, amplifying the musical’s theme of a divine (or diabolical) muse watching from above. Pithy symbolism aside, however, the heart of The Phantom of the Opera is a love triangle between its title character, his soprano protégée Christine and her admirer Raoul. And in this touring production, there isn’t enough vocal or dramatic chemistry between the performers to get you fully involved. The flat characters and voices can’t muster enough heart to deliver the devastating, melodramatic climax we expect from composer Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom. As Christine, Katie Travis sings with a bright, agile soprano, but her dueling suitors, Chris Mann (from The Voice) as the Phantom and Storm Lineberger as Raoul, struggled through with under-
Lloyd Webber’s music of the night goes flat.
whelming voices and breathy singing. Mann sang the climactic high A-flat of his big number, “The Music of the Night,” in a forced, hoarse tone. He and Lineberger sometimes only got a single word out before having to breathe again, and both singers bastardized any word with the “oo” sound in it, turning it into a nonresonant, nasal “iewwwww.” The result was far from romantic. Such vocal issues aren’t entirely the two men’s fault; Lloyd Webber shoulders considerable blame. Aiming to infuse both roles with the dark, rugged sex appeal of a lower voice but also the sweetness of higher notes, Lloyd Webber wrote both parts in an awkward range that’s too low for a tenor but too high for a baritone. Even accomplished singers struggle. Mann’s Phantom has another glitch. Gym-fit and freshly 33, the actor is just too young and hunky. Back in 1986, when Michael Crawford created the role, he was a 44-year-old veteran of stage, film and television, with a distinguished bearing to match his hefty credentials. Crawford’s older, more damaged Phantom made his mentor-ingenue chemistry with Christine more perversely Freudian. Christine’s dilemma—to choose the spookily sophisticated Phantom or the bright-eyed Raoul— should be creepier, more profoundly existential and tragic. Although Lineberger, this production’s Raoul, is 10 years younger than Mann’s Phantom, they seem the same age onstage. This leaves Christine with a much simpler choice: a dashing hottie who wears a mask, or a dashing hottie who doesn’t? And in this production, it’s hard to care about what she decides. RICHARD SPEER. see it: The Phantom of the Opera is at the Keller Auditorium, 222 SW Clay St., 248-4335. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Saturday, 1 pm Thursday, 2 pm Saturday, May 20-23. $34-$129. Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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may 20–26
Our Country’s Good
A crew of Royal Marines and its convict charges wax theatrical after mooring in the jailhouse colony Great Britain made of Australia. Optimism and comfort are hard to come by, so one aspirational lieutenant hatches a plan to stage a comedy with the thieves and murderers as the cast. A little historical and unabashedly metafictional, this play is a more serious selection from Hillsboro’s slapstick Bag & Baggage crew. Venetian Theatre, 253 E Main St., Hillsboro, 693-3953. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sundays through May 31. $26-$30.
Ramona Quimby
Portlander Beverly Cleary’s obnoxious yet somehow beloved thirdgrader is up for big adventures. In Oregon Children’s Theatre’s play about the very average Quimby family on Northeast Klickitat Street, Ramona gets in sisterly tiffs and navigates the big world of grade-school drama. Newmark Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 2 pm and 5pm Saturdays 11 am and 2 pm Sundays through May 31. $18-$30.
Static
Scottish playwright Dan Rebellato pits the power of rock against the sound of silence. The production is a tragi-comedy with only four characters, and it’s bilingual in English and American Sign Language. Chris—a music fanatic who lost his hearing in an accident several years prior to the start of the play— dies unexpectedly, leaving his wife Sarah with a mixtape and a perplexing question. Why would a deaf man make a mixtape? Sound is key here, with nostalgic tracks from the Who, the Beatles and the Smiths degenerating into darkness and static amplified to a volume you can feel. But watching his survivors cope with loss, the play’s pathos feels flat. Chris is gone before we grow attached, so it’s hard to miss him, especially since he lingers in the play as a ghost. If Static is anything, it’s a love letter to the mixtape. The play stabs at the sterility of digital media. And unraveling the mixtape mystery occupies most of the play. Imago Theatre, 17 SE 8th Ave., 2313959. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Saturday, 2 pm Sundays, through May 24. $24-$47.
Storefront Revue: The Babes are Back
Three songs after the Kent State shootings, a man unbuttons his costume to expose a massive, starspangled phallus. Like Storefront Theater, the notorious 1970s-’90s Portland theater that inspired it, Triangle Productions’ play is a constant, rainbow-hued provocation. Triangle founder Don Horn pieced the script together from stacks of old Storefront scripts and scenes he wrote himself about the company’s history. Triangle’s spectacularized dramedy jumps between wildly different scened: the ensemble cast protesting, one actress sharing a blowjob story backstage, three actors dressed as technicolor dinosaurs. Horn’s historical sections are a necessary, grounding foil to the play’s outrageous musical numbers, but they feel tacked-on. The play is best as a bedazzled “greatest hits” production. An actor, dressed in what can only be described as an iconic rape-van costume, throws candy into the audience while the cast sings, “No, no, don’t get in his car.” Even through a black-lit strip tease and the ditty “Eat Your Fucking Cornflakes,” Storefront Revue never lets us forget its history. If you nitpick, you’ll see flaws, but who’s looking that closely at a patriotic phallus with tinsel for pubic hair? Sanctuary at Sandy Plaza, 1785 NE Sandy Blvd., 239-5919. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday through May 30. $15.
The Lion
Guitarist Benjamin Scheuer’s one-man show is a bildungsroman of fatherand-son stories, set to music. Scheuer, wearing business-casual slacks on a plain stage, alternates between six guitars and sings folksy ballads about banjos, cookie tins and other heartwarming things. Gerding Theater, 128 NW 11th Ave., 445-3700. 7:30 pm
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Tuesday-Sunday, noon Thursdays, 2 pm Saturday-Sunday through June 14. $25-$50.
The Undiscovered Country
Defunkt’s dark tale of addiction follows the demise of a group of friends, made up of three couples, as it spirals out of control. The play is all explicit, drugtripping episodes and provocative sex scenes on a minimalist stage at Back Door Theater. The flamboyant narrator and drug-dealer Terry (Matthew Kern) leads a four-person cast and provides for its characters’ plentiful narcotic needs. It’s an unglamorous portrait of drugged-out relationships. Terry’s onenight stand with his conquest Richie (Spencer Conway) has an unexpectedly complicated aftermath; Rebecca (Lyn Sher) jumps off a roof as the play begins, sending her girlfriend Jess (powerfully acted by Lauren Modica) into drugged-out mourning; closeted Tony (also played by Conway) and his cracked-out girlfriend Angie (also played by Sher) yell in drug-induced arguments about who’s picking up the beer. Reminiscent of a bad thriller where the group dwindles down to one forsaken victim, The Undiscovered Country is a dark, opiate-filled, waiting game. It would be a dreary, tiresome tale if not for the tiny cast’s strong performances. After all, it’s just a matter of time until the next character overdoses. AMY WOLFE. Back Door Theatre, 4319 SE Hawthorne Blvd, 4812960. 7:30 pm Thursdays-Sundays through June 20. Pay-what-youcan Thursdays and Sundays, $15-$25 Friday-Saturday.
COMEDY & VARIETY Bats in the Belfry
Like a delightful romp through posttraumatic stress disorder, Bats in the Belfry promises an “improvised adventure” comedy about mental illness, delving into how we’re all crazy and should probably be medicated into sanity. But let’s laugh at ourselves instead. Brody Theater, 16 NW Broadway, 224-2227. 8 pm Saturdays through May 30. $12.
Dan Soder
Dan Soder is a small-town Colorado kid who moved to the Big Apple six years ago to chase big standup dreams. The youthful comic picks on the millennial generation and its contribution to ruining society in his sets, and is on shows such as Comedy Central’s The Half Hour and MTV2’s Guy Code. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 888-643-8669. 8 pm Thursday, 7:30 and 10 pm FridaySaturday. $15 general admission, $23 reserved.
Funny Humans vs. the Wheel
If you go to enough shows around town, you start to memorize comedians’ sets. Think of this weekly show, hosted by silly duo Adam Pasi and David Mascorro, as an antidote to all that repetition: Comedians start out with a planned set, but halfway through, they have to spin a wheel to determine what comes next—crowd work, one-liners, maybe even a heckle battle. Bar of the Gods, 4801 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 232-2037. 9 pm every Sunday. Free. 21+.
Helium Open Mic
Generally regarded as the best openmic night in town, Helium’s sign-ups fill quickly. Show up between 6 and 7 pm to snag some stage time. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 888643-8669. 8 pm every Tuesday. Free with a two-item minimum. 21+.
Minority Retort
A standup show produced by Jeremy Eli and Jason Lamb that gives the spotlight to comedians of color. Tonight’s lineup includes Nathan Brannon, Katie Nguyen, Crystal Davis, Anthony Lopez and David Mascorro. Curious Comedy, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 9:30 pm every fourth Friday. $7.
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
Naked Comedy Open Mic
REVIEW BRuD GILES
PERFORMANCE
The Brody hosts a thrice-weekly openmic night. Comics get four-minute standup slots and can sign up online. Brody Theater, 16 NW Broadway, 224-2227. 9:30 pm every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Free with one-item minimum purchase.
Open Court
Team-based, long-form improv open to audience members and performers of all stripes. Curious Comedy, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 7:30 pm every Thursday. $5.
Random Acts of Comedy
Curious Comedy puts on a freewheeling show that brings together sketch, standup and improv. Curious Comedy, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 9:30 pm every Saturday. $7-$10.
DANCE Cosmosis
BodyVox brings in Carnegie Hall alums, the Amphion String Quartet, to soundtrack a contemporary dance and film performance with acoustic versions of Elliott Smith and Samuel Barber. This multimedia showcase is a world premiere from partners and co-artistic directors Ashley Roland and Jamey Hampton, whose unique shows reveal their past choreographing for operas and films. BodyVox Dance Center, 1201 NW 17th Ave., 229-0627. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday; 2 pm Saturday, May 30 and June 6; through June 6. $25-$64.
Pastie Pageant
A nine-week-long competition, the Pastie Pageant promises a mix of RuPaul’s Drag Race and Survivor, with burlesque and boylesque dancers competing weekly for the winning prize. Designed to hone the skills of up-and-comers, the pageant picks a musical theme and a random skill each week that must be incorporated into the following week’s acts. Produced by Zane Phoenix, expect a rotating panel of judges each week with some of Portland’s best in burlesque. Funhouse Lounge, 2432 SE 11th Ave., 841-6734. 9:30 pm Thursdays through June 11. $7-$10. 21+.
Pepper & Bones Anniversary Show
Dee Dee Pepper and Wanda Bones celebrate the first anniversary of their love child, the burlesque striptease show Pepper & Bones. Guests Scarlett Thrustmore, Kit Katostrophic and popn-lock royalty Angelique DeVil join the duo, whose signature acts are kinky duo strips and interactive games. This one promises cocktails, beautiful people and kissing strangers. In that order. Funhouse Lounge, 2432 SE 11th Ave., 841-6734. 10 pm Friday, 12:30 am Saturday, May 22-23. $10. 21+.
The Portland Ballet Spring Concert
Oregon Ballet Theatre’s new co-artistic director Anne Mueller debuts her new Carioca show alongside the youth ballet’s spring buffet of dance. Pieces range from classical to contemporary with excerpts from Sleeping Beauty, Tchaikovsky Pas de Deux and BodyVox’s Josie Moseley, whose shoeless, acrobatic pieces are compared to Martha Graham. Lincoln Hall, Portland State University, 1620 SW Park Ave., 725-3307. 7 pm Friday-Saturday, May 22-23. $10-$25. All ages.
The Rocklesque Revue
Drag queens and burlesque femme fatales join forces for one head-banging night inspired by classic rock. Led by burlesque’s official “Glittering Misfit” and Rose City Shimmy member Baby Le’Strange, plus a whole list of flamboyant names such as Dangrrr Doll, Carla Rossi, Rummy Rose and Bettie Velo. It’s like the Rolling Stones, but with hips. Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St., 226-6630. 9 pm Wednesday, May 20. $10 advance, $12 door, $45 VIP reserved table for four. 21+.
For more Performance listings, visit
burned out: (From left) isaac Lamb, brian Adrian Koch, Kemba shannon and Cristi Miles.
MR. BURNS: A POST-ELECTRIC PLAY (PORTLAND PLAYHOUSE) The Simpsons is a cultural institution. Gen-Xers grew up with it. Many millennials have never known a world without it. Even a few baby boomers embraced its irreverent, referential humor. But what if we had The Simpsons, and nothing else? That’s the question posed by Anne Washburn’s Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play at Portland Playhouse, where the characters try to rebuild their post-apocalyptic world using The Simpsons episodes as creation allegories. It begins a few months after a vague nuclear disaster has wiped out human civilization. A few survivors huddle around a campfire, drinking PBR and trying to remember “Cape Feare” line by line. But Mr. Burns is not 2½ hours of characters quoting The Simpsons. Washburn is more interested in the TV show as a shared cultural experience. During the course of three acts, we see it morph from a bonding tool into a business and ultimately into a religion. Mr. Burns’ first act is staged around a campfire in the yard adjacent to Portland Playhouse. The sounds of cars speeding along MLK Boulevard and neighbors blasting “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head” set the tone. But these distractions fade quickly enough as the characters reminisce further and further into the seminal Simpsons episode and Bernard Herrmann’s ominous score. This is a premise that could only work with The Simpsons. And it functions very well, assuming you can restrain yourself from correcting the characters who don’t remember the lines as well as you do. Then we jump ahead seven years and head into the basement for the second act. (Brian Weaver’s ambitious direction moves the audience with each act, from the courtyard to the Playhouse basement to the auditorium of the repurposed church.) The crew of survivors are now a traveling troupe performing The Simpsons episodes they have the rights to, bartering for new lines, performing commercials and singing pop songs. Like a theatrical game of telephone, The Simpsons source material morphs as more and more time passes from the last time any of the characters saw the show. Quotations turn inaccurate; impersonations are off; the stories change. The Simpsons characters take on more archetypal roles, like Bart the defiant hero and Homer the fool. Itchy and Scratchy become the Devil’s right-hand men, and the villainous Sideshow Bob is replaced by Mr. Burns, a fitting change in a land ravaged by nuclear fallout. But it’s all believable. Candlelit paths leading the audience between acts add to the play’s post-electric vibe. We should all be thankful that BridgePort’s Conviction Pale Ale also apparently survived the end of civilization. As someone who frequently interacts with others through a mishmash of Simpsons quotes, Monty Python lines and other random TV show dialogue, I find Mr Burns inherently interesting. We are all pop culture consumers and recyclers. Will pop culture survive after the rest of society ends? Will that time Harvey Birdman traveled back in time to argue in a caveman court become the creation myth for a new world order? We can only hope it has the same humor and symbolism of a world where “Cape Feare” is an allegory for Genesis. JOHN LOCANTHI.
What if only The Simpsons survived?
see it: Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play is at Portland Playhouse, 602 NE Prescott St., 488-5822. 8:30 pm Wednesdays-Saturdays, 2 pm Sundays through June 7. $20-$36.
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VISUAL ARTS
may 20–26
= WW Pick. Highly recommended. By MEGAN HARNED. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, submit show information—including opening and closing dates, gallery address and phone number—at least two weeks in advance to: Visual Arts, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Email: mharned@wweek.com.
Cash For Your Banksy
CFYB is the brainchild of artist and curator “Mad One.” The project began in late 2013 in response to the ongoing attention to the artist known as Banksy and to an art market that treats paintings and sculptures as investments similar to real estate and gold. Through stickers, stencils, plastic signs and installations, Cash For Your Banksy has been a subtly hilarious part of the urban landscape and the art market for the past couple of years throughout Portland and other major cities. Through May 30. Future Shock, 1914 E Burnside St., 327-8473.
Emily Counts: The Ins and Outs
Holes, perforations, and protrusions dominate the surfaces of Emily Counts’ ceramic sculptures in her exhibition of new work. Although largely abstract, her forms have a bodily presence— those repeated interruptions recall pores, faces and sexual organs. By playing with scale and materials, Counts pushes traditional symbols of celebration and condolence into complex, unwieldy icons. Are they Freudian, feminist or just weird? You’ll have to see and decide for yourself. Through June 1. Nationale, 3360 SE Division St., 477-9786.
Fluid
Jaws returns to the water by ryan Woodring
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
Ceramic pieces, whether utilitarian or purely aesthetic, start out with soft, wet, pliable clay and end up hard and fragile. But the artists in Fluid, Peter Christian Johnson and Bobby Silverman, carry clay’s initial wet look over into their finished pieces, with sometimes disconcerting results. To see a ceramic artwork that appears to have water, slime, honey or molten lava flowing across it, is like looking at something that ought to be impossible. Not only is it a technical feat, it also sets up a cognitive dissonance that bids us re-examine our preconceptions of the medium itself. April 3-May 30. Eutectic Gallery, 1930 NE Oregon St., 974-6518.
Mothmeister’s Wounderland: Surreal World of Imagination, Nightmares and Taxidermy
Mothmeister is an artistic, taxidermyloving duo based in Antwerp, Belgium. They anthropomorphize their bestial preserves with outfits and masks as a reaction against the dominant exhibitionism of selfie culture and beauty standards marketed by mass media. Is it a lot of contemporary affect to justify playing with dead animals, or is there real critique of our ever present narcissism and surveillance state? Only one way to find out! Through June 9. Paxton Gate, 4204 N Mississippi Ave., 719-4508.
PICA: Celebrating 20 Years, Reflecting on the First Decade
How long has PICA been an artistic mainstay? Twenty years, according to the curated retrospective of the first decade, from 1995 to 2005. Those early years were lead by founder Kristy Edmunds, whose unique vision included emerging and established regional, national and international artists. Her legacy lives on in the annual Time-Based Art Festival that includes visual, sound, dance and performing arts. At 5 pm Wednesday, May 6, Elizabeth Leach Gallery will host a conversation with Edmunds and Kristan Kennedy, PICA’s visual art curator. Through June 27. Elizabeth Leach Gallery, 417 NW 9th Ave., 2240521.
Ryan Woodring: Jaws Returns to the Water
A looped animation of the fictional shark (from the now-extinct, eponymous ride at Universal Orlando) is projected onto the surface of a painting on panel. Covered layer by layer in cast and painted acrylic, the painting was used to create the animation, drawing from amateur video footage taken by a rider. The loop continuously replays the part of the ride in which the animatronic shark fatally bites into , seeming to be killed and
resurrected in succession by the same electrical current. Woodring’s work is appearing as part of Aprés-Upfor, an after-hours program of moving-image art playing from 6 pm to midnight in Upfor Gallery’s storefront. Ongoing. Upfor, 929 NW Flanders St., 227-5111.
Those Days are Over
Jeremy Okai Davis created his latest series from photographs of a group of friends on vacation in the ’80s. Davis is interested in images of people that evoke warm nostalgia and the idea of recreating those feelings through painting. To achieve this he’s blown up the scale of many of the photographs so viewers can immerse themselves in the scene. The casual interactions among friends recall Renoir’s outdoor dance scenes, but Davis’ manner of capturing the subtle gradations of the ‘80s color palette through pixelated brush strokes creates the experience of viewing memories from a different time and place. Through May 29. Duplex, 219 NW Couch St., 206-5089.
Tight Rope: New Paintings by Arvie Smith
Tight Rope is a collection of powerful works linking our troubled past to our equally troubled present. About his work, local artist and educator Arvie Smith says “By critiquing atrocities and oppression, by creating images that foment dialogue, I hope my work makes the repeat of those atrocities and injustices less likely.” If reading about other experiences doesn’t always create empathy between people divided by race, class, religion, and sexuality, it’s my and many artists’ hope that art will reach across those divides more directly to help us experience our shared humanity. Through June 12. Mark Woolley Gallery @ Pioneer, 700 SW 5th Ave., 3rd floor, Pioneer Place Mall, 998-4152.
For more Visual Arts listings, visit
BOOKS
MAY 20–26
= WW Pick. Highly recommended. By PENELOPE BASS. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, submit lecture or reading information at least two weeks in advance to: WORDS, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Email: words@wweek.com. Fax: 243-1115.
WEDNESDAY, MAY 20
SATURDAY, MAY 23
Lucia Perillo and Glen Moore
Daniel H. Wilson
Since 1988, jazz bassist Glen Moore (co-founder of the group Oregon) has collaborated with the Mountain Writers Series to perform alongside poets such as Billy Collins, Linda Gregg and Marvin Bell, adding a little sophistication to otherwise rowdy affairs. Joining him this month will be Olympia, Wash., poet and Pulitzer Prize finalist Lucia Perillo, most recently author of Spectrum of Possible Deaths. Vie de Boheme, 1530 SE 7th Ave., 360-1233. 7:30 pm. $10 suggested admission, $5 students and seniors.
THURSDAY, MAY 21 Walidah Imarisha
Educator, writer and spokenword artist Walidah Imarisha has been asking the question, “Why aren’t there more black people in Oregon?” in her popular discussion for Oregon Humanities’ Conversation Project. Now Imarisha will be the featured speaker for the 2015 Think & Drink series focusing on resistance, justice and reconciliation. Imarisha will speak about the history of continuity and resistance in Oregon’s black communities, as well as alternatives to incarceration and social change. Alberta Rose Theatre, 3000 NE Alberta St., 719-6055. 7 pm. $10, minors allowed with parent or guardian. 21+.
Kirsten Rian
Kirsten Rian—longtime writer, multidisciplinary artist and current poetry editor for The Oregonian—attempts to make connections through storytelling, whether that’s with words, pictures, video, music or even mathematical equations. She will read from her new collection of poetry, Life Expectancy, because sometimes the universe gives you a sign, or cosine. Broadway Books, 1714 NE Broadway, 284-1726. 7 pm. Free.
Bill Kreutzmann
Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann explores his experiences touring, performing more than 2,300 concerts and how the loss of Jerry Garcia still affects him in his new autobiography, Deal: My Three Decades of Drumming, Dreams, and Drugs with the Grateful Dead. He will be joined for a Q&A with co-author Benjy Eisen. Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing, 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd., Beaverton, 800-878-7323. 7 pm. Free.
Lucas Mann
When Lucas Mann was age 13, his older brother Josh died of a heroin overdose. In his new memoir, Lord Fear, Mann attempts to reconstruct the shards of memories about his brother’s life into a more complete picture while discovering his own motivations and still-complicated feelings. Powell’s on Hawthorne, 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 800-878-7323. 7:30 pm. Free.
FRIDAY, MAY 22 Jillian Lauren
In her 20s, Jillian Lauren had dropped out of college, developed a drug addiction and become a concubine in the Prince of Brunei’s harem. She rose to fame with the release of her memoir detailing those years, Some Girls. But her life changed drastically again when Lauren and her husband, Weezer bassist Scott Shriner, adopted an Ethiopian child with special needs, chronicled in Everything You Ever Wanted. Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 800-878-7323. 7:30 pm. Free.
Portland author, robotics engineer and New York Times bestselling author Daniel H. Wilson (Robopocalypse, Robogenesis) will read, talk about his work and share his paranoia about the inevitable robot uprising. Might as well be prepared. Multnomah County Library— Northwest Branch, 2300 NW Thurman St., 988-5560. 3-4:30 pm. Free tickets available 30 minutes in advance.
TUESDAY, MAY 26 Stacy Wakefield and Ash Thayer
In 1994, Stacy Wakefield published her first book about the squatting movement, based on her experiences, in the underground hit Not for Rent. Her new novel returns to the squatter scene of ’90s Brooklyn in The Sunshine Crust Baking Factory. Joining her for a reading will be Ash Thayer, whose new book, Kill City, is a compilation of photographs taken while she too lived among squatters in New York City. Reading Frenzy, 3628 N Mississippi Ave., 274-8044. 7 pm. Free.
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REVIEW
GREG RUCKA AND JUSTIN GREENWOOD, STUMPTOWN, VOL. 3 Forget what Portlandia or Portland Monthly would have you believe. Scratch the skin of this town and you come up with dirt under your fingernails— theft rings under bridges, child prostitution, White Russians hooked on black tar heroin. Darkness on the edge of Bridgetown. Greg Rucka, the Eisner Awardwinning author of private-eye noir comic Stumptown, understands this deeply, and in the third volume of his now-iconic series (Oni Press, 144 pages, $29.99), Portland seethes with darkness and menace, even at a sunny, summertime soccer friendly, or a Portland Timbers match later in the day. The latent violence of the soccer chant and the animus toward opposing fans or scalpers at the gates—one of whom reportedly brawled with a Timbers fan in 2013—rise uncomfortably to the surface. After a match against the Seattle Sounders, a Timbers Army vet is brutally beaten into a coma, a Sounders scarf found strewn across a nearby hedge. The victim’s a good friend of Dex—the gruff-with-a-heart-of-gold owner of Stumptown Investigations, and one of the more rounded female characters in comics, a creature blending ill-concealed rage with solicitous familial care and a healthy (as opposed to cartoonish) libido. Much of the plot involves her hunt for the assailants, but the book digs just as deeply into Dex herself. Justin Greenwood’s art is expressionistic in the old Weimar film style. Characters’ faces contort and shift with their moods, or are heavily shadowed over. Greenwood took over as artist from Seattle’s Matthew Southworth for this volume, and in place of the clean-lined intricacy of those books, the panels can seem sketchy in places; this occasionally verges on unmolded clay, but at its best it’s the nightmare vision at the corner of the eye. But the steady grimness of Stumptown’s Portland can stretch credulity. A pack of white-bread 107ists as hard-bitten street gang could just as easily be a Portlandia sketch as serious noir, but in Rucka’s alternate-universe Rose City there are dank soccer dives dangerous as a biker bars in Texas, with violent MS13ers occupying the suites at Providence Park. Rucka’s writing is usually good enough to sell each scene, even as the relentless seaminess—though leavened with heartening, unsentimental notions of community—sometimes tips too far over the line. But consider this book an antidote to the quirky Portland hoo-ha of the airline magazines and Japanese guidebooks, an ode to the very real darkness that’s always getting swept under the PDX carpet. MATTHEW KORFHAGE.
Friday, May 22nd through Monday, May 25th 10am to 7pm all days! 1000’s of New CDs! 1000’s of Used CDs! 1000’s of New & Used Vinyl! DVDs, Books & Other Surprises!
Save up to 70%!
HELIO SEQUENCE RECORD RELEASE EVENT! WEDNESDAY, MAY 20TH AT 7PM
The Helio Sequence have just released their self-titled 6th album, a renewed push forward for the longtime Portland Indie Rock stalwarts. Crisscrossing vocals and crosstalking guitars and drums map a broad swirl of emotions. There’s a delightful candor to The Helio Sequence, an openness that is a rare and special feat for a band about to enter its third decade.
BARNA HOWARD SATURDAY, MAY 23RD AT 3PM
The songs on Barna Howard’s second album, Quite A Feelin’, ruminate on his relationship with home. Now entrenched in Portland, Oregon, these tracks immortalize and reflect on the Mississippi he once knew, while others focus on the relationships that define his new home out west. Small town life has long been celebrated in country and folk music, but Howard’s knack for capturing his own deeply personal nostalgia resonates in a rarely universal way.
PURUSA
SUNDAY, MAY 24TH AT 5PM Purusa is a Portland based rock band that toured the West coast heavily between 2000-2004. Citing influences as diverse as Toad the Wet Sprocket, Stevie Wonder, and Stevie Ray Vaughn, the band’s distinct soul-infused alternative rock sound helped build a strong following. This performance is one of only two shows the band will play in 2015.
MINI MANSIONS MONDAY, MAY 25TH AT 5PM
Hailing from California, Mini Mansions’ (a side project of QOTSA’s Michael Shuman) musical venture was born organically (jam sessions turned into recordings), fated from a shared love of punk rock and melody. The new album’s entire song cycle teems with that kind of surprising discovery, while embracing dreamy psychedelic pop and 80’s new wave.
GO: Greg Rucka reads from Stumptown, Vol. 3, on Tuesday, May 26, at Powell’s on Hawthorne, 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd., powells. com. 7:30 pm. Free. Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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MUSICFE STNW
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FOSTER THE PEOPLE
BEIRUT
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ALL AGES! TICKETS ON SALE NOW!
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
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FRIDAY
DAYS OF MUSIC
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AUGUST 21-23
MISTERWIVES MILO GREENE LOST LANDER
BELLE AND SEBASTIAN TWIN SHADOW BATTLES TITLE FIGHT CAYUCAS TALK IN TONGUES SALES ALIALUJAH CHOIR
THE TALLEST MAN ON EARTH DANNY BROWN THE HELIO SEQUENCE LADY LAMB STRAND OF OAKS PURE BATHING CULTURE DIVERS BEAT CONNECTION
may 20–26
= WW Pick. Highly recommended. Editor: ENID SPITZ. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, send screening information at least two weeks in advance to Screen, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Email: espitz@wweek.com. Fax: 243-1115.
OPENING THIS WEEK Bigger Than Life
A Rebel Without a Cause has a per-
fectly legitimate hold on the popular imagination, but 1956’s Bigger Than Life might be Nicholas Ray’s greatest triumph. James Mason stars as terminally ill schoolteacher Ed Avery, whose only hope for recovery is a course of cortisone treatments that hurls him into a bipolar breakdown. It’s a riveting trip through the overlapping rings of a domestic hell, and whether you see it as a study of patriarchal sadism, a glimpse into addiction’s punishing circuits, or an examination of mental illness, the important thing is that you see it. In 1963, Jean-Luc Godard ranked it among the 10 best American sound films ever made. I wouldn’t go that far in 2015, but Godard was not wrong. CHRIS STAMM. Northwest Film Center. 6 pm Saturday, 7 pm Sunday, May 23-24.
Good Kill
C Hollywood targets drones in this
psychological war drama, directed by Andrew Niccol (The Truman Show), about remote pilots navigating the treacherous border between backyard barbecues and a job that resembles a lethal game of Wii. Grounded fighter pilots, like Ethan Hawke’s vodka-swilling Maj. Thomas Egan, fly drones from a shipping crate unceremoniously plopped down outside Las Vegas. When the CIA recognizes Egan’s talents, his team becomes the agency’s minions, indiscriminately bombing Yemen on orders from a bodiless voice on speakerphone. The plot is as stale as the Nevada air: Military authority clashes with personal morality. Hawke punches mirrors and speeds around in a 1968 Pontiac Firebird. January Jones (Mad Men) is again the slighted housewife; Bruce Greenwood (Star Trek) as Col. Johns perpetually reminds the rank-and-file that they are fucking numbskulls and we are in a goddamn war, roger? Good Kill attempts innovation by adding drones, but the same old war movie tropes weigh it down. R. ENID SPITZ. Cinema 21.
On Dangerous Ground
B+ Nicholas Ray’s 1951 crime drama is a dark trip rife with masochistic energy and bleak declivities. Like Ray’s noirish 1950 masterpiece, In a Lonely Place, On Dangerous Ground takes the basic ingredients of a potboiler— in this case, a hardened New York City cop is sent upstate to investigate the murder of a young girl—and cooks it down until only despair remains. The redemptive conclusion is a cheat, but it really doesn’t matter, because the dark momentum leading up to it is strong enough to send viewers into the end credits feeling properly battered and bruised. NR. CHRIS STAMM. Northwest Film Center. 2 pm Sunday, 7 pm Monday, May 24-25.
Poltergeist
Yet another remake of Steven Spielberg’s 1982 haunted-house flick in which the Bowen family (parented by Sam Rockwell and Rosemarie DeWitt) find their new suburban home occupied by evil forces. This time, Oscarnominated Gil Kenan (Monster House) and Sami Raimi (The Grudge) tell the supernatural kidnapping tale. PG13. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Pioneer Place.
Tomorrowland
George Clooney, as grown-up boy genius Frank, explores the retrofuturistic universe of Disney’s Tomorrowland. He buddies up with a robot (Mr. Selfridge’s Raffey Cassidy) and a bright young thing (Britt Robertson) to ogle jet packs and Space Mountain in this newest tour of the Magic Kingdom from Brad Bird (The Incredibles) and the co-creator of Lost. Screened after deadline. Look for
Alex Falcone’s review on wweek.com. PG. Bagdad, Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Cinetopia, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, St. Johns Theater.
STILL SHOWING 5 Flights Up
C+ Completely reliant on the warmth
and goodwill generated by its stars, this AARP-oriented dramedy strikes all the familiar chords. Retired teacher Ruth (Diane Keaton) and painter Alex (Morgan Freeman), with a niece (Cynthia Nixon, Sex and the City) as their broker, put their place on the market. It’s hard to see why this warranted a feature film, except for the welcome chance to enjoy Keaton and Freeman coasting in what’s essentially a TV movie. PG-13. BRIAN MILLER. Living Room Theaters.
fucking stupid. But if you lower your expectations, it’s also kind of a blast. R. AP KRYZA. Avalon, Vancouver.
Cinderella
D+ Kenneth Branagh’s tiresome liveaction retcon of the girl in the glass slipper. PG. JOHN LOCANTHI. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Empirical.
Clouds of Sils Maria
B- Directed by Olivier Assayas (Paris,
je t’aime), this meta-narrative about an immensely talented, and uncomfortably aging, actress named Maria is as foggy as its titular clouds. Juliet Binoche as Maria and Kristen Stewart as her savvy assistant, Valentine, wax philosophical and run lines for Maria’s next role, as the actress grapples with her waning fame. R. KELLY MCCRILLIS. Living Room Theaters.
Danny Collins
B This simultaneously hackneyed and
likable rock-’n’-roll redemption tale follows Al Pacino as Danny, a music celebrity who, 40 years after the fact, discovers John Lennon wrote him a letter telling him to stay true to his art. Pacino makes even the shortest moment of banter feel genuine. R. SEAN AXMAKER. Academy.
The D Train
C Dan Landsman (Jack Black) is an
alumni committee chairman trying to round up the class of ’94 for its 20th reunion. He wasn’t popular. Even the rest of the committee makes fun of him. But Dan gets an epiphany: He’s going to bring the star of a commercial, the coolest kid in the class of ’94, to the reunion. By roping in Oliver Lawless (James Marsden), Dan is con-
vinced he’ll finally earn the acceptance he has craved for 20 years. But The D Train can’t tie its mound of plot material together, so it retreats into the warm embrace of cheap laughs. It’s an odd film that mostly exists to show Jack Black make out with James Marsden. PG. JOHN LOCANTHI. Bridgeport.
Dior and I
B+ “My work is my life’s reason,” says king of couture Christian Dior in this decadent look at the work—or work of art—that is high fashion. NR. KATE PEIFER. Fox Tower.
Ex Machina
B- Frankenstein’s monster is easy on the eyes in Ex Machina, Alex Garland’s sexualized science-fiction tale of a coder named Caleb (Domhnall
REVIEW COURTESY OF MAGNOLIA PICTURES
MOVIES
’71
D Behind Enemy Lines, as seen through the eyes of an abandoned British soldier in the midst of the Troubles of 1971 Belfast. ’71’s excellent pacing and a well-crafted, character-driven plot manage to evoke comparisons to films like Scorsese’s Departed. R. PARKER HALL. Academy, Laurelhurst Theater.
The Age of Adaline
B Though the wisp of a plot could never achieve the epic romance trailers promise, this is the nearest chick flicks have come to the superhero blueprint. Adaline doesn’t fight her way out of trouble but dominates through unerring good taste and a particular set of skills (like conversational Portuguese). Her foes, beyond the government agents following her, are all overeager suitors until Ellis Jones (Michiel Huisman) wins her over. Their love is pleasant, if pointless, until a weekend trip to meet Ellis’ parents brings Adaline face to face with an old beau (Harrison Ford), who happens to be her new beau’s father. This is typical 20th-century cinema, and the character of Adaline isn’t especially rewarding either. PG-13. JAY HORTON. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Cinetopia, Living Room Theaters, Bridgeport, City Center, Division.
in bloom: iris Apfel.
IRIS
GREY GARDENS ’ DOCUMENTARIAN PROFILES A 93-YEAR-OLD FASHION ECCENTRIC. by e N id sP itz espitz@wweek.com
Adult Beginners
C- Nick Kroll’s Jake, a failed Manhattan tech financier, is forced back to his family’s New York mansion with his estranged sister (Rose Byrne), adorably hunky brother-in-law (Bobby Cannavale), and their neglected toddler. Kroll feels forced into the role too but an effervescent Joel McHale as Jake’s buoyant cokehead chum gives Adult Beginners its actual life. R. JAY HORTON. Laurelhurst.
Avengers: Age of Ultron
A- If you loved The Avengers: You’ll squee all over yourself because, man, everything looks so cool! You’ll love the portrayal of Ultron from the ramshackle first appearance to the smooth and witty version with even more personality than in the comics. But if you got dragged to the movie: Buckle up, it’s gonna be a long ride. Between giant, smashy fights, each of the 2,000 characters gets a dark past, a love story, a moment of self doubt, and a separate resolution. In between, there’s lots of fighting, too often just two indestructible characters bashing each other into stuff. PG-13. ALEX FALCONE. Bagdad, Cedar Hills, Clackamas, CineMagic, Bridgeport, City Center, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, St. Johns Cinemas.
Chappie
B- Essentially a mashup of Short Circuit, Robocop and assorted directto-video action films from the ’80s. It’s all to say that Chappie is pretty
CONT. on page 39
In Grey Gardens, Onassis relative Little Edie obsessively wraps and rewraps her head scarf to make it perfect, in a bedroom with holes in the walls and cat litter strewn around her feet. In Iris, a new film by the same director, fashion icon Iris Apfel weighs herself down with enough lacquered bangles to rival her body weight, and walks to New York Fashion Week. You may think you’re watching a documentary about Apfel, a nonagenarian decorator who collects otherworldly jewelry. What you’re really watching is an exposé of its director, the late Albert Maysles, an octogenarian film icon who collected otherworldly souls. Iris, Maysles’ penultimate film before dying at 88 in March, disrobes the avant-garde world of a 93-year-old interior designer who’s notorious for her gargantuan eyeglasses, for the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibit dedicated to her, and for designing White House interiors under nine presidents. She shuffles through crowds with Karl Lagerfeld types, wearing enough magenta beads to hold her wrinkled neck up straight. And she models her favorite outfits for the camera: a bracelet of lacquered ladybugs as large as mice, a Mao tunic and even more curious curations. The film mindfully tours viewers through Apfel’s life. Vintage photo collages show her hum-
ble beginnings in Queens as the daughter of a small glass business owner and his fashionable Jewish wife. Interviews with fashion demigods, such as Dries van Noten, detail Apfel’s Depression-era coming of age and her successful Old World Weavers textile company with husband Carl. But this is no dramatic exploitation of a bizarro eccentric. Iris documentarian Albert Maysles and his brother David, who died in 1987, are credited as the fathers of “direct cinema,” the realistic technique that produced such notable films as Grey Gardens (1975) and Gimme Shelter (1970). MTVlike, fly-on-the-wall shooting originated with Albert Maysles and his 16 mm film. Like the subjects in Maysles’ other films, Iris is in no rush. Gimme Shelter showed Mick Jagger roap trip as much as it showed him perform. Salesman (1968) went door to door with Bible salesmen. And Iris is content to say “whatever,” instead of trying to force grandmotherly wisdom. Maysles’ films prove that understatement and patience can be priceless, an unpopular thesis in a Super Size Me world. He documented people, and bands, on the brink of death or disaster. But Iris couldn’t give a rat’s ass if anyone cares for her orange smoking slippers, and Maysles is going to show you those miniscule details whether they bore you to death or not. At her first public appearance in the film, Iris speaks at clothing retailer Loehmann’s 90th anniversary on her 90th birthday. A salesperson presents her a cake, and of course, one pesky candle won’t go out. “It’s like the eternal flame,” Iris said. Iris and its director are like that: an optimistic light that seems like it will slowly burn forever. As with flames, it’s hard to look away. A SEE it: Iris opens Friday at Living Room Theaters and Kiggins Theatre.
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MAY 20–26
Gleeson), whisked away by his genius boss (Oscar Isaac) for a topsecret project, is familiar. But we’re enticed enough to follow along anyway. R. MICHAEL NORDINE. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Hollywood, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center.
Far From the Madding Crowd
B+ Carey Mulligan’s unsmiteable Bathsheba Everdene has little patience for society’s expectations in this stunning adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s 19th-century romance. Despite the progressive youth’s best eff orts, Everdene attracts three suitors. Mulligan’s eff ortlessly free-spirited performance that keeps the classic relevant, as she smirks through her marriage refusals with disconnected amusement. Director Thomas Vinterberg’s widescreen nature shots of the English hills give us time to breathe between the inevitable twists of fate that befall each character. The question is whether the captivating cinematography and Mulligan’s standout performance are enough to refresh what doesn’t amount to much more than another Victorian love story. PG-13 . LAUREN TERRY. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Hollywood, Fox Tower.
now they’re catfi ghting; now they’re straddling each other while driving a bus and shooting guns. There’s also a delightful cameo from Jim Gaffi gan, which just made me wonder why it wasn’t a Jim Gaffi gan movie with a Reese Witherspoon cameo. That would have been great. PG-13. ALEX FALCONE. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Cinetopia, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, St. Johns Theater.
mathematician Alan Turing was an odd duck. Turing pioneered the field of computer science and helped crack Nazi codes. And there’s something to be said for a drama as sturdy and watchable as The Imitation Game. With a story this compelling and a cast this good, it’s difficult not to play along. PG-13. Laurelhurst.
I Am Big Bird
Insurgent
man awkwardly hiding in the bodies of Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch exposes the largely unknown actor as a talented loner within the Sesame Street crew. Luckily, Spinney’s lack of charisma isn’t crippling to the documentary, which has plenty of interesting anecdotes from his 40-plus-year career. NR . ALEX FALCONE. Living Room Theaters.
It Follows
B This documentary about the
The Imitation Game
B As geniuses often are, British
C- A dumb action movie, except with the traditional gender roles reversed . PG-13 . JOHN LOCANTHI . Academy, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Mission, Valley.
A- When your guard is lowered, something truly terrifying like It Follows can burrow into your psyche. We meet Jay (Maika Monroe), who slept with Hugh and
REVIEW COURTESY OF DMC FILMS
MOVIES
Felix and Meira
B- A character study of a Hasidic woman’s un-Orthodox extramarital affair with a sad bachelor. The film stays on familiar emotional terrain, going just far enough to reach a bittersweet truth: even great passion can’t liven up the ambivalent human heart. R. CHRIS STAMM. Living Room Theaters.
Furious 7
A- Furious 7’s action and ridicu-
NEWSLETTER
Beyond the Print
lousness make it perhaps the best yet. Its tribute to Paul Walker, who tragically died (in a high-speed car wreck) before the film wrapped, makes it one of the most affecting movies about things exploding ever made. The central chase scene is frantic and ludicrous, and Dwayne “The Rock” Robinson flexes his sinewy biceps so hard that he breaks a goddamned plaster cast. This time, the team takes on terrorists and Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham), PG-13. AP KRYZA. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Bridgeport, Division, Fox Tower, City Center.
Get Hard
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Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
C+ A movie about a rich white guy hiring a poor black guy to get him ready for a stint in prison. R. JAMES HELMSWORTH. Eastport, Clackamas.
Heaven Adores You
A- The title is wrong. It sounds like a soft-focus TV movie about an angel who dreams of being a runway model. But this film is the most complete attempt to date at telling the story of late singer-songwriter Elliott Smith. We get meditative, straightforward accounts of what it was like to be Smith’s friend, his contemporary, or his bandmate, and the films eventually cuts through the Elliott Smith mythology to remind viewers that it took a lot of money, hardworking hired hands, and dedicated friends to make Steven Paul Smith into Elliott. And shit, it didn’t turn out too great. NR. CASEY JARMAN. Living Room Theaters
Home
A technicolor extraterrestrial descends to Earth. PG. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center.
Hot Pursuit
D Reese Witherspoon applies her blondness to a bumbling Barney Fife-type police offi cer who’s improbably bad at human interactions. She’s paired with Modern Family’s Sofi a Vergara, and the pair goes on a wacky road trip, trying to avoid being shot by a murderous drug cartel. It’s like Chief Wiggum and Jessica Rabbit running from Hans Gruber. There are gags: now they’re “kissing;”
HAGGIS WESTERN: Kodi Smit-McPhee and Michael Fassbender.
SLOW WEST The Old West, with a Scotsman’s twist.
Slow West feels like propaganda made to discourage anyone from timetraveling back to the Old West. At one point, a man gets shot in the chest. As he falls, a stray bullet hits a salt jar on a shelf above him, spilling salt into his gaping wound. Life back then sucked. And that’s precisely what’s so refreshing about this movie: It doesn’t romanticize gunslinging. Instead, it focuses on the day-today indignities of living on a horse, constantly in danger of being robbed, murdered, or caught in a flash flood and forced to ride the next day in your underwear while your only clothes dry out. It makes a dusty genre feel distinctly modern. The audience surrogate in this fascinating unpleasantness is Jay (Kodi Smit-McPhee), a wealthy Scottish boy who sets off across the brutal country in search of his lost love. He makes one face the entire time: stunned but resolute, as if he just stepped in something unexpectedly squishy and wet, but he isn’t about to look down to see what it is. That, for nearly 90 minutes. Meanwhile, he lucks into the protective custody of Silas (Michael Fassbender), a quiet desperado with an improbable number of cigars for a guy living out of his saddlebags. It’s not surprising that this version of the American legend is so unromanticized, since its creator is about as far from a cowboy as you can imagine. If you guessed keyboardist in a Scottish folktronica group from the ’90s, 10 points for Gryffindor! Slow West was written and directed by John Maclean, the former Beta Band member who left music to make this Sundance favorite about people and salt jars getting shot at. While a number of Italian directors helped glorify cowboys in the spaghetti Westerns of the ’60s, this, um, haggis Western, tries hard to undermine the cowboytriarchy. Maclean even chose to film in New Zealand instead of Colorado, meaning the production benefited Middle-earth more than the actual Western states. Consider it the equivalent of a peaty Scotch instead of a fine bourbon—both will get you drunk, robbed and left out in your underpants. ALEX FALCONE. A-
SEE IT: Slow West opens Friday at Cinema 21.
MAY 20–26 caught a curse. Until she sleeps with somebody else, she will be followed by a malicious force. For most of the movie, you’ll be too nervous to think about allegories—and too busy looking over your shoulder. R . AP KRYZA. Academy, Laurelhurst, Valley.
Jupiter Ascending
B A wholly illogical fairy-tale denouement that leaves little expectation of sequels. PG-13 . JAY HORTON . Vancouver.
Kingsman: The Secret Service
A- Remember when spy movies were fun? Kingsman: The Secret Service does. R . Academy, Avalon, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Mission, Vancouver, Valley.
Kumiko: The Treasure Hunter
B+ A lost soul in Tokyo sets off
to unearth Fargo’s fictional buried treasure. NR. MICHAEL NORDINE. Academy, Laurelhurst.
Lambert & Stamp
B+ We followThe Who managers Stamp and Lambert from when they first stumbled on the Who in London’s Mod scene to their bitter separation under charges of mismanagement. There’s enough archival footage to almost make up for the absence of three principal figures. What you have is a story about how a band of unphotogenic people who didn’t like each other, managed by people who had no idea what they were doing and no money, came to be one of the defining rock-and-roll acts of the 20th century. R. JOHN LOCANTHI. Fox Tower.
MOVIES
a Norman Rockwell-style 1940s California seaside where 8-yearold Pepper (Jakob Salvati) misses his dad (Michael Rapaport), a POW being held by the Japanese. So: The earnest, comic-book-crazy kid takes Bible parables literally, inspires the townsfolk and makes everyone believe in miracles. Oh, and Little Boy also overcomes racism. PG-13. SEAN AXMAKER. Clackamas, Division.
The Longest Ride
D+ Bullriding champ Luke (Scott Eastwood) and budding art gallery intern Sophia (Britt Robertson) take hand-holding strolls across North Carolina resortland. This is not Mr. Sparks’ first rodeo. PG-13. JAY HORTON. Clackamas, Bridgeport, Division.
The Lusty Men
B+ One of two 1952 films directed by Nicholas Ray, The Lusty Men stars Robert Mitchum and Arthur Kennedy as a pair of saddle tramps entrenched in the glory and heartbreak (and legbreak and ribbreak and neckbreak) of the rodeo. It doesn’t quite measure up to Ray’s best work, but the film’s long middle stretch offers a compelling and even touching portrait of the homosocial tensions and prickly camaraderie that develops when a group of men is bound by a single, self-destructive compulsion. The Lusty Men eventually stumbles into a tragic finale that it hasn’t engaged us enough to earn, but it’s hard not to love something with Mitchum’s impossible face all over it. NR. CHRIS STAMM. Northwest Film Center. 4:30 pm Sunday, May 24.
Little Boy
B- This home-front family drama of friendship and faith from Roma Downey and Mark Burnett (The Bible and Son of God) is set in
CONT. on page 42
COURTESY OF NEW LINE CINEMA
REVIEW
ELEPHANT Why it’s Portlandy: The 2003 film’s notoriously long shots wind through Portland’s former Whitaker Middle School at Northeast 39th Avenue and Killingsworth Street, a soulsucking labyrinth of water-damaged halls and plastic paneling. The school closed one year before filming, after WW revealed in 2001 it was contaminated with radon gas. The building was demolished in 2007, and in 2013, City Commissioner Nick Fish led an initiative to make the site a community garden. NW Film Center professor Mario Falsetto’s notes: “Made with a mostly nonprofessional cast, it’s a frightening yet poetic response to the issues surrounding teen violence, and leaves the viewer in something of a numbed state.” Van Sant said: “Going postal isn’t accepted—there has to be reason why, because there has to be control. There have to be psychological reasons behind it. It’s too scary to our organized minds.” Best line from the film: (Last line) “Eeny…meeny…miny… moe. Catch a…tiger…by the...toe.” SEE IT: Elephant plays at NW Film Center’s Whitsell Auditorium, 1219 SW Park Ave., on Thursday, May 21. 7 pm. $9. Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
41
A
MAY 20–26
Mad Max: Fury Road
I left the theater feeling like I should take a shower. This is a batshit, dirt-punk world, where the lack of resources has somehow convinced roving bands of ne’er-do-wells there is only one way to survive: make everything look awesome. And they do. It’s as if a world war erupted at Burning Man. This is not to say Fury Road makes any sense. In a world fi ghting over gasoline, the action is a nonstop fi ght scene between souped-up cars with fl ame throwers and a tanker truck full of breast milk. First, a group of people needs to drive one way and try not to die, then they need to drive another way and try not to die. That’s it. Suddenly, Furious 7 seems densely plotted. What’s so amazing is that this nonsensical explodey fuckpile can get away with almost anything. If you loved any part of the original Mad Max trilogy, you won’t be disappointed by it restarting with such vigor. If you don’t know anything about it, you’ll be thrilled to discover a new series. PG-13. ALEX FALCONE . Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, CineMagic, Bridgeport, Division, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, St. Johns Cinema.
McFarland
Having previously assisted underdog baseball and football teams, Kevin Costner now coaches an underdog 1980s track team. There are ethical epiphanies about race relations and being true to oneself. PG. Avalon, Mission, Valley, Vancouver.
Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2
Kevin James takes his daughter to Vegas and saves the world on a Segway. PG. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Pioneer Place.
Pitch Perfect 2
C+ The Barden Bellas are back, riding high on the fame and ego of being three-time national champions—until a wardrobe malfunction turns them into a national disgrace. How’s a band of misfi ts to recapture their glory? Win the world championships (which no American team has ever won). The fi lm immediately falls into the sequel trap, where every joke is an exaggerated version of the same joke from the fi rst movie. The fi lm as a whole becomes a series of questionable choices by Elizabeth Banks, who took the helm as director. The jokes that do land are the ones that don’t try too hard, nailed by Anna Kendrick’s deadpan delivery and some choice cameos by David Cross and Reggie Watts. What ultimately makes Pitch Perfect 2 tolerable enough to sit through are the musical performances. Actual a cappella groups from all over the world make appearances, and they rock. If you’re not a fan of musicals, God help you. PG-13 . PENELOPE BASS. Pioneer Place, Lloyd Center, Eastport, Cedar Hills, Clackamas, City Center, Division, Vancouver.
The Salt of the Earth
B Sebastiao Salgado’s still photos are more alive than most moving pictures. The UNICEF goodwill ambassador equally beautiful and disturbing photographs from Africa hold a magnifying glass to the massive scope of our social and ecological responsibility. NR. KATHRYN PEIFER. Fox Tower.
Tangerines
C+ This somber Estonian fi lm (the country’s fi rst Oscar contender) follows elderly Estonian farmers tending their tangerine orchards as war rages around them. Their existence is mundane until a small battle breaks out on farmer Ivo’s front lawn, leaving two men wounded. Will the two mortal enemies begin to see each other as human as they heal under the care of Ivo the wise and peaceful? Well, duh. NR . AP KRYZA. Living Room Theaters.
True Story
B- Disgraced New York Times
reporter Michael Finkel (Jonah Hill) gets a shot at redemption in this true story based on his 2005 book. Jobless after fabricating the subject of a cover story for the newspaper’s Sunday magazine, Mike tries to get a second chance by getting the story of Oregon murderer Christian Longo (James Franco). R. BRIAN MILLER. Laurelhurst.
Unfriended
B Unfriended ingeniously reboots
the tired, teen horror genre, employing a daunting menu of lo-fi horror strategies to make fear incarnate in an uncloseable browser window. A group of frenemies virtually hanging out gets an uninvited guest using the screen name of a deceased classmate, Laura, who committed suicide after an anonymously posted video exposed her drunken misadventures. R. JAY HORTON. Clackamas, Division, Pioneer Place.
The Water Diviner
D+ Actor-musician Russell Crowe’s feature directorial debut is a dumb and overwrought mess that aims for the heart with a sledgehammer. For two long hours. Crowe stars (of course) as Joshua Connor, a widowed water diviner who treks to Turkey to retrieve the remains of his three dead sons. R. CHRIS STAMM. Bridgeport, Fox Tower.
Welcome to Me
B- Kristen Wiig proves her relatable allure and comedic timing once again, hypnotizing us as Alice Klieg, an Oprah fanatic with borderline personality disorder who wins the lottery. Her dream is to host a two-hour talk show with no theme but herself, and she finds a failing TV station to agree. Segments include five minutes of Alice eating meatloaf made to look like birthday cake and a re-enactment of her college friend’s betrayal, which closes with the credits rolling over Alice as she bawls, “Fuck you to death, Jordana!” At first, director Shira Piven’s pacing is refreshing, but the increasingly uncomplicated plot falls flat compared to the magnetic strangeness of Wiig’s character. Like the fans of her show, we just want to see what Alice does next. R. LAUREN TERRY. Cinema 21.
What We Do in the Shadows
B+ The last thing pop culture needs
is another vampire fl ick. The secondto-last is more reality TV. Leave it to a pack of Kiwis—including Jemaine Clement of Flight of the Conchords fame—to give us both and somehow make vampires and reality TV feel fresh. R. JOHN LOCANTHI. Cinema 21.
While We’re Young
A- This Gen-X midlife-crisis movie is a career-best comedy for both Ben Stiller and Noah Baumbach. Filmmaker Josh (Stiller) and producer wife Cornelia (Naomi Watts) are stalled in careers and marriage. More than a generational clash, this is a satire of an entire class of narcissists (the director included). R. BRIAN MILLER. Kiggins, Cinema 21.
Wild
A- Reese Witherspoon takes a walk. R. Laurelhurst, Valley.
Wild Tales
B+ Don’t let the dark subject matter fool you: Director Damián Szifron mines the humor out of a chef suggesting rat poison and a millionaire’s attempts to buy his drunken-driving son’s way out of prison after he kills a pregnant woman. R . JOHN LOCANTHI. Living Room Theaters .
Woman in Gold
C+ Holocaust survivor Maria Altmann (Helen Mirren) and her lawyer nephew Randol (Ryan Reynolds) take the Austrian government to court to reclaim a painting that was stolen by Nazi art thieves (Nazis are the worst!). R. KELLY MCKRILLIS. Hollywood, Bridgeport, City Center, Fox Tower.
For more Movies listings, visit 42
AP FILM STUDIES CO U R T E SY O F PA R A M O U N T P I C T U R E S
MOVIES
Willamette Week MAY 20, 2015 wweek.com
NO SUCH THING AS TOO MUCH: Doris Day and James Stewart.
DÉJÀ VIEW HITCHCOCK AND THE ART OF THE REMAKE. BY A P KRYZA
apkryza@wweek.com
Our Facebook and Twitter feeds tell us a lot about the world. If we vaccinate our children, they will grow tentacles. Obama once ate a kitten. And Hollywood is perhaps the most prolific sexual predator this side of Dr. Huxtable’s office. “They’re raping my childhood.” It’s a wildly inappropriate phrase uttered every time a film remake hits cinemas. This week, it’s Sam Raimi’s Poltergeist update lurking in the shadows, ready to defile your innocent childhood memories of face-peeling and evil clowns. Last summer, it was Michael Bay dropping a roofie into the radioactive slime of the Ninja Turtles. Soon, both The Crow and The Craft will be the talk of every Hot Topic in the U.S. “Hollywood has run out of ideas,” people moan. They moan so loudly they forget some of the greatest films of all time are remakes. Take Alfred Hitchcock’s seminal 1956 “wrong man” adventure, The Man Who Knew Too Much (Laurelhurst Theater; May 22-28), which was the director’s remake of his own 1934 film. Largely lauded as one of the Master of Suspense’s greatest yarns, it’s a classic through and through. James Stewart gives a wonderfully paranoid performance; Doris Day pulls double duty as a Hitchcock blonde and a songstress; and it’s set in gorgeous Morocco. The film was met with cheers. Hitchcock didn’t receive any complaints from Depression-era cinephiles that he had violated their childhood memories of the 1934 version. In revisiting the espionage tale of mistaken identity, Hitch improved his original in every way imaginable—the performances are stronger, the music was instantly iconic, and the Cold War lent further credence to the suspense. Of course, only Hitchcock could aptly remake Hitchcock (sorry, Gus Van Sant). But The Man Who Knew Too Much is just one of many classics in which auteurs cribbed from older films. John Huston’s classic The Maltese Falcon is the second go at Sam Spade. Kurosawa’s Yojimbo and
Seven Samurai became Sergio Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars and John Sturges’ The Magnificent Seven. David Cronenberg and John Carpenter improved B-movie classics like The Fly and The Thing. Even Martin Scorsese got into the remix game, scoring a hit with his Cape Fear remake and an overdue Oscar for The Departed, a riff on Infernal Affairs. These examples are typically ignored in debates dominated by recent redo failures like Carrie, Robocop, Total Recall, Clash of the Titans and The Wolfman. Will Poltergeist be better than the original? Probably not. Ditto for the upcoming remake of Point Break, which was already remade as The Fast and the Furious anyway. Will they be affronts to your childhood? No. Because no matter what Hollywood does, your childhood is safe and sound in old VHS and DVD collections. They’ll probably sit next to True Lies, Heat, Some Like It Hot, 12 Monkeys, His Girl Friday and a dozen other movies you pretend aren’t remakes. ALSO SHOWING:
Church of Film presents Jacques Rivette’s pirate fantasy Noroît, inspired by Thomas Middleton. North Star Ballroom. 8 pm Wednesday, May 20. Hecklevision takes on the video-game adaptation Double Dragon, which rivals Super Mario Bros. as the worst video-game movie ever. Hollywood Theatre. 9:30 pm Wednesday, May 20. Filmed by Bike returns for its 13 year of twowheeled cinema. Hollywood Theatre. May 22-23. See HollywoodTheatre.org for full listings. Cinema 21 provides its monthly Tommy Wiseau dose with The Room and an episode of his impossibly awful—even by Wiseau standards—sitcom, The Neighbors. Cinema 21. 10:45 pm Friday, May 22. It’s shocking that George Lucas hasn’t revisited his 1962-set breakout film, American Graffiti, and digitally added sideburns to at least one character. Academy Theater. May 22-28. Never mind the questionable hockey moves in The Mighty Ducks. Why would a judge sentence a convicted drunk driver to mentor at-risk ghetto kids? Hollywood Theatre. May 23-24. Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket might seem like two films stapled together, but damned if they aren’t two of the best Vietnam movies ever. Century Clackamas Town Center. 2 pm Sunday, May 24. Profile Theatre opens up its cinematic sock drawer for a showing of Hysteria, the story of how the first electric dildo got a bunch of Brits’ knickers in a bunch. Hollywood Theatre. 7 pm Monday, May 25.
MOVIES
COURTESY OF FILMED BY BIKE
MAY 22–28
MUSIC PG. 25 WAVE: The Filmed by Bike festival is May 22-24 at the Hollywood Theatre.
Regal Lloyd Center 10 & IMAX 1510 NEMultnomah St. TOMORROWLAND: THE IMAX EXPERIENCE FriSat-Sun 01:00, 04:10, 07:20, 10:30 POLTERGEIST Fri-Sat-Sun 02:30, 10:15 POLTERGEIST 3D Fri-SatSun 11:45, 05:05, 07:40 TOMORROWLAND Fri-SatSun 12:15, 03:25, 06:40, 09:50 ALOHA Fri 01:00, 03:55, 07:00, 09:45
Regal Division Street Stadium 13
16603 SE Division St. POLTERGEIST Fri 12:15, 05:15, 10:15 POLTERGEIST 3D Fri 02:45, 07:45 TOMORROWLAND Fri 12:30, 03:45, 07:00, 10:15
Cinema 21
616 NW 21st Ave., 503-223-4515 WHILE WE’RE YOUNG Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 04:30, 06:30 WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 08:45 WELCOME TO ME GOOD KILL Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 04:15, 06:45, 09:15 SLOW WEST Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 04:30, 07:00, 09:00
Mission Theater and Pub
1624 NW Glisan St. KINGSMAN: THE SECRET SERVICE Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 07:50 INSURGENT Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 04:30 PORTLAND TIMBERS VS. TORONTO FC Sat 02:00 DC UNITED VS. PORTLAND TIMBERS Wed 07:30
St. Johns Cinemas
8704 N Lombard St., 503-286-1768 AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue-Wed 04:00, 07:00 MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 05:00, 07:45 SAN ANDREAS
CineMagic Theatre
2021 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 503-231-7919 AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 05:30, 08:00
Kiggins Theatre
1011 Main St., 360-816-0352 EVERY SECRET THING MAGGIE IRIS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 04:30, 06:15 WHILE WE’RE YOUNG FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 08:00
Regal City Center Stadium 12
801 C St. MAD MAX: FURY ROAD POLTERGEIST Fri-Sat-Sun 02:00, 09:30 POLTERGEIST 3D Fri-Sat-Sun 11:30, 04:30, 07:00 MAD MAX: FURY ROAD 3D HOT PURSUIT AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON 3D PITCH PERFECT 2 THE AGE OF ADALINE PAUL BLART: MALL COP 2 EX MACHINA FURIOUS 7 WOMAN IN GOLD HOME TOMORROWLAND FriSat-Sun 11:00, 12:00, 02:15, 03:10, 05:15, 06:15, 08:10, 09:15 ALOHA SAN ANDREAS SAN ANDREAS 3D
Kennedy School Theater
5736 NE 33rd Ave., 503-249-7474 SHARK TALE KINGSMAN: THE SECRET SERVICE Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 07:45 ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 05:30 THE DIVERGENT SERIES: INSURGENT Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 02:30
Hollywood Theatre
4122 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-281-4215 EX MACHINA Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 07:15, 09:30 WOMAN IN GOLD HAROLD AND MAUDE FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 06:45, 09:15 WORLD’S BEST BIKE MOVIES A Fri 07:00 WORLD’S BEST BIKE MOVIES B Fri 09:00 YES WE RIDE! WOMEN IN RACING Sat 05:00 ADVENTURE NIGHT Sat 07:00 THE MIGHTY DUCKS Sat 02:00 ROAR Sun 07:00 HYSTERIA Mon 07:00 SUSPIRIA Tue 07:30 DON’T THINK I’VE FORGOTTEN: CAMBODIA’S LOST ROCK AND ROLL Wed 07:30
Century 16 Cedar Hills
3200 SW Hocken Ave. ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA (STRATFORD FESTIVAL) CINDERELLA HOME FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:25, 02:50, 05:15, 07:40 FURIOUS 7 WOMAN IN GOLD PITCH PERFECT 2 Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:00, 12:25, 01:50, 03:15, 04:40, 06:05, 07:30, 09:00, 10:20 AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 11:00, 12:20, 02:20, 03:40, 05:40, 07:00, 09:00, 10:20 AVENGERS:
AGE OF ULTRON 3D Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 04:30 PAUL BLART: MALL COP 2 THE AGE OF ADALINE Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:00, 01:45, 04:30, 07:15, 10:00 HOT PURSUIT FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 10:10 MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 01:30, 04:30, 05:30, 07:30, 08:30, 10:30 MAD MAX: FURY ROAD 3D Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:30, 12:30, 02:30, 03:30, 06:30, 09:30 TOMORROWLAND Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:30, 12:30, 01:30, 02:30, 03:30, 04:30, 05:30, 06:30, 07:30, 08:30, 09:30, 10:30 EX MACHINA Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 11:05, 01:50, 07:40, 10:25 POLTERGEIST Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 02:00, 04:30, 07:00, 09:30 POLTERGEIST 3D Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:30, 12:30, 03:00, 05:30, 08:00, 10:30 FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:00, 01:50, 04:40, 07:30, 10:20 UFC 187: JOHNSON VS. CORMIER LIVE Sat 07:00 TURBO Tue 10:30 SAN ANDREAS SAN ANDREAS 3D ALOHA
Regal Cinemas Bridgeport Village Stadium 18 & IMAX
7329 SW Bridgeport Road TOMORROWLAND: THE IMAX EXPERIENCE Fri-SatSun 12:00, 03:05, 06:30, 09:35 AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON -- AN IMAX 3D EXPERIENCE POLTERGEIST Fri-Sat-Sun 12:10, 05:10, 07:40, 10:45 POLTERGEIST 3D Fri-Sat-Sun 11:35, 02:05, 02:40, 04:35, 07:05, 09:35 EX MACHINA FURIOUS 7 WOMAN IN GOLD TOMORROWLAND Fri-Sat-Sun 10:00, 11:00, 01:05, 02:05, 04:10, 05:10, 07:15, 08:15, 10:20 ALOHA Fri 11:05, 01:40, 04:20, 07:05, 09:45 SAN ANDREAS Fri 11:45, 05:05, 07:45, 10:25 SAN ANDREAS 3D Fri 11:10, 01:50, 02:25, 04:30, 07:10, 09:50
Living Room Theaters 341 SW 10th Ave., 971-222-2010 5 FLIGHTS UP Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:00, 02:20, 05:20, 07:30, 09:35 CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 02:30, 06:50, 09:10 FELIX AND MEIRA I AM BIG BIRD: THE CAROLL SPINNEY STORY Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue-Wed 12:05, 05:10, 08:30 TANGERINES Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 02:10, 06:30 THE AGE OF ADALINE FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:10, 02:50, 04:20, 06:40, 09:00 WILD TALES Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 12:15, 04:00 HEAVEN ADORES YOU: AN ELLIOT SMITH PROJECT
Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:25, 02:40, 04:10, 07:00, 09:30 IRIS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 12:20, 02:00, 05:00, 07:15, 09:15 ALOHA
Century Clackamas Town Center and XD
12000 SE 82nd Ave. ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA (STRATFORD FESTIVAL) CINDERELLA Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 10:45, 01:25, 04:15, 07:15, 10:05 HOME Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:15, 01:45, 04:25, 07:00 GET HARD FURIOUS 7 Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 01:30, 07:25 THE LONGEST RIDE PITCH PERFECT 2 Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 10:50, 11:40, 12:40, 01:40, 02:40, 03:40, 04:35, 05:40, 06:40, 07:35, 08:40, 09:40, 10:30 AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 10:50, 12:25, 02:10, 03:45, 05:30, 08:55, 10:25 AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON 3D FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 07:05 PAUL BLART: MALL COP 2 Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue-Wed 10:55, 10:25 THE AGE OF ADALINE Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 10:45, 04:40, 10:35 HOT PURSUIT Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:00, 02:30, 05:05, 07:30, 10:00 MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 12:30, 01:30, 03:25, 06:20, 07:10, 09:20 MAD MAX: FURY ROAD 3D FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:20, 02:10, 05:00, 07:50, 10:40 TOMORROWLAND Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 11:45, 03:00, 06:15, 09:30 EX MACHINA Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 09:35 POLTERGEIST Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 12:15, 02:50, 08:00, 10:40 POLTERGEIST 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 11:00, 01:35, 04:05, 05:20, 06:35, 09:10 LITTLE BOY Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 11:30, 04:55, 10:20 FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue-Wed 10:55, 01:50, 04:50, 07:40, 10:35 WHERE HOPE GROWS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 02:15, 07:45 UFC 187: JOHNSON VS. CORMIER LIVE Sat 07:00 FULL METAL JACKET SunWed 02:00, 07:00
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Tomorrowland (PG) 10:40AM 11:45AM 1:55PM 3:00PM 5:10PM 6:15PM 8:25PM 9:30PM Tomorrowland (PG) 11:45AM ® 3:00PM ® 6:15PM ® 9:30PM ® Mad Max: Fury Road (R) 12:30PM 1:30PM 3:25PM 6:20PM 7:10PM 9:20PM Mad Max: Fury Road (3D) (R) 10:40AM 11:20AM 11:20AM ® 2:10PM 2:10PM ® 4:20PM 5:00PM 5:00PM ® 7:50PM 7:50PM ® 10:00PM 10:40PM 10:40PM ® Poltergeist (2015) (3D) (PG-13) 11:00AM 1:35PM 4:05PM 5:20PM 6:35PM 9:10PM Poltergeist (2015) (PG-13) 12:15PM 2:50PM 8:00PM 10:40PM Pitch Perfect 2 (PG-13) 10:50AM 11:40AM 12:40PM 1:40PM 2:40PM 3:40PM 4:35PM 5:40PM 6:40PM 7:35PM 8:40PM 9:40PM 10:30PM
Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (PG) 12:20PM 2:55PM 5:25PM 7:55PM 10:25PM Where Hope Grows (PG-13) 2:15PM 7:45PM Avengers: Age Of Ultron (PG-13) 10:50AM 12:25PM 2:10PM 3:45PM 5:30PM 8:55PM 10:25PM Cinderella (2015) (PG) 10:45AM 1:25PM 4:15PM 7:15PM 10:05PM Avengers: Age Of Ultron (3D) (PG-13) 7:05PM Little Boy (PG-13) 11:30AM 4:55PM 10:20PM Age Of Adaline, The (PG-13) 10:45AM 4:40PM 10:35PM Home (PG) 11:15AM 1:45PM 4:25PM 7:00PM Hot Pursuit (PG-13) 12:00PM 2:30PM 5:05PM 7:30PM 10:00PM Furious 7 (PG-13) 1:30PM 7:25PM Ex Machina (R) 9:35PM Far From The Madding Crowd (PG-13) 10:55AM 1:50PM 4:50PM 7:40PM 10:35PM
Mad Max: Fury Road (R) 10:30AM 1:30PM 4:30PM
Pitch Perfect 2 (PG-13) 11:00AM 12:25PM 1:50PM 3:15PM
5:30PM 7:30PM 8:30PM 10:30PM
4:40PM 6:05PM 7:30PM 9:00PM 10:20PM
Mad Max: Fury Road (3D) (R) 11:30AM 12:30PM 2:30PM
Home (PG) 10:00AM 12:25PM 2:50PM 5:15PM 7:40PM
Tomorrowland XD (PG) 1:00PM 4:10PM 7:20PM 10:30PM
3:30PM 6:30PM 9:30PM Tomorrowland (PG) 10:30AM 11:30AM 12:30PM 1:30PM 2:30PM 3:30PM 4:30PM 5:30PM 6:30PM 7:30PM 8:30PM 9:30PM 10:30PM Poltergeist (2015) (PG-13) 10:00AM 2:00PM 4:30PM
Avengers: Age Of Ultron (3D) (PG-13) 4:30PM Age Of Adaline, The (PG-13) 11:00AM 1:45PM 7:15PM 10:00PM Hot Pursuit (PG-13) 10:10PM Far From The Madding Crowd (PG-13) 11:00AM 1:50PM 4:40PM 7:30PM 10:20PM
7:00PM 9:30PM
Ex Machina (R) 4:30PM 7:40PM 10:25PM
Poltergeist (2015) (3D) (PG-13) 10:05AM 11:30AM
Avengers: Age Of Ultron (PG-13) 11:00AM 12:30PM
12:30PM 3:00PM 5:30PM 8:00PM 10:30PM
2:20PM 3:50PM 5:40PM 7:10PM 9:00PM 10:30PM
Mad Max: Fury Road (3D) (R) 12:30PM 3:25PM 6:20PM 9:15PM Mad Max: Fury Road (R) 11:00AM 1:55PM 4:50PM 7:45PM 10:40PM Tomorrowland (PG) 11:00AM 12:40PM 2:15PM 3:50PM 5:30PM 7:00PM 8:40PM 10:10PM Hot Pursuit (PG-13) 12:10PM 2:40PM 5:10PM 7:40PM 10:05PM Poltergeist (2015) (3D) (PG-13) 10:45AM 11:45AM 1:10PM 3:45PM 6:30PM 9:00PM Poltergeist (2015) (PG-13) 2:30PM 5:00PM 7:45PM 10:30PM Monkey Kingdom (G) 10:50AM 1:15PM 3:30PM 5:45PM 8:00PM 10:15PM Pitch Perfect 2 (PG-13) 10:55AM 1:40PM 4:30PM 7:30PM 10:20PM
Avengers: Age Of Ultron (3D) (PG-13) 5:20PM Avengers: Age Of Ultron (PG-13) 10:45AM 12:20PM 2:00PM 3:40PM 7:00PM 8:40PM 10:20PM Home (PG) 11:35AM 2:10PM 4:35PM 7:20PM 9:55PM Age Of Adaline, The (PG-13) 11:10AM 2:00PM 4:45PM 7:45PM 10:30PM Far From The Madding Crowd (PG-13) 10:50AM 1:50PM 4:50PM 7:50PM 10:40PM Furious 7 (PG-13) 12:35PM 3:55PM 7:15PM 10:35PM Cinderella (2015) (PG) 10:55AM 1:50PM 4:40PM Ex Machina (R) 7:30PM 10:15PM
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OUT FOR ASH: A piece from Dazed and Glazed by Brett Stern.
ALL FIRED UP Sculpture galleries far too rarely get you high... even when it might help your appreciation of the art on display. From the outside, Thurman Street Collective fits right in at the end of a string of Northwest neighborhood pleasantries: the Multnomah County Northwest Library, the Dragonfly Coffee House, St. Honoré, etc. Step inside, and it’s both an art gallery and a medical weed dispensary. Thurman Street Collective’s front gallery has been integral to the vision of owner Bobby Wald and wife Kanani Miyamoto—a graduate student at Pacific Northwest College of Art—since the space opened six months ago. The gallery features up to four local artists each month. The current installment, Dazed and Glazed, exhibits ceramic work from artist and inventor Brett Stern, who lives in the neighborhood. “My goal was to create a bunch of interesting glazes and shapes that are fun to stare at while smoking,” he writes. The outlandish ashtrays run the gamut from square to amorphous, earth tone to Day-Glo. Stern’s bowls and teapots, however, may also please a nonsmoking clay enthusiast without any J’s to snuff. “There are a lot of artists in this neighbor-
hood,” says employee Lisa Miller. “[Miyamoto] started telling a few, and suddenly we’re booked through next year.” Amid new dispensaries trying to stand out—whether with foxy female employees (Cannababes) or a speakeasy theme (Brooklyn Holding Company)—Thurman Street’s community approach is hearteningly sincere. “I think it would be great if more people oriented their dispensaries toward their neighbors,” says Miller, adding that their space is often frequented by art seekers instead of weed smokers. “It’s important to have something more than just the product.” They sometimes expand their First Saturday art events into the back dispensary, a stoner sanctum usually reserved for OMMP cardholders. “We just put all the product away and open the back room,” Miller says. So sure, they’ve got plenty of Sour Diesel and Alaskan Thunder Fuck for those so inclined, but Thurman Street Collective also offers a dream of a legalized future where dispensaries are judged by their communities, and not just by their weed. And maybe, you know, by the psychedelic bricks of ashtray in the window. TED JAMISON. GO: Dazed and Glazed is at Thurman Street Collective, 2384 NW Thurman St., 971-8037970, thurmancollective.com. Through June 5.
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Misanthrope” playwright 53 “Suits you to ___” 54 “The Family Circus” cartoonist Keane 55 What some goggles provide 60 “Able was I ___ I saw Elba” 61 Choice of words 62 Home of the Burj Khalifa 63 “Curious George” author H.A. ___ 64 Hits with snowballs 65 Splitsville
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Across 11 Long stories 6 Bridge support beams 11 “I’m not feelin’ it” 14 Communications officer on 49-Across 15 Not at all 16 Tatyana of “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” 17 Manhattan area where punk rock took off 19 Drug dropped in the ‘60s
37 Pinky, for one 38 More reptilian, in a way 39 Common Market inits. 40 Besting 42 Prefix on the farm 43 By way of 44 Tooth doc’s deg. 45 Broadcast studio alert 46 “Northern Exposure” setting 49 See 14-Across 51 “The
20 “Girls” creator/ star Dunham 21 Rap’s ___ Boys 23 Come together 27 Pirates’ stashes 28 Seek water with a divining rod 29 Birthplace of Robert Burns 31 “___ Ho” (“Slumdog Millionaire” showstopper) 32 Turns brown, maybe 33 Obstruction in the night
Down 1 Grafton whose works are in letters 2 “That’s it!” 3 “Gloomy” guy 4 Naive 5 Damsel in distress’s cry 6 Out to lunch 7 7’7” center Manute ___ 8 Obsessive whaler of fiction 9 Man of many synonyms 10 It accrues with unsavory language 11 Bottle handy with fish and chips 12 Borden’s spokesbovine 13 Lies low 18 Bach’s “Mass ___ Minor” 22 Body wash, e.g. 23 Build on
24 “Just ___ know ...” 25 High school in a series of 1980s-’90s novels 26 They’re closed, don’t you see? 30 Puts back 33 Biol., e.g. 34 “___ + Cat” (PBS Kids show) 35 Chill-causing 36 “Put ___ in it!” 38 Stunned 41 Emphatic exclamation, in Ecuador 42 Gets in on the deal 45 Tater Tots brand 46 Color in “America the Beautiful” 47 Longest river in France 48 Get up 50 Off-road goer, briefly 52 Equal, in Cannes 56 Driver’s lic. figure 57 Basketball Hall of Fame coach Hank 58 Lifeboat mover 59 Tiny complaint last week’s answers
©2015 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com) For answers to this puzzle, call: 1-900-226-2800, 99 cents per minute. Must be 18+. Or to bill to your credit card, call: 1-800-655-6548. Reference puzzle #JONZ728.
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Week of May 21
CAMPAIGN
Field Organizer - $12.25/Hour - $15/Hour After 90 days
JOBS ARIES (March 21-April 19): James McNeil Whistler was an influential painter in the latter half of the 19th century. He advocated the “art for art’s sake” credo, insisting that the best art doesn’t need to teach or moralize. As far as he was concerned, its most important purpose was to bring forth “glorious harmony” from chaos. But the immediate reason I’m nominating him to be your patron saint for the coming weeks is the stylized signature he created: an elegant butterfly with a long tail that was actually a stinger. I think you’ll thrive by embodying that dual spirit: being graceful, sensitive, and harmonious and yet also feisty, piquant, and provocative. Can you manage that much paradox? I think you can. TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Renowned author George Bernard Shaw was secure in his feeling that he did good work. He didn’t need the recognition of others to validate his self-worth. The British Prime Minister offered him a knighthood, but he refused it. When he found out he had been awarded a Nobel Prize for Literature, he wanted to turn it down but his wife convinced him to accept it. The English government also sought to give him the prestigious Order of Merit, but he rejected it, saying, “I have already conferred this order upon myself.” He’s your role model for right now, Taurus. Congratulate yourself for your successes, whether or not anyone else does. GEMINI (May 21-June 20): “Aha!” is your mantra for the coming weeks, Gemini. Keep it on the tip of your tongue, ready to unleash. This always-ready-to-be-surprised-by-inspiration attitude will train you to expect the arrival of wonders and marvels. And that will be an effective way to actually attract wonders and marvels! With “Aha!” as your talisman, all of your wake-up calls will be benevolent, and all of the chaos you encounter -or at least most of it -- will be fertile. CANCER (June 21-July 22): Do you chronically indulge in feelings of guilt? Do you berate yourself for the wrong turns and sad mistakes you made in the past? These behaviors may be sneaky ways of avoiding change. How can you summon enough energy to transform your life if you’re wallowing in worries and regrets? In presenting the possibility that you might be caught in this trap, I want you to know that I’m not sitting in judgment of you. Not at all. Like you, I’m a Cancerian, and I have periodically gotten bogged down in the very morass I’m warning you against. The bad news is that right now you are especially susceptible to falling under this spell. The good news is that right now you have extra power to break this spell. LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): In the TV comedy-drama Jane the Virgin, the fictional character known as Rogelio de la Vega is a vain but lovable actor who performs in telenovelas. “I’m very easy to dress,” he tells the wardrobe supervisor of a new show he’ll be working on. “Everything looks good on me. Except for peach. I don’t pop in peach.” What he means is that his charisma doesn’t radiate vividly when he’s wearing peach-colored clothes. Now I want to ask you, Leo: What don’t you pop in? I’m not simply talking about the color of clothes that enable you to shine, but everything else, too. In the coming weeks, it’s crucial that you surround yourself with influences that make you pop. VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Are you willing to entertain an outlandish possibility? Here’s my vision: You will soon be offered unexpected assistance, either through the machinations of a “guardian angel” or the messy blessings of a shape-shifting spirit. This divine intervention will make it possible for you to demolish a big, bad obstacle you’ve been trying to find a way around. Even if you have trouble believing in the literal factuality of my prophecy, here’s what I suspect: It will at least come true in a metaphorical sense -- which is the truest kind of truth of all. LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): “Glory” is the theme song of the film Selma. It’s an anthem about the ongoing struggle for equal rights by African Americans. I want to borrow one of its lines for your use in the coming weeks: “Freedom is like a religion to us.” I think those will be good words for you to live by. Are you part of a group that suffers oppression and injustice? Are you mixed up in a
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situation that squashes your self-expression? Are you being squelched by the conditioned habits of your own unconscious mind? It’s high time to rebel. The quest for liberation should be your spiritual calling. SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): If you’re planning on breaking a taboo, sneaking into a forbidden zone, or getting intimate with an edge-dweller, don’t tell boastful stories about what you’re doing. For now, secrecy is not only sexy; it’s a smart way to keep you safe and effective. Usually I’m fond of you telling the whole truth. I like it when you reveal the nuanced depths of your feelings. But right now I favor a more cautious approach to communication. Until your explorations have progressed further, I suggest that you only discuss them sparingly. As you put your experiments in motion, share the details on a need-to-know basis.
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SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): There are many possible ways to create and manage a close relationship. Here’s one of my favorite models: when two independent, self-responsible souls pledge to help each other activate the best versions of themselves. If you don’t have a partnership like this, the near future will be a favorable time to find one. And if you already do have an intimate alliance in which the two of you synergize each other’s quest for individuation, the coming weeks could bring you breathtaking breakthroughs. CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): It’s a challenge to drive a car through Canada’s far north. For example, if you want to get from Dawson in the Yukon Territory to Inuvik in the Northwest Territory, you take Dempster Highway. It’s gravel road for the entire 417-mile trip, so the ride is rough. Bring a spare tire and extra gasoline, since there’s just one service station along the way. On the plus side, the scenery is thrilling. The permafrost in the soil makes the trees grow in odd shapes, almost like they’re drunk. You can see caribou, wolverines, lynx, bears, and countless birds. Right now, the sun is up 20 hours every day. And the tundra? You’ve never seen anything like it. Even if you don’t make a trip like this, Capricorn, I’m guessing you will soon embark on a metaphorically similar version. With the right attitude and preparation, you will have fun and grow more courageous. AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Aquarian author James Joyce wrote Ulysses, one of the most celebrated and influential novels of the 20th century. The narrative is both experimental and tightly structured. Its chaotic stream-of-consciousness passages are painstakingly crafted. (Anyone who wonders how the astrological sign of Aquarius can be jointly ruled by the rebellious planet Uranus and the disciplinarian planet Saturn need only examine this book for evidence.) Joyce claimed he labored over Ulysses for 20,000 hours. That’s the equivalent of devoting eight hours a day, 350 days a year, for over seven years. Will you ever work that hard and long on a project, Aquarius? If so, now would be an auspicious time to start. PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): The English writer and caricaturist Max Beerbohm moved away from his native land when he was 37 years old. He settled in Rapallo, Italy, where he lived for much of the rest of his life. Here’s the twist: When he died at age 83, he had still not learned to speak Italian. For 40 years, he used his native tongue in his foreign home. This is a failing you can’t afford to have in the coming months, Pisces. The old proverb “When in Rome, do as the Romans,” has never been so important for you to observe.
Homework Choose one area of your life where you will exceed your personal best in the coming week. Testify at FreeWillAstrology.com.
check out Rob Brezsny’s Expanded Weekly Audio Horoscopes & Daily Text Message Horoscopes
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The audio horoscopes are also available by phone at
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