NEWS THE PDC BURNS A POT BUSINESS. P. 9 HEADOUT COCKTAILS FOR OLD PORTLAND. P. 25 DRANK WE DRANK EVERY VANCOUVER IPA. P. 27
WILLAMETTE WEEK PORTLAND’S NEWSWEEKLY
“I’D FULLY COMMITTED MYSELF TO HATING JOY.” P. 29 WWEEK.COM
VOL 42/23 4.6.2016
e h t e h e t t A e II At g n I g h n t I h e l t o e h l o W Wh
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9 POUNDS’ 3 H G U O R H T P M O H C ONE MAN’S QUEST TO ORTH OF PORTLAND FOOD CHALLENE GES. W RFHAG ATTHEW KO BY M
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In honor of National Fair Housing Month | April 2016
We Are Fair Housing
WE
, as housing providers to the people of Oregon, pledge the following:
1. To provide equal opportunities for rental housing to Oregon residents without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, sex, familial status, disability, source of income, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, or victims of domestic violence. 2. To be open and transparent in all our practices, investigations, and other activities related to fair housing laws. 3. To provide ongoing training and education in fair housing best practices to all our employees. 4. To address all fair housing complaints and, if fair housing laws are broken, to hold violators accountable. 5. To uphold all fair housing laws as our legal and moral obligation to all Oregonians. Signed, The Board of Directors of Multifamily NW representing Cascade Management, Tokola Properties, Greystar, Mainlander Property Management, Quantum Residential, American Property Management, Background Investigations, Bittner & Hahs, Capital Property Management, Guardian Real Estate Services, Home Forward, Income Property Management, Interstate Roofing, Kennedy Restoration, Princeton Property Management, Sterling Management Group, WPL Associates. This fair housing pledge represents a public commitment from management companies and housing providers that manage or own approximately 160,000 multifamily units or homes in Oregon. To learn more about our pledge and fair housing laws, please visit out website at multifamilynw.org. 16083 SW Upper Boones Ferry Road, Suite 105, Tigard, OR 97224 | ph: 503-213-1281 email: info@multifamilynw.org
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
jenn liv
FINDINGS
pAgE 25
WHAT WE LEARNED FROM READING THIS WEEK’S PAPER VOL. 42, ISSUE 23.
The city may turn one 15-acre site in Northwest into a homeless camp. 6
Chris Stamm was an asshole and a coward, and punk rock was to blame. 29
There’s one guy in Portland who didn’t watch the Hulkster’s sex tape. 7
Byron Beck viewed his new
The Portland Development Commission doesn’t want to work with the state’s fastest-growing industry. 9
Othello is one of Shakespeare’s most racist plays. 43
A Nebraska woman came to Portland and ate one-tenth of her body weight in a single sitting. 11
ON THE COVER:
dance-choreography project as a journalist. 41
Blazers great Bill Walton had his phone tapped because of his loose ties to the Symbionese Liberation Army. 45
OUR MOST TRAFFICKED STORY ONLINE THIS WEEK:
Photo by rachael renee levasseur.
the owner of Base Camp Brewing was arrested on weapons charges.
STAFF Editor & Publisher Mark Zusman EditoriAl News Editor Aaron Mesh Arts & Culture Editor Martin Cizmar Staff Writers Nigel Jaquiss, Rachel Monahan, Beth Slovic Copy Chief Rob Fernas Copy Editors Matt Buckingham, Maya McOmie Stage & Screen Editor Enid Spitz Projects Editor Matthew Korfhage Music Editor Matthew Singer Web Editor Lizzy Acker Books James Helmsworth
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IS WHEELER READY TO BE MAYOR?
Pacifica Annual Spring Warehouse Sale! 3135 NW Industrial Street • Portland, OR
Saturday and Sunday April 16th & 17th from 10am–5pm This sale is not to be missed!
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fetcheyewear.com | 877.274.0410
It is refreshing to see a person who actually wants to be a public servant rather than a politician [“Reinventing the Wheeler,” WW, March 30, 2016]. Ted Wheeler is willing to try new approaches, fail and apologize, succeed and not fight over the glory. Portland’s future is about change. It’s time for a public servant who does his homework and is humble enough to say “sorry” if there is a better way. Portland may again be the city that works. —“spdxcyclist”
In more than one city, the tap water is toxic. How about our water? —Thirsty
Your question is a little vague, Thirsty, but I’m just going to assume you’re asking about lead, the headline-grabbing Donald Trump of watersupply adulterants. Childhood exposure to lead is believed to result in reduced intelligence, shorter attention spans, difficulty deferring gratification and lack of empathy toward one’s fellow human beings. If you want to look around at the current state of American culture and say “hmm,” I’m not gonna call you paranoid. In Flint, Mich. (let’s be real, that’s what you’re thinking about), lead found its way into drinking water through the use of lead pipes, which are great for clobbering Colonel Mustard in the dining room, but lousy for not poisoning people. Portland’s municipal water system, lucky for us, has no lead pipes. (The last lead components were removed in 1998.) However, the Water Bureau doesn’t own the Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
No innovative public servant anywhere has gotten anything done without ruffling a few feathers along the way. Wheeler is a guy with an incredible background who’s candid about his track record and open to new ideas. —Oliver McCoy
NEW HOMELESS SHELTER
If you read the extensive assessment of San Francisco’s efforts to Wheeler, when discussing his busi- “He sounds ness enterprises, says he didn’t get like a real address rampant homelessness “a dime” from his parents. Never you’ll see it provides a rich public servant there, mind the immense privilege in comarray of services, like the navigaing from a Fortune 500 family, or and not just tion center and transitional housattending all the best universities, or another slimy ing, but all of that has not reduced the fall-back plan of working for his politician.” homelessness [“Homeless Cambrother’s investment companies. pus,” WW, March 30, 2016]. Anyway, it’s not a bad thing to be born Homeless folks use the services, including wealthy, but it makes me cringe to hear people apartments and hotel rooms, but continue to try to sound like they know struggle because they spend all of their time on the streets, with their refused some monetary backup here or there. chosen family/social world. —Benno Lyon If the goal in Portland is to reduce homelessness, I’m not sure that emulating San Francisco Oh, Wheeler is not schooled in the art of the deal? is the way to go. If the goal is to reduce chronic He sounds like a real public servant and not just health conditions and otherwise help the conanother slimy politician. tinuing homeless to be more comfortable, go Also, he has run a top-performing investment ahead with the navigation center. portfolio as state treasurer for six years. He’s —“FWIW” smart and he listens. He’s got my vote. Reading Venerable Properties president Craig —Jamey Duhamel Kelly’s concern—“Do I need to add more secuThe “smartest guy” tag caught my attention, but rity to my building so I can sleep at night?”—I it would be hard for anyone who watched the couldn’t help mentally adding, “…in my nice, OPB mayoral debate to go away thinking Wheel- warm bed, in my comfy room, in my expensive, security-alarmed home.” er was the smartest guy in the room. Neither front-runner performed even ade- —“Just Sayin’” quately, in my opinion. I watched as a probable Jules Bailey voter, but am now strongly recon- LETTERS TO THE EDITOR must include the author’s street address and phone number for verification. sidering that position. Letters must be 250 or fewer words. To me, the only smart person emerging in Submit to: 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. this race is Sarah Iannarone. I was genuinely Email: mzusman@wweek.com.
Q.
4
surprised by her candor and her knowledge of how the city operates—something all other candidates fell short on. More about her please? —Michael Oliver
plumbing in your house—you could have anything in there. Actual lead pipe is pretty rare, but plenty of houses plumbed between 1970 and 1985 used lead solder to connect copper pipes. With the belt-and-suspenders caution of an agency that gets blamed every time someone drops their cellphone in the toilet, the Water Bureau actually tries to help out with our slipshod plumbing, adjusting the water’s pH to reduce the amount of lead it picks up by 70 percent. (Flint skipped this step, with less-than-optimal results.) The pH adjustment helps keep 90 percent of those at-risk M*A*S*H-era homes from having elevated lead levels in their water. If you’re worried about your own pipes, you can get a free lead test kit from Multnomah County’s leadline.org. If you do have lead in your plumbing, you can greatly reduce exposure just by letting water run for 30 seconds before using it and buying lead-rated filters for drinking water. Be lead smart! If your kids still grow up to be dumb, shortsighted jerks, at least we’ll know it’s just due to lousy parenting. QUESTIONS? Send them to dr.know@wweek.com
T:9.639” S:9.639”
Goodbye cheese that’s not really cheese. Goodbye corporations pretending to be cheesemakers. Goodbye Big Food.
Hello farmers who created a co-op and started a company. Hello integrity. Hello Tillamook Sharp Cheddar. Let’s do lunch. Or dinner. Or breakfast.
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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T:12.25”
S:12.25”
Hello craftsmen who age their cheese the right way, with time.
MURMURS Avakian Will Seek $4 Saltzman Looking at Million From Stars Cabaret Terminal 1 for Shelter
Avakian
Spring Sale! April 16th - 23rd Up to 75% off all in-store items
BICYCLES
916 NW 21st Avenue - Portland, Oregon www.21stbikes.com - 503-222-2851
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
Stars he is bringing civil rights charges against the company for unlawful sexual harassment of minors, and intends to fine the company $7,200. More significantly, Avakian seeks damages of $4 million each for two teenage girls who danced at Stars’ Beaverton location when they were 13 and 15, respectively. The 13-year-old was raped repeatedly, and a Stars manager was sentenced to 15 years in prison for her abuse. Avakian will now pursue an administrative prosecution of Stars and its owners in which he will seek to force them to compensate the young women. “Today’s charges reflect the severity of conditions faced by these vulnerable minors,” Avakian said in a statement. Courtney Angeli, Stars’ attorney, was unavailable for comment.
PSU Spending Big on Consulting for Tax Measure
Portland State University hasn’t yet begun gathering signatures for a ballot initiative to create a $35 million payroll tax to fund student tuition. But the school’s ballot campaign is already spending big money on political consultants. Records filed April 1 show the campaign paid $43,534 to Winning Mark, the consulting firm owned by Mark Wiener. The filing says the campaign is paying Winning Mark for management services, as well as advertising via buttons and yard signs.
The latest property being considered for a homeless camp? City land formerly used for building sewer pipes. Commissioner Dan Saltzman would like to turn a portion of a vacant city lot in industrial Northwest Portland into a long-term shelter for the homeless. The property, Terminal 1 at 2400 NW Front Ave., served as a staging ground for the manufacture of pipe segments during Portland’s Big Pipe sewer project until 2011. Portland’s Bureau of Environmental Services still owns the 15-acre site but doesn’t use it. Commissioner Nick Fish, who oversees BES, says he wants to sell the property and pass the earnings to sewer ratepayers. “It’s a nonstarter,” Fish says.
New Copper Penny Will Become Apartments The New Copper Penny, the controversial East Portland nightclub that
DANIEL COLE
P E T E R h I AT T
Oregon Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian is turning up the heat on the Stars Cabaret strip-joint chain. On March 31, Avakian notified
for years flummoxed city efforts to redevelop the Lents neighborhood, was sold April 1 to a real estate developer who plans to turn it into an apartment building. Palindrome Communities paid $5 million to club owner Saki Tzantarmas to buy the property at the intersection of Southeast 92nd Avenue and Foster Road, say officials at the Portland Development Commission. The PDC did not finance the sale, but will loan Palindrome $8.1 million to redevelop the site. Tzantarmas had quarreled with the city for years over a purchase price for his club, which takes up a full city block (“Saki’s Big Bet,” WW, Nov. 11, 2014).
NEWS
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW THIS WEEK
THE MOST
Ted’s Money Talks A barrage of mail will hit voters’ doorsteps this month: Ballots in the May 17 primary election are mailed in three weeks, and candidates for Portland mayor will vie for attention with enticing mailers. Those glossy fliers with photos of smiling candidates and their kids don’t come cheap. Expect to see the face of Oregon Treasurer Ted Wheeler a lot: He has a huge fundraising lead on his opponents, according to state filings. BETH SLOVIC.
FOUR QUESTIONS FOR:
Peter Horan
Ted Wheeler
Money raised in 2015 and 2016: $568,885.17 Cash on hand: $162,480.99 (including a $50,000 loan) Notable contributions: Merritt Paulson, Portland Timbers owner, $2,500; International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 48, $20,000; Tim Boyle, CEO of Columbia Sportswear, $10,000.
Jules Bailey Money raised in 2015 and 2016: Cash on hand: $64,768.87
$173,629.58
Notable contributions: Portland Association of Teachers, $250; Portland State University President Wim Wiewel, $250; Keep Portland Safe PAC/Portland Police Association, $250.
Sarah Iannarone
Money raised in 2015 and 2016: $24,429 Cash on hand: $7,727.21 Notable contributions: Nancy Hales, wife of Mayor Charlie Hales, $2,500; developer Dike Dame, $1,000; developer John Carroll, $2,500.
Sean Davis Money raised in 2015 and 2016: Cash on hand: $2,738.60
WW: Did you watch the full video? Peter Horan: I did not. Beyond being distasteful, it wasn’t relevant to the analysis that I was doing.
$5,479.57
Notable contributions: Lidia Yuknavitch, author, $500.
Portland HOT SPOT
Portland’s Next Light-Rail Line The next MAX stop is Bridgeport Village. This week, a Metro project team will present the public with two big recommendations. First, it will advocate using light rail, rather than bus rapid transit, to connect downtown Portland to Tualatin. Second, it will advise against connecting the line to Portland Community College’s Sylvania campus via tunnel because it’s too expensive—and the team would rather extend the line to Tualatin, home of shopping destinations Bridgeport Village and outdoor superstore Cabela’s. The project’s preliminary budget is $1.8 billion. NIGEL JAQUISS.
Multnomah Village
Tigard
Tualatin
How much is a Hulk Hogan sex tape worth? That’s the question one Portlander had to answer in a Florida courtroom last month. Peter Horan, a Portland tech investor, was called as an expert witness in the civil trial of Hogan’s lawsuit against Gawker Media for invading his privacy by posting the video. The jury awarded the professional wrestler $140 million in damages. Horan argued as a witness for Gawker, testifying that the video was worth far less than the $55 million in economic damages Hogan sought. WW asked him about his work. KARINA BUGGY.
Barbur Transit Ctr.
How much did Gawker make from posting the video? Hogan was filing his suit based on the claim that the website was nothing before gaining attention from the video. This really was a relatively insignificant event in the life of Gawker. A month before this, they ran a topless picture of Kate Middleton. They cover gossip; this is just one in a series of hits. The video added less than $100,000 to the total value of Gawker. Why did the jury disagree? I believe that the jury wanted to send a message that they don’t enjoy gossip and are concerned about media invading people’s privacy. They were reacting as if they had been the ones seen in that videotape. What are the ramifications of this ruling for First Amendment rights? It is important to think of this case as a First Amendment case because this could affect the way all public figures are covered. People say they are in favor of freedom of speech, but seem to really only feel this way if it is high-minded and not embarrassing. Freedom of the press should cover more than just high-minded things. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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NEWS
Making Up the Numbers A WHISTLEBLOWER LAWSUIT RAISES QUESTIONS ABOUT A KEY PORTLAND PUBLIC SCHOOLS PARTNER. rmonahan@wweek.com
A new lawsuit says the Native American Youth and Family Center falsified attendance figures at a private school the nonprofit organization runs in Northeast Portland. Yolanda Gallegos, former principal of the NAYA Early College Academy, says top management fudged the numbers to keep public dollars that support the school flowing in from state and federal sources. She claims the nonprofit inflated average attendance figures from 65 percent to higher than 85 percent—an exaggeration the suit says cost $50,000 in government funding. In a her lawsuit, filed March 15 in Multnomah County Circuit Court, Gallegos claims she was fired for whistleblowing and seeks $800,000 in damages. NAYA employees, the lawsuit says, had “specific knowledge of the falsification of records for the receipt of program funding” and “state and federal funds used to mislead others.” NAYA’s interim executive director, Tawna Sanchez, who is also running for the Oregon Legislature in House District 43, says the lawsuit is “without merit” but declined to answer specific questions. “NAYA staff work diligently to ensure our programs comply with state and federal regulations,” Sanchez says. “We have no reason to believe NAYA is out of compliance with any state or federal mandate.” Native American Youth and Family Center is a nonprofit that runs education, elder care and housing programs from its campus of low-slung brick buildings in Northeast Portland’s Cully neighborhood. One of those programs is Early College Academy. The academy, founded in 2007, focuses on serving at-risk students, many of them high school dropouts, ages 14 to 20. This school year, it has 70 students, of whom 27 percent are Native American. The amount of school funding at issue in the lawsuit isn’t much, but NAYA is a key partner in the district’s effort to improve racial equity. Under Superintendent Carole Smith, Portland Public Schools has worked to improve dismal graduation rates for Native American students, just over half of whom finish high school in four years. The nonprofit has long had close ties to PPS. Former executive director Matt Morton, who left NAYA in December, served on the Portland School Board from 8
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
2011 to 2015. NAYA also has multiple contracts to work with city schools. Its contract with PPS to run the Early College Academy is worth up to $664,615 this year. Its biggest project with the school district is a $22 million joint venture called NAYA Generations, which will create an early-childhood education center sur-
In 2013, Gallegos took over as principal of the Early College Academy. Gallegos says she soon spotted major problems—including the fact that kids weren’t showing up for school in the same numbers the academy was claiming. NAYA submitted what she says was a “falsified” report inflating students’ attendance in January 2014. At issue wasn’t the number of students enrolled but the attendance of the students in question, though Gallegos’ suit also says the school wasn’t properly tracking students who
rounded by affordable housing in Lents. Even before Gallegos’ lawsuit, there were signs of financial stress at NAYA. In 2013-14, the same year Gallegos alleges the attendance figures were inflated, the nonprofit’s tax return showed a significant deterioration in its financial condition. Revenue dropped and expenses jumped, swinging NAYA from a $1.4 million surplus to a $1.3 million deficit that year. That’s a lot of red ink for an organization whose total budget is $9.3 million. Morton says he stands by NAYA’s leadership. “Being a culturally specific, community-based organization committed to serving the most marginalized and invisible Portlanders is hard, risky and politically
were no longer enrolled. Gallegos says more than one of every three students were missing on an average day during the period of the falsified report—a startlingly high number of absences even for a school that focuses on serving dropouts. NAYA’s contract with at least one school district required an 85 percent attendance rate, the lawsuit says. When Gallegos brought the issue to the attention of her supervisor, Cori Matthew, Matthew admitted she already knew about the false report, the lawsuit says. After Matthew’s admission, Gallegos went around her back and reported the problem to Portland Public Schools, the
kim herbst
By Rachel Monahan
vulnerable work,” Morton tells WW. “I have a great deal of confidence in NAYA as an organization and its staff and board leadership.”
suit says. Gallegos says her whistleblowing ultimately cost the academy $50,000 in funding. WW could not independently confirm that NAYA was ever financially penalized for inflating attendance figures. For every public school in the state, funding is contingent on kids continuing to attend. When a student misses 10 consecutive days, the district or the school loses funding. That policy applies to the Early College Academy, says PPS. The lawsuit makes other allegations as well: The school was improperly awarding credit when students hadn’t earned it, and staff left students unattended. The suit also charges that Matthew failed to address drug use and dealing on or near campus and “directed” Gallegos not to report to the school district the treatment of students by a special education teacher who called one child “retarded.” Gallegos says Morton, NAYA’s top executive and a School Board member, also failed to act. When Gallegos approached Morton, the lawsuit says, he told the principal “there were conflict of interest issues so he had to be careful with his involvement” because he was on the School Board. Matthew did not respond to messages left with her current employer. Morton directed WW’s inquiries about the lawsuit to NAYA and the nonprofit’s attorney. In her lawsuit, Gallegos claims NAYA retaliated against her for calling attention to shortcomings at the academy and, instead of addressing the school’s problems, fired her in March 2015. Gallegos’ attorney, Dori Brattain, says Gallegos, who now works in New Mexico, was homeless for almost a year after NAYA fired her. “Whistleblowing cost her everything she had except for her integrity,” Brattain says. Elevating graduation rates for students of color has been at the top of PPS Superintendent Carole Smith’s to-do list. By one key measure, Native American students have struggled more than any other minority in the district. This year, PPS’s graduation rate rose to 74 percent for the class of 2015, but just 51 percent of Native Americans graduated in four years. The graduation rate for NAYA Early College Academy, because it is technically a private school, is not publicly reported. Smith, who ran a community-based program for 23 years, has relied on programs such as the academy, despite past criticism that they aren’t helping to raise the district’s graduation rates (“Flunk Factories,” WW, Nov. 12, 2013). PPS officials say NAYA failed to meet contract requirements for attendance in 2013-14, but the academy has improved. Smith declined to comment.
E M I LY J O A N G R E E N E
dispensary have been shattered—by other condo owners and the PDC. Last week, the PDC took the extraordinary step of filing for a restraining order in Multnomah County Circuit Court to block Zaré from renting out the condo at Vanport Square to a marijuana business. A dispensary on the property would cause the PDC to suffer “irreparable injury” to its financial interest in Vanport Square, according to its complaint. A judge tossed out the PDC’s demand. But the urban renewal agency’s goals have already been met: Grossman has halted her plans for the dispensary. The partially renovated condo sits empty. “So much for supporting the small businesses,” Zaré says.
WEED WHACKED: Marina Zaré stands in front of her commercial condo at Vanport Square, which she wanted to rent to a medical marijuana dispensary.
Potboiler
THE PORTLAND DEVELOPMENT COMMISSION GOES TO COURT TO KEEP MEDICAL MARIJUANA OUT OF A BUILDING IT FINANCED. BY PE T E R D ’AUR I A
243-2122
Investing in Vanport Square seemed like a good idea to Marina Zaré. In 2008, Zaré, a chiropractor, took a $300,000 loan subsidized by the Portland Development Commission to buy a commercial condominium at Vanport Square, a shopping complex the PDC financed along Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. Zaré looked smart—she was getting newly constructed space on a busy thoroughfare in a rapidly gentrifying part of town. But when her plans for a health clinic fizzled, she started trying to rent out the space in 2010. For five years, she couldn’t
find a tenant. “Developers thought really highly of that neighborhood, but it didn’t pan out,” says Zaré. “It was not what they promised it would be.” Then, late last year, Zaré finally met a match: Janice Grossman, who wanted to lease the space and open a medical marijuana dispensary. To Grossman, Vanport Square offered a valuable opportunity. The property was one of the increasingly rare places in Portland where it’s possible to open a marijuana dispensary—because it isn’t within 1,000 feet of a school or another dispensary. But Zaré and Grossman’s plans for a
Vanport Square was completed in 2008 as a neighborhood renewal project on the former site of Marco Machine Works. Most of its financing came from the PDC, in the form of a $6 million loan. In an effort to attract lower-income and minority business owners, the PDC agreed to subsidize purchases of its 17 commercial condos, allowing buyers to pay low interest rates on mortgages. “Essentially, it gave small-business owners an opportunity to own property where they could conduct a business,” says Anne Mangan, a spokeswoman for the PDC. Among the businesses that have taken advantage of Vanport Square’s financing opportunities are Old Town Brewing, Horn of Africa restaurant, and Curious Comedy, a nonprofit theater. In December 2015, Grossman starting leasing Zaré’s condo and began preparing to open a dispensary called Penthouse Greenery Wellness Center. “I wanted to find a place where I could give back to the community,” Grossman tells WW. “Cannabis oil cured my cancer. I wanted to help other people get well.” Grossman says her application for a dispensary license was approved by the state in February. She began tenant improvements on the condo in preparation for the opening of the dispensary. But she soon ran into difficulty. In March, the Vanport Square Condominiums Owners’ Association sent Zaré a cease-and-desist letter to halt plans for the dispensary. “They’re raising hell, saying that this is
all illegal,” Zaré recalls. Jeana Woolley, a member of the association board, says a dispensary would put the property’s insurance at risk. “The main objections that the Vanport Square Condominium Owners’ Association board has to the dispensary use in Vanport Square are primarily business-related,” Woolley tells WW in an email. Woolley also says Vanport Square unit owners are not thrilled about being neighbors with a dispensary. “They would prefer to see another small community business that helps to increase the family-oriented retail and service vitality of Vanport Square,” she says. Grossman says she stopped construction work on the property when the owners’ association told her to. But apparently that wasn’t enough. In March, Woolley, who was a developer on the Vanport Square project, contacted the PDC for help blocking the dispensary. “We have also asked the PDC…to assist in protecting the community’s interests,” Woolley says. PDC officials say the agency was protecting its own investment. “PDC initiated legal action to protect our interest in $6 million worth of loans at Vanport,” says Mangan. On Friday, April 1, the PDC filed a temporary restraining order against Zaré in Multnomah County Circuit Court. The PDC argued that, because it violates federal law, a marijuana dispensary would put Vanport Square’s commercial insurance at risk and put the building at risk of seizure. But at the April 1 hearing, Judge Kathleen M. Dailey rebuked the PDC’s attorneys, Brent Summers and Robert Betcone. “Really, gentlemen, the law just doesn’t work this way,” said Dailey. The judge declined to issue an injunction blocking the dispensary, saying that a legal assurance that a dispensary would not open made the point moot. Zaré says that, after the ordeal she’s been through, she just wants out. “If they want their precious Vanport,” she says, “they can buy it from me.” Grossman estimates she invested around $60,000 in the Vanport Square dispensary. Now, she says, she’s lost that entire investment. “They’ve made my life a living hell,” Grossman says.
PETE YORN WEDNESDAY, APRIL 13TH AT 6PM
JOSEPH
SATURDAY, APRIL 9TH AT 3PM Fresh off their debut performance at this year’s SXSW festival, Joseph is a Portland trio of sisters who layer ethereal harmonies over folk influenced guitar, creating their own haunting brand of pop.
STURGILL SIMPSON LISTENING PARTY! SATURDAY, APRIL 9TH AT 5PM
Hear the new album from Sturgill Simpson a week before the release! Refreshments to be served.
CASTLETOWN SUNDAY, APRIL 10TH AT 3PM
Portland based four piece “Castletown” derive their name from a small town in County Cork, Ireland. Their music blends the energy of traditional Irish reels with modern folk, blues, jazz and country influences.
MATTY CHARLES & KATIE ROSE
TUESDAY, APRIL 12TH AT 6PM Matty Charles was at the forefront of the old-time & folk music resurgence that began in Brooklyn, NY in the early 2000’s. Returning to his home of Portland in 2012, Matty met Katie Rose at the Landmark Saloon. The rest, as they say, is history.
Pete Yorn’s new album, ArrangingTime, plays with the elasticity of the years— it’s not only a culmination of the Los Angeles by way of New Jersey artist’s adventurous latter-day projects, but a return to his original leaner methods. For the first time since Yorn’s RIAA gold-certified debut, musicforthemorningafter, and its follow-up, Day I Forgot, producer R. Walt Vincent returns to help Yorn execute his most poised and diverse set of songs yet. ArrangingTime runs the gamut from elegiac folk to wasteland blues to upbeat, synth-kissed rock. Of course, some things never change. Yorn still plays the observer, stepping into characters — or his past selves from previous years — routing wistful poems and beatific visions through the weather-beaten voice of a man who’s seen a few things in his time.
MIIKE SNOW
iii
Ingrid Records
$10.99* CD “The first two Miike Snow records weren’t without their guilty pleasures, but iii, the high-powered Swedish trio’s new project, is easily their most robust and impressive work to date. The product of a three-year hiatus, it features not only some of their catchiest pure pop, but also the group’s most thrilling forays into a darker, heftier sound.” —Line Of Best Fit
RECORD STORE DAY 2016 IS APRIL 16TH!!! 450+ LIMITED EDITION VINYL RELEASES!!! *SALE PRICE VALID THROUGH 5/4
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
BY M AT T H EW KO RFH AGE
mkorfhage@wweek.com
Nobody loved a party more than Pondo Kosmas. And if you run a Greek deli, eating and drinking to painful excess is what a party is all about. The late owner of the Mad Greek Deli on East Burnside Street—he passed away suddenly in February at age 49—ran one of the nation’s most insane food challenges for a decade at two locations of his family’s deli. Mad Greek’s 10-pound monster sandwich is stuffed with salami, pepperoni, turkey, ham and three kinds of cheese, plus pepperoncinis and a mountain of tomatoes, onions and lettuce. It’s all stacked high onto a 24-inch bun and slathered in oil and vinegar, then topped with olives. Contestants get one hour to polish off the whole thing along with a pound of Greek fries and 32 ounces of their beverage of choice. The challenge is pretty much impossible, which is why only three people have ever finished it—and two of them were competitive eaters who flew to Portland, lured by a jackpot that grows by $15 every time somebody fails, which is almost always. The last winner, 115pound Molly Schuyler of Nebraska, left with $600. The thing about Kosmas’ challenge is that it didn’t make any sense. The sandwich includes about $65 worth of ingredients—much more than the $30 sandwich costs, even if you lose your bet— all of which the late cook weighed personally and assembled lovingly by hand.
“The only way to understand it is to know Pondo,” says Jake Marks, a longtime friend who has helped manage the deli since Kosmas’ death. “It was all about family and community. The 20 bucks wasn’t the big deal. It was, ‘Someone’s going to try it again!’” But nothing about competitive eating really make sense. That’s what I learned from my weeks-long journey through all of the Portland area’s meaningful food challenges—that is, the challenges where you don’t have to pay if you finish. In tribute to Kosmas, I took on challenges involving pounds of pho, steaming plates of Cambodian hot wings, and a mammoth hunk of steak that a previous generation of my family attempted to eat. I learned what it is like to be a python—stretching my PONDO KOSMAS stomach to imbibe many meals’ worth of food in a single sitting and then slowly digesting it over the course of days. And I did it at personal peril not only to my health, but to my bank account (see below). My first stop was Mad Greek Deli—the first time someone attempted to eat the 10-pound sandwich since Kosmas’ death. “It was the first time we got together as a group to do it for him,” Marks says. “It was emotional for all of us. Because he was that guy. What we do here is a labor of love. It’s something that will always be very near and dear to us forever.”
I L L U S T R AT I O N S B Y E L I S E E N G L E R T
TO CHOMP T S E U Q ’S N A ONE M NDS’ WORTH S. U O P 9 3 H G U O THR HALLENGE C D O O F D N A L OF PORT
CONT. on page 12
Rules of the Challenge When we embarked on this project, my kindly editors worried I might not be properly incentivized to finish each food challenge. It seems they’d seen far too many videos of news reporters at eating contests gently putting down their forks, pinkies up, saying, “Oh, my goodness!” at the sight of so much food.
So we came to an agreement. I would put my own money on the line. The total cost of all these food challenges, before tips, was $221.10. No matter what—whether I won or lost—the newspaper would reimburse me precisely half that amount. That means if I won all the challenges, I had a chance of making a cool
$110.55 bonus. And if I lost every one, I would be out over $100. Thanks to the generosity of Mad Greek Deli’s Jake Marks, who would not let me pay for the first 10-pound sandwich challenge since the death of deli owner Pondo Kosmas, I ended up $7.45 ahead.
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E M I LY J O A N G R E E N E
Progressive Challenge at
Mad Greek Deli ingredients for a 2-foot-long, 6-inch-tall layer cake of cheese and cold cuts. Each sledge of provolone, Swiss and cheddar is the width of a quarter-pound cheese package at the supermarket. In between them are literal pounds of meat. The sandwich, taken together with fries and drink, is over 13 pounds—the weight of the heaviest baby ever born in India. And I’m supposed to eat it all in under an hour. “Hope you’ve gone to the bathroom,” Marks says, “because once your butt hits that seat, you can’t lift it again.” I have engineered a strategy. I will take ketchup with the fries, because it’s more watery. I’ll only drink water, not the soda I was offered. And I will eat the bread and mountainous pile of lettuce last, on the reasoning that lettuce will be easy to swallow and the
MARCH 17 AT 7:30 PM The challenge: Eat a 10-pound sandwich stuffed with meat and cheese, plus a pound of Greek fries and 32 ounces of any drink, in one hour. The stakes: If I lose, I pay $30. If I win, I get the sandwich free, plus an insane jackpot of $750. Each time someone loses, $15 goes into a kitty. Many, many people have lost.
HENRY CROMETT
“You’re gonna get the meat sweats,” says Kevin, a regular customer at Mad Greek Deli. He thinks about it for a second, then reconsiders. “You’re gonna get the meat and cheese sweats.” He seems unendingly happy about this. Together we are watching Mad Greek’s Ahmet Çelik, who’s in the kitchen building my ruined future. He is pulling, slicing and carefully weighing the
bread might otherwise expand in my stomach. But all that strategy is the work of a fool. After 10 minutes and maybe a pound and a half of food, I know that I’m doomed not merely to fail, but to experience a form of misery that is entirely new. I would love this sandwich in small doses—an oldschool, deli-style sub with a Greek twist from a spot where most ingredients are housemade. But in such volume, the salt of multiple pounds of salami and pepperoni and cheese have colluded to suck the water out of all cells in my mouth. I no longer taste the sandwich. What I have instead is a feeling I remember from my distant past—slow-building pain and exhaustion that I know is going to continue for 50 minutes. The feeling is…high-school athletics. This exertion of solemn and determined will in the face of intensifying suffering is familiar to me only from long-distance running and the sticky tortures of wrestling. This sandwich is a deoxygenating lung, an arm around my neck squeezing the life out of me. I continue, bite by painful bite, as the time ticks forward. Thirty minutes left, 20, 10. I will not win. But I will eat half of this sandwich. Because if I can get through half, I have hopes of winning somewhere else—the other challenges require that I ingest only 5 pounds of food. There are at least 30 people watching me fail. For the final 10 minutes, I think I just chewed a single bite of food. But as they count down the final seconds, the people in attendance at Mad Greek cheer loudly and, it seems, sincerely. Couples stop by afterward to survey the carnage or taste-test the sandwich. Marks declares me “a champion in my books.” This is why people like Greek weddings. “This is the first challenge since Pondo died,” says Mad Greek manager Nicole Hoss, who’s worked there 11 years. Tears well up as she tells me. A memorial to Kosmas sits by the front door, with photos of his beefy arm around the shoulders of everyone I’ve met today. “This is the first one we’ve made without him.” No matter how many times I insist, Marks refuses to let me pay, slapping $40 on the table. “You’re lucky the T-shirts for losers are on order,” Hoss says.
Result: Failure. But the remaining half of the sandwich is lunch for our entire office. Health effects: When I leave, I feel drunk, though I am very sober. There is no blood anywhere near my brain, and even the five-block drive home feels dangerous. My stomach does not quite hurt—but it is angry enough I wake up almost every hour during the night. I eat no food until 10 pm the next day.
MARCH 21 AT 9 AM The challenge: Eat a half-pound, 5-inch glazed doughnut that’s the equivalent of about six doughnuts in under 80 seconds. The stakes: $4.50 and a button.
s s a x e t the at t u n h g dou oughnut d o o d o o v
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My first attempts to visit Voodoo Doughnut don’t really work out. After three failed tries to avoid lines at off hours—apparently there was a David Bowie tribute— I end up at the eastside location at 9 am on a Monday. When I say I want to take the challenge, the girl behind the counter asks what city I’m from. When I say Portland, she looks amused. “Matthew from Portland!” she announces, while ringing a bell
kept behind the counter for this very purpose. Maybe one person looks up, confused. I have been given advice on how to complete this challenge, by a man who calls himself Max Carnage—he’s completed almost every eating challenge near Portland that isn’t the Mad Greek (see sidebar, page 13). But though he has told me to ball up pieces of doughnut and dunk them, in the heat of eating
I forget. I dunk doughnut bits without smushing them, and my mouth bogs down with dense and chewy dough. I can’t stop laughing as the time runs out. When time is called, the room makes the approximate sound of a party balloon going flaccid. “I’ve never seen anyone win, and I’ve been here a year,” says the girl who rang my bell. Another employee, a veteran, has seen four people succeed “out of maybe 50 or 60.” These statistics are heartening. But I still feel I should have eaten the hell out of that doughnut. Result: Failure. Health effects: None more lasting than shame.
Advice From the Experts After my drastically failed attempt eating a 10-pound sandwich at Mad Greek Deli, it was blazingly apparent I was illequipped to handle an eating challenge on my own. And so I consulted Ryan Rodacker—otherwise known as Max Carnage, president of Portland’s Big Eaters Club. Look on the walls of almost any restaurant hosting an eating challenge in Oregon, and you’ll find Carnage in Polaroid form among the winners. Here’s what I learned.
y z a r c e h t wings aot istr mekong b
You have to stretch your stomach.
Starving before eating doesn’t work— your belly gets too small. “I can eat 5, 6 pounds without prepping,” says Carnage, “but for a big event, what I like to do is eat a whole bunch of salad the night before.” The roughage cleans you out and fills your belly—but it’s gone by the next day. He then drinks water in the morning, along with some coffee to encourage urinating. “What some people do is drink over a gallon of water in five or six minutes,” he says, “then throw it back up. But that’s dangerous.” Nonetheless, Carnage has done it. His Facebook is filled with images of “water-stretching.”
MARCH 21 AT 7:30 PM The challenge: Eat 25 “crazy hot” Cambodianspiced chicken wings dripping in bird’s eye pepper sauce and coated in seeds in 15 minutes. The stakes: $10 and a T-shirt.
Manage your water.
The biggest thing holding you back from eating, short of sheer physical capacity, is the moisture in your mouth. “There’s a lot of salt in meat and cheese,” says Carnage, which dries you out. “But when you drink water, it takes up space in your belly. What you have to do is take micro-sips.”
Dunk whatever you can.
Dunking food adds just enough moisture to swallow. For the giant Tex-Ass doughnut at Voodoo, says Carnage, “you rip the doughnut into six pieces, then ball them up real tight and dunk each one in water.” I forgot to ball them up, and I failed the challenge. Carnage, on the other hand, beat the 80-second challenge within a mere 17 seconds.
Result: Success! I am now the proud owner of a Mekong Bistro T-shirt.
Wait till your food cools before you start.
Health effects: Oh. God. It begins at 4 am, when I wake up feeling that parts of me have liquefied. Capsaicin has accumulated within me in such bulk it has transformed my body into an acid kettle. It is like giving birth to a school of angry piranhas, one by one.
Otherwise it hurts.
e m e r p u s pizza at
pizzeria flying pie
At Portland’s only remaining Cambodian restaurant, a tucked-away Northeast 82nd Avenue eatery that doubles as a sports bar, I dive into a bowl of steaming crazy wings far too soon. They are too hot to eat—in temperature, not spice. But you know what? It doesn’t matter. The crazy wings at Mekong are simply sweet-hot fish-sauce wings with balanced spice, pretty much how I’d order them if I was eating for pleasure. The bird’s eye pepper heat doesn’t linger or build and punish like, say, habanero or ghost pepper. There are special techniques I’ve learned for eating wings, both from the internet and local big eater Max Carnage (see left): The “typewriter,” the “meat umbrella,” the “bone splitter.” I don’t do any of them. What I do is I eat the wings, one by one, until they’re gone, with 26 seconds to go. My lips sting. My fingers sting at their cuticles. And for the first time, I am a winner. Frankly, even if I’d lost, $10 is a hell of a deal on 25 wings. “Next time?” says Mekong ’s server. “Ostrich wings.”
pho e g n e l l a ch
at
o pho tang
MARCH 23 AT 2 PM The challenge: Eat 2 pounds of noodles and 2 pounds of meat, served in a bowl of pho broth you don’t have to drink, in one hour. The stakes: $29.95 and a picture on the wall.
Pho Tango is a somewhat nondescript mini-mall Hillsboro pho spot with one highly distinctive feature: a gigantic bowl of pho. When it arrives, the bowl is massive—but the second I see the plate under it, I know what I’m going to do. I pull out all the noodles and beef, slopping them onto the plate in hopes much of the water will evaporate. I eat all the beef immediately, while I can still swallow. Over time, the noodles dry into a sort of glutinous paste. It is the most tedious meal I’ve ever eaten—a plate of slowly drying, sticky rice, mildly sweetened with whatever pho broth remains within it, eaten over what seems like an eternity. I’m done with eight minutes to spare. When done, I’m left feeling like the kid at a soccer game who doesn’t have a mother. We try steadfastly to get the staff’s attention. “I finished! I’m done! I did it! Look, ma!” Eventually our server almost wordlessly wanders over with a camera and a little flag that reads “I DID IT!” and takes my picture. There is no T-shirt. Still, I leave a winner, swollen with rice. Result: Winner! Health effects: The simple starches in this challenge make it the easiest to digest. After less than 24 hours, I feel almost human.
MARCH 25 AT 1 PM The challenge: Eat a 16-inch, approximately 6-pound pizza loaded with meat in one hour. The stakes: $29.60, the regular price of a 16-inch pizza.
I am afraid of this challenge for a personal reason: Flying Pie’s pizza and I go way back, and I do not want to associate this pizza with pain. At a normal pizzeria, eating a 16-inch pizza would not be difficult. But Flying Pie’s slices are so monstrous that a single lunchtime slice will gorge most diners. The dough is finger-thick, the cheese dripping, the sausage a burial mound for mul-
tiple pigs. And as with the Mad Greek Deli sandwich, there is enough salt on this thing to mess up a horse. After 20 minutes, I feel an ever-building pressure against my tonsils as my body ceases to understand the pizza as food and begins to think of it as a toxic assault. Everything slows down. At Mad Greek, there were cheers; at Pho Tango, there was apathy. Here at the Montavilla Flying Pie, the prevailing mood is that I’m not too bright. “He ain’t gonna make it,” says a man in a cowboy hat, who taps me on the shoulder as he leaves.
“Pain is temporary,” says a nearby dad. I died on the final slice, with probably an additional half-pound of stray meat on the platter. The fine people of Flying Pie, in generous condolences, send me out with a T-shirt anyway. Result: Failure and pain. Health effects: In what amounts to an egregious tactical error, I visit a beer festival thereafter, reasoning that a few samples couldn’t hurt me. I am wrong. I am like an ancient Hebrew caught at adultery, whose punishment is death by stomach rupture as grain expands within. Once I finally reach a chair, I do not move or think or speak for over two hours.
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R A C H A E L R E N E E L E VA S S E U R
calzone
at
ria opa pizza
MARCH 28 AT 7 PM The challenge: Eat a 5-pound calzone in 30 minutes. The stakes: $30.
R A C H A E L R E N E E L E VA S S E U R
The spelling of “Pizzaria” lets you know there’s something different going on here: This is a Greek pizzeria, and so the fillings in the calzones are equally Greek. There is gyro meat on pizzas. The food challenge is sort of a choose-your-own adventure. The massive shell of the calzone is the same, but what’s inside the dough is chosen by the eater, with eight options. I opt for vegetarian. I am becoming, slowly, afraid of meat. Opa limits winners of its challenge to one attempt a year. “There are people who could do this once a week for a free meal,” says our server. “We had to set limits.” On the photo board of winners, the same few people show up again and again. “This lady ate a 7-pound calzone,” the server says.
Kindly, the staff allows you to cut apart the calzone and let it cool so you don’t singe your mouth. Unkindly, they give you only 30 minutes to eat 5 pounds of thickass crust, sauce, cheese, olives, peppers and pepperoni. I cut it into itty-bitty pieces, and it’s pretty much room temperature by the time we start the egg timers. The olives and peppers take their sodium toll, and the dough feels unswallowable after the first 15 minutes, but I get painfully close before the challenge ends. There’s about a lunch slice of pizza left when I’m done. I’m maybe a half-pound shy. The proximity to victory is…painful. Result: Close is no cigar. But I walked out with a T-shirt. “It doesn’t say winner,” says the server. “And it doesn’t say loser.” Health effects: Am I getting used to this? I’m…eerily fine. My body has become accustomed to this bizarre rhythm of bingeing and fasting. But the next day, two angry zits appear on my face. I am unhealthy. And I am starting to measure all food in pounds.
gogo burgers
at
gers gogo bur in aloha
MARCH 31 AT 6 PM The challenge: Eat two gigantic, towering four-patty burgers, plus 2 pounds of french fries, in an hour. The stakes: $40.
Somehow I never knew this place existed. Gogo is a Vietnamese burger shop in Aloha that also serves pho, and used to be a Mongolian grill. It now makes stacked multi-patty burgers and offers a giant condiment bar. “You go for it!” shouts a man from the kitchen as I pile into the foot-tall burgers, each stacked with four half-pound beef patties and much, much bacon, lettuce, tomato and onion. Even sauceless, the burgers are pretty damn nice. And I get through them both in about 40 minutes. The fries, though, are trouble. By the time I get to the fries, they are 2 pounds of cold, salty and oily mass that offers little incentive to
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continue. The mush accumulates in my cheeks, refusing to pass the gullet. For the first time, I raise the white flag, with nine minutes and a pound of fries to go. At Gogo, the hourlong eating challenge reveals its fundamental human character: loneliness. It makes me feel so lonely to eat like this, wrapped up in a titanic struggle whose point could never be expressed to anyone. Around me there is normal life, normal conversation—marriage, jobs, family. And here I am, as depressed as I’d ever been…chewing potato. Result: Failure is becoming the new normal. Also, I am losing so much money. Think of the wonderful meal I could have had for $40 somewhere else. Health effects: This is just the new me, walking around with a food baby, retaining so much water you’d swear I was actually pregnant.
k a e t s at
ld sayler’s o itchen k y r t n u o c
APRIL 2 AT 1 PM The challenge: Eat a 72-ounce steak, plus all the trimmings, in one hour. The stakes: $65 and a T-shirt.
The Mad Greek Deli’s challenge may be the most insane in town. But the one at Sayler’s Old Country Kitchen is the most famous. Since 1948, this hulking East Portland steakhouse—it looks like the lobby of a Red Lion—has offered a free meal to anyone eating an uninterrupted 4½ pounds of boneless, no-trim beef, accompanied by a nonsensical array of sides: two each of pickles, olives, carrots and celery, a piece of bread, 10 french fries, an onion ring, and a little bowl of ice cream. The challenge is a change to avenge my Uncle Rick, who attempted to eat the steak in 1973 when he visited Portland for the East-West Oregon Shrine All-Star football game. He made it through only two-thirds; the Shriners picked up the tab. I’m allowed to eat the salad early—probably a means of tiding me over because it takes almost an hour to cook a 72-ounce steak medium rare. Next to me is a man eating a 40-ounce steak he says lasts him three meals. He wishes me good luck. But you know what? I may struggle with bread, chewing endlessly, and I may give up in the face of french fries. But meat is meat, and I like it. Some primal, pre-civilization impulse keeps me chewing. After trimming around the hard-to-swallow well-done bits on the outside, when I am down to about 24 ounces of mostly red meat, I know that I have won. Upon downing my mostly melted bowl of ice cream and cleaning up the weird parts for good measure—with two minutes to spare—I finally understand why anyone would undergo the pain of an eating challenge. It is an enormously satisfying accomplishment, if also egregiously wasteful in ways I should probably recognize. Along with a T-shirt proclaiming “I ate the WHOLE Thing,” I receive two little white numbers with adhesive on the back. On the big board that greets all visitors to Sayler’s, I change the number of men who have succeeded in eating the steak from 639 to 640—satisfied in the knowledge that I had won, and that I would never have to do anything like that again. Result: Success, sweet success, and family pride. Health effects: A sense of well-being doctors could never find in their fancy charts.
No Money, No Honey
PORTLAND-AREA CHALLENGES THAT NO LONGER EXIST OR DON’T OFFER FREE MEALS. BALLS OF FIRE at Salvador Molly’s These habanero hush puppies are a mouthful of hot glass on the way in, and an amusement-park version of Crohn’s disease on the way out. If you eat them, you get nothing but pride and a picture on the wall. DIABLO BURRITO at Allan’s Authentic Mexican Restaurant Once upon a time, this spicy burrito was free if you ate it in 10 minutes. Now you get free burritos for a year, but only if you beat some nutty record set by a woman from Nebraska. THE BEHEMOTH BURGER at the Ram The Behemoth contains Anaheim peppers, American cheese, cheddar cheese, horseradish-chive havarti cheese, caramelized onions, lettuce, pickle chips, mushrooms, bacon, ham, corned beef and tomato. It costs
$25. There is no reason to eat it—it costs more than the T-shirt you get for enduring it. EL JEFE WINGS at Fire on the Mountain These habanero chicken wings are a mouthful of hot glass on the way in, and an amusement-park version of Crohn’s disease on the way out. But if you eat them, you get nothing but pride and a picture on the wall. FIVE-POUND POUTINE at the Original Dinerant The challenge has been discontinued. You could probably still order 5 pounds of gravy fries and eat them for an hour. But I don’t know why you would, and you don’t get anything if you do. THE MARINE at Killer Burger This serrano-habanero-ghost-pepper burger is off the menu. It hurt people. People threw up. Their faces swolled up. It burned fingers. It was the only Killer Burger burger that might actually kill people. Some things are too damn hot to eat, and this was one of them.
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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Willamette Week Presents
Willamette Week’s Annual Summer Camp Guide is a great resource for Portland parents who are deciding where to send their children for summer activities. Day camps to overnight, arts, sports, music, and everything in between.
Your child will surely find something fun to do in Portland!
For information about advertising in this section, Call Matt PLambeck 503-445-2757
ART + DESIGN �AMPS AGES 4-14
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It is an experience of a lifetime!
2016 Summer Day Camp
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tryonfriends.org
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River Ranch Summer Pony Camps!
The oldest & best riding camp for young people.
Summer Pony Camps Ages 5-7 Weekly Sessions beginning June 13th Moderate Price • Safe & Fun • Small Groups
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Do you love to act, sing and dance? Do you want professional training in a fun, friendly and emotionally safe environment? Do you have Summer plans? Spend a week, or two, or three or four at the Columbia Gorge School of Theatre. Study Acting, Singing, Dancing, TV/Film Acting and the Biz with professionals from across the country! Be in a show and make new friends from around the world! Located at Lewis & Clark College • Scholarships Available
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We help kids avoid brain drain and stay sharp with their math skills during active play! Classes: Gr 1-6/Math Gamers Active July 25-29 Uplands, Lake O Aug 8-12 CPRO, Newberg New! Gr 2-5/Measuring Baxter the Dog July 18-22 Taborspace, Portland Aug 1-5 CPRD, Newberg
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Summer Camps at Marylhurst Creative Arts Day Camp
For kids with or without special needs $170 | July 11 - 14: ages 5 - 10 July 18 - 21: ages 11 - 17
Marylhurst Choir Camp For high school and community college students $150 | August 1 - 5
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Campus is located just 10 minutes of Portland between Lake Oswego and West Linn.
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Shandong www.shandongportland.com
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“Dead leaves filled my mouth.” page 27
STARTERS
BITE-SIZED PORTLAND CULTURE NEWS.
MFNWPPP: Tame Impala, Duran Duran, Ice Cube and Ween will headline the conjoined summer music festival known as MusicfestNW Presents Project Pabst. The festival is a collaboration between MFNW—owned by the people who own WW—and Pabst Brewing, which had put on a festival at Zidell Yards for the past two years. The new festival ICE CUBE will take place at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 27-28. Other acts on the bill include rapper A$AP Ferg, reunited post-hardcore pioneers Drive Like Jehu, headbanging party philosopher Andrew W.K. and Portland’s own STRFKR and Unknown Mortal Orchestra. Limited early-bird tickets go on sale Friday, April 8. They are $45 for single-day tickets, $75 for a weekend pass. After those sell out, prices increase to $55 and $90, respectively. A slew of separately ticketed nightly concerts, taking place at various venues around town, are yet to be announced. QUARTERWORLD: Portland’s giant, new 4,000-squarefoot video and pinball palace, Quarterworld, is opening Friday in the old Alhambra Theatre on Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard. It’ll be open every day but Monday until 1 am on weekdays and 2 am weekends, and will be all-ages until 8 pm. “To see that many games in one room is just jawdropping,” says owner Phil Ragaway. “All the juices are flowing, the beer’s moving, I’m licensed up, pedigreed and signed off.” Food will be made by the people behind the Baowry. In addition to its trademark banh mi and Chinese bao sandwiches, Quarterworld will serve deep-fried burritos, deviled eggs, cotton candy and other “glorified, exaggerated carnie food.” BASQUE BEER: Beaverton is getting a brewery again. At gigantic antique mall the Garage Sale Warehouse on Southwest Western Avenue, Emilie Karas and Ellie Johnson plan to open food and beer cart Pints & Pintxos, serving toothpick-spiked Basque tapas paired with beer. At first, these will be guest taps, but once the federal licensing comes through, they’ll serve their own Hyggely Brewing beers. The name comes from the Danish term “hygge,” which translates loosely as “cuddling kittens on a bearskin rug while eating fondue and having your hair brushed by a lover in front of a roaring fire.” BRO? BRO!: The Broder empire continues to expand—this time to the east. Broder Øst—the fourth location of the Scandinavian-inflected brunch and dinner spots known for meatballs and lefse—will open as soon as May 1 in Hood River, bringing its ebelskiver deep into the Columbia Gorge, on the bottom floor of the Hood River Hotel. Hood River-area native Chad Hinman, longtime manager at the original Broder on Southeast Clinton Street, will head Broder Øst. He’ll tweak the tried-and-true Broder formula only slightly, taking advantage of local farm and orchard fare, as well as skewing the menu a bit more Norwegian than Scandinavian. “More lefse, fewer meatballs,” Hinman says, then adds: “We’ll probably have Norwegian meatballs. Norwegian meatballs have more of a brown sauce. There’s more lamb used in Norway.”
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
GO WHAT TO DO THIS WEEK IN ARTS & CULTURE
Trampled Rose: A Night Carnival for Old Portland is at the Steep and Thorny Way to Heaven, Southeast 2nd Avenue and Hawthorne Boulevard, on Saturday, April 9. 9:30 pm. $15. facebook.com/ events/835440829918216.
WEDNESDAY APRIL 6 Barbara Holm Believes in You
[COMEDY] Your life seems less shitty at standup shows, where you’re comparing it to comedians’ shittier lives. But Barbara Holm’s showcase wants everything to be bunnies and rainbows, so she gives audience members prizes and free comedy from locals like Randy Mendez, JoAnn Schinderle and Nathan Brannon. Bossanova Ballroom, 722 E Burnside St., 206-7630. 8 pm. Free.
SOME DRINK TO REMEMBER The only Old Portland cocktail menu you’ll ever need.
O
Lompoc Hip-Hop IPA Night
ld Portland. We all miss it, even though we aren’t sure when it started or ended, or even what it was, necessarily. This weekend, you can celebrate that evanescent time with a Night Carnival for Old Portland, where they will serve Old Portland cocktails. If you can’t make it, we’ve got a few of our own that you can make in your Clown House and drink while watching Ramblin’ Red videos on the free couch you yanked off the curb with your cats Bud and Vera. Cheers! LIZZY ACKER.
[BEER] Five taps of hip-hopthemed IPAs: World Class Wreckin Brew, a tropical mix brewed with the bystander-ish help of WW, will tap with Mama Said Hop You Out, Hotel Motel Holiday Inn, MCA IPA, and Hopster’s Paradise, along with a gin-’n’-juice cocktail. Lompoc Tavern, 1620 NW 23rd Ave., 8949374. 4 pm-1 am. Free entry.
Operators
[DARK ELECTRO] Apparently Wolf Parade’s reunion this year wasn’t enough to keep Dan Boeckner occupied. Blue Wave, the debut from his Operators project, is a dark, slick continuation of the synth-plus-frigidguitar Boeckner employed in Handsome Furs, his aggro growl making him sound like the leader of the house band at a goth prom. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+.
THE DANDIEST WARHOL OF ALL
I L L U S T R AT I O N S B Y J E N N L I V
Champagne with a “powdered sugar” rim.
THE SILENT WATERFALL
A cup of Columbia River water drizzled over salmon roe, salted to taste with the drinker’s tears.
THE SHANGHAI TUNNEL SURPRISE
THE CAPTAIN OF INDUSTRY
THE ALEXAKIS
Tinashe
THE HOBO CHRISTMAS
A ’90s-era cocktail. Warm Pabst tallboy with a half-smoked Camel Light at the bottom.
Folgers Coffee, bleached two days in California sun and reheated by microwave, served in a Styrofoam to-go cup.
THURSDAY APRIL 7
One shot of Willamette River sewage water infused with moss from outside Bullseye Glass and mixed with one shot of HRD vodka, served in a red glass.
One handle of bottom-shelf gin, muddled with crushed breath mints foraged from local restaurants. Accompanied by a McDonald’s ketchup-packet chaser. Served inside or outside of Tony’s Tavern.
FRIDAY APRIL 8 Othello
[DRAMMY DRAMA] How can Post5 Theatre follow an 80-year-old King Lear? Cast Ithica Tell as Othello, surround her with a female ensemble cast, enlist Drammy-winning body-painter Caitlin FisherDraeger to direct, and set the 15th-century tragedy in the American prison system. The place has been completely renovated, and this take on the Bard looks damn fresh too. Post5 Theatre, 1666 SE Lambert St., 971-333-1758. 7:30 pm. $20.
THE STORM LARGEST
Fireball and vodka, served tall and shaken with ice balls.
THE I, ANONYMOUS
Seawater imported from Seattle with an additional sprinkle of salt, shaken with lightly chewed gum. Served with a mini-doughnut on a penis-shaped skewer.
THE LONG DECEMBERIST
THE BEST VOODOO DOUGHNUT Two tablespoons of NyQuil and a double shot of vodka in a cup full of Froot Loops with an aspirin garnish.
THE DRUGSTORE COWBOY Actually just heroin.
[R&B] Ciara may have canceled her tour, but at least we’ve still got Tinashe, representing the next generation of R&B singers to descend from Velvet Rope-era Janet Jackson. New single “Ride of Your Life” finds her slinking into Rihanna territory. Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W Burnside St., 225-0047. 8 pm. $27 advance, $32 day of show. All ages.
SATURDAY APRIL 9 Late Night Action
A cup of aged mead made by noble and tragic seditionists, with a dash of crane’s blood. Served in a gilded chalice and garnished with a bough of young pine.
[TED TALKS] Ted Wheeler and the local founder of a frozen Brazilian cheese-bread company are the guests of honor on Alex Falcone’s last late-night talk show of the season, soundtracked by XRAY’s DJ Bobby D. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 7 pm. $15.
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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FOOD & DRINK = WW Pick. Highly recommended. By MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Editor: MARTIN CIZMAR. Email: dish@wweek.com. See page 3 for submission instructions.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6 Lompoc Hip-Hop IPA Night
Lompoc has been kicking out ’90s hip-hop-themed IPAs for over a year now—Dre, Snoop, probably Skee-Lo at some point. So now you get the Jamz compilation, with five tapping at the same time. There’s World Class Wreckin Brew, a tropical mix brewed with the bystanderish help of WW, plus Mama Said Hop You Out, Hotel Motel Holiday Inn, MCA IPA, and Hopster’s Paradise. Lompoc Tavern, 1620 NW 23rd Ave., 894-9374. 4 pm-1 pm. Free.
THURSDAY, APRIL 7 Unibroue-ing
The Abbey Bar will host Unibroue for an event with merch and special bottles, including the 2011 17 Grande Réserve that topped the London World Beer Awards, plus various other Grande Réserves, cognac-aged Trois Pistoles and tequila-aged La Fin du Monde. The Abbey Bar, 716 NW 21st Ave. 222-1593. 5-8 pm. Free.
SATURDAY, APRIL 9 Nano Beer Fest
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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For two days, John’s Marketplace, the westside’s best-loved bottle shop, will host a fest consisting exclusively of the state’s tiniest brewers, whether newbies like Labrewatory, Pono and Bent Shovel or comparative oldies like Ambacht and Boring. The brewers will be hanging out on a rotating schedule. John’s Marketplace, 3535 SW Multnomah Blvd., 244-2617. Through April 10.
1. HunnyMilk
5222 NE Sacramento St., 320-7805, hunnymilk.com. Saturday-Sunday only. The weed brunches sell out fast, but this pop-up brunch always offers startling invention, with Dutch babies under creme brulee ice cream and an “open face croissant-donut sammy.” $$.
2. Marukin
609 SE Ankeny St., 894-9021, marukinramen.com. Ramen spot Marukin’s multitude of shio, shoyu and miso broths are marvels of richness and subtlety, a noodle-filled gauntlet thrown at Biwa a few blocks away. $$.
3. Gastro Mania
1986 NW Pettygrove St., 689-3794, gastromaniapdx.com. Tiny spot Gastro Mania serves up octopus salad with a tenderness and spice-charred exterior as fine as most fine dining. But it costs a mere $8.50. $.
4. Paiche
4237 SW Corbett Ave., 403-6186, paichepdx.com. Chef Jose Luis de Cossio serves some of the most extraordinary food in Portland—including the brightest, most balanced and lovely ceviche we’ve had in this country. $$.
5. Wei Wei
7835 SE 13th Ave., 946-1732. Taiwan spot Wei Wei’s beef noodle soup ($13) is the beefiest beef noodle soup. And the most wonderful beef noodle soup we’ve had this year. $$.
DRANK
Kachka Horseradish Vodka (NEW DEAL/KACHKA) Remember, back in the early 2000s or so, when every halfway hip bar had its own infused vodkas? You know, some skunky stuff muddled with flavors that probably included cucumber and some kind of pepper? Wasn’t that awful? Well, for over a year our 2014 Restaurant of the Year, revolutionary Russian eatery Kachka, has been doing that, but doing it right. With a helpful nudge on technique from a Ukrainian bartender back in the day, Kachka coowners Israel and Bonnie Morales have served a horseradish-infused vodka at their restaurant that is nothing short of extraordinary. And now they’re applying the same process to New Deal Distillery vodka, selling the stuff in bottles to take home for $27.95. It’s spicy, sweet, and never overly bitter or a shock to the sinuses. Consider it a highly alcoholic, high-class equivalent of Horsey Sauce. And it is a constituent in what’s become our favorite dirty martini recipe in town. Just get some pickle juice from Fee Brothers—the same company that makes the cocktail bitters—and add celery bitters and maybe a spot of cucumber, and you have a far more civilized, refined summer drink than even a Pimm’s cup. New Deal will let you taste it if you visit the distillery, but you have to ask for it special. Ask for it special. Recommended. MATTHEW KORFHAGE.
TASTE-OFF
Hopping North BY S OP H I A J U N E
ELISE ENGLERT AND GABI MCKENZIE
WE DRANK EVERY IPA MADE IN VANCOUVER, WASHINGTON. HERE ARE THE BEST. sjune@wweek.com
In January, we sampled every IPA made in the city of Portland—73 in all—in an epic blind tasting, with surprising results. The top five were all new-to-Portland breweries, and the top two came from Fat Head’s. But while tasting beers for our annual Beer Guide, we noticed a brew revolution happening in our suburb to the north, where the number of breweries have doubled in the past two years. And so last week we gave Vancouver the same treatment. We gathered a panel of eight beer experts—among them Breakside brewmaster Ben Edmunds, Saraveza publican Sarah Pederson, N.W.I.P.A.’s Jackson Wyatt and the New School blog’s Ezra Johnson-Greenough—to blind-sample all 19 IPAs available at Vancouver’s breweries. According to tasters who took part in both panels, Vancouver stacked up pretty well, with lower highs but also higher lows. Vancouver’s IPAs tend to be more classic—you won’t find the Vermontstyle beers like the Great Notion IPAs that have captured the attention of New Portland. But a brand-new brewery again came out on top. Vancouver’s best IPA is from a spot less than 3 months old, and the second and third best come from a brewery already halfway done moving to Portland.
1. Corner Window (Trusty)
ABV: 7 percent Not only is Trusty Brewing Co. Vancouver’s newest brewery—it opened in January—it’s the first commercial brewing venture from longtime homebrewer Gary Paul. But despite Paul opening his doors only three months ago, his light-bodied, straw-colored West Coast IPA blew away the competition. Even with 88 IBU, the beer—named for a corner-window seat at Trusty’s brewpub—is deliciously sippable. Paul doesn’t come from Vancouver, though. He’s from West Linn, and for years he’d been trying to start a brewery in Portland but was stymied by real estate prices. So he decided to buy a space in downtown Vancouver—a city whose beer scene Paul says will only grow from here. “Vancouver is a ghost town compared to Portland,” he says. “It’s right across the river from the biggest brewing city in the world. I’m shocked that there’s 14 breweries on this side, and 90 on the other side.” This has made finding a name for Trusty incredibly easy—Paul didn’t have to distinguish himself from as many breweries as there are in Portland. It’s easy to attribute Trusty’s success to Paul’s 20 years of experience as a homebrewer in San Francisco and the Portland area, but he maintains it’s also largely due to Vancouver’s proximity to the Yakima and Willamette valleys and grain company Country Malt. “A lot of people ask us about expansion,” Paul says. “We are planning on expanding, but we’re only three months in; we haven’t even named all of our beers yet.” Comments from beer panelists: “Easy-drinking with Citra citrus.” “Killer aroma, clean and hoppy all the way through.” “Great example of West Coast IPA. Go ’Couv!”
2. Asylum Avenue (Mt. Tabor)
ABV: 6.3 percent Unlike Trusty, Mt. Tabor Brewing is one of Vancouver’s oldest brewpubs. The brewery opened in Portland in 2010, hence its name, but then moved to Vancouver in 2011. Now it’s about to move back. Owner and brewer Eric Surface will be opening a Southeast Portland Mt. Tabor Brewing location this summer in the Buckman neighborhood. Surface is originally from Portland, but moved the brewery to Vancouver to work a different full-time job without the long commute. Coming back to Portland has always been part of the brewery’s master plan, he says. The change is fitting. Several of Mt. Tabor’s
beers are named for Portland landmarks, including the Asylum Avenue, named after Hawthorne’s Old Portland nickname. Asylum Avenue was one of Surface’s original homebrew recipes, using just Amarillo and Simcoe hops. He eventually added Mosaic, creating a balanced, easy-drinking beer that’s not overly bitter. Comments: “Solid. Could drink a lot of it.” “Pineapple, strawberry, aromas. Yum.” “This. I would order this a second time.”
3. Bridge Lifter (Mt. Tabor)
ABV: 6.8 percent The Bridge Lifter was born out of a shortage. In 2012, Tabor brewer Eric Surface couldn’t find enough Amarillo hops to make his flagship Asylum Avenue. So this brew uses Cascade, Zythos and Falconer’s Flight to get a big hop flavor. Combined with near-aggressive bittering at 86 IBU, our panel praised this IPA for its old-school Northwest feel. “I was late getting to the tasting room one Friday because of a bridge lift. We hadn’t even named the beer yet, but that night I was like, ‘Oh, I got this one,’” Surface says. “It’s one of our most popular beers.” Comments: “Old-school. Miss you, 2008.” “Balanced, clean old-school.”
4. Shadow Ninja (Loowit)
ABV: 7.2 percent Shadow Ninja has always been important to Loowit. When the brewery opened its doors downtown in 2012, Shadow Ninja was one of the first beers on tap. In 2013, it was the first beer Loowit bottled. Now, with a 20 barrels, 25 beers currently on tap and bottles sold in Washington and Oregon, Loowit has become one of the ’Couv’s best breweries. Comments: “I love it. Orange peel, malt, slightly sweet.” “Clean, green aroma.” “Woody hop, nutty malt.”
5. Mortal Peril (Brother Ass)
ABV: 7.5 percent After working in the insurance business for 30 years, brewer Wally Wakeman decided to retire. A homebrewer with limited experience, he couldn’t find a job at a brewery, so he decided to open his own. He admits Mortal Peril had a ways to go when it was first brewed, but like his priorities in life, he seems to have figured it out. Comments: “Grassy with underlying citrus, slight banana, candied and caramel.” “Reminds me of a softer Sierra Nevada pale.”
13. Carnage (Heathen)
6. Evergreen (Old Ivy)
ABV: 6.1 percent Old Ivy rebooted in June with veteran brewer Chris Spollen, who has 22 years’ brewing experience, including time at Rogue in Newport and Amnesia in Portland. At Old Ivy, Spollen created Evergreen IPA, a classic Northwest-style brew with big citrus notes. Comments: “Garden fresh. Great summer IPA.” “Great aroma with tropical fruit.”
7. Flawless Victory (Loowit)
ABV: Loowit’s Flawless Victory didn’t win, but the brewpub that pours it is still Vancouver’s best hang. Comments: “Floral, herbal and complex hop flavor.” “Grapefruit, earthy, funky.” “SweeTarts!”
8. Johnny Chinook & the Crystals (Old Ivy)
ABV: 6.7 percent Despite a judge’s comment, this IPA has Chinook and Crystal hops and zero Rice Krispies, although Old Ivy does also make a cream ale brewed with flaked corn. Comments: “Oddly smells like root beer.” “Smells like Rice Krispies with berries.” “Hot and sulfuric, not especially harmonious.”
9. Koronides (Loowit)
ABV: 6.4 percent Loowit’s newest IPA is infused with grapefruit peel. Comments: “Not much happening.” “Great orange juice flavor. Minty.” “Aroma of forest.”
10. Transcend (Heathen)
ABV: 6.2 percent Small-batch brewery Heathen makes “progressive ales for the promiscuous palate.” While Transcend didn’t win here, it did win the People’s Choice Award at both the Portland Spring Beer and Wine Festival in 2013 and Vancouver Summer Brewfest in 2014. Comments: “Papaya and banana.” “Autumn leafy.” “This owns.”
11. Hopnado 2
(McMenamins on the Columbia)
ABV: 5.4 percent McMenamins’ tropical version of its Hopnado beer tasted more like pot than pineapple to our panel. Comments: “Smells like pot. Roll me a joint.” “Easy drinking.”
12. 5K (Ghost Runners)
ABV: 6.4 percent Rob Ziebell and Jeff Seibel started Ghost Runners in 2012. Both runners, they often fueled their runs with the promise of a beer afterward— hence the name of their 5K IPA, the highest ranking of the three IPAs they entered. Comments: “Flavor is on point.” “Put some soul into this beer!”
ABV: 7.6 percent Heathen calls Carnage “a massacre of hops.” In our Portland IPA tasting, we found that tasters tend to move away from ultra-hoppy IPAs to lighter, more sessionable brews, which explains one judge’s comment: “Older-school.” Comments: “Hops a bit sweaty.” “Pine resin. Merry Christmas!”
14. Metal Meltdown (Heavy Metal)
ABV: 7.5 percent Heavy Metal Brewing Company may welcome a judge’s description of its beer as having a “tobaccolike note.” The brand-new brewery— which makes its current two brews at Doomsday Brewing in Washougal—also specializes in pizza and metal jam sessions. Comments: “Harsh savory.” “Needs finishing hops/ bitterness.” “Dead leaves filled my mouth.”
15. Fortside (Fortside)
ABV: 6.2 percent Fortside was founded this past September by Vancouver natives with the goal of putting the ’Couv on the West Coast beer map, with beers like Couve A’licious and Straight Outta Yakima. Comments: “Cellarlike malt flavor.” “Zesty.” “Caramelized honey bomb.”
16. Hydration (Ghost Runners)
ABV: 7 percent This beer proved a bit too bitter to be thirstquenching. Comments: “Bitter orange.” “Laundry detergent.” “Initial aroma pungent, then it grows on you.”
17. Trestle NW (Railside)
ABV: 6.9 percent Brewer Mike Davis and his wife originally opened Railside in Washougal back in 2012. Now in Vancouver, Davis designed the English-style Trestle NW to have big hops and big malt, which our panel found too sweet. Comments: “Artificial fruit flavor. Good for kids of the ’80s.” “Murky orange lemon like unfiltered yeast on shelf.”
18. Trap Door (Trap Door)
ABV: 7.1 percent Trap Door opened its doors last November. We really enjoyed our visit in January—and the patio will be hopping come summer—but our tasters did not like the IPA. Comments: “Chewy granola bar made from a hippie.” “Canned green beans. Jolly green giant.” “Dries out at the end.”
19. Hawaiian Hydration (Ghost Runners)
ABV: 7 percent The tropical version of the Hydration IPA was funky in a bad way. Comments: “Lost in space.” “One-dimensional.” “Pond water got blended in!”
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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TICKETS ON SALE AT
PORTLAND.PROJECTPABST.COM
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
SUNDAY AUGUST 28 SATURDAY AUGUST 27
21+
DURAN DURAN ICE CUBE
/ NATHANIEL / RATELIFF
STRFKR / & THE NIGHT SWEATS A$AP FERG / ANDREW W.K. / LIZZO THE COATHANGERS / KYLE CRAFT
TAME IMPALA / WEEN / DRIVE LIKE JEHU
UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA PARQUET COURTS / SHEER MAG HOP ALONG
/ DIARRHEA PLANET / TENEMENT
WATERFRONT PARK PORTLAND, OR
MUSIC 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, APRIL 6
THURSDAY, APRIL 7
Santigold, Leileki47
Michael Martin Murphey
[GOLD MINE] Santi White likes to take her time. The Philadelphia singer, whose last name turns from white to gold for her stage name, recently released 99 Cents, her first record in four years, and only her third since 2008. It’s a tightly crafted eclectic collection of unwavering energy. The album confirms what most already knew to be true: Santigold may be the most versatile artist around. She effortlessly dances between four or five genres even in the same song, turning from soul to electronica to hip-hop to reggae to punk, backed by grimy synth bass, soulful trumpets and rock guitar. Her bouncy single “Can’t Get Enough of Myself” highlights her vocal chops better than any song, bringing to mind both Aretha Franklin and Beyoncé—if Beyoncé ever wanted to try her hand at chamber reggae rap. SOPHIA JUNE. Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W Burnside St. 8:30 pm. Sold out. All ages.
Operators, Bogan Via
[HOWLIN’ WOLF] Wolf Parade’s reunion this year would have been enough to keep Dan Boeckner in blog headlines, but since dude isn’t capable of sitting idle, he once again formed an incredible new band in the meantime. First, it was electro-pop duo Handsome Furs, with then-wife Alexei Perry, then indie-supergroup Divine Fits, with Spoon’s Britt Daniel, and now again, with Operators. Blue Wave is a dark, slick continuation of the synth-plus-frigid guitar tone Boeckner employed in the Furs, except he dresses his aggro growl in impeccable, all-black formal wear, as if he were the leader of a goth prom house band. CRIS LANKENAU. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St. 9 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+.
Robert Cray Band, Ty Curtis
[DELTA HOUSE BLUES] 4 Nights of 40 Years Live, the latest live collection from Robert Cray, boasts such evident agelessness and instrumental mastery that the youngest living inductee of the Blues Hall of Fame might appear unfit to serve as elder statesman of his chosen idiom, given the untroubled brow and effortless rise. But Cray’s career success isn’t without tragedy. Although the crisp riffs and contemporary popcraft of 1986’s Strong Persuader did as much as any album to keep the relevance of its deadlining musical genre alive, Cray’s Eugene gigs with Curtis Salgado a decade earlier—luring the cast of Animal House and inspiring a young John Belushi to form the Blues Brothers—likely dealt the fatal blow. JAY HORTON. Revolution Hall, 1300 SE Stark St. No. 110. 8 pm. $45. 21+.
Egrets on Ergot, Super Brown, Mr. Wrong, Moon
[POST-PUNK] Unlike a lot of bands associated with the post-punk revival, Egrets on Ergot hasn’t limited its exploration of ’80s darkness to chorus pedals and extravagant melancholy. The Los Angeles quartet certainly dips into the past, but the band’s apparent affection for the Gun Club and the Birthday Party goes beyond polite mimicry. Egrets on Ergot borrows just enough to map a way to strange new forms of dark power, and the result is often legitimately unsettling, which is what happens when bands pursue essences instead of appearances. If this is nostalgia, it is nostalgia for something more ancient and evil than old records. CHRIS STAMM. The Know, 2026 NE Alberta St. 8 pm. $5. 21+.
[SINGER-SONGWRITER] I never really thought twice about Michael Martin Murphey. His signature 1975 hit, “Wildfire,” remained in memory only vaguely, a cornball yarn about a girl and her horse from the era when fringejacketed folkies improbably topped the charts. But hearing a haunting rendition by a chorus of ’70s schoolkids on 2001’s Langley Schools Music Project album brought home to me the true weirdness and mystery of the tale, which Murphey says came to him in a dream—while redeeming its cornier aspects in unalloyed childhood innocence. Murphey’s other period hit, “Geronimo’s Cadillac,” was ahead of its time in addressing Native American issues. Today, he’s a master performer whose evident Christian faith seems to imbue him not with self-righteousness but a type of divine grace. JEFF ROSENBERG. Alberta Rose, 3000 NE Alberta St. 8 pm. $40. Under 21 permitted until 9:30 pm.
Northwestern Black Circle Festival VII
[METAL] Now proudly in its seventh incarnation, Black Circle has become the longest running metal fest in town. As a testament to its status, the 2016 headliners are luminary in their darkness. Abigail Williams tops the Thursday bill, with American black-metal legend Absu making Friday the night to remember. The true coup, of course, is Grim Reaper. This is a band that exemplifies why heavy metal is considered so comedic to outsiders. Every cliché saturates the English band’s videos and discography, going all the way back to its discovery in a battle of the bands shortly after its formation in 1979. Lead vocalist Steve Grimmett is the only standing member, but this appearance promises to be a sterling example of metal’s excess and entertainment value. NATHAN CARSON. Ash Street Saloon, 225 SW Ash St. 5:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, April 7-9. $15 advance, $18 day of show Thursday, $19 advance, $22 day of show Friday, $27 advance, $30 day of show Saturday. 21+.
Night Beats, Hollow Sidewalks
[HEAVENLY GARAGE] Discounting the old adage, Seattle’s garage-cumpsych troupe Night Beats is pretty much the sum of its individual parts. One dude issued an EP on Burger Records, another contributed some guitar to a release from the Bay Area’s Hunx and His Punx. Moving from the Trouble in Mind label to Heavenly for the release of the new album, Who Sold My Generation, continues a fiveyear streak of churning out compositions that might have just missed the cut for Nuggets back in the day—but that’s a laudatory position to be in, so deep as we are into the nth generation of garage and psych re-creations. DAVE CANTOR. Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St. 9 pm. $10. 21+.
Ages and Ages, Ezza Rose
[CHOIR CAMP] Ages and Ages is an eight-piece indie-pop Portland band that first formed in 2009 and has been presidentially approved: President Obama has it on his official Spotify playlist. You could argue that Ages and Ages sounds like one of those vaguely Christian rock bands, with its spiritual lyrics and choirstyle vocals. But more than a group cool Jesus kids can get down to, Ages and Ages is a well-polished campfire band, the harmonies coming together in jawdropping, effortless stacks backed by acoustic guitar and Tim Perry’s voice, which sounds like the twin of Fun’s Nate Ruess. SOPHIA JUNE. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St. 9 pm. $12. 21+.
CONT. on page 32
COMMENTARY RICK VODICKA
= WW Pick. Highly recommended. 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.
SemiCharmed Lie PUNK IS DEAD. THIRD EYE BLIND LIVES. Punk rock turned me into an asshole—a giant asshole who was supposed to hate bands like Third Eye Blind. It happened fast. When Dookie came out, I was a zitty 14-year-old who liked Smashing Pumpkins and Nine Inch Nails and Tori Amos. I liked music that sounded good. A year later, I was a zitty 15-year-old with pink hair and a stockpile of bold pronouncements about the insufficiencies of skate punk. I was in thrall to Maximumrocknroll and 924 Gilman Street, and those twin monoliths of the Bay Area punk scene dosed me with a deep loathing for anything that flirted with the mainstream. I was not only an asshole, but a coward. In the early days of my punk conversion, before I’d fully committed myself to hating joy, I made my 10-year-old brother buy Pearl Jam’s Vitalogy for me because I was afraid the punk clerk at Tower Records would judge me for wanting to listen to something that wasn’t advertised on his leather jacket. Soon after, I let an older punk talk shit about my longhaired friend for having long hair and wearing a Counting Crows shirt. I should have stood up for my friend. More importantly, I should have stood up for Counting Crows. That first album is great. By 1997, I was utterly insufferable. I wouldn’t even listen to pop punk. It wasn’t intense enough. It wasn’t “real” enough. Songs about love? Forget it. Crass said love was a “shit condition.” I couldn’t disagree. I listened to powerviolence and crust punk exclusively. I was a high-school dropout with impeccable taste in short songs about the government ( bad) and eating animals (also bad). Which is all to say I did not plan on becoming a fan of Third Eye Blind when its self-titled debut came out in 1997. But my little brother hadn’t been poisoned by punk dogma yet. I’d turned him on to the Ramones in an attempt to build myself a best friend, but he was 12—he liked anything that was good. And Third Eye Blind was good. So my brother liked Third Eye
Blind. That weird little home-schooled knucklehead was treating his pubescent insanity with 24/7 exposure to Stephen Jenkins’ insipid broetry, and to share a house with my brother in 1997 was to share a house with Third Eye Blind. I don’t have to describe what the first Third Eye Blind album sounds like. You remember it. You know why you remember it? Because nearly every song on it is a pop masterpiece. So access that sweet spot in your brain where memories of perfection live and imagine my dirty, shameful lust as I lingered in my brother’s bedroom for a taste of “Graduate” and “How’s It Going to Be” and “Thanks a Lot.” I wish I could have stayed there in my brother’s bedroom forever. I still believed in guilty pleasure back then. I still believed in shame. I still believed in punk. And nothing is sweeter than a love lined with self-loathing. So here’s to hating pleasure and adoring Third Eye Blind. Thank you, brother. I owe you one. CHRIS STAMM. SEE IT: Third Eye Blind plays Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., with Bad Bad Hats, on Tuesday, April 12. 8 pm. Sold out. 21+. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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MUSIC
Simple ApproAch
Bold FlAvor vegan Friendly
The Thesis: Calvin Valentine, China Marie, Stevo the Weirdo, Matty, Verbz
open 11-10
everyday
500 NW 21st Ave, (503) 208-2173 kungpowpdx.com
Headout P.25
[HIP-HOP] Portland’s leading monthly hip-hop showcase welcomes back producer-rapper Calvin Valentine, maybe better known by his behind-the-boards name, G_Force. The TxE member decamped to California a few years back, but is returning here in advance of a promised new project on rising local imprint EYRST. He’s joined by R&B newcomer China Marie and Stevo the Weirdo, an introspective stoner rapper in the mold of Myke Bogan, but with a smoother, mellower flow. Kelly’s Olympian, 426 SW Washington St. 9 pm. $5. 21+.
FRIDAY, APRIL 8 XRAY Records Launch Party: Sun Angle, the Ghost Ease
[LET’S GET LABELED] Portland’s favorite community radio station is starting a record label. (No, not KBOO, the other one.) It’s such a natural extension of the two-yearold station’s proselytizing for the local music scene that it’s kind of a wonder it didn’t happen sooner. Tonight’s show features two bands already that already have releases on XRAY’s docket: post-punk trio the Ghost Ease, and resurgent psych-prog tsunami Sun Angle, featuring the recently returned-totown Papi Fimbres. Bunk Bar, 1028 SE Water Ave., 328-2865. 9:30 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+.
Marco Benevento
[PIANO PSYCH] Having collaborated with members of bands like Phish, Tortoise, the Barr Brothers and more, Marco Benevento has established himself as the next piano man to watch. His studio
records bridge his jammy, psychedelic tendencies with a love of pop. Live, though, Benevento often channels his inner Ben Folds with eccentric covers and musical interpretations, while also performing for hours on end. This show at the Wonder serves as the release party for his sixth studio LP, The Story of Fred Short. HILARY SAUNDERS. Wonder Ballroom, 128 NE Russell St. 9 pm. $15 advance, $17 day of show. 21+.
SATURDAY, APRIL 9 Noah Gundersen
[SOMBER AMERICANA] Secular music isn’t for everyone, especially if you were brought up in a devout home like Noah Gundersen. The 26-year-old Washington native has used the years since moving out to question his faith and explore music from beyond the confines of his upbringing, most recently with his sophomore LP, Carry the Ghost. Downtempo guitars continue to highlight the fragility of Gundersen’s voice and those of his siblings, while spare piano and string arrangements add to the album’s melancholic nature. The result is something that’s intimate, confessional and impactful, whether he’s addressing starcrossed lovers or the very notion of the God under which he was raised. BRANDON WIDDER. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St. 9 pm. Sold out. 21+.
Gangstagrass
[C-MURDER BALLADS] In this age of mash-ups, there’s little surprise from any new pairing of thug-life braggadocio with traditional string band frolic. But, where covers like the Gourds’ “Gin and Juice” played upon the essential disparities for
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SMALLZ & RASKIND
PREVIEW
Tinashe, Blackbear [POST-AALIYAH R&B] We were supposed to get two R&B divas in town this week. But then Ciara canceled her tour, leaving us with only the next best thing, 23-year-old Tinashe Jorgenson Kachingwe—emphasis on next. Like Ciara, the singer, who understandably prefers the mononym Tinashe, is a descendent of Janet Jackson circa The Velvet Rope, with an understated swag that inevitably invites Aaliyah comparisons. She first home-recorded two remarkably self-assured mixtapes, and that confidence carried over to her breakthrough 2014 single, “2 On.” Subsequent album Aquarius established her mastery of feline sultriness, remaining effortlessly transfixing even when the production tended to drift. “Ride of Your Life,” the latest single from upcoming follow-up Joyride, and featuring a chiming beat from producer of the moment Metro Boomin, finds Tinashe slinking into Rihanna territory, luxuriating in the spoils of newfound fame. Go ahead and reach for Rih Rih, girl—at this point, nothing seems out of her range. MATTHEW SINGER. Crystal Ballroom, 1332 W Burnside St. 8 pm Thursday, April 7. $27 advance, $32 day of show. All ages. 32
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DATES HERE
PETER ELLENBY
INTRODUCING
Moon Tiger WHO: Alison Cohn, Taylor Hill, Alicia J. Rose, Meagan Faith Schreiber. SOUNDS LIKE: Sleater-Kinney singing noise-pop sea shanties. FOR FANS OF: Superchunk, Wild Flag, Tom Waits, Bitch’n. When Alicia Rose traded playing in bands for booking them into clubs, taking their photos and directing their videos, she thought she’d mothballed her accordion for good. Even when she returned to playing music, she didn’t anticipate picking up her old instrument again—nor did she necessarily want to. “We made you play,” says Alison Cohn, Rose’s bandmate in Moon Tiger, from across a table at Lardo on North Williams Avenue. “At some point, we started playing, and they were like, ‘Dude, come on. Everyone’s got a drummer, no one’s got an accordion player. Let’s just embrace that as part of who we are,’” says Rose. “And I relented—gradually.” That’s what happens when you’re in a band with three selfdescribed “alpha women.” In most situations, though, there’s not a whole lot of arm-twisting required to get anyone in Moon Tiger just to give something a try. Incubated for a year and a half before going public, the group arrived at its raw, tuneful sound through a process of, as Cohn puts it, “divine fucking around.” That process hasn’t exactly stopped. Live, everyone switches instruments, and everyone takes a turn on the mic. As a conglomeration of musicians who wanted desperately to get back to playing, who plays what has never really mattered, as long as they were playing something. Rose spent almost two decades working her squeezebox in the neoclassical avant-pop project Miss Murgatroid before focusing on other creative pursuits (she’s directed videos for Bob Mould and helms the web series The Benefits of Gusbandry), while Cohn spent the ’90s in the New York rock scene. Meagan Faith Schreiber had never been in a band before, but always dreamed of being a singer, for a long time suppressing her musical desires as a form of misguided rebellion against her studio musician father. Brought together by a mutual friend, the band had no preconceived notions of what it would look or sound like, or if anyone outside the practice space would ever even hear it. “It really just happened because we needed to get it out of our systems,” Rose says. Quickly, though, the trio—plus Cohn’s boyfriend, Taylor Hill, who joined later—found itself clicking in unexpected ways. On Moon Tiger’s debut EP, driving, distorted guitars buzz against primal drumming and the melodic hum of accordion, while the vocals shift from harmoniously dreamy to soulfully bluesy, depending on who’s delivering them. It sounds messy, and it is in parts. But what cuts through the clatter is the simple, unmistakable joy of making a racket, a feeling the members thought they’d never experience again. “We’re coming into our second wind of enjoying this, and doing it in a really pure way,” Rose says. “We’ve all opened up a portal of happiness.” MATTHEW SINGER. SEE IT: Moon Tiger plays Bunk Bar, 1028 SE Water Ave., with Ali Muhareb and Dreckig, on Thursday, April 7. 9:30 pm. $7. 21+. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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DATES HERE
a respectful giggle, Gangstagrass shelves the whimsy—and, alongside it, much of the point. Thanks to troupe trail boss, Brooklynite producer Rench, albums like 2015’s American Music temper the excesses of hick-hop with a decidedly coastal sensibility, to middling ends. The sextet can fiddle up a menacing storm—they laid down Justified’s opening music— and has a credible knack for shouty barnburners. But whenever the act’s MCs take center stage, they just haven’t much to say. JAY HORTON. Star Theater, 13 NW 6th Ave. 9 pm. $12-$25. 21+.
Elephant Revival, Mandolin Orange
[MODERN FOLK] These two groups are among the leading contemporary folk artists today. Headliner Elephant Revival is a Colorado-based five-piece that uses such traditional instrumentation as washboard, musical saw, banjo, mandolin, fiddle and more. Mandolin Orange, who plays Portland frequently, is a duo that takes a more singer-songwriter approach. Both acts shine in their wholesome harmonies and reinvention of centuries-old sounds. HILARY SAUNDERS. Wonder Ballroom, 128 NE Russell St. 9 pm. $25. 21+.
Nick Jaina
[LITERATE FOLK] Last year, Portland musical polymath Nick Jaina released a memoir titled Get It While You Can, and ended up getting listed as a finalist for an Oregon Book Award. Tonight, he’ll “perform” that memoir in its entirety, with an assist from Neko Case percussionist Daniel Hunt and multi-instrumentalist Jason Leonard. We don’t know exactly what that means, but considering the book is a little over 200 pages, you should probably prepare to get comfy. Viscount Dance Studio, 720 NE Sandy Blvd. 6 pm. Free. All ages.
MONDAY, APRIL 11 Astronauts, Etc., Harriet Brown, Minden
Miike Snow, Kaneholler
[SWEDISH ELECTRO-POP] Stockholm three-piece Miike Snow has been making electro-pop since 2007. It recently released its appropriately titled third album, III, which adds more melodic elements like piano, elongated synths and Etta James samples to their already catchy songs—the kind of catchiness that allows it to get away with having nobody in the band named Miike, a jackalope as its logo, references to Genghis Khan and lyrics like, “I don’t want you to get it on with nobody else but me.” But this pop sensibility makes sense: Two members are Grammy-winning producers, having worked with Britney Spears, Madonna and Kelis. Miike Snow also plays a DJ at Euphoria, 315 SE 3rd Ave., later tonight. SOPHIA JUNE. Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave. 8:30 pm. Sold out. 21+.
TUESDAY, APRIL 12 The Residents Present Shadowland
[OP-ART ROCK] Like a Blue Man Group fronted by Captain Beefheart, Sun Ra and Banksy, the Residents draw appeal from their willful difficultness just as anonymity girds their fame. Over the 40-plus years since KBOO and Music Millennium effectively launched them, we still don’t know much more about the experimentalist provocateurs than stray insights gleaned from a daunting oeuvre, theatrical stage shows and early-MTV-tested, MOMA-approved transgressive videos. Shadowland, the final chapter of the touring trilogy that near-unrecognizably tweaks past “hits” midst hazy conceptual framework, opens with scenes from Theory of Obscurity, the recent documentary about their tireless quest to wring art from the bare bones of 20th century popular music absent the slightest care for response— which still doesn’t explain the eyeball masks of old. JAY HORTON. Aladdin Theater, 3017 SE Milwaukie Ave., 234-9694. 8 pm. $30 advance, $35 day of show. Under 21 permitted with legal guardian. PETER SHARP
[POLISHED GROOVES] For Anthony Ferraro, Toro Y Moi’s touring keyboardist and the head honcho behind Astronauts, Etc., music isn’t about defying restrictions. His excellent fulllength, Mind Out Wandering, takes his classical training and effortlessly infuses it with elements of funk, jazz, rock, soul and a host of other genres that once rested
outside his wheelhouse. A gorgeous tapestry of cymbals, freeform guitar and keys create one of the best odes to ’70s pop that doesn’t sound like a complete Bee Gees knockoff. Still, given Ferraro’s dreamy falsetto, a Barry Gibb comparison would be totally apt. BRANDON WIDDER. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave. 9 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+.
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DATES HERE
CLASSICAL, JAZZ & WORLD Oregon Guitar Quartet
[CLASSICAL] Classical music has several collections of preludes (by J.S. Bach, Shostakovich, Debussy and others) that aren’t really introductions to anything, despite the name. But they do make formidable expressions of an instrument’s vast possibilities. Portland composer and PSU music prof Bryan Johanson composed a set of two dozen preludes in that tradition for classical guitar in 2008—but left one on the cutting-room floor. It kept bugging him, demanding its own showcase. This show features the premiere of the multimovement work that sprouted from that discarded seed, Quartet on an Abandoned Prelude. Johanson’s Oregon Guitar Quartet will play it along with new transcriptions of music by Baroque masters Bach and Scarlatti and selections from the ensemble’s World Tour album. BRETT CAMPBELL. Lincoln Recital Hall at Portland State University, 1620 SW Park Ave., 503-224-9842. 7:30 pm Friday, April 8. $25. All ages.
Oregon Stories: Audio Documentaries with Original Music for the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble
[JAZZ TALES] “He can really tell a story” is one of the highest compliments paid to jazz musicians, whose instrumental solos somehow sound like a narrative. But in this visionary project (scheduled for recording soon) by the 12-member Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble, the music doesn’t have to do all the talking. Pianist Darrell Grant, former Tin Hat guitarist and film composer Mark Orton, and trumpeter Douglas Detrick composed music to combine with audio interviews (produced by KMHD’s Jessica Rand) featuring Oregonians who faced and surmounted racial and gender discrimination. Their voices and new jazz music join to tell their stories. BRETT CAMPBELL. The Old Church, 1422 SW 11th Ave. 7:30 pm Friday, April 8. $15 general admission, $12 for PJCE members, $10 for PJCE musician members, $10 for students with ID.
Allison Miller’s Boom Tic Boom, Blue Cranes
[DRUMMER MADNESS] The voraciously sensitive, mind-inhabiting drummer Allison Miller is apparent from the moment her sticks first strike a drumhead in front of you. A dynamic performer whose compositions drive a grooving two-horn sextet, she swings in the pocket like the ’60s never ended, while her band explores harmonies straight from the farthest reaches of outer space. But Miller’s music breaks through dissonance for the sake of it, exploring new sounds so well that moments on her latest record, Otis Was a Polar Bear, feel almost uncomfortably personal. In a world overstuffed with heady, cleancut jazz, such beat poetry remains a sight to behold. PARKER HALL. Alberta Street Pub, 1036 NE Alberta St. 7:30 pm Saturday, April 9. $20. 21+.
Elgar’s Symphony No. 1
[CLASSICAL] Elgar’s first symphony was a triumph of early 20th-century symphonic music. Inspired by his hero, Strauss, Elgar set about to compose a nearly hour-long epic that was immediately hailed by audience and critics. Prior to the Elgar, this program’s centerpiece is a triumph of early 21stcentury music—a 20 minute violin concerto by Thomas Adès from 2005 titled Concentric Paths. Its three movements, “Rings,” “Paths” and “Rounds” will be explored with subtlety and verve by violist Augustin Hadelich. This is the exact sort of modern work that keeps symphonic music vital, rather than simply an institution to revisit. NATHAN CARSON. Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 7:30 pm Saturday-Sunday, 8 pm Monday, April 9-11. $23-$105. All ages.
For more Music listings, visit
ALBUM REVIEWS
Strategy
INFORMATION POLLUTION (Further) [WHITE NOISE] Paul Dickow has employed many guises over the years, but none wears his sonic environment quite as well as his latest, Information Pollution. Under the nom de guerre of Strategy, this moonlighting master technician has experience with a vast spectrum of frequencies in the electronic music field, most famously daydreamy house music and left-field beats befitting any mood. Like many creatives working within a shifting landscape, Dickow’s attempts at finding a new place to live left him with limited studio options, forcing him to make music by more spartan and utilitarian means. Information Pollution allegedly finds Dickow working with found source material, overdubbed and layered using a reel-to-reel tape player. The result is closer to the haunting ambient collage that artists like Grouper are famous for, with droidlike transmissions and shortwave sounds replacing ghostly vocals. Released by Seattle’s Further Records, it’s an album deserving of a live format. But as a limited run of packaged vinyl, it’s hard not to consider its evocation of an airborne toxic event impenetrable for anyone outside the ivory tower of experimental music. WYATT SCHAFFNER. SEE IT: Strategy plays Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison St., with Raica and Visible Cloaks, on Wednesday, April 6. 8:30 pm. $7. 21+.
Neo G Yo FOOLIN WISE
(Futro)
[LABOR’S LOVE] Neo G Yo’s latest mixtape, Foolin Wise, was produced last month, the product of the February Album Writing Month challenge. With 11 guest vocalists and 11 producers coming together for 14 tracks, it’s not only a testament to the rapper ’s range as an MC but a nod to the diversity of collaborative talent in Portland—and a singular statement presented by the multimedia collective Futro Records. Despite the time-based concept, it’s refreshing to note that Foolin Wise slaps out the box. From the Mac Dre-esque beat of “Do.thang,” led by Lamar LeRoy and Slick Devious, to the fizzy breakbeat number “Five.flavors,” composed by E*Rock, Neo radiates with collected energy, leading with inspired hooks to carry each unscripted session, despite occasional lapses into “conscious rap” cliché. But as the ringleader behind the project, Neo, also known as Danny Diana-Peebles, makes room on Foolin Wise for all the feels. With atmospheric soul vocals provided by Amanda Eve Sloane—highlighted on the track “Blankets” with a hazy beat from Thirsty City founder Northern Draw—there is little reason not to throw down a solid donation and cop this digital album. WYATT SCHAFFNER. SEE IT: Neo G Yo plays Church, 2600 NE Sandy Blvd., with Jonny Cool, Amanda Eve Sloane and DJ Lamar LeRoy, on Monday, April 11. 9 pm. Free. 21+. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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ON SALE NOW
ANDRE DREW W BIRD BIRD
CHARLES BRADLEY
WEEZER
$12.95 reg.cd/$16.95-reg. lp
$12.95-cd/$15.95-lp
$10.95-cd/$16.95-lp
Are You Serious
Changes
Weezer
Sale prices good thru 4.14.16
April 16 is the day record labels roll out 100s of special vinyl releases. We’ll have limited-editions, special pressings, 7-inch singles, box sets & more. Quantities limited so come in early. Check out everydaymusic.com or recordstoreday.com for details. MORE THAN A RECORD STORE! WE HAVE TURNTABLES, VINYL ACCESSORIES, POSTERS, HEADPHONES & MORE.
NEW & US CDs, DVDs ED & VINYL
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MUSIC CALENDAR WED. APRIL 6 Alberta Rose
3000 NE Alberta St Makana & Paula Fuga: Soul, Slack, Hawaii
Alberta Street Pub
1036 NE Alberta St Sequoia, Blind J. Wakins, Zach Bryson
Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall
1037 SW Broadway Star Trek: The Ultimate Voyage
Crystal Ballroom
1332 W Burnside St Santigold, Leileki47
Doug Fir Lounge
830 E Burnside St. Operators, Bogan Via
Duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave DeltaPhonic
Edgefield
2126 SW Halsey St The Talbott Brothers
High Water Mark Lounge
6800 NE MLK Ave Humours, Jerkagram, Rolling Through The Universe, Old Kingdom
Holocene
1001 SE Morrison St. Strategy, Raica, Visible Cloaks
Jimmy Mak’s
221 NW 10th Ave. The Christopher Brown Quartet, Mel Brown Quartet
THURSDAY, THURS. APRIL 7 Aladdin Theater
3017 SE Milwaukie Ave Jonathan Coulton, Paul & Storm at Aladdin Theater
Alberta Street Pub
2530 NE 82nd Ave The Lonesomes
3000 NE Alberta St Michael Martin Murphey 1036 NE Alberta St Stoneface Honey, King Taylor Project, Amber Sweeney
Bossanova Ballroom
722 E Burnside St. INTERVALS / PLINI / ANGEL VIVALDI / SAVE US FROM THE ARCHON
Bunk Bar
1028 SE Water Ave. Ali Muhareb, Moon Tiger
Crystal Ballroom
1332 W Burnside St Tinashe
Dante’s
Holocene
1001 SE Morrison St. Dreamers, Arkells, The Karma Killers
Jimmy Mak’s
Kelly’s Olympian
LaurelThirst Public House
3552 N Mississippi Ave Red Yarn
4847 SE Division St, Zach Bryson, Midnight County
Mississippi Pizza
Mississippi Studios
3552 N Mississippi Ave Tallulah’s Daddy
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Matthew Logan Vasquez, Reverend Baron, Dustin Lovelis
Mississippi Studios
Star Theater
Revolution Hall
1300 SE Stark St #110 Robert Cray Band
Star Theater
13 NW 6th Ave POWER TRIP with Gag and Local Species
The Analog
720 SE Hawthorne Blvd. BANE
The Goodfoot
2845 SE Stark St Ramblin’ Rose aka Cats Under The Stars
The Know
2026 NE Alberta St Egrets on Ergot, Super Brown, Mr. Wrong, Moon
The Liquor Store
3341 SE Belmont St, US Lights
The Old Church
1422 SW 11th Ave Trevor Fitzpatrick
Valentines
232 SW Ankeny St Echo Pearl Varsity, The Yacolt Burn
Jimmy Mak’s
Landmark Saloon
Landmark Saloon
3100 NE Sandy Blvd Blood Owl, The Gloaming Hours, Unusual Subjects
6800 NE MLK Ave Bloody Knives, We Are Like The Spider, Peridot, Airport
Duff’s Garage
4847 SE Division St, Jake Ray and the Cowdogs, Miller and Sasser’s Twelve Dollar Band!
Panic Room
High Water Mark Lounge
Kelly’s Olympian
Landmark Saloon
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Barna Howard, Snowblind Traveler
1507 SE César E. Chávez Blvd. Pseudoboss, Seven Inches & Muff Pistol; Trust No One Entertainment Presents: 2Reps x Brookfield Duece x Cool Nutz
Doug Fir Lounge
426 SW Washington St. The Thesis with Calvin Valentine
Mississippi Pizza
Hawthorne Theatre
221 NW 10th Ave. Errick Lewis & Expressive Vibe: Tribute to Chaka Khan
2530 NE 82nd Ave Spank
13 NW 6th Ave QUANTIC
426 SW Washington St. Cotton, Barry Brusseau, Waver Clamor Bellow 4847 SE Division St, Shorty and The Mustangs; Jumptown Aces
Lincoln Recital Hall at Portland State University
1620 SW Park Ave. Oregon Guitar Quartet
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. The Ballroom Thieves, Tall Heights, Rory James
Panic Room
3100 NE Sandy Blvd The Shrike, Fortune’s Folly and Prosody
Roseland Theater 8 NW 6th Ave Andre Nickatina
Star Theater
13 NW 6th Ave Shafty
The Firkin Tavern
1937 SE 11th Ave Human Ottoman, Kulululu and Hot Mess NW
The Old Church
1937 SE 11th Ave Jake Capistran, Dusty York
1422 SW 11th Ave Oregon Stories: Audio Documentaries with Original Music for the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble
The Goodfoot
The Secret Society
The Firkin Tavern
2845 SE Stark St ELEKTRAPOD
The Liquor Store
3341 SE Belmont St, New Move, Earth World
The Secret Society 116 NE Russell St Baby & The Pearl Blowers, Everything’s Jake
FRI. APRIL 8 Aladdin Theater
3017 SE Milwaukie Ave Home Free Vocal Band at Aladdin Theater
Alberta Rose
3000 NE Alberta St Peter Mulvey, Sam Baker
Al’s Den at Crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave Kevin Lee Florence
Bunk Bar
1028 SE Water Ave. XRAY RECORDS LAUNCH PARTY with SUN ANGLE and THE GHOST EASE
LAST WEEK LIVE
Duff’s Garage
350 West Burnside Night Beats, Hollow Sidewalks 830 E Burnside St. Ages and Ages, Ezza Rose
[APRIL 6-12]
Doug Fir Lounge 830 E Burnside St. Aurora
Kelly’s Olympian
2958 NE Glisan St Laura Veirs
350 West Burnside PAT TRAVERS BAND with Rod DeGeorge and Patrimony
Alberta Rose
221 NW 10th Ave. Mel Brown B3 Organ Group
426 SW Washington St. Laryssa Birdseye, Val Bauer, Land of the Living
Dante’s
For more listings, check out wweek.com.
COLIN MCLAUGHLIN
= WW Pick. Highly recommended.
Editor: Matthew Singer. 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.
116 NE Russell St Pete Krebs and his Portland Playboys; Catamount, Tiny Little Empire, There Is No Mountain, No Fancy
Valentines
232 SW Ankeny St BODY ACADEMICS, MISTER SEAHORSE, PAPERMACHINE
White Eagle Saloon 836 N Russell St The Talbott Brothers
Wonder Ballroom 128 NE Russell St. Marco Benevento
SAT. APRIL 9 Aladdin Theater
3017 SE Milwaukie Ave Elephant Revival, Mandolin Orange
Alberta Street Pub
1036 NE Alberta St Allison Miller’s Boom Tic Boom, Blue Cranes
Doug Fir Lounge 830 E Burnside St.
LUST, LIFE AND DEATH: Iggy Pop has been thinking a lot about death lately. “Is there a heaven for the brave?” he wondered aloud at Keller Auditorium on March 29. It was two songs in, and the charcoal blazer he’d entered with was already slung over his shoulder, returning him to his natural state of shirtlessness. “Would I like it? Is it like Vegas?” Seeing him onstage, maneuvering and contorting that famously lithe physique, looking nowhere close to an almost-septuagenerian, it’s hard to imagine he’ll find out very soon. But even an indestructible force must confront the void eventually, particularly when it begins to swallow those around it. To a degree, Iggy is the last man of his era standing, so it’s understandable he’d begin to ponder the end, and whatever comes after. But at the Keller, one thing was made clear right away: He ain’t dead yet. Bounding out to “Lust for Life,” joined by his new collaborator, Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme (who produced his new album, Post Pop Depression), and four other Homme associates, that particular message resonated as loud as the big, familiar opening drumbeat. If this really is it for the Great and Powerful Ig, he’s going down swinging—and gyrating and leaping, and falling backward into the audience, and humping the occasional speaker. After the house lights went up, following a celebratory run through 1977’s “Success,” he remained onstage as the rest of the band exited, grinning wide as he flipped a loving double bird and waving to the crowd, as he did throughout the night. It was uncertain whether they were meant as hellos or final goodbyes. Either way, the show confirmed something that once seemed improbable: Against all possible odds, Iggy Pop is going to die old, and leave an exquisite corpse. MATTHEW SINGER. Noah Gundersen
Duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave Strangetones
Jimmy Mak’s
221 NW 10th Ave. Errick Lewis & Expressive Vibe: Tribute to Earth, Wind & Fire
Kelly’s Olympian
426 SW Washington St. Malachi Graham, Don Lang
Landmark Saloon
4847 SE Division St, The Oregon Trailers
Panic Room 3100 NE Sandy Blvd Rae Spoon & Turnback Boyz
Star Theater
13 NW 6th Ave GANGSTAGRASS
The Analog 720 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Heels and Bow Ties Starring 5Lan
The Firkin Tavern
1937 SE 11th Ave Pinehurst Kids, Buttercup, Echopurr at The Firkin
The Goodfoot
2845 SE Stark St LIFE DURING WARTIME (Talking Heads Tribute)
The Old Church
1422 SW 11th Ave An Evening With Geoff Berner and Jason Webley
The Secret Society
116 NE Russell St The Jenny Finn Orchestra Damian Erskine Project; Buddy Jay’s Jamaican Jazz Band, The Ground
Viscount Dance Studio 720 SE Sandy Blvd Nick Jaina Wonder Ballroom 128 NE Russell St. Elephant Revival
SUN. APRIL 10 Alberta Street Pub 1036 NE Alberta St Kaeley Stepehens
Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall
1037 SW Broadway Elgar’s Symphony No. 1
Hawthorne Theatre
Holocene
High Water Mark Lounge
Jimmy Mak’s
1507 SE César E. Chávez Blvd. Twiztid
6800 NE MLK Ave Tetrad Veil, Plattenbau
Kelly’s Olympian
426 SW Washington St. Alexa Dexa
Landmark Saloon
350 West Burnside FLYING BALALAIKA BROTHERS
Doug Fir Lounge 830 E Burnside St. Shook Twins
Duff’s Garage
2530 NE 82nd Ave The 44’s
Landmark Saloon
8 NW 6th Ave Miike Snow, Kaneholler
Rontoms
2845 SE Stark St Sonic Forum
Corkscrew
Dante’s
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Jackie Greene, The Suitcase Junket
The Liquor Store
1665 SE Bybee Blvd Cafe Jazz Trio
Jimmy Mak’s
4847 SE Division St, Well Swung
Roseland Theater
Bossanova Ballroom
3341 SE Belmont St, Papermoon Cabaret
The Goodfoot
The Secret Society 116 NE Russell St Leigh Nash
TUES. APRIL 12 Aladdin Theater
3017 SE Milwaukie Ave The Residents present Shadowland
MON. APRIL 11
Alberta Street Pub
Church 2600 NE Sandy Blvd. Neo G Yo Dante’s
Alhambra Theatre
350 West Burnside KARAOKE FROM HELL
Doug Fir Lounge 830 E Burnside St. Lukas Graham
Hawthorne Theatre
Landmark Saloon
Mississippi Studios
The Know
2530 NE 82nd Ave Hi FI Mojo 1507 SE César E. Chávez Blvd. Intronaut
4847 SE Division St, Ian Miller and Friends!
600 E Burnside St Haley Heynderickx, Briana Marela, Lilac
Duff’s Garage
221 NW 10th Ave. Dan Balmer Trio
3939 N Mississippi Ave. Astronauts, etc., Harriet Brown, Minden
2026 NE Alberta St RAMONA, Low Culture, Husky Boys, Hard Sulks
722 E Burnside St. Stump City Soul
1001 SE Morrison St. Benoit Pioulard, Ilyas Ahmed
1036 NE Alberta St La Rivera
4811 SE Hawthorne Blvd, The Bastard Suns
Doug Fir Lounge 830 E Burnside St. DMA’S
221 NW 10th Ave. Mel Brown Septet 4847 SE Division St, Get Rhythm
LaurelThirst Public House 2958 NE Glisan St Gurf Morlix
Mississippi Studios
3939 N Mississippi Ave. AEC, The Crenshaw, Amani
Roseland Theater
8 NW 6th Ave Third Eye Blind
Star Theater
13 NW 6th Ave LAURA STEVENSON with Crying & Chris Farren
The Analog
720 SE Hawthorne Blvd. The Bastard Suns
The Goodfoot
2845 SE Stark St RADULA (Free!)
The Liquor Store
3341 SE Belmont St, Lörd Bëcky + Ali Muhareb + Laura Palmer’s Death Parade
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MUSIC Where to drink this week. 1. Tryst
19 SW 2nd Ave, 477-8637. Berbati’s old lobby is Voodoo Doughnut. Its Pan is a strip club. And now Berbati’s itself has reopened as Tryst, from longtime Old Town bar manager AdaZoe Freeman with Asian fusion drinks and food—and good god damn if that ginger ketchup with the furikake french fries isn’t the best fry sauce in town.
HENRY CROMETT
BAR REVIEW
2. 23rd Avenue Bottle Shop
2290 NW Thurman St., mcmenamins.com. Not only are the cocktails very nice here—with a refreshing $5 special daily— there’s no corkage fee on bottles. That means Pabst tallboys are $1.10, cheaper than at Yamhill Pub, and import bottles are the price of a pint. Wow.
3. Pop Tavern
825 N Killingsworth St., 206-8483. Pop Tavern has a solid $5 tap list featuring Pfriem and the Commons, a $6.50 burger (with fries!) that’s meaty as hell, and a back patio. Like the bar equivalent of a good rug, Pop Tavern really ties the neighborhood together.
4. Pope House Bourbon Lounge
2075 NW Glisan St., 222-1056, popehouselounge.com. The sun is intermittently back, and it’s patio whiskey season again—a fine time for a $5 whiskey-vermouth Half Man cocktail at happy hour or a $10 Old Fashioned one of our writers swears is precisely twice as good.
5. Flying Fish
2340 NE Sandy Blvd., 971-806-6747, providorefinefoods.com. Grab an imported beer from the fridge at Providore Fine Foods, or pour one from one of the store’s two bars— the hidden Pfriem and Buoy taps in back or Flying Fish’s oyster-paired wines. Then down Netarts Bay oysters straight from the oyster farm for two bucks apiece.
WINE-AL TAP: At the new Brooklyn tasting room for Teutonic Wine Co. (3303 SE 20th Ave., 235-5053, teutonicwines.com), the first thing winemaker Barnaby Tuttle did was ask if we wanted a beer. This wasn’t quite a joke. There’s Rainier on the menu under a list of 11 mostly German- or Alsatian-style wines by the glass, served on a bar top made by pouring clear resin over cuts from Tuttle’s neighbor’s woodpile. It’s a rare place where the guy who actually made the wine is also your DJ—Tuttle’s vinyl selections veer from early Stereolab to “Animal Magnetism” by Scorpions, whose sexist album cover inspired Spinal Tap’s Smell the Glove. Teutonic offers $12 white and $15 red flights, but the Medici Vineyard riesling ($9) is also a great introduction to the house style, with crisp lime acidity and a long coconut-water finish. For reds, Tuttle’s Alsea Vineyard pinot noir ($14) is a feather-light, clay-mouthed and complex take on Oregon pinot, made from grapes grown at Teutonic’s hand-planted vineyards in Benton County. But it’s the curveballs I like best. His Deep Probe riesling ($13) is barely sulfured, dead dry, and slightly orange from grape-skin contact. It’s a collaboration wine made with Fausse Piste and Division Winemaking Co.—“a rock band in a bottle,” Tuttle says, the story expanding as he retells it. The name “Deep Probe” was originally conceived, he says, to annoy his wife and co-owner, Olga. The Wild Hunt, a new food cart from Viking Soul Food, will inhabit the parking lot. Tuttle also plans events like a shark taco Sunday with San Felipe Taqueria and Tuttle’s friend Jeff Fischer—the stoned guy from Fox’s American Dad! and owner of Habit Wine Co. There is no expensive “bar in a box” design here, just some vinyl, nice speakers, and a rotary-dial phone. The place is as handmade as the wine, and all of it is an expression of the guy pouring it. JORDAN MICHELMAN. The Lovecraft Bar
421 SE Grand Ave Necronancy Queer Dance Party w/ JACKIE HELL
SAT. APRIL 9 WED. APRIL 6 Dig A Pony
736 SE Grand Ave. El Dorado (early rock’n’roll, R&B)
The Lovecraft Bar
421 SE Grand Ave Event Horizon (industrial, EBM, electro)
THURS. APRIL 7 Dig A Pony
736 SE Grand Ave. Strange Babes (post-punk, soul, dance)
The Lovecraft Bar
421 SE Grand Ave Shadowplay (EBM, goth, industrial, darkwave)
Dig A Pony Valentines
232 SW Ankeny St DJ Rosy Crucial
736 SE Grand Ave. Montel Spinozza (funk)
Holocene
Dig A Pony
1001 SE Morrison St. Verified with Doctor Jeep, GANG$IGN$, SPF666, Quarry, DVST
Holocene
8 NW 6th Ave Snails, Botnek
The Goodfoot
3341 SE Belmont St, Booms and Claps: Grimblee vs Hecka (bass music)
The Liquor Store
421 SE Grand Ave Musick for Mannequins w/ DDDJJJ666 and Magnolia Bouvier
FRI. APRIL 8 736 SE Grand Ave. Maxx Bass (boogie) 1001 SE Morrison St. Dance Yourself Clean (indie pop) 2845 SE Stark St Soul Stew with DJ Aquaman and Friends (funk, soul, disco, break beats) 3341 SE Belmont St, Believe You Me with Artish
Roseland Theater
The Liquor Store
The Lovecraft Bar
Valentines
232 SW Ankeny St DJ Wicked
SUN. APRIL 10 Dig A Pony
736 SE Grand Ave. Sunday Selects with Ante Up (hip-hop, R&B)
The Lovecraft Bar
421 SE Grand Ave Glam Rock Trash Bash
MON. APRIL 11 Dig A Pony
736 SE Grand Ave. Bad Wizard (‘50s and ‘60s soul and rock)
Euphoria Nightclub
315 SE 3rd Ave Miike Snow (DJ set), Andrew & Pontus
The Lovecraft Bar 421 SE Grand Ave Morbid Monday w/ Miz Margo
TUES. APRIL 12 Dig A Pony
736 SE Grand Ave. Lowlife (garage, psychobilly, soul, doo-wop)
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C O U R T E SY O F FAC E B O O K
PERFORMANCE = 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). Comedy: MIKE ACKER (macker@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.
OPENINGS & PREVIEWS Blue Door
The second installment in Profile Theatre’s Tanya Barfield season is Blue Door, Barfield’s first play, which ran off-Broadway for a year. In the mystical realism two-man play, a mathematician struggles to make sense of his identity as a black man. In an insomnia-driven hallucination, he is visited by ghosts of his ancestors. 21-year Portland theater veteran Bobby Bermea directs this play from Pulitzer nominee Barfield, who’s based in New York, but is originally from Portland. Earlier this season, Profile presented a successful run of Barfield’s The Call. With original songs and dreamlike sequences, Blue Door is set to be more mystical and less realistic, but professionally polished nonetheless. SOPHIA JUNE. Profile Theater, 1515 SW Morrison St., 242-0080. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, April 9-23, 11 am Wednesday, April 13 and 2 pm Sunday, April 10, 17 and 24. $38, $20 under 30.
A Doll’s House
Daily life doesn’t end in rainbow-farting bunnies, but when Henrik Ibsen’s breakout drama about a perfect family failed to close with a happy ending, it scandalized 1879 theatergoers. The picture-perfect family—banker father, wife Nora, three kids—ekes through its stifling, monotonous existence until Nora accidentally exposes her husband’s financial disgraces. The real kick to the crotch of patriarchal storytelling is Nora walking out in the end. DJ-turned-director Jacob Coleman and Matthew Kerrigan, of the bawdy Dissenter’s Handbook story time, star in Samantha Van Der Merwe’s production, where the whole theater is built to look like a perfectionist’s household. Shaking the Tree Theatre, 823 SE Grant St., 235-0635. 7:30 Thursday-Sunday, April 8-May 7. $25.
Love and Information
You’re missing out on the coolest thing, and everyone else knows, and goes, and tweets. Meanwhile, you are in the cold dark, alone. Caryl Churchill’s most famous play this decade packs 100 characters, played by around a dozen actors, into scenes that can be as short as 25 seconds. It’s a show about—you guessed it—the lack of human connection in modern society. As written by the famously feminist and surrealist playwright, this play actually feels like an hours-long spiral down the reddit wormhole. Or Pinterest. Or other time-suck of your choice. Theatre Vertigo stuffs one of the largest casts on any Portland stage into the aptly-named Shoebox. Extra shows 7:30 pm Sundays April 24 and May 1. Thursdays are pay-what-youwill. No performance on Sunday April 10. Shoebox Theater, 2110 SE 10th Ave. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday and 2 pm Sundays, April 8-May 7. $20.
The New Electric Ballroom
Elvis Presley, James Dean, all the Beatles and Justin Bieber—lump pop culture’s male icons together and you have the stud who never appears, but haunts every minute of Edna Walsh’s surrealist Irish play. In it, three old-maid sisters in a rural Irish fishing village jabber incessantly about their failed loves and dress up a local fishmonger as their Prince Charming. “What would the Virgin Mary make of all of this?” asks one of the hens. It’s a dry, dry, dry black comedy starring Todd Van Voris, who’s debatably Portland’s best live actor on any stage. Imago Theater, 17 SE 8th Ave., 235-1101. 7:30
pm Wednesday-Saturday and 2 pm Sundays, April 8-30. Under 30 $38. General $42.50.
Road House: The Play
Portland’s improv queen, Shelley McLendon, reprises her popular revamp of the ‘80s classic, adding music and her Liberators-style comedy to a dive-y action thriller that starred Patrick Swayze as a rebel-withouta-cause bouncer in Missouri. Expect smaller biceps, but no less blood, from local comedians including Jed Arkley, Ted Douglass and co-writer Courtenay Hameister. The Siren Theater, 315 NW Davis St. 8 pm Friday-Saturday, April 1-16. $22.
Three Amigos! Live
Steve Coker just wanted to be Chevy Chase. It’s an understandable wish, especially for anybody who wore out a VHS tape of Fletch or Caddyshack. But for Coker, a Portland actor, Dusty Bottoms was the ultimate. We’ve seen a rash of live stage versions of cult movies lately. There is Point Break Live!, the local take on Top Gun and Manos: The Hands of Fate, which is largely considered the worst movie of all time. This is different: a reverent tribute to a funny film, rather than a parody. Coker and his company transform the movie into a minimalist musical packed with a robust live score. It’s what you should expect from a crew that includes Blitzen Trapper’s Brian Koch in a hilariously large sombrero. The film’s musical numbers remain intact—including “My Little Buttercup” and a potential cameo by a certain scene-stealing reptile—with on-point additions written by the likes of Freddy Fender and singin’ cowboy Gene Autry. Clinton Street Theater, 2522 SE Clinton St., 888-5141. stageworksink.com. 7:30 pm ThursdayFriday; 2 and 7:30 pm Saturday, April 7-9. $15-$18.
ALSO PLAYING Davita’s Harp
Chaim Potok’s coming-of-age story isn’t a sappy World War II drama about Ilana (Kayla Lian), a girl growing up with Communist parents in New York. Instead, Jewish Theatre Collaborative’s new play feels eerily present-day. Trump springs to mind when one character calls Hitler “a clown who nobody takes seriously,” or when the play zooms in on gender discrimination. Ilana’s point of view anchors the story, with other characters referring to themselves in third person. While the nontraditional technique seems like an improv game, it gives the play an urgency that fits the intense subject matter of fascism and communism. Quick scene changes and abrupt blackouts augment that intensity and give a realistic perspective of what the events would look like to a child. Extra show 7:30 pm Wednesday, March 30. SOPHIA JUNE. Milagro Theatre, 525 SE Stark St., 236-7253. 7:30 pm ThursdaySaturday and 2 pm Sunday, through April 9. $30.
The Few
It’s 1999, at the height of Y2K panic, and a small-town Idaho newspaper created for long-haul truckers is failing. It doesn’t get much bleaker than that. Samuel D. Hunter’s play embraces loneliness through a no-fail combination of monologues about long-haul trucking, voicemails of people submitting their personal ads and characters affected by small-town conservatism
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DIVE DEEP: Dancers Alicia Cutaia, Scott Stampone, Daniel Kirk and Eric Skinner.
PREVIEW
Outside Their Wheelhouse BODYVOX HAD NON-DANCE “CREATIVES” CHOREOGRAPH ITS SEASON PREMIERE. “I’ve always wanted to be a dancer,” says Byron Beck, the 53-year-old Portland blogger and former Willamette Week editor known for his Queer Window column. “Never a choreographer,” he says, “because that shit is hard.” But Beck just choreographed an original work for one of Portland’s top dance companies, BodyVox. He is one of 11 “creatives” whom BodyVox commissioned for Pearl Dive Project, which might be the most experimental show in the 18-year-old company’s history. Pink Martini singer China Forbes also signed on for the project, along with Dharma Bums frontman Jeremy Wilson and Clark James, a director for M&Ms and Nike ads. Other guest choreographers range from Colombian landscape architects to a New York pianist and the conductor of Vienna’s Tonkünstler Orchestra. For the first time, BodyVox asked experts from other industries to choreograph new works, which will premiere in Pearl Dive Project this month. “It’s a scary fucking thing,” says Beck. “They’ve never done this before.” Sourcing nontraditional talent was long overdue, according to BoxyVox artistic director Jamey Hampton. “Everywhere you look in this country, every company has the same formula,” Hampton says. “Everyone is hiring people from Europe or South America. We thought, what could we do that’s challenging to the company, the dancers, the whole formula we have?” Anthony Hopkins and Joni Mitchell sprung to Hampton’s mind. “The theory is that creativity knows no bounds. Hopkins is an amazing painter,” he says, “Joni Mitchell doesn’t even call herself a
musician anymore, she calls herself a painter.” For a Portland headhunter, BodyVox went straight to Beck. “I’m a walking Rolodex,” Beck says of how he helped Hampton brainstorm a list of around 60 potential talents. “Byron knows literally everybody in town,” says Hampton. Simpsons creator Matt Groening slipped through their fingers, but Hampton is hopeful for next year. Overly ambitious stunts from this year’s choreographers might make the company think twice about reprising the experiment, though. Beck wanted his dancer to smoke profusely onstage, creating an opaque, carcinogenic cloud to project images on. For Beck, choreographing is not unlike breaking news about Justin Bieber. “I had to look at this project like a journalist,” he says. “I won’t tell you who it was—not me—but when I was at The O, one writer interviewing Storm Large cried through the whole interview. As a journalist, that’s really fucked up. You can’t do that. I have this bad habit of being starstruck, too. I had to let go of that to work with Ashley [Roland, BodyVox co-artistic director].” Forbes wanted one male dancer to perform while all the others hung off his limbs. “China was like, ‘Can’t everyone climb up and hang on him?’” Hampton says, “There are nine of us. That would mean one guy standing with about 1,200 pounds on him.” Abstract performances loaded with multimedia and effects are expected from BodyVox, which projected live video feeds from hidden cameras in last year’s opening show, Green Screen. Even so, Pearl Dive is a wild card for the company. “It might be a piece of shit,” says Byron, “but I don’t think the dancers would let that happen. This is not ‘Dancing With the Fucking Stars.’” ENID SPITZ. SEE IT: Pearl Dive Project is at BodyVox Dance Center, 1201 NW 17th Ave., bodyvox.com. 7:30 pm Thursday-Friday, 2 and 7:30 pm Saturday, April 7-23. No 2 pm show Saturday April 9. $25. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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O R E G O N
B A L L E T
T H E A T R E
P R E S E N T S
Avery Reiners. Photo by Tatiana Wills.
Apr. 14 - 23, 2016 | Newmark Theatre
Nicolo Fonte | Antonio Vivaldi, Max Richter, Ólafur Arnalds With Special Guest Artists Susan Banyas and Gregg Bielemeier Don’t miss the company premiere of Nicolo Fonte’s Beautiful Decay juxtaposing the fragility of age with the daring athleticism of youth. SUPPORTED IN PART BY
PERFORMANCE and isolation. In both dialogue and set, the play succeeds in its preciseness. The thrust set, which is the inside of a trailer that holds the newspaper’s office, is decorated with old photographs of cats, postcards, dirty computer monitors, a Garfield coffee mug and pictures of long-haul trucks colored by kids. At points where the pauses between dialogue feel long, the set is endlessly interesting to notice. Val Landrum as QZ and Michael O’Connell as Bryan succeed in playing two people whose relationship has been twisted by loss and time. But it’s Caleb Sohigian’s Matthew who has the most dynamic character of the show, physically characterized with abrupt exits and by trailing off at the ends of his sentences, which he sometimes overplays for comedy. SOPHIA JUNE. CoHo Theater, 2257 NW Raleigh St., 220-2646. 7:30 pm ThursdaySaturday and 2 pm Sunday, through April 16. $28.
The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane
Edward is a heady rabbit doll who goes on a 20-year journey of self-discovery and discovers the true meaning of friendship in this Oregon Children’s Theatre show. Edward’s odyssey takes him through piles of garbage, treacherous waterways, and eventually, “a hobo’s knapsack.” No shows 5 pm April 23 or 11 am April 24. Winningstad Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway, 2289571. 2 and 5 pm Saturdays; 11 am and 2 pm Sundays, through April 24. $14-$28.
The Twilight of the Golds
If your fetus will be a homosexual person some day, and you know this while it’s inside of you, what do you do? New Yorker Suzanne and her family debate this dilemma in the 1994 hot-button drama by Jonathan Tolins. The show flopped on Broadway, but the TV-movie version starring Brendan Fraser and Rosie O’Donnell fared a bit better. North Portland’s small Twilight Theater gives abortion politics a go. Pay what you will 8 pm Thursday, April 14. Twilight Theater Company, 7515 N. Brandon Ave., 847-9838. 8 pm Friday-Saturday and 3 pm Sunday, through April 16. $15.
Othello
How can Post5 follow-up an 80-year-old King Lear? Cast Ithica Tell as Othello, surround her with a female ensemble cast, enlist Drammy-winning body-painter Caitlin Fisher-Draeger to direct, and set the 15th Century tragedy in the American prison system. Shakespeare’s inspiration for Othello was partly an Anglo-Islamic scandal, when Moroccan ambassadors descended on London and clashed with Queen Elizabeth. Today, the tragedy about a devious minion named Iago and his plot to frame the Moorish general Othello brings a couple CNN headlines to mind: racial profiling in the American justice system and refugees in modern Turkey. If the emotional gut-punch of King Lear or Post5’s remodeled proscenium stage aren’t enough to pull you to Sellwood, the stunning Tell should be. Extra show 7:30 pm Thursday, April 21. Post5 Theatre, 1666 SE Lambert St., 971333-1758. 7:30 pm Friday-Sunday, April 1-23. $20.
We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as Southwest Africa, From the German Sudwestafrika, Between the Years 1884–1915
The new show at Artists Rep is a theatrical mic drop. The audience sat in silence for three minutes (I timed it) when the show ended on opening night, except for the sound of a few people trying to swallow their sobs. It’s a hilarious, belly-laughing show about German soldiers committing genocide in Namibia. Playwright Jackie
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Sibblies Drury, in a stroke of genius, packages dense history as a presentation by a group of lovable actors. On a mostly empty stage, Chantal Degroat leads a series of skits that jump from present-day improv workshops to past atrocities. Your belly will hurt from laughing at Rebecca Ridenour’s ukulele rendition of “Edelweiss,” until the play makes a 180 and gut-punches you with the harsh, horrible reality of racial prejudices. Then all you can do to stare at the blank stage, with the house lights shining on you, and practice your deep breathing. Artists Repertory Theatre, 1515 SW Morrison St., 241-1278. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Sunday and 2 pm Sunday, through April 10. $48.
COMEDY & VARIETY
Eliza Skinner
It’s hard to find a better commendation in today’s alternative comedy world than being called a favorite up-and-coming comedian by Patton Oswalt on a reddit AMA. LA-based musical improv and standup comedian Eliza Skinner, who is making a one-night stopover in Portland, has unlocked that alt comedy achievement, and many, many others. MIKE ACKER. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 888-643-8669, 9:45 pm Thursday, Apr. 7. $12-$20. 21+.
Extra Cheese
Brodie Kelly’s weekly pizza party/ comedy showcase gives locals a tight 5 for standup, and coincides with happy hour: $2.50 pints. Hotlips Pizza, 2211 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 234-9999. 8pm Mondays. Free.
American Comedy: An Evening Inspired by Steven Seagal
Friday Night Fights
Who’s your favorite boyishly handsome aikido master, straight-to-TV actor, Stevie Wonder guitarist, energy drink entrepreneur, animal rights activist and BFF to Vladimir Putin? Toast/roast Steven Seagal with comics like Gabe Dinger and Bri Pruett. The American Comedy multimedia variety show sold out its Andy Kaufman show—Seagal’s next for this one year anniversary show. Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison, 239-7639. 8:30 pm Sunday, April 10. Free.
Jeff Dunham
Barabara Holm Believes in You
Your life seems less shitty at standup shows, in comparison to comedians’ much shittier lives. But positive affirmation is the theme of Barbara Holm’s monthly showcase, where audience members win prizes and get free comedy from locals like Randy Mendez, JoAnn Schinderle and Nathan Brannon. Bossanova Ballroom, 722 E Burnside St., 206-7630. 8 pm Wednesday, April 6. Free.
Barry Crimmins
Political comic, satirist, and author of Never Shake Hands With a War Criminal, Barry Crimmins was the subject of Call Me Lucky, fellow Boston comic Bobcat Goldthwait’s documentary about child sexual abuse. With an election on, Crimmins, who once worked for Bernie Sanders, will no doubt have a few opinions on Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton .MIKE ACKER. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 888-643-8669. 7:15 pm Thursday, Apr. 7. $17-$25. 21+.
The Brody Open Mic
Twice-weekly, Portland’s most prolific improv venue opens its stage to everyone for 3-minute bits. Sign up online day of before 1 pm. Brody Theater, 16 NW Broadway, 224-2227. 8:30 pm Tuesday-Wednesday. Free.
Curious Comedy Open Mic
Sign up start at 7:15, and every comic gets a tight three minutes onstage in this weekly show hosted by Andie Main. Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 8 pm Sundays. Free.
Curious Comedy Playground
It’s basically free time for comedians. Acts run the gamut, from improv to video and musical comedy, and you never know who’s coming out to play. Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 4779477. 9:30 pm every first, third and fifth Thursday. Free.
Earthquake Hurricane
Some of WW’s favorite funny Portlanders showcase famous and not-so-famous, local and not-solocal comedians. Hosted by Curtis Cook, Alex Falcone, Anthony Lopez and Bri Pruett inside a pretty epic bike shop. Velo Cult Bike Shop, 1969 NE 42nd Ave., 922-2012. 9 pm every Wednesday. Free, $5 suggested donation. 21+.
Curious’ twice-monthly improv competition pits teams that won last week’s Thursday Night Throwdown against one another. Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 9:30 pm every first and third Friday. Free.
Ventriloquism, the act of a performer throwing their voice to make it sound like it’s coming not from their mouth but from the mouth of a puppet, has been around since the ancient Greeks. Jeff Dunham has been using the technique to print money since basically the 1980s. Consistently listed as one of the highest grossing comics on the planet, Dunham’s cast of puppets includes, but is not limited to, an old man named Walter, a purpleskinned humanoid named Peanut, and the self-explanatory José Jalapeño on a stick. MIKE ACKER. Moda Center, 1 N Center Ct St., 235-8771, 7:30 pm Thursday, Apr. 7. $47.50.
J Names
Eight local improvisers whose names start with J unite for a feature-length show hosted by an S and an M, Savira Kambhu and Michael Schoenfelder, at Shelley McLendon’s new Siren Theater. Expect Curious Comedy’s Jay Flewelling and Brody’s Janet Scanion. After a year of long-form shows together, the eight say farewell to Jake Michels, who’s joining the comedian exodus from Portland. The Siren Theater, 315 NW Davis St., 7:30 pm Thursday, April 7. $10.
Michael McDonald
Appearing on ten of its 14 seasons, Michael McDonald is MadTV’s longest-tenured cast member. His character Stuart Larkin is one of that sketch show’s most recognizable contributions to the American comedy canon. McDonald left MadTV as the final cast member to be hired in the 1990s. Comedy from the 90s is a hot ticket these days. MIKE ACKER. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 888-643-8669, 7:30 and 10 pm Friday-Saturday, Apr. 8-9, $22-$33. 21+.
Open Court
This weekly, long-form improv show combines performers from many Portland theaters and troupes. Newbies are welcome and teams are picked at random, then coached by an improv veteran before taking the stage. Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 7:30 pm Thursdays. $5.
The Ranger Station Open Mic
Sign ups start at 8 pm for a weekly open mic night hosted by Victor Johnson, set in the whiskey-heavy bar WW once compared to “a Roosevelt-era public works cabin.” The Ranger Station, 4260 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 894-8455. 8:30 pm Wednesday. Free. 21+.
Revolution Comedy
Local comedians Jason Traeger, Curtis Cook, Veronica Heath and Hutch Harris of the Thermals do
standup to raise money for furry friends at the Oregon Humane Society. Summer Cannibals lead singer Jessica Boudreaux soundtracks the night with her Pixiesstyle rock. The Siren Theater, 315 NW Davis St., 8 pm Wednesday, April 6. $10.
Sunday School
Workshop students, veteran crews and groups that pre-register online perform long form improv every Sunday. Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 6 pm Sundays. $5 suggested donation.
Supernova
Brody’s students showcase their improv, sketch and standup skills— a different class each week. Brody Theater, 16 NW Broadway, 224-2227. 7:30 pm Thursdays. $5.
DANCE
Shen Yun
OCD/Dance
In dances from San Francisco’s Oberlin Dance Company, ballet twirls turn into twerking duets or contemporary lyrical pieces, often backed by live cello. Co-artistic directors Brenda Way and KT Nelson collaborated on an upbeat ensemble work soundtracked by Schubert, and guest choreographer Kate Weare will debut her commission for White Bird, Portland’s hands-down best dance programmer. Newmark Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway. 7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, April 7-9. $26-$72.
A dizzying kaleidoscope of Chinese drums, dragons and silks set to a full orchestra is the spectacle from New York-based Shen Yun company. Transporting Portland audiences to China’s Middle Kingdom, it’s an experience like the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony live inside the Keller. Keller Auditorium, 222 SW Clay St., 888-974-3698. 7:30 pm Tuesday and Thursday, 2 pm Wednesday, April 12-14. $60-$180.
For more Performance listings, visit
C A R R I E A N N E H U N E YC U T T
REVIEW
NOTHING LIKE PORTLANDIA: Joellen Sweeney and Ithica Tell.
Women With Guns Post5’s gender-ben Othello marks a new era for the Sellwood theater.
Call it gentrification if you must—Sellwood has edgy art now. That’s thanks to the new Post5 Theatre, which leaves the vision of former directors Cassandra and Ty Boyce far behind it with its newest production, an all-female Othello set in what looks like an Operation Desert Storm bunker. Until now, Post5 had a reputation for doing happy-go-lucky adaptations of Shakespeare’s fluffier works. After starting with Romeo & Juliet at Montavilla’s Milepost 5 artist community, the company moved to Sellwood and continued with polka-dotted circle skirts in Much Ado About Nothing and a Comedy of Errors that looked like Portlandia. The occasional dramatic productions were relatively straightforward stagings of contemporary works like Equus and Bill Cain’s post-9/11 play Equivocation. This Othello is a different beast. Drammywinning makeup artist Caitlin Margo FisherDraeger directs 6-foot-plus actress Ithica Tell as the eponymous Moorish general. Tell seizes, sweats and smothers her wife on a splatter-painted stage that’s decorated with hazard signs, air intake fans, electrical boxes and naked light bulbs. Within the first five minutes, Tell creates a homoerotic charge by embracing Joellen Sweeney (playing Desdemona) as Post5 mainstay Jessica Tidd blazes onstage as villainous Iago in combat boots and a septum piercing. This is Shakespeare with tattooed female soldiers who wield handguns and spend their time either fucking each other or fucking each other over. The one male character, Sean Doran as Roderi-
go, mostly gimps around the play. Limping across stage with a bum leg, he’s a comic foil to Tidd’s hurricane of an Iago, speaking malapropisms and getting pummeled by Oregon Children’s Theater actress Lava Alapai. He dies first. Female-driven, violent productions with Black Lives Matter references have been the calling cards of Portland theater this year, but Fisher-Draeger’s female troops deliver something different. At Bag & Baggage Theater, a woman played Ahab for the first time ever in Moby Dick, Rehearsed, but sex barely mattered in that PG-rated classic. Here, sexuality and fidelity fuel the entire plot. Othello as a woman is the same: a jealous Goliath who smothers her lover. But Tell makes the titular general human by hesitating to murder and sweating with fear. You can’t look away from her. Tell is also the only black cast member in a play criticized as one of Shakespeare’s most racist. “An old black ram is tupping your white ewe,” Iago says. But unlike the Afrocentric play We Are Proud to Present... at Artists Rep or Smoldering Fires at Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center, blackness isn’t the focus here. It’s a subtlety that pops in and comes straight from the script, since Shakespeare wrote Othello after African ambassadors stirred up controversy in London. On a modern set with guns and combat boots, the topic doesn’t need drilling home, and Fisher-Draeger is smart to honor the script without belaboring the point. This is Portland theater as noteworthy as it gets—in Sellwood, in a remodeled chapel across from a shiny row of new townhouses. ENID SPITZ. SEE IT: Othello is at Post5 Theatre, 1666 SE Lambert St., 971-333-1758. 7:30 pm FridaySunday, through April 23. $20. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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VISUAL ARTS = WW Pick. Highly recommended. By JENNIFER RABIN. 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.
2016 Contemporary Northwest Art Awards
A tilted monolith of concrete, wood, foam and metal greets you in the gallery of Portland Art Museum’s biennial awards exhibition for Northwest Art. Work from eight regional artists, in every medium from etched glass to neon, wait for you beyond. The photorealistic drawings of post-apocalyptic scenes by the collaborative duo known as Lead Pencil Studio are a standout, as are the haunting faceless figures, drawn on paper by Samantha Wall, that give the impression that they might dissolve at any moment should you stand in front of them too long. Portland Art Museum, 1219 SW Park Ave., 226-2811. Through May 8.
Now I Am Myself
For its grand opening, Wolff Gallery is presenting a group show of five female photographers whose portraits of themselves and other women subvert the male gaze. In so doing, the work excludes the dominant perspective, the lens through which representations of women have always been presented to us. That said—and here’s the tricky part—in order to change the culture, in order to shift the balance and give female artists their voice, it is imperative that we evaluate Now I Am Myself, not as work made by women, but as work made by artists. Wolff Gallery, 618 NW Glisan St., Suite R1, 971-4131340. Through May 1.
Photographer Delaney Allen captures a future race inhabiting a distant landscape. Allen shoots outdoors in the dark, aiming a floodlight at some of his subjects, which gives the impression that they have never been seen before, caught unsuspecting in the middle of the desert in the dead of night. In other photographs, Allen cloaks his figures in tribal textiles, covering most of their skin and faces until they are unrecognizable, shrouded in ceremonial mystery. There is a sharp contrast between what is hidden and what is exposed, and therein lies the tension of the series.Nationale, 3360 SE Division St., 4779786. Through May 9.
COURTESY OF BRIANA CEREZO
ARTIFACT
Inventing Problems and Congratulating Myself for Solving Them
Sculptor Shelby Davis investigates the way that things intersect. Sometimes the materials are divergent, like the river of soft pewter that Davis inlays into a slab of unyielding concrete. In other pieces, meticulously finished wood planks pierce weathered hunks of gnarled wood painted to resemble concrete. The same material takes on different properties, and the point of intersection makes them alien to each other. Davis also uses humor as part of his visual language, so don’t be surprised to find a concrete casting of Romanesco broccoli, sitting like a curiosity atop one of the sculptures. Alexander Art Gallery at the Niemeyer Center, 19600 Molalla Avenue, Oregon City, 594-3032. Through April 29.
Michael T. Hensley: Recent Work
Some of Michael T. Hensley’s abstract paintings look like what you might expect to find inside Hensley’s head, if you were able to unzip it and have a peek. Frenetic graffiti-esque marks spanning the color palette shout over one another for attention. Other canvases are comparatively subdued, like whitewashed chaos, hinting at the muted madness underneath. The occasional naïve doodle— discernable as a Christmas tree or a pyramid or a hand with six fingers— gives the work a childlike quality and a lack of self-consciousness. Hensley has established an unmistakable visual language all his own, and if you’ve seen it once, in his paintings or in one of his public murals around town, you will recognize it immediately. Mark Woolley Gallery, 700 SW 5th Ave. Suite 4110, 998-4152. Through May 15.
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you can see the wax and paint, and can even read the newsprint she uses to create texture, but view the work from the other end of the gallery and Mantećon has left you drifting out into the cosmos. She plays with the density of her surfaces, sometimes building up thick layers of material onto which she gouges quick hatch marks or meandering tributaries. In other pieces, Mantećon uses a wash of pigment so faint that the grain of the wood panel shows through. Mark Woolley Gallery, 700 SW 5th Ave. Suite 4110, 998-4152. Through May 15.
Symbolic Autobiography
Photographer Ann Mansolino’s black-and-white portraits are not meant to capture something personal about her subjects, but to represent Mansolino’s own internal states of mind. In one photo, a woman stands in a field of stones so endless that it disappears into the horizon. The subject, her head cropped out of the frame (Mansolino obscures the faces of all of her subjects so as to de-emphasize the importance of the individual), stands in the close foreground burdened by her own heavy armload of stones. Through her subjects—usually women, sometimes herself—emotions are made manifest, embodied in physical form. And though the medium and largeformat images are carefully staged, the backdrop of the outdoors lends them a naturalistic quality, leaving us free to lock into the feeling that Mansolino is trying to convey without distraction. Sage Gallery, 625 NW Everett St. No. 106, 541-206-2560. Through April 28.
Temporal Ecologies
Crinkled openmouthed paperbags grow like barnacles from the corners, walls, ceiling and floor of the Portland Building’s installation space. By using an everyday object like the ubiquitous brown PUT ME TO BED BY BRIANA CEREZO, paper bag, from which FROM NOW I AM MYSELF we have all eaten thousands of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, artist Jenna Reineking gets The International Center for us to see beyond its usual form and Photography (ICP) presented the our associations with it. Reineking Lifetime Achievement Award for transforms it into a raw material, photojournalism to Ruth Gruber on a building block for a new enviher 100th birthday. Now approachronment. Together, the humble ing her 105th birthday, a retrosculpted bags look like hundreds spective of her work, curated by of organisms, imbued with life by the ICP, has made its way to our Reineking, that have the potential fair city. The exhibition unfolds the to spread through the gallery on story of her serendipitous career, their own. The Portland Building, from her assignment to shoot the 1120 SW 5th Ave., 823-4000. then-unknown Alaskan frontier, to Through April 15. being sent by the Department of the Interior on a secret mission to bring back a thousand refugees Upfor Gallery is doing what it does from Europe. She photographed best by celebrating the intersection everything along the way, often of a classic art form and the techsneaking into places she wasn’t nologies that have reshaped it into allowed. The most affecting photos what is newly possible. This month, from the exhibition are those that eight artists show us the entire document the unfathomable condispectrum of printmaking, from tions that the refugees were subserigraph to 3-D printing. Alyson jected to on their way to finding Provax’s looped video, using leta permanent home. Though the terpress animation cells, will keep images were captured 70 years you glued in front of it. And Janet ago, they are painfully relevant Ballweg gives us a series of moody during the current refugee crisis. intaglio prints, which look like 2-D Oregon Jewish Museum and Center theater sets of abandoned living for Holocaust Education, 1953 NW spaces. Created from computerKearney St., 226-3600. Through generated models, the final prints June 13. exist in the ineffable space between
Ruth Gruber
Variable States: Prints Now
Shape Shifting
Lauren Mantecón’s abstract paintings make you feel like you’re in the middle of an interplanetary dream. Faded orbs hover in the background while clusters of tiny dots, like constellations, pop with bright color in the foreground. Up close,
the digital and the tangible. Upfor Gallery, 929 NW Flanders St., 2275111. Through April 9.
For more Visual Arts listings, visit
BOOKS = WW Pick. Highly recommended. By JAMES HELMSWORTH. 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.
Alexis Smith and Danielle Dutton
Alexis M. Smith was working at Powell’s when her boss asked to see her manuscript. Next thing she knew, she had a book deal with Tin House. Her book, Glaciers, follows a 20-something bohemian though a single day, reminiscing on her childhood in Alaska, lusting after her Iraq-veteran co-worker and getting a dress at a thrift store. She’ll be joined by Danielle Dutton, whose novel Margaret the First is a dramatic retelling of the life of 17thcentury English Duchess Margaret Cavendish. Annie Bloom’s Books, 7834 SW Capitol Highway, 246-0053. 7 pm. Free.
Maggie and the munitions. Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 228-4651. 7:30 pm. Free.
TUESDAY, APRIL 12 Sallie Tisdale
Over the past 30 years, author and journalist Sallie Tisdale has covered everything from abortion clinics to Buddhism in publications like Harper’s and The New Yorker, and in her own books such as The Best Thing I Ever Tasted and Women of the Way. Her new collection, Violation, compiles articles
Richelle Mead
Best-selling author Richelle Mead’s work features succubi, shapeshifters and vampires. Her new series, The Glittering Court, follows its protagonist Adelaide through a charm school. Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing, 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd., 228-4651. 7 pm. Free.
Carl Adamshick, Jonathan Wells
Carl Adamshick, a Portland resident originally from Toledo, is the author of Saint Friend, a poetry collection published by McSweeney’s and currently up for an Oregon Book Award. He’ll be joined by New York poet Jonathan Wells. Broadway Books, 1714 NE Broadway, 284-1726. 7 pm. Free.
Adam Hochschild
In his new book, Spain in Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War 1936-1939, Mother Jones co-founder Adam Hochschild introduces readers to some of the 3,000 Americans who schlepped across the Atlantic to fight Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War. Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 228-4651. 7:30 pm. Free.
FRIDAY, APRIL 8 Augusten Burroughs
Still running with scissors after all these years, but now unlucky in love. Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 228-4651. 7:30 pm. Free.
MONDAY, APRIL 11 Jonathan Levi
Jonathan Levi is fiction editor of the Los Angeles Times and co-founder of Granta. His first novel in 24 years, Septimania tells the story of an organ tuner who travels to Rome to find the woman who took his virginity, only to find out he’s heir to an 8th-century Franco-Judaic fiefdom. Across his travels, he’ll also encounter an elephant that changes color and one of the guys who did 9/11. Powell’s Books on Hawthorne, 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 228-4651. 7:30 pm. Free.
Charlotte Rogan
From the author of The Lifeboat, in which a babely megalomaniac narrates the tribulations of the aforementioned vessel, comes Now and Again, a novel about how two lives interconnect. In Charlotte Rogan’s latest, Maggie is a middle-aged Midwestern mother who stumbles across a scandal and a cover-up at her job as a secretary at a munitions plant. Meanwhile, a guilt-ridden Army officer launches an anti-war website that soon connects him to
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FEATURE
Brian Castner
In his 2012 memoir, The Long Walk, Brian Castner recounted his experience working the Explosive Ordnance Disposal beat—that’s that stuff from The Hurt Locker where they have to figure out what to do with bombs—in Afghanistan. His newest, All the Ways We Kill and Die, starts that same year, following the death of one of his EOD friends. Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing, 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd., 228-4651. 7 pm. Free.
APRIL 25-26 | THE ARMORY
For more Books listings, visit
The Seven Most Walton Moments in Bill Walton’s New Book Bill Walton is known to Trail Blazers fans for conjuring up Portland’s lone NBA championship banner in 1977, and to everyone else as a Deadhead sports broadcaster so prone to irrelevant remarks about “the solemn responsibility of redheads” that there’s a word for it—Waltonisms. In Walton’s memoir, Back From the Dead (Simon & Schuster, 336 pages, $27), he gives a detailed account of, well, his entire life: boyhood bike rides through suburban San Diego, his UCLA years under coach John Wooden, his time in the NBA, and the decay of a pro athlete’s body. We picked out the most Bill Walton-y Bill Waltonisms. JAMES HELMSWORTH. On parenting: “I would write on the boys’ lunch bags an endless variety of Coach Wooden’s maxims…[a]s the children got out of the car, I would always say, as loud as I could, ‘I love you!’” On the importance of teammate solidarity during training: “I stopped one stride short of the finish line and waited for everyone else to come across. When a clearly befuddled Jack Ramsay called out the free-time limit, I finally took my last stride across the line, exactly one second late.” On his relationship with Wooden: “We had differing opinions on almost every subject, from the length of my hair to my lifestyle, politics, and choice of friends to my idea of writing a letter to President Nixon demanding he resign—on Coach Wooden’s personal stationery.” On his connection to the Patty Hearst kidnapping by the Symbionese Liberation Army: “When everything went spiraling out of control [Walton’s roommates] Jack and Mikki were, much to my surprise, quietly and secretly recruited to help keep Patty and some of the SLA members safe and alive....[m]y phone was tapped, my mail was intercepted.” On Portland: “I lived in as hip and urban an environment as Portland had to offer in those days, on Northwest Kearney and 23rd streets. And the fans and neighbors would always come by the house bearing inspirational gifts that they would leave on the front porch—food, fruit, brownies, flowers, Grateful Dead stuff, and music.”
COURTESY OF ESPN MEDIA ZONE
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6
from across her career, and touches on high-school sociology, watching her children grow and Disneyland. The title piece concerns her family members’ reactions to being written about, which this will certainly do nothing to improve. Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 228-4651. 7:30 pm. Free.
40 TONS, ZERO DRIVERS How Daimler built the first road-ready self-driving semi truck
ALAN PEARSON CHIEF ENGINEER OF PRODUCT VALIDATION AT DAIMLER TRUCKS NORTH AMERICA
STEVE NADIG CHIEF ENGINEER OF MECHATRONICS AT DAIMLER TRUCKS NORTH AMERICA
More talks and speakers at techfestnw.com/speakers
PITCHFESTNW / DEMO ALLEY FEATURING THE LATEST IN VIRTUAL/AUGMENTED REALITY
PARTIES / NETWORKING
On bonding with Larry Bird: “I went outside, got down on my hands and knees, and started rubbing lots of the Larry Bird driveway dirt all over me. When I was done, I scooped up some of the loose, moist dirt and filled the jar...whenever things got rough on the road that season, I would reach into my game bag and rub a little more dirt wherever I could.” On hair: “David Crosby was proud. I was the first player in NBA history with a ponytail.” GO: Bill Walton will sign his book at Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St., 228-4651, on Saturday, April 9. Noon. Free. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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C O U R T E S Y O F S T X E N T E R TA I N M E N T
MOVIES = 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.
Get in This Head
OPENING THIS WEEK Bloodsworth: An Innocent Man
C Though the story of the first man sentenced to death and exonerated by DNA is a dark, shocking tale in its own right, director Gregory Payne uses high-contrast lighting and a handheld camera to add the melodramatic flair of a Lifetime movie. It’s undeniably inspiring that Kirk Noble Bloodsworth took it upon himself to save his own life and suggest that his attorney check out this newfangled thing called DNA genetic fingerprints. Yet rather than incorporating scientific testimonies or perspectives from anyone besides Bloodsworth himself, we are left with a dozen camera angles of his Guy Fieri goatee sucking on a Marlboro menthol, creating a less than objective presentation of the event. Moving from Bloodsworth’s arrest in 1984, to a couple sentences at a 2013 speech against capital punishment, then back again for the trial, the choppy pacing flattens all momentum building toward one of the most significant moments in the history of criminal law. NR. LAUREN TERRY. NW Film Center. 7 pm Thursday, April 7.
HARDCORE HENRY IS THE NEWEST FILM SHOT IN FIRST-PERSON. WE’D RATHER BE IN ONE OF THESE. BY A LEX FA LCON E
Hardcore Henry is a first-person shooter made into a feature-length movie, filmed almost entirely by a GoPro strapped to director Ilya Naishuller’s face. It’s an interest-
IN A CUBICLE?
Is it because you’re too old or too young to work? YES NO , too stoned
YES NO
Richard Linklater treads yet another swath of Americana for his first film since Boyhood. This time, he tells the story of some freshmen baseball players in 1980s Texas, at the pinnacle of disco’s popularity. Starring newcomer Will Brittain and former Disney star Zoey Deutch. Screened after deadline. See wweek.com for Sophia June’s review. R. Opens Friday, April 8. See wweek.com for theaters.
C+ This film’s clever title comes from a 60 Minutes segment about Tobias Hammel, an underprivileged youth who became a drug trafficker for the privileged, white youth of a private school in Connecticut. It centers on Tobias as the non-rich outcast establishes a cocaine connection from Colombia in an effort to fit in with the preppies and, of course, to get the girl. While the film starts with a standard coming-of-age formula, it gets better as it gets grittier, ending with a not particularly poignant commentary on money and class. The backstory is interesting, and the actors are catalog-worthy. If only the producers had traded the overbearing narration for actual character development. R. EZRA JOHNSON-GREENOUGH. Cinema 21.
Instead, I’d rather live in one of these characters for a brief moment. Here’s a handy way to decide which first-person movie or character you’d be better off trying to get inside.
NO
YES
Everybody Wants Some!!
The Preppie Connection
ing, if nauseating, concept. But of all the point-of-view shots in film history, why is one from the head of a mute, murderous cyborg running almost plotlessly around Russia the one that was stretched to a full 90 minutes?
do you have a job?
The Boss
Melissa McCarthy plays a Martha Stewartstyle maven who takes over the Girl Scouts of America after getting out of prison. Screened after deadline. See wweek.com for a review. R. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, Tigard, St. Johns Cinemas.
@alex_falcone
Being John Malkovich: It’s the title of film, after all. Of course you get to experience life inside John Malkovich’s head, and it’s great! I’ve crawled through hundreds of file cabinets since seeing that movie hoping I’d get to be JM for even a moment, but alas, I’m stuck here.
HOME OFFICE?
Animals, in general: There’s no shortage of shots from animal’s perspectives, from the shark in Jaws to a sassy cat in Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey to an even sassier cat stuck in a boat in Life of Pi. Getting in an animal’s head is one of the great joys of filmmaking. Heck, being an Ewok and doing my best to ruin Return of the Jedi would be more fun than being Hardcore Henry for even a minute.
FIELD WORK IDEAL VACATION: CITY OR COUNTRY
STILL SHOWING
The Big Lebowski: You get to wake up to Julianne Moore in a wig and ride down a bowling alley under some dancers. The Coens also give you the option of looking out from a bowling ball, though that isn’t a life I want to borrow for even a moment.
YES Jimmy Stewart as peeping Tom:
10 Cloverfield Lane
C+ The motto of J.J. Abrams’ latest thriller is, basically, don’t text and drive. Also, don’t break up with your fiance, or else you’ll get in a terrible car accident, be abducted by a Lolita-inspired murderer and watch your whole family die in the alien apocalypse—in one night. 10 Cloverfield Lane falls victim to the usual thriller clichés: It doesn’t come close to passing the Bechdel test and contains numerous gratuitous shots of Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) in her under-
CONT. on page 48
The Terminator: OK, so the T-800 is a murderous cyborg too, but being inside its head is also pretty interesting. Especially with the informational view that gives possible human responses to social situations, and identifies people whose names you might not remember, both of which would make parties much easier.
Predator: Like the T-800, the Predator has some POV advantages that he uses to kill, but that would also be nice in the real world. The heatsensing vision in Predator would be really useful for knowing if restrooms are occupied and whether or not the “vacant” sign is working properly.
We’ve all spent time staring out the window hoping to see our neighbors getting into some shit, but they’re way less interesting than the neighbors in Hitchcock’s Rear Window. If I’m going to be looking out from the eyeballs of a snoop, I’d like it to be one as fun as the wheelchair-bound Stewart.
SEE IT: Hardcore Henry is rated R. It opens Friday at Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Lloyd Center, Tigard. Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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MOVIES wear, a cheap thriller soundtrack and, of course, aliens. Despite the clichés, Abrams shows for the first hour and 20 minutes that he’s almost capable of a smart psychological thriller. The last 10 minutes, however, confirm he’s not. The majority of the film creates a claustrophobic, paranoid world inside a bunker designed to survive the apocalypse, and Howard (John Goodman) is the seemingly friendly ringleader. The bunker is surprisingly homey, equipped with games, DVDs and enough food to last for years. For a second, you wonder: Is this really so bad? That’s a question Abrams makes sure to answer. PG-13. SOPHIA JUNE. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, CineMagic, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, Tigard.
45 Years
A- Andrew Haigh’s rich, slow-moving marital mystery centers on gorgeous cinematography and masterful acting by Tom Courtenay and Charlotte Rampling as a buttonedup, childless woman on the verge of celebrating her anniversary to a man she suddenly doesn’t know. R. LIZZY ACKER. Laurelhurst.
Anomalisa
B- It’s a little creepy watching a stop-motion puppet perform cunnilingus. Charlie Kaufman (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) fills his movie with jarring moments when our childhood associations of stop-motion animation collide with this very grown-up story. It was nominated for an Oscar for Best Animated Feature, but it’s also an early contender for feel-bad movie of 2016. R. RICHARD SPEER. Academy, Laurelhurst.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
D Batman and Superman are fighting, and it’s hard to choose a side. The new Superman is boring and out of place in the 21st century. Batman, on the other hand, has been reinvented as a huge dickhead. Played by Ben Affleck with a characteristic lack of gravitas, Batman walks around in a silly metal suit killing people. You know how Batman never kills people? He does now. Even when he doesn’t have to. He even tries killing Superman because, you know, “he might be bad later.” With nobody to root for, BvS:DoJ is just an unconscionably long slugfest simultaneously attempting too much and accomplishing almost nothing. Despite the rare bright spots—like Jesse Eisenberg’s intriguingly outlandish Lex Luthor and Amy Adams as a strong international war reporter version of Lois Lane—I left feeling bored and slightly concussed from giant men punching each other into buildings for no reason. PG-13. ALEX FALCONE. Bagdad, Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, CineMagic, Edgefield, Milwaukie, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, Tigard, Roseway, St. Johns Cinemas.
The Big Short
A We’re in a bubble of movies about the financial crisis, but The Big Short is the first good one. It’s based on the book by Michael Lewis, who’s known for making complicated financial topics into compelling stories, and adapted by Adam McKay, who is known for Talladega Nights and the “More Cowbell” sketch. Surprisingly, this combo works. R. ALEX FALCONE. Academy, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Vancouver, Valley.
Brooklyn
A- Based on the novel by Irish author Colm Tóibín and adapted by Nick Hornby (High Fidelity, About a Boy), Brooklyn is just the sweetest thing. Saoirse Ronan (Atonement) makes an adorable couple with Emory Cohen (Smash), and I could watch them court for hours, especially their awkward dinners with Cohen’s Italian family. PG-13. ALEX FALCONE. Academy, Laurelhurst.
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City of Gold
B+ Jonathan Gold is one of food
journalism’s only legitimate heroes, and certainly the only one with a Pulitzer on his metaphorical belt buckle. With his Counter Intelligence column for L.A. Weekly and the Los Angeles Times beginning in the ‘80s, Gold helped change the way traditional working-class and ethnic fare like tacos and pho are viewed by food critics—as cuisines every bit as layered, vital and full of history as the stuff at high-dollar French spots. This new documentary by Laura Gabbert accompanies the legendary journalist as he tours the eateries and neighborhoods of L.A. Gold told WW, “I love the way it makes Los Angeles look. It’s a part of Los Angeles that doesn’t make it onto film so often. In a way, it’s probably as much about the ecstasy of being in your car as the sun sets as it is about going to restaurants.” Read the full Q&A with Gold at wweek.com. NR. Cinema 21.
Deadpool
B Within the first 10 minutes. the titular “merc with the mouth” slaughters a baker’s dozen of goons to a soundtrack of “Shoop,” breaks the fourth wall by talking to the audience, punches multiple scrotums, drops more f-bombs than Tony Montana and takes a bullet directly up the butthole while giggling about it. Deadpool doesn’t reinvent the wheel. But it does teabag it. And sometimes that’s enough. R. AP KRYZA. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Tigard.
The Divergent Series: Allegiant, Part 1
D Undistinguishable from its counterparts, Part 1 spends every second dragging out what it calls a plot to set up the entirely unnecessary final installment. It was intended to be anchored by a joyless love story that features zero chemistry. Instead, we don’t give a fuck about either of them, so we don’t give a fuck about their love story. The film’s excessively dull proceedings are punctuated by generic action scenes in which the Bureau of Genetic Welfare uses a bunch of weirdo army shit to kidnap little kids and wipe their brains clean. If you are over 17 years old there is exactly zero reason for you to waste your money on this. PG-13. MIKE GALLUCCI. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, Tigard.
Hello, My Name is Doris
B Enter the mind of Doris, where
20-something men with waxed chests rip off their shirts and slam her passionately against the wall. Until someone wakes her from the daydream. Doris is a whip-smart comedy that pokes fun at the ultra-curated youthful lifestyle, while avoiding the recent trope of seniors finding a place amid the nostalgic fascination of millennials. You can almost feel John trying not to laugh as he offers custom-blended artisanal cocktails to Doris during Friendsgiving at his place. PG-13. LAUREN TERRY. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Hollywood, Living Room Theaters, Bridgeport, City Center.
Eddie the Eagle
C Based on Michael “Eddie the Eagle” Edwards’ rise to (sort of) Olympic fame, this is an underdog story with a twist: He never gets any cooler, and he doesn’t win the gold. As Britain’s first competitor in Olympic ski jumping, he qualified just by successfully landing a jump, which on its own can be a deadly feat without proper training. Though he finished last, his enthusiasm and goofy appearance won over audiences worldwide. Taron Egerton brings his own twitchy charm to the role of Eddie, scrunching up his face to get a better look through his thick glasses. A synthy musical score sets the tone during the 1988 Olympics in Calgary, but ’80s nostalgia and a lovable, bespectacled hero can’t save the cheesiness of coach Bronson Peary (Hugh Jackman) taking on a ski
Williams (not to be confused with his son and grandson of the same name) was a skinny man in a bedazzled Western jacket and a Stetson hat who sang warbly country-folk songs about domestic unhappiness. The Hank had 35 singles in the Billboard Top 10, including such toe-tappers as “My Son Calls Another Man Daddy” and “Why Should We Try Anymore.” Known for a troubled family life and his affinity for combining booze and Vicodin, he was fired from the Grand Ole Opry for being unreliable and frequently intoxicated. He died of substance-induced heart failure on the way to a gig. I Saw the Light gives little insight into his life and why he wrote such depressive tunes. Instead, the whole thing feels as if it’s about a man who never did much. R. ALEX FALCONE. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, City Center, Fox Tower.
jump in jeans and a lit cigarette. PG-13. LAUREN TERRY. Vancouver.
Embrace of the Serpent
A- Colonialism rears its ugly head in this Oscar-nominated film, which follows a shaman, a German explorer and a native who’s assimilating into colonized culture as they journey through South American jungles in the early 1900s, searching for a plant with mysterious healing powers. NR. SOPHIA JUNE. Living Room Theaters.
Eye in the Sky
D About halfway through London Has Fallen, Gerard Butler’s grumbling, stabby Secret Service agent slowly digs his gigantic knife into the organs of Random Brown Villain No. 453 and implores him to “go back to Fuckheadistan.” The look of horror on the face of his BFF-inchief, Aaron Eckhart as the U.S. president, is meant as part of a joke (he’s such a pussy!). Featuring Melissa Leo, Morgan Freeman and Jackie Earl Haley, for fuck’s sake, this sequel to Olympus Has Fallen is a hugebudget debacle that looks like a direct-to-video toss-away. The action sequences are at best shootouts and at worst look like cutscenes from an old Playstation game—with added gay panic and racism. It’ll undoubtedly inspire some jingoistic fists to
CONT. on page 50
REVIEW CAITLIN CRONENBERG
C+ The year’s first movie on the ethics of drones and the last film featuring Alan Rickman, misses its mark. British Col. Katherine Powell (Helen Mirren) tracks infamous terrorists to a house in Nairobi, Kenya. To stop the suicide bombing they’re planning, Powell orders a Predator drone to destroy the house. The only problem is a small, hula-hooping neighbor girl. The plot arc is more of a plot sine wave. Every 15 minutes, the girl’s life seems doomed. Then some new circumstance delays the strike. This pattern is an exasperating running joke, with the withering Lt. Gen. Frank Benson (Rickman as a wandless Professor Snape in olive drab) throwing up his hands and staring down the people who just refuse to blow that little girl up already. It’s not Rickman’s fault (RIP) that his dry humor is out of place in a movie about the ethics of vaporizing people with missiles. R. ZACH MIDDLETON. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Living Room Theaters, Bridgeport, City Center, Lloyd Center.
London Has Fallen
Gods of Egypt
D It’s ancient Egypt like you’ve never seen it before: bigger, shinier and chock-full of deities punching each other. The gods are distinguishable from the normals because they’re a bit taller, they transform into shiny animal robots and—despite being in Africa 5,000 years ago—they’re white as crystal meth. They’re led by Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Game of Thrones) as Horus, god of light, and Gerard Butler (Olympus Has Fallen) as Set, god of beard stubble. Shown but never explained: giant flying beetles; a 3,000-foot waterfall; removing and putting back somebody’s glowing blue brain; a flaming pyramid; ridable, giant fire-breathing snakes; and why the characters are all so white. This is Egypt! PG-13. ALEX FALCONE. Avalon, Clackamas.
Hail, Caesar!
B+ From the opening scene, in which Capitol Pictures “fixer” Eddie Mannix (a gruff Josh Brolin) skips out of confession, it’s a quick 27-hour shitstorm through high drama as movie star Baird Whitlock (George Clooney) gets abducted. The Coens’ funniest film since The Big Lebowski combines a zany caper, a communist plot, ’50s studio politics and a touching story about one man’s calling in life into a cohesive, lighthearted and quip-heavy comedy. It’s a neat package like only the Coen brothers can tie up. PG-13. JOHN LOCANTHI. Hollywood, Living Room Theaters, Vancouver.
How to Be Single
D Dating is hard, not sure if you’ve heard. It’s especially hard for four single women in New York who are, like, different kinds of single (Rebel Wilson, Leslie Mann, Dakota Johnson, Alison Brie). R. ALEX FALCONE. Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Vancouver, Valley.
Kung Fu Panda 3
A- It’s been five years since Kung Fu Panda 2, and Jack Black hasn’t been in anything even close to that good since. PG. Academy, Avalon, Empirical, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Mt. Hood, Division, Valley.
I Saw the Light
B- I Saw the Light seeks to educate the world about the 1940s country singer who burned bright and too briefly. You’d expect a story of a musician living life in the fast lane to be exciting, but The Light manages to make drinking and womanizing seem like a lecture on tax law. Hiram “Hank”
THE TOUCH OF YOUR LIPS: Ethan Hawke.
Almost Blue
Traditional biopics go through the motions, hitting all the perfectly rehearsed notes until even the most fascinating life has been transformed into a bland composition. Writer-director Robert Budreau wanted to challenge such played-out conventions with the Chet Baker feature Born to Be Blue. “Jazz is an improvisational art,” says Budreau, “and I think, to remain true to the spirit of jazz and the spirit of the character, we had to stray from the traditional biopic.” Rather than awkwardly cramming Baker’s entire life into a film, Budreau focused on a period in the 1960s when Baker’s career saw a rebirth following his brief recovery from heroin addiction. “When I heard his comeback story and the themes of addiction,” says Budreau, “I really just got into Chet Baker as an interesting character in an interesting time to explore.” Budreau drew from jazz, using facts as familiar refrains to touch base with and stray from rather than as rigid rules. The result is a new type of biopic that captures the essence of the artist while winking to the audience that some scenes are just for fun. It opens with black-and-white footage of Baker’s dark hallucinations and the temptations of sex and heroin, but those scenes are just the setup for a big f-you for anyone expecting another customary biopic. Even Jane (Carmen Ejogo), Baker’s van-dwelling, hippie love interest in Blue, is not based on one specific person. Her character is an amalgamation of the many women who passed through Baker’s life. While it would be nice to see what the real women in Baker’s life were like, or how he treated the people who loved him, or how difficult his recovery was, Baker was a heroin addict who had to rebuild his aperture from scratch, and movies can only be so long. A little improvisation here works just fine. Ethan Hawke as Baker brilliantly captures the cracked vocal inflections and withered demeanor of the addled jazz legend. Even in the film’s darkest scenes, in which Baker struggles to choose between sobriety and drug-induced inspiration, Hawke adds a sense of excitement that’s worthy of the talented performer. There’s wonder in the desperation when we see Baker bleeding from the mouth in a bathtub as he practices the trumpet. CURTIS COOK. A new Chet Baker feature is more of a riff, less of a biopic.
B+ SEE IT: Born to Be Blue is rated R. It opens Friday at Living Room Theaters.
WWEEKDOTCOM WWEEKDOTCOM Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
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MOVIES Marguerite
A- A shrill French lady is so rich no one dares snuff out her dreams of becoming an opera singer, in Xavier Giannoli’s portrait of splendor, a surprisingly humorous drama that’s all fur collars, stage lights and silk robes. But there’s melancholy too, as Marguerite’s husband arranges sad, private concerts filled with pre-screened patrons. R. MERYL WILLIAMS. Fox Tower.
Midnight Special
B The premise of a magical boy running from the government sounds trite. But add a clever, light-handed screenplay, take away the kitschy magic, and include a dark take on the increasing flow of data through satellites, and you’ve got a fresh, modern science-fiction film. Writer-director Jeff Nichols (Mud) uses sparse dialogue to maintain an air of mystery around the calm, young Alton (Jaeden Lieberher), carefully using every word and glance to tell a little more about this electromagnetically charged child. Nichols never resorts to intergalactic battles or wizardy magic, but he plays with our expectations to amp up the tension. During a nighttime scene, car headlights look lifelike as they cut through the darkness, their movements backlit by the eerie glow of city skyline. Just as you’re waiting for a green, two-headed alien to materialize, the camera turns to Alton reading space-themed comic books with a flashlight. The trick leaves you even less prepared for moments that can’t be explained, turning your shock into terror when Alton screams in pain and beams of light shoot from his eyes. PG-13. LAUREN TERRY. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Cinema 21, Lloyd Center.
My Golden Days
A A French New Wave drama as clichéd as they come, My Golden Days is wrought with existential crises, rapid scene changes, split screens, shots of characters longingly gazing out the window or looking directly at the camera, as if to remind audiences that they are indeed watching a film. But director Arnaud Desplechin, who created the film as a prequel to his 1996 My Sex Life…Or How I Got Into an Argument, pairs these clichés with a realistic story about the life of protagonist Paul Dédalus (Quentin Dolmaire) in France. The film begins with Dedalus as a middle-aged man, then digresses into one long nostalgia-stained flashback. His story is hauntingly naive, told through shots of house parties lit in dim blues and greens, teens in ’80s-print button-downs rolling joints, drinking whiskey and chain-smoking cigarettes. The existential depression grows tired by the end, but somehow, watching an innocent love story devolve into dark obsession doesn’t. R. SOPHIA JUNE. Fox Tower.
My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2
Fourteen years after the big fat wedding bells, Nia Vardalos and John Corbett are back, with a ton of familiar faces and Hollywood-style parental trails. Remember Joey Fatone of ’N Sync fame in the original? Neither did we. Screened after deadline. PG-13. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Moreland, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Tigard, St. Johns Theater.
The Revenant
A- In terms of pure spectacle and cin-
ematic beauty, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s The Revenant approaches masterpiece status. Fur trapper Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) finds his trapping party on the receiving end of a bear attack that leaves him barely clinging to life. R. AP KRYZA. Academy, Clackamas, Laurelhurst, Mt. Hood, City Center, Fox Tower, Tigard, Valley.
Spotlight
son: It’s a movie that feels like prestige television. Specifically, it feels like The Wire. Recounting how a Boston Globe investigative team uncovered an epidemic of pederast priests abetted by the archdiocese, the 2016 Oscar winner for Best Picture borrows the rhythms of a propulsive TV procedural and resists the temptation for self-congratulation. R. AARON MESH. Academy, Laurelhurst, Fox Tower, Vancouver.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens
A- If there’s one thing we know about Star Wars fans, it’s that they’re as resistant to change as any religious zealot. And so, the best thing that can be said about The Force Awakens is that it’s almost old-fashioned. PG-13. Academy, Avalon, Empirical, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Mt. Hood, Vancouver, Valley.
Where to Invade Next
B America hasn’t won a war in a while, Moore posits, so why not use the military nearly 60 percent of our taxes support to invade a country we can get something useful from? In Italy, the film’s first stop, he documents the average Italian’s time off. In Portugal, he talks to cops who no longer bust drug offenders. In France, nutritious and delectable school lunches. But arguments about “Americanness” fall flat out of the mouths of lefties like Moore, and he glosses over some of the existential issues that those other countries face. R. JAMES HELMSWORTH. Kiggins, Laurelhurst.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
C+ Tina Fey stars in this light comedy about the war in Afghanistan, based on the book The Taliban Shuffle by Chicago Tribune writer Kim Barker, who was sent to cover Afghanistan with no prior experience in a war zone. Fey’s portrayal of Barker is the same as other characters you’re used to seeing from her, bumbling yet surprisingly competent, awkward in life, awkward in love. She’s funny for sure, but something just feels off with the 30 Rock-style humor interlaced with the horrific violence of Kabul circa 2004. Mix in some friend drama with Margot Robbie (The Wolf of Wall Street) and a really uncomfortable sexual encounter in which Bilbo Baggins puts his fingers in her mouth, and WTF ends up an awkward teenager of a movie, not sure who it is or why it feels the way it does. It’s occasionally brilliant but never seems comfortable. R. ALEX FALCONE. Bridgeport, Fox Tower.
Zoolander 2
D Little more than a repackaging of the original, with more celebrity cameos. Occasionally, there are inspired moments—the mid-’90s aqua vitae commercial—but it ends up as 100 minutes of a movie trying to be dumber than a brain fart. PG-13. JOHN LOCANTHI. Avalon.
Zootopia
B Leave it to Disney to sneak powerful, adult messages into a PG-rated movie. A modern-day Morocco, the Zootopia of the title is a metropolitan melting pot, where predator and prey live in perfect, fictional harmony. Every dynamic, doe-eyed character in this animated adventure brings laughs for the kids, and hope for adults that their children won’t adopt Donald Trump ideals. A small-town bunny with big dreams, Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin), escapes her carrot-farming future by becoming the first rabbit to join Zootopia’s police force. Little does she know, when predators mysteriously return to their ferocious, prey-hungry ways, her hometown’s small-mindedness multiplies throughout Zootopia faster than bunnies during breeding season. PG. AMY WOLFE. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Milwaukie, Moreland, Oak Grove, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Pioneer Place, Tigard, St. Johns Cinemas.
For more Movies listings, visit
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AP FILM STUDIES
A- Spotlight inverts the usual compari-
C O U R T E S Y O F N I K K AT S U
pump. In fact, it might have inadvertently given the Trump campaign a new slogan for foreign policy: “Go back to Fuckheadistan.” R. AP KRYZA. Avalon, Clackamas, Bridgeport, Division, Tigard.
Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
tokyo drifter
The Imitation Game SEIJUN SUZUKI IS THE DIRECTOR YOUR FAVORITE DIRECTORS WANT TO BE. BY A P kRYzA
apkryza@wweek.com
For cinema fans who’ve never gotten a taste of oldschool Japanese B-movies, watching the works of psycho auteur Seijun Suzuki can be like listening to the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique your whole life, then one day discovering Abbey Road and the collected works of Curtis Mayfield, Kurtis Blow, Sly Stone and James Brown in rapid succession. Homage is nothing new in cinema. But ever since Quentin Tarantino cobbled together every genre influence that ever gave him a boner for Kill Bill, movies channeling hip-hop and sticking samples in their soundtracks have been a pop-culture calling card. It’s a wink at audiences who are in the know, and a way for filmmakers to draw attention to under-seen masters or pass off their own work as original. Few directors have influenced such a broad audience for so long with as little mainstream recognition as Suzuki. This month, NW Film Center hosts a robust and completist retrospective, starting Friday with Suzuki’s batshit 1966 classic, Tokyo Drifter. One need only look at the one-two punch of Suzuki’s two most significant films—yakuza noirs Tokyo Drifter and Branded to Kill—to see how this misunderstood rebel influenced everything from Tarantino’s chopsockey mixtape to Jim Jarmusch’s Ghost Dog, the gunfu ballets of John Woo, the unabashed crazy of Takashi Miike, and even Scorsese at his most surreal. These films—which got Suzuki blacklisted from the Japanese studio system for being so incomprehensible—are, at their very core, stock exploitation films. The hard-boiled updates of samurai lore and gangsterchic dive headlong into expressionism. They jarringly slice up scenes like a katana and add blasts of jazz, avant-garde flourishes and enough explosions of color to make Dario Argento believe he’s taken the wrong acid. That’s to say nothing of the musical numbers featuring pop star/actor Tetsuya Watari, which we’ll leave for your own discovery. The less you know about any of Suzuki’s films going in, the better.
Suzuki’s work—steeped in noir, teetering into sexploitation, always dazzling—is a prime example of trash cinema taken to artistic levels. His films are absurdist turds polished with the eye of an artist hungry to make an impression while bucking the very system that first employed and then jettisoned him, cementing his status as a nerd legend. Suzuki, like those who followed in his footsteps, isn’t so much interested in original concepts as he is in taking established genre tropes and taking them to demented heights. It’s that quality that makes his films at once familiar and seemingly unstuck in time. He was making trash-picture throwbacks 40 years before it was cool. The revival of films by Suzuki, now 92, should inspire a whole new onslaught of fans. Sure, his body of work emphasizes violent, surreal style over substance. But when the style’s this singular and frenzied, substance is just filler anyway. Accept no imitations. SEE IT: Action, Anarchy, and Audacity: A Seijun Suzuki Retrospective is at NW Film Center. April 8-29. Visit nwfilm.org for a full schedule. alSo showinG:
The Queer Commons LGBT film series presents 1985’s My Beautiful Laundrette, Stephen Frears’ story of a Pakistani man (Gordon Warnecke) and his complicated relationship with a racist gutter punk (Daniel Day-Lewis) who happens to be his lover. Hollywood Theatre. 7:30 pm Wednesday, April 6. A great poet once said: “Lordy, lordy, look who’s 40 (times 10),” and as such, the Clinton commemorates the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death with 2005’s The Taming of the Shrew and 1971’s trippyas-hell A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Clinton Street Theater. 2 pm Friday and Sunday, April 8 and 10. For many, Grease is the perfect musical. For folks like me, the idea of enduring the film for any amount of time is like being waterboarded in a Scientology lab. Saturday’s screenings are singalongsthst will be a rollicking good time or a reenactment of the scene in Scanners where dude’s head explodes. Which is to say, Grease is fucking divisive! Mission Theater. Opens Saturday, April 9. See mcmenamins.com for full dates and times. In honor of Gregory Peck’s 100th birthday (and, incidentally, on the heels of Harper Lee’s death), Cinema Classics stays true to its name with 1962’s To Kill a Mockingbird, a film in which Peck plays a paragon of justice and understanding who absolutely, 100 percent does not go on to become a bigoted shithead in a later story. No sir. Hollywood Theatre. 2 pm Saturday-Sunday, April 9-10.
Regal City Center Stadium 12
Regal Lloyd Center 10 & IMAX
1510 NE Multnomah St. BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE -- AN IMAX 3D EXPERIENCE WedThu 12:00, 3:30, 7:00 THE METROPOLITAN OPERA: MADAMA BUTTERFLY ENCORE Wed 6:30 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE Wed-Thu 12:45, 3:00, 6:30, 8:30 MEET THE BLACKS Wed-Thu 11:40, 2:10, 4:45, 7:20, 9:50 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE 3D Wed-Thu 11:30, 4:35, 10:00 MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING 2 Wed-Thu 11:55, 2:30, 5:05, 7:40, 10:15 THE DIVERGENT SERIES: ALLEGIANT Wed-Thu 12:15, 3:20 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE Wed-Thu 1:05, 3:55, 9:35 ZOOTOPIA Wed-Thu 12:25, 3:40, 6:40, 9:45 EYE IN THE SKY Wed-Thu 12:55, 4:25, 7:10, 9:55 DEADPOOL WedThu 12:35, 3:50 THE BOSS Thu-Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:40, 2:20, 5:00, 7:40, 10:20 HARDCORE HENRY: THE ULTIMATE FAN EXPERIENCE Thu 7:00 HARDCORE HENRY Thu 9:50 THE GI FILM FESTIVAL CINEMATIC SALUTE Thu 7:00 BOLSHOI BALLET: DON QUIXOTE Sun 12:55 BILL Mon 7:00
Regal Division Street Stadium 13
16603 SE Division St. GOD’S NOT DEAD 2 WedThu 12:20, 3:15, 6:45, 9:45 MEET THE BLACKS Wed-Thu 11:55, 2:35, 5:05, 7:40, 10:10 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE WedThu 12:00, 2:30, 3:30, 6:00, 7:00, 10:00 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE 3D Wed-Thu 11:30, 12:30, 3:00, 6:30, 9:30, 10:30 MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING 2 Wed-Thu 11:50, 2:20, 4:50, 7:20, 9:50 THE DIVERGENT SERIES: ALLEGIANT Wed-Thu 11:35, 3:50, 6:50, 9:55 MIRACLES FROM HEAVEN Wed-Thu 11:25, 2:00, 4:35, 7:15, 10:05 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE Wed-Thu 11:40, 2:25, 5:00, 7:35, 10:20 LONDON HAS FALLEN Wed-Thu 12:10, 2:40 ZOOTOPIA Wed-Thu 11:35, 2:10, 4:40, 7:10, 9:40 THE WITCH Wed-Thu 7:30, 10:25 DEADPOOL Wed-Thu 11:45, 2:15, 4:45, 7:25, 9:55 KUNG FU PANDA 3 Wed-Thu 12:05, 2:20, 4:55 THE BOSS Thu-FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:30, 2:00, 4:30, 7:15, 10:00
Avalon Theatre & Wunderland
Bagdad Theater
3702 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 503-249-7474 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE WedThu-Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:00, 2:45, 7:00
Cinema 21
616 NW 21st Ave., 503-223-4515 MIDNIGHT SPECIAL WedThu-Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 4:00, 5:30, 7:00, 8:15, 9:30 CITY OF GOLD Wed-Thu-FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 4:00, 6:30 THE PREPPIE CONNECTION Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 8:45
Clinton Street Theater
2522 SE Clinton St., 503-238-8899 THE MAGNIFICENT ELEVEN Wed 7:00 NO FILMS SHOWING TODAY Thu
Laurelhurst Theatre & Pub
2735 E Burnside St., 503-232-5511 SPOTLIGHT Wed-Thu 6:45 THE BIG SHORT Wed-Thu 9:15 THIEF Wed-Thu 8:45 BROOKLYN Wed-Thu 6:15 HOW TO BE SINGLE WedThu 9:30 ANOMALISA Wed-Thu 9:05 45 YEARS Wed-Thu 7:00 STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS WedThu 6:30
Mission Theater and Pub
1624 NW Glisan St. BULL DURHAM Wed-Fri-Sat 5:45 FIELD OF DREAMS Wed-Fri-Sat 3:00 GREASE Sun-Tue 5:45
Mt. Hood Theatre
401 E Powell Blvd., 503-665-0604 KUNG FU PANDA 3 WedThu 4:30 STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Wed-Thu 7:00
St. Johns Cinemas
8704 N Lombard St., 503-286-1768 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE Wed-Thu 4:10, 7:30 ZOOTOPIA WedThu 4:30, 7:00
CineMagic Theatre
2021 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 503-231-7919 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE Wed-Thu 4:00, 7:00
Kennedy School Theater
5736 NE 33rd Ave., 503-249-7474 THE BIG SHORT Wed-Thu 2:30, 8:00 KUNG FU PANDA 3 Wed-Thu 5:30
Hollywood Theatre
4122 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-281-4215 HELLO, MY NAME IS DORIS Wed-Thu-Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 6:30, 9:00 HAIL, CAESAR! Wed-ThuFri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 6:45 THE WITCH Wed-Thu-FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 9:15 MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE Wed 7:30 THEY WILL HAVE TO KILL US FIRST Thu 7:30 TAXI DRIVER Fri-Sun 7:00 TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD Sat-Sun 2:00 SAN ANDREAS Sat 9:30 FROM THIS DAY FORWARD Mon 7:30 FIVE DEADLY VENOMS Tue 7:30
Regal Fox Tower Stadium 10
846 S.W. Park Ave. MY GOLDEN DAYS Wed-Thu 1:00, 3:50, 6:50, 9:40 I SAW THE LIGHT Wed-Thu 12:20, 3:20, 6:40, 9:30 MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING 2 WedThu 12:00, 3:40, 4:40, 7:10, 8:40, 9:30 MARGUERITE Wed-Thu 12:15, 3:15, 6:15, 9:40 THE WITCH Wed-Thu 7:30, 10:00 DEADPOOL Wed-Thu 12:00, 2:30, 5:00, 7:20, 9:50 WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT Wed-Thu 12:10, 4:00, 7:00, 9:45 ONLY YESTERDAY WedThu 12:50, 3:30 THE LADY IN THE VAN Wed-Thu 12:45, 6:00 THE REVENANT WedThu 12:30, 2:50, 6:20, 9:10 SPOTLIGHT Wed-Thu 12:40, 4:10, 6:30, 9:20
Northwest Film Center 1219 SW Park Ave., 503-221-1156
Regal Pioneer Place Stadium 6
340 SW Morrison St. BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE Wed-Thu 11:45, 2:30, 6:00, 8:00, 9:30 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE 3D WedThu 1:00, 3:10, 4:30, 10:00 THE DIVERGENT SERIES: ALLEGIANT Wed-Thu 12:40, 3:40, 6:45 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE Wed-Thu 12:50, 3:50 ZOOTOPIA Wed-Thu 12:20, 3:15, 6:15, 9:45 THE BOSS Thu-Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 1:00, 3:45, 7:00, 9:45 HARDCORE HENRY Thu 9:00
St. Johns Theater
8203 N Ivanhoe St., 503-249-7474 MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING 2 Wed-Thu 1:00, 4:00, 7:00, 9:30
Academy Theater
7818 SE Stark St., 503-252-0500 KUNG FU PANDA 3 WedThu 2:15, 4:30 ANOMALISA Wed-Thu 2:30, 9:40 THE BIG SHORT Wed-Thu 4:40, 9:20 STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Wed-Thu 11:30, 6:35 SPOTLIGHT Wed-Thu 2:00, 6:50 BROOKLYN Wed-Thu 11:40, 7:20 PAN’S LABYRINTH Wed-Thu 4:20, 9:30
Valley Theater
9360 SW Beaverton-Hillsdale Highway, 503-296-6843 THE BIG SHORT Wed-Thu 5:30, 8:50 STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Wed-Thu 6:15, 8:00, 9:00 HOW TO BE SINGLE Wed-Thu 8:50
Living Room Theaters 341 SW 10th Ave., 971-222-2010 EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT Wed-Thu 12:05, 2:30, 6:30, 9:10 EYE IN THE SKY WedThu 11:45, 12:15, 1:50, 2:40, 4:10, 5:10, 7:15, 9:05, 9:35 HAIL, CAESAR! Wed-Thu 11:55, 2:10, 4:30, 6:50, 9:15 HELLO, MY NAME IS DORIS Wed-Thu 11:50, 2:00, 4:20, 5:00, 7:00, 7:30, 9:30 THE PROGRAM Wed-Thu 12:00, 2:20, 4:40, 9:10
SubjecT To change. call TheaTerS or ViSiT WWeek.coM/MoVieTiMeS For The MoST up-To-daTe inForMaTion Friday-ThurSday, april 8-14, unleSS oTherWiSe indicaTed
courTeSy oF channel Four FilMS
3451 S.E. Belmont St., 503-238-1617 GODS OF EGYPT Wed-Thu 7:00, 9:20 ZOOLANDER NO.
2 Wed-Thu 5:10 KUNG FU PANDA 3 Wed-Thu 1:00, 2:55, 6:50 THE 5TH WAVE WedThu 4:45 STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Wed-Thu 12:10, 2:40, 8:40
801 C St. BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE Wed-Thu 11:00, 1:55, 2:35, 5:05, 5:40, 8:00 BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE 3D Wed-Thu 11:45, 8:40 I SAW THE LIGHT Wed-Thu 12:10, 3:00, 5:50, 8:35 MY BIG FAT GREEK WEDDING 2 Wed-Thu 12:25, 2:50, 5:25, 7:55 HELLO, MY NAME IS DORIS Wed-Thu 11:40, 2:40, 5:35, 8:30 THE DIVERGENT SERIES: ALLEGIANT WedThu 11:15, 2:05 MIRACLES FROM HEAVEN Wed-Thu 11:50, 2:30, 5:15, 8:20 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE WedThu 1:10, 3:45, 6:25, 9:05 EYE IN THE SKY Wed-Thu 11:25, 2:20, 5:20, 8:25 ZOOTOPIA Wed-Thu 12:00, 6:00 ZOOTOPIA 3D Wed-Thu 3:05 THE REVENANT Wed-Thu 11:10, 2:00, 4:55 DEADPOOL Wed-Thu 12:40, 3:30, 6:20, 8:55 THE BOSS Thu-Fri-SatSun 11:15, 1:45, 4:15, 6:45, 9:20 HARDCORE HENRY Thu 9:00
BLOODSWORTH: AN INNOCENT MAN Thu 7:00 TOKYO DRIFTER Fri 8:00 AU HASARD BALTHAZAR Fri 5:30 BRANDED TO KILL Sat 7:00 A BRIGHTER SUMMER DAY Sat-Sun 12:00 SMASHING THE O-LINE Sun 5:00 KANTO WANDERER Sun 7:00 YOUTH OF THE BEAST Mon 7:00
A PeRFeCT PAIR: My Beautiful Laundrette is at Hollywood Theatre. 7:30 pm Wednesday, April 6.
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Three-a-Days HOW A SERIOUS CANNABIS JUDGE PERFORMS HIS SOLEMN DUTY. BY TYLER HU R ST
@tdhurst
So you want to be a weed judge? You think you do, but it’s a little harder than it looks. If you’re properly judging cannabis, you don’t just toke up and jot down some thoughts— you take a disciplined, studied approach. That means consuming on a regular schedule while avoiding alcohol and heavily spiced food. Take it from me, someone who is taking on a crazy project: In less than a month, I’m attempting to sample all 98 strains submitted for judging in the first Cultivation Classic, a festival of the state’s best soil-grown, chemicalfree cannabis. The festival is April 30, and you can try some of this stuff there—take my word for it, it’s great. You might never go back to conventional cannabis. Here are the rules I’m setting for myself, to give you some idea what it takes to judge cannabis seriously. Stay regular. For me, judging begins first thing in the morning and ends in the evening. In between are 10 to 18 hours in a happy place where time can stop and nothing gets done. Or, you put on our adult pants and stay employable. People use cannabis all the time, folks. Some with their breakfast cereal, others at lunch, or between meetings, or when they get inside their house after work. If they can toke up and lead a normal, productive life, a cannabis judge can, too.
THE NATION’S ONLY COMPETITION FOR CANNABIS GROWN WITHOUT MINERAL SALT FERTILIZER, OR SYNTHETIC PESTICIDES/HERBICIDES/FUNGICIDES.
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Willamette Week APRIL 6, 2016 wweek.com
Plan your days. People who write shit down and then make plans to take care of that shit at a specific time tend to get shit done. No shit? So we loaded up our calendars and alerts with anything that needed attention. Waking up? 7 am alarm. Dinner prep? 4:15 pm reminder. Client meeting? Workout? Walk the dog? I added those, and
kept everything on the hour—too much to do is just as distracting as too little. Prep your instruments. There’s no one way to consume cannabis, so I start each day with a bong, vaporizer, pipe and rolling papers. The first three should be cleaned the night before and left out to dry. If you’re serious about judging, be sure to use the same brand of rolling papers for every strain in the competition. Carry a notebook everywhere. New strains are about surprises, so keep that smartphone charged and pen and paper ready. Need to shit? Bring all those things with you. Pre-select meals. Hitting up a food-cart pod seemed a great idea when I started judging, but, uh, the amount of decision-making required to get from where I am to where it is hurts to think about. Bypass the urge to give in to the munchies by having last night’s leftovers at the ready. Toss in some fruit, maybe frozen grapes, and you’ll come out of this back at your fighting weight. Think beyond THC. Yes, getting high is fun. But if you’re judging a competition, the THC alone is the most boring measure. It’s the combination of cannabinoids and terpenes that gives that oh-so-good feeling, so don’t spend all your energy on the psychoactive part. Good judges will take note of how their lungs feel. Great judges will toke up while on a brisk hike. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m taking this Strawberry Cough for a run. GO: The Cultivation Classic is Saturday, April 30, at the North Warehouse, 723 N Tillamook St. Noon-6 pm. $40. Tickets on sale at wweek. com. 21+.
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MCMENAMINS CORNELIUS PASS ROADHOUSE is NOW HIRING for all positions -
Come to our hiring call, on Wednesday, April 13th, 2016. Walk ins welcome from 11am to 3pm! We have both seasonal and long term opportunities available. Current openings include, Line Cooks, Dishwashers, Servers, Foodrunners/ Bussers, Catering Servers, Bartenders, Hosts and more! What we need from you: An open and flexible schedule, including days, evenings, weekends and holidays; Previous experience is preferred, but we are willing to train ; A love of working in a busy, customer service-oriented environment. Interested in a career in the hospitality industry? We offer opportunities for advancement as well as an excellent benefit package to eligible employees, including vision, medical, chiropractic, dental and so much more! Apply online 24/7 at mcmenamins.com or stop by the Cornelius Pass Roadhouse, anytime to fill out an application. EOE.
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Available positions include: LINE COOKS, PREP COOKS, DISHWASHERS, SERVERS BARTENDERS, HOSTS, BUSSERS, AND FOOD RUNNERS. Qualified apps must have an open & flex sched including, days, eves, wknds and holidays. We are looking for applicants who have prev related exp and enjoy working in a busy customer service-oriented enviro. We are also willing to train! We offer opps for advancement and excellent benefits for eligible employees, including vision, med, chiro, dental and so much more! Please apply online 24/7 at www.mcmenamins.com or pick up a paper app at any McMenamins location. Mail to 430 N. Killingsworth, Portland OR, 97217 or fax: 503-221-8749. Call 503-952-0598 for info on other ways to apply. Please no phone calls or emails to individ locs! E.O.E.
HAVE YOU BEEN HURT BY OR HAD A NEGATIVE EXPERIENCE WITH RELIGION? Do you want to move on from that story & desire tools for developing peace or your own spirituality? HRASO meets every 2nd and 4th Monday of each month 7:00 - 8:30 pm New Thought Center for Spiritual Living (NTCSL) 1040 C Avenue Lake Oswego, OR 97034 For more info contact aquacyndie@gmail.com
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FUNDRAISERS EXCEED ENTERPRISES a nonprofit for people with disabilities, will host its annual fundraiser on April 30, 5-9 at the Oregon Convention Center to benefit the more than 200 adults and students that we serve.EE is selling Raffle tickets for a 55” TV. Funds collected will go toward the purchase of a new bus with a wheelchair lift. The winner will be announced at the Gala.Please visit exceedpdx.com to sign up and purchase tickets.
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Hiring locations include The Ram’s Head, Blue Moon, White Eagle, Ringlers, Broadway and Bagdad Theater. Qualified applicants must be open to cooking in a high-volume and busy pub environment. Qualified applicants will have an open & flexible schedule including days/eve/ weekend/holiday availability, and a positive and professional demeanor. Previous kitchen experience is a plus, but we are willing to train the right applicant if you are eager to learn. Please apply online 24/7 at mcmenamins.com or pick up an application at any McMenamins location. Mail your complete application to: McMenamins attn: HR 430 N. Killingsworth St. Portland, OR 97217 or fax to: (503) 221-8749. Please no phone calls or emails to individual locations!!! EOE
MUSICIANS MARKET FOR FREE ADS in 'Musicians Wanted,' 'Musicians Available' & 'Instruments for Sale' go to portland.backpage.com and submit ads online. Ads taken over the phone in these categories cost $5.
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CHATLINES
JONESIN’
by Matt Jones
“Bridging the Gap”–getting across is important, too.
62 Resentment of the successful, in Irish slang 63 2014’s “The ___ Movie” 64 Short-lived NBC drama named for the outermost section of the Pentagon 65 Full of malicious intent 66 Border 67 OKCupid meetups 68 B.O. purchases
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Across 1 Postgraduate study, perhaps 4 1,550-mile continental range 9 Little demons 13 Hip-hop’s ___ Fiasco 14 “Come Away With Me” singer Jones 15 “Protein,” in some restaurant options 16 Go through 18 Sweat source 19 Big shiny building, once you get past the fence? 21 Fractions of a mi.
22 Bus route divisions 23 “Happy Days” diner 26 “___ a small world” 28 Broadway legend Merman 32 Droid 33 Swimming or floating 37 “Game of Thrones” actress Chaplin 38 Chuck, at a fancy NYC party? 41 Yellen’s forte, for short
42 “Rare and radiant maiden” of “The Raven” 43 First responder, briefly 44 “Big Three” meeting site of 1945 46 Mama’s boy? 47 Part of DOS: Abbr. 48 Hipbone-related 52 Anderson who directed “Rushmore” 54 Last dance theater at the end of the block? 61 “Ricochet” actor/ rapper
Down 1 “___ Jr.” (Pixar’s first film, featuring the lamps now used in their logo) 2 Kitchen item: Abbr. 3 Like a neglected garden 4 Remove, in a way 5 “The Man Who Fell to Earth” director Nicolas 6 “I Love Lucy” costar Desi 7 ___-ovo vegetarian 8 “Two and a Half Men” actor 9 Stand-in 10 “Gimme some cat treats” 11 Remove, as a potato peel 12 Hip add-on? 13 “Sweep the ___” (“Karate Kid” quote) 17 Sign of owing 20 Prop for the course 23 Downton, for one 24 Poet Federico Garcia ___ 25 Bar support 27 Affliction of the eyelid
29 Plot flaws 30 Jet, to a Shark, e.g. 31 Hangs in there 34 Raggedy ___ 35 Lts.’ subordinates 36 Small floor coverings 39 How some sneak in 40 Virgil epic 45 “Blue Rondo ___ Turk” (Brubeck song) 49 Cheeky words after reading a fortune cookie fortune 50 Luxury Hyundai sedan 51 Lawful, informally 53 “Fuller House” actor Bob 54 Word game piece 55 Blasted through 56 Simon of “Hot Fuzz” 57 Aquatic bird 58 Strauss the jeansmaker 59 “Silly Rabbit” cereal 60 “Popeye” surname
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 #JONZ773.
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Week of April 7
ARIES (March 21-April 19) French artist Henri Matisse (1869-1954) is regarded as one of the greats, in the same league as Picasso and Kandinsky. Even in his eighties, he was still creating marvels that one critic said seemed “to come from the springtime of the world.” As unique as his work was, he was happy to acknowledge the fact that he thrived on the influence of other artists. And yet he also treasured the primal power of his innocence. He trusted his childlike wonder. “You study, you learn, but you guard the original naiveté,” he said. “It has to be within you, as desire for drink is within the drunkard or love is within the lover.” These are good, sweet thoughts for you to keep in mind right now, Aries. TAURUS (April 20-May 20) Taurus-born Kurt Gödel (1906-1978) was among history’s greatest logicians. His mastery of rational thought enabled him to exert a major influence on scientific thinking in the 20th century. Yet he also had an irrational fear of being poisoned, which made him avoid food unless his wife cooked it. One of the morals of his story is that reason and delusion may get all mixed up in the same location. Sound analysis and crazy superstition can get so tangled they’re hard to unravel. The coming week will be an excellent time to meditate on how this phenomenon might be at work in you. You now have an extraordinary power to figure out which is which, and then take steps to banish the crazy, superstitious, fearful stuff. GEMINI (May 21-June 20) For a time, pioneer physicist Albert Einstein served as a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, NJ. On one occasion, a student complained to him, “The questions on this year’s exam are the same as last year’s.” Einstein agreed that they were, then added, “but this year all the answers are different.” I’m seeing a similar situation in your life, Gemini. For you, too, the questions on this year’s final exam are virtually identical to last year’s final exam -- and yet every one of the answers has changed. Enjoy the riddle. CANCER (June 21-July 22) Your personal oracle for the coming weeks is a fable from 2600 years ago. It was originally written by the Greek storyteller Aesop, and later translated by Joseph Jacobs. As the tale begins, a dog has discovered a hunk of raw meat lying on the ground. He’s clenching his treasure in his mouth as he scurries home to enjoy it in peace. On the way, he trots along a wooden plank that crosses a rapidly-flowing stream. Gazing down, he sees his reflection in the water below. What? He imagines it’s another dog with another slab of meat. He tries to snatch away this bonus treat, but in doing so, drops his own meat. It falls into the stream and is whisked away. The moral of the fable: “Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow.” LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) “I never get lost because I don’t know where I am going,” said the Japanese poet known as Ikkyu. I stop short of endorsing this perspective for full-time, long-term use, but I think it suits you fine for right now. According to my astrological projections, you can gather the exact lessons you need simply by wandering around playfully, driven by cheerful curiosity about the sparkly sights -and not too concerned with what they mean. P.S. Don’t worry if the map you’re consulting doesn’t seem to match the territory you’re exploring. VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) “If literally every action a human can perform was an Olympic sport,” Reddit.com asked its users, “which events would you win medals in?” A man named Hajimotto said his champion-level skill was daydreaming. “I can zone out and fantasize for hours at a time,” he testified. “This is helpful when I am waiting in line.” You Virgos are not typically Olympic-class daydreamers, but I encourage you to increase your skills in the coming weeks. It’ll be a favorable time for your imagination to run wild and free. How exuberantly can you fantasize? Find out! LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22) In his book Strange Medicine, Nathan Belofsky tells us about unusual healing practices of the past. In ancient
Egypt, for example, the solution for a toothache was to have a dead mouse shoved down one’s throat. If someone had cataracts, the physician might dribble hot broken glass into their eyes. I think these strategies qualify as being antidotes that were worse than the conditions they were supposed to treat. I caution you against getting sucked into “cures” like those in the coming days. The near future will be a favorable time for you to seek healing, but you must be very discerning as you evaluate the healing agents. SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21) In his poem “The Snowmass Cycle,” Stephen Dunn declares that everyone “should experience the double fire, of what he wants and shouldn’t have.” I foresee a rich opportunity coming up for you to do just that, Scorpio. And yes, I do regard it as rich, even marvelous, despite the fact that it may initially evoke some intense poignance. Be glad for this crisp revelation about a strong longing whose fulfillment would be no damn good for you! SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) “When I look at my life I realize that the mistakes I have made, the things I really regret, were not errors of judgment but failures of feeling.” Writer Jeanette Winterson said that, and I’m passing it on to you at the exact moment you need to hear it. Right now, you are brave enough and strong enough to deal with the possibility that maybe you’re not doing all you can to cultivate maximum emotional intelligence. You are primed to take action and make big changes if you discover that you’re not feeling as much as you can about the important things in your life. CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) Psychotherapist Jennifer Welwood says that sadness is often at the root of anger. Feelings of loss and disappointment and heartache are the more primary emotions, and rage is a reflexive response to them. But sadness often makes us feel vulnerable, while rage gives us at least the illusion of being strong, and so most of us prefer the latter. But Welwood suggests that tuning in to the sadness almost always leads to a more expansive understanding of your predicament; and it often provides the opportunity for a more profound self-transformation. I invite you to apply these meditations to your own life, Capricorn. The time is right.
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AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) “The causes of human actions are usually immeasurably more complex and varied than our subsequent explanations of them.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky said that in his novel The Idiot, and now I’m passing it on to you just in the nick of time. In the coming weeks, it’s especially important for you to not oversimplify your assessments of what motivates people -- both those you respect and those you don’t fully trust. For your own sake, you can’t afford to naively assume either the best or the worst about anyone. If you hope to further your own agendas, your nuanced empathy must be turned up all the way. PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) “Believing love is work is certainly better than believing it’s effortless, ceaseless bliss,” says author Eric LeMay. That’s advice I hope you’ll keep close at hand in the coming weeks, Pisces. The time will be right for you to exert tremendous effort in behalf of everything you love dearly -- to sweat and struggle and strain as you create higher, deeper versions of your most essential relationships. Please remember this, though: The hard labor you engage in should be fueled by your ingenuity and your creative imagination. Play and experiment and enjoy yourself as you sweat and struggle and strain!
Homework Comment on Bertrand Russell’s statement, “The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.”
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