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S A N TA M O N I C A , C A
FINDINGS AARON LEE
LOLO PASS, PAGE 20
WHAT WE LEARNED FROM READING THIS WEEK’S PAPER VOL. 47, ISSUE 41 A praise-and-worship concert on the Willamette River sparked an exchange of mace and fireworks. 6 Ten percent of the Multnomah County residents who died of hyperthermia in June were living in public housing. 7
The Chinese Rose Princess was crowned last weekend. 16 After 12 years, Wolf & Bear’s concluded its fine falafel run and closed both its carts. 18 Twitter star Melissa Broder has a new book out from Tin House. 19
A 911 dispatcher described a rumor about Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty as “juicy juicy.” 8
Lolo Pass’ mille-feuille looks like gourmand sushi. 20
When Lincoln High School football wins, you party at the Witch’s Castle. 9
vaccination proof at basement shows. 24
July was the busiest month in the history of Portland’s Entertainment District. 12 Black people are more likely to be killed by homicide in Portland than in Chicago. 13 Security guards fear gunfire from an Old Town parking lot they dub
Portland punks screen for
If you grew up a Friday the 13th fanatic, every natural area in Oregon looks like Camp Crystal Lake. 26 You can now watch live theater inside the old Barge Building along the South Waterfront. 28
“the Boneyard.” 14
Ravencrest security guard Jean-Pierre “Reaper” LaFont, photo by Justin Yau.
ALEX WITTWER
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Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
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DIALOGUE
Last week, WW profiled five people who made a counterintuitive choice: They moved to Portland in the past 18 months (“Welcome to Portland,” Aug. 4, 2021). The recent transplants WW spoke to range from a vegan blogger to an architecture student, and came to Portland from places as close as San Francisco and as far as Yangon, Myanmar. We asked the new arrivals why they moved to Portland during a year when the city has made national headlines for political unrest, a homelessness crisis, and deadly climate events. Here’s what our readers had to say: Dot Halford, via wweek.com: “Looking forward to the companion piece of this article: ‘Why People Are Leaving Portland Right Now.’” Keith Lamond, via wweek.com: “My wife and I moved here in late fall of 2019 and guess what, we are happy we are here. We love our neighborhood and all the shops, restaurants and bars that are close by. I also love that Mount Hood and the beach are pretty close by. Chinatown area is a mess, I don’t see us going back there for a while, but the rest of downtown is coming back. My wife and I enjoyed a recent trip to Powell’s and walking around that area. Portland is also a lot more than just downtown. The pandemic hit Portland hard, but there still is a lot to like.” Ryan Miller, via wweek.com: “Clean and safe. These two basic priorities must be met to a much higher degree—everything else Portland has to offer is secondary. I’m optimistic we are turning the corner after a horrific 18 months. But there is a lot of work to do.” Tom Mcroy, via Facebook: “Portland’s long game is sound. It’s got a diverse economy, temperate weather and smart people. I think the riot prom and COVID will eventually be a footnote. With Boise and Salt Lake now as expensive, maybe our soiled rep might chill things out a bit.”
Dr. Know
No fewer than three readers (a deluge, by my standards) wrote to ask me this same question. Trivial? This shit is #trending! Sure, it may be less about the flag itself than the way we’ve all been staring glassyeyed into the distance a lot lately (sometimes in the direction of a bridge), but I’m going for it. I won’t keep you in suspense: The Oregon flag— or, more precisely, the mechanism that allows it to be raised, lowered and set at half-mast to make you feel guilty about not knowing who died—is broken. Rather than allowing it to flail in the wind, potentially dropping parts onto traffic below, the Oregon Department of Transportation removed it until the mechanism can be repaired properly. Their waving may look peaceful from the ground, but the lives of these 15-by-25-foot banners (like those of the jurisdictions they represent) can be pretty brutal. In fact, the flags only last about four months before the wind whips them into tatters, so it’s not too surprising that some hardware eventually gave way as well.
Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
@VaderSnark, via Twitter: “Did you interview any of the low-income people that were displaced to the numbers and Gresham by the out-of-state bourgeoisie?” Maura Gingerich, via wweek.com: “It is quite dehumanizing to focus on random strangers’ personal feelings about ‘the homeless problem,’ when it is clear that the interviewees had no great problem finding housing in Portland. Curious if WW tasked the contributors with this offensive focus or if they chose it themselves.” @lasertag19, via Twitter: “Did you seek out transplants of privilege or was that all you could find?” Mary Thiel, via Facebook: “All of these people interviewed are a great addition to the Portland population and embody what is best about Portland, especially their ability to see the city as offering so much more than what detracts from it, and their compassion for the homeless, like many Portlanders. I moved here from Southern California six years ago, and I still love Portland more than any place I’ve been.” LETTERS TO THE EDITOR must include the author's street address and phone number for verification. Letters must be 250 or fewer words. Submit to: 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Email: mzusman@wweek.com
BY MART Y SMITH @martysmithxxx
I used to gauge the wind’s direction by the flapping of the U.S. and Oregon flags atop the Fremont Bridge. Now, however, the Oregon flag has disappeared. What happened to it? Will it be replaced? And if so, how will anyone get up there to do it? —Person With Trivial Concerns
4
Jeff Roth, via wweek.com: “I feel like they could have found at least one houseless person that arrived here in the last year to interview, just to balance out the article. Aside from the student, this is basically Californians and New Yorkers that found a much cheaper place to live and a couple that doesn’t eat anything that casts a shadow. I think they’ll all fit in nicely.”
And, as horrible as it may sound to you and me, replacing these flags does indeed require someone to go up there. A cramped crawl space inside one of the arches leads to a flimsy open-air catwalk 380 feet above the river. You know, in case you’ve been wondering who would win a fight between fear of heights and claustrophobia. When the bridge opened in 1973, it didn’t even have flags—they were added in 1976 in honor of the U.S. Bicentennial. (They were supposed to be temporary, but public opinion intervened.) Unfortunately, parts for a 1976 model year flagpole are tough to find nowadays, and ODOT had to have them fabricated from scratch. This is taking a while, though they have ordered a few spares in case this happens again. In the meantime, Trivial, I would point out that you really need only one flag to judge the wind’s direction. Sure, we’ll all miss watching Oregon’s flag flapping to the left even as the U.S. one blows right, but patience is a virtue. QUESTIONS? Send them to dr.know@wweek.com.
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OREGON GOVERNOR REQUIRES VACCINES AND MASKS: With health officials projecting record hospitalizations from the Delta variant of the coronavirus, Gov. Kate Brown said Aug. 10 she would mandate vaccinations for all state employees and require mask wearing indoors. The vaccine requirement will cover employees of all state agencies—including those working for the State Treasury, the Bureau of Labor and Industries, and the Department of Justice, which are run by other elected officials. Her order follows a similar vaccine mandate announced this week by Washington Gov. Jay Inslee. Multnomah County announced a mask mandate on Aug. 9, and Brown says she followed suit after seeing projections that the state could see a shortfall of 500 staffed hospital beds by September. “Oregon is facing a spike in COVID-19 hospitalizations—consisting overwhelmingly of unvaccinated individuals—that is quickly exceeding the darkest days of our winter surge,” Brown said in a statement. “If our hospitals run out of staffed beds, all Oregonians will be at risk.” Oregon’s seven-day new case average is now above 1,000, a figure not seen since January. CONCERT THAT SPARKED CLASH LACKED CITY PERMIT: The worship concert held at the Tom McCall Waterfront Park on Aug. 8 that eventually descended into nighttime violence between leftwing and right-wing protesters did not obtain a permit from the city. That’s according to the two bureaus who would be responsible for approving such permits, Portland Parks & Recreation and the Portland Bureau of Transportation. The concert was led by evangelical Christian singer Sean Feucht, who held a similar, unmasked concert last year during the pandemic—also not permitted, say city officials. Some of the men who volunteered as security guards for Sunday’s concert then roamed the streets downtown, engaging in a running battle of mace, fireworks and pepper balls with leftist foes. Portland Police Bureau spokesman Lt. Greg Pashley said the bureau “may have authority to enforce non-permitted events” but that “ I am not aware that the Police Bureau has ever done that.” Pashley said resources were unavailable because of a homicide in Southeast and a robbery in Old Town: “There were not resources to address
many other things going on during a period of hours, including whether or not an event had been permitted.” Feucht did not respond to WW’s questions. WILLAMETTE RIVER ALGAE BLOOM NOT TOXIC TO HUMANS: Most of the Willamette River that runs through Portland is now poisonous to dogs. Due to toxic algae blooms, local health officials are now warning Portlanders to keep their pets out of the Willamette River from Ross Island to the Sauvie Island Bridge, a 14-mile stretch that includes most of the city’s waterfront. The blooms get worse with high temperatures. But even with this week’s heat wave, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality says it’s unlikely the blooms will become dangerous enough that humans will have to stay out of the water too. The Oregon Health Authority says some toxins produced by algae blooms become harmful to humans when they exceed eight parts per billion. Right now, the levels in the Willamette are about 1.8 parts per billion. “Typically, the lower Willamette blooms don’t produce a lot of toxins,” says Lauren Wirtis, a spokeswoman for DEQ, which tests for harmful algae bloom levels. “But that doesn’t mean we’re not monitoring the situation closely.” WHEELER RECALL GATHERS LESS THAN 6,000 SIGNATURES: The Total Recall PAC seeking to recall Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler says it has collected fewer than 6,000 signatures. That’s a low number: The campaign is a third of the way through its allotted 90-day signature-collecting window, and is only one-eleventh of the way to its 65,000 signature goal (it needs 47,788 valid signatures to qualify for the ballot). Campaign spokeswoman Audrey Caines blamed the Delta variant, extreme heat and “the resulting changes to foot traffic patterns in the city.” Caines says the heat wave forecasted this week will prevent paid signature gatherers from working and “any time lost to extreme weather and public health events would have to be made up with more volunteer signature gatherers.” Although Caines says the campaign’s 350 volunteers remain committed, the campaign will face an uphill climb to meet its goal of collecting 20,000 signatures in the next two weeks.
NEWS
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW THIS WEEK
CLOCKED
MAPPED
Hunzeker Watch
Hidden Toll
DYING AT HOME: The five Home Forward buildings where residents died in the June heat wave.
148 DAYS:
One in 10 people killed by heat in Multnomah County lived in buildings run by Home Forward, the largest affordable housing provider in the state. BY S OP H I E P E E L
speel@wweek.com
On Aug. 2, the Multnomah County district attorney ordered the county medical examiner to release the names and addresses of people who died of hyperthermia—that is, overheating—from the 117-degree temperatures that blistered Portland in June. That decision came after a handful of news outlets, including WW, appealed to the DA’s office when the county declined to release the names. As another wave of 100-degree highs bears down on Portland, the data released by county officials suggests some of the people facing the greatest risk from heat live in buildings managed by Home Forward, the city housing authority. Six of the confirmed 59 heat deaths were residents of Home Forward buildings, the newly released list shows. That means 1 in 10 heat deaths in the county occurred in buildings run by the largest affordable housing provider in Oregon. Home Forward-owned apartment units account for 2% of Portland households. It’s also double the number of heat deaths Home Forward had previously acknowledged. It told reporters it knew of only three deaths in its units. In fact, only when the county was compelled to release its data Aug. 6 was it revealed that two of the deceased were residents of the same building: Northwest Tower, the 13-story Section 8 building on Northwest 19th Avenue. The new data notes that all six fatalities either occurred or were discovered on or before July 6. (The medical examiner’s office told WW: “The date of death may reflect the date the person was discovered, but it may also indicate the date they died. It depends on the circumstance.”) But on July 7—after denying to WW that a third death had occurred at one of its buildings for three days after residents told WW about it—Home Forward director Michael Buonocore told reporters on a private Zoom call
A 911 dispatcher was suspended for gossiping about Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty.
that a third death had occurred in a Home Forward building after all. Home Forward spokeswoman Monica Foucher says Buonocore shared “the extent of what we knew about people who died in our apartments due to the heat wave.” In a follow-up response, Foucher called the new reporting “surprising.” “After the report from Multnomah County was released on July 13, we were satisfied that we had accounted correctly for the heat-related deaths at our properties during the heat wave. I don’t know why the reporting is different now,” Foucher said. “I can confirm the addresses are Home Forward addresses, but I can’t confirm that each person died at them.” When asked about the discrepancy, county spokesperson Kate Yeiser told WW: “The preliminary report was based on the number of confirmed cases at that time. That number has changed.” As the county released the contested data, officials admonished the press about potential harms of its use. “Releasing names and addresses violates the privacy of friends and family members of those who died, creates vulnerability to vandalism of occupied and unoccupied residences and increases the risk for identity theft,” Yeiser wrote. “Over the longer term, we are concerned that individuals will be less likely to cooperate with death investigations, making it more difficult to fully understand cause and manner of deaths in our county.” But the county neglected to update the number of housing authority-run buildings at which residents died. Here’s where those buildings are located: Northwest Tower (2): 335 NW 19th Ave. Peter Paulson: 1530 SW 13th Ave. Ainsworth Court: 1515 N Ainsworth St. Peaceful Villa: 2835 SE 47th Ave. Bud Clark Commons: 665 NW Hoyt St.
That’s how long ago Officer Brian Hunzeker resigned from his role as president of the Portland Police Association due to what the union described as a “serious, isolated mistake related to the [Portland] Police Bureau’s investigation into the alleged hit-and-run by Commissioner [Jo Ann] Hardesty.” We still don’t know what he did. The mayor’s office says it doesn’t know what he did. Hunzeker has been on paid administrative leave since May 27.
159 DAYS:
That’s how long it’s been since the Police Bureau opened an internal affairs investigation into the leak of information that wrongly implicated Commissioner Hardesty in the March 3 hit-and-run. It has released no results of its inquiry.
147 DAYS:
That’s how long it’s been since the city signed a contract with an outside investigative firm to probe the leak.
13 DAYS:
That’s how long it’s been since the Bureau of Emergency Communications, which oversees the 911 call center, concluded its inquiry into the actions of emergency operators and dispatchers. The inquiry, whose results were released to WW after it inquired last week, found that none of BOEC’s employees leaked to the press. But the bureau disciplined three employees, suspending two, for gossiping about Hardesty with other public safety officials. On July 14, BOEC sent a discipline letter to an unnamed employee who has worked for the bureau since August 2016 and whose job title is emergency communications senior dispatcher. The discipline letter says the employee received a message from a co-worker on March 4 through BOEC’s computer-aided dispatch system. The message informed the employee about the allegation against Hardesty. “You then referred to this information as ‘juicy juicy’ and immediately passed the information to [redacted] with whom you are friends,” the discipline letter reads. “Here again, you referred to the information as ‘juicy.’ When [redacted] cautioned that it may not be true, you replied, ‘Don’t be a grinch...in my head its true.’” TESS RISKI. Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
7
NEWS
SON OF THE SOIL: Nicholas Kristof hails from Yamhill County.
Article V, Section 2
New York Times columnist and gubernatorial hopeful Nick Kristof faces residency questions. What the Oregon Constitution says about candidates for governor: Article V, Section 2 states, “No person except a citizen of the United States, shall be eligible to the Office of Governor, nor shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained the age of thirty years, and who shall not have been three years next preceding his election, a resident within this State.” (Emphasis added.) Why it matters: In 2022, Oregon will hold an election for a truly open governor’s seat for the first time in 20 years. One of the potential Democratic candidates, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, grew up in Yamhill County but spent most of his adult life away from Oregon. WW reported last month that Kristof is mulling a run—but the three-year residency requirement may be a problem for him. What we know: Elections officials in New York say Kristof voted as a New York resident in the November 2020 general election. Records show he then registered to vote in Oregon on Dec. 28, 2020. That is less than three years before the Nov. 8, 2022, general election date that will determine Oregon’s next governor. When Kristof bought property in Yamhill County last year, he used his longtime home address in Westchester County, N.Y., for correspondence. What others say: Greg Chaimov, a lawyer at Davis Wright Tremaine who is frequently involved in elections issues, says he’s hard pressed to see how Kristof can qualify. “It would appear that Mr. Kristof 8
Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
would have a hard time establishing that he has been a resident of Oregon for the required period of time,” says Chaimov, who formerly served as the Legislature’s top lawyer. “A significant issue would be whether Mr. Kristof were registered to vote in a state other than Oregon between November 2019 and December 2020. Registration typically requires residency, and you can’t be a resident of two places for election purposes.” State laws say no single factor determines residency for political candidates. Some indicators: where a person pays income taxes, obtains routine services such as mail delivery and health care, and conducts a social life. But the rules can be ambiguous. WW previously raised questions about the residency of such candidates as GOP candidate for governor Chris Dudley (2010) and Portland mayoral candidate Charlie Hales (2012). In both cases, state officials took a permissive view of the candidates’ residency. What Kristof says: Kristof confirmed he voted in New York last year but calls questions about his residency “ridiculous.” He notes he has owned land here since 1993, began paying income taxes here in 2019, holds an Oregon drivers license, and has always considered himself an Oregonian. “Insiders always want to fix the political game to keep out those they don’t control,” Kristof says. “I want to help fix the state I love. I’m as Oregonian as they come, and the rest is politics.” NIGEL JAQUISS.
FIVE QUESTIONS FOR
MISSISSIPPI STUDIOS
HENRY CROMETT
DOCUMENT
Kevin Cradock
MISSED: Pins show support for Mississippi Studios.
The co-owner of some of Portland’s most prominent music venues wants local officials to require proof of vaccination at his shows. Kevin Cradock recently shrank his vaccination card and laminated it. Now he carries it in his wallet. “Anyone can make a dummy of these cards,” he says. “You can’t undo that. That’s a CDC thing. They had a long time to come up with a card. They got a great vaccine and they came up with a terrible identification process for it.” The co-owner of Mississippi Studios, Revolution Hall and Polaris Hall, Cradock occupies a rare position: He’s a music venue operator who also used to work in disease outbreak response, back when the Oregon Health Authority was still called the Oregon Public Health Division. That’s also why he agreed to talk about the vaccination trailers he’s coordinated to give free COVID tests in front of Mississippi Studios and Revolution Hall, starting Wednesday, Aug. 11. “If somebody’s going to talk about it, it would be me,” he says. The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity. SUZETTE SMITH. WW: So Mississippi Studios’ policy right now is no admittance for shows without proof of vaccination, but you’ll also take a negative COVID test. Correct? Kevin Cradock: Yeah, we want to be like, “Hey, no drama. You didn’t hear about this. You didn’t get the email. Just get a test and wait 15 minutes.” When did you start planning to offer free COVID tests? It happened fast. No earlier than last week. This was something agents and artists were asking for. That was the primary precipitator.
What’s your background with the OHA? My academic background is public health, epidemiology and science. I worked with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ironically, back in 2005, we did a full-scale exercise on pandemics. It was called Pandora, if you can believe it. It’s really surreal having worked on that and now I run a music venue that’s been closed for a year and a half because of the pandemic. Would it be easier to enforce proof of vaccination at the door if it were mandated on a state or county level? I understand the position the governor’s in, with a very polarized state. I get that. I want Oregon to be less polarized. If she came down with a mandate, I don’t know if some of the county commissioners and county seats could even enforce it. On a county level, Chair Deborah Kafoury wants to possibly run for governor, so she doesn’t want to be viewed as this highly regulatory, Portland person. I do think the conversation should happen at the municipal level—at least in Multnomah County. What would you like to see at the municipal level? It would take a lot of pressure off businesses if there was a proof-of-vaccination requirement. The New York model seems like it would be a good fit for Portland, and it would be an easier way to disseminate the information rather than one bar at a time. We have the vaccination rates. We have to reopen these businesses, and keep them open. The best way to keep people safe is: vaccine, vaccine, test, test, test, vaccine.
NEWS JACK KENT
Passing the Torch For years, teenagers have brought tiki torches to a stone ruin in Forest Park to party. Neighbors say climate change makes that unacceptable.
TRADITION: The Witch’s Castle in Forest Park is a popular party spot for teens. BY S OP H I E P E E L
speel@wweek.com
Many of those concerned about the tiki torches partied themselves at the stone structure when they were younger. “We had bonfires, and we built them in the middle of the castle,” Lee says. “We would bring candles and put them in the windows of the castle.” The tradition continued. McKean Farnell, a 2019 Lincoln High School graduate, attended about 16 parties at the castle during high school. “When we’re getting closer, you can see the torches through the trees,” he recalls. “That excitement builds, and you can hear the chatter, and you start to hear the music through the speakers.” He says they’re coordinated events usually led by a group of upperclassmen, shared through word of mouth and group chats, and happen a couple times a month. Every year, a new group of seniors takes over. It’s usually the party crowd, and mostly Lincoln kids with a few other westside students sprinkled in. But after football games or the end of a semester, Farnell says, everyone from the school would show up. Akili Kelekele, another 2019 graduate of Lincoln, adds: “It creates this camaraderie in the school and brings you closer together. If the cops came, we would all just mob to the nearest park and play basketball or go to Stepping Stone [Cafe] and get some food.” But adults are now sending dire warnings to the next generation. Lincoln High School students received two emails last week, following the the Nextdoor post. Lincoln principal Peyton Chapman sent the first midweek. She wrote that families in the West Hills had “shared concerns about youth using lit tiki torches in the woods” and that “the woods are dry and could ignite quickly, causing hundreds of acres and many homes to catch fire and burn rapidly.” A second email from Lincoln’s booster club, Friends of Lincoln, was sent to students Friday afternoon labeled “URGENT MESSAGE FROM THURMAN BRIDGE FIREWISE TEAM.” It blamed the city for not responding to complaints: “When we try to report this activity: Park Rangers do not respond as they go home at 9 pm. Portland Police do not respond to calls about tiki parties in the park...the Fire department only comes out if there’s an actual FIRE not ‘fire hazardous activities.’” Portland Fire & Rescue Lt. Kim Kosmas, who spearheads the efforts to prevent wildfires in Forest Park, says residents aren’t aware of “a lot of stuff happening behind the scenes” to discourage open flames. But she still thinks the kids could find an easier way to light their parties: “They have to find something else, like glowsticks.” This past weekend, the fire and parks bureaus had rangers and firefighters stand
at all three entrance points to the Witch’s Castle, watching for teens with tiki torches. On Friday night, at the trail entrance along Northwest Holman Street, WW came across two firefighters and one park ranger posted near a car. They’d been there since 7:30 that evening and planned to stay until 11 pm. Kosmas, who helped coordinate the joint effort, says the two bureaus will be patrolling for two weekends. She says the fire bureau takes the issue seriously and is working on a plan in which calls concerning open flames would result in both a park ranger and the fire bureau responding together going forward. Kosmas says they spotted no activity on Friday or Saturday night. On the Nextdoor post, neighbors tossed around a variety of homegrown ideas to deal with the tiki torches. One woman proposed buying a bunch of LED tiki torches on Amazon and bringing them to the kids on a party night. Another proposed that adults “have nightly jazz concerts in the same location and ruin the vibe for the kids.” One man wrote: “I’m going to say that I also think you all are going way out of proportion on this. If young adults aren’t able to handle 13 tiki torches without burning down Portland, holy fuck, we are really in trouble.” The climate change generation, robbed of its parents’ parties, is also seeking solutions. Farnell, the 2019 Lincoln graduate, says the intention was always to pack out what they brought in, and the organizers would always bring trash bags so they could clean up after themselves. But when cops broke up the parties around midnight—which happened often—everyone would scatter. Farnell says he spent years “banging my head on a wall” for a way to light the parties without torches. He went to Home Depot to try to find mounted lights, and researched solar panels, he says. “I really think there’s a path to making this a unique tradition that’s less harmful than it is now.”
JACK KENT
On July 28, the Portland City Council approved a plan to remove homeless campers from urban forests, including Forest Park, to reduce the risk of wildfire. But Rebecca Lee believes another threat offers greater reason for concern: Lincoln High School students bringing open-flame tiki torches with them to party at a stone ruin called the Witch’s Castle. Lee, 48, was walking up Lower Macleay Trail into Forest Park on July 31 when she spotted teenagers carrying tiki torches and fuel. “I saw them setting them up and spreading them around,” Lee says, “and I went up and said, ‘What can I do to convince you to not light those things?’ They were like, ‘Nothing.’ One of the most disturbing things was how completely unaware they were of the danger.” She stayed in the woods for hours. “I was like, I’m not leaving,” she recalls. “I picked up torches that fell over.…At one point they had one leaning on the side of the castle, and it was basically leaning right under a tree with low-hanging dry branches.” Parties at the Witch’s Castle—a 1930s stone park shelter and restroom partly destroyed by the Columbus Day Storm in
1962—aren’t new. In fact, neighbors tell WW it’s a long-standing party spot that even many of them frequented in the ’80s and ’90s—Lee included. Even the open flames are standard atmosphere. The difference, according to Lee? “There’s no rain anymore.” Alarm over the tinder-dry conditions in Portland’s urban forests has rarely been so keenly felt as this summer. Fire officials told WW last month that a wildfire in Forest Park ranks among the city’s most significant natural hazards. City officials have responded by pledging to remove campsites along the Wildwood Trail. But last week, a post on the social networking site Nextdoor sparked intense debate over whether the real threat is a teenage tradition spanning generations. Neighbors lamented that the city wasn’t doing enough to enforce the county’s burn ban after hours. “We’ve tried calling all the usual bureaus that you’d think would respond: rangers, police, fire,” says Nora Gruber, who wrote the original post on Nextdoor. “There’s no nighttime enforcement at all of the burn ban, which is hugely problematic because the city knows about these people. That’s the travesty to me, that there’s no effort being made to actually enforce the ban.”
Officials with the city’s parks and fire bureaus say they’ve posted signs warning of fire danger. And WW encountered park rangers and firefighters posted at trailheads on the night of Aug. 6 to intercept would-be torchbearers. Gruber and her neighbors have another plan. “Can we deploy our own private patrols? We’re talking about neighborhood associations coming together to fill in the gaps where the city isn’t providing enough security.”
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NEWS AARON LEE
HEALTH FOOD: Erica Montgomery hosted a COVID-19 vaccination clinic at her food cart.
Bubble Burst
In a blue state and county, Black and Latinx residents have lower vaccination rates as COVID cases mount. BY R AC H E L M O N A H A N
rmonahan@wweek.com
A food cart might seem an unlikely place to get a lifesaving medical treatment. But when Erica Montgomery, owner of Erica’s Soul Food, was approached about hosting a COVID-19 vaccination clinic, her answer was: “Hell, yeah.” Montgomery, 39, an Atlanta native who describes herself as biracial, is aware of what she calls “vaccine innuendo.” It’s part of why she got her COVID shot as soon as she was eligible. “I felt like it was the right thing to do for my community,” she says. But she knows many Black Portlanders aren’t following suit. “They want Black people to trust the government, but Black people are still getting killed by police,” she says. “It’s just like, how do you expect us to trust you when you’re not behaving trustworthy?” As the latest wave of the pandemic hits Southern states the hardest, much media attention is focused on Republican opposition to vaccines, among other safety protocols. National data shows just 54% of Republicans have received one shot, according to data from the health care nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation. But in a deep blue state, and an even deeper blue county, there’s also a different and noteworthy gap in who has gotten a shot. Multnomah County has a nearly 20-point gap between the vaccination rates of white and Black or Latino residents—a startling disparity made all the more notable by the county’s pledged focus on equity. In Multnomah County, 69.9% of white adults have at least one shot, as of Aug. 7, while 50.5% of Black adults and 50.3% of Latinx adults have had one. To be sure, racial health disparities, including COVID19 vaccination rates, are the American norm rather than the exception. But Multnomah County is recognized for its public 10
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health expertise—County Chair Deborah Kafoury called the county’s public health department among the “best” in the country in an interview last month. And some places that have focused on addressing disparate outcomes have experienced success: In San Francisco, a higher percentage of Latinx residents are vaccinated than white residents. But in Portland, the lower vaccination rates mean that Black and Latinx residents are disproportionately at risk in the latest wave. At a July 26 event, Multnomah County said Black residents were five times as likely to be hospitalized as the Delta variant took hold in Oregon. The county says a disproportionate number of hospitalizations for Black Portlanders has continued. “Local Public Health and the Community Health Center have had enormous success reaching communities of color; nearly three-in-four people vaccinated through Multnomah County identify as BIPOC,” says Multnomah County spokesperson Kate Yeiser. “We continue to expand and adjust those efforts, including a current shift alongside the state in census tract-specific vaccination clinics and incentives.” A certain dismissiveness is common among Portland progressives who grabbed vaccinations early on—a sort of Darwinian spectator sport of watching the recent case increases. The whispered question: Why care about those who aren’t vaccinated yet? One version of that sentiment came from Gregory McKelvey, a Black activist-turned-political consultant who tweeted July 26: “At what point do we collectively decide that if someone isn’t vaccinated by now that they might just suck and can’t be convinced?” (To be sure, McKelvey, who is active on social media, has also pressed for a greater understanding of Black vaccine hesitancy due to racism.) But it is possible for vaccine-hesitant people to be persuaded. Rachelle Dixon, a Black community leader who spoke
to WW for a January story on vaccine hesitancy, said at the time she’d wait and see. She now says she received among the last COVID-19 shots given at the Oregon Convention Center. What convinced her? The variants. “It was mutating so fast I realized I would become part of the problem,” she now tells WW. In national polling, white Republicans are more likely than Black and Latinx people to say they never want a vaccine. That provides an opening for bridging the disparity. The county is working to make vaccinations more convenient. It is paying people up to $150, in hopes the financial aid will enable them to take time off work, and providing as much information to specific populations as possible. And after playing down the prospect of imposing vaccine mandates at a Portland Public Schools COVID-19 briefing on Aug. 4, county officials now say they haven’t ruled them out. “We did start with education and offered incentives to motivate people,” Yeiser tells WW. “As we learn more about the Delta variant, we know the main way out of this pandemic is through widespread vaccination, which leaves all options on the table at this point.” National surveys show some 5% of adults have not made the time to get vaccinated but would do so if it were required for work or to go to restaurants or attend public events. Last month, the success of small vaccination drives was measured in terms of 50 or 100 people showing up. Boys & Girls Clubs have been hosting clinics since May at a rotating list of locations, working with other community organizations, including the Immigrant & Refugee Community Organization, El Programa Hispano Católico, Hacienda CDC and Latino Network. On a Sunday in July in Lents, the clinic gave patients vaccinations, bread and water in addition to gift cards. “Some folks have to miss work or get a sitter for their kids,” says Rachel Schutz, vice president of club services for Boys & Girls Clubs in the metro area. “If we can alleviate some of that burden, that’s helpful.” Two men who have been eligible since May both mentioned the convenience of a clinic in their neighborhood— one attended church nearby, and another lived close to the clinic. One said it took time for him to learn more about the vaccine. “I was hesitant because I had a friend who died after his second dose,” says Robert Dorris, 64, a retired computer
“They want Black people to trust the government, but Black people are still getting killed by police.” tech who is Black. “Later I learned he had other issues.” As for Montgomery, she thinks building trust between Black people and government requires addressing social justice: “I think if the Biden administration acknowledged systemic racism and made crimes that are racially based very, very highly punishable, then maybe the Black people will trust you.” Meanwhile, she’s doing what she can. Last month, Montgomery saw one of her elderly mobility-challenged customers waiting in the parking lot long before she opened. He was awaiting his second dose. “I’ve never seen him do that,” she recalls. “I felt like, even if it was just that one guy, at least that we got that done.”
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Old Town clubs reopen amid gunfire— and ex-soldiers stationed in the street.
PHOTO: Caption tktktk THE RIFLEMAN: Jean-Pierre LaFont patrols Northwest Couch Street outside Shake Bar.
BY T E SS R I S K I
and
AARO N M ES H
503-243-2122
It’s last call in Chinatown, and a crowd spills out of Shake Bar onto Northwest Couch Street—about 200 people stumbling, some looking for electric scooters, women barefoot and carrying their high heels. The clubgoers are met by a heavily armed guard. He stands beneath the Hung Far Low sign, clad in a bulletproof vest and desert-tan tactical pants, with a 9 mm pistol strapped to his leg and an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle slung over his shoulder. His name is Jean-Pierre LaFont. He’s a 45-yearold veteran who lives in Gresham. He says he did a tour of duty in Bosnia with the Navy SEALS. He’s 6 feet tall, wears black gloves outlined with white bones, and is delighted to talk about his work. “My job is to get you home safe,” he says. “Unless you’re the perpetrator. The only way for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing. So I’m going to do something.” LaFont works for Ravencrest Force Protection Group. On the job, he goes by “Reaper.” His boss is codenamed “Ghost.” Their Northeast Portland firm bills itself as a private military contractor—the kind of firm that operates in war zones. Their latest assignment: deployment to one block of Portland’s Old Town. After a June shooting in the club’s doorway,
Shake’s owners hired Ravencrest to secure not only the bar, but the length of Couch Street between 3rd and 4th Avenues. Nearly two months later, LaFont patrols this street every Friday and Saturday night, trying to prevent the latest killing in what he describes as a gang war. He finds the work gratifying. “I’d rather die with my boots on,” LaFont says, “than die in an old folks’ home hearing Christmas carols sung by Boy Scouts.” Ravencrest is one of at least three companies with armed guards patrolling Old Town’s club scene. Downtown Portland was defined last summer by squadrons of uniformed men equipped with tear gas and guns—federal agents, as well as police officers, sent to quell Portland’s racial justice protests. This summer, armed men have returned to the downtown core, but for a different reason: to keep parties from turning into shootouts. Their presence marks the confluence of club owners’ desire to reopen for business despite City Hall’s floundering attempts to grapple with the social upheaval that upended Portland after George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis sparked months of protests and nationwide demands to defund police. One of the results: a Portland Police Bureau
that says it’s about 120 officers slimmer, bolstering demand for private security companies like Ravencrest. This spring, the city’s nightclubs reopened—in the midst of a wave of gunfire killing Black people at a rate seen nowhere else in the country (see “Worse Than Chicago,” page 13.) Within days of reopening, bars in the city’s Entertainment District were packed. In fact, Old Town bar owners say July was their busiest month ever. Amid the flourishing nightlife scene: many bullets. Less than a month after a gunman opened fire at Shake Bar, an 18-year-old woman was killed in front of a row of food carts in Old Town on July 17. The shooter wounded six others. But amid the booming business and gun violence, the Portland Police Bureau hasn’t kept pace. Following last year’s budget cuts, the bureau last July dissolved its nightlife unit—the Central Precinct Entertainment Detail. Currently, only two Portland police officers are assigned to the neighborhood’s nightlife scene, compared to nine before, according to Police Bureau spokesman Lt. Greg Pashley. Business owners and police alike say that’s insufficient. “There aren’t enough police officers,” says Jessie Burke, co-owner of the Society Hotel and vice president of the Old Town Chinatown Community
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HALFWAY THERE: A Friday night crowd hits the dance floor of Dixie Tavern (above). A block west, a Ravencrest security guard stands at the entrance to Shake Bar (right).
Association. “We’re having to do what the government used to do. We’re kind of running an underground government to keep things safe.” The decreased police presence created what business owners describe as a public safety vacuum. Private security companies arrived with rifles, metal detector wands and Kevlar vests. The strategy alarms a police captain who once oversaw the Entertainment Detail. “We’re there just to make sure that people are safe,” says Central Precinct Capt. Robert Simon. “And introducing an AR-15 into a group of drunks—it’s not the right tool for the application. We never did that.” On Friday, Aug. 6, a line snakes around the exterior of Dixie Tavern at Northwest 2nd Avenue and Couch Street. Thumping bass emanates from inside, where rotating red and green spotlights shine on a crowded dance floor of mostly white college-aged revelers, sans masks, doing the “Cha-Cha Slide.” More flock to the dance floor as Bon Jovi’s “Living on a Prayer” begins playing. When it comes time for the chorus, the DJ cuts the music and the crowd belts out the words of a song released in 1986—more than a decade before most of them were born. “It’s not packed yet,” says Dan Lenzen, Dixie Tavern’s owner, gazing down at the dance floor from a second-level balcony. Lenzen says July was a record month. He attributes the surge to a hunger among young people to be social and flirt after more than a year of isolation. “You’ve got this jubilant feeling about getting out,” he said in an interview earlier that day. “People want to have fun.” Across West Burnside Street, another crowd of young people flocks outside of Fuse Bar. This clientele is predominantly Black and Latinx. Azim Patel, owner of Fuse Bar, agrees with Lenzen that pandemic fatigue is great for business. “It’s Sociology 101,” Patel says. “You had a year when people couldn’t celebrate their birthdays. The whole zodiac.” Beginning in 2012, the Portland Police Bureau staffed a unit specifically assigned to the nightlife scene. Sam Adams, who was mayor during that time, implemented the city ordinance that paid for barricades around the Entertainment District. Adams, now director of strategic innovations in Mayor Ted Wheeler’s office, says the barricades, in addition to removing vehicles from the equation, 12
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helped prevent drunken skirmishes he describes as “bro bumping” by allowing clubgoers to walk in the street instead of squishing them onto crowded sidewalks. The Entertainment Detail consisted of one sergeant and up to seven officers who patrolled outside Old Town nightclubs—which on weekend nights could draw 20,000 patrons, Lenzen says. “That sergeant and those officers became experts, basically,” says Pashley. “It’s a specialty.” The Entertainment Detail officers patrolled on foot within the barricade, and squad cars circled the perimeter. In addition, an officer was—and still is—assigned to patrol Old Town during the night shift, which lasts from 10 pm to 2 am. During the day, Entertainment Detail officers often walked the neighborhood and chatted with business owners, who alerted them about upcoming events so law enforcement could anticipate and prepare for large, potentially rowdier crowds. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Downtown businesses went dark. And last summer, when most activity near the so-called Entertainment District consisted of racial justice protests, the Portland City Council slashed the Police Bureau’s budget by $15 million. One of the casualties, Pashley says, was the Entertainment Detail. “We’re working with bare-bones staffing,” he says. “It’s like trying to paint a wall without enough paint.” Bar owners and local neighborhood groups raised concerns about the decreased police presence during a midJune meeting at Dixie Tavern with Capt. Simon, as well as the Central Precinct commander and a lieutenant. After this meeting, the Police Bureau reinstated one sergeant to the Entertainment District, Simon says, bringing the total to two. Pashley says police in Old Town can call for backup from one of about 18 officers patrolling the Central Precinct, which encompasses about 41 square miles and over 200,000 people. But the bureau says those officers, too, are often busy responding to other calls. “We’re at the point in the Police Bureau where any time we add staffing to a certain unit—say, the Entertainment Detail—we have to take it away from something else,” says Simon, the Central Precinct captain. “Do I cut my daytime bike team downtown to staff the Entertainment Detail?” Old Town business owners hoped the Entertainment Detail would reappear in this year’s budget. That didn’t happen. They scrambled to replace it: As The Oregonian reported last week, Lenzen erected barricades without city permission, trying to keep cars from speeding past his nightclub.
“We defunded programs before we figured out what the replacement programs were,” the community association’s Burke says. “The city is in this decision-making spiral of Band-Aid on top of Band-Aid on top of BandAid.” Among the scenes of violence: Shake Bar. On June 25, a shooting at the nightclub’s entrance sent two people to the hospital. Police found 28 shell casings along Northwest Couch Street. Bullets struck eight vehicles. “It’s a mass murder, if anybody could shoot,” says Andrew Murdoch, who owns nearby nightclub District. Jake Durighello was smoking a cigarette outside Shake Bar. “I heard nine shots, and they were shooting through the doorway,” he recalls. “I just started running.” Durighello, 25, is a photographer who takes portraits for event promoters at Shake. He says the club attracts people from across the city—some of whom are feuding Continued on page 14
Black Portlanders are more likely to be murdered than their peers in cities better known for crime. When an unknown gunman fatally shot 18-yearold Makayla Harris in the early morning hours of July 17, the brazen killing in downtown Portland continued an alarming trend: Black Portlanders such as Harris are being murdered at an extraordinary rate. In fact, in the 12 months ending June 30, more than 1 in every 1,000 Black people living in Portland died in a homicide. That’s a rate far higher than that experienced in U.S. cities most known for gun violence. Portland saw 94 homicides in that period, according to newly released Portland Police Bureau figures, and of that number, 39 victims— that is, 41%—were Black. MICK HANGLAND-SKILL
MINGUS MAPPS
Black people make up 5.8% of the city’s population. Put another way, Black Portlanders were killed at about seven times their share of the city’s population—and 12 times the rate of white people. “I am acutely aware of the high rate of Black and Brown victimization from gun violence,” says City Commissioner Mingus Mapps, who worked in the city’s crime prevention office before becoming last year the third Black man ever elected to the Portland City Council. “It is absolutely unacceptable.” The 39 Black victims killed in Portland in that one year mark a 250% increase from the 11 Black homicide victims in 2019.
Brian Renauer, director of Portland State University’s Criminal Justice Policy Research Institute, says Black people have long been disproportionately harmed by gunfire. “Black homicide (particularly gun violence) victimization in Portland and across the U.S. has historically been higher than other racial/ ethnic groups and significantly overrepresented compared to population percentages,” he says. But Renauer adds that the increase Portland has seen in the past year is “astounding and likely unprecedented in our local history.” In the 12 months ending June 30, Black Portlanders died in homicides at a rate of 102 per 100,000 people. That’s a significantly higher rate than their peers in cities better known for violent crime. WW examined the rates in other U.S. cities that tracked demographic data for homicide victims during the same period. (The calculations were based on local murder-tracking sites and FBI and U.S. Census data.) Those cities include Chicago (77 per 100,000) and Philadelphia (64 per 100,000). Black Portlanders died at a higher rate than Black Baltimoreans and at nearly double the rate of Black Los Angelenos. Lt. Greg Pashley, a spokesman for the Portland Police Bureau, calls the rate at which Black residents are being gunned down “tragic.” “From the police perspective, we wish there were sufficient resources to reduce homicides, shootings, and other crime by mere presence, prevention and close connections to the community,” Pashley says in an email. “In the event crimes occur, police wish there were sufficient resources to investigate and bring cases to a conclusion. We’re short all those resources.” In the current political climate, such resources are probably not forthcoming. Meanwhile, the question is, what’s causing the carnage? “There is no one explanation as to why we are overrepresented as victims of gun violence,” Mapps says. “The [coronavirus] pandemic was hardest on those who were already struggling to make it. Our society is awash in guns. There is a lack of viable economic opportunity, especially for our young folks.” Of course, the conditions Mapps cites afflict other cities as well. Rich Chatman, a spokesman for the city’s new Division of Community Safety, says a lot has changed since 1998, when he began working as one of the city’s few Black firefighters. Then, Chatman says, “well-defined neighborhood boundaries and parks separated rival gangs.” But gentrification pushed Black residents east of 82nd Avenue, where they compete for scarce low-income housing. “The result is that people who didn’t used to interact are now living in the same apartment buildings or row houses due to financial circumstance,” Chatman says. “That can lead to conflict, and it has: what we see as behavioral and gun violence.” Mapps says part of the solution is to bolster organizations that work directly with people at risk to shoot others. But he says after a year of high-profile shootings, the public wants to see immediate improvement. “We need to admit that law enforcement has a role in interrupting this cycle of homicides,” he says. “As a [city] council, we need to get real and recognize the fact there are police officers that specialize in
this type of work. It is critical that we fill the volunteer positions of the Focused Intervention Team and its oversight board.” Andre Miller, community safety liaison for Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty, says the Black community in which he grew up deserves more than quick fixes. “We as a city are not currently treating the actual cause of these issues,” Miller says. “We are treating the symptoms.” Miller says creating more economic opportunity and reducing income inequality is part of it—and so is teaching children, especially boys, to think differently. “When somebody puts you down, we have been taught we have to respond or you are a punk,” Miller says. “If we teach conflict resolution and shame reduction at an early age, we give kids tools so they don’t retaliate in an aggressive way. We have to reach people before they become high risk.” NIGEL JAQUISS and AARON MESH.
The demographics of Portland homicide victims. Total Homicides in Portland, July 1, 2020-June 30, 2021: 94
White: 42
Black: 39
Hispanic: 9
Asian: 2
Pacific Islander: 2 Source: Portland Police Bureau
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online but wouldn’t typically encounter each other face to face. “You have people from Northeast, Southeast, and you put ’em all in a pit,” Durighello says. “Everybody’s intoxicated. You get the wrong crowd at any bar. This one just happens to be poppin’.” State business filings show Shake was purchased in 2020 by a group called Band O’ Brothers LLC, whose registered agent was listed as Brian Lozano. He did not respond to calls from WW seeking comment. In July, Shake hired Ravencrest Force Protection Group. The patrons exiting Shake after last call on Aug. 6 appear nonchalant about the presence of a guard carrying a semi-automatic rifle. Perhaps it’s the alcohol. One young woman in a minidress walks up to LaFont and caresses one of his biceps. “Gorgeous, gorgeous,” she coos. “Handsome boy.” LaFont’s boss Cory Webb stands several feet away, in the center of Couch Street, scanning the crowd for handguns. “My eyes are twitching from looking at people’s hands,” he says. “We have to treat this almost like overseas. Keep your head on a swivel.” Webb, 41, who uses the moniker “Ghost,” is an easygoing, portly man who stands 5-foot-6. In his spare time, he drift-races sports cars. After an Army tour of duty in Iraq, Webb founded Ravencrest Force Protection Group in 2017, seeking to employ veterans who didn’t want to become police officers. “Some guys come out of the military tired of the government,” he says. On its website, Ravencrest says it will send security teams in “tactical uniform” to protect businesses. “Within the limits of local and state law,” the site explains, “a uniformed security officer will take all responsible and necessary steps to protect persons and property, including the apprehension of suspects and the use of deadly force when necessary.” But Webb says his men are loath to fire their weapons. Instead, he says, much of his squad’s task is to provide the appearance of order. That includes pulling out the AR-15 at closing time. People leaving the club glimpse the gun, Webb says, and decide: “Oh shit, that’s a big-ass gun. I’d better get out of here.” Ravencrest takes other precautions. As the club pre14
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TOSSED: Ravencrest founder Cory Webb tries to move a woman away from Shake Bar’s entrance on Aug. 7.
pares to close at 1:30 am, Webb pulls a Mercedes ML350 SUV into the intersection. The vehicle has bulletproof doors, and Webb says people smoking cigarettes on the sidewalk can duck behind the vehicle if bullets fly. Webb’s greatest concern: a surface parking lot across Northwest 4th Avenue from Shake. He says patrons leave their guns in vehicles parked in the lot, and if a fight breaks out, they run back to their cars and fire toward the club. Ravencrest guards dub this parking lot “the Boneyard,” after a field of burned-out cars in Iraq where snipers would fire on U.S. soldiers. “This is our worst nightmare, this parking lot,” Webb says. His team will pursue shooters across the road and into the maze of parked cars, he adds. But Webb has grown uneasy about this assignment. “I wouldn’t be downtown,” he says, “if they weren’t paying us a king’s ransom.” Others are skeptical that a security detail of armed ex-soldiers is the right tool for the job. Lenzen, the Dixie Tavern proprietor, says his security team, which he trains in house, is unarmed. That’s for two reasons: First, Lenzen says, most shootings in the Entertainment District occur outside or from a drive-by vehicle. Second, he fears that a firearm in a crowded nightlife setting would injure bystanders. “I worry about what’s potentially in the background,” he says. “When there’s an armed security officer and somebody’s shooting at them, what are they going to shoot back at?” Portland police aren’t thrilled, either. Officers express concern that drunken clubgoers might not be able to distinguish between a cop and a guard. “Some of the customers who may have a few libations or may be a little intoxicated—they might not understand the rules of engagement with these separate and different companies,” says Capt. Simon. “And that presents a lot of confusion, both for the patrons and for the owners: They don’t know what they’re getting and what they’re paying for. It’s in a weird spot down there right now.” Private security guards in Portland occasionally use deadly force. On May 29, a guard for Cornerstone Security Group shot and killed 49-year-old Freddy Nelson Jr. at Delta Park Center, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported. And in 2019, a private security guard shot and killed 42-year-old Eugene Pharr Jr. outside the Dream On Saloon on Southeast Stark Street. Simon says that prior to lockdown, he observed no more than two private security firms in the nightlife scene. Today, he says, there are about five: “Now it’s a little more fragmented.” At least two additional security firms patrol downtown streets with guns. One of them, Portland Patrol, has long worked for the Portland Business Alliance and is authorized to carry weapons by a contract with the city. The other, Echelon Protective Services, patrols Ankeny Alley—the pedestrian plaza outside Voodoo Doughnut. Its officers, dressed in blue uniforms, carry handguns in side holsters. Echelon’s owner, Dustin Alex Stone—a former police officer in Clatskanie, Ore.—says his guards act as a deterrent. “It’s like a scarecrow in the field,” he says. Stone characterizes Echelon’s work in part as “outreach” to the unhoused community. “That’s what security companies need to do,” he says. “They need to be helping people. Even just handing out a cigarette to somebody.” Kaitlyn Dey, a homeless advocate with the Western Regional Advocacy Project, has tracked the expansion of private security in downtown Portland. She says Echelon has overstepped its boundaries by patrolling public streets. “It seems like, increasingly, private security is starting to take over public space—which is a very alarming trend,” Dey says. “They don’t seem to be following any laws at all.” In Oregon, private security guards receive certification from the same state agency that trains police: the Department of Public Safety Standards and Training. Statewide, DPSST has certified 14,923 unarmed security guards who completed 14 hours of training, and 1,861 armed security guards who underwent an additional 24 hours of training. But it is difficult to say how frequently state-certi-
J U S T I N YA U
fied private security guards use force of any kind. That’s because DPSST does not require incident reporting. Instead, it relies on complaints submitted by the public, police and the security companies themselves. “A lot of individual companies really hold their employees accountable, and they do have them fill out those types of reports to keep them on file,” says Michelle Morrison, a certification and licensing background investigator with the agency. “We can’t be out and everywhere.” DPSST can investigate complaints and revoke certifications of individual security workers who violate rules, Morrison says, but it cannot yet penalize private security firms that have a pattern of bad practices. In response to a public records request from WW, DPSST says neither Echelon nor Ravencrest have generated complaints, but that “there are open and active professional standards complaints against the executive managers for these companies.” Morrison says the agency discourages certified private security staff from wearing uniforms or driving vehicles that resemble law enforcement. Oregon has no rules about the types of firearms that guards may carry, she adds. Sam Adams says he understands why Old Town and Chinatown bars have resorted to hiring private security, but he is concerned about the open display of firearms. “It is startling to see people carrying weapons out,” he says. “I don’t think it’s necessary to show that kind of level of force. It makes people unnecessarily nervous and it’s counterproductive. You don’t have to have that display of armament.” In the early hours of Sunday, Aug. 8, it happens: a fight breaks out inside Shake. A woman in a striped jumpsuit is hauled out of the club
THIS CAN GO TWO WAYS: Security at Dixie Tavern (top) is unarmed, while guards around Shake Bar (bottom) carry weapons.
by one of her friends, screaming curses and demanding to go back inside. Soon, the Ravencrest guards are trying to clear her and her friends from Couch Street. Webb pulls an orange, non-lethal pepper gun from a pouch in his vest and points it at a young man in a yellow silk shirt who refuses the leave the road. The man salutes Webb, sneering. As his friends try to pull him away from the guards, he leans over the street barricades and says, slowly and ominously: “You know what’s been going on.” What’s been going on, for months, is bloodshed in the streets of Portland. In that context, Webb and LaFont view the young man’s meaning as unmistakable: He’s threatening to kill them. Ravencrest calls the cops. Two Portland police officers arrive and move a squad car with flashing lights into the intersection, announcing they’ll search the perimeter once the bar empties. One officer glances at LaFont’s rifle: “You’re more outfitted than me right now,” he says. Thirty minutes later, a burst of gunfire comes from the direction of the Boneyard. Four shots: pop-pop, pop-pop. Police officers rush, guns drawn, up Northwest 4th Avenue. LaFont levels his AR-15, aiming into the night. The crowd keeps milling in the street, edgy but not leaving. A Shake patron tugs on LaFont’s vest, trying to get his attention. “Get the fuck out of here!” LaFont shouts. “There are people shooting!” Minutes later, LaFont lowers his rifle and lights a cigarette. He’s upset—not just by the gunfire but by the people ignoring it. His eyes are wide and he looks like he’s about to cry. “This once was a great city,” he says. “This is a great city. It’s the best. We just forgot.”
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STREET
CHINESE FESTIVAL Photos by Chris Nesseth On Instagram: @chrisnesseth
Pioneer Courthouse Square, Portland’s living room, welcomed visitors Saturday afternoon for a lion dance by White Lotus Dragon & Lion Dance, poetry readings, Wushu instruction, dance performances and other celebrations of China’s cultural heritage, organized by the Oregon Chinese Coalition.
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STARTERS
• •••• ••••
A T R E A LRBO S ER E T •••• A E H T
THE MOST IMPORTANT PORTLAND CULTURE STORIES OF THE WEEK—GRAPHED.
R E A D M O R E A B O U T TH E S E STO R I E S AT WW E E K .CO M .
RIDICULOUS AGÊNCIA BRASIL
Shot putter Ryan Crouser of Boring, Ore., breaks his own Olympic record to win the U.S. a gold medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
SEPT 10 + 11
JIMMY DORE SHOW political comedy SEPT 15
BFF podcast gone wild
NPR radio show
SEPT 17
Wildfire smoke hanging over the city last week finally moves east, thanks to some brief rain showers.
the high priestess of cabaret
with special guest Jet Black Pearl
SEPT 18
one night only!
SEPT 25
OREGON BURLESQUE FESTIVAL
NW favorite blues diva SEPT 24
SEPT 30
RUTHIE FOSTER
TOO SLIM & THE TAILDRAGGERS
+
+ Tevis Hodge Jr.
OCT 2
Mary Flower
Twenty-four Portland bars band together to form the “Vaxx Coalition,” pledging to check proof of vaccination, along with ID, for indoor service.
OCT 3
genius Americana songwriter
DARRELL SCOTT
stand-up comedy
with special guest Gary Ogan
UPCOMING SHOWS
•••••••••••••
10/7 • BOOKER T. JONES | 10/8 • TONY STARLIGHT 10/9 • JOHN PRINE TRIBUTE | 10/10 • TOM WAITS TRIBUTE 10/12 • THE DEAD DAISIES |10/22 • BOOKLOVER’S BURLESQUE
•••••
albertarosetheatre.com
3000 NE Alberta • 503.764.4131 Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
LISA DUPRE
PETE CORREALE
BRIAN BURK
award-winning acoustic blues
blues rock guitarist
In response to a surge of COVID cases, Multnomah County Chair Deborah Kafoury issues an executive order requiring masks in indoor public spaces, effective Friday, Aug. 13.
E M I LY J O A N G R E E N E
SEPT 29
18
Pearl District Peruvian restaurant Andina announces it will reopen Aug. 18. Its pandemic concept sister Chicha will continue to offer takeout and patio dining.
D I N A AV I L A
DUFFY BISHOP
SEPT 21
AWESOME
Hawaiian supergroup
Nina Simone tribute
After serving near-perfect falafel for 12 years, Wolf and Bear’s closes its carts for good.
AWFUL
I PUT A SPELL ON YOU
VIVIAN JOHNSON
J U S T I N YA U
THE RIZO INFLESH
Mississippi Studios and Revolution Hall starts offering free rapid COVID tests for customers who don’t have proof of vaccination status.
THOMAS TEAL
THIS MIGHT GET WEIRD
SEPT 16
The team behind the Oregon Brewers Festival announces the Westside Beer Festival, scheduled to take place Sept. 24-26 at the Washington County Fairgrounds.
SERIOUS
The National Weather Service issues an excessive heat watch for Portland, warning of highs near 100 degrees starting Wednesday, Aug. 11. Local officials warn that toxic algae blooms have made the Willamette River toxic for pets. MICK HANGLAND-SKILL
LETTERBOXD
GET BUSY
STUFF TO DO IN PORTLAND THIS WEEK, INDOORS AND OUT.
☛ DO | Tropitaal One of Portland’s favorite dance nights is making its return. Hosted by stalwart DJs Anjali and the Incredible Kid, Tropitaal mixes club music from India and South America—everything from urban desi to trap and reggaeton. Pre-pandemic, the monthly party regularly packed the Goodfoot’s basement dance floor. The first Tropitaal since the pandemic will feature guest DJ Papi Fimbres—drummer of seemingly every other Portland band. The Goodfoot requires proof of vaccination, so be sure to bring your vaccine card or a photo of it. The Goodfoot, 2845 SE Stark St., thegoodfoot. com. 10 pm Saturday, Aug. 14. $12. 21+.
SEE | Desperate Living (1977) The third installment of John Waters’ thematic “Trash Trilogy,” this dark comedy stars Mink Stole as a neurotic housewife on the run after her maid helps kill her husband. The pair end up in Mortville, a settlement filled with criminals and ruled by the evil Queen Carlotta (Edith Massey) and Princess Coo-Coo (Mary Vivian Pearce). Screens in 35 mm. Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-4931128, hollywoodtheatre.org. 7:30 pm Wednesday, Aug. 11. $8-$10. IMDB
SEE | Jason Rising Though almost no one would remember them this way—the hockey mask and machete loom larger—the original Friday the 13th installments were New Jersey movies. But if you were an Oregon-based horror obsessive in the ’80s, like teenager James Sweet, Jason Voorhees lurked behind every boathouse, cabin and fir tree. “Growing up a fan of Friday the 13th,” Sweet explains, “every time you’re around these [natural] areas, the only thing that goes through your head is, ‘Oh, this looks like Camp Crystal Lake.’” The visions never left, and 30 years later, Sweet directed Jason Rising, an Oregonmade fan film, premiering Friday, Aug. 13, at the Hollywood Theatre. With crowdfunded production contributions exceeding $25,000, Jason Rising joins a recent string of Friday the 13th fan outings stoking this specific slasher cult. This one, however, promises to deliver Sweet’s ideal Jason and the kill his co-creator, the late Oregon actor Robert Blanche, always dreamed of. Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy Blvd., 503493-1128, hollywoodtheatre.org. 7:30 pm Friday, Aug. 13. Tickets available at Eventbrite. $13 for general admission, $113 for VIP.
GO | Laidback Lagerfest Other than our hardworking window A/C units, the only comfort that’s gotten us through this particularly hot, arid summer is can after can of refreshing lagers. With next week’s forecast looking particularly ovenlike, Uptown Beer’s new festival couldn’t be timed more perfectly. The Laidback Lagerfest, designed as a summer version of the bottle shop’s Black Saturday Dark Beer Festival, will feature more than 20 easy-drinking beers on tap, primarily from local producers celebrated for the style, including Buoy, Heater Allen and Wayfinder. If that doesn’t cool you off, lean into the tropical theme, which includes screenings of surf flicks and food from pop-up Sure Shot Surf Snacks, and pretend like you’ve hopped a plane to Hawaii for the day. Uptown Beer, 6620 SW Scholls Ferry Road, 503-336-4783, uptownbeer.co. 4 pm Saturday, Aug. 14. $15 for a commemorative pint glass, sticker and five tasting tickets. GO | The Lot Summer Music Festival Music festivals are back—at least kind of. Outdoor, socially distanced venue the Lot is hosting two days of back-to-back concerts by regional and local artists. There are four shows each night, and the lineup is a fitting display of the diversity of Pacific Northwest music. Day one will range from a showcase of local hip-hop and neosoul collective People Music to folk-rock favorite Blitzen Trapper. Day two will feature the big band cumbia of Orquestra Pacifico Tropical and rising Seattle R&B singer Parisalexa. Sure, you may be confined to fenced-off, individual seating areas instead of lounging in a sea of blankets and lawn chairs, but hey, at least that means you can worry a lot less about some stranger coughing on you. The Lot at Zidell Yards, 3030 S Moody Ave., thelotatzidellyards.com. 6 pm Saturday-Sunday, Aug. 14-15. $60 per day.
GO | Andy Haynes Andy Haynes isn’t a nice guy comedian, but he doesn’t rely on tired stereotypes to float his jokes. He’ll wax charmingly enough about the trials of being a reasonably empathetic white adult male in our modern society—then out of nowhere say something hilarious that will mess you up for days. A regular at both Comedy Store in L.A. and the Comedy Cellar in NYC, you’ve probably seen Haynes in at least one sketch comedy bit—or that commercial where he keeps trying to break up with his couch only to wake up on it in the morning. We expect him to blow up to John Mulaney levels of fame any day now. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 10th Ave., portland.heliumcomedy.com. 8 pm Monday, Aug. 16. $15-$23. 21+.
VIRTUAL EVENT | Melissa Broder Local publisher Tin House assembled three of Melissa Broder’s cult out-of-print poetry books—When You Say One Thing but Mean Your Mother, Meat Heart and Scarecrone— as well as the best of her fourth, Last Sext, into a collection called Superdoom. Broder is a millennial icon who gained notoriety for writing a Vice column and Twitter account, both called So Sad Today. Her poems are surreal, grotesque and often deeply funny. It’s not actually all that surprising that someone so good at tweeting would also turn out to know their way around a poem. Broder is joined in conversation by Katherine Morgan, author of No SelfRespecting Woman. Register at powells. com. 5 pm Tuesday, Aug. 17. Free. Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
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AARON LEE
FOOD & DRINK BAR REVIEW
Smooth Skies Lolo Pass hotel has an onsite art gallery and an unsung coffee bar, but we know you’re mainly curious about the rooftop cocktails. BY AN D R E W JA N KOWSK I
@andrewjank
Conditions are favorable at hostel-style hotel Lolo Pass. Opening earlier this summer, Lolo follows in the steps of other affordable yet IKEA-stylish lodgings that have popped up in our city within the past few years. The sister owners, Lauren and Lee Gonzalez, wagered that visitors coming to Portland would spend more time out of their rooms than in them yet also appreciate the finer things in life— like a rooftop bar and a bright, open lobby with a coffee stand right next to check-in. That bet seems well-placed. Lolo’s cafe drafted a barista from the deft yet unfortunately still closed Khora Coffeehouse, so it isn’t surprising that the lattes there hit like a sneaker wave—a trait we also found in the rooftop cocktails later that evening. Without barrier walls, the lobby feels, at times, like a cavernous food court. But such a lovely food court. Coffee drinkers and diners find themselves surrounded by light woods, tropical plants, cork-topped stools, and earthtone hues—the ambience of which lends itself a little more toward morning or early afternoon than evening. It’s still a fine place to start or end a longer night, but the main attraction is obviously the fifth-floor rooftop—featuring a fire pit, a communal guitar, its own bar, and no shortage of socially distant seating arrangements. The vantage offers a unique view of downtown and the Central Eastside. Before smog from the Bootleg Fire rolled in last week, everything from Big Pink to Buckman Field was on the scenic smorgasbord. Lolo’s house cocktails trend toward sweet and fruity, as evidenced in the pineapple-infused old fashioned, the unmuddled schnapps in the Teaches of Peaches Sex on the Beach, and the pamplemousse and aperol of the metropolitan but off-cycle Gemini SZN. Meanwhile, the dining menu favors herbal and savory flavors and rotates daily. The house salad’s mustard vinaigrette didn’t overwhelm the fresh, earthy greens. The chilled burrata plate was accented and balanced by juicy apricots, marinated radicchio, and a dash of salt.
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The house fries take the form of thick yellow and purple potato chunks, topped by shredded Parmesan and fried capers—but they desperately need more than the allotted dish of mild anchovy aioli. At our dessert peak, we found the mille-feuille’s flaky crust dry on its own, but loved that its ’Gram-worthy presentation with strawberries, pistachio crumbs, and yogurt cream passes for gourmand sushi at first glance. Lolo Pass also has an art gallery, which will present regular visual art shows. However, hovering above the foliage, it’s hard to imagine what kind of visual could outdo East Burnside’s treelined, urban pastoral scene.
DRINK
Lolo Pass, 1616 E Burnside St., 503-908-3074, lolopasspdx.com. Coffee 7 am-2 pm daily, cocktails 4-10 pm daily.
SCENE QUEEN: Lolo Pass’ rooftop bar offers a unique view of downtown.
FOOD & DRINK TOP 5
FEATURE
BUZZ LIST
Publican Power
Where to drink this week.
1. Teardrop Lounge
24 Portland bars joined together to card customers for vaccination proof at the door. Who is the “Vaxx Coalition”? Well, here’s a list. BY S U Z E T T E S M I T H
suzette@wweek.com
Rum Club ™ 720 SE Sandy Blvd., 503-265-8807, rumclubpdx.com. Slingshot Lounge ™ 5532 SE Center St., 503-445-6649, slingshotlounge.com. Teardrop Lounge ™ 1015 NW Everett St., 503-445-8109, teardroplounge.com. Tomorrow’s Verse ™ 4605 NE Fremont St., Suite 103, 971-346-2198, youenjoymybeer.com. Tough Luck ™ 1771 NE Dekum St., 503-754-4188, toughluckbar.com.
Wilder ™ 5501 NE 30th Ave., 971-710-5428, wilderpdx.com. Wonderly ™ 4727 NE Fremont St., 503-288-4520, wonderlypdx.com. Yukon Tavern ™ 5819 SE Milwaukie Ave., 503-235-6352, yukontavern.com.
TOP 5
HOT PLATES Where to eat this week.
1. YāYā PDX
1451 NE Alberta St., 503-477-5555, yayapdx. com. 4-10 pm Wednesday-Sunday. Chef Steven Chin calls Cantonese barbecue his soul food, and you really feel that. The streamlined menu focuses on serving meat over rice with hot mustard, dipping sauce and pickled cucumber and carrot. It’s simple and it’s great. YāYā particularly nails the duck and char siu pork. Of all the duck I’ve sampled (and it’s been many; sorry to my avian friends), Chin’s is the most fivespice forward. The ducks he selects also have more meat on the bones than many of the others, leading to luscious full bites of bird. As Cantonese duck is served chopped and bone-in, this means a bigger and better payoff as you nibble.
2. Chicha
1314 NW Glisan St., 503-953-1933, chichapdx. com. 4-9 pm Wednesday-Sunday. A long-planned, takeout sister of Andina popped up this past May, with a menu featuring empanadas, croquettes and skewers that pay tribute to the street food of Lima and the neighboring seaside city Callao. Though Andina is reopening on Aug. 18, Chicha will remain, offering patio dining, delivery and pickup.
Tran started messing around with recipes for banh pate so—flaky pastry stuffed with peppery ground pork or vegan Impossible meat. Soon enough, Tran got it dialed in and is selling them for $25 a dozen for meat, $30 a dozen for vegan from his Instagram handle, @heychaudy. The pate so have exploded in popularity. Tran is also making different Vietnamese soups for pickup every Tuesday, available at his personal handle, @_2anh.
5. Pure Spice
2446 SE 87th Ave., 503-772-1808, purespicerestaurant.com. 9 am-8:30 pm daily. Known more for its fresh-from-the-kitchen dim sum, Pure Spice low-key holds it down in the Cantonese barbecue category as well. Pure Spice’s barbecue pork is just a shade more tender and meatier than most, and lacks the overt sweetness that is often typical in a char siu situation. Pick the menu option that lets you order the roast duck, steamed chicken (another Cantonese classic), and barbecue pork together for $22.50, and then spend some time with the rest of the menu: Grab some har gow shrimp dumplings, a scallion pancake, and a rice noodle roll with XO sauce for maximum sampling satisfaction.
A
A
3. Lottie & Zula’s
E
White Owl Social Club 1305 SE 8th Ave. 503-236-9672, whiteowlsocialclub.com.
2133 SE 11th Ave., 503-504-9448, deadshotpdx.com. 4-10 pm Wednesday-Thursday,
720 SE Sandy Blvd., 503-265-8807, rumclubpdx.com. 3 pm-midnight Thursday-Monday. The now-classic Rum Club welcomes first-daters, out-of-towners, patio smokers and especially cocktail aficionados. Rum Club is known for some of the best bartenders in town working from one of the best shelves in town—ask about the house rum blends. The bar will make you a mind-bending daiquiri or fruit cocktail such as the Peach Blended—an umbrella drink made with blended rum, fresh peaches, lime and sugar—that is as good as blended drinks get. But don’t overlook the mainstay Pedro Martínez, which mixes aged rum with maraschino, Torino vermouth and bitters, and is possibly perfect.
LE
The Garrison ™ 8773 N Lombard St., instagram.com/thegarrisonpdx.
Peter’s Bar & Grill ™ 5701 NE Fremont St., 503-460-0544, petersbarandgrill.com.
3. Deadshot
5. Rum Club
N
Double Dragon ™ 1235 SE Division St., 503-230-8340, doubledragonpdx.com.
Paymaster Lounge ™ 1020 NW 17th Ave., 503-9432780, paymasterlounge.com.
2105 N Killingsworth St., 503-894-8937, drinkinoregon.com. 3-10 pm Monday-Friday, noon-10 pm Saturday-Sunday. The flagship of ex-Mercury staffer Ezra Ace Caraeff’s ever-expanding bar empire, the focus of the Old Gold rests squarely on the immense library of international whiskeys behind the bar, but even if it were serving nothing but swill, its handsome patio would still be getting a ton of use throughout the warm months. Reopening for Phase 1, Caraeff is taking full advantage of the outdoor seating, while also expanding into the neighboring lot. He also rigged a mobile ordering system where patrons use their phones to request a finger of Buffalo Trace or a Tillamook grilled cheese.
920 E Burnside St., 503-206-6223, heylovepdx.com. 3 pm-1 am Monday-Friday, 10 am-1 am Saturday-Sunday. This cocktail lounge, located in the Jupiter Next Hotel, is a timeless tropical bar so lush and cozy it feels like a secret botanical garden. Drinkwise, you’ll want to start with the Belafonte, which tempers the syrupy sweetness of añejo rum with a housemade ginger tamarind sarsaparilla and Amari. It’s dangerously drinkable, and you’re likely to hear a track by Harry Belafonte himself booming from the stereo while you gulp it down.
O
Deadshot ™ 2133 SE 11th Ave., 503-875-0527, deadshotpdx.com.
Paydirt ™ 2724 NE Pacific St., 503-908-3217, paydirtbar.com.
2. The Old Gold
4. Hey Love
R
Creepy’s ™ 627 SE Morrison St., 503-889-0185, creepys.business.site.
The Old Gold ™ 2105 N Killingsworth St., D 503-894-8937, drinkinoregon.com.
BRIAN BURK
Bar West ™ 1221 NW 21st Ave., 503-208-2852, westportland.com.
Leisure Public House ™ 8002 N Lombard St., 503-289-7606, leisurepublichouse.com.
on | rag
Bang Bang ™ 4727 NE Fremont St., 503-287-3846, bangbangpdx.com.
Leikam Brewing ™ 5812 E Burnside St., 503-477-4743, leikambeer.com.
eD bl
Aalto ™ 3356 SE Belmont St., 503-235-604, aaltolounge.com.
Holy Ghost ™ 4107 SE 28th Ave., holyghostbar.com. (Holy Ghost is not yet open.)
ou
Last week—in response to reports of increasing Delta variant cases—small business owner-initiated COVID precautions began popping up across the city’s nightlife scene. Inspired by similar guilds in San Francisco and Seattle, several Portland bars debuted a coalition to ask their patrons for proof of vaccination at the door. Informally, they called the group the “Vaxx Coalition.” But they didn’t really mean to adopt a catchy name, since the whole point of banding together was to gain a level of anonymity—to spread out the inevitable deluge of anti-vaxx sentiment that would roll off the internet and into their inboxes, voicemail and review pages. “Online, people are taking a bruising,” Teardrop L o u n g e ow n e r D a n i e l Shoemaker says. “My fear is that I’ll be the voice for it, and I’ll draw the wrath. We all come out together and it makes each of us less of a target.” Fifteen bars put their names on the list Friday, stating they would require proof of vaccination for indoor service. The terms for outside service remain unchanged. By Monday, the list had grown to 24. Shoemaker says he’s now starting to hear from local restaurants that want to join up. As of press deadline, here are the Portland bars of the Vaxx Coalition:
Hi-Top Tavern ™ 5015 NE Fremont St., 503-206-4308, hitoptavern.com.
1015 NW Everett St., 503-445-8109, teardroplounge.com. 4-10 pm Wednesday-Saturday. Teardrop Lounge is a pioneer not just in craft cocktails—the tempest Tempest and Nightwing are both whiskey originals you can find only there—but also in COVID precautions. Spearheading a local coalition, Teardrop and a number of other local bars won’t admit anyone without proof of vaccination for the foreseeable future. Will it all make customers comfortable enough to drink inside again? Hard to say—but the cocktails remain mighty enticing.
Sunday, 4 pm-midnight Friday-Saturday. This craft cocktail bar has been hyped to the high heavens: The reason is clear after just one visit. The space is genuinely modern, and the cocktails are creative and meticulously executed. Yes, you’ll pay a premium, but Deadshot is that rare place where a $14 cocktail is worth it. Give the House Old Fashioned a try and you’re likely to agree.
120-A NE Russell St., 503-333-6923, lottieandzulas.com. 8 am-4 pm Tuesday-Saturday. Breakfast all day, lunch 10:30 am to close. Takeout and delivery only. Toro Bravo is gone, replaced by a punky sandwich window with New England roots. The heart of the Lottie & Zula’s breakfast menu are bolo levedos, or “Portuguese muffins”—something like a cross between an English muffin and a King’s Hawaiian roll, which makes Lottie & Zula’s version of a McGriddle extra satisfying.
4. Hey Chaudy
Order @heychaudy. When beloved Vietnamese karaoke bar Yen Ha on Northeast Sandy Boulevard closed in 2019, longtime manager and co-owner Anh
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$
/2 grams Golden Pineapple Pop-tops
“ONE OF THE BEST PARTY STRAINS IN OREGON” – PDX MONTHLY
LU C KY L I O N P D X . C O M NORTHEAST PORTLAND
148TH & POWELL
162ND & SANDY
7817 NE HALSEY ST PORTLAND, OR 97213
14800 SE POWELL BLVD PORTLAND, OR 97236
16148 NE SANDY BLVD PORTLAND, OR 97230
Valid 8/11/21–8/15/21. Limit (2) Golden Pineapple 2g pop-tops per customer. Sale valid while supplies last. Price does not include tax. Do not operate a vehicle or machinery under the influence of this drug. For use only by adults twenty-one years of age and older. Keep out of the reach of children.
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POTLANDER
Summertime CBD Skin Care
Give your skin a stoner makeover. BY BR I A N N A W H E E L ER
Instead of focusing on monolithic ideas of what is or is not pretty—mental health, spiritual wellness and humanist vibes are this summer’s hot new beauty demands. I enjoy performing gender as much as the next swishy be-wiggled femme, but when the pressure of performance is off, the only standards I want to appease are my own—I just want to feel supple in my own skin. Cannabinoids in skin care may be old news, but that doesn’t make contemporary cannabis lotions, potions, serums, and essences any less exciting. Summertime heat events, years of ambient wildfire smoke, and life under late-stage capitalism may be taking their toll on our faces, but we can still indulge in these ultra-effective CBD skin care formulations to protect our vulnerable countenances. Your results may vary, but considering the climate, I feel positively springy.
Blunt Skincare Moonrock Renewal Face Oil I don’t necessarily have problem skin, but as a 42-yearold mom looking to vanquish inquiries about her dull, tired-looking face, I cannot get enough of this honey-hued, full-spectrum potion. Made with a blend of oils including avocado, rosehip and prickly pear, the mild perfume is simultaneously bright and unctuous, and the feel is both substantial and sheer. This oil’s efficacy is written all over my face; after a few weeks of post-shower applications, friends of similar ages were suddenly showering me with all manner of compliments on my skin’s even tone, bouncy vibrance, and healthy glow. A few drops of Moonrock Glow Oil after a shower keeps my face comfortably moisturized all day. And as part of a more complex makeup regimen, it layers well, protecting skin from heavier products. Blunt also produces a hydrating and balancing variety of hemp CBD face oils. Get it from: bluntskincare.com
Kana Skincare Purple Rice Sleeping Mask
Frigg Wellness Attuning Face Potion
For those curious about cannabis skin care but averse to daily routines, Kana Skincare’s Purple Rice Sleeping Mask is a great low-stakes introduction to the potential of cannabinoid dermal care. When applied before bed, this mask can calm inflammation, diminish enlarged pores and even out skin texture. If anti-aging is a concern, frequent use can also potentially reduce fine lines. If you’re embracing every nook and well-earned cranny, however, a more infrequent application of this mask can be an opulent, special occasion luxury that can leave skin refreshed, hydrated and glowy. Some of us laughed too hard to erase these lines—now we just want to pamper them.
Frigg ’s Attuning Face Potion is formulated with sea buckthorn, meadowfoam, and blue chamomile extracts blended with squalane, an emollient that mimics the skin’s natural oils, acts as an antioxidant, has anti-tumor properties, and can protect your skin from carcinogens. This potion is also outfitted with not just 300 mg of CBD, but also 100 mg of CBG, another minor cannabinoid known for its effective treatment of inflammatory skin issues. For those fighting the effects of time, this oil touts anti-aging properties as well as hyperpigmentation fading and plumping of fine lines. For those less bothered by gravity’s inescapability, this potion balances oil production and calms redness, leaving behind only a healthy glow.
Get it from: kanaskincare.com
Make & Mary Face & Body Serum Yvonne Perez Emerson has been deeply involved with the city’s arts and crafts scene for nearly a decade. Make & Mary’s skin care line is the offshoot of its popular cannabis wildcrafting workshop. It has since blossomed into a brand (and brick-and-mortar space) entirely of its own. Perez Emerson’s heritage techniques are on full display in Make & Mary’s Face & Body Serum, which features a base of rose hip, jojoba, and hemp seed oil and essences of rose geranium, carrot seed, clary sage, lavender and frankincense, most of which Perez Emerson produces in house. Bonus: Visit Make & Mary’s shop in person for not just a comprehensive breakdown of the traditional herbs and techniques that make its CBD skin care products so compelling, but also a full slate of community events, both creative and care-based, organized by Perez Emerson. Get it from: Make & Mary, 2506 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-444-7608, makeandmary.com.
Get it from: getfrigg.com
Honey Pot Cocoa & Mint CBD Hand & Body Wash
Undefined Glow Elixir
The Honey Pot x Laganja Estranja suite of CBD products crossed our desk earlier this year, and we found that the hand and body wash stood out as a product worthy of permanent boudoir status. Revisiting the line and discovering the cocoa and mint variety however, cemented the sentiment. I’ve used this wash on my tender bits, my stinky pits, and even as a shampoo for my notoriously pampered natural hair, and I will continue to keep this wash in rotation. I always feel like a creamy bar of holiday chocolate after I shower with this, but for those who’d rather not smell straight-up drinkable, the Laganja collab’s bright, limonene-forward perfume feels just as luscious and relaxing on the skin and is just as multipurpose.
Undefined’s brand leans at bit more preventative than restorative, which is to say, this brand is decidedly youth-y. Its glow elixir, for example, addresses acne as well as fledgling fine lines in a citrusy serum that looks like it would be as at home on a shelf at Sephora as it would behind the counter of a new-bohemian boutique. The Glow Elixir’s formulation includes, among other familiar botanicals, moringa and kalahari melon extracts. The firming and detoxifying properties in these extracts support the serum’s 250 mg of rejuvenating, anti-inflammatory CBD extract, resulting in a serum that works as well for youthful skin as it does for aging skin. When stoners make the beauty standards, all skin types are worthy of pampering.
Get it from: honeypotcbd.com
Get it from: undefinedco.com Willamette Week AUGUST 11, 2021 wweek.com
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MUSIC J O S H S C H U LT Z
MICRO-CELEB: Ezra Chong of Rhododendron.
Punks vs. the Pandemic Venues in Portland just started requesting vaccination proof at the door. DIY house shows have been doing that for weeks. BY M OR G A N T R O P E R
@mo_troper
It’s a precarious time for live music in Portland. In an attempt to combat the highly infectious COVID-19 Delta variant, production companies around town are taking steps to virus-proof their live events. Venues and bars belonging to Portland’s newly established “Vaxx Coalition” are requiring proof of COVID-19 vaccination upon entry. Some spots, like Mississippi Studios and Revolution Hall, are going a step further, offering rapid tests at the door for patrons who cannot prove their vaccination status. At first blush, house shows seem like one of the least safe places to experience live music right now—with their stuffy, sweaty basements, and secondhand smoke-filled backyards. But the inverse might actually be true. Toward the beginning of the summer, when Portlanders started leaving their masks at home and a sense of normalcy temporarily swept the country, the underground stayed cautious. DIY shows advertising vaccination enforcement— promoted almost exclusively on Twitter and Instagram—started to crop up across the U.S., weeks before the issue entered the national discourse. The kids aren’t only alright; they’re often more responsible than adults, period. “With bars, they’re trying to make money,” Zoe Tricoche explains, outside one such house show. “I’m not trying to make money. I can put these rules in place and I won’t lose anything. If somebody goes, ‘I’m 24
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never going to go to this house again because they enforced this,’ then they’re not gonna come to the house again. I literally do not care.” Like Tricoche suggests, for “real” venues, the politics of vaccination enforcement are inextricable from the politics of making money. This puts promoters and venue owners in a terrible, lose-lose situation: If they don’t enforce proof of vaccination, they put their patrons’ safety in jeopardy and risk tarnishing their brand, but if they do enforce vaccination, they risk alienating the small, disproportionately vocal segment of their clientele who—for whatever reason— doesn’t want to get vaccinated. These concerns don’t exactly apply to house shows, though. Tricoche asks for $5 at the door, but like most DIY shows, there’s a flexible NOTAFLOF (“no one turned away for lack of funds”) policy. “It’s kind of just on principle right now,” Tricoche says. “It just makes sense. [Some people] have this punk thing, where it’s like, fuck it, do whatever. I find peoples’ safety way more important. Being punk and being heavy metal or whatever is important to an extent, but honestly, I’m going to put shit in place and abide by those rules, because people are at risk. And no matter what, people are going to be at risk, but I can at least dampen it a little bit.” Tricoche lives in this house. He’s also running the door and playing in one of the bands. He diligently checks everyone’s vaccination status—even an email confirming a vaccination appointment will suffice—and also enforces a sort of revolving capacity limit so there’s ample space for people to move around the basement. When people leave the basement in between bands’ sets, they’re essentially forsaking their spot. It’s not a perfect system, but it does feel safer
than the alternative—and it also means that people who showed up late will get to see at least some music, if they stick around long enough. Tricoche and his housemates are also handing out free bottles of water to everyone in attendance. Which is great, because two songs into first band Twistur’s set, the basement is scorching. In addition to being a paragon of postlockdown DIY shows, tonight’s bill is a veritable who’s who of rising local talent. Twistur combines shoegaze with the leaner and more timeless aspects of nu-metal; Mt. Zena’s poppy posthardcore falls somewhere between Cap’n Jazz and Wire; and Tricoche’s band, Kill Michael, is unrelenting, blown-out punk. The big name on the bill, however—and “headliner”—is Rhododendron, a dizzyingly technical, self-identified “brutal prog” band whose members’ median age is 17. Guitarist and vocalist Ezra Chong—dressed in a stressed, counterfeit T-shirt with Sonic the Hedgehog on it, alongside the names “Harry Potter” and “Obama”—has both the look and disposition of a star. He’s soft-spoken and unfailingly courteous, but he also knows how good he is. Rhododendron is among the handful of bands that took a global pandemic as a cue to speed up, not slow down. They released their debut album, Protozoan Battle Hymns, in May, and it’s one of the most compelling records to come from Portland’s heavy music scene in a long time. COVID-19 decimated the live music ecosystem, but for some up-and-coming artists, there was a silver lining. The pandemic’s leveling of the status quo has led to a democratization of social power in the music industry, taking clout away from talent buyers, publicists, Twitter-verified critics, and miscellaneous gatekeepers, and, in many instances, putting it back in the hands of the artists themselves. When a young band discovers they can accrue a fan base and sell records simply by making good music and being funny and engaging on Twitter or TikTok, it raises the question: Was the old model of relentless touring and fighting for press and opening slots at midtier venues a ripoff? Rhododendron’s local ascent is a microcosm of this phenomenon, and Chong—a bit of a niche internet micro-celebrity himself— thinks it’s tied to something else: the wider acceptance of stranger, noncommercial music that maybe would have been passed over by tastemakers in a pre-pandemic world. “I think [people looking for catharsis now] is a super big factor,” Chong says. “There’s definitely a renewed interest in heavier stuff. “Before COVID, there was more of a focus on indie rock. It’s great to see indie bands, but it’s also cool to know there’s this place for really, really weird shit. As a whole, there are a lot of weirder bands starting to come up, and that’s super cool, ’cause I’m into a lot of weird, cool stuff. That makes me sound so pretentious! On the record.”
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Editor: Andi Prewitt / Contact: aprewitt@wweek.com
GET YO UR REPS I N KARL WHINNERY
screener
MOVIES
Desperate Living (1977) The third installment of John Waters’ thematic “Trash Trilogy,” this dark comedy stars Mink Stole as a neurotic housewife on the run after her maid helps her kill her husband. The pair ends up in Mortville, a settlement filled with criminals and ruled by the evil Queen Carlotta (Edith Massey) and Princess Coo-Coo (Mary Vivian Pearce). Screens in 35 mm. Hollywood, Aug. 11.
Carnival of Souls (1962) CRITERION
Jason Lives
IN DEEP WATER: The promise of more creative kills in Jason Rising has earned its trailer tens of thousands of hits online.
A new crowdfunded, Oregon-made Friday the 13th fan film offers a fresh approach to the franchise. BY C H A N C E S O L E M - P F EI FER
@chance_s_p
WW: For a true fan film, the reception is kind of the whole ball game, right? James Sweet: Absolutely. Unfortunately, there’s so much stigma on the words “fan film.” There are so [many] backyard, low-budget things people do with a friend on the weekend. But if you can push the production value a little higher, you’ll receive support. You just don’t want to let those people down who funded your project. Your trailer has 35,000 hits. How did you amass that following? The better the production value [of ] our teasers, the bigger our fan base got. People with credibility, like Vincente DiSanti, who did a fan film called Never Hike Alone, the first high-production-value fan film for Friday the 13th that blew up came aboard. So his fan base jumped aboard our film as well. In terms of chronology, is your film supposed to fall after The Final Chapter? Part IV is one of my favorites. It came out when I was 12 years old, and I connected a lot with the Tommy Jarvis 26
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Are you catering to modern fandom by filling theatrical gaps online? The last reboot was 2009. Right now, there’s a rights battle over Friday the 13th. A lot of people feel the fan films are filling this void right now. I look at it like how Disney is handling Star Wars. There’s room for all types of media. These fan films are our love letter saying, “Hey, we want to be a part of this.” I think we’re keeping a fire burning. Was there any particular era of Jason’s look you sought to emulate? Definitely I based my Jason on Part III and Part IV, the Richard Brooker-Ted White look. But I didn’t necessarily want the Part VI zombie version. I’m a big fan of The Evil Dead as well, which is why I wanted black blood instead of red. He’s cursed; he’s dead inside. Is there an effect in the film you’re most proud of ? They were all challenging, I know that! Christina Kortum from Ravenous Studios, who’s an amazing makeup artist, did a full life cast of Jason Reynolds, one of our actors. Robert [Blanche] wanted a blunt-force trauma kill where the skull gets dislodged from the spine. I wanted to amp that up, so we did the one where Jason chops off the arm and beats [the victim] to death with the arm. That was a long, cold night but a fun effect. The fact that we were able to have some of Robert in the film meant a lot to me. Is part of the joy of making a fan film embracing a beloved formula? My editor and cinematographer Karl Whinnery says, “I don’t know why you’d do anything but a horror film if you’re making a movie. You get to play with the toys.” You just swing for the fences with it and hope it goes over. SEE IT: Jason Rising screens at Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-493-1128, hollywoodtheatre.org. 7:30 pm Friday, Aug. 13. Red carpet photo opportunity before and Q&A after the premiere. Tickets available at Eventbrite. $13 general admission, $113 VIP.
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) Harrison Ford stars as the iconic snake-fearing Indiana Jones, an archaeology professor who eschews teaching to hunt down supernatural artifacts. In this five-time Oscarwinning adventure, he competes against the Nazis to secure the mythical Ark of the Covenant, which is said to make armies invincible (as long as you don’t look inside). Academy, Aug. 13-19.
Mamma Mia! (2008) In this all-ABBA jukebox musical, the daughter (Amanda Seyfried) of a headstrong hotelier (Meryl Streep) invites three of her mom’s former lovers (Colin Firth, Stellan Skarsgård and Pierce Brosnan) to her Greek island wedding, convinced that one of them is the dad she never knew. It’s the perfect summer movie, fun-averse haters be damned! Clinton, Aug. 14.
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) WA R N E R B R O S
Though almost no one would remember them this way— the hockey mask and machete loom larger—the original installments of Friday the 13th were New Jersey movies. But if you were an Oregon horror obsessive in the ’80s, like teenager James Sweet, Jason Voorhees lurked behind every boathouse, cabin and fir tree. “Growing up a fan of Friday the 13th,” Sweet explains, “every time you’re around these [natural] areas, the only thing that goes through your head is, ‘Oh, this looks like Camp Crystal Lake.’” The visions never left, and 30 years later, Sweet directed Jason Rising, an Oregon-made fan film, premiering Friday, Aug. 13, at the Hollywood Theatre. With crowdfunded contributions to the production exceeding $25,000, Jason Rising joins a recent string of Friday the 13th fan outings stoking this specific slasher cult. In advance of Friday’s screening, WW talked with Sweet about designing his ideal Jason, franchise chronology, and the kill his Jason Rising co-creator, the late Oregon actor Robert Blanche, always dreamed of.
(Corey Feldman) character because he was around my age. I wanted that connection [to Part IV] with Jason Rising. Because it’s Friday the 13th, none of the timelines ever made sense, but I wanted it to feel like if you took Friday the 13th today and made a series out of it, this could work as a pilot.
In this hugely influential indie horror film, a woman miraculously stumbles out of a deadly car crash, unable to recollect how she survived. She soon moves to a new town where she’s followed by a strange spectral man and becomes mysteriously drawn to an abandoned carnival. Here she must face her spiritual demons. Academy, Aug. 11-12.
Considered one of the best action films of all time, this post-apocalyptic masterpiece from visionary George Miller follows drifter Max Rockatansky (Tom Hardy) as he meets and helps Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron), a woman on a quest to overthrow the desert’s water-hoarding tyrannical ruler, Immortan Joe. Clinton, Aug. 16.
ALSO PLAYING: Academy: Labyrinth (1986), Aug. 11-12. The Wizard of Oz (1939), Aug. 13-19. Clinton: Supa Modo (2018), Aug. 11. The Goonies (1985), Aug. 12. But I’m a Cheerleader (1999), Aug. 12. El Topo (1971), Aug. 13. The Holy Mountain (1975), Aug. 13. Chicken Run (2000), Aug. 14. Hollywood: Miracle Mile (1988) and Cherry 2000 (1987), Aug. 14. Death Race 2000 (1975), Aug. 17. Rooftop Cinema at Lloyd Center: The Dark Crystal (1982), Aug. 15.
MOVIES HBO
NOW PLAYING TOP PICK OF THE WEEK
Small Town News: KPVM Pahrump A charming docuseries about an independent news station 60 long miles west of Las Vegas might seem the ultimate slice-oflife piece. Nothing seismic happens at KPVM. The station struggles to raise money and retain talent. It reports on petty desert crimes and livestock interest stories. Its founder, Vern Van Winkle, dreams of getting an antenna that will allow the broadcast to reach Vegas. But the mundanity of Small Town News belies its existence at an event horizon of creative nonfiction, reality television and 25 years of mockumentary comedy. Some of the show’s riotous yet eerie highlights depict station employees giving self-deluded pep talks worthy of Michael Scott or revealing their secret soft rock à la David Brent. The new weatherman in Pahrump could rival Fred Willard in any Christopher Guest outing for witless mugging. What’s more, the creators edit and score the show to play more like Waiting for Guffman than the actual documentary it purports to be. Two episodes in, that certainly renders Small Town News a gold mine of tomfoolery, but it’s never going to feel totally right finessing human beings into caricature, no matter how lucky the find or how funny the form. NR. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. HBO, HBO Max.
OUR KEY
: T H I S M O V I E I S E XC E L L E N T, O N E O F T H E B E S T O F T H E Y E A R. : T H I S M O V I E I S G O O D. W E R E C O M M E N D YO U WATC H I T. : T H I S M O V I E I S E N T E R TA I N I N G B U T F L AW E D. : THIS MOVIE IS A STEAMING PILE.
ALSO PLAYING The Green Knight
With A Ghost Story, director David Lowery demonstrated he was a master of dreamy wonderment. Yet that film never hinted he was capable of creating The Green Knight, a romantic fantasy so overwhelming it leaves you shivering in awe of cinema’s possibilities. Dev Patel stars as Sir Gawain, a callow adventurer who must repay a debt to his nemesis, the Green Knight (Ralph Ineson). As their final confrontation looms, Gawain wanders, encountering giants, a talking fox and a noblewoman (Alicia Vikander) who challenges his sexual timidity. Vikander also plays Essel, a sex worker with whom Gawain is in love, creating the impression that a single soul is guiding his journey in different forms. All of this strangeness makes perfect sense in Lowery’s universe, which modernizes the 14th century epic poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. While Gawain hungers for greatness, Essel asks him, “Why is goodness not enough?” The Green Knight matters, but not as much as Gawain’s acts of compassion, like helping a violated spirit (Erin Kellyman) find peace. It is possible to simply bask in the film’s surreal visions—like a beautifully haunting shot of Gawain and the fox walking along a ridge at night— but the wisest moviegoers will also cheer its rejection of hollow patriarchal glories and embrace its conviction that goodness is more than enough. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, Cinema 21, Cinemagic, City Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Hollywood, Laurelhurst, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Studio One, Tigard.
Stillwater
Bill Baker (Matt Damon) has a new life. After a career working on oil rigs, he has moved to Marseilles, started dating an actress named Virginie (Camille Cottin) and become a father to her daughter, Maya (Lilou Siauvaud). Yet Bill didn’t plan to forge a new family. He left his home in Stillwater, Okla., because his daughter, Allison (Abigail Breslin), was convicted of murdering her college roommate and has been languishing in a French prison for five years. While a wimpier film would have turned Bill’s dogged quest to prove Allison’s innocence into a righteous tale of a hometown hero battling foreign evils, Stillwater’s sharp emotional claws shred Bill’s moral authority and the myth of American exceptionalism. In ways both shocking and right, director Tom McCarthy (Spotlight, The Station Agent) reinvents the story seemingly in real time. Mystery and melodrama give way to romance, which gives way to horrific vigilantism and a reckoning with the anguish and delusions of America’s white working class. Late in the film, Bill stares at Stillwater and claims that he no longer recognizes it, but the truth is that he also no longer recognizes himself. Like us, he’s seen too much. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, Cinema 99, City Center, Clackamas Town Center, Cornelius, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Sherwood, Studio One.
Free Guy
The premise of Free Guy is so smart it almost makes you forget the movie is stupid. In a video game called Free City, a background character (Ryan Reynolds) gains sentience and teams up with Molotov Girl, the avatar of a gifted game
designer (Jodie Comer) searching for dirt on Antoine (Taika Waititi), the shameless, swaggering mogul behind Free City. The film is basically a comedic riff on The Truman Show and Ready Player One, and for a while, it’s clever fun. Director Shawn Levy (Night at the Museum) is an action ace—a garage battle that pits knife against steering wheel is a thing of kinetic beauty—and Comer relishes Molotov Girl’s goofy affections, including her artfully disheveled dark hair and faux-Emily Blunt accent. The movie is bursting with good vibes, but they get crushed by the climax: a bland brawl that bluntly reminds viewers they’re watching a Disney product. It’s sad to see storytelling shoved aside in favor of obnoxious cross-promotional gimmicks like Reynolds wielding a lightsaber and carrying Captain America’s shield. It’s even sadder that next to abysmal recent Disney films like Black Widow and Jungle Cruise, Free Guy looks like art. PG-13. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Clackamas Town Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Tigard
Space Jam: A New Legacy
Early in Space Jam: A New Legacy, two marvelously smarmy Warner Bros. executives (Sarah Silverman and Steven Yeun) pitch a galaxy of LeBron James crossover projects, including LeBron v Batman and LeBron of Thrones. LeBron (who plays himself) calls the concept one of the top five worst ideas he’s ever heard, but the idea is essentially the plot of A New Legacy, a shameless commercial for Warner Bros. properties that barely keeps up the pretense of being a movie. If the film were merely the story of LeBron and his son Dom (Cedric Joe) being sucked into the so-called Warner Bros. ServerVerse to play basketball with the Looney Tunes, it might have gotten by on goofy charm, but director Malcolm D. Lee (Girls Trip) inserts LeBron into The Matrix, Mad Max: Fury Road and even Casablanca. By
the time LeBron is playing basketball in front of Catwoman, Pennywise and the Night King, it’s clear that the film is nothing more than a product engineered to sell other products. Like too many mainstream movies, it adheres to the golden rule of the Ready Player One school of filmmaking—bludgeon your audience with references until they beg for mercy. PG. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, Clackamas Town Center, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, HBO Max, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Sherwood, Tigard, Vancouver Plaza.
The Suicide Squad
In one of the most memorable scenes in The Suicide Squad, a giant shark with the voice of Sylvester Stallone is repeatedly bitten by a school of deceptively cute-looking fish. Why? Because the film was directed by James Gunn (Guardians of the Galaxy), who likes to blend sweetness and savagery until you can barely tell the difference. The Suicide Squad directs his gruesome imagination toward Task Force X, a gaggle of superpowered convicts who invade a fictional Latin American nation called Corto Maltese in exchange for reduced prison sentences. The cast—which includes Idris Elba, Viola Davis, Margot Robbie and John Cena—is charismatic, but it would take more than good acting to redeem Gunn’s warped world. While the film depicts the murder of a main character as a tragedy, it plays a boomerang slicing an anonymous soldier’s head in half as a joke, suggesting that Gunn thinks violence is funny as long as it happens to other people. It’s a disturbing perspective, especially since it goes hand in hand with the film’s absurd conviction that Task Force X’s brutal brand of American interventionism could actually bring democracy to Corto Maltese. The Suicide Squad may be based on a DC comic book, but its ideal audience isn’t your average superhero fan. It’s George W. Bush. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Laurelhurst, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, St. Johns
Twin Cinemas, Studio One, Tigard, Wunderland Milwaukie.
Jungle Cruise Eighteen years ago, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl took the unholy idea of a film adaptation of a Disneyland ride and slathered it with subversiveness and eyeliner. Yet instead of admitting that Black Pearl was a corporate product that had personality almost by accident, the House of Mouse unleashed Haunted Mansion, four Pirates sequels and now Jungle Cruise, a bludgeoning voyage from Jaume Collett-Serra, director of four Liam Neeson action movies. Dwayne Johnson stars as Frank Wolff, a skipper helping two British explorers (Emily Blunt and Jack Whitehall) search the Amazon for magic flower petals called the Tears of the Moon during World War I. The story is absurd, but it isn’t messy enough for Jungle Cruise to be a batshit B-movie. Collett-Serra mechanically serves up stingy doses of action, humor and romance—watching his film is like watching an alien try to create a summer blockbuster based on a checklist. Jungle Cruise may be a movie, but it isn’t cinema. It’s a Disney film that wasn’t made by Lucasfilm, Marvel or Pixar, which is another way of saying it’s from a studio currently better at buying dreams than creating its own. PG-13. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bagdad, Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Disney+, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, St. Johns Theater & Pub, St. Johns Twin Cinemas, Studio One, Tigard, Wunderland Beaverton, Wunderland Milwaukie.
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PERFORMANCE
Editor: Andi Prewitt | Contact: aprewitt@wweek.com D AV I D K I N D E R
MUSIC Written by: Daniel Bromfield | @bromf3
Now Hear This
Listening recommendations from the past, present, Portland and the periphery. SOMETHING OLD
IN THE RED: Profile Theatre’s latest production focuses on sex workers trying to make ends meet as the Reagan era begins.
The Professionals
Five aging sex workers make a last stand in The Oldest Profession. BY BE N N E T T C A M P B E L L FE RGUS O N
The title of Paula Vogel’s The Oldest Profession has two meanings. It refers to the saying that prostitution is the world’s oldest profession—originated by Rudyard Kipling—but also to the aging of its characters. The play has no time for titillating fantasies. It is more interested in the ravages of time—and how they diminish the minds, bodies and wallets of its characters. In other words, audiences who go to see Profile Theatre’s production of The Oldest Profession expecting provocative sex scenes will be disappointed. Everyone else, however, will have the opportunity to savor the play’s moving, haunting and grimly witty depiction of women whose friendships are tested by dark, capitalistic forces. The Oldest Profession, directed by Jamie M. Rea, begins in the waning days of President Jimmy Carter’s first and final term, which is no accident. The five sex workers who are the focus of the play—Vera (JoAnn Johnson), Edna (Amalia Alarcón Morris), Lillian (Jane Bement Geesman), Ursula (Elizabeth Elias Huffman) and Mae (Brenda Phillips)—are not just characters. They are the embodiment of the story of a nation. Vera, Edna, Lillian and Ursula work for Mae, who is technically a madame but seems more like a surrogate mother. She is both taskmaster and guardian—a professional who is also a protector. She is the first person the others should turn to for advice and the second of them to vanish, part of a series of disappearances that Vogel explains in mostly vague terms. Vogel has never been afraid to write frank, funny dialogue about sex, so it is no surprise that The Oldest Profession is packed with zingers, like Vera’s declaration that sex work can be a patriotic duty. Yet Vogel refuses to let the play become a cute comedy for playgoers looking for crude laughs. The soul of her creation is both its humor and its meditation on what it is like when democracy devolves into tyranny. After Mae succumbs to memory loss, Ursula takes her place and embraces the role of the domineering boss with relish. She overschedules her employees, reduces their 28
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lunch breaks, and uses their money to double down on a dubious investment scheme—an act of cruel incompetence that leaves the play’s already poor characters even more impoverished than before. The Oldest Profession was first published in 2005, but it does not feel like a product of the Bush era. It is arguably about the transition from Carter to Ronald Reagan, which is symbolized by the way the quietly virtuous leadership of Mae gives way to the loudly performative leadership of Ursula. The play is Vogel’s way of reminding us that a business can be a country unto itself—and that a country can only be as democratic as its economy allows it to be. Profile is performing The Oldest Profession at Old Moody Stages in the Barge Building—a massive, open-ended arena on the South Waterfront on Zidell family property—and it is a place where Vogel’s characters seem thoroughly at home. The rough and rugged space suits The Oldest Profession, which would not have made sense in a slick or modernist venue where women like Mae and Ursula probably would not be welcome. While the Barge Building is a character in its own right, it does not distract from the play’s actual characters. The actors believably banter, bicker and wage emotional wars with apparent ease—especially Johnson and Alarcón Morris, who are onstage the longest. They lean into the physical transformations of their characters, stiffening their muscles and bending their backs as Vera and Edna crumble under the weight of a job they can barely do and cannot afford to quit. There is tangible physical and emotional agony in their performances—and also immense joy, which manifests in a wonderful scene where they press their cheeks together. It is interesting that in a play about characters who spend their lives serving men, the greatest intimacy is between two women. Therein lies the beauty of The Oldest Profession—it confronts the evils of patriarchalism, yet keeps them offstage where they belong. That is not just a clever storytelling strategy. That is justice. SEE IT: The Oldest Profession plays at Old Moody Stages’ Barge Building at Zidell Yards, 3121 S Moody Ave., 503-2420080, profiletheatre.org. Through Aug. 15. $40.
Before Agalloch and Wolves in the Throne Room spun the mossy majesty of the Cascadian wilderness into atmospheric metal epics, the Norwegian high schoolers in Ulver were composing spine-tingling music about the compulsion to slink off into the forest and abandon your senses. 1995’s Bergtatt is ground zero for nature-themed folk metal, and though it’s not always “heavy,” it’s so wild and untamed that it might just tempt you to get lost in the woods yourself. SOMETHING NEW Dām-Funk emerged in the 2000s with an ambitious vision for the electro-funk of his ’80s youth: music that evoked the vastness of the sky and the universe even as its underlying groove got into your bones. Above the Fray is the 50-yearold Angeleno’s most romantic album yet. Its synth leads seem to spiral into the sky, evoking a universe far above the turmoil of this one, where dragons fly and the funk is endless. SOMETHING LOCAL Com Postables 3: PPS Lunches is local beatmaker Spinitch’s tribute to the questionable meals he horked down as a student in Portland’s public school system. Appropriately, these are some of the darkest and dankest beats he’s dished up yet, with drums that clank and clatter like vintage trip-hop. All proceeds go to the local, POC-run Black Futures Farm; may their produce be made into a better meal than the ones eulogized here. SOMETHING ASKEW London musician Flora Yin-Wong’s travels around the world provided the raw material for last year’s Holy Palm, an hour-plus soft-collage epic that incorporates field recordings from Bali to Buenos Aires. The main attraction is the two 15-minute “Loci” tracks at the end, which sound like real-time glimpses of Yin-Wong’s memories and make a strong case for “Voice Memos” as the best thing Apple’s contributed to the world.
JONESIN’
by Matt Jones
"Exchanging Letters"--a different kind of letter-change puzzle.
Week of August 19
©2021 Rob Brezsny
ARIES (March 21-April 19) A blogger who calls herself TheSaddestChorusGirlInTheWorld writes, "Having sex with someone is a big deal and involves a ton of vulnerability. And I think it's troubling and gross and unhealthy and, yes, dangerous that we pretend otherwise and encourage people to 'be mature' by compartmentalizing or completely eliminating their deeper emotions from their sexuality. And even worse, any other view is dismissed as prudish and invalid and unenlightened and restrictive." You may agree with everything TheSaddestChorusGirl says here. But if you haven't arrived at her conclusions, now is a good time to meditate on them. Why? Because your assignment in the coming weeks is to deepen and refine your relationship with your sexuality. Be extra reverent about your sensual longings. Ensure that your erotic activities serve your highest ideals and noblest goals.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20) The popular American TV sitcom 30 Rock produced 138 episodes in seven seasons. At the height of its success, it crammed an average of 9.57 jokes into every minute. Its comic richness derived in large part from multi-talented Taurus star Tina Fey, who created the show and played one of its main characters. She was also a writer and executive producer. I propose we make her your role model in the coming weeks. According to my projections, you're entering a charismatic, ebullient, and creative phase of your astrological cycle. It's time to be generous to the parts of your life that need big happy doses of release and liberation.
GEMINI (May 21-June20)
ACROSS 1 Is perfectly snug 5 "_ _ _ and the Tramp" 9 Barroom battle 14 Home of the Jazz 15 Presque Isle's lake 16 Lofty nest 17 A short and unsatisfying dating show (from an ITV/ CBS reality dating show)? 20 Word after social or mixed 21 Luggage on a winter vacation, maybe 22 Uranus, for instance
53 "Doctor Who" broadcaster
23 "Livin' La Vida _ _ _"
56 Oscar-nominated composer Danny
25 Listed on a program
58 Landing site 59 Dairy product that hides facts under the lids (from a thicker variety of a dairy product)? 64 Got down, perhaps 65 Remove from the schedule 66 Those things, to Tomas 67 Sets up a vendor booth 68 "I cannot tell _ _ _"
24 "Aladdin" monkey
69 "Sabrina, the Teenage Witch" actress Caroline
26 Cannes entertainment
DOWN
27 "I think I know this one!" 28 English-speaking country of Central America 31 Jerk-faced jerk
1 It gets petted 2 Suburban suffix 3 Mausoleum built by Shah Jahan
24 Country on the Adriatic 29 Branch of philosophy 30 Long swimmers 33 Cage piece 34 Compliment 35 Quieter "Quiet" 39 Photo touch-up tool 40 Bacon hunk 41 "Match Game" host Baldwin 43 Le Havre's river 44 Do an old printmaker's job 45 Early Kevin Smith movie 46 Cosmetician Curtis 47 French engineer Gustave 51 One of the five senses 54 "Ni _ _ _, Kai-Lan" (Nickelodeon cartoon)
32 Mixtures that create purple (from a 1999 high school football movie)?
4 Martin of "The West Wing" 5 #1 Beatles tune of 1970
55 "The _ _ _ Sanction" (Clint Eastwood film)
36 Actress Shire of "Rocky"
6 Pavarotti specialty
57 The A in STEAM
37 Rogue computer in "2001"
7 God, in Italy
58 "Ice Road Truckers" truck
8 Tokyo currency
60 Magic org.
38 _ _ _ apso (small terrier)
9 Enjoy the beach (if you don't burn easily)
61 _ _ _-de-sac
42 Mount where transactions take place (from a 1999 horror video game-turned-movie)? 45 Revolutionary Guevara
10 Archaeological find 11 "Lawrence of _ _ _" (1962 epic)
48 Pick
12 Grammy-winning gospel singer CeCe
49 Singer Corinne Bailey ___
13 Cliff protrusions
50 Aloha garlands 52 "Life _ _ _ Highway"
18 AB followers 19 Trooper maker
62 Sturgeon eggs 63 Agcy. at a gate
last week’s answers
I got an email from a Gemini reader named Jaylah. She wrote, "Hi, not sure if you remember me, but in our past lives, you and I used to write sacred cuneiform texts on clay tablets while sitting across from each other in a cave in Mesopotamia 4,910 years ago. Your name was Nabu. Mine was Tashmetu. I was always a little jealous because you earned more money than I, but it didn't get in the way of our friendship. Anyway, if you ever want to catch up about the old days, give me a holler." I loved receiving this inquiry from a soul I may have known in a previous incarnation. And what she did by reaching out to me happens to be the perfect type of activity for you Geminis right now. Secrets of your history may be more available than usual. The past may have new stories to tell. A resource from yesteryear could prove valuable in the future.
CANCER (June 21-July 22) Cancerian-born Franz Kafka was an interesting writer and a master of language. But even for him, it could be a challenge to convey what he really meant. He said, "I am constantly trying to communicate something incommunicable, to explain something inexplicable, to tell about something I only feel in my bones and which can only be experienced in those bones." Now here's the good news, as far as you're concerned, Cancerian: I suspect that in the coming weeks, you will have more power than usual to do exactly what Kafka aspired to do. You will be able to summon extra ease and grace in expressing your truths. I invite you to be a connoisseur of deep conversations.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) "If we wait until we are ready, we will be waiting for the rest of our lives," declared novelist Lemony Snicket. This is good advice for you to heed right now. I really hope you avoid the temptation to wait around for the perfect moment before you begin. In my vision of your best approach, you will dive into the future without trying to have all your plans finalized and all your assets gathered. I expect you will acquire the rest of what you need once the process is underway.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) Author Katherine Mansfield once told her friend Virginia Woolf, "You put me in touch with my own soul." I'm sorry Mansfield didn't previously have that precious connection, but I'm elated that Woolf helped her make it. In the coming weeks, I expect you will encounter an abundance of influences like Woolf: people and animals and places and
experiences that can bring you into more intimate contact with your soul. I hope you take full advantage.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22) At the age of 70, Libran novelist Magda Szabó mused, "I know now, what I didn't then, that affection can't always be expressed in calm, orderly, articulate ways; and that one cannot prescribe the form it should take for anyone else." In that spirit, Libra, and in accordance with astrological omens, I authorize you to express affection in lively, unruly, demonstrative ways. Give yourself permission to be playfully imaginative, exuberantly revelatory, and vivaciously animated as you show the people and animals you cherish the nature of your feelings for them.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21) Do you Scorpios lie to yourselves more than the other signs lie to themselves? Are you especially prone to undermine yourselves through self-deception? I don't think so. However, you might be among the signs most likely to mislead or beguile other people. (But here's a caveat: On some occasions, your trickery is in a good cause, because it serves the needs of the many, not just yourself.) In any case, dear Scorpio, I will ask you to minimize all such behavior during the next five weeks. I think your success will depend on you being exceptionally honest and genuine—both to yourself and to others.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) "I like being broken," says Sagittarius actor Jamie Campbell Bower. "It means I can have chocolate for breakfast." I guess that when he feels down, he gives himself special permission to enjoy extra treats and privileges. According to my assessment of the astrological omens, you now have the right to give yourself similar permission—even though I don't expect you'll be broken or feeling down. Think of it as a reward for the brave work you've been doing lately. Enjoy this chocolatey grace period!
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972) was a Jewish theologian born under the sign of Capricorn. He wrote, "Indifference to the sublime wonder of living is the root of sin." That's a different definition of sin from what we're used to! To be a moral person, Heschel believed, you must be in "radical amazement" about the glories of creation. I hope you will cultivate such an attitude in the coming weeks, Capricorn. It would be a mistake for you to numbly take things for granted. I dare you to cultivate as much awe, reverence, and adoration as you can muster.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) A blogger who calls herself Hopeful Melancholy wrote a message to her lover. She said, "My favorite sexual position is the one where you work on your paintings and I work on my book, but we're in the same room and occasionally smile at each other." You might want to consider trying experiments comparable to that one in the coming weeks, Aquarius. The time will be fertile for you and your dear allies to work side-by-side; to cheer each other on and lift each other up; to explore new ways of cultivating companionship and caring for each other.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) Dick Dudley was a 17th-century swindler. Among his many victims was the Pope. Dudley offered an item for sale that he claimed was a divine relic: a piece of the beard of St. Peter, founder of the Roman Catholic Church. The Pope paid Dudley a small fortune for the treasure, and kissed it copiously. Only later did the full story emerge: The so-called beard was in fact a sex worker's pubic wig. I hope you don't get involved in switcheroos like that anytime soon, Pisces. Make sure that the goods or services you're receiving—and offering, for that matter—are exactly what they're supposed to be.
HOMEWORK: Describe what you're ever so thankful for. Newsletter@FreeWillAstrology.com
22 Put on Snapchat, say Check out Rob Brezsny’s Expanded Weekly Audio Horoscopes & Daily Text Message Horoscopes
©2021 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 #JNZ990.
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SPOTLIGHT ARTIST JENNIFER TAFT instagram @pandemicducknews twitter @DuckPandemic I am a Vermonter import to Oregon who enjoys politics in ducks
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