NEWS: Cheer Up, Portland! P. 9 FOOD: A Red-Sauce Roundup. P. 30 THEATER: Curious Incidents. P. 34
“THERE’S A SPECIAL KIND OF PAIN WATCHING A STANDUP ON ZOOM.” P. 32 WWEEK.COM
VOL 48/06 12.08.2021
WILLAMETTE WEEK PORTLAND’S NEWSWEEKLY
A VERY KATE BROWN
C hristmas ETT
E E WE
K’S
T F I G DE I GU
W
AM ILL
2021
E 21 PAG
Oregonians are shunning America’s least popular governor. Is she really so bad? BY RACHEL MONAHAN AND NIGEL JAQUISS
PAGE 13
Tips to celebrate the holidays safely The holidays are a time of celebration. With vaccinations and boosters now readily available, the risk of infection is different for everyone. If you and the people you see this holiday season are all fully vaccinated, your risks will be lower. But some vaccinated people still get sick with COVID-19. So here are some ways to stay safe this holiday season, no matter who you visit with.
Gathering with friends and family Get vaccinated (or a booster if eligible) to protect yourself and those around you. It’s okay to ask if others are vaccinated before getting together with people you don’t live with. You can choose to stay home or find other ways to connect if you feel nervous. Wear a mask when indoors with others and try to stay 6 feet apart. Avoid poorly ventilated spaces, especially when in a crowd.
Travel Only travel once you are fully vaccinated (2 weeks after second dose of Pfizer or Moderna vaccine or single dose of Johnson & Johnson vaccine). Wear a mask (everyone 2 and older) on public transportation and while in airports and bus/train stations. Wash your hands often and stay 6 feet apart from others. Get tested 1-3 days before your trip if traveling unvaccinated, and avoid gathering in crowds before and during travel.
Keep the air flowing by opening windows or running a fan or air purifier if possible. Get tested if you have symptoms of COVID-19 or have been in close contact with someone who has COVID-19. Stay home if you’re feeling sick or unwell, and don’t host any gatherings.
Eating/drinking in a group Wash your hands often.
Underlying medical conditions or weakened immune systems Take extra care if you have an underlying medical condition that puts you at higher risk of serious illness from COVID-19 or if you take medications that weaken your immune system. Wear a mask that fits snugly over your nose and mouth whenever you’re around people, even if you’re fully vaccinated and have had a booster.
Wear a mask when not eating/drinking. Prepare your own plate and drinks. Stay 6 feet from each other if you can.
2
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
www.SafeStrongOregon.org We hope you’ll stay safe and healthy this holiday season. Call 211, your local pharmacy or doctor’s office, or visit GetVaccinated.Oregon.gov to find your vaccine.
FINDINGS CNN FILMS
CITIZEN ASHE, PAGE 36
WHAT WE LEARNED FROM READING THIS WEEK’S PAPER VOL. 48, ISSUE 6 The Portland City Council may consider a foie gras ban in 2022. 5 Portsmouth residents want their indoor pool back. 6 Federal justice officials want to give Portland police $400,000 to surf the dark web. 7
Dec. 3 was the last Bandcamp Friday. 28
The Astoria Food Hub isn’t open for business, but this weekend it’ll let you take a peek. 29 You can’t yet ski at Mt. Hood Meadows, but you can drink pFriem beers there. 29
The Oregonian’s new positive-news brand changed its name after learning an Instagram account had already claimed “This is Oregon.” 9
Portland’s Italian restaurants all seem to serve dinner around 4 to 9 pm. 30
Fifteen teachers skipped class in one day at George Middle School. 11
Anne Zander and Phil Schallberger came up with their show Zäanderberger! over Facebook Messenger.
Gov. Kate Brown says The Oregonian and WW “peed all over me” for her COVID-19 policies. 14 A bumper sticker says Bigfoot hates Kate Brown. 16 The Dickens Carolers wander the streets of Portland in Old English costumes, singing four-part harmonies. 18
32 Nomsternailz is a local, cannabis-friendly, mobile nail salon that will massage your cuticles with CBD oil. 33
The Stamper house, built by Universal Studios 50 years ago, stands in Kernville to this day. 35
ON THE COVER:
OUR MOST TRAFFICKED STORY ONLINE THIS WEEK:
A Very Kate Brown Christmas, illustration by Brandon Hrycyk.
Ridwell is unnerving Portland trash haulers.
MASTHEAD EDITOR & PUBLISHER
Mark Zusman
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
3
DIALOGUE
• •••• • • • •
TA R E B A LRO S ER E T A •••• E H T DEC 8 THRU
Last week, WW explored how a Seattle-based startup called Ridwell incurred the wrath of Portland trash haulers by placing small white boxes on porches across Portland (“Who’s Afraid of a Ridwell Box?” Dec. 1, 2021). For $12 to $16 a month, Ridwell collects hard-to-recycle junk like light bulbs and plastic wrap, and pledges to send the products to companies that can reuse or recycle them. Haulers, who until now have enjoyed a monopoly on trash, complain that Ridwell is an unregulated interloper that only provides its service to the few who can afford the extra fee. Here’s what our readers had to say.
DEC 11
Beatles/circus mashup
WHITE ALBUM X-MAS with The NowHere Band
+ Rose City Circus one day, two shows!
DEC 12
it’s a
TONY STARLIGHT Christmas
MAGICAL STRING CELTIC YULETIDE 3 Leg Torso presents
DEC 18 DEC 19
THE ELVES OF FROSTLÄND
featuring
Cassandra Lewis & friends
HOLIDAY SPECIAL DEC 30
THE LOVE BALL
with Saloon Ensemble + Pink Lady’s “Cat’s Meow” Burlesque
an aerial celebration of Pink Floyd
MICHAEL NAMKUNG
OLDE TIMEY BUMP N’ GRINDEY
NYE party
Liberté Par La Musique JAN 8
GRAMMY FOXX’S
DEC 17
Good Pain: The Art of Being Hurt
JAN 14+15
DARK SIDE
a piece for assorted lunatics feat. LOVE GIGANTIC
33rd Annual
WINTERFOLK a benefit for JOIN PDX FEB 10
FEB 12+13
David Archuleta
OK, ALL RIGHT TOUR 2022
UPCOMING SHOWS
•••••••••••••
2/22 • 2022 BIAMP PDX JAZZ FESTIVAL - THE COOKERS 2/23 • CARSIE BLANTON 2/26 • 2022 BIAMP PDX JAZZ FESTIVAL - LAKECIA BENJAMIN
•••••
albertarosetheatre.com
3000 NE Alberta • 503.764.4131 4
county engage in performative gestures while the citizens struggle with real broken infra-
Dr. Know
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 MARTY SMITH @martysmithxxx
With all the talk about what to do with Lloyd Center’s 23 acres, no one has mentioned what used to be there. Houses for low-income people surrounding a Peanuts-style frozen pond where kids used to skate, I assume? —Jason W. VES
Lloyd executed his masterstroke: He died. Fortunately for you, me and Tonya Harding, his kids picked up the torch, and Lloyd Center opened in 1960. Unfortunately for my anti-capitalist narrative, though, nothing very big had to be knocked down except, you know, that one large building I mentioned earlier. What was that building? Jesus, I thought I you’d never ask. It seems to have been CH R A D an apartment block owned by J.E. N I would love to tell you that the A Bennett, one of only two Portland greed-crazed capitalists behind city commissioners ever to be Lloyd Center cruelly demolished recalled by voters. The recall some precious, irreplaceable petition described him as “disthing to make room for it—the courteous, abusive, uncouth, last known habitat of the ivo[and] insulting…toward ry-billed woodpecker, maybe, respectable citizens.” or the original Satyricon. The Insulting how? Well, Bennett The plot of land that now truth is more prosaic: It was holds Lloyd Center Mall, was a crusading teetotaler mostly a bunch of vacant lots. as seen in 1947. who wanted to prohibit pinball, An aerial view of the area from bowling and pool in taverns. (He 1947 shows just half a dozen buildalso wanted to prohibit taverns.) He ings, only one of them large, scattered advocated making Oregon a dry state, and over the entire 18-square-block site. How could at one point tried to have the Oregon Liquor such a desirable parcel remain undeveloped Control Commission indicted by a grand jury for so long? Mainly because of a California oil for granting liquor licenses in Portland without tycoon turned Portland real estate speculator consulting the city. named Ralph B. Lloyd. So yeah, that guy’s building got torn down. Lloyd had been dreaming of an eastside He was probably well paid for it, but I like commercial hub since 1905. He began acquiring to imagine he dropped all the money into a land in the area as a young man, before he’d cement mixer when a bulldozer ran over his even made his millions—though getting rich foot. A man can dream. certainly sped up the process. Finally, in 1953, L
FEB 5
MICHAEL G. SHAW, VIA FACEBOOK: “Again, the city and
on Ridwell itself, but it was kinda creepy how the boxes all appeared at once. Like how alien invaders took the form of bowling balls in [Clifford] Simak’s They Walked Like Men.”
T
cozy classics
GREAZYSTEAK, VIA REDDIT:
“I love the idea of this, but I don’t go through enough things to pay the $14 (on top of the $65 or whatever two months of garbage is) and I am cheap. I do have a collection of light bulbs I need to drop off and I have a giant box that is full of Styrofoam that I am going to drop off
BENJAMIN EMERSON, VIA FACEBOOK: “No opinion
R
JAN 22
replicas of Alpenrose milk boxes. I don’t understand how anyone could possibly regulate who you give your garbage to. What’s the difference between this and letting people cruise neighborhoods rooting through recycle bins? This will be interesting to watch.”
PO
Booklover’s Burlesque
“If people are willing to pay for the service, let Ridwell provide the service. Sounds like America to me.”
I don’t understand is who is throwing out so many batteries and clamshell packages that makes $14 a month a worthwhile expense? Just save them up and every six months or so make a trip out to Airport Way and drop it off. Sure, you might spend an extra $5 in gas, but you’d save $84 in monthly fees.”
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
OF
music, storytelling + Irish step-dancing
SINCE 1629, VIA WWEEK. COM: “Those boxes look like
MR LOGIC, VIA WWEEK.COM:
DUSTIN DDRAIG, VIA WWEEK.COM: “The one thing
CITY
DEC 15
at that place in Tigard if they still are taking Styrofoam. “I wish we had few central spots we could drop off these things.”
TRIARI, VIA WWEEK.COM:
“Ridwell is more of a mental health service than trash hauler. For a mere $14 a month you can feel guilt-free about your conspicuous consumption.”
structure. “Now the vulture capitalists are circling the rotting corpse of our recycling infrastructure. The haulers are pantomiming, ‘Oh no, they’re going to eat us.’ Yep. That is exactly what they’ll do if allowed. “Failure to govern and invest in infrastructure is an incentive to private monopolists.”
after almost a half-century of biding his time and slowly and carefully amassing property,
Questions? Send them to dr.know@wweek.com.
MURMURS J U S T I N K AT I G B A K
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Mon-Sat 10-6pm Sunday 11-5pm
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Tired of cereal? We'll make you some eggs! SEN. JAMES MANNING CITY COUNCIL MAY MULL FOIE GRAS BAN: City Commissioners Carmen Rubio and Mingus Mapps have expressed interest in bringing a foie gras ban before the Portland City Council sometime in the spring, they tell WW. Foie gras is made of fatty duck or goose liver enlarged by force-feeding the bird, a procedure animal advocates call cruel and inhumane. “As an animal lover, I am always interested in how we can ensure the ethical treatment of animals,” Mapps says. It’s the first time in nearly 13 years the issue has been reheated in this city. Last time around—in 2008, three years after a bill banning foie gras was killed in the Oregon House— animal advocates protested outside a number of high-profile Portland restaurants. (The protests did manage to pressure several restaurants into no longer selling foie gras, while others mocked activists). Sarah Hanneken, legal advocate for the Los Angeles-based group pushing the ban, Animal Equality, calls foie gras a “high-end product that is exceptionally cruel and only available to the elite classes.” Hanneken proposed enforcement by a complaint-based system, similar to the single-use plastics ban. Rubio’s office says she’s “open to the idea,” but that currently “our staff’s bandwidth is consumed by policies that have taken a high degree of priority.” New York state has a foie gras ban in place starting in 2022. California enacted a ban in 2012, but a judge ruled last year that Californians could import foie gras from other states for personal consumption. CANDIDATES TO SUCCEED DEFAZIO ASSEMBLE: When U.S. Rep Peter DeFazio, the longest-serving congressman in state history, announced his retirement from Oregon’s 4th Congressional District last week, Labor Commissioner Val Hoyle immediately announced her candidacy. Also looking hard at the race: state Sens. Sara Gelser Blouin (D-Corvallis) and James Manning (D-Eugene), both of whom are up for reelection and would have to surrender their seats to run. Gelser Blouin says she’s weighing a number of factors, including family considerations and where she could have the greatest impact. Manning says numerous supporters have encouraged him to seek DeFazio’s seat, which interests him, but he’s also got unfinished business in Salem. “I’m not a person who walks away,” he says, “and there is the old saying about a bird in the hand.” Manning expects to decide within the next week.
Also looking at a run in the Democratic primary: Andrew Kalloch, a Harvard Law-educated exec for Airbnb with a background in New York City politics. Kalloch, who relocated from Portland to Eugene last year, says he’ll make his decision over the holidays. “I anticipate being part of it,” he says. REWARD INCREASES TO $36K IN WOLF POISONING CASE: The Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife on Monday upped the reward to $36,000 for information that leads to the arrest of the individuals responsible for poisoning a pack of wolves in Eastern Oregon earlier this year. On Dec. 2, ODFW announced that state troopers in February had discovered two deceased male and three female wolves in Union County. The five wolves made up the entire Catherine Pack, state officials said, and toxicology reports showed the cause of death to be “consistent with poisoning.” Then, between March and July, state troopers discovered three more dead wolves, all believed to be poisoned as well. ODFW says it has “exhausted leads in the case” and needs the public’s help. As WW reported in October, poaching is a uniquely complex crime to prosecute (“Things Will Die,” Oct. 6, 2021). In 2019, the state Legislature passed a pair of bills that increased criminal penalties for poachers, and also carved out funding for a statewide poaching prosecutor. “We are furious and appalled,” says Sristi Kamal of Defenders of Wildlife. “Such a targeted attack against these incredible creatures is unacceptable.” CRISTOBAL’S PLAYERS DIDN’T GRADUATE: University of Oregon fans are still coming to terms with the sudden departure of head football coach Mario Cristobal, who fled Eugene for his hometown and alma mater, the University of Miami, this week after a second consecutive drubbing at the hands of the University of Utah. But UO economics professor and blogger Bill Harbaugh highlighted a stat that university officials want to talk about even less than the Utah games: the football team’s low graduation rate. Recently released NCAA figures first reported by the San Jose Mercury News show the Ducks tied for 10th in the Pac-12 in percentage of football players who graduate in six years (73%), ahead of only UCLA (71%), which is coached by another former Duck head coach, Chip Kelly. “Cristobal’s ‘student-athletes’ just aren’t graduating,” Harbaugh tweeted.
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
5
NEWS
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW THIS WEEK
ONE QUESTION
GRANT
Recount
Secret Surfing Feds offer Portland police $400,000 to investigate the “dark web” and COVID-19 fraudsters.
Candidates for Multnomah County chair respond to an auditor’s report that the Joint Office of Homeless Services overstated placements. BY N I G E L J AQ U I S S
njaquiss@wweek .com
Multnomah County Auditor Jennifer McGuirk reported last week that she’d been forced to halt an audit of the placements of homeless Portlanders into permanent housing because the data was “not reliable.” McGuirk found that the city and county’s Joint Office of Homeless Services, which is responsible for finding people housing, didn’t have addresses for 60% of those it claimed to have placed. More importantly, McGuirk’s audit team found, the Joint Office overstated the number of people for whom it had found permanent housing in the past two years by more than 20%, or 2,000 people in total. That’s because the Joint Office counted people who started the housing process, rather than those who actually moved in, a practice McGuirk termed “problematic.” County Chair Deborah Kafoury and Joint Office director Marc Jolin explained that the county only recently gained full control of the underlying data and took issue with the scale of McGuirk’s conclusions—but acknowledged a problem. We asked the four candidates competing to succeed Kafoury to respond to McGuirk’s report: Sharon Meieran, Multnomah County commissioner, District 1 (West and inner Southeast Portland) I deeply appreciate Auditor McGuirk’s focusing on and elevating the issue of data. Her findings are concerning and important. Effective data collection, management, and communication is the foundation for planning, measuring progress, and being held accountable for all the work we do at Multnomah County, including the tens of millions of taxpayer dollars we’re spending on homeless services. I’ve raised questions and advocated for a robust data collection strategy at the county, and the auditor’s report supports my questions and concerns. While I am disturbed by the findings, I’m encouraged that these discrepancies were discovered and brought forward. We need accurate, meaningful data, transparently communicated, to be effective in our work, and to deserve the public’s trust. I look forward to the auditor’s deeper dive. Shannon Singleton, former executive director of JOIN; currently adviser on equity and racial justice to Gov. Kate
HUNZEKER WATCH
Brown The answer is simple—the county needs to change the way it calculates the number of people housed to ensure that we have reliable data to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in our homeless services system. The auditor’s concerns around the lack of reliable data are valid, but this can’t be laid at the feet of one office or elected official—every current commissioner must own that this happened on their watch. This isn’t a new problem, as I identified data issues for county leadership years ago. The auditor’s report highlights why it is critical that we have a county CEO that has a micro-level expert understanding of how to approach moving people off our streets and into housing. Lori Stegmann, Multnomah County commissioner, District 4 (outer East Portland and Gresham) I appreciate the auditor’s diligence in looking into our most pressing challenge right now—getting people off the streets and on the path to permanent housing again. Transparency is critical, and being as clear as possible is key to effective implementation of programs to build and maintain trust with our residents. Her findings highlight gaps in reporting that need to be corrected. I agree that the delineation between “project start date” and placement into housing are two different things and are important to distinguish in order to measure our progress towards our Built for Zero goal. Jessica Vega-Pederson, Multnomah County commissioner, District 3 (outer Southeast Portland) We need an accurate accounting of our successes and failures in getting people into housing. The public entrusts us with addressing this issue, and we need reliable data to hold ourselves and our partners accountable. Collecting this data is complex—it includes input from different jurisdictions and nonprofits into a system that’s been active for less than a year. Having said that, the quality of this data is clearly inadequate. As chair, I will hold the JOHS and the service providers accountable for getting this right so we can focus on helping people find safer, healthier housing options. The reason we have an auditor is to bring these issues to light, and I welcome the auditor’s assistance in looking at the office’s information systems.
HOW THE POLICE BUREAU PLANS TO SPEND THE MONEY: • A $24,700 contract with the company Authentic8 for its website creation and hosting services, as well as licenses and a “dark web tool” for Authentic8’s cloud browser Silo, which enables anonymous web searches. The six Silo licenses will allow the task force to conduct “discreet investigations,” according to budget documents: “The internet creates an easy method for independent online websites to sell counterfeit goods. Silo will allow investigators to access those sites without being identified as law enforcement.” • About $170,000 for overtime costs of the 10 Police Bureau employees on the task force, comprising one supervisory sergeant, six detectives and three officers. “The overtime allows for grant program work in addition to the program staff’s daily workload,” budget documents say.
• About $150,000 in consulting fees for five local partner agencies: Beaverton Police Department Woodburn Police Department Washington County Sheriff’s Office Washington County District Attorney’s Office Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office • About $25,000 to cover travel expenses to intellectual property crime-related training and conferences in: Los Angeles Orlando, Fla. Arlington, Va. • About $4,500 in membership dues for intellectual property crime investigation organizations.
We keep watch over the Portland police leak investigation. BY TESS RISKI
278 DAYS:
That’s how long it’s been since the Portland Police Bureau opened an internal affairs investigation into the leak of information that wrongly implicated Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty in a March 3 hit-and-run. It has released no results of its inquiry.
6
The federal government has awarded the Portland Police Bureau a $400,000 grant to anonymously surf the dark web and make undercover purchases so it can investigate and prosecute intellectual property crimes like economic espionage and large-scale counterfeiting and piracy—specifically those that relate to public health and safety. On Dec. 8, the Portland City Council will vote whether to accept the grant, awarded by the U.S. Department of Justice through its Intellectual Property Enforcement Program. If approved, $220,797 of the grant would be allocated to the Police Bureau’s White Collar Crimes Unit for the first year of the two-year program. The remainder would roll over to the next fiscal year. (PPB has received grant money through this DOJ program before.) The grant shows that federal officials are still working closely with Portland-area law enforcement and the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office after relationships frayed in 2020 in the wake of racial justice protests. Mayor Ted Wheeler, who oversees the Police Bureau, has flagged the agenda item as an “emergency ordinance.” That’s because the city has a 45-day window to accept the money, according to his office. “This grant provides our White Collar Crimes Unit with the necessary resources to help stop counterfeit goods from reaching Portland marketplaces,” Wheeler tells WW. “In addition to providing financial resources, this program creates tools to educate our community about intellectual property crimes.” In budget documents reviewed by WW, the city pointed to successful online fraud investigations that the task force participated in recently, including that of a Hillsboro auto repair shop that purchased counterfeit airbags connected to a larger faulty airbag operation in Bulgaria; a Happy Valley business that bought counterfeit gun accessories from China and sold them online; and an ongoing investigation by Portland police and the Houston Police Department “related to transnational counterfeit N95 masks being sold to first responders in the U.S.” Budget documents say the funding will be used to “aggressively target, investigate, and prosecute individuals and or/criminal organizations” that commit state and federal intellectual property crimes. The task force will employ “various investigative techniques, including internet investigation of e-commerce websites (eBay, Amazon), classified ad websites (e.g., Craigslist, OfferUp, etc.), social media sites, and the dark web to identify individuals and organizations trafficking in [intellectual property crime] products,” say budget documents. The bulk of the money will finance the salaries of task force members and outside consultants: About 40% of the funds will go toward overtime costs of 10 Portland police officers assigned to the task force, and more than a third of the funding will be paid out in consulting fees to employees from five local law enforcement agencies that are also members of the task force. T E S S R I S K I .
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
267 DAYS:
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 Police Bureau’s investigation into the alleged hit-and-run by Commissioner Hardesty.” We still don’t know what he did. The mayor’s office says it doesn’t know what he did.
266 DAYS:
That’s how long it’s been since the city signed a contract with an outside investigative firm to probe the leak.
DONOR
COLUMBIA POOL (CLOSED): 7701 N Chautauqua Blvd.
PHOTO CREDIT
MAPPED
THREE POSSIBLE SITES FOR A FUTURE AQUATIC CENTER: CHARLES JORDAN COMMUNITY CENTER: 9009 N Foss Ave. COLUMBIA PARK: North Lombard Street and Woolsey Avenue (could include the Columbia Pool area)
COLUMBIA PARK ANNEX: North
Lombard Street and Willamette Boulevard
Heated Pool North Portlanders eye surplus dollars to get a beloved pool back. For nearly three years, residents of North Portland’s Portsmouth neighborhood have been promised a massive aquatic center to replace their shuttered indoor pool. But they want something else: their old pool back. The Columbia Pool closed in 2019, amid a budget shortfall that kneecapped the Portland parks system, and was kept shut this spring after an inspection determined the building was unsafe for occupancy. Now the fate of that pool is giving City Hall a headache. A flurry of lively discussion surrounded City Hall’s passage Nov. 17 of its latest surplus budget, with major allocations going to bolster police staffing,
IDEAS
add behavioral and mental health resources, and increase dollars for homeless camp sweeps. But a comparatively small line item is stirring its own debate after the budget’s passage: $1.5 million for Portland Parks & Recreation to increase access to swimming pools for North Portlanders who don’t live near one. That could include busing children to pools in other neighborhoods, say city officials. Some residents and advocates for recreational access in the Portsmouth neighborhood want the city instead to use some of that money to reinspect the Columbia Pool—and appraise the cost of making it safe. Needed repairs are estimated at $5 to $10 million. “All of our local governments have these budget
surpluses,” says Mary-Margaret Wheeler-Weber, president of the Portsmouth Neighborhood Association. “It was one thing to be told, ‘We’re going to close your pool because we have to lay off a huge number of staff.’ Well, that sucked and it was a hard pill to swallow. But it’s a much harder pill to swallow when it’s like, ‘We have all this money.’” The parks bureau tells WW it’s not that simple. In fact, Portland Parks & Recreation has at least $500 million worth of deferred maintenance across its facilities—and one shuttered pool can’t cut the line. “Portland Parks & Recreation does not have the direction or the $5 to $10 million (or more) to move forward with a temporary fix of Columbia Pool,” bureau spokesman Mark Ross says. “Columbia Pool is nearing the end of its useful life. The bureau has monitored whether the building is safe for years, and was forced to close the pool when life safety hazards related to the roof and skylight were discovered.” The closure and opening of public pools has always been one of the city’s most combustible issues during Portland budget season. But it takes on greater stakes as Portland experiences catastrophic climate events like last summer’s heat dome, making pools an even more valued civic resource. The budget item is largely meant as a stopgap measure to provide pool access while the city embarks on a long-term project to build a massive aquatic center in North Portland. This spring, City Commissioner Carmen Rubio announced an $11.7 million allocation from parks system development charges to build that center in the coming years. The North Portland aquatic center will likely take more than five years to complete, and still needs to secure additional funding, possibly from bonds and local tax revenues. (It’s tagged as a $35 million project.) Rachel Burdon, president of Friends of Columbia Park, says the parks bureau or Rubio could use $400,000 of the $1.5 million to do a full inspection of the old pool. “Any decision maker can decide to reallocate funds how they need to,” Burdon says. North Portland is more diverse, she adds, and therefore “deserves a little more attention than another part of town.” In a Dec. 6 meeting with Portsmouth neighbors, Rubio and the parks bureau resisted the idea of dedicating a third of the budget item to restoring Columbia Pool, saying the dollars were not meant to be used for inspections or repairs. But Rubio isn’t firmly saying no just yet. “I want to hear from community members their thoughts on the very real choices before us regarding Columbia Pool, a new aquatics center—and what we can do now to get people of all ages access to aquatics activities,” she tells WW. Rubio did unveil three possible sites for the future aquatic center. Here’s where they are, in relation to the pool that residents want back. S O P H I E P E E L .
LLOY D C E NTE R TOWE R
Robert Husseman writes: THE IDEA: 1,200-foot residential apartment tower (all market-rate units) THE RATIONALE: First, the tower’s 1,200-foot height would be higher than any building on the West Coast. For all its recent construction activity, Seattle doesn’t
even have a 1,000-foot tower. Suck it, Seattle. Second, the tower would not block the mountain views of any West Hills residents, so it is possible that construction might begin before the year 2050. Third, as readers of this esteemed publication are no doubt aware, Portland needs more housing.
Last, the tower represents a significant commitment by the city of Portland toward a more urbane future, with emphases on alternative transportation, walkable neighborhoods, climate change mitigation (which admittedly would have to be baked into the construction), and revitalization of neighborhoods left to decay amid our changing times. Put another
way, the tower represents an opportunity for Portland to act like the responsible global city it tells itself it is. WW is seeking reader proposals for the biggest real estate opportunity in Portland: Lloyd Center Mall. Send ideas to mall@wweek. com, and we’ll publish our favorite each week until the new year.
Contribution of the Week HOW MUCH? $100 WHO GOT IT? Nicholas Kristof, Democratic candidate for governor WHO GAVE IT? Joe Esmonde WHY DOES IT MATTER? Esmonde is the former longtime lobbyist for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 48, one of the most active and well-funded trade unions in state politics. His donation is paltry compared to the six-figure checks Kristof, a former New York Times columnist, reels in regularly (he’s raised $1.7 million compared with $661,000 for State Treasurer Tobias Read and $512,000 for House Speaker Tina Kotek). But Esmonde’s contribution adds to questions about private-sector union support for Kotek, the most pro-labor candidate in the primary. Esmonde’s contribution is far less significant than the endorsement Kristof recently got from United Food and Commercial Workers Local 555, but it could mark a trend. His check helps Kristof in another way: Most of Kristof’s money comes from out of state, so getting the support of a recognized Oregon political player adds legitimacy. Esmonde says he’s supported Kotek and Read before, so committing to give Kristof $100 a month for a year was a difficult decision. “I want a change and he brings a fresh set of eyes and a fresh voice,” Esmonde says. “He’s got some good things to say and I think people want to hear it.” Esmonde says he’s speaking only for himself, but he thinks Kristof’s combination of having grown up on a farm and worked as a globe-trotting journalist gives him a perspective that will be useful for Oregonians. “He wants to give back and help fix things,” Esmonde says. “The temperature has gone way up in the state and that isn’t good for anybody.” N I G E L J AQ U I S S .
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
NEWS BRIAN BRENEMAN
Sharing the Good News The Oregonian launches a positive-news outlet. Who wants that? BY A A R O N M E S H a m e s h @ w w e e k . c o m
On a recent Sunday, readers of The Oregonian’s print edition unwrapped the paper to find more bad news about Portland—although it was partly obscured by the promise of happier times. “While woman buys milk, boyfriend is shot outside,” one front-page headline read. Another story examined the debate over the fate of statues of U.S. presidents toppled by Portland protesters. But plastered over some of the bleakness was a cheerful yellow banner promoting a new offering called “Here is Oregon.” A blurb promised stories, both in print and online, that would celebrate “the people, the places, the experiences and the diversity of culture and skills that inspire innovation and build community.” In other words: a section of The Oregonian with only good news. It’s a phenomenon that some observers worry could detract from the paper of record’s mission to cover the news as it is rather than as some would like it to be. That’s a risk at a time when hard news coverage is thinner and thinner because of shrinking budgets. For three months now, Here is Oregon— which the paper’s executives describe as a “lifestyle brand” published on a website separate from OregonLive.com and in designated features in The Oregonian’s print edition—has provided Oregonian readers with a version of reality free from violent death and political disputes. The stories that populate the new website dwell on hiking trails, gingerbread houses and downtown cleanups. They arrive on a website free from the pandemic, shootings and stories about the homeless. That’s a dramatic break from the dire—and usually accurate—portrait of the city The Oregonian regularly presents to readers. The paper’s top editor says that’s OK. “It’s hit the mark with people, whether or not people recognize it as anything different from The Oregonian’s traditional content,” says Therese Bottomly, editor and vice president of content. “People want a break from the doom and gloom.” The happy-news service is the brainchild of two Oregonian Media Group executives with close ties to the Portland Business Alliance, the city’s chamber of commerce. In a year when Portland’s reputation is circling the drain nationally, the newspaper, which is owned by the wealthy Newhouse family, is betting that readers want more stories dedicated to loyal geese and small-town heroes. But as an election looms where Portland’s dismaying present and uncertain future are a top-of-mind issue for voters, The Oregonian’s new strategy could create two competing narratives: gritty reality versus an airbrushed version of a hip, happy and healthy Oregon that some wish existed. “Obviously, it creates a tension between
the commerce and the journalism side of the newspaper,” says Tim Gleason, who teaches journalism ethics at the University of Oregon. “It puts significant pressure on all the editors to make sure that the journalists are insulated.” Last May, Amy Lewin worked as communications director for the Portland Business Alliance. On a Friday afternoon, she emailed executives of local media organizations to ask how they could tell positive stories about Portland. (Disclosure: WW is also a member of the PBA and received the email.) “I had been in several meetings that week reviewing independent research that showed sentiment in the region was down and there was concern that Portlanders were losing confidence in a significant way,” she says now. Lewin says she received one immediate reply: from John Maher, president of Oregonian Media Group, who oversees the newspaper’s business operations, i.e., selling advertising, sponsorships and subscriptions. Lewin and Maher discussed the revival of a dormant brand, then called This is Oregon. The Oregonian started that project in 2018. Bottomly says it was modeled on This is Alabama, a positive-news site affiliated with newspapers also owned by the Newhouses. (The Oregonian renamed the site Here is Oregon after discovering an Instagram feed had already claimed
The Oregonian’s new strategy could create two competing narratives: gritty reality versus an airbrushed version of a hip, happy and healthy Oregon that some wish existed. the This is Oregon name.) In July, Lewin left the PBA and joined Oregonian Media Group as vice president of brand and strategic partnerships. On July 1, Maher became chair of the PBA’s board of directors. And on Oct. 20, Here is Oregon launched, with a website (hereisoregon.com) that collects stories from The Oregonian, partner newspapers from across the state, and some clearly labeled sponsor content. Most of the stories on the site, which in most cases were written by Oregonian staffers, would fit comfortably on the existing arts and culture pages—or as soft Sunday features. Missing from the new content: any interruption of the positive vibes. George Rede, a former Oregonian reporter who now teaches journalism at Portland State University, says Here is Oregon is a harmless endeavor. “I don’t see anything yet to give me an uneasy feeling about where this is headed,” Rede says. “It does address a desire from the public for some relief from what they see as a stream of nothing but negative news. If there are cynics who want to question that, that’s their prerogative, but I hope over time this results in a win
for readers and the newsroom.” The Oregonian could use such a victory. Over the past two decades, its newsroom staff has shrunk from more than 300 to its current total of 63. Like just about every media company, including WW, it is searching for new funding models. Lewin says advertisers have expressed interest in a positive-news site, but she denies trying to whitewash Portland’s reputation. “It is not a business campaign,” she says. “It is a place where we hope people will find a moment to smile and remind themselves why they remain committed to this place.” Two of the three “Oregon Community Champions” who partner with Here is Oregon are trade associations: Oregon Business & Industry, which represents the state’s largest employers, including Intel and Nike, and the Oregon Restaurant & Lodging Association, which advocates for restaurateurs and hoteliers. Oregonian Media Group director of marketing Chris Hammond says the groups provide sponsored content and tips for Here is Oregon to pursue. Members of both organizations have suffered from the blitz of bad press Portland has gener-
ated over the past two years. Lori Little, director of communications for ORLA, says Here is Oregon was a natural fit. “Our tourism stakeholders and partners are excited to be a part of efforts like this to get great stories out to inspire travelers in the midst of challenging years dominated by the pandemic,” Little says. OBI didn’t respond to a request for comment. But statewide numbers from an October OBI poll make clear why the trade group would support more optimistic stories. In that poll, conducted by Portland pollster DHM Research, 64% of Oregon voters said their community was on the wrong track, and 70% said Portland had a negative impact on the rest of the state. Some of that impression was created by reporters at The Oregonian doing their jobs, like when Shane Dixon Kavanaugh detailed the city’s inability to handle trash in the story “Dumptown.” Such assessments could create new tensions in 2022, as the newsroom covers elections— while Here is Oregon works equally hard to “lift and celebrate” the state. Bottomly says that’s a friction her newsroom can navigate. “I remember when we started the Home and Gardens section,” she says, “and some investigative reporters said, ‘Where’s the hard news?’ Any newsroom can have tensions among the various sections. But I think they can live peacefully. We can be more than one thing to the community.” Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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NEWS CHRIS NESSETH
weighed down by the demands of child care during the pandemic? Elizabeth Thiel: The reason we made these proposals in the first place is that we are facing a crisis shortage that threatens our ability to continue running schools at all. We cannot afford to continue losing educators. That leaves their kids without a teacher every day. There are no easy answers right now. And so we are looking for the answer that best serves our students, and that is taking into account the reality that a third of our teachers are considering leaving the profession. Did you anticipate this opposition? We have been raising this issue since September as a crisis we are facing. It has been disappointing that leaders in our state and our school district have not elevated the crisis of staffing to the point that the community has been able to see and understand it. I know when our community understands what we are facing they will be with us in finding the best solutions we can, given the realities that we are facing.
CLASS STRUGGLE: Portland teachers marched from Roosevelt High School to George Middle School on Dec. 6 to protest staffing shortages.
Hotseat: Elizabeth Thiel The president of the Portland teachers’ union defends a controversial proposal to cut classroom days. BY R AC H E L M O N A H A N
rmonahan@wweek .com
A Portland teachers’ union proposal last week to cut in-class instruction by one day a week at high schools set off a firestorm. Portland Teachers Association president Elizabeth Thiel has been calling for versions of this approach since early November. Portland Public Schools did not agree to last week’s proposal, which would also shorten classroom time by two hours a week at elementary and middle schools. Instead, the union’s proposition resulted in a rare email from the district to families, warning them about fewer classroom hours. That drew a statement in opposition from a Democratic candidate for governor, State Treasurer Tobias Read. “As a parent of two school-age children, I’m concerned about the recent proposal put forward by the Portland teachers’ union which would reduce in-person instruction time for our kids,” wrote Read. “We should be talking about ways to expand in-person learning opportunities for students to address the immediate learning gaps that emerged during the last two academic years, not eliminating roughly 20 days of in-person instruction for high school students and 10 for elementary and middle school.” Thiel calls Read’s numbers “misinformation,” in part because she says the proposal would allow high school students who are struggling to meet in person in smaller groups. Read, who has been highlighting his status as a concerned parent during the campaign, took an unusual tack by savaging the union’s proposal. Democratic candidates traditionally court the support of teachers’ unions.
“ There are no easy answers right now. And so we are looking for the answer that best serves our students, and that is taking into account the reality that a third of our teachers are considering leaving the profession.”
Asked by WW for comment, gubernatorial candidate Nicholas Kristof expressed alarm at the union proposal. “I understand the stresses faced by teachers and school staff, to whom we owe so much, and there’s a genuine risk of more of them leaving the profession,” he said. “But I am deeply concerned that less classroom time would hurt the most vulnerable students and their families.” Kotek was more equivocal. “I don’t have any comments on this specific proposal—that’s for PPS teachers, the district and parents to consider,” she says. “But students, parents and teachers have been through an incredibly challenging year that magnifies the need for thoughtful discussions on how to create stronger supports for all of them in and out of the classroom.” WW asked Thiel about the proposal and Read’s statement. WW: How does your proposal not burden parents, and specifically mothers, who have already been
What’s the problem at Portland Public Schools right now? So we are facing a drastic staffing shortage. We are trying to avoid what feels like will inevitably become a shutdown due to worker shortages and safety, like we’ve seen as close by as Reynolds Middle School. Responsible leadership is to readjust to make sure that we do everything we can to avoid a crash landing. What are the worst effects of it, practically speaking? Because we have a shortage of teachers and substitutes, we have unfilled positions every day. I heard at George Middle School [last] week, there were 15 educators missing on a single day. That means whenever there is an unfilled absence, other people are filling in, sometimes period by period. A teacher might have one period of preparation time; they’ll be asked to substitute. Our counselors, who we need so badly to be supporting our students, are being asked to substitute. Our reading specialists who are supposed to be helping catch kids up—they’re not available to do that because they are substituting in classrooms. So are principals and vice principals. And so when something goes wrong in the classroom—maybe it’s a younger kid and they’re throwing things in the classroom— there’s no one to call because all of the people that would normally be there to support that kid, they’re substituting in classrooms. What do you think people don’t understand about the union’s bargaining proposal? The crisis is impacting some schools more than others. Part of equity is looking to see who’s impacted most and making decisions that center those communities. George Middle School, Roosevelt High School, Roseway Heights, César Chávez, Ockley Green and Harriet Tubman—the district has identified schools that regularly do not have enough staff. Are you concerned you might alienate potential allies, like middle class parents who may not see the crisis in their schools? That is an interesting question. At the core of what I’m working for are public schools that work, and especially for our families and students that depend on them the most. I believe that when people have all the information, most people want to make the best decisions. Sometimes the solutions that we need to have the system work may be unpopular and they may be uncomfortable, but leadership is when you’re honest and transparent about the conditions you’re facing. Did you hear from Tobias Read before he issued a statement this week? And have you talked to him since? He did not reach out before he made this statement, and he has not reached out since or returned my call. I would say anybody who was trying to be a lead needs to talk to the people impacted by something before making a public statement. It’s a big disappointment that he didn’t reach out to understand what we’re asking for and why. Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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A VERY KATE BROWN
C hristmas
Oregonians are shunning America’s least popular governor. Is she really so bad?
BY RACHEL MONAHAN AND NIGEL JAQUISS ILLUSTRATION BY BRANDON HRYCYK
Gov. Kate Brown’s best day in office might have come a little over two years ago. It was Aug. 28, 2019. Brown, in a blue blazer and pearls, traveled to Portland’s Jefferson High School to sign the Student Success Act, a tax on corporations that would kick a billion dollars a year of new money into K-12 schools. “We know the future of Oregon depends on you—and you are worth every penny,” Brown told the students. In many ways, that bill marked the pinnacle of Brown’s tenure as governor. The bad days were more numerous. A mass shooting that left 10 dead (nine plus the shooter) at Umpqua Community College (2015). A 41-day siege at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge (2016). Historic wildfires (2017, 2018, 2020). And of, course, the COVID-19 pandemic (still going). It is an unenviable list of crises—and one that has contributed to Oregonians not only losing
faith in the governor they twice elected by healthy margins, but sending her popularity through the basement floor. On Nov. 18, Morning Consult, a national polling firm, reported that Brown’s approval ratings were the lowest of any governor in the nation: 50th out of 50. Portland pollster John Horvick of DHM Research says Morning Consult’s findings are consistent with his firm’s numbers: Brown’s standing with Oregonians is on a par with former President Donald Trump’s marks during his administration. Brown’s lousy poll numbers could influence next year’s governor’s race—and threaten Democrats’ possession of an office they’ve held since 1987. C O N T I N U E D O N PAG E 1 4
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C O N T I N U E D F R O M PAG E 13
Even her allies appear wary of getting her public support. “If she’s interested in making an endorsement, I would certainly talk to her about it,” House Speaker Tina Kotek (D-Portland), who’s running for governor next year, told WW diplomatically. Brown’s unpopularity puzzles supporters because, in addition to the Student Success Act, she can point to an impressive list of progressive policy wins. Brown signed the biggest transportation funding bill in state history in 2017. She presided over a rise in the state’s high school graduation rate from 69% when she took office to 83% last year. In the past five years, she signed new laws providing health insurance to all children and nearly all adults, secured some of the nation’s most aggressive minimum wage increases, and cemented the nation’s broadest access to abortion. Other victories included family medical leave, rent control, an end to single-family zoning; the effective demise of the death penalty, a half-billion dollars for new affordable housing, and the closure of Oregon’s last coal-fired electrical plant. Brown also dramatically reshaped Oregon’s courts, naming record numbers of women, people of color and LGBTQ+ lawyers to the bench. “Democrats have accomplished much of what she set out to do,” Senate Minority Leader Tim Knopp (R-Bend) acknowledges. Republicans had so little influence they stopped showing up for work—the only way they could block Democratic bills from passing. Brown didn’t get much credit for the legislative accomplishments, and that’s unusual for a governor or a president, who usually get the credit for lawmakers’ work. “This has been something we’ve been seeing almost through her entire time in office,” says Pacific University’s Jim Moore, who is writing a biography of Oregon’s last Republican governor, Vic Atiyeh. “When Democrats get their agenda through, she might show up to sign the bill or say, ‘We did it,’ but people still focus on Tina Kotek or [Senate President] Peter Courtney.” As it has been for much of Brown’s tenure, the economy is stronger in Oregon than in most states. The state’s per capita income recently rose above the national average for the first time in 50 years, and the poverty rate is the lowest since the 1970s. Some Salem insiders, such as Jim Carlson, the recently retired CEO of the Oregon Health Care Association, salute her. “Every governor back to Tom McCall (1967-1975) sought to diversify and stabilize the tax base,” Carlson says. “She’s the one who got it done. It was a major accomplishment that eluded every one of her predecessors.” In recent months, Brown has also inserted herself in high-profile conflicts, brokering compromises between environmentalists and the timber industry on forest practices and among warring factions on the billion-dollar widening of Interstate 5 through the Rose Quarter. Perhaps most importantly, Oregonians contracted COVID less often and died from the virus at a far lower rate than residents of all but a handful of states during the pandemic (see “Staying Alive,” page 17). “I have never seen a governor who accomplished so much, right from the beginning of her tenure, and who seems to receive so little credit for it,” says former Gov. Barbara Roberts. Are Oregonians just more miserable than the rest of the country? Or does Brown’s lack of popularity reflect the unemployment checks people didn’t get, the school days their kids missed, and the homeless camps that flourished? Politicos often referred to Ronald Reagan as the “Teflon 14
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president” because nothing bad stuck to him. For Brown it’s the opposite: She’s a blank canvas on which Oregonians sling all their frustrations. (She’s also created her own luck, as when she traveled to Washington, D.C., on Dec. 5 to pick up an award from Victory Fund, an LGBTQ political action committee, and was photographed without a mask, despite admonishing Oregonians to wear theirs at indoor gatherings.) “The heart of the tragedy of Kate Brown’s tenure is that she is a truly kind, decent person who is impossible not to like personally,” says her former political consultant Kevin Looper, who also advised her predecessor. “The fact that she is so poorly regarded publicly is a deeper failure than just one person.” In a brief interview, Brown attributes her unfavorable ratings to her efforts to challenge the “status quo.” She also blames the media, The Oregonian and Willamette Week in particular, which she says “peed all over me” for her COVID policies. But she adds the polling doesn’t bother her. “Frankly, I don’t give a damn,” she tells WW. “I want to focus on getting stuff done.” We set out to figure out how a governor whose tenure has included so many high points finds herself rated so low. We examined three theories:
She became Oregon’s COVID hall monitor.
COVID-19 defines Brown’s tenure like no other issue. Even though Oregonians fared better than residents of most other states, Brown’s scattershot approach to the pandemic irked constituents. From waffling initially on whether to order shutdowns to prioritizing vaccinations for teachers before seniors, some of her decisions have been head-scratchers. And they had impact. For the first time since the Spanish flu, a governor’s day-to-day decisions affected Oregonians’ lives immediately: whether they could go to school or work; whether restaurants, bars, hair salons and coffee shops could open for business. Her decisions made a difference, every day, in every household. To be sure, Brown can celebrate the outcome: Fewer people died per capita in Oregon than in all but a handful of states. “She’s done a really good job on the COVID stuff,” says Len Bergstein, a longtime Salem lobbyist. But Oregonians blamed her for the inconvenience and discomfort the pandemic caused—while few are running around cheering, “Kate Brown kept me alive!” “The moment we’re in cannot be separated out from the pandemic,” says Melissa Unger, executive director of Service Employees International Union Local 503, the state’s largest public employee union. “Her opposition has made her the focus of everything. That builds its own narrative.” Early in the pandemic, leading Democrats did not trust her to get the job done. Multnomah County Chair Deborah Kafoury and Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler launched public pressure campaigns to force Brown to move more aggressively to order Oregonians to stay home. Local school districts announced school closures before the governor did. Brown often seemed reactive rather than projecting confidence. “I strongly approve of the way the governor handled the pandemic,” says political consultant Liz Kaufman. “But sometimes she climbs on things late or misses them entirely.” Critics say Brown simply mimicked whatever Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and California Gov. Gavin Newsom did.
“I could anticipate how the governor was going to exercise her emergency powers by watching to see what California and Washington were planning,” says state Rep. Christine Drazan (R-Canby), who is running for governor. “And, you know, it might be tweaked a little bit, but she followed.” To be fair, Brown made more targeted decisions than her peers on economic shutdowns: keeping construction firms and manufacturers open, for instance, when other states did not. And she reinstated an indoor mask mandate when the Delta wave arrived. But there are still hard feelings from the economic inequities of Brown’s decisions. Restaurant and hotel owners say it’s unfair they had to close while grocery stores and factories stayed open. Just as painful: changing and sometimes conflicting directives that made ordering supplies, scheduling staff and communicating with customers almost impossible. “How could Gov. Kate Brown do better?” says Jason Brandt, CEO of the Oregon Restaurant and Lodging Association. “If the governor feels it’s in the public interest to reduce or close certain businesses for the sake of public
J U S T I N K AT I G B A K
health, then the government should compensate those businesses in the interest of the public good.” That might sound crazy, but throughout the pandemic, Brown picked winners and losers. When she closed schools in March 2020, she decreed that no school employees should be laid off, giving them a kind of job security that evaporated overnight for waiters, hairdressers and other service industry workers. Then, when COVID vaccines became available in 2021, Brown, unlike nearly every other governor, put teachers ahead of seniors—and then did not require them to return to schools. That fed into a narrative that Brown, who sprinkled her administration with former union officials, was beholden to the teachers’ union, a lousy negotiator, or both. “In effect, her legacy will be ‘more people did not die,’ and that’s hard to articulate,” says Moore. “It’s hard to erect a statue to that.”
She lost people on the issues that matter most to them.
Few Oregonians will thank Brown for consigning them
to their homes and locking their children out of school. Brown might have won more favor if state government had distinguished itself in crisis. Instead, critics say she struggled with one of the governor’s core duties, managing state agencies. Elected officials, particularly those in the same party, generally stay out of each other’s business. But on May 30, 2020, U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) ran out of patience with Brown and the Oregon Employment Department. He demanded the director’s head. That’s because more than 400,000 Oregonians had suddenly lost their jobs and the Employment Department could not answer its phones—let alone mail out unemployment checks. “This litany of incompetence and unresponsiveness has hit the breaking point,” Wyden said at the time. Oregonians buried lawmakers with complaints. “I have never had as many calls for constituent help as when people were unemployed and couldn’t get their checks,” says Knopp. “I would guess 1,000 in my district.” Brown forced Employment Department director Kay Erickson out that day. But another agency, Oregon Hous-
ARE OREGONIANS JUST MORE MISERABLE THAN THE REST OF THE COUNTRY? OR DOES BROWN’S LACK OF POPULARITY REFLECT THE UNEMPLOYMENT CHECKS PEOPLE DIDN’T GET, THE SCHOOL DAYS THEIR KIDS MISSED, AND THE HOMELESS CAMPS THAT FLOURISHED? C O N T I N U E D O N PAG E 16 Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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Some voters are sexist.
Brown has generated a cottage industry in bumper stickers and T-shirts: “Oregon Bigfoot Says ‘Fuck Kate Brown,’” “My Hate for Kate Keeps Me Warm,” and “If It’s Brown, Flush It Down.” She’s survived five recall attempts, each a little more unhinged than the last. Women governors are a rarity to begin with: Only nine states have one, and only 45 women have ever held to the top executive office in their states. 16
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OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR J U S T I N K AT I G B A K
ing and Community Services, subsequently struggled mightily to find housing for residents of the 4,000 homes destroyed in 2020 wildfires and to get federal rent assistance checks to tens of thousands of Oregonians facing eviction this year. “All that money that’s available, and they couldn’t get it out to people,” says state Sen. Lynn Findley (R-Vale). “It’s completely unacceptable that thousands of Oregonians have been waiting longer than 6 months to get urgent rent relief,” adds State Treasurer Tobias Read, a Democrat running for governor. “I don’t see any sense of urgency, even the special session took over a month to organize. We need to treat this like the crisis it is—the money is there, this is an issue of making government work for the people, and right now it’s failing them.” To be sure, every governor experiences agency failures. The Oregon Department of Transportation bought a $43 million communication system under Gov. Ted Kulongoski that didn’t work, and Gov. John Kitzhaber spent $200 million on an inoperable health insurance computer system. But no one went hungry, bankrupt or got evicted because of it. When Brown’s agencies failed, the impact on individual Oregonians was tangible and immediate. The pandemic heightened the stakes of every agency screw-up. On other issues important to Oregonians, Brown’s inability to make bold gestures proved a disappointment. That was true on climate, where a decadeslong effort to pass cap-and-trade legislation on carbon emissions fizzled once again in 2019 and 2020, leaving Brown to impose an executive order that satisfied nobody. “She’s had unprecedented revenue and a supermajority, but been hampered by a lack of clear direction and hamstrung by very serious communication issues,” says Looper, the political consultant. “Over time, this took away her ability to accrue credit for what has gone right, and increased the stickiness of what has gone wrong.” The other issue that matters to a lot of people: Portland. And many people interviewed for this story say Brown’s poll numbers reflect widespread alarm about the state of Oregon’s largest city. “People in Southern Oregon are pretty discouraged when they see Portland Police Bureau buildings on fire,” says state Rep. Duane Stark (R-Grants Pass). “Criminal justice reform should not equal anarchy.” Andrew Hoan, CEO of the Portland Business Alliance, says Brown called regularly during the past 21 months to ask how she could be helpful to his members—then did nothing. “If you are the CEO of Oregon Inc. and you look at the flagship city and see it in such distress, you intervene,” Hoan says. “That’s good government. As goes Portland so goes Oregon. This city is the state’s heartbeat.” Hoan knows city and county governments are responsible for local issues, but he says the pandemic, political violence, and homelessness crisis have exceeded local resources. “In every instance, there’s been a gap between her stated desire to help and the doing,” he says. “It’s absenteeism. It’s just an absence and it’s inexplicable to me.”
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C O N T I N U E D F R O M PAG E 15
“ I N EFFECT, HER LEGACY WILL BE ‘MORE PEOPLE DID NOT DIE,’ AND THAT’S HARD TO ARTICULATE. IT’S HARD TO ERECT A STATUE TO THAT.”
Brown is just Oregon’s second woman governor. Barbara Roberts, the first (1991-1995), noticed an interesting coincidence: Only two governors in modern Oregon history have faced recall efforts serious enough to reach the signature-gathering process. “Both are women,” Roberts says. Many progressives say Brown’s approval ratings suffer because voters don’t trust or respect women leaders as they do men—and are possibly homophobic. (Brown, who is married to a man, Dan Little, identifies as bisexual.) “There’s huge amounts of misogyny out there,” Kaufman says. Former state Rep. Vicki Berger (R-Salem) says Brown doesn’t get the benefit of the doubt accorded her male predecessors, such as Kulongoski and Kitzhaber. “To be a woman in politics is to dance an almost impossible dance,” Berger says. “We haven’t turned the corner on that.” Berger says Brown hasn’t communicated a personal narrative like Kulongoski—orphan, Marine, union lawyer—or Kitzhaber—doctor, fisherman, Marlboro man—that would make her more relatable. Roberts agrees. “I remember a picture of Ted Kulongoski fishing in the Deschutes River,” she says. “I rode a Brahma bull once. Kate Brown is a hiker, a kayaker and an expert equestrienne, but I don’t think people know that.”
Women in public office suffer from a “double bind” of often contradictory expectations, say researchers at the Barbara Lee Family Foundation, a Boston-based nonprofit that studies attitudes toward women in leadership. “Women really have to walk a tightrope because voters want to see that women are strong enough,” says Amanda Hunter, executive director of the foundation. “But then, if women are strong—and we’ve seen this during COVID— they can face a backlash because voters think they’re too tough.” Horvick the pollster says his numbers show less sexism than Brown’s admirers might think, in that Brown’s approval numbers are not that different between men and women: 32% of men approve of Brown and 33% of women do. “Men are a little bit more negative towards her than women are, but it’s usually within just a few points,” adds Horvick. Brown’s four Democratic predecessors all saw their
STAYING ALIVE Many Oregonians have rebelled against the executive orders issued by Gov. Kate Brown during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those orders have called for school and business closures, aggressive mask mandates and vaccinations, even for workers who don't want them. People might not like the orders, but they've kept Oregonians healthy—and alive. Here is the data on two key measures as of Dec. 4: COVID infections (Oregon’s are the fourth lowest) and deaths (only six states have lower rates). DEATHS PER 100,000
150 120 90 60 30 0
73
66 VERMONT
HAWAII
99
MAINE
111
UTAH
121
123
124
ALASKA
WASHINGTON
OREGON
CONFIRMED CASES PER 100,000
10000 8000 6000 4000
6,273
8,078
9,238 9,698
2000 0
HAWAII
VERMONT
MAINE
SOURCES: STATISTA RESEARCH; MAYO CLINIC
OREGON
popularity plummet toward the end of their tenures. Gov. Roberts left office with numbers lower than Brown’s— without a pandemic. The good news for Brown: Roberts today is the gold standard for Democrats, a beloved figure whose endorsement candidates covet. She attributes her rebound to crisscrossing the state in a wide variety of roles in retirement. The better people know her, the more they like her. “I don’t think Oregonians have seen the person Kate is,” Roberts says. “That doesn’t help your polling numbers.” The question for 2022, of course, is how Brown’s unpopularity will shape a competitive Democratic primary and a likely three-way race for governor in November. Nationwide, Democrats face a challenging 2022. And barring an unforeseen rally in Brown’s popularity, she will be a dead weight on them. In a normal year, Kotek, the longest-serving House speaker in Oregon history, would be a strong favorite for the party’s nomination, given her record of accomplishment and support from labor unions that dominate Democratic primaries. But with Republicans and state Sen. Betsy Johnson (D-Scappoose), who is running as an independent, likely to brand Kotek as Kate Brown 2.0, the speaker is vulnerable. (Kotek declined to discuss Brown’s weakness. “Tina is not interested in playing Monday morning quarterback,” says her campaign manager, Thomas Wheatley.) Republicans are in an uproar over vaccine mandates and shutdowns. And the people in the middle, the less engaged voters? They are the poll respondents who sent the governor’s numbers cratering. “The first four years of her term, you had a chunk of voters—somewhere between 20% and a third—who basically had no opinion about her,” says Horvick. “Over time, anybody who was undecided about her—a lot of those are not affiliated voters—have become negative towards her.” Similar dynamics upended the Virginia governor’s race last month and, in Oregon, have opened the door for political newcomer Nicholas Kristof in the Democratic primary, generated strong fundraising for Johnson the independent, and even prompted the GOP’s Drazan to cut short a promising legislative career to attempt something no Oregon Republican has done since 1982—win a governor’s race. On Dec. 3, the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, a highly regarded national online newsletter, noted the 2022 environment for Democrats looks dicey. “Democrats may be glad that Gov. Kate Brown is term-limited,” the publication wrote. “This is shaping up to be a unique race with interesting dynamics, and we are shifting it from ‘Solid’ to ‘Likely Democrat’ at this time.” It is perhaps telling that Brown has shifted her election-year gaze to other states, rather than boosting her own popularity. “I could be out there raising money so that I could be running ads,” she says. “I am choosing not to do that. I am raising money. I’m just doing it for other people: the women governors across the country, like Gretchen Whitmer [of Michigan] and Laura Kelly [of Kansas], who are going to have the most difficult reelection bids of their lives.” Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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STREET
PORTLAND NIGHT MARKET Photos by Justin Yau On Instagram: @ justinnyau
Our city is home to many talented cooks, artisans and entrepreneurs, and the tradition of weekend markets leading up to the holidays presents the chance to see what they’ve been crafting in their respective kitchens. Walking around the crowded, outdoor booths of the Night Market—which pops up four times a year in the Southeast Industrial District—we saw impressive piles of seasoned meats, hot sauces, hair oils, singing bowls, and hardworking artists creating wonders before our very eyes.
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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YOUR BACKSTAGE PASS TO THE WWEEK NEWSROOM Join the Dive podcast every Saturday as we quickly cover the week’s headlines, and then dive deeper into the big stories of the week. Host Hank Sanders sits down with the paper’s staff as well as the biggest names in Portland to discuss the city and the events that change lives. The Dive podcast by Willamette Week is the best way to stay up to date with Portland’s news, sports, arts, and culture.
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE
WILLAMETTE WEEK’S
G U T I D F I E G 2021
WHEN YOU WANT A GIFT that says you care about the little details, you shop locally. It’s another way of caring: putting holiday spending back into our hometown. We’ve worked with some of our favorite Portland shops and brands this year to present you a list of gifts that all help to lift spirits as we wait out this pandemic in the winter months. Please support these local retailers!
2019 Gamay Noir
$25.00
Tasting Flight
$18.00
Boedecker Cellars
August Cellars
Pink Package
$47
Pike Road Wines
For the rosé lover: a trio of pink wines 100% grown in Oregon’s Northern Willamette Valley. This Pink Package from Pike Road Wines includes the fruit-forward 2020 Pinot Noir Rosé, the festive 2020 Sparkler Rosé and the spirited 2020 Hog Wild Rosé. Cheers! 105 West Main St, Carlton pikeroadwines.com
Gamay Noir is a bright happy red wine. It is a perfect pairing for starchy foods as the bright cranberry notes cleanse your palette and leave you ready to enjoy the next bite or the conversation being had.
Gift a tasting flight in an urban winery. Present the opportunity to unwind in a cozy yet spacious wine cellar and savor small lot, Willamette Valley wines from our woman winemaker / woman run winery in Northwest Portland.
14000 NE Quarry Road, Newberg augustcellars.com
2621 NW 30th Avenue store.boedeckercellars.com
Cranberry Infused Vodka
$27.95
Cannabis Beverages
$4-96
Wild Roots Spirits
Magic Number
Wild Roots is all natural, with no artificial sweeteners, flavors or colors and always true to the fruit. Infused with over a pound of real cranberries, this infusion tastes like raw, fresh pressed cranberry juice. This vodka perfectly encompasses the unique elements of a cranberry: tart, dry and bold.
Liven up the holidays with Oregon’s most delicious live resin beverages and tasty tinctures. Brewed in Bend and made with all natural ingredients and single-strain cannabis, we can be found in dispensaries throughout Oregon. Celebrate life, experience the liquid revolution and discover your Magic Number.
wildrootsspirits.com
drinkmagicnumber.com
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Willamette Week DECMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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 reach of children
5 Gifts to Inspire Holiday Celebration
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3 Gifts Absolutely Worth the Splurge Neo + Terp Surfer
$349.00
Prrl Labs
Andromeda
$1,099
Campfire Audio
The Black Keys - El Camino 10th Anniversary Deluxe Edition Everyday Music
Oregon cannabis is delicious! Why burn it? This dynamic duo will unleash flavors and effects that the flower lover on your list never dreamed possible. By toasting, not burning, you savor a truly full spectrum experience direct from the flower. Without the cough. Without the stink. Without the stigma. Taste what you’ve been missing!
Campfire Audio’s Andromeda exudes unique confidence in its handling of fine musical detail, creating a world-class sonic experience. This holiday season, treat yourself to this must-have earphone, and support a hidden gem in Portland’s manufacturing community. Sold online only.
ptrrllabs.com
CampfireAudio.com/Andromeda
This 5LP Super Deluxe Box Set contains the original remastered album, previously unreleased full live concert and BBC Session Recorded in 2012, 2011 Electro-Vox Session, photo book, limited-edition poster and lithograph, & “new car scent” air freshener! Also available as a 3LP edition with remastered vinyl + live show. 1313 W Burnside & 1931 NE Sandy Blvd. | everydaymusic.com
3 Gifts They Can Wear Outside the House in 2022 14K Gold Stacking Rings
Starts at $300
Novi Necklace
$59-$69
Ladder Bracelet
$98
Betsy & Iya
Betsy & Iya
Think of these 14k gold stacking rings as the Little Black Dress of their jewelry box: gorgeous when worn solo, and fantastic when layered. These beauties are available with lab-grown white diamonds and conflict-free black diamonds. Designed & handcrafted on-site in the production studio attached to our Portland retail shop.
A necklace they’ll find themselves daydreaming about because it’s the stuff jewelry dreams are made of: universally flattering, oh-so wearable, with just the right amount of eye catching shine. Designed & handcrafted on-site in the production studio attached to our Portland retail shop.
A stand-out symmetrical beaded bracelet with matte Japanese glass beads and semi-precious stone beads. Beautifully set with an antique brass chain and handmade brass clasp. Handcrafted right here in Portland by people who care.
1777 NW 24th Ave betsyandiya.com/rings
1777 NW 24th Ave betsyandiya.com/necklace
1777 NW 24th Ave betsyandiya.com/bracelet
Betsy & Iya
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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Share the Care Symbolic Adoption $125
Owl Ornaments
$12.95
Pittock Mansion
Give a Brick Today! $125.00 Pioneer Courthouse Square
Oregon Zoo Foundation
SHARE CARE
THE
7 Gifts for Everyone on Your List
Start your symbolic adoption today
Show your love and support for polar bears with an Oregon Zoo Foundation Share the Care symbolic adoption. You’ll directly support conservation, education and animal welfare at the zoo. Whether you’re treating yourself or buying a gift for a loved one, you’re making a world of difference for wildlife!
Buy ethical this year with these handcrafted, fair trade gourd owl ornaments. Four styles to choose from.
bit.ly/3rkV6BS
pittockmansion.org
Monthly Postcard Subscription $14 - $29
Thunderpants Organic Cotton Underwear! $24
Holiday Scratch-itsSM
The Postcard Maven
Thunderpants USA
Oregon Lottery
The Postcard Maven’s subscriptions curate the finest designs on the market to send recipients a varied mix of three, five, or ten premium postcards per month— no gift wrap needed! Postage is included, making it fun and easy for the recipient to keep in touch with all their favorite people.
The Original comfy undies that don’t go up your bum. In sizes small - 3x large this very comfortable full brief sits in the natural crease at the top of the leg and usually hits just below the belly button. These are designed to not ride up or roll down - can you say no wedgies?! Made in USA with certified Organic Cotton / spandex blend. Thunderpants is a Women-run company, supporting fair wages and ethical manufacturing.
subscribe.thepostcardmaven.com
thunderpants.com
$1-$20
Five festive and fun designs make Holiday Scratch-its the perfect answer for all the question marks on your gift list. You can find them virtually anywhere, even up to the last minute. They’re perfect for white elephant exchanges, stocking stuffers and more. Make the holidays jolly with Oregon Lottery Scratch-its! oregonlottery.org/holiday Lottery games are based on chance and should be played for entertainment only, not investment purposes. Odds and payout vary by game.
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This holiday season join the over 82,000 Portlanders who own a piece of our City’s Living Room. Buy a personalized brick in Pioneer Courthouse Square. Gift wrapping available! 715 SW Morrison St thesquarepdx.org
1/2g & 1g Dippers
$11.10-$13.30
Broadway Cannabis Market
Handmade Fire Dept. Cannabis Dippers are indoor grown half gram or full gram pre-rolls, dipped in high potency extract then covered in dry-ice extracted kief. For a pre-roll with the oil and kief on the outside, they smoke very even and very slow, making them a delight to smoke, and make for the PERFECT stocking stuffer gift! 427 NW Broadway & 9952 SW Beaverton Hillsdale Hwy broadway-cannabis.com Willamette Week DECMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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8 Gifts for Making a Home Reclaimed Wood Cutting and Serving Boards from Splendid Tables $30 - $175
20th Anniversary Parks Posters $30
Photo Slates
$35-$75
Pro Photo Supply
12” Gold Gorillas $29.99 each City Liquidators
Portland Parks Foundation
Kitchen Kaboodle
These gorgeous one-of-a-kind cutting and serving boards are made right here in town by the artisans at Splendid Tables in NW PDX. Each board is crafted from sustainably harvested hardwoods that have been sourced from within fifty miles of downtown. Give them a truly unique gift you know they’ll love. Limited quantities available in-store only.
In celebration of the Portland Parks Foundation’s 20th anniversary, we’re commemorating three classic Portland parks—Peninsula, Laurelhurst, and Alberta—plus the Wildwood Trail, each with a poster by a leading Portland designer. These posters are unique, designed by local artists, and the proceeds of each go directly to supporting the Portland Parks Foundation.
4 Portland-area locations
portlandpf.org/store
Teapot Gift Set
$40
Tea Chai Te
Kirby Vases
$45 each
Asylum
Get your photos printed on a natural, hand cut material. No two are the same. Imperfections in shape, size, and coating make for an exciting, unique way to present your photos. Purchase instore, online with in-store pick-up, or to ship to the photographer in your life anywhere in the US. 1112 NW 19th Ave print.prophotosupply.com
Canvas Wraps
$36 & Up
Pro Photo Supply
Gold Gorillas doing yoga. 12 inches tall, 3 poses to choose from. Great gift for the yoga enthusiast in your life. 823 SE 3rd Ave
Pet Music Icons Prints & Pillows
cityliqs.com
$34.99
City Liquidators
Treat a loved one to this cute teapot gift set! Includes one ceramic glazed 18 oz teapot that has stainless steel infuser basket and stainless steel and silicone lid, choice of one tin of select Tea Chai Te blends, Lil Tea Note Pad and TCT teapot sticker. Teapot available in Gold, Black, Grey, Lime or Aqua. Gift Set Available Online Only (Select teaware available in shops) NW 23rd Ave, Sellwood & N Mississippi teachaite.com 24
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
Playful glazed ceramic vases. Three shapes with distinct personalities. Designed by Talbot & Yoon for Areaware. Beautifully boxed for easy gift giving. 3713 SE Hawthorne Blvd
Get your photos printed on beautiful canvas wrapped around a wooden, ready-to-hang frame. Choose from sizes between 8” x 8” squares and 40” x 60” frames. Available for purchase in-store, online with in-store pick-up, or to ship as a gift to anyone, anywhere in the US. 1112 NW 19th Ave print.prophotosupply.com
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Where pets meet celebrity, 16x20 inch prints or 18x18 inch pillows, unique and humorous, with more than 60 characters in the Pets Rock™world and many more waiting to be let off the leash, you’re never far from one of our pop culture pets! “These are real pets, not real celebrities.” 823 SE 3rd Ave
cityliqs.com
Gift Card
Price Varies
Salishan Lodge
Select Cliq Pods
$36
Curaleaf
Cascade Valley 0.25g Rainbow Party Pack $25.00 Green Goddess Remedies
7 Gifts for New Experiences
Give the gift of travel with an easy to use electronic gift certificate. Gift certificates are valid for use at Salishan Coastal Lodge including The Spa at Salishan, Salishan Golf Links, Provisions Market and The Attic Bar & Lounge.
DockBox Local Seafood Meal Kits Starting at $25
5103 NE Fremont Street
Distillery Row Passport
$25
Live Music
tickets start at
$20
PDX Jazz Festival
New Deal Distillery & Bottle Shop
Choose your own adventure or share the love with the Cascade Valley Party Pack! Each pack has 14 pre-rolls with 7 different color-coded strains to explore. These are full flower, hand-rolled, and potent. We love’em! They are easy to share and a great way to explore the kaleidoscope of cannabis. 5435 SW Taylors Ferry Rd greengoddesspdx.com
Holiday tickets start at Concerts $25 Oregon Symphony
DockBox by Local Ocean
Local Ocean fosters connections with Oregon fishermen to bring you wild, sustainable seafood. Share their renowned seafood experience with DockBox – locally crafted seafood meal kits shipped from the docks to your dinner table. Gift cards available. Newport, Oregon
Portland’s Distillery Row has one of the largest concentrations of craft distilleries on the planet. Explore this world of craft spirits and distillers with the Distillery Row Passport; offering educational opportunities, exclusive interactions, promotions, and prizes. The perfect gift for the spirit geek in your life! 900 SE Salmon St. newdealbottleshop.com
Give the gift of Live Music! 32+ events Ron Carter, Robert Glasper Black Radio, Gary Bartz, Makaya McCraven, Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah feat. Weedie Braimah, Brandee Younger & Dezron Douglas, MNDSGN, Domo Branch Trio, The Soul Rebels, Nate Smith + KINFOLK, Diane Schuur, Sasha Berliner, Flor de Toloache, Marquis Hill and more pdxjazz.org/festival/schedule
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This December, fill your hearts with good cheer and ring in the holiday season with the Oregon Symphony. Include us in your holiday traditions and choose from our festive variety of live concerts. Can’t choose just one? Save 20% and we’ll waive handling fees when you purchase tickets to three or more holiday concerts this December. Visit our ticket office in-person, or call us to redeem this offer. 909 SW Washington St 503-228-1353 oregonsymphony.com Willamette Week DECMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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 reach of children
7760 North Highway 101, Gleneden Beach salishan.com
The latest innovation from the Select family, Cliq is a sleek, pocket-sized, and intelligently designed vape delivery system. From the proprietary gravity-fed pod to its ultra-tough stainless steel encasing and premium hand feel, Cliq comfortably brings the best of high-quality oil and innovative hardware into the hands of cannabis consumers.
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Birkenstock Zermatt Wool/Shearling
$99.95
Footwise
The first true Birkenstock slipper, featuring the iconic Birkenstock footbed you know and love. The wool straps and shearling lining will keep your feet extra cozy this winter. Available in both kids and adult sizes. 1433 NE Broadway
Pretty Great Things Gift Set Greater Goods
$50
For the self-care warrior who loves a little eye candy. This set includes our delicious Strawberry Chocolate Bar, a gift box of fun Chocolate Covered Oreos, and our Cranberry Cherry Relax Gummies. Infused with full spectrum hemp CBD, 100% vegan, and hand crafted with love. hellogreater.com
CBD Starter Bundle
$60.00
footwise.com
Le Wand Arch
$140.00
She Bop
This holiday season, indulge in endless gratification with the Le Wand Arch. With luxurious weight, this beautiful stainless steel crescent-shaped dildo is optimized for next-level stimulation. After a year and a half into a pandemic… you deserve to scream with delight. 909 N Beech St & 3213 SE Division St sheboptheshop.com
A Taste of Oregon
$83.00
Willamette Valley Vineyards
East Fork Cultivars
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
Introducing our CBD Starter Bundle – Making the Holidays a little easier for everyone with a gift for you, and a gift for them. Bundle includes Organic Hemp CBD Oil, Hemp CBD Drops Beverage Enhancer, and an East Fork Cultivars blue llama pin.
Enjoy a Taste of Oregon with this gift pack complete with a handmade Myrtlewood cutting board in the shape of Oregon, a handcrafted jar of local strawberry jam and a bottle of our 2019 Estate Pinot Noir.
Hemp Bar, 6258 SE Foster Rd eastforkandfriends.com
8800 Enchanted Way SE, Turner wvv.com/holidaygifts
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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 reach of children
5 Gifts For Every Type of Self Care
6 Gifts For The Budding (or Pro) Photographer Sony Alpha 7R IV Mirrorless Camera
$3,499.99
Pro Photo Supply
Sony Alpha 7R III Mirrorless Camera
$2,799.99
Pro Photo Supply
$2,999 .9
$1,799.99
Pro Photo Supply
$1,999 .9
9
Canon EOS R Mirrorless Camera Body
$1,599 .9
9
The Sony Alpha α7R IV Mirrorless Camera brings incomparable image quality and processing speed to the α7R series. Enjoy pro level usability in a robust compact body for confidence, flexibility, and freedom. Purchase in-store, online with in-store pick-up, or ship as a gift to anywhere in the US.
The Sony α7R III Mirrorless Camera packs high power, precision, and potential into a strong, compact body to give you greater flexibility to take brilliant shots in any situation. Available for purchase in-store, online with in-store pick-up, or to ship to the photographer in your life anywhere in the US.
Versatility is key with the Canon EOS R. Whether capturing landscapes, wildlife, wedding portraits, or dance performances, the EOS R is an impressive imaging tool that’s primed to deliver the stunning photos and videos that photographers, moviemakers and any visual storytellers need to make their stories fly. Available for purchase in-store, online with in-store pick-up, or to ship to the photographer in your life anywhere in the US.
1112 NW 19th Ave
1112 NW 19th Ave
1112 NW 19th Ave
prophotosupply.com
Sony FE 50mm f/2.5 G Lens $599.99 Pro Photo Supply
Sony FE 24-70mm f/2.8 GM Lens
prophotosupply.com
$2,199.99
Pro Photo Supply
$549.9 9
Canon RF 70-200mm f/4 L IS USM Lens
9
prophotosupply.com
$1,599.99
Pro Photo Supply
$1,799 .9 til 1 2/
13
9
Sony’s FE 50mm F2.5 G lens delivers high resolution and beautiful bokeh in an ultra-compact lightweight package. Its high speed autofocus ability keeps up with the most demanding cameras. Purchase in-store, online with in-store pick-up, or to ship to the photographer in your life anywhere in the US.
A fast, standard zoom favored for its versatility, the Sony FE 24-70mm f/2.8 GM lens is a wide-angle to short telephoto lens designed for Sony mirrorless cameras. Available for purchase in-store, online with in-store pick-up, or to ship to the photographer in your life anywhere in the US.
Pro Photo Supply The RF 70-200mm F4 L IS USM is a telephoto length zoom lens that delivers high image quality while being compact and portable, as Canon’s shortest and lightest 70-200mm f/4 lens to date, making it the perfect travel companion. Available for purchase instore, online with in-store pick-up, or ship to the photographer in your life anywhere in the US.
1112 NW 19th Ave
1112 NW 19th Ave
1112 NW 19th Ave
prophotosupply.com
prophotosupply.com
SPONSORED CONTENT
prophotosupply.com
Willamette Week DECMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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Winner of five Tony Awards including Best Play!
STARTERS
THE MOST IMPORTANT PORTLAND CULTURE STORIES OF THE WEEK—GRAPHED.
READ MORE ABOUT THESE STO R I E S AT WW E E K .CO M .
RIDICULOUS
D AV I D S H A N N O N
A DA M S AW Y E R
Bandcamp holds its last Bandcamp Friday, but points out it still gives a heck of a lot of album profits to bands.
Ranger-led New Year’s Day hikes will resume this year at three state parks—and while that’s nothing, it’s something!
VA N P O R T M O S A I C
SEN SO RY-FRIENDLY PERFORMANCE | D EC. 21, 2021
M T. H O O D M E A D O W S
Fertile Ground Festival announces its 2022 lineup and reveals that all productions will handle their own streaming this year.
ON STAGE THROUGH DEC. 24, 2021
Harris Tweed Cap $115 100% Wool, fabric woven in the Outer Hebrides Scotland
AWESOME
Members of the cast of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Photo by Owen Carey.
SEASON SUPERSTARS
K AT H L E E N N Y B E R G
Herringbone Tweed Colors: Grey, Brown, Blue, Olive Sizes: 6 7/8 - 7 7/8
AWFUL
Ski resort Mt. Hood Meadows isn’t open for skiing yet due to warm temperatures, but it is so ready to be open for skiing.
503.445.3700 | PCS.ORG
Oregon State Parks reveals it will spend $50 million in the next two years to update state campgrounds.
SW Broadway 503-223-4976 BUY 4 969 WASHES, GET 2 FREE! Mon-Sat 10 - 5 Sun 12-5
McMenamins announces it’s adding live music shows to Forest Grove’s Grand Lodge venue.
503 CAR WASH www.johnhelmer.com Please see our website washmanusa.com to order or the location nearest you
11/4/20 Harris Tweed Cap $115
Herringbone Tweed Colors: Grey, Brown, Blue, Olive Sizes: 6 7/8 - 7 7/8
3:06 PM
AUSTIN JAMES JR.
100% Wool, fabric woven in the Outer Hebrides Scotland
CHRISTINE DONG
Washman_GG_2020.indd 1
For the second year in a row, Trap Kitchen PDX hands out holiday fir trees to local families in need. Oregon-born wolf OR-93, famous for making his way 1,000 miles south into California, is found dead.
969 SW Broadway 503-223-4976 Mon-Sat 10 - 5 Sun 12-5 www.johnhelmer.com
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
SERIOUS
GET BUSY
STUFF TO DO IN PORTLAND THIS WEEK, INDOORS AND OUT.
�GO | Ginger Minj’s Winter Wonderland Last year, holiday celebrations were small and simple out of an abundance of caution, but now that you’re vaxxed and boosted, it’s time to go big with Christmas—and it doesn’t get more over the top than drag. Ginger Minj, star of Ru Paul’s Drag Race, teams up with her bestie Gidget Galore in this nondenominational seasonal romp with classic and new songs. Expect more than a dozen costume changes and a slew of machines that spew everything from fog to confetti to snow. Aladdin Theater, 3017 SE Milwaukie Ave., 503-234-9694, aladdin-theater. com. 7 pm Thursday, Dec. 9. $30.
☛ DO | Celebrate the Season With pFriem The ski season may be getting off to a bit of a late start this year, but that doesn’t mean you can’t drink like you just wrapped up an epic day on the slopes. Eleven pFriem beers will be on tap at Mt. Hood Meadows for this rare vertical tasting, which includes charcuterie and live music. Brewers from the award-winning Hood River producer will also be on hand to answer all of your pressing beer nerd questions. And who knows? By this weekend, Mount Hood may be covered in several feet of snow, which could make this a true après-ski event. Mt. Hood Meadows, 14040 Highway 35, Government Camp, 503337-2222, skihood.com. 1 and 3:30 pm Saturday, Dec. 11. $35. ☛ DO | My People’s Market For three consecutive weekends, new vendors, new music and new snacks rotate through the winter incarnation of My People’s Market in inner Southeast. With a focus on elevating Portland’s entrepreneurs of color, the market presents a different 30 vendors each weekend—a terrific curation of local food, drink, apparel, art, beauty products and more. If you stop by this Sunday, you’ll be treated to performances by local soul singer Blossom. Next weekend, Yawa and DJ Anjali keep the beat. The Redd, 831 SE Salmon St., mypeoplesmarket.com. Noon-6 pm Sunday, Dec. 12.
SEAN JORDAN
�GO | Astoria Food Hub Winter Market The debut of the nearly finished Astoria Food Hub is on many must-go lists, and it isn’t shying from the attention, letting the curious and in the know get a peek at what’s coming together inside the renovated Mason-Ehrman & Co. Building. Situated on the city’s riverwalk, the market—where local farmers, cattle ranchers and others can sell directly to buyers—seems like a no-brainer to showcase the area’s abundant regional food producers. The space’s brief but welcome Winter Market gives fans a chance to get inside and check out what the hub is bringing together. Astoria Food Hub, Mason-Ehrman & Co. Building, 1152 Marine Drive, Astoria. Noon-3 pm Saturday, Dec. 11. SEE |
Faded Comedy with Sean Jordan Portlanders love to celebrate the return of 2014 WW Funniest Five alum Sean Jordan, especially when he rolls into town with a regular guest from his popular podcast, All Fantasy Everything, like Mike Mulloy. The duo won’t be doing fantasy drafts of cultural references, but the single-show engagement should be enough to get deep and take too seriously a number of super-silly topics. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 503-583-8464, portland.heliumcomedy.com. 8 pm Sunday, Dec. 12. $20-$28. 21+.
�VIRTUAL |
Cider Summit Northwest Holiday Festival to Go Last year, every beer and cider festival that could be packaged as a take-home event did just that in order to provide drinkers with some form of entertainment as they hunkered down for the pandemic. You might’ve thought that model would disappear with vaccinations, but the to-go experience remains popular, and Cider Summit has created another for the holidays. Choose from three different tasting kits, then crack open your assortment of cans and bottles while watching short videos featuring the cidermakers describing their creations on the Cidercraft magazine YouTube channel. Cider Summit Northwest, cidersummitnw.com/nwholiday. Orders must be received by 11:59 pm Sunday, Dec. 12. Kits available for pickup Saturday, Dec. 18, at three Portland metro area locations. $29.50-$99.50.
PFRIEM
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FOOD & DRINK THOMAS TEAL
Portland’s Best Italian Dining to Eat While Watching The Sopranos While not known for traditional East Coast red sauce joints, the city has more than enough gabagool to satisfy your cravings. BY A N D R E A DA M E WO O D
SPICY MEATBALL: DeNicola’s has the red-checked tablecloths vibe on lock. 30
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
Earlier this summer, a good friend and I embarked for the first time on the epic journey that is The Sopranos, launching into a world of Tony, Paulie Walnuts, bada-bings, unethical therapy and bullets shot into the backs of so many heads. Apparently, we were not alone in our sudden, inescapable draw to a mob show that debuted in 1999. The New York Times even ran a think piece, in late September, arguing The Sopranos is experiencing a resurgence among young leftists. “The show’s depiction of contemporary America as relentlessly banal and hollow is plainly at the core of the current interest in the show, which coincides with an era of crisis across just about every major institution in American life,” NYT story editor Willy Staley wrote. But for me, The Sopranos just makes me hungry. It’s a love letter to food from the first episode, when little A.J. Soprano, upon learning his grandmother isn’t going to make it to his birthday party, exclaims: “So what? No fucking ziti now?” (I think about this line a lot.) It’s Tony eating a T-bone with eggs at 7 am after a long night of drinking and doing lines off Icelandic stewardesses’ boobs, and it’s countless plates of pasta at their beloved Vesuvio restaurant. Portland isn’t known for its traditional East Coast red sauce joints, where
chicken piccata and eggplant Parm overflow onto red-checked tablecloths and your server has worked there for 35 years. I don’t contend that any place here is going to fully satisfy a transplant with strong opinions on manicot. But that doesn’t mean the cravings don’t demand satisfaction, and with that in mind, we schlepped to five East Coast Italian restaurants—a few very traditional, a couple that are more modern in approach—to help you find the right meatball for your rewatch. Bocci’s on 7th 1728 SE 7th Ave., 503-234-1616, boccison7th.com. 4-9 pm Friday-Sunday. For each of these meals, I brought along my Sopranos-watching pal, who is from New York and also has an Italian last name that ends in o, Bocci’s, we agreed, was somehow it. The small space on Southeast 7th isn’t hip, but it avoids being stodgy. It’s not gourmet but is still wonderfully delicious. We walked in and were greeted by super warm staff, the sounds of Bob Dylan floating from the kitchen and free house-baked bread—dense and soft with a crusty, salty edge—with olive oil and vinegar. Bocci’s meatballs (sausage and beef ) were just the right consistency, drenched in cheese and perfectly
Top 5
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WHERE TO EAT THIS WEEK.
WHERE TO DRINK THIS WEEK.
1. GUILDER CAFE SUZETTE SMITH
There are red-checked tablecloths and a map of Italy on your table, and your order of cheese-laden eggplant Parmesan will come with a side of spaghetti, just as God intended.
spiced. The lasagna’s tasty layers of ricotta and sausage, baked into a dish, had a lovely cheese crispiness on the edges. The star was the chicken Marsala: a generous chicken breast lightly breaded and still very moist, served piping hot over spaghetti and a marsala wine sauce that was buttery and rich without being painfully decadent. Then the amaretto chocolate cake was a puff ball of justboozy frosting that tastes like what you want those gross alcohol-filled chocolates you’d sneak from your parents to taste like. All in all, two appetizers, two entrees, a bottle of very drinkable barbera (Tasmorcan “badger” for $30 a bottle) and dessert set us back only $100 plus tip. This is my Vesuvio’s.
Campana 901 NE Oneonta St., 503-841-6195, campanapdx.com. 5-9 pm Wednesday-Sunday. Opened just before the pandemic, in the former Grand Army Tavern space in Woodlawn, Campana has flourished. Run by a husband-and-wife team from Manhattan, chef George Kaden and Annalisa Maceda, Campana claims East Coast cred, but strays from a typical red sauce spread. There’s no chicken Parmesan or giant baskets of garlic bread, but there is a beautifully balanced Americano cocktail (Campari, Cocchi Torino and soda) on the happy hour menu for $7, a gorgeous Caesar with an ample hit of anchovy and the best pasta we tried on our tour. Campana’s spaghetti and meatballs—
Gino’s Restaurant 8051 SE 13th Ave., 503-233-4613, ginossellwood.com. 4-9 pm daily. Another longtime Italian favorite (open since 1996), Gino’s in Sellwood has strong neighborhood vibes. Dining outdoors in the fall, we were surrounded by multigenerational families digging into its iconic Grandma Jean’s ragù—a long-simmered stew of tomatoes, pork ribs, beef and pepperoni—served over penne and indulging in the tiramisu for dessert. I’ll be back for the oversized pork chop that’s marinated in milk, fennel and sage, served over a heap of mashed potatoes with vegetables (though not a side of spaghetti as well, sadly), and to check out the extensive, but reasonably priced, list of Italian reds. Gabagool 7955 N Lombard St., 503-894-9096, gabagoolpdx.com. 4-9 pm daily. (To the tune of “Eleanor Rigby”): Tony Soprano, cares for the ducks who live in his pool, eats gabagool. (I stole this from a meme.) I mean, we had to go to Gabagool. As its website says, gabagool is how southern Italians pronounce capicola on the East Coast. FYI for those who want to keep eating outdoors though the pandemic winter: This former food cart turned counter service restaurant in St. Johns has the warmest heated outdoor patio I have ever encountered. Gabagool, despite the name, doesn’t fit the bill for a red sauce restaurant, but it does make its pastas and pizzas from scratch. The best thing we tried was an order of grilled oyster mushrooms served over arugula with lemon oil and pecorino Romano. It’s a recipe I’d like to steal. Unfortunately, the housemade pasta was a touch overcooked, and the meatballs, made with grass-fed beef, were oddly dense. However, the signature gabagool sandwich is just $13 and sports a heap of capicola ham, finocchiona salami and mozzarella, topped with romaine, marinated tomatoes, hot peppers, and oil and vinegar. It would give even Tony’s seasoned stomach a reason to reach for the Tums (in a good way).
2. PUSH X PULL
1. PIZZA THIEF
2610 NW Vaughn St., 503-719-7778, pizzathief. com. Noon-9 pm daily. The dual gem of Pizza Thief and its adjoining Bandit Bar is a newcomer that fits into its surroundings perfectly, serving up big, New Yorkstyle slices, quality craft beers and unpretentious cocktails under the neon lights of the Montgomery Park sign.
2. CLOUDFOREST
727 SE Morrison St., 503-893-2614, cloudforest. shop. 10 am-7 pm Thursday-Monday (outdoor seating only). A visit to the Cloudforest shop reveals an abundance of fine chocolate, ranging from the vanilla-infused Orchid bar to the Holy Wood: flavored with woodsy-herbaceous and reputedly medicinal palo santo. The namesake Cloudforest bar is refined solely from Nacional-type cacao beans grown in Ecuador’s Camino Verde orchard. Owner Sebastian Cisneros has also begun to extend his reach beyond bar chocolate. Summer brought ice cream made from cacao pulp, tasting of fruit with the barest whisper of chocolate flavor, and a hazelnut-chocolate spread suited to spoon right on top.
3. ZUCKERCREME
414 SE 81st Ave., 317-366-6938, instagram.com/ zuckercreme. 10 am-6 pm Wednesday-Saturday, weekly pop-ups 10 am-4 pm Sunday. Following a summer of successful themed pop-ups (Strawberry Museum, among them), Brittany Sigal decided to keep monthly themes moving through her Montavilla cafe, Zuckercreme. December is “cozy AF” month, and every Sunday she hosts local makers at the coffee shop’s tables—making it an impromptu little market. During the week, there’s a much chiller vibe of “damn fine” Mutt’s coffee, baked goods and a corner of consigned local wares. “I’m from the Midwest,” Sigal says, “and I think I accidentally made a Cracker Barrel.”
821 SE Stark St., pushxpullcoffee.com. 8 am-2 pm Monday-Friday, 8 am-3 pm Saturday-Sunday. Coffee may be ubiquitous in our city, but Christopher Hall, the 37-year-old co-founder of coffee roaster and cafe Push x Pull, possesses a singular focus on natural process beans. “Natural process” refers to fermentation of the entire coffee cherry after harvesting. In Push x Pull’s capable hands, the results are flavorful espresso shots and captivating cortados.
3. MIDNIGHT SOCIETY
3341 SE Belmont St., themidnightsocietypdx.net. 4 pm-midnight Tuesday-Thursday, 4 pm-2 am Friday-Saturday. When it’s an option, vermut de la casa is the best and cheapest vermouth choice you can make— and is assuredly the least FDA approved. Midnight Society co-owner and bartender Estanislado Orona makes two secret-menu blends. The white combines Dolin Dry and Padró & Co.’s Myrrha Blanco with saline to give the sweet and nutty mix a tang, like sour verjus. The red is a mix of Dolin and Cocchi Storico reds, set over cacao nibs for a week. The first sip is cherry cola and fudge. As it mellows on ice, clove and banana come out.
4. COOPERATIVA
1250 NW 9th Ave., Suite 100, 503-342-7416, cooperativapdx.com. 7:30 am-9 pm Wednesday-Saturday. New to the menu at the Pearl’s Italian market, the World Vermut Tour flight comes with three 3-ounce pours to remind drinkers that—to quote bar manager Joel Schmeck—“really killer vermouths” are made internationally and domestically. Alongside Spanish Lustau vermut rosé and Cnia Mata red vermouth, Cooperativa features Son of Man’s “Someday” vermouth. Made with the Basque-style Sagardo cider, brewed in Cascade Locks, this dry white warps the vermouth category—a category known to have few requisites other than being made with wine. The cloudy yellow bottle carries tart sips of kumquat and rhubarb.
THOMAS TEAL
DeNicola’s Italian Restaurant 3520 SE Powell Blvd., 503-2395221, denicolasitaliandining.com. 4-9 pm Sunday-Thursday, 4-10 pm Friday-Saturday. An institution on Southeast Powell since 1978, DeNicola’s remains family-owned to this day. If you’re lucky, you’ll get a booth under a framed portrait of current owner Donata, who runs it with her sons and brother. There are red-checked tablecloths and a map of Italy on your table, and your order of cheese-laden eggplant Parmesan will come with a side of spaghetti, just as God intended. There’s veal, and a decent bottle of chianti for $30. The food is not subtle or refined, but you’re not here for that. I loved the meatballs, which were the right blend of spice and meat-to-binder ratio. We got that side, eggplant Parm, manicotti, antipasto, a bottle of wine, a cannoli, and tip for like $100. Boom.
which I ordered at every spot—featured a bright sauce, a perfect pork and beef meatball and fresh pasta that kept its al dente bite. While you’re looking at $20 to $30 entrees, the quality makes up for it. Aaaaand, it’s happy hour pricing all night if you sit at the bar, where you can get full plates of select pastas for just $12.
1005 W Burnside St., guildercafe.com. 10 am-8 pm daily. Newly arrived in the corner spot at Powell’s City of Books, Guilder Cafe West is the second location of a local coffee business steaming up coffee drinks and roasting beans with as much of an eye on ethics as one might expect from a cafe named after a heroic fantasy adventure like The Princess Bride. “We all need to pay more for coffee because it costs more than we think to produce it,” the menu reads. That sentiment and menu items like the Farm Boy Oats or the Autumn Miracle Pill (a latte with cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, vanilla, panela sugar, cold brew and salt) are the subtle ways Guilder shows its inspiration. You’re unlikely to be called m’lady.
4. QUAINTRELLE
2032 SE Clinton St., 503-200-5787, quaintrelle.co. 5-10 pm Wednesday-Sunday. Mississippi fine dining spot Quaintrelle reopened in late August on Southeast Clinton with a noticeable upgrade. Chef Riley Eckersley and bar manager Camille Cavan stayed on and built out the former Burrasca location into the kitchen and bar of their combined dreams. There are now splurge-worthy five-, seven- and nine-course tasting menus with available add-ons and drink pairings, along with an à la carte menu. Eckersley continues his uncanny knack for drawing from wherever his culinary interests take him—a fish sauce here, freshly foraged mushrooms there— and a touch of Spanish flair. Plates always look like art, and also taste like it.
5. BRASA HAYA
412 NE Beech St., 503-288-3499, brasahayapdx. com. 5:30-10 pm, Wednesday-Sunday. Indoor seating not ADA accessible, vaccination required to dine indoors. A new Spanish restaurant in a converted home that was formerly Beech Street Parlor, Brasa Haya is a fine(r) dining restaurant with textbook salt cod croquettes. The portion was too small to split effectively, but this is a problem inherent to tapas, not Brasa Haya.
5. NIGHTINGALE
18 NE 28th Ave., 971-254-9017, nightingalepdx. net. 5 pm-midnight Thursday-Saturday, 5-11 pm Sunday, Monday and Wednesday. There’s something subdued about Nightingale, even with a decent weekend turnout of groups dining both inside and out—on the bar’s festive but understated streetside patio. The elusive quiet bar on a Saturday night, its cocktail menu consists of well-conceived concoctions, most with a “peaty” cast to them owing to the liberal deployment of mezcals, scotches and smoked bitters.
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COMEDY TONY COHEN
Look Out, Here Comes Zäanderberger! Two of Portland’s most exciting comedians make an argument for scripted comedy. BY SU ZETTE SMITH
suzette@wweek.com
Portland is a standup town. Although the city has more festivals devoted to improv and sketch comedy than dedicated standup, one look at audiences makes it abundantly clear this town has a specific idea of how it would like its jokes: one person, on a stage, wearing whatever they put on that morning. And yet two of Portland’s most well-regarded comedians, Phil Schallberger and Anne Zander, work solidly in the realm of sketch comedy, with scripts, props, costumes and only enough improv to keep things spicy. Presented by Kickstand Comedy, this weekend debuts their fused comedy sensibilities, scripted sketch one-hour show Zäanderberger! We sat down to talk about the show, the pandemic and the true essence of clowning.
BRUCE COCKBURN 50TH ANNIVERSARY TOUR (2ND ATTEMPT)
WW: How did you two come to work together? Schallberger: We’d seen each other perform, but I actually reached out over like Facebook. Messenger. It was during the pandemic. “When all this is over, do you want to make something?” Zander: I was definitely a fan of Phil’s work. I moved here from London in 2017, and I had just started doing solo character comedy. And I was like, “Oh, nobody does that here.” So Phil was definitely one of the first people I saw—I can’t remember where I first saw you—I think it was probably at Kickstand. But you did like a Cockney accent. Schallberger: The British guy. Zander: Oh my God—first of all—it’s so funny. So I respected it. But it was also like, oh, like there’s a kinship here. Like I get what this person is doing. Schallberger: We’re both kind of doing something a little bit weirder than other people, maybe. I’m not sure that’s the right word. It’s grounded, but maybe more absurd. We both like taking things to a different level of absurdity. Is your show two separate shows back to back? Or are you performing together? Zander: We have a few things that are together. The meat of it is us doing our own solo things, so it’s kind of a mishmash. Schallberger: And there’s also some video elements in it as well. I think we’re actually maybe doing more together.
DEC 16 & 17 ALADDIN THEATER TICKETS AT ALADDIN-THEATER.COM 32
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
Phil, I frequently see you perform with standups. Is your work standup? Is it scripted? Is it improv? Schallberger: Scripted, but I do perform with standups because that’s generally what’s happening and what I get invited to do. Standup preparation seems like show up and make jokes. But with you, Phil, you work with a projector, a laptop, and someone to run your laptop. Schallberger: Oh, I do it all. I don’t trust anyone.
One of your characters is a conspiracy theory-obsessed duck fanatic, and that whole sketch seems primed to go viral. But while your work is pretty visual, you’ve historically been opposed to recording it, right? Schallberger: It doesn’t translate as well to video. I tried shooting a full hour in 2019, just me and a couple guys playing around with video and editing. I realized that if you aren’t doing standup, you have to have almost a thesis, an artistic visual design. Maybe the same problems of standup on Zoom. Zander: There’s a special kind of pain watching a standup on Zoom. Their face is always, “I don’t know. Are people laughing? I don’t know.” Schallberger: And the audio on Zoom tries to combine all the channels and it all gets crushed immediately. Will the show have an overarching story? The press release made it sound like it’s about the pandemic. Zander: It’s not centered around it. But it’s kind of a part of the show. Are there specific characters? Zander and Schallberger: Different characters. [They look at each other.] Different characters. Do they know they’re in a show? I only ask because you both have such a history of breaking the fourth wall. Zander: It depends on the character, honestly. Schallberger: I always try to write sketches that happen here and now. If you go up and you just start addressing the moment as if it’s the 17th century and we’re all about to go on a carriage ride—I don’t like it. It’s not my style. Anne, you have this extensive background with clown work. Was clown college a deeply experimental space? Were you pushing the boundaries of radical clowning? Zander: Well, I didn’t go to a specific clown school. I did a Masters of Physical Theater. So we did a lot of like, very tense Eastern European body work. But I did a whole term on clowning, and I just sort of fell in love with it—I hated it at first because it was so difficult. You have to completely let your guard down. But once you learn to turn off your brain, there’s so much interesting body work to do. It can be really clear and precise. Do you have a succinct way of describing clowning that is not just face makeup and a red nose? Zander: It’s vulnerability, precision and audience connection. GO: Zäanderberger! shows at Shoebox Theater, 2110 SE 10th Ave., kickstandcomedy.org. 8 pm Friday and Saturday, Dec. 10-11 and 17-18. $15-$25.
POTLANDER
Don’t overlook experience gifts for the cannabis lover in your life. BY B R I A N N A W H E E L E R
’Tis the season to congratulate all your friends and fam on making it through another dystopian year. And what better way to celebrate such a feat than by bottoming out our holiday budgets on all manner of cannabis-themed merriment, enrichment and straight-up opulence. For 2021, our canna gift guide is less a nudge to get your canna-capitalist rocks off and more of an endof-the-world stoner wishlist that just happens to feature a few of our fave local goods and services. This year, when shopping for your cannathusiast self or the cannasseurs in your cypher, consider items that celebrate self-love, wellness, culture and art, the occasional gender-neutral spa service, and functional pothead fashion.
Heir Waterpipe Heir’s contemporary reimagining of a classic beaker bong is so sleek, so easy to smoke from, and so simple to disassemble and clean that it’s made me side-eye every other smoking device in my home. A deviation from the standard beaker or straight bong (where the downtube is situated above the base), Heir’s branching ceramic mouthpiece puts the bowl directly in the user’s eyeline. It also houses a ceramic downstem that easily screws apart from the water chamber for super-easy cleanup. The waterpipe is pricier than a standard 12-inch head-shop bong, but the smart design, posh aesthetic and freedom from of unscrubbable, stinky resin pockets make the whole package feel worth the extra coin. Get it from: smokeheir.com Lazarus Naturals x Ranger Full Spectrum CBD Chocolate Bar If you’re keeping chocolate stocking stuffers on your gift-giving radar, but feel less than confident about dosing your giftees, consider the newest collab from Lazarus Naturals and Ranger Chocolate.
This CBD-infused 70% dark chocolate bar is a gorgeous way to celebrate both Oregon’s craft chocolate and craft cannabis industries and a stellar introduction for cannacurious friends and family members with lower or nonexistent THC tolerances. Pro tip: One bar for each of the stockings hung can temper all the holiday stress messes. Get it from: lazarusnaturals.com
N o m ste r n a i l z P r i va te Manicure When shopping for the aesthetic stoner, it’s easy to get lost in the mire of contemporary lifestyle canna-products, which is precisely why you should instead consider the gift of experience. Nomsternailz is a private, cannabis-friendly, mobile nail service serving the greater Portland metro area and creating opulent, private nail salon experiences at whatever (consumption-friendly) location you secure. Though Nomster also operates out of a studio in the Alphabet District, its weed-positive willingness to travel and its dope nail services are what make it such a hot commodity. Pro tip: Stock your stash box pre-appointment with Meraki pre-rolls so you’ve got something nice to dangle between your fresh tips. Book a sesh: nomsternailz.com Make & Mary Relax Gift Set While Make & Mary’s branding feels decidedly femme, its product line is universally agreeable, particularly among those for whom wellness is the primary cosmetic. Its Relax Gift Set, for example, is a curated trio of spa indulgences designed to both relax and rejuvenate. If there’s a certain someone on your gift list whom you’d love to pamper for at least an evening, this set might be worth your attention. The complete package includes a satchel of hemp-infused herbal tea, a bath bomb formulated with 100 mg of CBD, and an aromatherapeutic candle that features a host
of essential oils, including hemp. Get it from: Make & Mary, 2506 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-444-7608, makeandmary.com. High Society Collection Sweet Jane Mask Chain, paired with Untamed Humans Mask Relief Mist Of all the dystopia-adjacent products that came through our feed this year, none was so covetable as High Society’s Sweet Jane Mask Chain. From a company best known for creative, multipurpose joint holders that moonlight as crowns, necklace charms and bun pins, High Society’s mask chain is a logical addition to its line of maximalist pothead grandeur. And yes, you can use it with your eyeglasses as well. Pro tip: Pair it with a bottle of Untamed Human’s skin-refreshing mask relief mist and you’ve got an inarguably dope apocalypse care package. Get them from: highsocietycollection.com, untamedhumans.com
Aurora Elixirs Hemp Soda Gift Set Dazzle at your most ostentatious this year with a gift box from Aurora Elixirs: a local, small-batch soda company whose line of 25 mg, broad-spectrum hemp CBD sodas make a great addition to any canna-friendly wet bar. These bottled fizzies are available in a gift set featuring four flavors: rosemary grapefruit, black currant spruce, cayenne citron and lavender orange. The set also comes with two gold, stainless steel straws in a velvet carrying pouch and a stylish matching gold bottle opener. Altogether, it’s a thoughtful, affordably chic introduction to CBD for the uninitiated and posh, as well as a brisk addition to an established cannabis user and bubble water snob’s drink chest. Get it from: Market of Choice, various locations.
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MUSIC
Now Hear This
Listening recommendations from the past, present, Portland and the periphery. SOMETHING OLD A central figure of the 1970s’ anti-colonial Hawaiian Renaissance, Gabby Pahinui made some of the most gorgeous and exploratory records of that decade in any genre, often with his ever-changing “Gabby Band.” Rabbit Island Music Festival might well be his best album, opening and closing with a chorus of seabirds and featuring 37 minutes of music that’s at once bustling and serene, communal and visionary. But it’s hard to go wrong with anything from 1972 onward. After that, go back and check out his earlier recordings as part of the Sons of Hawaii. SOMETHING NEW There’s a lot going on in Lotic’s vocal performance on her new album Water. On one hand, the Berlinbased, Texas-born artist summons all the vocal sounds you’d expect on an aquatic-themed album: whale whoops, siren shrieks. (She also does a better job than anyone else since Björk at sounding like Björk.) But mostly, she sounds like she’s having a blast. A decade into her career, she considers this her “arrival as an artist,” and though that undersells her rich body of work, she sounds exhilarated enough for us to understand what she means. SOMETHING LOCAL When an album called Pink Dream comes along, and it has an endless, color-corrected cityscape on the sleeve, the first question for any ambient-head should be: Does it sound like its title and cover? In the case of Elijah Knutsen’s January album, recently reissued in an expanded edition on the small local label Memory Color, the answer is a resounding yes. This is some of the warmest ambient music on this side of the Willamette, full of distant metallic squeaks and friendly field recordings, pleasant but never losing its essential mystery. SOMETHING ASKEW Sound-art titan Alvin Lucier passed away this Thursday at age 90, leaving behind an endlessly curious and enduringly influential body of work. Brain waves, magnets, clocks—all were fair game in Lucier’s sound explorations from the ’60s onward. But his most influential piece is no doubt I Am Sitting in a Room, in which a recording of his voice is played in a room before that recording is again recorded in the same room. At the end, the words have been absorbed into the acoustics of the room itself. They sound alien, frightening and beautiful.
Editor: Andi Prewitt | Contact: aprewitt@wweek.com
Christopher, the noise of the plot threatens to overwhelm the characters. It doesn’t help that the story’s sense of humor is overcooked. Too often, Curious Incident begs for the audience’s attention with jokes that are more irritating than endearing—especially during a scene where a suspicious Christopher searches his father’s bedroom and finds a series of trinkets that seem mechanically engineered to be punchlines, like a Scooby-Doo tie and some pee-stained underwear from T.J. Maxx. Cheap laughs are a common currency in contemporary plays. Stephens is far from the only playwright who seems to believe that audiences can’t handle GLOWING GLOBES: Jamie Sanders (center) gives a complex ideas unless powerful performance as a British teen whose surroundings they’re accompanied come to life in Portland Center Stage’s latest production. by cheap jokes, but that assumption says more about his abilities as a writer than the tastes of ticket buyers. Thankfully, Portland Center Stage has more faith in audiences. Sanders’ triumphantly intense performance trusts us to withstand the hurricane of obsession, loneliness and pride coursing through Christopher’s soul—feelings that are deepened and defined by Arnulfo Maldonado’s elegant and evocative scenic design. The set is painted whitish gray and topped with a round, disclike structure that looks like a flying saucer. It’s a refBY BEN N ETT CA MPB ELL FER GU SON erence to Christopher’s fascination with outer space, but Maldonado’s smooth The crime is murder. The victim is a dog. ioral difficulties.” Those “difficulties” surfaces also suggest a suffocatingly sterile The detective on the case is a British teen. might be a result of Asperger syndrome laboratory, hinting that Christopher feels That’s the premise of Simon Stephens’ or high-functioning autism—Haddon he is as much a captive as his pet rat, Toby. play The Curious Incident of the Dog in was never specific—but the play clearly Countless forces confine Christopher the Night-Time, based on the 2003 novel shows that investigating the mystery of emotionally, including the manipulations by Mark Haddon. It’s a buzzy setup, but Wellington’s demise brings Christopher of his father, the absence of his mother, the play is not really about murder, dogs a sense of purpose he has long lacked. and the mystery of Wellington, which or amateur detective work. It’s about Curious Incident uses actors not only to becomes a manifestation of the frequent identity, communication and, most of all, create characters, but to create scenery. incompatibility between the world and his movement. During a flashback in which we see Chrisneeds. He wants to be free of his bonds, but Those themes flourish in Portland Centopher’s mother (Ayanna Berkshire) at more importantly, he needs to understand ter Stage’s production of Curious Incident, the seaside, she is surrounded by a Greek them. which mostly rises above the play’s flaws. chorus of performers who swirl around While that journey could have particular There’s no eclipsing the artificiality that her, imitating the motions of surging resonance for audience members with bedevils some of the storytelling, but waves. conditions like Christopher’s, his struggle director Marissa Wolf and the cast sucIt’s thrilling and fitting that the actors to make peace with the people and places ceed in bringing poetry and surrealism mold and unmold themselves, embodying around him is as universal as it is specific. to a story that isn’t always as clever as it roles ranging from cops to London subway “It’s bloody hard telling the truth all the wants to be. doors. Christopher is so overwhelmed by time,” Christopher’s father tells him. That Curious Incident, which opened at the the world around him that he can’t bear to may be true, but at its best, The Curious Armory in March 2020 a week before be touched, so the idea of his surroundings Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time the first pandemic lockdown, begins coming to life and literally engulfing him speaks the truth clearly and beautifully. with 15-year-old Christopher (Jamie has an eerie inevitability. The world of the Sanders) discovering that Wellington, a play is the world as he sees it. neighbor’s dog, has been stabbed to death That world also contains questionable SEE IT: The Curious Incident of the with a garden fork. A policeman accuses writing—Stephens is faithful to Haddon’s Dog in the Night-Time plays at Portland Christopher, but he’s not just innocent— novel, histrionic plot twists included. It’s Center Stage at the Armory, 128 NW 11th Ave., 503-445-3700, pcs.org. 7:30 he’s exhilarated by the thought of solving not enough for Christopher’s father (Leif pm Thursday-Friday, 2 and 7:30 pm Wellington’s murder. Norby), for instance, to have one shockSaturday-Sunday, through Dec. 24. In the novel, Christopher is described ing secret—he has to have two. Just as Sensory-friendly show 7:30 pm Tuesday, Dec. 21. No 7:30 pm shows Sunday, Dec. as “a mathematician with some behavthe noise of life threatens to overwhelm O W E N C A R E Y/ C O U R T E S Y O F P O R T L A N D C E N T E R S TA G E
Written by: Daniel Bromfield | @bromf3
PERFORMANCE
Dogged Detective
Shuttered by the pandemic, the theatrical version of Mark Haddon’s novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time returns to Portland Center Stage.
19, and Friday, Dec. 24. $25-$87.
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Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
At Loggerheads As Sometimes a Great Notion turns 50, it’s worth looking back at the Stampers—the prideful lumber family at the center of the film—and Oregon’s role in the production. While Ken Kesey’s Sometimes a Great Notion is regarded as perhaps the quintessential Oregon novel, its 1971 film adaptation is more like a forgotten little brother. With One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (based on another Kesey novel, of course) ranking among the state’s most famous film productions, only devotees of Oregon film history or ’70s cinema likely recall much about Notion the movie. That, or maybe Paul Newman bought your uncle a beer in Newport during the summer of 1970, per the myriad boozy stories surrounding the film shoot. Fifty years old this month, this Paul Newman-directed drama unravels the pathological grit of the Stamper clan, a family of loggers in the fictional coastal enclave of Wakonda, Oregon. The Stampers have turned scab in the face of a timber strike, and one need only consult the family motto—“never give a inch”—to understand why they’ll keep on cutting, dammit. The film opens as though washed landward by the Pacific, an aerial shot combing the Central Oregon coastline while country music groundbreaker Charley Pride croons the gospel sentiments of “All His Children.” As establishing shots go, they seldom get more stunning, but we immediately see the movie veer in its own tonal direction. In Kesey’s opus, both
the setting and style are torrential. In the space of one page, the reader might plunge through three timelines of genealogy and perspective with unfilmable fluidity. Meanwhile, Kesey bestows Oregon nature with an almost alien power to inspire and madden the Stampers. By comparison, much of the film’s ambience is almost jaunty, as though the production couldn’t help but be impressed with its own riches of talent, source material and location. Nature is conventionally majestic. The Stamper house, built by Universal Studios on the Siletz River near Kernville, is more attractive than the novel’s half-drowned monument to stubbornness. Composer Henry Mancini’s bluegrass score practically frolics, while Newman’s irrepressible charms endow Hank Stamper with righteous irascibility, as he chainsaws union desks in half and essentially leaves Wakonda to rot while on strike. What’s more, one can sense from the classical, painterly filmmaking why Notion eluded lasting fame relative to other 1971 films, which saw The French Connection, Klute, Shaft and A Clockwork Orange help shape New Hollywood aesthetics with hip, provocative urban settings. (Granted, this didn’t stop Notion from being the first film ever shown on HBO in 1972.) Where Sometimes a Great Notion unequivocally thrives, though, is in enlivening Stamper family dynamics,
SEE IT: Sometimes a Great Notion streams on Amazon Prime and YouTube. You can also rent it at Movie Madness, 4320 SE Belmont St., 503-234-4363, moviemadness.org.
The Matrix (1999)
Visionaries Lana and Lilly Wachowski direct this blockbuster sci-fi masterpiece about a seemingly normal hacker (Keanu Reeves) who, with the help of Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), discovers he’s been living in a simulation. The highly anticipated fourth installment of the series hits theaters Dec. 22! Hollywood, Dec. 10.
Gremlins (1984) Set during Christmastime, this family-friendly horror comedy centers on a boy who receives a cuddly creature called a mogwai as a gift, with three strict rules about how to care for it. Of course, the rules are soon broken, and chaos reigns as the mogwai spawn and transform into gremlins, wreaking havoc across town. Academy, Dec. 10-16.
A Christmas Story (1983) WA R N E R B R O S
@chance_s_p
drenched in Olympia lager and 4:30 am maple syrup. In a body cast that holds his busted arm 90 degrees off his body, Henry Fonda leers and jeers unforgettably as the influential family patriarch, Henry. Then, in an Oscar-nominated turn as cousin and family cheerleader Joe Ben, Richard Jaeckel’s sunny disposition perfectly masks the film’s shocking conclusion. Michael Sarrazin excels as black-sheep hippie brother Leland reentering his estranged family’s orbit. And Lee Remick as Viv is stunningly wistful as Hank’s wife realizing she is the crew’s actual outsider. Through five stellar lead performances, Oregonian survivalism feels as spiritual as it does illogical. As Kesey’s novel puts it, these are the descendants of men with “itchy feet,” who migrated further and further into the Western wilderness, chasing a pasture some imperceptible shade greener. Even if the film portrays their antisocial tendencies more as a wellspring than a curse, the logging scenes testify to their work as a terrifying religion. We see trees the length of school buses felled by hand and yanked up mountainsides, and Quentin Tarantino has called the film’s climactic logging accident one of the best single movie scenes of the early ’70s. Just beforehand, a pulsating montage of clear-cutting shows the Stampers partaking in an Olympic feat of tradition, defiance and gluttony. No matter how handsome Paul Newman makes any of it look, one need only remember the origins of the book and film title—Lead Belly’s “Goodnight, Irene”—to recall the suicidal streak that deepens and damns every glorious sight the movie can muster. “Sometimes I live in the country/Sometimes I live in the town/Sometimes I get a great notion/to jump in the river…and drown.”
When a feeble nerd falls into a vat of toxic waste, he suddenly transforms into a mutant with superhuman strength. Revenge against his bullies quickly ensues. A PG-13 reboot of this darkly funny superhero B-movie is scheduled for release next year, and stars Peter Dinklage, Kevin Bacon and Elijah Wood. Clinton, Dec. 9.
WA R N E R B R O S
TRUE GRIT: Five stellar lead performers brought the Stamper clan to life in the fictional Oregon town of Wakonda.
BY C H A N C E SO L E M - P FE I FER
The Toxic Avenger (1984)
Editor: Andi Prewitt / Contact: aprewitt@wweek.com B I G G E S T T R A I L E R DATA B A S E
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Little Ralphie just wants a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas, but everyone from his parents to his teacher to a department store Santa repeats the same refrain: “You’ll shoot your eye out!” Other memorable scenes from this Christmas classic involve licking frozen flagpoles, a fishnet-stockinged leg lamp and Ralphie’s mom washing his mouth out with soap. Hollywood, Dec. 12.
Boogie Nights (1997) Prep for the Christmas release of Licorice Pizza with Paul Thomas Anderson’s breakthrough sophomore hit! Set in 1977, a well-endowed busboy (Mark Wahlberg) is recruited by a porn director (Burt Reynolds) to become an adult film star in this ensemble dramedy co-starring Julianne Moore, Heather Graham, John C. Reilly, Philip Seymour Hoffman and others. Hollywood, Dec. 13.
ALSO PLAYING: Academy: Elf (2003), Dec. 8-9. Scrooged (1988), Dec. 8-9. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989), Dec. 10-16. Clinton: Elf (2003), Dec. 13. Hollywood: Martial Arts of Shaolin (1986), Dec. 14.
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
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Citizen Ashe Arthur Ashe may have broken tennis’s racial barriers in the early 1960s, but when it came to finding his place among the era’s activist Black athletes, he was a late bloomer. At its most insightful, the new documentary from Rex Miller (Althea) and Sam Pollard (MLK/FBI) infers that Ashe’s gradual discovery of his voice on civil rights was due to his internalizing a back-breaking perfectionism and respectability streak while thriving in America’s whitest major sport. In this way, Citizen Ashe examines an athlete who’s reduced, however ironically, to groundbreaker status. But what of the man himself? Sometimes even the film isn’t sure. The closing credits reveal Ashe’s widow, Jeanne Moutoussamy-Ashe, displaying the depths of his library. This evidence of an intellectual thirst stands out as one of the film’s few journalistic moments as opposed to straight biography. Mostly, Citizen Ashe functions and compels as your average 30 for 30-level sports doc. The details of Ashe’s ingenious gambit against Jimmy Connors at Wimbledon in 1975 are riveting, and activist Harry Edwards fascinatingly assesses the covert radicalism of Ashe’s anti-apartheid rhetoric. In the end, saddled with the inevitable details of Ashe’s tragic health issues, Citizen Ashe settles for the simple conclusion that he was a great man. It’s not wrong. NR. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. 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 House of Gucci When Aldo Gucci (Al Pacino) learns that his reign over the fashion empire that bears his name is over in House of Gucci, he howls, “I’m dead! Dead!” It’s a scene that lets Pacino turn hamming it up into high art—a talent he shares with all the actors in this sleek and sumptuous melodrama directed by Ridley Scott. House of Gucci stars Lady Gaga as Patrizia Reggiani, who in 1998 was convicted of ordering a hit on her ex-husband, Gucci heir Maurizio Gucci (Adam Driver). As Patrizia and Maurizio, Lady Gaga and Driver have scorching chemistry— when she yanks him into a bubble bath, their erotic energy nearly vaporizes the screen. Yet House of Gucci is less a love story than it is Frankenstein as a soap opera, with Maurizio as the monster and Patrizia as his creator. She ignites his ambitions, tragically sealing her fate—to be cast aside when he ousts Aldo and takes command of Gucci. With obsessive fervor, Scott drinks in the grotesque magnificence of the Gucci dynasty, savoring their elegant possessions and their operatic emotions. Maurizio Gucci may be dead, but thanks to the palpable enthusiasm of Scott and the cast, House of Gucci has hunger in its eyes, lust in its heart, and the sweet breath of decadence in its lungs. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, Cinemagic, City Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Living Room, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, St. Johns Twin Cinemas, Studio One, Tigard.
The Power of the Dog When Phil Burbank (Benedict Cumberbatch) sees Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee) watch36
ing him bathe outdoors in The Power of the Dog, he shouts and calls him a little bitch. It’s a terrifying moment, but it’s also the start of a twisted friendship that defines this triumphantly suspenseful Western directed by Jane Campion (The Piano, Top of the Lake). Based on a novel by Thomas Savage and set in 1925, The Power of the Dog takes place on a Montana cattle ranch where the stench of resentment is equal to the odor of manure. Seething over the marriage of his brother (Jesse Plemons) to a widow named Rose (Kirsten Dunst), Phil torments them both. His ultimate revenge on Rose? Grooming Peter, her teenage son, to be his protégé—and perhaps something more. Violence is inevitable, but Campion is more interested in the tragic erosion of Rose’s dignity and the anguish that Phil experiences as a closeted gay man in a tyrannically heteronormative world. By capturing Phil’s dangerous petulance and haunting vulnerability, Cumberbatch makes the character worthy of both our revulsion and our compassion. If you see the film, you may despise him, but like Peter, you won’t be able to look away. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Hollywood, Netflix.
Belfast Near the end of director Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast, Caitríona Balfe and Jamie Dornan dance to “Everlasting Love,” Love Affair’s lustrous anthem of desire, regret and hope. It’s an intoxicating scene, but it’s also an outlier. Burdened by a suffocating cloak of nostalgia, Belfast is unable to reconcile the demands of a tale defined by trauma and a director who can’t stop gazing wistfully into the past. The setting is Ireland and the year is 1969, during the 30-year clash between Catholics and Protestants known
Willamette Week DECEMBER 8, 2021 wweek.com
as the Troubles. Sectarian violence rages, but religious battles hold no interest for Buddy (Jude Hill), a young Protestant who’s happiest watching movies like Chitty Chitty Bang Bang with his parents (Balfe and Dornan). Based in part on Branagh’s childhood, Belfast is a safe, smooth film where kids are adorably spunky and life has a never-ending Van Morrison soundtrack. Branagh seems to be trying to get away from the glorious excesses of his Shakespeare films, but restraint doesn’t suit him—nothing in Belfast is so vibrant and truthful as the sight of him jubilantly frolicking in a fountain in 1993’s Much Ado About Nothing. If the play is still the thing for Branagh, it’s because he speaks more eloquently through the stories of others than he does through his own. PG-13. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cascade, City Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Division, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Hilltop Cinema, Living Room, Movies on TV, Sherwood, Stark, Tigard, Wilsonville.
ago. Details of the disappearance of Bruno (John Leguizamo), the black sheep in the family, begin to emerge via Lin-Manuel Miranda’s original score. We learn that his special ability is predicting the future—unwanted fates foretold that are becoming all too true. When powers begin to fade and cracks in the floorboards echo familial fissures, Mirabel embarks on a quest to piece together her uncle’s most recent visions. In other words, despite the supposed wonders of the mighty Madrigals, our heroine prefers to ditch her family and zone out watching new stories appear on a jerry-rigged iPad. Judging from the murmured dismay of a progressively less-enchanted young audience, she’s far from alone. PG. JAY HORTON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lake Theater & Cafe, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Studio One, Tigard, Wunderland Milwaukie.
Encanto
Narratively and thematically, this sci-fi drama from Amazon Studios is one big backward walk into a corner. Soon after Malik (Riz Ahmed) initiates a surprise road trip with his two estranged sons and a massive conspiracy theory about alien parasites in tow, a showdown with law enforcement and an audience screaming, “Well, is it true?!” seems imminent. On the way to the painted corner, though, there’s plenty to appreciate. Morphing from exciting young actor to über-committed awards candidate with last year’s The Sound of Metal, Ahmed capably disguises himself with a roughneck accent and an ex-Marine’s twitchy defensiveness, and he’s compellingly unhinged while trying to play the cool dad. But the gestures toward elusive, Jeff Nichols-esque genre fare are often undone by miscalculated drama. With a script bent on Malik’s salvation and doom, up-and-coming director Michael Pearce gives Malik’s parole officer, played by Octavia Spencer, precious little to do and the child actors playing his estranged boys (Lucian-River Chauhan and Aditya Geddada)
A dazzling swirl of color bursting with irrepressible joy in every frame, Disney’s 60th animated feature, Encanto, is a wonder to behold, but the story of a South American clan blessed with extraordinary powers becomes a struggle to endure. Even though glowingly introduced by fiercely envious Mirabel (voiced by Stephanie Beatriz), sole member of the Madrigals born without special abilities, the gifts bestowed on her family seem ones best returned. Everblossoming eldest sister Isabela (Diane Guerrero) rides her ability to conjure up flowers toward de facto princesshood, while curative culinary prowess keeps Mirabel’s mom (Angie Cepeda) in the kitchen and super-strong middle sis Luisa (Jessica Darrow) relegated to nonstop labor. More creepily, shape-shifting has turned cousin Camilo schizophrenic, perfect hearing renders his sister Dolores an incurable gossip, Aunt Pepa always walks under a miniature rain cloud, and the prophecies laid out in emerald flat screen for Mirabel’s uncle effectively forced his banishment years
Encounter
far too much. No matter how much rubber they burn across the Nevada desert, they can’t outrun the film’s overwrought unpleasantness—a would-be family movie defined by fringe terror. That’s probably why The X-Files motto isn’t “regardless of whether the truth is out there, endanger your kids.” R. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. Amazon Prime, Clackamas Town Center.
West Side Story “You’re not thinking I’m someone else?” “I know you are not.” Those beautiful words were exchanged by Tony (Richard Beymer) and Maria (Natalie Wood) when they first met in the 1961 film adaptation of West Side Story. Yet Steven Spielberg, the latest director to adapt Leonard Bernstein’s musical riff on Romeo and Juliet, has apparently decided that banality beats beauty. With a surgeon’s precision, he has transformed West Side Story into an epic so bloated and unmagical that even its sublime dancing scenes can’t make it worth seeing. The overall story hasn’t changed—once again, the romance between Tony (Ansel Elgort) and Maria (Rachel Zegler) is rocked by a showdown between white and Puerto Rican gangs in 1950s New York—but it’s burdened by Tony Kushner’s painfully literal screenplay. The new Tony and Maria don’t use the quasi-poetic verse of the original film—they trade excruciatingly obvious lines like “You’re not Puerto Rican” and “Is that OK?” It doesn’t help that Elgort is too insincere and uncharismatic to play an exuberantly optimistic character like Tony, but the real culprit is Spielberg. The entire film is steeped in his folly—the folly of a filmmaker who put his faith in a soulless leading man and who foolishly believed that a classic could be improved upon. PG-13. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Clackamas Town Center, Cornelius, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Sherwood, Studio One, Tigard, Vancouver Plaza.
JONESIN’
by Matt Jones
"Free Fifty"--that's 5x10x2.
Week of December 16
©2021 Rob Brezsny
ARIES (March 21-April 19)
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22)
Key questions for you, beginning now and throughout 2022: 1. What do you need to say, but have not yet said? 2. What is crucial for you to do, but you have not yet done? 3. What dream have you neglected and shouldn't neglect any longer? 4. What sanctuary is essential for you to visit, but you have not yet visited? 5. What "sin" is it important for you to forgive yourself for, but you have not yet forgiven yourself? 6. What promise have you not yet fulfilled, even though it's getting late (but not too late!) to fulfill? 7. What secret have you hidden so well that you have mostly concealed it even from yourself?
Author Barbara Sher offered this wise counsel: "Imaginary obstacles are insurmountable. Real ones aren't." I bring this to your attention because I believe the coming weeks will be an excellent time to identify the imaginary obstacles you've erected in your inner world—and then smash them or burn them or dispose of them. Once you're free of the illusory interference, I think you'll find you have at least twice as much power to neutralize the real obstacles.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20) Taurus novelist Anthony Trollope (1815–1882) took one of his manuscripts to a publishing company, hoping it would be made into a book and sold to the public. A few weeks later, he got word by mail that his masterpiece had been rejected. He took a train to the publisher's office and retrieved it. On the train ride home, he turned the manuscript over and began writing a new story on the back of each page. He spent no time moping. That's the spirit I recommend you embody in the coming weeks, dear Taurus.
GEMINI (May 21-June20)
ACROSS
and they, grammatically
1 When they're low, insurance companies are more profitable
54 Rosy assertion
11 Trans Am that talks
56 Kitten's scruff
15 Central, with "of" 16 "I Am Not My Hair" singer India._ _ _ 17 Sap 18 Haynes with the documentary "The Velvet Underground" 19 Musical work featuring historical figures, often 20 Indigo dye
55 St. Vincent's backup group? 57 The act of not paying attention, old-style 58 "House" actor Omar
34 "Citizen Kane" studio 38 "C'mon, let's do this!"
2 Head of a bowling team?
5 Do some boot repair
23 Canadian actress Cooper of Apple TV+'s "See"
6 Title ship in a 1997 Spielberg movie
24 Circumvents
7 Solution strength, in chemistry
37 Basis of the name of a short-lived, short-form streaming platform
8 "Do _ _ _ to eat a peach?" (Eliot) 9 Rome's port in the Punic Wars 10 Like some hams, at this time of year? 11 _ _ _ Damacy (Playstation game with a ball that picks up everything in its path)
40 Detach from the dock
12 Like some T-shirt art
41 "In _ _ _ called malice, yeah" (The Jam lyric that's almost the proper title)
13 Spruce quality? 14 Show with the Season 1 episode "Biscuits"
46 "L&O: SVU" costar
25 "Be Kind, Rewind" device
47 Like two structures that map out the same way
27 Billy Zane's character in the Netflix miniseries "True Story"
52 30 Seconds to Mars singer Jared 53 Like the pronouns he, she,
Actor and model Kate Beckinsale unleashed a cryptic boast: "My best feature is unfortunately a private matter, although I'm told it is spectacular. But you can't really walk it down the red carpet. What can I say?" Are you imagining what I'm imagining? I bring this oddity to your attention in the hope that I can convince you to be more forthright and expressive about your own wonderful qualities. It's time to be less shy about your beauty, less secretive about your deep assets. Show the world why you're so lovable.
1 Cruise liner decks with pools
22 Costar of Thora and Wes in "American Beauty"
36 Unilever laundry soap brand that's over 100 years old
32 Children's cold medicine brand
DOWN
4 Counties overseas
35 Race a motor
CANCER (June 21-July 22)
33 Boundaries between biomes
3 Monk known as "the Venerable"
30 Puff _ _ _ (venomous critter)
31 Outdated headgear for a poor student
series "_ _ _ Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Level"
59 Ferrari model
21 Second-hand, alternately
26 He played Tobias Funke
30 Like an eagle's beak
"John Coltrane was an addict," wrote author Cornel West about the renowned jazz saxophonist and composer. "Billie Holiday was an addict. [Nobel Prizewinning author] Eugene O'Neill was an addict. What would America be without addicts and post-addicts who make such grand contributions to our society?" I welcome West's sympathetic views toward addicts. Many of us who aren't addicts understand how lucky we are not to have the genetic predisposition or the traumatic experiences that addicts often struggle with. We unaddicted people may also have been spared the bigotry and abuse that have contributed to and aggravated some addicts' addictions. Having acknowledged these truths, I nevertheless hope to do whatever I can to help you convert any addictive tendencies you might have into passionate obsessions. Now is an excellent time to launch a new phase of such work. Invitation: Make a list of three things you can do in the coming months to nurture the process.
28 Heeler healer?
39 Municipality in the province of Padua (and not a Japanese send-off) 42 Supposed occupation of Joe Coulombe, founder of a grocery chain 43 Cigar brand whose name means "best" in Spanish 44 Gets petulant 45 Sue Ann _ _ _, Betty White's role on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" 48 "An Impeccable Spy: Richard _ _ _, Stalin's Master Agent" (2019 Owen Matthews book) 49 Future indicators 50 North Dakota State Fair city 51 Wicker basket used in jai alai
last week’s answers
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) Leo-born Edna Ferber (1885–1968) was a celebrated author who won a Pulitzer Prize. She was witty and outspoken. Her stories featured strong women and characters struggling against discrimination. "I never would just open a door and walk through," she said about her career. "I had to bust it down for the hell of it. I just naturally liked doing things the hard way." At least in the coming weeks, Leo, I urge you NOT to adopt Ferber's attitude. In my view, you'll be wise to do everything possible to open doors rather than bust them down. And the best way to do that is to solicit help. Cultivate your ability to ask for what you need. Refine your practice of the arts of collaboration, synergy, and interweaving.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) "No one has ever written, painted, sculpted, modeled, built, or invented except literally to get out of hell," wrote Virgo dramatist Antonin Artaud. That's a ridiculous generalization, in my opinion. For example, I occasionally generate songs, stories, and horoscopes to help me escape from a momentary hell. But most of my creations are inspired by my love of life and a desire to inspire others. I'm very sure that in the coming weeks, your own motivations to produce good things will be far closer to mine than to Artaud's. You're in a phase when your quest for joy, generosity, blessings, and fun could be fierce and productive.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21) Prolific author Ray Bradbury liked to give advice to those with a strong need to express their imaginative originality. Since I expect you will be a person like that in 2022, I'll convey to you one of his exhortations. He wrote, "If you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling. I wish you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will last a lifetime. I wish craziness and foolishness and madness upon you." Keep in mind that Bradbury was referring to constructive craziness, wise foolishness, and divine madness.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) The coming months will be a favorable time for you to redefine the meaning of the term "sacred" and to deepen your relationship with sacredness. To spur your imagination, I offer four quotes: 1. "Recognizing the sacred begins when we are interested in every detail of our lives." —Buddhist teacher Chögyam Trungpa 2. "When you notice something clearly and see it vividly, it then becomes sacred." —poet Allen Ginsberg 3. "Holiness begins in recognizing the face of the other." —philosopher Marc-Alain Ouaknin 4. "Modern culture, in its advertising of sex, is in a misguided fashion advertising its longing for the sacred." —teacher Sobonfu Somé
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) Capricorn author E. M. Forster wrote, "The only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have yet gone ourselves." I propose we universalize that statement: "The only people, information, and experiences that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have yet gone ourselves." I believe this principle will be especially fruitful for you to embrace during the next three months. Prepare yourself for lessons that are vital for you to learn—and on the frontier of your understanding
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) Among America's Founding Fathers was Aquarian William Whipple (1730-1785). He was one of 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, instigating war with Great Britain. Unlike many of his colleagues, however, Whipple believed it was hypocritical to enslave human beings while fighting for freedom. That's why he emancipated the person who had been in bondage to him. The coming months will be a favorable time to make comparable corrections, Aquarius. If there are discrepancies between your ideals and your actions, fix the problem.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) According to Piscean author Ryunosuke Akutagawa, "People sometimes devote their lives to a desire that they are not sure will ever be fulfilled." So true! I can personally attest to that behavior. Is such a quest misguided? Delusional? Naive? Not in my view. I see it as glorious, brave, and heroic. Akutagawa did too. He said that those who refrain from having inspirational desires are "no more than mere spectators of life." In any case, I recommend you think big in 2022, Pisces. From an astrological angle, this could be the year you home in on and refine and upgrade the single most important desire you will ever have.
HOMEWORK: Tell me your most important lesson of the year. https://Newsletter.FreeWillAstrology
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