DigBoston 12.14.17

DIGBOSTON.COM 12.14.17 - 12.21.17

STREET ART

PAGING SANTA ILLUSTRATIONS BY KURESSE BOLDS

INDIE GIFT TIPSTER

BLACK MARKET IN ROXBURY PLUS: A MUST-HAVE FOR EDIBLE LOVERS

MEDIA FARM

MASS MELTDOWN

FROM GATEHOUSE TO THE STATE HOUSE

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DEC 14, 2017 - DEC 21, 2017 BUSINESS PUBLISHER Marc Sneider ASSOCIATE PUBLISHERS Chris Faraone John Loftus Jason Pramas SALES MANAGER Marc Sneider FOR ADVERTISING INFORMATION sales@digboston.com BUSINESS MANAGER John Loftus

EDITORIAL EDITOR IN CHIEF Chris Faraone EXECUTIVE EDITOR Jason Pramas MANAGING EDITOR Mitchell Dewar ASSOCIATE MUSIC EDITOR Nina Corcoran ASSOCIATE FILM EDITOR Jake Mulligan ASSOCIATE ARTS EDITOR Christopher Ehlers STAFF WRITER Haley Hamilton CONTRIBUTORS G. Valentino Ball, Sarah Betancourt, Tim Bugbee, Patrick Cochran, Mike Crawford, Kori Feener, George Hassett, Zack Huffman, Marc Hurwitz, Marcus Johnson-Smith, Micaela Kimball, Derek Kouyoumjian, Dan McCarthy, Adam Sennott, Maya Shaffer, Citizen Strain, M.J. Tidwell, Tre Timbers, Baynard Woods INTERNS Kuresse Bolds, Olivia Falcigno

DESIGN DESIGNER Don Kuss COMICS Tim Chamberlain Pat Falco Patt Kelley DigBoston, PO Box 51960 Boston, MA 02205 Phone 617.426.8942 digboston.com

ON THE COVER KURESSE BOLDS IS AN ILLUSTRATION MAJOR AT LESLEY UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN WORKING IN EDITORIAL, CONCEPT ART, AND CHARACTER DESIGN, AS WELL AS COMIC BOOKS. YOU WILL BE SEEING A LOT MORE OF HIS WORK IN DIGBOSTON IN THE COMING MONTHS. ©2017 DIGBOSTON IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY DIG MEDIA GROUP INC. NO PART OF THIS PUBLICATION CAN BE REPRODUCED WITHOUT WRITTEN CONSENT. DIG MEDIA GROUP INC. CANNOT BE HELD LIABLE FOR ANY TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS. ONE COPY OF DIGBOSTON IS AVAILABLE FREE TO MASSACHUSETTS RESIDENTS AND VISITORS EACH WEEK. ANYONE REMOVING PAPERS IN BULK WILL BE PROSECUTED ON THEFT CHARGES TO THE FULLEST EXTENT OF THE LAW.

HOLIDAY HIT LIST

Dear Reader, Face it, you love shit. I do too. Junk. Garbage.

Tchotchkes. The kind of scrappy nonsense that you purchased while in line at a despicable big box store where you didn’t need to be shopping in the first place. There are almost no exceptions. Even my hippiest of hippy friends collect or hoard things that they could live without. As human beings we are hardwired to hunt and gather, or something like that. Bottom line: A lot of us get dopamine spikes down our spines at the mere sight of trinkets which, for some reason, tickle our fancy, whether you’re a banker buying a new sports car, a teen on a spree at the mall, or a freegan stumbling upon an accidentally discarded mood ring on your evening trash dive.

There’s nothing wrong with having such materialistic instincts. What’s important, I think, is how you steer and focus them. My last intention is to lambaste people who know the mall holiday hours and start dates by heart, especially around the holidays, in one of our shopping guides for chrissakes, but my God, as a society we’re basically just piling on landfills at this point. I’m part of the problem myself, and while on a trip to a suburban mall last weekend, became something between sad and sickened by the popularity of merchandise with poop emojis. In a frontrunner for metaphor of the year, people are literally stuffing giant socks with mugs, shirts, and frisbees that are branded with shit memes. And they’re wrapping all of it in paper that will be immediately thrown into a Glad bag.

Though I’m fairly frugal and live somewhat modestly, I am personally guilty of being wasteful.

So to make up for my sins, and since I’ve always worked for small and independent businesses myself, I make it a point to spend as much money as possible in local stores and on the services provided in communities I care about. It’s not about being a martyr; rather, it’s about supporting cool things so that they don’t go away. And I don’t want to hear it about how much you can save shopping at chain stores. For every plastic import knockoff knick knack you can bag at Walmart, there’s an equally affordable doodad you can buy from any number of area vendors.

When we do our jobs as editors and journalists, every issue of the Dig plays some role as an independent shopper’s guide. From interviews with vendors to product reviews and consumer-focused features—a lot of which you’ll find herein, to complement the flea market and gift guides we’ve already run this month—we see it as our job to steer you not just at the best of Boston, but also toward the next of Boston. As well as into hidden, unseen, unsung corners of the city and region, where people still make products both the customer and seller can be proud of.

On that note, happy holidays, ya filthy animal.

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NEWS+OPINION

MASS HYSTERIA: FROM GATEHOUSE, TO THE STATE HOUSE MEDIA FARM

The week Commonwealth residents looked at the encroaching national apocalypse and said, ‘Us too!’

BY CHRIS FARAONE @FARA1

Last week yielded the most major breaking news out of the Hub since the Marathon bombing and race to replace Mayor Thomas Menino roiled 2013. Like other close observers of the media and politics whom I have spoken with, I’m still trying to process the outrageous deluge while remaining high enough above the swells to see what doom lurks on the darkening horizon. In accelerated times like these, it helps to keep good notes so that certain exigent topics and worthwhile tangents don’t fade simply because sexier sensational stories surface.

Which they will. Oh yes, they will.

I. I couldn’t bear to cover Mass Senate President Stan Rosenberg’s embarrassing press conference last week. His husband, troubled operative Bryon Hefner, has apparently been handsy in his already notorious approach to peddling his partner’s influence. The story that snapped Hefner’s back was dutifully written and broken by Boston Globe reporter-columnist Yvonne Abraham, who has been leading coverage of sexual harassment on Beacon Hill.

This is clearly an important issue, especially for those of us who want to see a lot more women and nonbinary lawmakers in top positions. Nevertheless, it’s critical to think about the reason that so many journalists came out from all across the state to cover Rosenberg’s semiapology (as one comparison, not a single TV news truck showed up for a massive demonstration in support of net neutrality on Newbury Street last week). Was it a genuine watershed media moment? With producers and editors motivated to smoke out abusers? Or was it just a horde of copycats chasing a sound bite like a carrot on a stick for clicks?

II. Back when I was a wee journalism student working at the State House every day, my peers and I once got an opportunity to meet Frank Phillips, the Globe’s Beacon Hill bureau chief, and to throw some questions at him.

I asked what he recalled to be his worst day on the job, and Phillips said that it was when the Boston Herald slashed the heart out of its staff covering the legislature, effectively giving Globies like him less reason to fear every 4

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morning that their leading competitor’s front page was juicier.

III. As a Northeast elitist myself, I can say from my experience that lots of us are unrelenting snobs. We point fingers at rubes in less fortunate parts of the country— the flyover cesspools, as well as waterlogged stormfronts like Texas and Florida. We laugh out loud when politicians who the idiot conservatives in those states send to Washington strip subsidies and aid from their most vulnerable voters, as if children and deserving needy folks are not affected.

Last week, though, there was less time for pointing and laughing. Even as President Trump stumped for Alabama food court casanova Roy Moore. Despite the countdown to either a world war or impeachment that is ticking away, things were ugly enough here in the Commonwealth to turn our darts and fingers inward.

From the Boston Herald, which was already a sad sack in several regards, being sold to the mass-market monolith GateHouse Media, to the federal indictment filed in federal court charging former State Sen. Brian A. Joyce, who apparently found ways to collude with or con every business he crossed, we are approaching peak insanity, descending into a depraved abyss where facts unravel like conspiracies on television dramas.

Overall, last week—and even last month and the past year, but mostly last week, oh wow, what a week—was an “us too” moment for Mass. The week we collectively realized that New Englanders are just as ratfucked as the dolts caught in the crosshairs of our cruelest classist punchlines. Our politicians, despite mostly being Democrats, are crooks willing to sell out their constituents for pennies relative to what their corporate masters pocket. Our institutions are infested with harassers, and our news outlets are increasingly consolidated and reduced to hollow vehicles that provide insufficient serious coverage and run on the compromised fumes of whatever dwindling municipal ad revenue remains in the killing fields. Things are bad and worse. Us too.

IV. Here’s some interesting, if not hilarious, news: As Gintautas Dumcius of MassLive noted, “Former Sen. Brian Joyce always insisted reporters include his middle initial. I’m sure he’s appreciative that the Dept. of Justice took additional step of spelling it out in press release.” The “A,” it turns out, stands for Augustine.

Now here’s a bit of great news: Some people are smelling the broccoli that Gov. Charlie Baker is steaming. And they’re writing about how badly it stinks.

There have been multiple critical op-eds in regional dailies from Springfield to Lowell, plus a poignant piece last week by Miles Howard for WBUR, “What Charlie Baker’s Popularity Says About The State Of The Commonwealth.” As the latter notes, “Baker has barely committed Massachusetts to transitioning to clean energy alternatives,” while in a broader sense Howard laments “a historically bold and visionary state now surrendering its principles to the convenience of relativism in the age of Donald Trump.”

(Even the Globe has questioned Baker’s popularity, but only in a way that’s several shots of absinthe short of self-aware, complete with gratuitous reminders that our state’s “economy is strong,” “unemployment is low,” and “there’s a sense among voters that the state is generally headed in the right direction, while the nation is on the wrong track.”)

Come to think of it, while kneecapping Baker is becoming en vogue, there’s really only one news source that I can think of which regularly watches the gov like a prison guard, and that’s the Herald. With the significant cuts that are expected to be coming for its staff, Baker will have that much easier a time hooking up millionaire class cronies and pushing to privatize everything that isn’t nailed down.

V. Boston’s not a two-newspaper town. Never has been. The phrase has a nice ring to it, and there’s no doubt that the Globe with the Herald behind it lead the way on multiple fronts, from unique site visits to resources, but ultimately it’s insulting to the rest of us who work for the dozen-plus other ethnic, alternative, and neighborhood papers around here—kind of like when they give a best new artist Grammy to musicians who have been recording albums for more than a decade.

By the way, GateHouse owns 126 media properties in Mass, ranging from weekly shoppers to a range of influential daily newspapers of record like the Cape Cod Times, Worcester Telegram & Gazette, Brockton Enterprise, Quincy Patriot Ledger, and its mothership, the MetroWest Daily News. If you’re looking for a single entity to point and scream at for the bankrupt state of Massachusetts media, GateHouse is a worthy target, after the majority of TV journos who report on things like holiday congestion and Black Friday.

VI. For those who aren’t in the media and didn’t spend last Friday evening glued to the #mapoli feed on Twitter, word has emerged on public channels that a male employee of the Globe has disappeared without a trace after separating from the paper due to revelations of his less than savory behavior. From what I’ve surveyed of the external response, my sentiments lie somewhere in between those who think everyone accused of something awful should be doxed and outed before any formal inquiry, and people who believe the Globe is in the wrong

HEADLINING THIS WEEK! for hiding the identity of said offender.

Thing is, it doesn’t really matter what I think in this case, because Globe managers are alone here in knowing the exact nature of the complaint(s) in question. It just happens to make matters worse that they treated the wound with lemon and sandpaper, allowing the humiliation to leak via sports talk knuckleheads on radio who, and I can sympathize with them on this up to a certain point, love few things more than exposing hypocrisy and inconsistencies at Boston’s leading publication.

To interpolate the sentiments of my former Boston Phoenix editor Carly Carioli, who opined on Twitter that “this is a case-study that will be studied for years on how NOT to write about yourself if you’re a newspaper,” when the encyclopedia of sexual harassment is written—at this rate, it will have to be a breathing document, compiled by news watchers working back-to-back shifts overnight—Globe Editor Brian McGrory should be listed right alongside all the dopiest enablers. Here’s part of the memo he wrote to his newsroom that was printed in the paper’s ham-fisted attempt to stop the bleeding: Yes, we’re well aware that by withholding the identity of the reporter involved, we’ll be accused of a double-standard by people and organizations that are not privy to all the facts. I can live with that far more easily than I can live with the thought of sacrificing our values to slake the thirst of this moment.

Please reread that last line if you’ve yet to vomit.

Chris Distefano

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VII: It’s interesting just how little interest there appears to be in sexual and racial harassment when it happens on the low end of the socioeconomic spectrum, particularly that involving minimum wage laborers and service workers. The Globe has done commendable work on tackling these topics in the food and beverage industry, while we and others will continue giving voice to those in kitchens and behind bars, but all of us are still to blame in many ways for how the larger feeding frenzy over sexual misconduct and abuse of power takes a far less urgent tone when names of perps and victims aren’t recognizable. Just an observation.

Ringside with Jim Ross Special Engagement: Sat, Dec 16

VIII: Look: The problem with the journalism that gets done around the State House—and especially with the journalism that doesn’t get done around the State House—is that few reporters have the time and resources available to expose the next Augustine.

Jess Hilarious

BET, MTV’s Wild ‘n Out Special Engagements: 2 Shows Tues, Dec 19

IX. Belated (but nevertheless quick) disclaimer: I have been underpaid and underemployed by both GateHouse and the Herald in my 15-year career. In the spirit of hanging one’s own dirty laundry in public, I have also been put in compromising financial positions by the Dig. For those personal reasons and others, under a new management team that I am a part of, we are currently months into a complete reorganization that includes increasing both transparency and quality of interaction with our employees and freelancers. I personally reply to several emails a week in which readers and media writers ask about the way we navigate difficult waters, and I encourage anybody else who has such questions to drop me a note: fara1@digboston.com

The Best of Laugh Boston

Jim Colliton, Sean Sullivan, Chris Pennie + more Dec 21-23

X. The Globe has an investigative series dropping all this week: “Boston. Racism.

Image. Reality.” The tagline: “The Spotlight Team takes on our hardest question: How racist are we?” Released over the course of several days, it will seemingly attempt to smash open the core of this most vexing quagmire, and promises installments such as, “A brand new Boston, even whiter than the old,” “Lost on campus, in a sea of white,” and “The bigot in the stands, and other stories.”

Before suffering through the unfocused cumbersome hodgepodge of an intro— for one insanely pointless exercise, they actually counted the number of patrons of color at certain downtown establishments, some of which are tourist traps—as a prerequisite, I recommend a 2015 column by noted media writer Tracie Powell.

Headed “Why young journalists of color leave the news industry,” it details the treatment of a young black woman at the Globe’s life sciences vertical:

Sam Morril

Comedy Central, Last Comic Standing Dec 29-31 (New Year’s Eve!)

Jon Stetson

Stat… just fired its wonderkid on Friday, but not before they switched the journalism and computer science grad’s job from research and reporting to primarily clerical work that included filing expense reports for the editor-in-chief (which is apparently against Globe policy), creating name tags for Stat events (which was initially assigned to an intern before the journalism grad was tasked with it), as well as booking lunches and ordering food for editors, and other reporters.

America’s Master Mentalist Special Engagement: Sat, Dec 30

McGory never sent out any memos in response to Powell’s post, at least not that we know of. I guess it took a racist president, Colin Kaepernick, and a national movement to convince Globe honchos it was finally worth sacrificing what they truly value—white men who need to be coddled, businesses like General Electric— to slake the thirst of this moment.

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LITTLE GOES A LONG WAY NEWS TO US

Boston native skates across country for trans rights and awareness

BY KATELYN BURNS On a Sunday earlier this month, Calleigh Little was making her way down Boylston Street toward the Marathon finish line, weaving her way through pedestrians and parked cars. To those who noticed her, she looked like any other skateboarder; apart from the huge pack on her back, there was no way of knowing that once she crossed that finish line, she had completed a rarely attempted quest.

Little raised her arms and screamed as she finished, and the handful of acquaintances gathered let out a cheer.

“I just skated from Oregon to MOTHERFUCKING BOSTON!” Little yelled as she spiked her board and collapsed on the cold pavement.

Only two other people, both cisgender men, have ever successfully skateboarded across the country solo before.

It’s a tremendous test of an endurance that requires meticulous planning and survival skills.

With her signature winged eyeliner and a 55-pound pack on her back, Little became the first woman to attempt it, though she got plenty of help along the way from friends as well as strangers.

Little is a 26-year-old Boston native who’s been living in San Diego. She’s also a professional in Long Distance Pushing, a sport born out of illegal skateboarding races

Only two other people, both cisgender men, have ever successfully skateboarded across the country solo before. It’s a tremendous test of an endurance that requires meticulous planning and survival skills.

like the Broadway Bomb, an intense underground weave through Manhattan. While Little doesn’t make any money from being a professional, she does have sponsorships from companies within the LDP scene.

The trip was an incredible exposure to parts of the US she had never seen. “I hadn’t really left the coasts before,” Little told DigBoston in an interview.

She battled extreme weather, hitting snow in Oregon, Idaho, and Ohio, as well as rough roads, scarce food and water, and illness. But there was another challenge that Little had to manage as well: She’s transgender.

Transgender rights are a hot-button political issue these days. Controversies ensued in early 2015 in the wake of a repeal of the city of Houston’s LGTBQ nondiscrimination ordinance, which was defeated by a campaign with the tagline “no men in women’s bathrooms.” A few months later, North Carolina passed its now infamous HB2 bathroom law, forcing trans people to use the bathroom consistent with their birth certificate.

Last year, here in Massachusetts, Gov. Charlie Baker signed into law a bill that protects trans people in public accommodations, so trans people can now use the bathroom or changing room consistent with their gender identity without harassment. Despite that progress made to protect trans rights in the legislature, Mass Resistance, a national anti-LGBTQ group based in Waltham, has organized opposition and gathered enough signatures for a referendum to repeal the new law in 2018. It will be the first time that trans accommodations rights on their own will be voted on, an important test for the future of trans rights nationwide. If trans rights fail here, they could be voted

down anywhere else in the country. Enter Calleigh Little’s cross-country skate.

Little herself admits that she’s not very political—not because she doesn’t have opinions, but because she doesn’t always feel the need to express them. She finds it hard to believe that Commonwealth voters would take away valuable trans protections.

“C’mon, it’s Massachusetts,” she said in a post-finish interview with DigBoston at the Pour House on Boylston Street. “I don’t think the people of Massachusetts would do something like that.” Nevertheless, one of the reasons she set out from Bend, Oregon, was to raise awareness of trans people and their issues in parts of the country where folks might not have met a trans woman before. “I can’t tell you how many times I walked into a random bar out west and I was the only person not wearing camouflage,” Little said.

Along the way, she had to manage her bathroom use for safety reasons. While none of the 15 states she skated through explicitly ban trans women from women’s restrooms, only Illinois and the coastal states she passed through offer protections from bathroom discrimination for trans people.

Little noted at the finish line that she only had to shit in the woods once, an especially impressive feat for a trans woman who battled the effects of parasites from drinking out of a river in Wyoming, plus endured diarrhea and vomiting in Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois. When asked about how she determined the safest potty option, she explained that she just played it with care, especially out west. Because of the weather, Little said she often rolled into towns with her face covered and a winter hat over her long, strawberry blonde hair. With her body and face covered, she said it was often easiest to just walk into a place and use the men’s room without risking confrontation.

It was the people, however, that Little met along the way that she won’t ever forget. “I feel like I have homes in 15 states now,” she said. As we spoke on Boylston Street, she told stories about people she met along the way. “I found my life on the road,” Little said.

At times on her journey, she recalled that strangers often dropped everything to help her along, or to buy her food and tons of coffee, with none of them caring that she was trans. “Gender isn’t important when you’re out in the middle of nowhere, gender isn’t important when you’re running out of water in the middle of fucking Wyoming, none of it really matters. The only thing that matters is the connections you make and the people you make them with.”

And when that coffee ran through her body, she simply wanted to use the restroom in peace without harassment.

Learn more about Little’s journey at skatecrosscountry.com 6

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TRUMP GOES SOUTH

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Noted racist President Donald Trump had the audacity to attend the opening of the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum in Jackson last Saturday.

“I knew a little before everybody else, but I’ll simply say this without even referencing Trump himself,” Jackson’s Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba told me when the visit was announced. “The opening of the Civil Rights Museum is an important moment of a recognition of struggle, and out of that struggle we’ve seen people historically rescue themselves in a state that has been known for some of the most negativity that the world has ever seen.”

Lumumba took Trump’s election last year with a certain level of equanimity, saying that on the day after the election, “I woke up in Mississippi, which means whether it is Obama, Clinton, or Bush, Mississippi is still at the bottom.”

But Trump’s refusal to condemn the white supremacists in Charlottesville caused many civil rights leaders, including John Lewis, to threaten to boycott the opening if the president attended. But it wasn’t just Charlottesville. White supremacy may be the only consistent ideology of the Trump administration.

“We have to observe this corrosion of integrity and this erosion of people’s human and civil rights and identify what role or what steps we’re willing to take,” Lumumba said. “It’s important that we recognize that struggle.”

Trump, being Trump, made the controversy worse by seeming to support a justification of slavery. Days before the presidential visit to the first state-sponsored civil rights museum, Roy Moore, the Alabama senatorial candidate who is supported by the president despite allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior with minors, went viral saying that America “was great at the time when families were united— even though we had slavery, they cared for one another.”

Just in case there was any question about what Trump thought of this definition of his catchphrase, the very next day he tweeted: “LAST thing the Make America Great Again Agenda needs is a Liberal Democrat in Senate where we have so little margin for victory already. The Pelosi/Schumer Puppet Jones would vote against us 100% of the time. He’s bad on Crime, Life, Border, Vets, Guns & Military. VOTE ROY MOORE!” When he finally got to Jackson, Trump, who was invited by the state’s white Republican governor, spoke to a small crowd, primarily reading from a script, and not at the main event. “The fight to end slavery, to break down Jim Crow, to end segregation, to gain the right to vote, and to achieve the sacred birthright of equality—that’s big stuff,” Trump said.

Lumumba has some more big words for Trump. He wants Jackson, a city in deeply red Mississippi, with a long history of racism and white supremacy, to be the “most radical city” in the world. Bigly.

“Ultimately what I mean by being the most radical city on the planet is giving people more access,” he told my colleague Jaisal Noor. “We do this through the … movement of people’s assemblies that allow people to speak to their conditions, and so that is very important to us.”

The movement grew out of a collaboration of Black activist groups forming in the Mississippi River Delta in the wake of Hurricane Katrina’s destruction and quickly managed to take over the city of Jackson, when Lumumba’s father won the mayorship in 2012.

“Free the land” was a common refrain in the elder Lumumba’s first campaign. It came from his trip to Mississippi in 1971 to start an autonomous Black nation in that state with the “Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika.” To get to their land, Lumumba and his comrades had to face down the Klan. This weekend, with the president’s visit, Lumumba’s son, who succeeded him as mayor, had to take a similar stand.

“A radical is a person who seeks change,” he said. “A radical is a person who does not accept the conditions as they see them. But we look at the conditions of our community and we see a need for change. Then the reality is we need to be as radical as the circumstances dictate we should be.”

Baynard Woods is a reporter at the Real News. Email baynard@therealnews.com.

Twitter @baynardwoods.

CORPORATE FABLES AND KIDDIE TABLES TOWNIE

Townie is a worm’s eye view of the Mass power structure

BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS

Big local corps quiet about huge profits to come from Repub tax scheme… except GE An interesting WBUR article, “Largest Mass. Companies Are Mostly Silent On GOP Tax Plans,” asked the top 12 corporations in the Commonwealth to comment on the recently passed Republican scheme to transfer vast amounts of money from the working and middle classes to the rich and the corporations they control— euphemistically called “tax reform” in most of the major news media. Unsurprisingly, Bay State business leaders didn’t want to take time away from rubbing their hands together and cackling with glee about all the free money they’re going to get—choosing instead to remain mum for the moment.

But WBUR did get a statement out of General Electric after the Senate vote on the tax plan: GE commends Congress and the White House for their commitment to comprehensive tax reform. GE supports the Senate tax reform plan because it would upgrade the U.S. to a territorial tax system, bring rates in line with other countries, and allow U.S. businesses and workers to compete fairly around the world, so it’s the quality of our products that determine whether we win global deals, and not tax differences.

No surprise GE would say that, since it will benefit tremendously from the drop in federal corporate tax from 35 percent to only 20 percent. But it will also get to repatriate as much of the lucre it’s been offshoring as it would like at a one-time tax rate of merely 12 percent.

And now that the feds are “upgrading” to a “territorial tax system,” the company will make even more money. Why? Because a territorial tax system means that all the profits multinationals sock away in offshore tax havens will be taxed at a rate of zero percent. You read that correctly.

Nada. No taxes at all on foreign profits.

Currently, companies like GE stash profits in other countries because, although they have been technically taxed on all profits—foreign and domestic—at the base 35 percent rate (basically a total joke since there are so many corporate tax loopholes that big companies like GE actually end up with a negative tax rate some years, but let’s play along for the purpose of this explanation), they are only required to pay those taxes when they “repatriate” the money back to the US. Which has often been never thanks to a complicated system called “transfer pricing” where corporations book profits in low tax countries, and take deductions in the US and other higher tax countries. And then borrow cheap money on the strength of their foreign bank accounts to make more profits.

The result will be even more offshoring of both money and jobs by megacorps. Because why would a company like GE not move more of both away from the US if foreign profits are tax free—without nearly as much of the tricky accounting that’s currently needed to play the transfer pricing game? Just really bad news for Mass workers.

And for boosters of the GE Boston deal. And anyone who

Just really bad news for Mass workers. And for boosters of the GE Boston deal.

thinks big companies like Amazon are going to have much incentive to add lots of jobs anywhere in the US going forward.

BPDA “PLAN: Glover’s Corner” protested in Dorchester As the neoliberal capture of the government and the public sector continues apace, earnest technocrats at the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA, formerly known as the BRA) still find it necessary to play the communitarian “public meeting” game when trying to sell bad deals that advance corporate interests to the working families who are all too often the targets of such deals.

Communitarianism being the decades-old fad where institutions representing the rich and powerful work hard to make sure that “every constituency has a seat at the table” when they want to do something that will harm those constituencies. But, of course, the power relations remain unchanged. The rich and powerful remain rich and powerful. Everyone else does not. And “the table” isn’t the real table—where bankers, CEOs, and top government leaders meet to make policy decisions happen. Usually behind closed doors. It’s basically a kiddie table where regular people can pretend they have some impact on a process that’s over before it begins.

Which is why it’s nice to see that housing activists with the Dorchester Not For Sale coalition decided to crash a recent BPDA transit-oriented public meeting on its “PLAN: Glover’s Corner”—which is slated, among other things, to add hundreds of units of housing that will be mostly unaffordable to current Dot residents.

According to the Bay State Banner and the Dorchester Reporter, the Dorchester activists are taking a page from JP and Roxbury housing activists with the Keep It 100% for Egleston coalition who protested the larger BPDA PLAN: JP/ Rox—which might ultimately involve thousands of units of new housing—until the city relented and mandated that 36 percent of the new units (and 40 percent overall, including units currently permitted for construction) must be affordable.

The definition of “affordable” for the JP/Rox plan area is pegged to percentages of the average median income of the Boston region set by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). So, for example, according

to an August Spare Change News article, some “affordable” units being rented and sold as part of the 3200 Washington complex are being offered to households making 70 percent of the region’s average median income, and some to households making 100 percent.

But JP and Roxbury advocates have continued to protest PLAN: JP/Rox even after it was made official because its definition of “affordable” remains too high.

Spare Change continues, “For the Boston metropolitan region, the average median income is just over $100,000, and according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the average household income for all of Jamaica Plain is $76,968.

However, households within the plan’s range have an average income of just over $50,000.”

According to a March Bay State Banner article, activists three goals for the plan are “to deepen the affordability level on designated affordable housing units so that they are attainable by households making less than $35,000 per year; increase goals for the portion of new housing that’s designated as affordable from 36 percent to 55 percent; and require the conversion of 250 market-rate units into affordable units..”

So while their activism raised the amount of “affordable” housing the BPDA planned to offer in the deal from 30 percent to 36 percent, it’s not going to help many people currently living in or near the affected neighborhoods to stay in the area unless the definition of affordable is changed to reflect economic reality. Given that fact, Mayor Marty Walsh’s much-vaunted progress on getting more affordable housing built on his watch is based largely on smoke and mirrors because much of it remains unaffordable to the people who need it most.

The Dorchester activists, meanwhile, are demanding that the BPDA accept a six-month moratorium on PLAN: Glover’s Corner, use the extra time to provide more data to the community on the plan, and do things like provide childcare at public meetings to allow more locals to attend.

Thus far, the BPDA is blowing off such demands and trying to plow forward without significant changes to its plan. Boston City Councilor Frank Baker, who attended the Glover’s Corner meeting, agreed with the BPDA in a recent Spare Change article, saying “As far as I’m concerned, it’s not a valid request.”

Seems the fight for housing justice is far from over in Dorchester.

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TERMS OF SERVICE

TIP HAPPENS

About Trump’s proposed changes to gratuity sharing

BY HALEY HAMILTON @SAUCYLIT If you work in a restaurant, or know someone who works in a restaurant, odds are you have seen or heard about the proposed tip-sharing rule that President Donald Trump’s Department of Labor is considering—and you or your friend are probably pretty pissed off about it.

In sum, the proposition would allow tips to be shared with staff who are currently federally excluded from getting tips, mainly kitchen crew and support staff. And while the thought of coming even close to defending something that ass in the Oval Office condones makes me gag, here’s the thing: right now, it is illegal for the folks in the back of the house—the cooks, the dishwashers, the other people working insanely hard to not only give guests a proper experience but to produce a hefty portion, in most restaurants, of the day’s sales—to receive a percentage of the front of house’s (servers and bartenders) tips (specifically, “tips received by the employee must be retained by the employee except through valid tip pooling arrangements among employees who customarily and regularly receive tips”).

And that’s fucked up.

In Massachusetts, the minimum wage is $11/hour, the starting wage of most back-of-house positions. We also have a tipped minimum wage, $3.75, that is paid hourly to folks who make at least $30/month in tips. If a tipped worker does not average at least the federal minimum of $7.25/hour throughout the course of their shift, the restaurant is required to make up the difference (which rarely happens but, if and when it does, is obscenely hard to reinforce).

I work for tips, and working for tips is awkward for a lot of reasons, but there’s a good rule of thumb to go by when it comes to calculating your income: I should be making at least 20 percent of the dollar amount of sales I ring in during my shift.

It’s a little trickier with bartenders because there’s typically more than one of us working, and we share tips, but with more than one body on the bar you can, in theory, serve that many more people and ring that many more dollars in sales.

As for take-home sums, if I don’t average at least $25/hour during a shift, I consider it a meh shift. I have made as little as $9/hour and as much as nearly $50/ hour, but you had better believe I earned that $50/hour. I have spent years waking up on Sundays and feeling like I’ve been thrown down a flight of stairs from all of the shaking and stirring and bottle lifting I did the evening before.

But on those same nights, the nights we break sales records, the nights I walk out of work at 4 am pale and sweaty, but knowing my next paycheck is going to be insane, everybody working in the back of the house goes home saying, I can’t believe I did all of that for $11/hour. What this proposition does is allow kitchen staff to be cut into the success of an insanely busy, profitable evening.

But it doesn’t say that exclusively…

Right now, managers and owners, generally salaried employees who do not have an active hand in regularly serving guests or making food or drink, are also legally prohibited from taking tips from the front-of-house staff.

This provision would change that.

And the potential for theft is outrageous.

Earlier this year, Hawkeye Hospitality, the restaurant group behind Five Horses Tavern and Worden Hall, settled a wage theft suit for over $15,000 with employees claiming that management at Five Horses Tavern in Davis Square had forced employees to pay for mistakes—ringing in the wrong appetizer or beer, a burger being undercooked and sent back, a guest walking out on their tab or failing to pay for all of it—out of their tips.

Alix Macaluso, a former server at Five Horses, had a table transferred to her one night and when she dropped the check, the table walked out. Management told her she was responsible for paying the bill.

“I fought it, they said fine, I could pay half of it,” Macaluso told me. “It came out of my tips. I told my manager it was wrong. I left and I never came back.”

Brian Sparks, another former server at Five Horses who led the charge to bring a formal suit against the owner of the restaurant, said he saw a manager go into the tip bucket and take money out to pay for a mistake on a bill.

“I thought, ‘Oh my god, that can’t be legal,’” he says. “I couldn’t believe no one said anything.”

The owner denied any of this took place, but Sparks obtained emails, through the office of the attorney general, showing correspondence between managers containing the words “mistake(s)” and “paid.” The documents are damning.

The Attorney General’s office determined that this was not allowed because of the current law, the law Trump’s administration wants to change, that declares all tips belong to the employee and are not shared with nontipped employees.

I am all for kitchen and support staff being paid more. In fact, and I’ve said it before, I’m for getting rid of tipping in general and moving to something like profit sharing, like Juliet in Somerville, or being paid a percentage of sales, like Danny Meyers’ Hospitality Included model.

But this provision isn’t doing that.

TALKING JOINTS MEMO

EDIBLE WONDERWEAR

All we want for Christmas is this decarboxylator

BY DIG STAFF @DIGBOSTON It can be tacky or untenable to request the actual gift of green for the holidays. Plus you probably have better access to elite cannabis than whoever is shopping for you.

At the same time, tools and paraphernalia can make for ideal presents, and among the current options on that front there are few as ideal for pot consumers than the NOVA decarboxylator by the Boston-based company Ardent. It’s a fairly simple device that can be a little difficult to explain, and so we had company founder Shanel Lindsay and Ardent marketing coordinator Megan Cunningham come through the Dig office to show us in person. The following is excerpted from a demonstration by Shanel…

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Why somebody would need a NOVA… If people like edibles, topicals, any cannabis product, it has to go through this process of decarboxylation to activate the material. This is a precision decarboxylator—it’s super simple, it doesn’t smell, and when the material comes out, it’s fully activated without any kind of loss.

The problem [with cooking cannabis in an ordinary oven] is that it will look that color [brownish] whether you decarboxylated it well, or whether you burned half of it off. At the end of the day, our patients are using about half, or even a quarter of what they were using before to make their products.

Inspiration and developing the product…

My son is almost 17 now. I got an ovarian cyst when he was born, and that’s when I started making edibles and topicals and I was making them at my house.

And one thing I was disgusted with was how much fat and oil I was eating because I was incorporating that into my diet… When I was developing this product, part of my mission was to create these tools that would make it really simple at the end.

I started working on [the NOVA] in 2013. It was after medical marijuana came to Massachusetts, and MCR Labs opened in Framingham. So I went in there and I tested my medicine, and I was wasting over 30 percent. And that’s me being an expert for more than a decade… Just a couple of degrees or a couple of minutes can impact the process. You’re never going to be able to get that kind of precision from an oven or a toaster oven.

How it works…

We have a heating element that fully encapsulates the core, so you’re getting even heating all around. And there are multiple sensors, and that allows us to create these perfect heating cycles that fully permeate everything. You’re getting that precision without any loss, unlike if you use a toaster oven or something like that. It’s really simple—you press the button, it turns red, and there’s an algorithm in the circuit board that is reading that temperature, bringing it up to the right temperature, starting to control for that inside sensor, and creating these perfect heating cycles.

It will stay on for about an hour and a half to an hour and forty-five minutes, depending on how much material you put in there. And when the light turns green, it’s all been decarbed. At that point, it’s up to the person what they want to do. They can do a traditional method by taking that activated material and infusing it in a butter, or an oil. Or they can actually cut right to the chase and infuse directly with the plant material.

The perks…

[Smell] is the biggest thing. If you’re in a small space, or a combined space, this can be decarbing in the background and you wouldn’t even know.

Business so far…

We started last year with beta units, but we weren’t in full production with our factory then. We continued to grow this year, and now we’re adding new products and getting interest from local dispensaries. We have some edibles kits coming out.

You can work backwards from any end product that you want, and what we do is provide that base formulation… We’re about to launch [a line of capsules]... One of the formulations is “awake,” so it has a B12 vitamin with caffeine, and another one is “sleep,” so you would pair that with more of an indica. The idea is you can incorporate cannabis into your overall health and wellness regime.

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Kai Grant of Black Market in Roxbury on creating, shopping, and selling with a purpose INTERVIEW BY C. SHARDAE JOBSON We asked Kai Grant of Black Market, which is fast-becoming a Roxbury cultural institution, about the importance of shopping local and supporting artisans who aren’t represented in big box stores and shopping malls…

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On their vision…

Black Market is a pop-up market that happens on the weekends, and our mission is to eradicate the wealth gap, which is about a quarter of a million dollars. For every $8 a black indigenous Boston family has, a white indigenous Boston family has $247,500. So, we’re here to ensure that black businesses, local businesses, female-led businesses have a platform to be able to sell their goods and their services. We launched in June 2017, and we’ve had over 150 businesses represented here… They set up their businesses like a boutique within a boutique.

We estimated around 1,350 people walking in and out of this space, having the opportunity to shop small, to shop black, to shop local, to shop female, and they literally made a decision to not go to the mall, but to bring their money to Dudley Square in Roxbury.

On the diverse vendors…

We have East Africa, we have South Africa, we have West Africa, we have Cape Verde, Jamaica, we’ve had Trinidad, we’ve had Russia. We’ve had all kinds of different countries represented here, and it’s incredible artisanship. We have one vendor whose husband is from Senegal, and he sews here in Roxbury. So his products are made in Roxbury, but they’re actually transported from Senegal. We have another vendor who actually does business from Zimbabwe. She has jewelry and accessories. Anything that comes over, it comes from women that are actually being paid. We have a soap purveyor who makes organic soaps that are all small batch, handmade. He gets his products and raw ingredients from Uganda.

On success so far…

We had an amazing time for Black Friday and Small Business Saturday, and also Black Sunday, which we enduringly call [the following day]. We generated $50,000 for small businesses in three days. We estimated around 1,350 people walking in and out of this space, having the opportunity to shop small, to shop black, to shop local, to shop female, and they literally made a decision to not go to the mall, but to bring their money to Dudley Square in Roxbury. It was very special.

On Dudley then and now…

Dudley is really our anchor, and we’re here to really help ignite the creative economy, which is so necessary. There are eight storefronts that are empty, there’s such a loss of vibrancy. This used to be a destination. You’d shop Dudley, you’d get your goods, you’d come here on a Saturday and it would be bustling. Dudley Square was second only to Downtown Boston. It’s struggling, it’s struggling with its identity, it’s struggling to remember its roots.

The great thing about Black Market is we have the ancestral kind of vibe going on when it comes to what was here before us that lent the spirit of Afrocentricity and commerce within the community… We’re kind of taking on the mantle, and continuing the legacy for the next generation.

On a positive trend…

There is a real movement around shopping local. And Black Market is kind of the hotbed for that. Dudley Square in particular has been deemed an arts and culture district by the state of Massachusetts, so we’re filling a gap in that area. We’re very proud to say that most of our vendors are artists.

On innovation in and around Dudley…

We are trying to eradicate that wealth gap, Boston is number one in wealth inequality in the country. But our second mission is to really lend our platform for arts and culture. There’s a lot of innovation going on here, in particular with black artists who don’t have a lot of platforms to make and create and also showcase and sell. It’s important that we do both, and that we do both excellently.

This interview was done in collaboration with the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism and Beyond Creative as part of “Beyond Boston,” a monthly news digest that BINJ produces with several cable access centers in the region.

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EXIT INTERVIEW: BENT SHAPES MUSIC

Allston’s indie pop punk act answers questions before its final show

BY NINA CORCORAN @NINA_CORCORAN

Last year, four-piece Bent Shapes released one of our favorite local albums of 2016, Wolves of Want, but that shouldn’t have come as a surprise. The band has been whittling down sharp, poppy, indie rock with a punk bent ever since it formed in 2009. Singer-guitarist Ben Potrykus, drummer Andy Sadoway, bassist Jenny Mudarri, and guitarist Luke Reed even made the Allston dream a reality: evolving from basement band status to signing to a proper label, the California-rooted Father/Daughter Records. It’s been a fruitful run for the band, but now, they’ve decided to call it quits.

“The momentum of the band has always been perpetuated by the question ‘What’s next?’ and I think we realized that we kept forcing next steps, committing to obligations without having the same energy that we used to,” says Sadoway. “Rather than continuing the project, it feels better to be proud of what we created together in the past and say farewell. I think Ben and I care too much about Bent Shapes to do it in a way that doesn’t do it justice.”

Hold off on the handkerchief. All four members of Bent Shapes play in other projects in the Boston area—Sadoway plays in Chrome Bouquet, Jenny in Thrifty, Reed in Mini Dresses, and Potrykus in Young Familiar—and they plan on using Bent Shapes social pages to direct fans toward those. Plus, there’s the main event: a farewell show. This Saturday, Bent Shapes will headline Great Scott to blow a final kiss to the city that birthed them and the work they’ve created.

Plus, Beware the Dangers of a Ghost Scorpion and Ian Doerr are set to open, which feels fitting given Evan Murphy from Beware and Doerr co-produced and engineered Feels Weird, the band’s 2013 album.

It doesn’t feel right letting Bent Shapes come to an end without one last spotlight. So to add to the confetti, we asked Potrykus and Sadoway to fill out an exit interview ahead of Bent Shapes’ final show.

When you originally formed the band, what were your goals?

POTRYKUS: When we formed the band, I just wanted to play loud guitar again. A couple months before Girlfriends started, my folk band was on its last tour, and when we played Cake Shop in NYC, I picked up a compilation they’d put together. It had all these bands like caUSE co-MOTION, the Beets, Sex Clark Five, My Teenage Stride, Crystal Stilts— these bands were playing largely lo-fi guitar rock inspired by a mix of ’60s pop and early post-punk—and it got me really excited about electric guitars again. We ended up playing with several of those groups in the first couple years, which was really fun.

What was the most memorable show you’ve ever played?

Who is an unsung hero involved in Bent Shapes’ history that you want to shout-out?

SADOWAY: One of the most memorable shows we played was in 2011 in Ottawa at a house with a band called the Girlfriends. We linked up with our Canadian cousins via the internet and thought it would be hilarious to play a show together. So the guy that was living at the house “venue” was getting evicted. In the spirit of an

POTRYKUS: So many people have been so instrumental!

Past members and part-time members deserve a shoutout first, lest anyone forget—Jen, Supriya, my sister Kate, Emeen, Casey, Elio. Freddy Hamel recorded half our first tape for free at his job. Jerry MacDonald recorded some of our first singles and put one of them out on his own dime.

Andy’s mom let us record in her basement and scrapbooked any and all early press coverage.

John Vanderslice took us on our first tour with a national act. Liz Pelly wrote about us early and often, giving us some great opportunities.

Countless bookers took chances on us, including Carl Lavin at Great Scott. My wife, Athena, and Andy’s wife, Mary, helped with gear and artwork and driving and all kinds of things. Brian Butler, who is deservedly in demand, has always made time to do poster and shirt art for us. Also, Becca Smith has ceaselessly championed our band in really meaningful ways.

What’s your favorite idea another member in the band contributed?

POTRYKUS: Andy’s drumming on “Behead Yrself, Pt. 2” still blows my mind every time I hear it, and “Leave It Till You Need It” is a classic. I absolutely love Jenny’s harmonies on all of Wolves of Want, but especially “Third Coast.” As for Luke, when he improvised the “Samantha West” solo, we were literally jumping up and down in the control room of the studio.

What’s the final message you want to say to fans?

“eviction party” people were kicking holes through the drywall. The keg was in the kitchen, which was next to the room where the bands were playing, so in the name of convenience, someone decided to make a large hole in the wall connecting the two rooms. Also I remember there was a stack of TVs behind where the band was playing—at one point someone knocked one over.

Which of your songs are you most proud of?

POTRYKUS: There’s a couple on Wolves of Want that I’m particularly proud of, primarily because I’d finally figured out a way to write about something I’d wanted to put in a song for a long time. Writing pop songs about anarchism and anti-capitalism, mental illness, and your relationship with your siblings isn’t the most intuitive process.

“Intransitive Verbs,” in particular, demanded a certain amount of vulnerability, which was hard to balance with my fondness for wordplay and upbeat melodies.

SADOWAY: I just hope it’s apparent that we were always 100 percent invested in what we were putting together for songs and albums. That’s pretty important to me. One thing that this band taught me is how hard it is to come to grips with the existence of “the game,” and the fact that there’s a big difference between playing music because you love the experience, or want to create something that expresses a feeling or an idea, and “playing to win.” Maybe some folks can balance the industry and hustle side of it with their art, but I don’t think I’ve ever been able to do that. And letting go of the notion that our band is legitimized by one thing or another—a review on a particular website, opening for a big band, a spot on a fest, inclusion in a certain circle of popular musicians— has been a difficult, but freeing process. We experienced some or all of those at one point or another and, as Andy said during an interview earlier this week, we just sort of realized that those aren’t the things that bring us joy.

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CONTEMPORARY BLUES FOR WHOEVER YOU CHOOSE SAMANTHA FISH + LOUIE FONTAINE

MON 12.18

NOISE ROCK WITH A TOUCH OF ’80S HARDCORE UNSANE + BIG BRAVE + CHILD BITE + HEPATAGUA

[Great Scott, 1222 Comm.

Ave., Allston. 9pm/18+/$15. greatscottboston.com]

WED 12.20

HO HO HIP-HOP: A VERY UZI XMAS LIL UZI VERT + AUSTIN MILLZ + LIL SKIES

[House of Blues, 15 Lansdowne St., Boston.

7pm/all ages/$45. houseofblues.com]

WHEEL OF TUNES

MUNICIPAL WASTE

The thrash metal band talks bong water and dog shit

BY NINA CORCORAN @NINA_CORCORAN Municipal Waste is the metal band you should have gotten into during middle school. The Virginia band have been rocking their hybrid of hardcore punk and thrash metal since 2001. But it’s their ability to keep the music both frivolously juvenile and surprisingly serious that draws fans back time and time again, no matter how old you are.

This year, Municipal Waste rolled out their sixth album, the heavy but expectedly fun Slime and Punishment. There’s plenty to discuss about it, like how it’s their first record in five years because the band decided to take a break to let other musical ideas run their course. Vocalist Tony Foresta and bassist Land Phil churned through a serious career in Iron Reagan. Guitarist Ryan Waste recorded music in two other bands.

Drummer Dave Witte spiraled off in Brain Tentacles. But Slime and Punishment isn’t just a reunion from the side projects. It’s a chance to churn out new ideas with the same goofy attitude, in part thanks to new guitarist Nick “Nikropolis” Poulos. Instead, most of the chatter surrounding Municipal Waste right now has to do with politics— particularly a shirt they pressed after the 2016 election that shows Trump shooting himself in the head.

“When that shirt came out, a lot of people were like, ’What the fuck? Why do they have to bring politics into it?’ But we’ve been talking about this since the beginning.

You just weren’t paying attention,” says Foresta. “Don’t download the album and maybe buy a record maybe once, check out the lyrics, and you’d get it. I think we’re more outspoken at shows to let people know that it’s a time where people have to speak up. Right now, racist people think it’s okay to run their mouth or show their faces. That’s bullshit. We need to let people know that we’re not one of bands.”

To help Municipal Waste get back on the goofball path before headlining Brighton Music Hall, we interviewed Tony Foresta for a round of Wheel of Tunes, a series where we ask bands questions inspired by their song titles. His answers shouldn’t surprise you, no matter how unpredictable some of the stories are.

1. “Breathe Grease” Which liquid makes it easier for you to breathe: liquor, beer, wine, tea, broth, cough syrup, or orange juice?

Can I pick bong water? It cleans the throat out, clears it up, gives you smooth, fresh air. Fresh weed air [laughs].

2. “Enjoy the Night” When was the last time you went “out on the town” to have fun but with no specific plans in mind?

Last night! I do that all the time. It’s what you’re supposed to do. If there’s nothing go[ing] on, then go make something. I went out last night and saw a Guns N’ Roses cover band. They were great and the singer was a black man who went by Blaxl Rose. It was my friend’s bar called Wonderland. It’s in downtown Richmond.

3. “Dingy Situations” What’s the most dingy place you’ve ever crashed for the night?

Oh god. It’s definitely been on tour. I’m kind of a diva when it comes to where I sleep, or I guess maybe not because we’ve slept in horrible places. There’s been multiple cat shit houses, but there was one time in Arkansas where there was dog shit everywhere. It was with my other band, Iron Reagan. This girl took us back to her house and there was dog shit everywhere.

It smelled so gross. I’m normally polite when someone extends their house to us, but it was so gross, so I asked where she expected us to sleep because there’s poop everywhere. This was like a year ago, too!

When it comes to crafting real taste in our blends, two ingredients are all we’ve ever needed.

Tobacco Ingredients: Tobacco & Water Discover our difference at AmericanSpirit.com*

Read Nina’s interview about the rest of the track list at digboston.com

>> MUNICIPAL WASTE, NAILS, MACABRE, SHITFUCKER. WED 12.13. ONCE BALLROOM, 156 HIGHLAND AVE., SOMERVILLE. 6PM/18+/$20. ONCESOMERVILLE.COM

CIGARETTES *Website restricted to age 21+ smokers NEWS TO US Boston Dig 12-14-17.indd 1

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

©2017 SFNTC (4)

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

17

11/8/17 2:44 PM

FILM

INTERIOR DESIGN

A conversation with writer/director Stephen Cone

BY JAKE MULLIGAN @_JAKEMULLIGAN So it doesn’t overlap a ton. It just overlaps in terms of giving me experience at being on set and [letting me] continue to make stuff even when I don’t have the money to make a feature. And I’m sure that my relationships with actors are affected by them being my main priority in both life and work.

Speaking of which, another kind of work that we can find on your Vimeo page is other people’s acting reels. I’m interested in the way that your films often double as showcases for underseen actors—and also interested in how that feeds into the aesthetics of your films.

Stephen Cone is an American filmmaker, currently based in Chicago, who has written and directed eight feature-length films since 2008. His latest, Princess Cyd [2017], dramatizes the burgeoning connection between 17-year-old Cyd (Jessie Pinnick) and her aunt Miranda Ruth (Rebecca Spence), a professional author who hosts Cyd in Chicago for a few weeks during a summer break. Cone is also a professional educator who teaches courses on film and acting at Northwestern, as well as at Acting Studio Chicago—where he teaches the Cinema Lab course, during which Cone and his students collaborate on a rough script for a short film, which he then directs, with the students playing the roles (a large number of the resulting works are currently available to stream on Cone’s Vimeo page). I spoke to Cone recently about Princess Cyd and his other work; at the start of this transcript, we’re speaking about the shorts he’s completed in conjunction with Cinema Lab students.

CONE: I will say that the No. 1 way those shorts—and my work with students in general—affects my larger body of work and my features is by giving me storytelling practice. It teaches me how to tell a story better: what sort of information that you should relay at a given moment, and general things about narrative structure and screenwriting. It reminds me of how to put the pieces together in a successful way. So in a sense these Cinema Lab courses are serving as the screenwriting class that I never had myself.

Other than that, the way [the shorts] are created is entirely different [from my features]. The class is improvisation-based: We come up with these stories on our feet, and I get ideas from all the students. And that’s not the way that I make the features—which is a more traditional process, sitting down and writing a screenplay.

I’ll probably contradict myself 12 times while talking about this, but I have zero interest in making a film that’s a showcase for an actor where I’m not also profoundly interested in [the subject] formally.

So I do not feel that my interest in actors is bigger than my interest in cinema. For example, as a cinephile, I’m never watching movies because of actors. So I have no real interest in movies as a showcase for actors. If there’s a love of performance in my films, then it’s because a love of performance and of bodies and of faces is tied up into my own cinephilia, and into the work that I love. And in the work that I love the most, there is a sort of inseperable energy between the performance and the form. … In TV or film, you so often see an ambivalence about form and a prioritizing of performance. And I will say that one of my great fears was that I would be perceived in that way. I have issues with being spoken about as an actor’s director. When it’s described thoughtfully, I appreciate it.

But I hope that people see the emergence of some kind of subtle cinematic sensibility, and also … I don’t know. It’s the sort of thing that sets apart George Cukor from maybe, like, Stanley Kramer. With Cukor, you can tell that he’s in love with his actors—but you can also tell that he’s in love with shooting them. I think that’s why he was such a big fan of Andy Warhol and Paul Morrissey: because Cukor was also interested in form and in how it’s tied up with filming a living being, in their body, as they are now.

… After [screening] a movie I made many years ago, In Memoriam [2011], someone pointed out to me that there were no insert shots in the film. And that’s been pointed out to me multiple times. There was a point at which I realized that I wasn’t shooting anything that didn’t have people in it. And I guess that’s what we’re talking about. I am interested in film primarily as a medium in

which gesture and movement and voice and states of mind can be relayed.

How do your characters typically develop, in terms of getting them from the page towards those gestures and movements?

I am really interested in interior life and in trying to see if that can drive a narrative. I think all of it has something to do with growing up the son of a Southern Baptist minister in the Bible Belt, and with being surrounded three times a week in church—Sunday mornings, Sunday nights, and Wednesday nights—by adults who were not revealing their interior life. And I think that’s it, to be honest—I think that’s it. So whether the characters are progressive or conservative … [their depiction] is an extension of my longing to see people articulate their interior life, and grapple with it, and accept it. I hope I’m not being too reductive about my own psychology to confidently say that I really do believe that that’s where it comes from—from wondering what the congregants of my Dad’s church were thinking, and feeling, and not knowing. I think that’s it.

In your films the older characters are often experiencing this kind of spiritual reckoning. And then those crises are often inherited, in a way, by the younger characters—specifically in Henry Gamble’s Birthday Party [2015] and Princess Cyd—who are then able to sort their problems out with dialogue, typically in a manner that their older counterparts don’t seem to be capable of.

There’s a small irony of these films being called comingof-age films. I haven’t made a single movie just about teenagers. And yet a lot of these movies are billed that way … I’m only interested in teenagers in contrast to their middle-aged counterparts—and in that sense of staying the same person in the same body throughout your whole life, [despite] different periods of transformation.

And how we get from A to B—A to B being 20 to 40. I’m interested in that transformational process of getting into adulthood. I’m 37, and I’m in this weird place where I’m teaching 18-21-year-old college students, and I still don’t feel like I’ve grown up. I’m at the point in my life where I’m like, “Oh, you never really feel older”… I thought I would feel like a 30-something, and I don’t. And you never do— because we’re the same people. Our shells are changing, but we’re not changing. So it’s an interesting study. And I think I’ll only become more and more interested in aging … it feels like an ever-giving pool of ideas.

Conversation has been edited and condensed (particularly my questions, which were much wordier).

>> PRINCESS CYD IS CURRENTLY AVAILABLE ON VOD OUTLETS AND ON DVD. SOME OF CONE’S OTHER FILMS—INCLUDING HENRY GAMBLE’S BIRTHDAY PARTY, BLACK BOX, AND THE WISE KIDS—ARE ALSO AVAILABLE ON VOD OR DVD. HIS VIMEO PAGE, FEATURING MANY OF HIS SHORT FILMS, IS AT VIMEO.COM/USER2328169

FILM EVENTS FRI 12.15

FRI 12.15

SAT 12.16

SAT 12.16

MON 12.18

MON 12.18

[Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle St., Harvard Sq., Cambridge. 10pm/NR/$911. Screens through 12.21; see brattlefilm.org]

[Harvard Film Archive, 24 Quincy St., Harvard Sq., Cambridge. 7pm/R/$7-9.

35mm. See hcl.harvard. edu/hfa for info]

[Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle St., Harvard Sq., Cambridge. 6:30pm/G/$911. 35mm. brattlefilm.org]

[Museum of Fine Arts, 465 Huntington Ave., Boston.

3pm/PG/$11. Also screens on 12.17. 35mm. See mfa.org for information]

[Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle St., Harvard Sq., Cambridge. 7pm/NR/$9-11. brattlefilm.org]

[Coolidge Corner Theatre, 290 Harvard St., Brookline.

7pm/R/$12.25. 35mm. coolidge.org]

NEW DIGITAL RESTORATION OF DARIO ARGENTO’S SUSPIRIA [1977]

18

12.14.17 - 12.21.17 |

‘THE WORLD OF BOB FOSSE’ CONTINUES AT THE HFA ALL THAT JAZZ [1979]

DIGBOSTON.COM

STANLEY KUBRICK’S 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY [1968]

‘HARRY DEAN STANTON: SAY SOMETHING TRUE’ AT THE MFA WISE BLOOD [1979]

VARIOUS SHORT FILMS BY WOMEN FILMMAKERS, VIA THE ONGOING SERIES “GRRL HAUS CINEMA”

‘SCIENCE ON SCREEN’ PRESENTS TODD HAYNES’ SAFE [1995]

NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

19

PAY THE COST TO BE JIM ROSS SPORTS + ENTERTAINMENT

The Dig steps the ring with the greatest announcer of all

BY DIG STAFF @DIGBOSTON Diehard baseball fans are probably familiar with Ball Four, the classic 1970 book in which pitcher Jim Bouton retraced his time spent in the drunken and drug-addled big league.

Controversial in its own era, the tell-all opened floodgates for the endless celebrity dirt that we get to ogle these days.

Standing out from from all the paparazzi propaganda, Jim Ross, better known to professional wrestling fans as JR and as one of the sport’s greatest ringside announcers, tells stories that have proven over and over again to be both entertaining and reliable. Like Bouton and others who have told the raw truth and still more or less remained in the good graces of contemporaries, JR’s a refreshing font of honesty and a cultural gem—from his writing, to his barbecue brand, to his nonprofit endeavors for Bell’s palsy patients (Ross is one himself), to RINGSIDE with Jim Ross, his traveling show that comes through Laugh Boston on Saturday.

We caught JR on the phone between stops on a recent book tour. Among other things, he told us Boston fans can expect a serious autograph session—Ross is a proponent of personalizing merch and thinks it’s selfish when performers shy away from such requests—and promised that he’ll open up the floor for what is guaranteed to be a no-holds-barred array of audience questions.

You’re a man who is used to large arenas. What’s it like to get more intimate with your fans?

Oh, I like it. It’s more personal, it builds more of a relationship. We can interact, and that’s a good thing. I’ve been doing these ringside shows for about three years.

A lot of my peers are trying to do the same sort of thing, which is great, because imitation is the highest form of

flattery. The show in Boston is my last one of the year … We don’t screen questions, nothing is off-limits, we don’t get the questions ahead of time. It’s an opportunity for fans to really express themselves, get things off their mind, and not feel shamed.

Is that a thing you find? That it’s unpopular to publicly like wrestling?

When you sit in first class with executives, they all know who you are. They just don’t want to admit it because they don’t want anyone to know they watch wrestling. They have to qualify themselves and let you know that they know it isn’t real. For that reason, people who come to my show should feel like they are in a wrestling sanctuary and that no one will be there to shame them.

Do you pose for selfies?

I do. I love the fans, plus if you don’t, you get shit on.

So would the lifestyle that a lot of these guys lived during, say, the Hulk Hogan era have been able to fly in this day and age?

Uh, probably not. Some inside of wrestling have described it as a “nonviolent mafia.” You had to know somebody, you had to be somebody, you had to have some value to get a seat at the table.

Social media has changed everything. Big time. Now all this information is out there and available. But here’s the problem—a lot of it is bad information…

I don’t know if it would have been for better or for worse, but when Hogan was red hot, this kind of information distribution would have only made him

>> RINGSIDE WITH JIM ROSS. SAT 12.16 @ 1PM. LAUGH BOSTON, 425 SUMMER ST., BOSTON. LAUGHBOSTON.COM 20

12.14.17 - 12.21.17 |

DIGBOSTON.COM

hotter.

A lot of announcers are larger than life these days, and bigger than just announcing. How much credit do you deserve and get for that?

All the guys I’ve met at Fox over the years, doing boxing and voiceovers, have been very respectful. What I’ve found out from a lot of these guys is that they watched [Monday Night Raw]. So consequently, for better or worse, JR was a voice they grew up with. I was just at the right place at the right time. I never played a role. I never played a role as a wrestling announcer. I was just myself. I see that as one of the problems today [in wrestling], which is that they’re not being themselves and they don’t come off as genuine.

There are some people in the business who are playing the role of a pro wrestler, or at least what they perceive it to be, and they’re not going with their natural instincts or the natural extensions of their own personality.

Anything in particular fans should ask about in Boston?

I had some great times in Boston. I’ll get some questions about that, and I’m sure that there will be some football questions. My favorite memory from Boston isn’t even ringside—it happened in a small room the size of a closet with Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan. We shared this little dressing room in the old [Boston] Garden—it was steamy, it was hot. Monsoon was sweating like he was going to the electric chair, and Heenan kept messing with him.

107 Brimbal Ave

(978) 927-3400 cycles128.com NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

21

SAVAGE LOVE

SUBWAY STRADDLING

BY DAN SAVAGE @FAKEDANSAVAGE | MAIL@SAVAGELOVE.NET

I’m an attractive 30-year-old woman. Recently, I was stuck in a packed subway car. I squeezed in next to the best-looking straphanger I could find, faced him like we were slow-dancing, pressed my tits into him, and straddled his leg. We were so close, my head was over his shoulder—I could feel an electrical charge running through his body—and we stayed that way until I got to my stop.

Upon parting, I whispered, “You’re very attractive.” And he whispered back, “So are you.” I’ve pulled this on crowded trains a few other times. They’re my favorite erotic memories, and it sure seemed like the guys enjoyed these experiences. But Charlie Rose thought he was “exploring shared feelings.” So I wanted to ask: Am a groper?

Tiresome Reality Arrogates Intimate Nearness Yup. Some people would say the obvious response—the obvious way to open your eyes to what’s so wrong about your actions—would be to ask, “If a dude did this to a woman on a public conveyance, would that be okay?” But a woman seeking out the hottest guy on the subway and pressing her tits into his chest and straddling his leg exists in an entirely different context than a man doing the same to a woman. As I wrote recently on my blog in the Savage Love Letter of the Day: “Men don’t move through their lives deflecting near-constant unwanted sexual attention, we aren’t subjected to epidemic levels of sexual violence, and consequently we don’t live with the daily fear that we could be the victims of sexual violence at any time and in any place.” So a man on the receiving end of your behavior—even a man who felt annoyed, offended, or threatened—is going to experience your actions very differently than a woman subjected to the same actions by a man. A man is unlikely to feel threatened; a woman is unlikely to feel anything else.

While the men you’ve done this to seemed to enjoy it—and we only have your word to go on—that doesn’t make your subway perving okay. There are definitely men out there, TRAIN, who would be upset and/or angered by your actions. Me, for instance—and not (just) because I’m gay. (I don’t like being hugged by strangers. I would hate being humped by a random perv on the train.)

There are also men out there who have been the victims of sexual violence—far, far fewer men than women, of course, but you can’t tell by looking at a guy whether he’d be traumatized by your opportunistic attentions. Even if your hump-dar (like gaydar, but for humping) was perfect and you never did this to a man who didn’t enjoy it, you’re normalizing sexual assault on subways and buses, TRAIN, thereby making these spaces less safe for women than they already are. Knock it the fuck off.

Give the gift of the magnum Savage Lovecast at savagelovecast.com!.

COMEDY EVENTS THU 12.14

COMEDY NIGHT @ ARTLOUNGE

Featuring: Zenobia Del Mar, Sam Ike, Kim Margolis, Ethan Marsh, Penny Oswin, Jere Pilapil, Srilatha Rajamani, & Awet Teame Hosted by Laura Burns

1346 MASS AVE., ARLINGTON | 7PM | $10 THU 12.14

COMEDY NIGHT @ CARROLL’S RESTAURANT

Featuring: Artie Januario, Carolyn Plummer, & Steve Scarfo Hosted by Hank Morse from WROR

121 MAIN ST., MEDFORD | 6PM | $40 + TAX & GRATUITY (INCLUDES BUFFET) FRI 12.15

PENNY 4 YA THOUGHTS @ JACQUES CABARET

Featuring: AJ O’Connell, Brett Johnson, Cathy Coleman, Duval Culpepper, Erin Feeley, Randy Williams, Stephen Hubbard, Ted Pettingell, & Tommy O’Deed Hosted by Penny Oswin

79 BROADWAY, BOSTON | 7:30PM | $10 FRI 12.15

THE COMEDY STUDIO

Featuring: Dana Jay Bein, Mike Donovan, Kathe Farris!, Brian Longwell, Kwasi Mensah, Ben Quick, Jim Whitman, & Nonye Brown-West.

Hosted by Rick Jenkins

425 SUMMER ST., BOSTON | 8PM & 10PM | $25-$29 FRI 12.15 - SAT 12.16

CHRIS DISTEFANO @ LAUGH BOSTON

Chris Distefano, star of the MTV & MTV2 shows Girl Code & Guy Code, has a doctorate in physical therapy -- but he’s a master of comedy. & when you catch his high-energy comedy show, you’ll see why. With hilarious impressions of his New Yorker family members, Distefano is a regular at all the top NYC clubs, including Caroline’s, The Comic Strip & Gotham Comedy Club, & recently premiered his first half-hour comedy special on Comedy Central. Distefano has appeared on the Late Show with David Letterman, has been heard on Sirius XM radio, & has been featured in multiple national Nike commercials alongside JB Smoove.

425 SUMMER ST., BOSTON | 8PM & 10PM | $25-$29 SAT 12.16

COMEDY 2 THE CLUB @ GEM

Featuring: Josh Filipowski, Shyam Subramanian, Tim King, Tom Kelly, Andrew Della Volpe & more Hosted by Jeremiah Bohan Broderick

42 PROVINCE ST., BOSTON | 9PM | $10 SUN 12.17

THE PEOPLE’S SHOW @ IMPROVBOSTON

Featuring: Ish Patnaik, Molly Dugan, Emily Ruskowski, Gloria Rose, Tooky Kavanaugh, Nonye Brown-West, & Laura Severse Hosted by Danielle Andruskiwec

40 PROSPECT ST., CAMBRIDGE | 9PM | $10 TUE 12.19

JESS HILARIOUS @ LAUGH BOSTON

savagelovecast.com

Jessica “Jess Hilarious” Moore is a female comic on the rise, having originally started her career in sketch comedy & later expanding into standup & acting. Well-known for her big personality & unique creativity, Jess’ career on the road has earned her spots on stage opening for prestigious comic names such as Martin Lawrence. Jess can also currently be seen on Season 9 of MTV’s hit comedy improv show, WILD ’N OUT.

425 SUMMER ST., BOSTON | 7 & 9PM | $30-$40

MORE LISTINGS AT BOSTONCOMEDYSHOWS.COM

22

12.14.17 - 12.21.17 |

DIGBOSTON.COM

COMEDY

HELPING HELEN

WHAT'S FOR BREAKFAST

BY PATT KELLEY PATTKELLEY.COM

A blowout benefit for an iconic Boston comic’s family

BY DENNIS MALER @DEADAIRDENNIS When you think of comedy, you usually don’t want to be reminded of sad things, like illness or charity. You just want to laugh. That’s why the idea of a comedy benefit can be baffling to some people.

But when that benefit is for photographer Helen Crimmins, the beloved partner of Barry Crimmins, a man who has meant so much to the Boston comedy scene and to humor in general, you quickly move beyond the negative and get to making the jokes.

Barry started producing shows at the iconic Ding Ho restaurant in Inman Square in the ’80s, helping to launch the careers of comedians including Steven Wright, Paula Poundstone, Bobcat Goldthwait, Kevin Meaney, Jimmy Tingle, Lenny Clarke, and more.

As shown in Call Me Lucky, the outstanding 2015 documentary about Crimmins that was directed by Goldthwait, his crusade against child pornography has also earned him accolades, as such early efforts to speak out against abuse were ahead of their time.

Now, the Crimmins family has another battle on its hands—Helen is battling stage 4 cancer. In response to the news, a GoFundMe was started to help pay for medical expenses, and now comedians in Boston are taking their assistance one step further.

Helen and Barry have a rather unique relationship. They were close friends for several years, but months ago, after Helen announced her cancer diagnosis and was in need of help, Barry rushed to her side in Chicago from upstate New York to help with groceries, walking the dog, and anything else that she needed. His caring and their mutual respect soon blossomed into something stronger.

“Neither of us were thinking in terms of love, but there it was and here we are,” Helen tells DigBoston. The couple quickly segued from a short engagement into marriage. As Barry puts it, “Our love came as a surprise to both of us, one that has already brought us great happiness.”

While the passion of their union is relatively new, the hardships of a fight with cancer aren’t new to Helen. In 2005, the 5-foot-10 bartender and dog walker was diagnosed with lymphoma. Forced to work during treatment, the high cost of chemotherapy left her in a financial hole that was difficult to crawl out of. After 12 years, she did eventually overcome the debt, but in mid-February, days after an annual checkup, Helen received a call from her doctor’s office asking her to return for a biopsy.

From there, the all-too-familiar whirlwind of cancer diagnosis and battle began.

“When I picked up my first prescription, I had to sell the vested shares I had in the company I worked for that were meant to be saved for my retirement—which was all I had left after paying my out-of-pocket expenses for the year,” Helen says. Later she would be forced to sell one of her cameras to pay for one week’s worth of chemo.

“Photography is one of the few things I have that brings me a lot of joy and serves as a great distraction when I’m feeling particularly ill, so giving up one of my tools was heartbreaking and momentarily brought me back to wondering if all of this was worth it.”

The emotional costs are as hard to endure as the constant state of illness and the pressure of $22,000 a month in medical bills. Meanwhile, the loss of quality social time with friends and loved ones can make patients wonder if the stress is worth it. “If Alfie the dog and the cats here [at home] could talk, they’d be able to give you a lot of dirt on what some of my darkest thoughts were,” Helen jokes. Fortunately, she has her satirist husband by her side. That means he is unable to tour, which has always been Barry’s primary source of income.

So far, family, friends, and fans have raised (at the time of this writing) nearly $45,000 towards Helen’s treatments. Earlier this year, British comedians Robin Ince and Mark Thomas, along with musicians Billy Bragg and Charlotte Church, organized a benefit show at the New Wimbledon Theatre to help. Not to be outdone, Boston comedian Jim McCue, who awarded Barry the lifetime achievement award at this year’s Boston Comedy Festival, is doing the same. On Tuesday, he will join others who owe their careers to Crimmins at Center for Arts at the Armory in Somerville to raise laughter and dollars for the newlyweds in need.

THE WAY WE WEREN’T

BY PAT FALCO ILLFALCO.COM

OUR VALUED CUSTOMERS

BY TIM CHAMBERLAIN OURVC.NET

>> STAND UP TO CANCER: A NIGHT FOR HELEN CRIMMINS. FEATURING BOBCAT GOLDTHWAIT, EUGENE MIRMAN, CAROLYN PLUMMER, MIKE MCDONALD, MIKE DONOVAN, LENNY CLARKE, AND MORE. TUE 12.19. CENTER FOR ARTS AT THE ARMORY, SOMERVILLE. BOSTONCOMEDYFEST.COM

NEWS TO US

FEATURE

DEPT. OF COMMERCE

ARTS + ENTERTAINMENT

23