2020-04-09

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Thursday, April 9, 2020

Ann Arbor, Michigan

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Graduate students struggle with confusion, uncertainty as virus outbreak stalls research PhD candidates face unclear future as labs respond to orders to ramp down work VARSHA VEDAPUDI Daily Staff Reporter

For Rackham student Pistorius, living Stephanie on-campus with her husband during the time of COVID-19 has been full of uncertainty.

She said she was not prepared for the impact on lab research, though she had been following the news in the weeks leading up to the University of Michigan’s announcement of the cancellation of in-person classes. “(The announcement) felt focused on undergrads,” Pistorius said.

However, with the pandemic spreading, she mentioned how not going into the lab for more than six weeks will derail her tentative graduation date.

“It’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately,” she said.

Pistorius works in a wet lab that runs experiments with cell lines and animals. The cell lines can be frozen and picked up once things go back to normal, but the animals have

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to be a certain age to conduct experiments and require her to go in periodically and take care of them. Once the University announced that only critical lab work would

be permitted, Pistorius faced a dilemma.

“It was like a daily struggle of ‘Should I go in or should I not go in?’” Pistorius said.

With the time she would

usually be spending in the lab, Pistorius is catching up on data analysis, reading primary research papers and writing the introduction to her dissertation.

Residents use 3D printers to make masks AAPS teachers, AADL staff pool resources to address shortage of medical equipment BRAYDEN HIRSCH Daily Staff Reporter

Several Ann Arbor engineering teachers are aiding a campaign called Operation Face Shield Ann Arbor, using 3D printers to create face shields for medical professionals on the front lines during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Robert Cupit, a teacher at Ann Arbor Public Schools, said he came across a video announcement from fellow teacher Bill Van Loo explaining how AAPS engineering teachers were creating 3D-printed face shields to donate to medical professionals. He had access to a 3D printer through the school system and decided he wanted to help out.

The time it takes to create a mask varies, but Cupit said his machine takes about two-and-a-half hours.

In an email to The Daily, Cupit

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explained how the process works.

“I personally have 8 spools of filament, which is the material the 3D printers use to print,” Cupit wrote. “I can make approximately

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22 shields per spool so 176 shields total. We have approximately 9 people working on the project with 3 distribution hubs. Each person has about the same amount, if

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not more material than I do. We are going to print as many as we possibly can with the time we have.

The issue with scaling up is that once we run out it is very difficult to get more filament with all of this going on.”

Cupit and other AAPS teachers are working to make any personal protective equipment that they feel will help the medical professionals fight off the coronavirus pandemic.

The AAPS teachers are asking for support through a GoFundMe page.

“We have a lot of masks to print and not a lot of time to make them,” Cupit wrote. “People needed them last week and we just can’t keep up with the demand. The advantages of 3D printing are definitely cost and usability. You don’t have to be an engineer to use this equipment.”

See MASKS, Page 3

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“Hopefully this time I use to catch up (on material) will make me more efficient once I’m back in the lab,” Pistorius said.

See RESEARCH, Page 3

TECHNOLOGY

App to offer support for ‘U’ students Team behind kare looks to promote mental health IULIA DOBRIN

Daily Staff Reporter

Opening kare’s website, the tagline “because sometimes we don’t feel our best” appears on the homepage.

According to Business junior Bennett Hilkert, chief executive officer and a co-founder of kare, this tagline outlines the purpose of the company: to help connect students via an anonymous peer-to-peer support network.

See APP, Page 3

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Workers weld materials in preparation for a field hospital at the TCF Center in Detroit Monday afternoon.

SOFC covers expenses for student groups amid crisis

Funding committee of Central Student Government works to distribute money to different organizations for disrupted events JULIA RUBIN

Daily Staff Reporter

The Central Student Government Student Organization Funding Committee distributes $500,000 to student organizations every semester on a refund system. With student organizations canceling all in-person events following Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s “Stay Home, Stay Safe” Executive Order and the University of Michigan’s recommendation that students return home, it has pivoted to refunding as many organizations as possible for non-refundable expenses.

“In cases where expenses related to a cancelled event were already paid for and cannot be refunded, SOFC will reimburse these expenses with valid documentation according to our Proof of Payment guidelines,” reads a statement on the SOFC website. “This policy change applies only to expenses that are ‘non-refundable’ and have already been incurred.”

SOFC distributes its funds in nine waves over the course of the fall and winter semesters. The committee decided to maintain funding for waves seven through nine, for which student organizations must apply by March 23, March 30 and April 6 to be eligible for SOFC funds.

Business senior Crede Strauser, outgoing chair of SOFC, said roughly $50,000 is available for the last three waves. Strauser said many student

organizations are applying for funding for expenses not typically covered by SOFC. “Organizations are circling back and applying for expenses they maybe hadn’t applied for earlier because of their experience knowing that SOFC is extremely competitive and they wanted to apply for the things they were most likely to get funds for at the time,” Strauser said.

Typically, leftover SOFC funds rolled over into CSG’s fall budget. For the first time, funding will be available during the summer through a SOFC process, rather than requiring applicants to apply through the Summer Assembly and present their plans in person. Strauser projects $7,000 to $8,000 will be left over for the summer term.

“I think that those kinds of decisive actions just helps for a lot of organizations to not have that additional concern about their organization potentially having a negative account balance or potentially not being able to carry out their activities once they get back to normal because they don’t have the funds to do so,” Strauser said.

Michigan Movement, a studentrun non-profit focused on combating homelessness and poverty in Washtenaw County, had to cancel its in-person events.

Instead of pausing operations, MIM adjusted their work amid the pandemic.

Though MIM’s seminal MIMKit event, which partners with Ann Arbor’s Mercy House to create more than 100 care packages, had to be canceled after

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the governor’s stay-at-home order, MIM decided to instead directly provide Mercy House with items it needed most.

LSA junior Lindsay Calka, vice president of MIM, said the community that benefits from their work is particularly at risk during the pandemic.

“It was kind of like a double whammy, where not only is this group already going to be suffering effects from decisions made for social distancing and shelter in place, but we couldn’t do the things that could potentially help them in this scenario,” Calka said. “We really didn’t have the option to just stop. We had to pivot what we were doing.”

Because the items differed from the long-term care items that typically fill MIMKit care packages, MIM had to apply for wave nine SOFC funding. SOFC granted MIM only half of what they requested, even though this exact amount applied for during the eighth funding wave was granted in full.

“I think priority-wise, we should be seeing how we can be using our money the best way to serve people who need it right now,” Calka said. “I know there’s a lot going on (in the greater CSG budget) but it would have been nice to have that exact award met that we were guaranteed beforehand.”

Calka said MIM is working on plans to continue serving vulnerable communities with less money than anticipated. They plan on filling funding gaps left both by SOFC and canceled fundraisers by writing grants and applying for funding in other areas.

Engineering senior Zeke Majeske, a former member of CSG, said the best way for SOFC to support student organizations during this time is for them to improve their process with the newly freed time usually spent reviewing funding applications. “(I hope SOFC) spends as much money as they can on organizations and try to come up with improvements in the process so next semester when it gets rolling again, it works even better for students,” Majeske said.

Reporter Julia Rubin can be reached at julrubin@umich.edu.

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RESEARCH From Page 1 Costas Lyssiotis, a molecular and integrative physiolog y professor and Ph.D. adviser, runs a lab that studies cancer cells in order to form targeted therapies to improve the immune system. Many of these experiments take multiple months and involve mice that need to be periodically monitored. Some of his lab members have set up a Google Calendar and take turns going into the lab in order to keep collecting data from the mice.

“In addition to the time and financial burden, we’re cognizant that these animals

MASKS From Page 2 Once the staff at the Ann Arbor District Library heard about the AAPS teachers’ use of 3D printers, they realized they can use their 3D printers to pitch in. Rich Retyi, communications and marketing manager at the AADL, said AADL involved coworkers in helping to create

APP From Page 1 According to Hilkert, kare, which is being launched as a mobile app, is his response to a stigma he noticed surrounding the use of University of Michigan’s resources, as well as frustration with Counseling and Psychology Services’ long wait times.

“A lot of times it might be you didn’t do as well as you wanted to on an exam, or you had a breakup but maybe you’re not in a dire mental need,” Hilkert said.

“We felt like maybe professional therapists weren’t needed there as much as peers, so we did a lot of research into peer-to-peer support.”

Hilkert began work on the project in fall 2019 with co-founders Business and Engineering junior Stephanie Shoo and Engineering senior Rodney Shibu.

“We felt that a lot of students maybe needed problem-solving and stress relief more than they needed actual therapy,” Hilkert said. “So, we decided to create sort of a mobile application community, or an online community, that would allow students to connect and talk with each other anonymously, and hopefully make people feel a little better.”

Hilkert said he based his idea off of Wolverine Support Network and their peer-to-peer support system.

“I thought (Wolverine Support Network) is a really good resource,” Hilkert said. “But the limitation there is that it’s once a week for an hour rather than being a live resource where you can chat at any time.”

The community feature of the

News

Thursday, April 9, 2020 — 3

give their life for research and you want to treat them as fairly as possible, and so to just sack an experiment when the results were looking positive,” Lyssiotis said. “We deem that to be too extreme.”

Lyssiotis said he has been overwhelmed throughout the COVID-19 outbreak and the governor’s stay-at-home order, with his two kids occupying a lot of his time, but he knows the same isn’t true for others.

“I know some of my grad students are starting to exhibit signs of boredom — getting silly on Twitter, for example,” Lyssiotis said.

Daniel Kremer is a Rackham graduate student in Lyssiotis’s lab, hoping to graduate in

May. He has a paper in the revision process, where experts in his field suggest he conduct certain experiments before publishing the paper.

However, being unable to go into the lab pushes back his tentative graduation date to the end of the summer.

“It was kind of like ‘You’re almost done. You’re almost free, almost across the finish line, but then yeah,’” Kremer said.

Rackham student Christa Ventresca is in the middle of lab rotations, where graduate students spend several months in different labs before deciding on one at the end of the year. She said her program in Biomedical Sciences had

made it easy for students, allowing them to join a lab they wanted without completing all the rotations. However, for Ventresca, spending time in the physical lab space was an important part of making a decision. “(This situation) makes it really hard to pick a lab when you’re not physically in the lab,” she said.

Rackham student Zachary Reese is involved in social psychological research where he performs studies on participants from the LSA Psycholog y Subject Pools. With the cancellation of all human studies, the focus in his lab has shifted from data collection to data analysis. He said the

Psycholog y Department has been supportive and is letting students work at their own pace, so fulfilling degree requirements was not a major concern. However, finding a job is a pressing challenge for Reese, especially with the current state of the economy.

“When looking at 2008 and the big recession, we know (those who graduated that year) had trouble finding jobs,” Reese said. “But when they did find one, they were much more grateful and happy with what they had ... I think finding a silver lining in all of this is important.”

Reporter Varsha Vedapudi can be reached at varshakv@ umich.edu.

personal protective equipment.

They have access to four large printers, which can print three shields at a time, and some smaller ones that can do one at a time. On average, the library’s machines make about 20 shields per day.

“We’ve gotten great support from everyone at the library, which is really important because they made it really easy for us to get the things we need

and to just go,” Retyi said. “We’ve been doing a lot of stuff through our website. We’ve been putting out craft videos, entertainment videos, that kind of thing on our website, but then to be able to add in something that’s tangible and that’s directly related to what’s going on is important for us to be able to do.”

Nursing sophomore Zoe Gierlinger said the personal protective equipment being

created by the Ann Arbor community is important for doctors and nurses to have when treating patients.

“One of the first things that we learned about is how to properly put on PPE and the different types of precautions. It ensures not only the safety and protection of the patient but also of the employees,” Gierlinger said. “For nurses taking care of someone with an illness, you want to make

sure that you’re not spreading anything else to a patient that is already immunocompromised and you want to make sure that the nurse is protected because the nurses are working with other patients and coming in contact with other health care providers. It basically ensures the protection of both sides.”

Reporter Brayden Hirsch can be reached at braydenh@umich.edu.

kare app works through threads, where students can make groups about anything they want to chat about.

“It could be, for example, ‘Econ 101 homework help’ or it could be ‘stressed about grades’ or it could be ‘internship group,’” Hilkert said. “Then (students) can all sort of chat anonymously and create sub-threads within that, where they’re able to talk about different things that are bothering them.”

With the app being completely anonymous, the kare team has implemented measures designed to ensure kare remains a safe community. Users who make threatening statements, engage in cyberbullying or use names will have their account deleted, as outlined in the user agreement.

Shoo, who is chief procurement officer of kare, was involved with running focus groups and conducting user interviews with students about the product. According to Shoo, these interviews confirmed the need in the community for such a resource, with one student telling her he does not have time to wait weeks to talk to a professional who he feels does not really understand him.

“It really reaffirmed my time that I’ve committed to kare because that’s exactly what kare does,” Shoo said. “It’s an instantaneous platform that allows students to overcome that barrier of being worried that their issues aren’t big enough.”

With classes moving to an online format and students having to social distance, the team said they decided to accelerate work and move up the launch time to this month rather than next semester. The app is set to have an early release on April

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17 for the first 1,000 University students who sign up.

“We really want to be a resource for people during this hectic time,” Hilkert said.

“We felt like being able to chat anonymously, whether it be about your internship being potentially canceled or about how you’re handling different grading policies or different things … (It) was really important to launch now.”

They all continue to work on the project from home through virtual meetings with their team, which consists of the three co-founders, three students in computer science helping on

the technical side of the app and several freshmen helping with development and business management.

Because the team wants to launch the app as soon as they can, kare is currently focused solely on the community aspect of the app. There are several other features the team said they hope to integrate in later, such as an active listener feature where students can connect with trained peer listeners. These peers would be represented by different keywords, such as their major or their ethnicity, to help students find individuals able to relate to their experiences.

Though kare is currently just open to University students, Shibu, who is chief technology officer, said they have plans to expand to colleges nationwide, and the universities they have already spoken to expressed interest in the app.

“We hope we can get a bunch of users onto the platform from a bunch of different universities because, since it is a community, it will be the more the merrier,” Shibu said. “The more people you have on, the more people can give their feedback.”

Reporter Iulia Dobrin can be reached at idobrin@umich.edu.

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VARNA KODOTH | COLUMN

How COVID-19 further highlights disparities

W

ith the current COVID-19 public health crisis, it’s become particularly clear that the pandemic reaches beyond being just a highly contagious, viral disease or issue of community spread.

The coronavirus pandemic effectively stratified the population into its different social identities and personalities based on the impact on specific communities. While the United States may be a melting pot, the virus has made evident these pre-existing divisions within a community.

These “new” categories or groups make us aware of identities and statuses we may not have considered within the standard set of “social identities.”

We tend to consider communities based on where someone is living. Especially for millennials, the COVID-19 public health crisis is an incredible teaching moment. The current state of the world shows us the ways in which disease and illness impact us disproportionately.

Typically when discussing social identities, there’s the standard “social identity wheel.”

This circle includes 11 sectors: ethnicity, race, religious or spiritual affiliation, age, physical, emotional, developmental ability, first language, national origin, sexual orientation, sex, gender and socioeconomic status. It’s easy to view identities as rigid categories when it’s important to instead shift and look at identities as a spectrum.

Alongside the 11 identities listed, COVID-19 proved that occupation, encompassing job security and income, is an identity that is affected unequally.

Additionally, whether or not you are essential personnel or a non-essential worker is another division brought to light due to COVID-19. These are examples of identity that, while associated with the socioeconomic part of the social identity wheel, aren’t always visible to the eye and therefore aren’t taken into account on a daily basis.

Another example within a global context reported by the Center for Strategic and International Studies is

“The Impact of COVID-19 on Humanitarian Crises.”

Due to travel restrictions, refugee resettlement programs are temporarily halted. Additionally, migrants and refugees are often in living situations that do not allow for social distancing to flatten the curve. Personally, immigration status is an identity that, as a U.S. citizen, I do not think about often.

This is a privilege because, in this day and age, immigration status determines the level of public health care you’re able to receive.

Even on our campus, being

Look around you and take note of the widespread impacts that stretch far beyond the symptoms. a local business owner in Ann Arbor is particularly difficult right now because most of the campus community has gone home, and the people that are still in Ann Arbor are mostly staying at home. This means that the usual customers aren’t coming in and the unfortunate reality is that rent is still due on the first of the month. For example, welcoming spaces like aUM Yoga or MVMT which many University students frequently attend, are completely shut down. However, both studios are creating videos to make content virtually accessible to all. For those University students who are dependent on places like aUM or MVMT to prioritize both mental and physical wellness must seek this in new forms. There are local farms and produce-growers across the country within the agricultural industry offering contact-free curbside delivery of items that may no longer be available in big brand grocery stores. However, farm owners are still struggling to find innovative ways to sell their crops and produce revenue during this uncertain time.

Additionally, this is a terrifying time for health care professionals fighting on the front lines against

COVID-19. Now more than ever, the world is depending on health care professionals to be superheroes. There are doctors living in tents in their garages to prevent spreading the virus to their family members. There are pregnant ER doctors who risked not just their health but the health of their child in order to care for their patients with COVID-19. Furthermore, with the lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) available, it is time to re-evaluate reality — there is not enough support for our health care professionals.

Take this time to learn about how this pandemic affects different identities and what you can do to help. Look around you and take note of the widespread impacts that stretch far beyond the symptoms of cough, fever and shortness of breath. Practice being mindful of all identities and groups; we are more than what’s found within the social identity wheel. Start making a list of all the efforts being made to help health care workers and those affected by COVID-19.

When we’re able to return to new normalcy, let’s return the support to these organizations and institute preventative measures to protect small businesses and health care professionals in the future.

To my fellow graduating seniors, no matter how heartbreaking it may be to end four years on such an uncertain note, let’s take this as a handson opportunity in whatever field or line of study you’re pursuing post-graduation to learn how to improve the current systems in place. If you’re pursuing health care or medicine, this is the time to start thinking about how we can better deliver health care to all affected groups and identities.

If you’re pursuing business, this is the time to find creative ways to fund small businesses before entering times of economic decline? In times of emergencies like these, it’s up to us to apply our University of Michigan educations to find ways to bridge these divisions.

Varna Kodoth can be reached at vkodoth@umich.edu.

T

Class of 2021, post-pandemic

he f uture is disturbingly uncertain, yet it’s the only thing to think about. When will things go back to normal? Soon, but also never. This generation of young people will be feeling the effects of the pandemic for a long time and the experience of living through it is going to shape the way they see their lives and the world forever. College seniors — who had their last months on campus and their g raduation taken away by COV ID-19 and are g raduating into an uncertain world and f loundering economy — are undoubtedly in a unique situation. Juniors, on the other hand, narrowly escaped that experience and instead have a one-year buffer.

Juniors have been g iven a unique circumstance.

They are experiencing those shocking withdrawals from college which are traditionally associated with seniors, yet they still have one more shot. Three years on campus have felt like all of eternit y. Most of us are at a point where our high school friendships have narrowed down to just a few and our college circles are the biggest parts of our lives. We are now geog raphically scattered, much as we will be af ter g raduation.

Yet, we will return to campus in the fall for a school year unlike any other. It will have been the longest we have ever been apart from our college friends and restarting our normal activities will feel like a reunion.

Af ter returning from online classes, we will likely have less of an itch to pull out our phones under the table. We will know how valuable in-person learning is af ter our attempted month-and-a-half of awkward Zoom discussions.

When assig ned a g roup project, rather than being annoyed with the diff icult task of f inding a common meeting time, we might just be glad we get to interact with our classmates in person.

Af ter three years in the same spot, college seniors of past years may have been itching to leave campus.

Ever y thing they wanted to tr y was done and ever y place they wanted to see was seen. The horrible landlord was frustrating, the late nights at the librar y were exhausting, the same catered pizza at ever y campus event was bland. That won’t be the

case for the class of 2021. We aren’t going to feel like we’ve outg rown our campus because we won’t be taking any moment for g ranted.

It’s possible that af ter reuniting with our friends, we will feel like the college students we were before the pandemic. However, g iven the scale of this event, it’s impact isn’t going to disappear from our daily lives. The landscape of Ann Arbor may feel different with more local businesses gone. We still won’t be at ease, being close to others in large g roups. Our personal f inances will be in a different place than expected. Sadly, some of our peers and colleag ues will be mourning someone whose life was taken by the virus. Ever y thing we do on campus for our f inal year is going to be at least a little bit different.

It will certainly be f illed with more g ratitude.

Of course, we didn’t get to say goodbye to the seniors in the way we wanted to. That’s one thing that cannot be done over. The class of 2021 had the 2020 seniors by our side for our entire college experience. They are our mentors, role models and friends. Seeing their time at Michigan closed out abruptly without celebration felt personal to us. Our friends who we looked to for advice on f uture courses, housing and internships are now facing g reat economic uncertainties. We looked to them to watch how our f uture might unfold, and they can no longer ser ve as a g uide to us.

Thinking long-term, this generation, mostly Generation Z, is never going to forget what it was like to be a young person during the pandemic. The rapid transition to distanced communication and the uncertain f uture will be the same memor y in the minds of all schoolaged young people no matter what g rade they were in. The unique position of college juniors is that we have exactly one year lef t of our education. It feels like ever y thing has fallen apart right at the end, but we have t wo semesters to piece it all back together again and f ind some semblance of normalcy. In 2021, we are going to have a g raduation ceremony, and it won’t feel like just a formalit y.

They are experiencing those shocking withdrawals from college which are traditionally associated with seniors, yet they have one more shot.

Leah Adelman can be reached at ladelman@umich.edu.

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Arts

Thursday, April 9, 2020 — 5

MUSIC REVIEW

Sam Hunt’s ‘Southside’ is a monster of an album

subdued. Hunt retraces the choices he made that year, now wishing he could “put the Daily Arts Writer whiskey back in the bottle / put the smoke back in the joint” and devote all of 2016 to his If you were a country music fan in 2014, longtime on-again, off-again girlfriend (now you either loved, or loved to hate, Sam Hunt. wife), Hannah. It’s refreshing. Hunt swaps His unabashed devotion to mashing R&B his cool guy persona and heavy reliance into country music and his clean cut, city-boy on hip-hop beats for an honest, apologetic image made for scathing fan debate fodder. country sound. Logistically, “2016” is a Whether you sang along to his clever twists useful explanation for why Southside took so of phrasing out loud or under your breath, long. Hunt has struggled a lot with fame and Hunt’s music was unavoidable. Nearly every preserving his relationship — experiences track on his debut album Montevallo became that should amount to a substantive album. a hit. Then, for the most part, he disappeared.

That’s why the next track and current Hunt’s return with single “Hard to Forget” his sophomore effort is such a let down. It’s Southside finds him irritatingly catchy with some explaining radio candy. Listening to do and with the through the album, potential to become one can’t help but even more divisive. feel duped. For every ‘Southside’ Despite having glimmer of hope that a Sam Hunt nearly six years to put mature and grounded MCA Nashville Records it together, Southside Sam Hunt will emerge, is incredibly messy. there’s a song like the Following up a massive patronizing “That Ain’t success is tricky Beautiful” that dashes enough, and Hunt’s lack it. The potential for a of commitment to any self-aware, growthparticular direction centered album peeks only exacerbates the through in Southside, problem. The result is a Frankenstein’s but so does an album that’s merely trying to monster of an album. Not only are there replicate his earlier Montevallo — and Hunt’s chunks of country, pop and R&B, but songs indecision leaves him with neither. released in years past have been haphazardly One throughline in Southside is that sewn onto the body of work as well. The country fans’ genre quarrels have clearly project is falling apart at the seams; Southside gotten under Hunt’s skin. Traditional feels like it’s trying to separate into two country instrumentation has been lathered different albums. over top of this R&B-driven record a bit The album opener “2016” is promisingly unevenly. On the tail end of the otherwise KATIE BEEKMAN

MCA NASHVILLE

pop heavy “Young Once,” the listener catches a fiddle solo. “Hard to Forget” samples the 1953 country song “There Stands the Glass”

by Webb Pierce. “Let It Down” pulls off the country R&B combination best. Hunt talk-raps until the chorus bursts into a recognizably country riff complete with pedal steel, dobro and banjo.

For all of Southside’s identity crises, the album’s biggest head-scratcher is its inclusion of the track “Body Like a Back Road,” which was a hit two years ago. Alongside “Downtown’s Dead,” another single from 2018, these tracks feel like zombies on a project that’s supposed to breathe new life into Hunt’s artistry. That’s why “Breaking Up Was Easy in the 90’s” elicits a sigh of relief. The social media savvy break up anthem confirms that Hunt still has it. “It” being the ability to smooth-talk his way into an infectious just-barely-country song.

The only forgivable inclusion of an old Hunt song is the album closer “Drinkin’ Too Much.” Like “2016,” this song has shock-value. “I’m sorry I named the album Montevallo,” Hunt confesses, Montevallo being the name of his wife’s hometown. He goes on to detail their rocky relationship, then calls her out by name, even though he acknowledges that she wants her privacy. It’s painful and raw and unfair. Still, “Drinkin’ Too Much” holds the key to why Hunt’s country rap experiment worked in the first place — the genres intersect in brutally honest storytelling.

With Southside, Hunt holds onto his titles: the first mainstream country rapper, the most controversial artist in Nashville and, yes, the “Drake of country music.” But he’s sloppy about it. Hopefully it won’t take another six years for him to get a little more vulnerable.

FILM NOTEBOOK

Revisiting Hollywood and Bollywood, side by side I grew up watching Bollywood movies. I sang the songs even though I didn’t know what I was saying, I did the dances despite the fact that I couldn’t (and still can’t) dance and I watched the stories unfold onscreen, enthralled by the colors, the music and the beauty. It wasn’t until I was older, maybe a teenager, when my mom burst my naive childhood perception of Bollywood by saying: “You know these are all copies of American movies, right?” No. I did not know that. However, once I came to that realization and began watching some of those American movies, I was shocked by how similar they were. I decided to rewatch some of these Hollywood and Bollywood pairings to compare them and see just how similar they were once placed side by side.

“Partner.” There also isn’t a mob boss who’s after Sara (Eva Mendes, “The Other Guys”) in “Hitch,” though there is one after Naina (Lara Dutta, “Don 2”). Despite the shocking similarities — and some glaring differences — “Partner” is much less refined than “Hitch.” Salman Khan cringily swaggers as a “love guru,” whereas Will Smith confidently strides in his role of the “date doctor.” Kevin James thoughtfully pauses in his character’s attempt to win over Allegra Cole (Amber Valletta, “Gamer”), but Govinda thoughtlessly obsesses in his pursuit of Priya Jaisingh (Katrina Kaif, “Dhoom 3”).

The characters in “Partner” feel like caricatures compared to their more mature and believable Hollywood counterparts. The whole film is a little ridiculous, complete with awful special effects and scenes that leave you in jaw-dropped horror due to the sheer awkwardness unfolding on screen.

However, I’ll admit: It’s hilarious.

“Hitch” (2005) and “Partner” (2007) “Partner” is by far the most obvious remake of its Hollywood counterpart, “Hitch.” Both feature a “cool guy” who fixes up a “not-so-cool guy” with the girl of his dreams even though she’s way out of his league, while simultaneously falling in love himself. I mean, there are some scenes that are exact recreations of the original: the boardroom scene, the whistling scene, even the scene where Albert (Kevin James, “Paul Blart: Mall Cop”) sprays water on his pants is exactly copied in “Partner” when the same thing happens to Bhaskar (Govinda, “Happy Ending”). The two films are so similar that the creators of “Hitch” may have threatened suit against the creators of “Partner.”

There are some differences though, I’ll admit.

For example, I don’t recall a five-minute segment of a missile chasing Alex (Will Smith, “Men in Black”) on a jet ski in “Hitch,” do you? Well, that did happen to Prem (Salman Khan, “Kuch Kuch Hota Hai”) in

“When Harry Met Sally” (1989) and “Hum Tum” (“Me and You,” 2004) I know that there’s a Bollywood movie called “When Harry Met Sejal” that is a more obvious remake of the classic rom-com “When Harry Met Sally,” but “Hum Tum” is definitely the original remake. Similar to “When Harry Met Sally,” “Hum Tum” follows two characters who run into each other many times over the course of their lives until they fall in love. Not surprising in Bollywood, though, “Hum Tum” is much more unnecessarily dramatic than “When Harry Met Sally.” There were even parts of “Hum Tum” that my mom used to skip because she thought it would be too sad for us to watch. Another difference between the two films is that “Hum Tum” has a cartoon aspect in it; Karan’s (Saif Ali Khan, “Kal Ho Naa Ho”) comic book characters Hum and Tum fight and debate often on whether or not girls and boys can be just friends, which is of course, a common topic for

SABRIYA IMAMI Daily Arts Writer

debate in “When Harry Met Sally.”

The relationship between Rhea (Rani Mukerji, “Kuch Kuch Hota Hai”) and Karan is a little more chaotic than Harry (Billy Crystal, “Forget Paris”) and Sally’s (Meg Ryan, “Sleepless in Seattle”), too.

They “meet” more times and face more difficulties than their Hollywood versions because they don’t become friends for a while. And when they do become friends, Karan tries to set Rhea up with one of his friends, not realizing that she likes him. All in all, it is very dramatic. I won’t lie, though: Maybe it’s because I watched “Hum Tum” before I watched “When Harry Met Sally,” or maybe it’s because “Hum Tum” has some really great songs, but I like “Hum Tum” more. That might be blasphemous to Hollywood traditionalists, but I honestly don’t care.

“John Tucker Must Die” (2006) and “Ladies vs. Ricky Bahl” (2011) “John Tucker Must Die” is probably one of the best examples of a cliche high school romcom. There’s a basketball star, a cheerleader, a shy nobody … basically all the essentials. “Ladies vs.

Ricky Bahl” isn’t quite like that, I’ll admit, but there are some huge similarities, the most prominent being that there are three girls who team up and recruit a fourth girl to get revenge on a guy. The biggest difference, though? In “John Tucker Must Die,” the male protagonist is a high school playboy, and in “Ladies vs. Ricky Bahl” the guy is a highstakes conman. So in “John Tucker,” the girls want revenge on John (Jesse Metcalfe, “Christmas Under the Stars”) because he was cheating on all three of them at the same time, but in “Ricky Bahl” the girls want to con Ricky to get their money back from him.

These movies aren’t the exact same — that’s clear. But the endings of the films are probably what set them apart the most. “John Tucker” ends with Kate (Brittany Snow, “Pitch Perfect”) parting

somewhat amicably with John Tucker and moving on to a different love interest, whereas “Ricky Bahl” closes with Ishika (Anushka Sharma, “Band Baja Baaraat”) and Ricky (Ranveer Singh, “Band Baja Baaraat”) beginning a genuine, con-free romantic relationship. These movies may be pretty different, but they’re similar enough that it’s hard not to draw comparisons between them. However, I’ll admit: “John Tucker Must Die” has that iconic rom com appeal which makes it a little more enjoyable and lighthearted than “Ricky Bahl.”

“Dead Poets Society” (1989) and “Mohabbatein” (“Love Stories,” 2000) When I found out that people compared “Dead Poets Society” and “Mohabbatein,” I wasn’t sure that I agreed. After watching the films, I’m still not totally sure that I do. However, there are some obvious similarities that you can’t ignore. In both films, there is a teacher who has unconventional ideas and changes the lives of his students by teaching them to defy conformity. In “Dead Poets Society,” Mr. Keating (Robin Williams, “Mrs. Doubtfire”) teaches his students about individuality through literature and poetry … but in true Bollywood fashion, Raj Aryan (Shah Rukh Khan, “Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham”) teaches his students about individuality through music and love. That isn’t entirely surprising, given the fact that the title “Mohabbatein” literally means “love stories.” “Dead Poets Society” is an incredible, meaningful film that has you sobbing by the end, but “Mohabbatein” is not even close to that. It’s three and a half hours of cheesy, forced love stories and very few good songs, which is what really makes it a Bollywood disappointment to me.

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TV REVIEW

‘Broke’ has a relevant story, but that doesn’t make it good JUSTIN POLLACK Daily Arts Writer

Last spring, no one could have predicted the economic downfall we currently find our country in. Meanwhile, broadcast television networks have been developing sitcoms based on the premise that everyone has extended family just one questionable investment or medical misfortune away from being forced to consolidate under one roof. This kind of uncertain economic pre-apprehension makes comedies like NBC’s “Indebted” and CBS’s “Broke” feel eerily grounded in our reality.

Even ABC has an “Extended Family Loses Their Fortune Forcing Multiple Families Under One Roof” show with “United We Fall,” set to premiere later this spring. These shows’ applicability to our current reality doesn’t inherently make these shows funny by any means, but their foresight must be worth something. As far as these new and suddenly relevant sitcom subgenres go, “Broke” probably has the most potential — which isn’t really saying much.

Marking the former “NCIS” star’s return to television, Pauley Perrette plays hardworking, bartending Jackie — the loud single mom of talented elementary-aged Sammy (Antonio Corbo, “Brooklyn Nine-Nine”). Jackie’s childhood home is practically falling apart when her estranged sister Elizabeth (Natasha Leggero, “Another Period”) and wealthy husband Javier (Jamie Camil, “Jane the Virgin”) unexpectedly show up at her front door. Jackie hopes to use their sudden reappearance as an opportunity to ask for a loan to get back on her feet, but little does she know that Elizabeth and Javier are also broke. Don’t worry, given the name of the show, this isn’t a spoiler. In the pilot,

and presumably in subsequent episodes, Javier learns and Elizabeth re-learns to live a life within new financial limits. Meanwhile they still deal with a personal assistant named Luis (Izzy Diaz, “Telenovela”) because he remains on Javier’s father’s payroll.

Perette’s performance should only improve as she settles into the kind of acting necessary to perform in front of a live studio audience. But, for that to happen, the writers will need to give her more to work with.

There’s a clear division between Leggero and Perrette’s characters that enables Perrette to find humor in her own. Leggero’s character has one of those faintly British “I only started speaking like this after I got money” accents as well as a tiny dog for her purse, while Jackie’s personality revolves around having a son and being stressed about finances.

Anyone who has seen “Jane the Virgin” can immediately appreciate Camil’s character — a toned down version of the big-hearted actor Rogelio de la Vega, one that fits the bluecollar atmosphere of the show as opposed to the extravagant one you would get from a telenovela. The best character, who will surely get more screen time as the series progresses, is Javier’s assistant Luis. He’s gay, but that isn’t at the forefront of his character, as he circumvents stereotypes with cleverness. There are also frequent interactions between Javier and Luis when they speak in Spanish to each other, which is an added layer of realism to an otherwise unrelatable show.

“Broke” attempts to reflect the current delicacy of the economy, recognizing that the low unemployment rate and high stock market aren’t benefiting all families equally.

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Thursday, April 9, 2020 — 6

COMMUNITY CULTURE COLUMN

The concert hall on the computer screen SAMMY SUSSMAN

Daily Community Culture Columnist

As a high school student, I remember asking my friends if they’d be interested in coming with me to various classical music concerts. We’d dress nicely — not too nicely, of course — and sit in the faraway student-ticket sections of incredibly high-end concert venues. We’d turn off our cell phones and disconnect from our Internet-based high school lives. It was the only occasion in which we would choose to forget about social media and virtual interaction for hours at a time.

Back then, in the era before digital wellness became technology companies’ newest selling point, I wasn’t as conscious of the battle between the performing arts and the cell phone. I had witnessed the occasional pre-concert reminder to turn off my cell phone, of course, but that hadn’t become part of the concert ritual. And I hadn’t ever witnessed a concert designed for Internet viewers or social media posts.

Over the next six or seven years, I watched the cell phone come into conflict with the performing arts. First there were the musicians who stopped playing when ringtones interrupted their chains of thought. Then there were the actors who called out audience members for recording their performances, sometimes even weaponizing ushers as a means of ensuring they didn’t end up online.

Artists began to describe the fight against cell phones as a desire to control how their artistic work is shared and consumed. They didn’t want unauthorized recordings to make it to the Internet — they didn’t want to discourage people from buying tickets. And in many cases, artists said cell phones distracted them from producing their best work. These practices were strongly discouraged but never expressly banned.

However, at a performance by Hasan Minhaj last year at the Michigan Theater, I had my first experience with a mandatory cell phone ban — I had my phone locked in a magnetically-sealed pouch at the door to enter the theater. This was a precaution, Minhaj’s production company claimed, meant to ensure that none of the jokes from his upcoming show ended up online. It was the only way that he felt comfortable trying out new jokes and new ways of telling these jokes.

While I could understand this rationale, it felt more punitive to me than preventative. Had the trust between artists and audience members completely disappeared? Were comedians this distrustful of their fans, that to prevent an errant joke from becoming a Twitter trend they were forced to lock away our cell phones?

And what did this say about the human condition, about our constant need to record and digitize our experiences? I remember sitting with a friend before the event started, trying to make small talk in a time we both knew would normally be spent in our respective digital spheres. The cell phone had begun to encroach on the sanctity of the performance; during intermissions playbills were gradually replaced with my cell phone.

Yet at that performance, I enjoyed not having the ability to check my phone between acts. I loved talking to my friend about it afterward, neither of us feeling any pressure to immediately re-enter our digital lives once the entertainment had ended.

And I began to wonder if Minhaj acted in our best interest. Were we becoming addicted to our phones — addicted to the point that they needed to be locked away from us if we wanted to enjoy a concert? Was the locking of our phones just as much in our interest as it was the artist’s?

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COMMUNITY CULTURE NOTEBOOK

Shattered dreams and new hope in ‘A Beautiful Country’ TRINA PAL

Daily Arts Writer

To Matthew Ozawa, director of the University production “A Beautiful Country,” the COVID19 pandemic has felt like “having the rug ripped from under you.” The intended opening night of “A Beautiful Country” was April 2, but, like so many other productions, the show has been canceled.

“It’s been a crushing blow to see so many artists out of work and so many companies on the brink of closing,” Ozawa said.

“A Beautiful Country,” by playwright Chay Yew, would have been the fifth production that Ozawa, also a professional opera director, has directed at the University. He currently serves as a voice professor in the School of Music, Theatre & Dance. When the cast learned that University instruction would be shifted online, the show was already one month into intensive rehearsals six days a week, costumes were in progress and the production was almost completely staged.

Ozawa is hopeful that the show can premier in Fall 2020, but nothing is set in stone.

“A Beautiful Country” follows 150 years of Asian American history in vignettes, told through the eyes of Miss Visa Denied, an Asian male drag queen. Miss Visa Denied is a Malaysian Chinese immigrant, aptly named when his visa is denied by U.S. immigration authorities. The play explores this country’s history of xenophobia toward Asian Americans, assimilation and the intersecting identities of immigrants. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, these hot-button issues seem all the

more pressing.

“COVID-19 was detrimental to what we were trying to show,” Music, Theatre & Dance sophomore Morgan Bo, an acting major cast as the body of Miss Visa Denied, said.

The show details xenophobia against Asian Americans, and clear parallels are seen in the COVID-19 pandemic today.

Hate crimes against Asian Americans have been on the rise over the past month. Bo pointed out that racial homogenization between Asian Americans and Asian immigrants has increased as well, as is often the case when a particular minority group becomes a target of racism.

“I’ve only heard stories like this in history books,” Bo said. “It says something about how we, as a world, haven’t grown to love each other.”

“A Beautiful Country” is deeply personal for Ozawa, whose father was raised in a Japanese internment camp during World War II. For him, the COVID-19 pandemic feels like a repeat of history. He’s scared about what the U.S. will look like after the pandemic blows over, and fears for his safety and that of

other Asian Americans.

“I’m sometimes shocked by how little our country has evolved and how we continue to make the same mistakes,” Ozawa said.

“This pandemic is only heightening feelings that have existed for a quite a while.

Immigrants are largely characterized by their racial identity, often because it’s the most visible. But “A Beautiful Country” recognizes that there’s so much more to any immigrant. Miss Visa Denied has a racial identity as East Asian, a cultural identity as Malaysian and a gender identity as a male drag queen, among others. “(Immigrants) are caught between two continents, two cultures, two languages, two homes,” Ozawa said.

Ozawa chose to split up Miss Visa Denied into three parts — the body, the voice and the soul — to show that immigrants can’t be homogenized into blackand-white groups. Yet, immigrants aren’t writing the history of our nation, and their stories aren’t taught in K-12 schools.

“Who are we listening to, and what’s being

The play explores this country’s history of xenophobia toward Asian Americans, assimilation and the intersecting identities of immigrants.

In light of the COVID19 pandemic, these hotbutton issues seem all the more pressing

left out?” Ozawa said.

Bo, like Ozawa, identifies as Asian American, and feels strongly that this show deserves to be shown, especially in light of current circumstances. In assuming the role of Miss Visa Denied’s body, Bo focused on learning how to dress hyper-feminine and dance in vogue.

“I learned a ridiculous amount about myself and my identity through playing this character,” Bo said. “Things were clicking, but I was definitely still learning as I was going.”

The messages of “A Beautiful Country” were special for everyone involved in the production, and the cast is devastated that their production is canceled for the foreseeable future.

“We were creating something that was not only important, but was created with care,” Ozawa said, who made extra efforts to ensure rehearsal spaces were safe, comfortable and afforded a sense of agency for the cast.

Yet, in the midst of this chaos, there’s still optimism and hope.

“When things start to restore, we as a society need the arts,” Ozawa said. “The arts will have a huge responsibility to restore our sense of being.”

The pandemic may be keeping us at home, but this idle time is ripe for creativity and creation.

“People have such creative minds right now,” Bo said. “People are going to want to do something where they don’t feel like they’re locked in. I do believe theatre will have that rejuvenation and renaissance period.”

Can the performing arts recover from the blows of this pandemic? Bo remains optimistic.

“The theatre industry is shifting toward a new light,” Bo said. “A better light, hopefully.”