Seattle Weekly, September 11, 2013

SEPTEMBER 11-17, 2013 I VOLUME 38 I NUMBER 37

SEATTLEWEEKLY.COM I FREE

LY NN S HE LT ON ’S T OUCHY F EELY. PA G E 29 | D EA L I N G W I TH T H E D I C K W O LV E S . PA G E 3 7

TROUBLED WATERS Fishing the Duwamish River will…

• Help you build a community.

• Connect you to your cultural heritage.

• Provide your family with sustenance.

• Lower your life expectancy.

• Give the EPA a huge headache.

A Story by Daniel Person

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

Keith Jarrett, Gary Peacock, & Jack DeJohnette Charles Lloyd Group w/ Bill Frisell • The Bad Plus Brad Mehldau • Patricia Barber • Ken Vandermark Philip Glass • Dave Douglas Quintet Nicole Mitchell • Bill Frisell’s Big Sur Quintet SFJAZZ Collective • Manhattan Transfer John Medeski • B’shnorkestra • McTuff Peter Brötzmann • Industrial Revelation John Scofield’s Überjam • Cuong Vu Omar Sosa Afri-Lectric Sextet

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inside» September 11–17, 2013 VOLUME 38 | NUMBER 37

» SEATTLEWEEKLY.COM

»19

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news&comment 5

DEFENSE UNREST

Public defenders negotiate their status with King County, and Washington’s “pot czar” goes home to California.

6 | SPORTSBALL

9

DIRTY DUWAMISH

BY DANIEL PERSON | The efforts to clean up Seattle’s river impact not only the region’s economy, but the locals’ cultural identity.

food&drink 19 SALMON SAYS

BY BETH MAXEY | All about the Northwest’s iconic fish.

19 | FOOD NEWS 19 | TEMPERATURE CHECK 22 | THE BAR CODE

arts&culture 23 OUR KIND OF TOWN

BY MARGARET FRIEDMAN | ACT

presents an update of sorts to Thornton Wilder’s Our Town.

23 ARTS 28 FILM

Lynn Shelton’s latest, plus religious fervor in Austria, family conflict in Belgium, and the resurgence of bike racing in Rwanda.

30 | FILM CALENDAR

33 MUSIC

Julia Sweeney returns to town with Jill Sobule, plus new albums from Monogamy Party and Heatwarmer.

33 | SEVEN NIGHTS

odds&ends

37 | THE GEEKLY REPORT 38 | TOKE SIGNALS 39 | CLASSIFIEDS

»cover credits

ILLUSTRATION BY KAREN STEICHEN BACKGROUND PHOTO BY SOGGY DAN

EDITORIAL Managing Editor in Charge of News Daniel Person Senior Editor Nina Shapiro Food Editor Nicole Sprinkle Arts Editor Brian Miller Entertainment Editor Gwendolyn Elliott Editorial Operations Manager Gavin Borchert Staff Writers Ellis E. Conklin, Matt Driscoll, Kelton Sears Editorial Interns Justin Lester, Ning Liu, Devon Simpson Contributing Writers Rick Anderson, Sean Axmaker, Sara Billups, Ma’Chell Duma LaVassar, Steve Elliott, Margaret Friedman, Zach Geballe, Andrew Gospe, Megan Hill, Robert Horton, Sara D. Jones, Isaac Kaplan-Woolner, Sandra Kurtz, Dave Lake, Beth Maxey, Duff McKagan, Terra Clarke Olsen, Kevin Phinney, Keegan Prosser, Mark Rahner, Michael Stusser, Jacob Uitti PRODUCTION Production Manager Christopher Dollar Art Director Karen Steichen Graphic Designers Jennifer Lesinski, Sharon Adjiri ADVERTISING Sales Director Matthew Gaine Advertising Sales Manager, Arts Carol Cummins Senior Account Executives Terri Tinker, Krickette Wozniak Account Executives Peter Muller, Sam Borgen Classifieds Account Executive Matt Silvie MARKETING Marketing Director Jen Larson DISTRIBUTION Distibution Manager Jay Kraus OPERATIONS Administrative Coordinator Amy Niedrich PUBLISHER Wendy Geldien COPYRIGHT © 2013 BY SOUND PUBLISHING, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART WITHOUT PERMISSION IS PROHIBITED. ISSN 0898 0845 / USPS 306730 • SEATTLE WEEKLY IS PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY SOUND PUBLISHING, INC., 307 THIRD AVE. S., SEATTLE, WA 98104 SEATTLE WEEKLY® IS A REGISTERED TRADEMARK. PERIODICALS POSTAGE PAID AT SEATTLE, WA POSTMASTER: SEND ADDRESS CHANGES TO SEATTLE WEEKLY, 307 THIRD AVE. S., SEATTLE, WA 98104 • FOUNDED 1976.

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news&comment»

Muzzling the Watchdogs

A courthouse shake-up has many worried that King County’s public defenders could lose their rep as crusaders for better justice.

BY NINA SHAPIRO

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tant, benefits. After a court ruling ordered that decade ago, the city of Seattle public defenders be given access to the state-run thought it had no choice but to pension afforded to county employees, the county build a jail. Seattle had long housed decided that it might as well bring the defense lawits misdemeanor inmates at King yers onto its payroll.

County’s downtown lockup. But the county That was just fine with Dolan. But his boss at announced that soon it would have to kick out the Associated Counsel for the Accused (ACA), such offenders. There simply wouldn’t be room, along with the directors of the three other indethe county said. pendent agencies, all vociferously objected. In a A number of public defenders thought the county was wrong. Its jail actually had empty beds at the time, and the prisoner population was shrinking—not expanding, as dated projections, before the crime rate took a nose dive, had predicted.

“They just kept urging, ‘Look closer, you’ve got to examine the data,’ ” Seattle councilmember Tim Burgess recalls of the public defenders, the most vocal of whom came from what was then a nonprofit known as The Defender Association (TDA). It was not a popular stance. The county “had become so entrenched in its position,” Burgess says. And many city officials had too, declaring the planned jail a fait accompli. Yet the council eventually agreed to take another look at the numbers.

“They were right,” Burgess says of the public defenders.

Persuaded by Seattle, the letter to the county council, they said the implicacounty also reconsidered, and realized it did have room for misdemeanor prisoners after all. In 2010, tions were “breathtaking” and hadn’t been thought through. They pointed out that the county was Seattle scrapped plans to build a jail, saving $200 meddling with a system that was nationally million. known for its quality, and worried about being With episodes like this, King County public under the thumb of the county executive. defenders have earned a nationwide reputation for The defenders lost the battle over being not only defending the county’s poorest defendants brought in-house, but succeeded in launching a but also fighting for a better criminal-justice sysprolonged deliberation over what the new publictem. But will they continue to play such a feisty defense department should look like. The county role in public affairs? Lisa Daugaard, TDA deputy council has now drawn up a charter amendment director, is skeptical. As of July 1, the four indepenthat will go before voters in November. dent public-defense agencies that once contracted The amendment writes the new department with the county (and the city, for misdemeanor into the county charter, and takes a number of cases) became part of a new county Department unusual steps to broaden the mission of public of Public Defense. Under the new system, public defenders and ensure their independence. It says, defenders who buck the county will be bucking for instance, that the department director, to be their own employer. titled the county public The radical—and defender, can be fired only little-noticed—restructuring for cause and not at the resulted from a lawsuit filed PRINT IS GREAT, but if you executive’s whim. by a public defender named want to read . . . how politics is derailing efforts to make What would really Kevin Dolan, who argued downtown safer, check it out on make the new departthat he and his colleagues The Daily Weekly. ment unique, however, are were county employees in all SEATTLEWEEKLY.COM/DAILYWEEKLY but name and, more impor» CONTINUED ON PAGE 7

5

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rom 2004 to 2010, our state’s top two college-football teams had a combined record of 49 wins and 118 losses. This regional tragedy inspired panic, fury, shame, intoxication, and now, on the eve of a potential turnaround season, acceptance. Washington’s college-football players and coaches are finally talking—even laughing—about the Dark Times.

Washington State University starting quarterback Connor Halliday came right out with it. “Half those kids wouldn’t have started for a good high-school football team,” he said. “We actually have some guys who can play at this level now.”

Unviersity of Washington head coach Steve Sarkisian speaks with more subtlety. Read between the lines as Sark explains why he’s only now unleashing the Huskies’ new hurryup offense: “In years past I felt like, if we could shorten the game, keep it close, have a chance in the fourth quarter, we could win that way.

And I thought it was effective for us. Now we have the depth, we have the personnel, we have the athletes on our team that, man, the more chances they get, they’re gonna make plays.”

The evidence on the field also indicates that we’ve emerged into the light. Washington’s Aug. 31 win over #19 Boise State and Wazzu’s Saturday win at #25 USC marked the first time since 2003 that the Dawgs and Cougs beat ranked opponents in consecutive weeks.

I can finally recommend college football in this state again. Both teams will play in Seattle this month: the Dawgs against Idaho State in the gorgeous new Husky Stadium on Sept.

21 (tix $33–$526 on StubHub) and Arizona on Sept. 28 ($45–$703). Washington State hosts Stanford at CenturyLink on Sept. 28 ($18–$250).

OSTRACIZED: The WNBA Storm. They clinched a berth in the playoffs, which start in mid-September, but will have to play their first-round game in the Tacoma Dome because KeyArena is booked.

ENERGIZED: Hopes for the 2014 Mariners’ pitching staff. Taijuan Walker and James Paxton both won their first MLB starts, and Danny Hultzen (the second overall pick in the 2011 draft) has recovered from a shoulder injury.

MONOPOLIZED: State high-school football, by the Bellevue High Wolverines. Kelly Clarkson sang at the team fundraiser last month, which suggests how deep-pocketed the program is. Dominant, too, with a winning streak that now stands at 41 games. On Saturday the Wolverines played their toughest opponent of the year, defending 4A champs Skyline—and crushed them 45-7. E

sportsball@seattleweekly.com

news&comment» » FROM PAGE 5 the duties described in the amendment, which include promoting “system improvements, efficiencies, and access to justice and equity.” In other words, virtually everything about the criminal-justice system would be fair game for public defenders to take on—and the amendment takes the further step of stipulating that “elected officials shall not interfere.”

“It’s a model for the rest of the nation,” says the new Department of Public Defense’s interim director, David Chapman, who for many years served as director of the ACA. He contends that the mission outlined by the amendment would allow public defenders to do even more varied work than before, including seeking to expunge criminal records and restore civil rights like the ability to vote.

Chapman also says he believes that public defenders will have a stronger voice going forward because all four former agencies will be united and guaranteed a seat at the table with other county players, like the prosecutor’s office and the courts.

Daugaard, however, says that even under the charter language, it will be difficult to fight for an unpopular position from the inside. “People say: ‘This decision has already been made. We’ve talked about this 17 times.’ It’s hard to bring it up the 18th time.”

To maintain its outsider voice, TDA spun off a nonprofit, the Public Defender Association, to handle public-policy issues. But Daugaard says its effectiveness is limited by being separated from

the day-to-day work of the criminal justice system.

Another solution is possible. A task force initiated by the council recommended late last month that the new system include one outside entity, which would both handle routine defense work and pursue “social justice” causes, including potential class-action suits. Daugaard, who in the past has worked on TDA litigation charging selective enforcement in drug cases, says she and her colleagues would be happy to be that outside group.

The defenders pointed out that the county was meddling with a system that was nationally known for its quality, and worried about being under the thumb of the county executive.

Meanwhile, from the inside, Dolan and some of his colleagues are pressing for true parity with other county officials. “Now that we’re employees, we’ve got to be treated the same as prosecutors,” Dolan says, referring to salary figures that show public defenders get paid $20,000 to $30,000 less a year. The defenders voted to be represented by the Service Employees International Union.

Negotiations with the county have begun.

“These guys have already lost one lawsuit,” Dolan says of county officials. Public defenders, he insinuates, might just file another one.

What Happened to Washington’s Pot Czar?

NINA SHAPIRO E

news@seattle weekly.com

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

geted an initial $100,000 for the much-soughtafter consulting work. The state ended up paying much more—$814,000, as of last week, with one payment still pending, Smith tells SW. It might seem a little strange that the pot czar has left while Washington is still immersed in crafting regulations, the latest version of which was made public last week. But Smith emphasizes that Kleiman’s refulgent title was a media construct. The academic’s reports concentrated on market analysis and technical subjects, like the projected impact of legalization Initiative 502’s taxing scheme on the price of pot. The work informs, but does not direct, the LCB’s decision-making.

That’s not to say that Kleiman, who last month briefed the Seattle City Council while being trailed by a New Yorker writer, hasn’t expressed his opinions. The blunt-talking academic has stirred controversy—for instance, by raising sharply critical questions about the medical-marijuana market.

“The medical system is unregulated and unlicensed. You don’t even have required testing,” he reiterates to SW. Medical-marijuana entrepreneurs have not been pleased.

Smith says, however, that such controversy has nothing to do with the state’s wrap-up of BOTEC’s projects, which he describes as a purely financial matter. “We’re satisfied with what we got from BOTEC,” Smith says.

NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF JUSTICE

When the Department of Justice announced it would not fight Washington’s and Colorado’s newly enacted pot-legalization laws, the press turned for comment to Mark Kleiman, dubbed by the press our state’s “pot czar” and by himself, jokingly, “hemperor.” Washington’s top pot consultant chimed in from Los Angeles, however.

At the end of July, Kleiman’s consulting company, BOTEC Analysis Corporation, gave up its Tumwater apartment-cum-office. “We’ve folded up our tents,” says Kleiman, who teaches public policy at UCLA in addition to heading BOTEC. The company is also winding up its final projects for the state, leaving the Liquor Control Board on its own as it refines regulations for the fledgling recreational-marijuana market.

Kleiman, who never moved here but made periodic trips to our state, says he expected his Washington stint to last longer. “I cleared out my teaching schedule for the fall,” he says.

BOTEC’s contract with the state runs through April (with the possibility of extensions), but his company works on specific projects assigned by the LCB, for which it is paid an hourly rate of $292. After churning out a variety of reports, BOTEC pitched 20 more, according to Kleiman. But the LCB said it had run out of money.

“BOTEC wanted to do a lot more than we had the resources to pay for,” confirms LCB spokesperson Brian Smith.

When it hired KleiMark man last March, the Kleiman LCB said it had bud-

7

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

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s he waits for crabs with raw chicken and salmon heads are heaved to take his bait, into the still water from a fishing pier. On the The Duwamish River the Cambodian horizon, jets brought in for the Seafair airshow provides immigrants in man explains his make loop-de-loops over Lake Washington.

South Seattle with food, money, approach to eating seafood out of the Just across the river, a man in a tiny sailboat and cultural identity.

Duwamish River. S “If it comes up yanks on lines as his friends enjoy what looks black . . . I throw it back,” he says. “But like a very precarious ride around the waterway.

It’s also making them sick. if it looks normal, that means it just S Crabbing is a waiting game. You throw Can the EPA’s $305 million cleanup swam up from the Sound. It’s OK to your pot in, wait 10 minutes, then pull it up fix one without destroying the other? eat.” S He then pulls out his phone to see if anything has gotten snagged. Here, and proudly shows off a photo of a crabbers pass the time playing cards, drinking

BY DA N I E L P E R S O N huge, pink, seemingly clean Dungeness Coors, and noshing on a generous potluck in the crab he hauled in the week before. picnic shelter. They number maybe 20, but S T-105 Park—named after the make the tiny park feel crowded. S When industrial shipping terminal the Port of Seattle carved it out of—is abuzz this time comes, the crabbers draw in the rope attached to their pots, pulling them Sunday afternoon with crabbers, almost all of them appearing to be members through grooves worn into the wooden railing from years of crabbing. S of a tight-knit Cambodian community. One by one eight or so crab pots baited » CONTINUED ON PAGE 10

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

DANIEL PERSON

A

Crabbers pull in their pots by rope and heavy fishing line at T-105 Park along the Duwamish River.

9

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» FROM PAGE 9 Almost without fail, the pots are full of crab.

In one instance, an eel is hauled in with the catch and subsequently used to torment squeamish young women in miniskirts who have come out for the festivities. Few of the crabs are keepers, not because they are black with pollution but because they are too small. These crabbers are no slouches: They know the Washington Department of Fish and Game regulations and make sure they follow them. When one man pulls up a red Dungeness that appears to be big enough to keep (6.25 inches), a friend pulls out a plastic measuring stick. It is big enough, and it is kept.

If it’s a typical Duwamish crab, the shellfish’s muscle will contain a level of the carcinogen PCB just above the state’s threshold for consumption, meaning these crabs should never be eaten. The hepatopancreas, commonly known as “crab butter” and considered a delicacy in may Southeast Asian cultures, contains PCB levels 20 times that. It may be taken home and boiled in beer, an ineffective but widely used method of sanitizing seafood. Of greatest concern to health officials, it could be served to children in the man’s family or a pregnant woman—two populations particularly vulnerable to the menace posed by fish that live in Seattle’s only river.

There are many reasons the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is poised to order a $305 million cleanup of the last five-mile stretch of the Duwamish River that B-lines it through Seattle, past T-105 park, and into Puget Sound. But the main one, as stated by the EPA, is to make these fish and shellfish fit to consume. Right now, with the exception of salmon—which actually do migrate into the river from the Sound—they are not.

tion and as small as a corner auto-detailing shop in Mount Baker that doesn’t have electricity.

But no matter where you enter the maze, if you follow it far enough it leads back to the crab pots at T-105 park and other fishing spots that line the river: That’s where the environmental sins of Seattle’s past and present are pulled in from the Duwamish in hard-shell and scaly packages, cooked and consumed. And while it may seem like a simple problem compared to the daunting task of literally scrubbing contaminants from pieces of sand, keeping people from eating the fish in the Duwamish has proven surprisingly difficult. Experts point to a combination of poverty, culture, and the fact that few people understand how the carcinogenic chemicals in the water work. And there’s ample doubt that even $305 million will be enough to solve the problem for good.

I

n 1850, Col. Isaac Ebey, a ’49er who came to Olympia after his hopes for California gold were quickly dashed, hired Indian guides to take him around the Sound. Traveling from Elliott Bay, Ebey and his scouts ventured up what he called the Dewams River—then the site of at least 17 fishing villages—until they reached a massive inland lake. Ebey found it so stunning, he tried to name it after Lake Geneva in Switzerland. Geneva didn’t stick; the lake eventually took the surname of our first president.

About the Dewams, he wrote: “The river meanders along through rich bottom land, not heavily timbered, with here and there a beautiful plain of unrivaled fertility.” But while it was that fertile farmland that originally attracted white settlers, the river itself would ultimately define the area’s—and in many ways the entire region’s—economic worth.

In 1913, work began to straighten and deepen the water. Beautiful as Col. Ebey’s meandering river sounds, it was bad for business, and what was 13 miles of river eventually became five after 20 million cubic yards of mud and sand were moved to fill in its bends.

10

MOHAI

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

Col. Isaac Ebey, left, and the Duwamish in 1938, when a new Boeing plant opened on the west side of the river.

More than 100 years of industrial pollution has rendered the Duwamish River a Superfund Site, among the nation’s most contaminated areas. PCBs, mercury, arsenic, lead, and nearly 40 other pollutants exist at troublesome levels in the water, the sediment, and the seafood.

Final plans for the cleanup, scheduled to begin in 2015, will be released later this year or early next, and will represent the most concerted and expensive effort yet to launder Seattle’s soiled doormat. Responsibility for cleaning the river and keeping it clean will fall on a labyrinthine tangle of state, federal, and local agencies working with private industries as big as the Boeing Corpora-

This straightening was possible in part because of a systematic effort that kept the clean water running off the Cascades from reaching the river.

Even if his canoe could avoid all the shipping barges that now ply the Duwamish, Col. Ebey would not be able to find his wonderful Lake Geneva today, at least not by boat. The Black River, which fed out of the lake and connected it to the Duwamish, no longer exists.

With the digging of the Montlake Cut, finished in 1916, and the Ship Canal past Fremont, the level of Lake Washington dropped, and it began feeding water into Lake Union instead of

» CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

Celebrate the rebirth of the band’s third and final studio album with activities inside and outside the museum: Exclusive preview screenings of Nirvana’s “Live and Loud” concert in Sky Church Guided gallery tours of Nirvana: Taking Punk to the Masses Set lists, stage props, intimate photographs, and Cobain’s sonic blue Fender Mustang from the In Utero tour City of Seattle’s Buskers Week at EMP with musicians paying tribute to the album

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» FROM PAGE 10

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

“A

lot of people

from Vietnam, they escaped from the river side.

Most of them are from a fishing family.

They like being by a river.”

But there was just one problem: PCBs were likely carcinogenic, and at the very least toxic, though the extent to which they posed a risk to human health wasn’t realized until the 1970s. By 1979, the manufacturing of PCBs was banned in the United States because of the chemicals’ links to cancer, but it was already too late for the Duwamish.

Though 40-some pollutants are in the crosshairs of current cleanup efforts on the river, PCBs are by far the most pervasive. With every rainfall in Seattle, more PCBs are washed off buildings with old coats of paint and elsewhere and into Seattle’s storm-drain pipes. In the river, the chemicals settle into the river bottoms, where they are consumed by tiny worms and other creatures in the sand. From there the PCBs travel up the food chain until they reach the resident seafood. These fish contain on average 20 times the amount of PCBs than the fish from Puget Sound, itself by no means a pristine fishery.

When the state Department of Health issued its “Do Not Eat” recommendation in 2004 for the Lower Duwamish, the body of an English sole pulled from the river had a PCB level of 3,120 parts per billion; a tenth of that would have prompted the state to place a do-not-eat order on the fish.

did so. Then in the 1930s came an innovation out of the Monsanto Corporation in St. Louis: a new class of chemicals called polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. This elixir of capitalism made paint last longer and caulk seal better, and prevented electrical systems from overheating.

“This was the good stuff,” says David Schuchardt, the Duwamish River program leader with Seattle Public Utilities, which has an extensive program in place to prevent contamination of the river. “For high-end construction, companies would buy the best product on the shelf, and the best product on the shelf contained PCB.”

P

The Duwamish industrial area employs 100,000 people, and is credited with an annual economic impact of $13.5 billion.

BIKEJUJU

12

South Park resident Peter Quenguyen helps educate Vietnamese residents about the dangers of eating fish from the Duwamish, and relays the residents’ concerns to the EPA.

JOSHUA HUSTON

the Duwamish. To supply the Ballard Locks with enough water to operate, the Cedar River was re-channeled away from the Duwamish and into Lake Washington, where its waters would reach the Locks via the Cut. With a third major tributary, the White River, diverted toward Tacoma, by the 1920s the Green River remained the sole source of water for the Duwamish, making the two rivers essentially one.

In the words of Richard Hugo, obituary writer of many great Northwest rivers, the squelched Duwamish became “Midwest in the heat,” its curves “slow and sick.”

Businessmen attracted to the Puget Sound access that this newly pliable water provided came in droves, setting up mills, shipyards, and the Boeing manufacturing plant that famously rolled out 16 B-17s in 24 hours during WWII. And while some mills have shut down and the B-17 is out of production, industry along the Duwamish is still massive. According to King County, the business corridor along the river employs 100,000 people, or 7 percent of all jobs in the county. An economic impact study found that in 2008 the Lower Duwamish industrial area had a total economic impact of $13.5 billion.

The physical footprint of that industry also hides the river, literally, from a city that prides itself on its environmental acumen.

As one EPA employee noted to me wistfully: “You don’t see it. It just kind of disappears amongst all that industry.”

And while business hid the river, the river hid the by-products of business and Seattle’s progress.

Over the 20th century, Seattle’s storm drains were built to whisk runoff that naturally would have gone into Lake Washington and Lake Union into the Duwamish instead. Factories considered the river a convenient way to dispose of waste, and

eter Quenguyen is in his element.

Wearing a tweed driving cap, he charges from group to group at a barbecue being held in a dusty patch of land in South Park, shaking hands and cracking self-deprecating jokes about his diminutiveness.

In his pocket is a roll of what looks like play money: Duwamish Dollars, vouchers that are as good as cash in participating businesses near the river, backed by the full faith and credit of the EPA. The purpose of the gathering, and those Duwamish Dollars, is to engage the community.

As we eat Vietnamese barbecue and fresh water-

» CONTINUED ON PAGE 14

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» FROM PAGE 12 melon, the river dominates the conversation.

Offering me a glass of water, one woman laughs, “Don’t worry, this isn’t Duwamish water!”

As part of the Superfund process, the EPA uses gatherings like this and liaisons like Quenguyen to keep an open conversation going with the people most directly affected by Seattle’s industrial pollution, namely residents of South Park and Georgetown.

South Park is much more diverse and poorer than the rest of the city. According to the most recent census, the neighborhood is 55.4 percent minority, compared to 30.5 for the whole of Seattle, while its per-capita income is $18,575, less than half the Seattle average.

Residents are also far less healthy—a fact that environmental advocates have pointed to as proof that Seattle’s industrial wealth comes at a direct cost to the city’s poorest residents. According to a health-impact study of Seattle area codes released earlier this year, life expectancy in South Park and Georgetown is eight years shorter than the Seattle and King County average, and 13 years shorter than that of residents of Laurelhurst (median income $81,866).

These poor health outcomes can’t be traced solely, or even largely, to fish consumption. Still,

EPA analysis shows that regular consumption of Lower Duwamish resident fish increases one’s chances for cancer; studies elsewhere have linked PCB consumption by pregnant women to lower birth weight and other developmental complications, as well as disruption of hormone and immune systems.

When I’m able to pull Quenguyen away for a quick interview, he tells me that it’s in the nature of many Vietnamese to want to spend days on the river. “A lot of people from Vietnam, they escaped from the river side. Most of them are from a fishing family. They like being by a river,” Quenguyen says.

When they arrive in Seattle, many Vietnamese immigrants settle near the river because of the already strong community there (South Park is 7 percent Vietnamese), as well as the relatively

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

SEPTEMBER 11-17, 2013

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cheap cost of living. But even in an established community, they don’t have good information about the risks of Seattle’s river. Quenguyen rattles off the challenges to keeping people from eating fish from the river: “All of the language barriers, they need it for their family—they don’t care about the pollution.”

So Quenguyen, among many others, is tasked with clearing up the confusion. He says he’s highly successful. “After I tell them, they don’t eat the fish any more,” he says. “They love me!”

How many people are eating fish from the Duwamish is unknown, despite a number of attempts to gauge it. Survey after survey has been frustrated by too-small sample sizes; sources who clam up when asked about consumption in any official capacity whether they eat fish from the river; or sheer ignorance of where the fish is coming from. Researchers in 2011 noted that in some Seattle immigrant populations, fresh seafood is often purchased from ad hoc fish stands where the source of seafood is unknown.

The same survey of 1,005 immigrants in King County found that only two people knew the Duwamish River by name.

What is known is that immigrants like the Vietnamese at the barbecue or the Cambodians crabbing at T-105 are particularly vulnerable, given the language barriers and poverty noted by Quenguyen. And then there is the cultural issue of differing environmental standards.

“Especially where some of us come from, it looks like a pristine river,” says Alberto Rodriguez, a native of Honduras and program manager for the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition. “Where I come from, we have a hometown river as well, but it has so much raw sewage in it, it stinks. . . . You can tell it’s dirty because it stinks.”

Added Renee Dagseth, the EPA’s community involvement coordinator: “The residents there have a lot more immediate challenges. The air quality is sending their kids to the hospital.”

Yellow signs posted at fishing sites on the river warning people not to consume the resident fish are now featured in eight languages, but officials acknowledge that signs are a notoriously bad way to protect the health of fishers, particularly if the fishers use their catches for subsistence or profit.

An EPA report released in February concurred, noting that getting people to understand the risks involved with eating fish from the Duwamish is only half the battle, if that. Subsistence fishers may have no other viable food source. Going elsewhere to fish may cost too much in gas or require different fishing equipment and skills. And if fishing is important in their community, telling people not to eat fish out of the Duwamish “may be akin to recommending abandonment of their cultural heritage and identity,” according to the report.

So what can government agencies do? If you force people to stop eating the fish, they may starve. If you let them eat it, they could get cancer.

Ideas have been floated. The City of Seattle says it will begin publishing bus information showing which routes lead to good fishing holes.

Among the possibilities suggested by the EPA: stocking food banks with fish so people don’t feel compelled to go to the Duwamish; setting up a fish-trading system in which people could swap their crabs or sole for clean fish; providing transportation to fishing areas where the fish are clean; or simply paying residents to stop fishing the Duwamish.

But of course the ultimate solution is clear, if seemingly impossible: clean the river so the fish aren’t toxic at all.

B

y design, Superfund cleanups are acrimonious. The federal government seeks to avoid eating as much of the cleanup cost as possible, and instead attempts to identify who it thinks are major polluters are and force them to foot the bill for however much the federal agency determines is necessary. In the case of the Duwamish, the four biggest polluters ID’ed in 2001 were the City of Seattle, King County, the Port of Seattle, and Boeing. In addition, last year the EPA also issued 325 notices to businesses informing them that they were considered to be on the hook for some fraction of the cost. This includes businesses whose only link to the current pollution is the fact that the land they bought was once a source of PCB or other pollutants.

“T

he bottom line is,

we’re going to take

a lot of stuff out of the water.”

» CONTINUED ON PAGE 16

The city of Seattle is spending millions to track and remove pollutants in storm drains and the soil before they can reach the Duwamish.

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

Since the 2001 Superfund designation, the four major parties—know collectively as the Lower Duwamish Waterway Group—have spent $110 million in “early-action cleanups” that have targeted the river’s most polluted parts. Those cleanups have cut the PCB level in the sediment by 50 percent.

But that was a prologue to the major cleanup to come. How much that will cost is an uneasy question. The answer depends largely on how pristine the EPA decides the Duwamish should be by project’s end—a measure that comes down in part to how clean the fish are.

When the EPA released its draft cleanup plan for public review last winter, thousands of comments poured in, critiquing various aspects of the document that ran into the hundreds of pages.

The battle lines between the agencies and industries that would have to pay for the cleanup and environmental groups pressing for a more expensive and expansive plan of action were many: The LDWG argued for less dredging; environmental groups wanted more. The LDWG liked the scope of the cleanup; environmental groups thought more miles of river should be included.

The LDWG balked at the EPA’s statement that one goal of the cleanup was to render resident fish clean enough to eat without restriction, noting that the EPA’s own modeling showed that it could never actually achieve that goal; environmental groups said never say never.

The argument for less dredging goes like this: Not only does dredging cost a lot of money, it takes a lot of time. The EPA’s plan includes seven

years of dredging, compared to five years under a plan put forward by the city, county, port, and Boeing. The problem with the longer work plan, in this line of thinking, is that dredging by nature kicks up contamination currently in the mud, causing a possible 10-fold spike in the amount of PCBs in the water that is easily picked up by the fish, according to Jeff Stern, King County’s sediment program manager. The longer the dredging period, the longer the heightened exposure.

Considering that many of the health hazards faced by Duwamish Valley residents aren’t even addressed by the river cleanup, the plan as it stands would mean a net loss in environmental health during the dredging process, according to King County officials. “It’s more years and more people who have the potential for being exposed because of that longer dredging period,” says Christie True, director of the King County Department of Natural Resources and Parks, King County’s lead agency on the cleanup.

LDWG members also like to note that no matter how clean they get the Lower Duwamish, it will always rebound to the levels found in the Green River, which feeds directly into it. Federal guidelines state that riverbed contamination should be kept lower than two parts per billion in order to prevent dangerous contamination in fish. The cleanest the EPA thinks it can get the Duwamish is 20 times that—40 parts per billion, which is the level of pollution coming in from upstream. It must be noted, however, that the LWDG also argued against including upriver cleanup and so-called “source control” measures as part of the Superfund plan, moves that environmentalists claim would be the most effective way to bring down the entire river system’s pollution levels.

Still, LDWG members say it’s absurd to suggest that the sediment will ever be clean enough to render all fish completely safe to eat. According to True, modeling suggests that at cleanup’s end, it will be safe to eat Duwamish crab on a limited basis. Everything else will have to be monitored to see how the fish respond.

And while the cost would be negligible compared to that of the rest of the cleanup, Boeing went as far as to challenge the EPA on its proposal to provide clean seafood to people who are now fishing along the river, saying that went beyond the scope of the agency’s authority.

All told, the LDWG’s plan is cheaper than the EPA’s by about $45 million.

Asked about the county’s argument that more dredging would hurt fishers and other residents along the river, James Rasmussen, Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition coordinator, says he’s suspicious.

“All of a sudden, being concerned about the community—it seems disingenuous, quite honestly.

For the last 30 years, they didn’t really care,” says Rasmussen, who earlier this year was quoted by

15

» FROM PAGE 15

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The Stranger as saying the city and county needed to get their heads “out of their asses.”

The DRCC—a nonprofit that grew from a group of stakeholders gathered by the EPA to take community comment—also wants a quicker cleanup than what’s planned, but one that’s a lot more expensive, costing around half a billion dollars. The extra cost arises from a more aggressive dredging program—which the DRCC says will best ensure that pollution is removed from the river—and from its broader scope, including cleaning up the up-river pollution that everyone agrees will set the floor for how clean the Duwamish can get.

As for the price tag, the DRCC contends that while their recommended plan will cost more in the short term, it will save money in the long term, since under the current plan, the results will fall short of federal cleanup standards and require everyone to go through the entire process again.

Of the projected 10-fold increase in contaminants during dredging, Rasmussen tells Seattle Weekly that the county’s claim doesn’t hold water, saying that their prediction is based on old dredging technology that is no longer used, and that newer technology is much cleaner. When Boeing oversaw the cleanup of one early hot spot—Boeing Plant 2—chemical levels never exceeded state standards, he says, according to monitoring by the EPA. “It was incredibly impressive, actually. Don’t compare old dredge data to new dredge technology—and no question about this, the new tech will be used on the river.”

Contamination will still increase during dredging, says Rasmussen, but a period of heightened pollution in the river is better than just leaving contamination there for good. “If it means talking to the community about not fishing for 10 or 15 years while the cleanup is going on, that’s a much easier sell than saying ‘We have to keep you from fishing forever, and we need to do a better job informing you about the pollution,’ which amounts to just shouting louder.”

The EPA acknowledges that as the plan stands now, the Duwamish won’t meet federal waterquality standards at the conclusion of the cleanup.

But, it argues, those standards would be impossible to meet in an urban waterway like the Duwamish no matter what kind of cleanup was conducted.

While the agency is still weighing all comments before releasing a final plan, the EPA’s Duwamish Cleanup Project Manager, Allison Hiltner, says the agency determined that spending more than $305 million wouldn’t get the river any cleaner. “If we dredged the rest of the river, would it make it cleaner? Our initial assessment is it would not,” Hiltner says.

“The bottom line is, we’re going to take a lot of stuff out of the water,” she says, noting that seven years after the cleanup, there will be 90 percent fewer PCBs in the water than there are now; about a year after the cleanup is complete, fish tissue levels are expected to drop by the same amount.

With the EPA considering it inevitable that water quality will not reach the point where fishing can occur on the Duwamish without restriction in the foreseeable future, it is preparing to launch a year-long study to finally get a grasp on how widespread fishing is and how best to tackle

it. The LDWG, DRCC, and state agencies are also participating in the study, which will begin next year.

There’s little disagreement that the study is necessary, given that even under the best scenario, Duwamish fish won’t be fit to consume until the 2020s. But as the EPA itself noted in a document released earlier this year, even if it’s unavoidable, a fundamental injustice occurs when Superfund cleanups leave fish too contaminated to eat and thus require steps to keep people from consuming them in the long term: It puts “the burden of addressing environmental contamination’s health effects on those affected,” the EPA notes, “rather than those responsible for the risk.”

B

ut who is truly responsible for that risk?

The EPA will eventually come up with a full list of responsible parties, businesses large and small that will have to pay into the cleanup fund—right now Monsanto is on the list; so is something called the Scougal Rubber Corporation—as well as public agencies whose part we’ll all pay via taxes and utility rates.

But these entities aren’t what killed the Duwamish. Seattle killed the Duwamish.

Beyond its economy, Seattle’s very geography in many ways was built on the back of its river.

Most of the water that once coursed from the Pacific Crest to the braided lowlands of the

“T

alking to the community about not fishing for

10 or 15 years while the cleanup is going on, that’s a much easier sell than saying ‘We have to keep you from fishing forever.’ “ Duwamish now instead flows to Lake Washington. It’s perhaps coincidental, but still interesting, that water that once belonged to the Duwamish and ran past South Park now flows in front of the most expensive houses of lakefront Laurelhurst, where residents can expect to enjoy, on average, 13 more years of life.

As Matthew Klingle noted in his environmental history of Seattle, Emerald City, it’s easy to slip into the belief that Seattle is a pristine city on the Sound. “This garden city seems benign . . . from the lofty heights of Queen Anne,” he wrote, “but to the residents of the Duwamish Valley, it hardly seems benign.”

Rasmussen himself admits it’s unclear whether, even under the best-case scenario, the Duwamish can get clean enough to allow people to freely eat the fish and crab they pull out of its gray water. But after 100-plus years of disregard for the waterway that welcomed Seattle’s first white settlers, he says we have to try.

“The Duwamish River has been a sacrifice zone for a long time,” he says. “It’s been where all the contamination of this city has gone, a place where we’ve said, ‘Oh well, this is just the way it is.’ At least try to do the work before you say you can’t do it.

“If the wisest, richest, most educated city on the Puget Sound doesn’t show the leadership and clean its river, nobody is going to do any more than we are doing. What’s proposed right now is not going to do anything. It’s like saying ‘This is just the way it is. We can’t do it.’ ” E

dperson@seattleweekly.com

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

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Shopping for Salmon

FoodNews

BY BETH MAXEY

Food News: Cider, Beer, & Bicycle Tours

What you need to know to buy the perfect piece.

I

Aliases King salmon, spring salmon, blackmouth salmon, Copper River

salmon (when they come from the Copper River) Average size Largest of all species: 10–50 lbs.

Average lifespan Five years Season May–September Sustainability Nine populations listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Price Highest—up to $30 per pound.

Contamination Highest levels of PCBs and PBDEs. Cooking Fattiest of all salmon. Balanced, luxurious flavor. Best grilled or seared.

Sockeye

Aliases Red salmon (for their flesh), blue black salmon (for their skin) Average size 3–8 lbs.

Average lifespan Four to six years Season May–September Sustainability Listed as an endangered and threatened species in Snake

River and Lake Ozette, respectively. Populations are more secure in Puget Sound and the Columbia River.

Bavarian wunderland Von Trapp’s is setting up a covered outdoor biergarten from Sept. 21 through Oct. 6 during Oktoberfest. The al fresco picnic-table seating will stay open until 10 every night.

Central Co-op is staying put for another five years at its home on 16th Avenue and East Madison Street. Current membership is at about 12,000.

More than two dozen local farms are participating in this weekend’s Jefferson County Farm Tour. On Sunday, Finnriver Farm & Cidery in Chimacum will offer a tasting, wood-fired pizza, and bicycle tours via Edible Pedal.

World of Beer will occupy 2,600 square feet in the Terravita building at 1615 Belmont Ave. on Capitol Hill by November. Expect 50 rotating drafts and more than 500 beers for sale by the bottle. The Floridabased chain opened its first Washington location in Renton earlier this year. E food@seattleweekly.com

Temperature Check Know your salmon lingo.

Price High, generally second to chinook—up to $25 per pound.

Contamination About ⅓ the accumulation of PCBs and PBDEs; only

slightly more than coho.

Cooking Fatty flesh and the strongest flavor. Because of their krill-based diet, their flesh is a beautiful ruby-grapefruit red. Best grilled or seared to show off their color.

Coho

Aliases Silvers Average size 7–11 lbs.

Average lifespan Two to four years Season June–October Sustainability Four of the seven populations of coho in Washington and

Oregon are listed under the Endangered Species Act. Price Generally less than chinook and sockeye, up to $20 per pound.

Contamination PCB and PBDE levels are less than that of sockeye and more than chum.

Cooking Medium oil content, savory and satisfying with a milder flavor.

Delicious on the grill as well as poached or steamed.

Chum

Aliases Keta salmon, dogfish

» CONTINUED ON PAGE 21

»from chef Jeff maxfield, Skycity

Preserving local, seasonal ingredients. Jellies, preserves, and pickles are a great way to introduce the summer harvest into a winter menu.

KALE! Die already—we’ve seen it in juice, as a chip, in a purée, as dessert. I love the stuff, but enough is enough. How about looking at cauliflower???

DEAD, 86’d, go away and never come back: Truffle oil, enough said. (Great ones are foraged here in the Northwest, and, if sourced from the right people, can rival those found abroad.) E

food@seattleweekly.com

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

Chinook

BY SARA BILLUPS

CC MONICAS DAD

had a dream: I went to the market and knew everything essential to choosing the best kind of salmon. I knew that king was also chinook and that keta was another name for dogfish. I knew sockeye had the strongest flavor and king the fattiest flesh. If I wanted value and sustainability or I simply wanted to make a wonderful chowder, I’d choose pink. I wasn’t lurking around Loki with a recipe for “salmon” too embarrassed to ask which of the different kinds I should use. And when I did choose, I felt confident that the fish I selected wasn’t one my children would only read about or would dose them with mercury. In short, I understood the variables. I wasn’t confused and I wasn’t swimming. I came home with the perfect piece of fish.

Dreams are dreams. Confidence, unfortunately, requires research. So I hit the books, inspired by the knowledge that pink salmon are having an incredible run right now in the waters between Seattle and Everett.

Despite their various aliases (I count 15!) and the tendency of cookbooks to treat all salmon as one, the family Salmonidae includes five Pacific salmon: chinook, sockeye, coho, chum, & pink. Salmon are anadromous, meaning that they begin their life in freshwater, migrate to the ocean, and then return to freshwater—usually the same stream they were born in—to reproduce and then die. This return migration is the salmon run you’re always hearing about. Steelhead and trout, it turns out, are also members of Salmonidae. They are the same species, in fact: rainbow trout. The difference is that steelhead migrate; trout do not. Wild steelhead are extremely threatened, and Washington state banned commercial fishing of them in 1984.

In terms of size, lifespan, fat content, price, and sustainability, our Pacific salmon stack up neatly by tropic level or their rank on the food chain. Chinook, or king, salmon are the biggest, longest-lived, fattiest, most expensive, and, many would say, tastiest salmon. They are also the most contaminated by mercury, PCB’s (coolants), PBDE’s (flame retardants), and other distressing chemicals that have persisted in and permeated our environment.

Pink salmon are the smallest, shortest-lived, and leanest of the Pacific salmon, though I love their creamy taste. They are also the cheapest and least contaminated.

This contamination, though, should be taken in perspective. First, salmon fats are fabulous for us. Second the contamination level, even among chinook, is insignificant compared to the big offenders: marlin, king mackerel, and yellow-fin tuna. The Monterey Bay Aquarium lists wild-caught Pacific salmon of all types as “The Best of the Best” for health.

I was starting to feel a little more confident, and ready to shop. Here’s a handy guide if you’re planning to head to the fishmonger too!

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food&drink» Shopping for Salmon » FROM PAGE 19 Average size 10–15 lbs.

Average lifespan Three to six years Season June–November Sustainability Two populations are on the Endangered Species List: Hood Canal and the Lower

NATUREVALLEYPROTEINGRANOLA

Columbia. It’s the second most abundant salmon species, behind pinks.

Price Inexpensive—between $5 and $10 a pound.

Contamination The second-least-contaminated Pacific salmon.

Cooking Lean flesh, mild flavor. Good steamed and smoked. Wonderful in spreads and salmon cakes. Takes seasoning exceptionally well.

Pink

Aliases Humpback

salmon

Average size 3–5 lbs.

Average lifespan Two

years

Season June–Novem-

ber

Sustainability Most sustainable. No populations on the Endangered Species List. There are threatened populations in Washington and California. Fisheries in Alaska and British Columbia are secure.

Price Least expensive—currently $11 for a whole, wild, 3–4 lb. fish.

Contamination Because of their short lifespan and their low-food-chain, plankton-based diet, pink salmon are the cleanest, with the lowest bio-accumulation of toxins.

Cooking Leanest flesh, mildest flavor, delicate flakes. Good smoked, in chowder, or gently broiled.

Least forgiving to overcooking. E

Cooking Tips

Becky Selengut, chef extraordinaire and the author of the great book Good Fish: Sustainable Seafood Recipes From the Pacific Coast (2011, Sasquatch Books), believes every species of Pacific salmon is delicious. You just have to cook them the right way.

Becky categorizes salmon into two fatty species, chinook and sockeye, which are best seared or grilled; and two lean species, chum and pink, which are best with moist heat—for example, steamed or in chowder. She borrows a baseball term and calls the versatile coho a “utility player.”

Regardless of the species, buy the freshest, firmest fish you can and don’t overcook it. Your goal is to cook the salmon to the point that the flakes of the fish spread slightly, like a fan, when you press the flesh with your finger. If the flakes do not separate, cook the salmon a bit more. If the flesh crumbles, you’ve overcooked it. The white protein that appears at the top of cooked salmon—of any species— is another indication that the fish is overdone.

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The Home Bar, Part 3: The Tools

BY ZACH GEBALLE

W

are a must for any cocktail that involves sparkling elcome back to the Bar Code’s wine: that French 75 we made last week, and a Home Bar series! Hope you’ve few variants we’ll cover soon. Coupes are wideenjoyed the first two weeks, rimmed, shallow glasses that sit on a stem—an which have guided you in interesting alternative to martini glasses because assembling a roster of a few basic spirits and they’re a bit larger, so there’s less risk of sloshing. turning them into some of the most iconic cockThey can also be used for drinks with sparkling tails. (That’s assuming, of course, that you’ve folwine in them, and they’re just a neat visual option. lowed my advice; if you haven’t, I can’t be blamed for any mishaps.)

Tools: My suggestions are easy to find and Now let’s talk about the tools of the trade. First, won’t break the bank. A bar spoon is long and has measurements are essential in making a drink a spiraled shaft; it’s the easiest way to stir a cockproperly. There are several differtail. As I mentioned last week, stirring a drink is ent types of jiggers on the about chilling it without agitating it or watering market, and while the classic it down too much, so be gentle. A two-ended metal one- or muddler can be either wooden two-ounce jigger is somewhat or metal, but again, be delicate: useful, I prefer to use plastic or If you have to take out your rage metal jiggers with measurement on something, don’t let it be your marks on them—this offers you drink. Most muddled ingredients much more versatility than just will turn bitter if you’re too two sizes. harsh with them.

You can squeeze citrus Glasses: While there are directly into your glass, but you practical reasons to own differrun the risk of letting in seeds ent types of glasses, let’s be honand pulp. Instead, use a est: The real reason is that it’s citrus juicer to reserve it in cool to have the right glass a second glass and transfer for the right drink.

A Boston it from there into the drink, For making cocktails, shaker and a using a mesh strainer if you I recommend a few solidly jigger with measuring lines. really want to limit the pulp. built pint glasses—excellent Cocktail strainers are a great vessels to build a cocktail in, way to separate your drink from the ice you used as you can easily stir or shake it. They’re also a to chill it, and they’ll fit both a pint glass and a perfectly fine way to serve drinks on the rocks, Boston-shaker rim. especially if you like a slightly larger margarita A channel knife is what you use to get those or mojito. thin ribbons of citrus peel we bartenders call twists, A Boston shaker fits neatly over the top of a and you can find them at a restaurant-supply or pint glass, and is the quickest, easiest, and cleankitchen store. They take a bit of practice, but after est way to shake a cocktail. Slip it over the top and tap the bottom of the shaker firmly to secure it, then shake away. To remove the shaker, use While there are practical the flat of your palm to hit the shaker 90 degrees from where the glass and metal touch; it should reasons to own different loosen relatively cleanly. If you shake your drink types of glasses, let’s be too long and get the metal too cold, it might be more difficult, in which case you’ll have to honest: The real reason is run hot water over the shaker. It’s better to be too gentle than to end up with shards of glass that it’s cool to have the embedded in your hand, as most veteran barright glass for the right drink. tenders can tell you, often in gory detail.

For serving drinks, here’s what’s essential: martini glasses, lowball or rocks glasses, highball trashing a few lemons, you should be able to pull a or Collins glasses, white- and red-wine glasses, nice, long strip. The down side to channel knives is and champagne flutes. A coupe is a nice addithat they tend to take a fair amount of pith, which tion, but a bit more of a luxury item. For those can lead to a slightly bitter drink. A fun alternaunfamiliar with the terminology: A lowball tive is to use a vegetable peeler to take a wider but glass is relatively wide and squat—great for Old thinner slice of peel, which you can then twist into Fashioneds, gin and tonics, and other drinks the drink the same way—this is something you’ll served on the rocks. A Collins or highball glass see at many of Seattle’s finer cocktail bars. is tall and narrow—nice for drinks where you We’ll wrap up the Home Bar series next week want to really show off the internal components. with a look at a few spirits that can add diversity It’s what I’d serve that sexy mojito you made to your cocktail roster, and at a few variants on in, because you’ll be able to see the mint leaves the drinks you’ve already learned. Until then, swirling around as you sip. happy drink-making! E Wine glasses are of course great for wine, but For Parts 1 and 2 of the “Home Bar” series, see are also cool for cocktails: a housemade sangria, a seattleweekly.com. kir, even a white-wine spritzer. Champagne flutes thebarcode@seattleweekly.com

arts&culture

An Earthly Constellation Everyone’s a star, or made of the same stardust, in this fanciful play about small-town life and universal truths.

BY MARGARET FRIEDMAN

THURSDAY, SEPT. 12

Xanadu

CHRIS BENNION

John and Mary (Riedmann and Tavares) become strangely familiar.

By contrast, the John and Mary scenes are very

much “working scenes” in the playwright’s handbook; and it’s a lot of work to dramatically prop up Eno’s loosely associated vignettes. Lacking the breezy informality that yields amusing surprises elsewhere in the play, it falls to them to illustrate the life cycle in its most climactic moments.

Tavares, blessed with a “rainbow” face—which can be rainy and sunny at the same time—has no trouble riveting us all the way through to the predictable culminating contrivance. Even so,

the second act doesn’t really escalate/complicate/ mature so much as veer toward soap opera.

Though generally pitch-perfect in their poetic deployments, Eno’s situations sometimes try too hard. It seems mighty convenient that Middletown launched an astronaut—Blakely, outfitted in a bug-zapper-like illuminated helmet—with whom we journey to outer space. Replete with a curved, planetarium-like wall lit full of stars by Ben Zamora, the scene piggybacks on the shared cultural awe inspired by the first moonwalk.

But clichés here are never unacknowledged. The astronaut criticizes his own unoriginal thoughts, even while generating more original ones. The universal and the specific forever commingle: big/small, far/close, important/insignificant.

Perhaps as a way of showing that all humans are made of similar psychological matter (where most other plays try to suggest otherwise), all the characters in Middletown share certain traits, like curiosity about words (everyone’s always parsing and puzzling), confusion about their purpose here, and an ongoing metabolic volley between plenitude and bereftness. As if obeying a cosmic EKG pattern, their moods almost invariably follow the same wave: highlow-middle. Each surge of self-assertion gets checked by a jolt of self-effacement, before settling in some central place of acceptance. Steady as the ancient heart of the future. Middletown, population: everybody. E

stage@seattleweekly.com

ACT THEATRE 700 Union St., 292-7676, acttheatre.org. $41 and up. 8 p.m. Tues.–Sun. Ends Sept. 29.

Front St. N. (Issaquah), 392-2202, villagetheatre. org, $30–$65. 7:30 p.m. STEVE WIECKING

Skerritt and Stokinger go back to the disco era.

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

the town tour (Sarah Harlett) tries to explain to the tour guide (Renata Friedman) how she and her husband are not typical tourists looking for typical things: “We always sort of want something more, I guess because there’s a long history of death in both our families.” How desperately everyone is striving to be different, to distinguish him- or herself from the lumpen clot of humanity. Later, in a fantastic meta-scene supposedly set during intermission (don’t get up just yet, a real intermission will follow), five fake audience members banter like a Chekhovian chorus. “I’m writing a book on being an audience member.

Originally, I wanted to be an autobiographer,” blathers Wright’s ticket-buyer. “But then I had to sit down and ask myself, ‘Seriously? Me?’ ” Another patron (Aaron Blakely) accidentally breaks his chair. Then there’s a mentally handicapped gal blurting enigmatic snippets from the play; in this role and beyond, Friedman’s incongruous intensity—better suited to her solo performance in The K of D a few years back— doesn’t quite mesh with the naturalism and rich polyphonies Langs teases from his cast.

Critics would’ve laughed back in 1980 if you’d told them that Xanadu, Olivia Newton-John’s failed attempt at post-Grease film superstardom, would hold any charm for theater audiences as a stage musical decades later. Yet laughter is the key to the fast (about 90 minutes) and very loose 2007 Broadway adaptation by playwright Douglas Carter Beane (The Little Dog Laughed).

This production keeps the movie’s pleasing pop score by longtime ONJ collaborator John Farrar and rock band ELO’s Jeff Lynne. Also intact is the movie’s fantastically ridiculous notion that a muse (here played by Jessica Skerritt) would descend from the heavens to inspire some dimbulb artist (Drew Stokinger) to open a roller disco (or, as he puts it here, “My apex of all the arts”). But Beane gets mischievous: The Greek muse Kira’s inexplicable Australian accent in the film becomes part of her “disguise”; her sister muses include a couple of men; and an added subplot involving mythical conniving allows for the interpolation of other ELO hits like “Evil Woman.” Expect director David Ira Goldstein to know how to put extra kick into the numbers with the help of choreographer Kathryn Van Meter. Xanadu doesn’t demand much from its audience—except perhaps some affection for the film, the ’80s, and/or a certain kind of camp theatrical sensibility. As one of the muses notes, “This is like children’s theater for 40-year-old gay people.” (Through Oct. 20; then moves to Everett Oct. 25–Nov. 17). Village Theatre, 303

MIKE HIPPLE

W

ill Eno’s Middletown is an agile, meandering play about life: spectrums, spans, gradations, scales, and the individual’s compulsive quest to locate and quantify himself amid all these ranges of possibility. Unlike Eno’s 2005 hit monologue Thom Pain, Middletown has 10 actors playing about two dozen characters in a series of town-centric vignettes.

Starting with its title, threads of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town weave through the play’s wry, eerie tapestry of place. Like Wilder’s stage manager, the “Public Speaker” (R. Hamilton Wright) welcomes us, but not with situational or background information about the town. Rather, he attempts to welcome everyone in the universe, literally, which includes “the poorly depicted, people who are still teething, who are looking for a helping verb, the quote beautiful, the unquote beautiful, whose bones are just so, whose veins are just so, the drunk, the high, the blue, the down . . . ” The list goes on for over three minutes and introduces the tone of the 2010 play: an earnest, dissonant yearning that vibrates between grandiosity and humility, kind of like an Oscar speech. “I know I’m forgetting somebody,” the Public Speaker flails, consulting his tiny index card of notations. Such scrupulous inclusion and endearing intent leaves little doubt that, whoever you are, you are meant to be here. This play’s for you. As manifested in this excellent production, directed by John Langs, it probably is.

In another nod to Wilder, Jennifer Zeyl’s set austerely outlines two adjacent houses on risers— though unlike Wilder’s neighbors, their inhabitants don’t know each other yet. New to town and married to someone who travels a lot, Mary (Alexandra Tavares) quickly meets jack-of-various-unsatisfying-trades John (Eric Riedmann).

As awkward as that meeting is (he’s riddled with anxiety), chaste sparks fly as these two random humans, lonely in their own ways, find themselves liking each other. It feels bizarre, irrational, wonderful; and their subsequent friendship provides scaffolding for what story there is here.

But the majority of scenes are free-standing encounters between various denizens, a collection of moments that more closely approximates the rhythm of real-life experience than a more tightly escalating structure would. Eno doles out exposition via whatever guerrilla methods strike his fancy: the town librarian reading from Google; a tour guide concocting town history; characters directly addressing the audience with their innermost thoughts. Thankfully, Eno’s wit and brio, along with mostly feather-light acting and the succulent unreliability of the information, make it a palatable swallow.

And often a very funny swallow, laced with myriad instants of absurdity. A female visitor on

ThisWeek’s Agenda

» CONTINUED ON PAGE 24 23

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instagram.com/ Stewart holds onto Novak, briefly, at the Cinerama.

» FROM PAGE 23 Everything Is Terrible

Part of the new VHS-meets-the-Internet videotape nostalgia boom, Everything Is Terrible creates supercuts of found-footage oddities, most of them from the ’80s, when the compilers were kids glued to the idiot box. This road-show presentation, hosted by Dimitri Simakis, offers two such examples: one a collage of white folks vainly cashing in on hip-hop and rap; the second, called Comic Relief Zero, is a 50-minute compilation of VHS and cable comedy specials featuring the likes of Jay Leno, Robin Williams, Eddie Murphy, and Bob Saget. I mention those names because the other 90 percent of the performers are mostly forgotten journeymen—wait! was that Sinbad?—with mullets and parachute pants.

And none get to tell an entire joke the whole way through. What Simakis and his EIT cohort do is to edit on repeated gestures and bits, to tease out the parallels and perhaps outright cribs among the comedy trade. Ethnic stereotypes, “Did ya ever notice?”, sexist humor, and other stage tropes are painfully and somewhat numbingly cut into a new sequence. All you’re left with is hackery and cliché, and soon you’re laughing at these guys, not their jokes, which is EIT’s whole point. Sometimes this seems unfair, as with Richard Belzer or Eric Bogosian; and Letterman is conspicuously absent from the montage. But here come Carlos Mencia and Howie Mandel—and no, you decide, they’re getting just what they deserve. Central Cinema, 1411 21st Ave., 686-6684, centralcinema.com. $13. 8 & 10 p.m. BRIAN MILLER

FRIDAY, SEPT. 13

The Big-Screen 70 mm Film Festival

Just voted Best Movie Theater in our Best of Seattle® readers’ poll, Paul Allen’s Cinerama is presenting a dozen old titles worthy of its giant screen. Or screens, actually, since the cinema will be using the curved, 90-foot wraparound screen for the threestrip, Cinerama-process prints of How the West Was Won and This Is Cinerama. Tonight and for the other 70 mm titles, the standard 68-foot screen is plenty large. First up is the 1992 ethnographic trance movie Baraka, directed by Ron Fricke. Following is Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 masterpiece Vertigo, the most emotionally resonant tragedy of his long career. James Stewart is the San Francisco cop,

afraid of heights, who falls for Kim Novak, loses her, and then gradually loses his mind while trying to recreate her image with another woman (also Novak, unbeknownst to him). This psycho-thriller is less overtly Freudian than, say, Psycho, but plunges deepest into the psyche of a guy so in love with a dead woman (who claims to be a reincarnation) that his urges push a live woman—who can’t live up to his ideal—to her death. It’s eros and thanatos dancing to an eerie score by Bernard Herrmann, pulling Stewart inexorably into the fatal whorl of his own passion, like the spiral curl of Novak’s blonde hair, like the twisted tissues of his own cortex. Following in the series are classics including Lawrence of Arabia, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and The Sound of Music. (Through Sept. 29.) Cinerama, 2100 Fourth Ave., 448-6880, cinerama.com. $13.

5:30 & 9:30 p.m. BRIAN MILLER

Le Joli Mai

Hardly seen in the U.S., this 1963 documentary essay by Pierre Lhomme and Chris Marker has been digitized and restored by Icarus Films. It now runs over two and a half hours—which is a lot of Parisian street scenes and interviews, plus voice-overs by Yves Montand (in subtitled French, plus a song) and Simone Signoret (in English)—but I would argue Le Joli Mai is worth it. (Though you’ll want to sneak out for an intermission snack.) Marker puts miles of philosophical musings in Signoret’s mouth, yet it’s the ordinary French citizens who speak most eloquently—sometimes merely through their shrugs and gestures. Using light new handheld 16 mm camera rigs allowed the filmmakers to grab some gorgeous black-and-white street scenes on the fly, and the frame often wanders from the interview subject to something more interesting in the background. The city is changing, and Marker keeps asking his subjects about slum clearance and economics. New tower blocks are rising in the outer arrondissements, but Paris doesn’t yet seem like a modern postwar metropolis. Though there are violent protests against the colonial occupation of Algeria, the ’60s haven’t really happened yet in 1962. (That will wait for the Beatles, the Pill, and the riots of ’68.) Men wear ties, women wear gloves, and many scenes have the aspect of Brassaï or Robert Doisneau. A half-century later, the cobblestones are still there, but this old Paris is gone. (Through Mon.) Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., 267-5380, nwfilm forum.org. $6–$10. 7 p.m. BRIAN MILLER

arts&culture» Performance Stage OPENINGS & EVENTS

MARIA BAMFORD The Crazy Target Lady from those

holiday ads is also a critical darling among stand-ups. The Neptune, 1303 N.E. 45th St., 877-784-4849, stgpresents.org. $25.50. 8 p.m. Thurs., Sept. 12.

BENGAL TIGER AT THE BAGHDAD ZOO WET begins its fall season with Rajiv Joseph’s 2009 magical-realist fable of the early Iraq War, in which two American soldiers guard—and eventually kill—the once-proud predator in Baghdad’s ruined bestiary. The talking tiger, played by Mike Dooly, doesn’t die; its philosophical ghost hangs around to haunt the quarrelsome G.I.s (as does the ghost of Uday Hussein, the psychopathic son of the deposed dictator, who keeps his dead brother’s head in a bag). The play is set in 2003, when few could’ve imagined the occupation would last another decade. Certainly unprepared are the two soldiers (Jonathan Crimeni and Ryan Higgins), who depend upon an Iraqi translator (Erwin Galan), formerly Uday’s gardener, with an agenda of his own. All parties are degraded in their micro-conflict. If the tiger comes off best, it’s because he appeals to justice beyond his cage; meanwhile, his human tormentors fight over the spoils of war. Michael Place directs Joseph’s Pulitzernominated drama. BRIAN MILLER Washington Ensemble Theatre, 608 19th Ave. E., 325-5105, washingtonensemble. org. $15–$20. Preview Sept. 12, opens Sept. 13. 7:30 p.m.

Thurs.–Mon. Ends Oct. 7.

BURLESQUE ROYALE The Shanghai Pearl headlines this all-star revue, with San Francisco’s Grant Avenue Follies, “living legends from the Golden Era of Burlesque!”

The Triple Door, 216 Union St., 838-4333, tripledoor.com. $25–$35. 7:30 & 10:30 p.m. Sat., Sept. 14.

CUPCAKE FALL READING SERIES Live Girls!’s readings of new works. Annex Theatre, 1100 E. Pike St., lgtheater. org. $8. 7 p.m. Thurs., Sept. 12–Sun., Sept. 15.

DIRTY ROTTEN SCOUNDRELS Two con men in France vie to see who’s the con-iest. Seattle Musical Theatre, 7400 Sand Point Way N.E. # 101N, 800-838-3006, seattle musicaltheatre.org. $30–$40. Opens Sept. 13. 7:30 p.m. Fri.– Sat., 2 p.m. Sun., plus 7:30 p.m. Thurs., Oct. 3. Ends Oct. 6.

DON QUIXOTE & SANCHO PANZA, HOMELESS IN SEATTLE For Hispanic Heritage Month, eSe Teatro reads

of Rose Cano’s take on Cervantes. ACT Theatre, 700 Union St., eseteatro.org. $10. 2:30 p.m. Sun., Sept. 15.

Send events to stage@seattleweekly.com, dance@seattleweekly.com, or classical@seattleweekly.com See seattleweekly.com for full listings. = Recommended

•

EarSupply

» by gavin borchert Though I’m a firm advocate of the you’ll-eatyour-broccoli-and-you’ll-like-it school of concert programming, I have no objection to fluff, especially at a festive event like a season-opener.

And orchestral music doesn’t get any fluffier than the Toccata by Bulgarian composer Pancho Vladigerov: Imagine an MGM musical set on an Eastern Bloc collective farm, packed with rousing dancing-peasant production numbers and boiled down to four almost painfully colorful minutes. Vladigerov (1899–1978) is the one name on the Seattle Symphony’s Sunday-afternoon gala that might be unfamiliar; conductor Ludovic Morlot has surrounded it with favorite dances by Bartok, Borodin, Brahms, and Dvorak, and will follow it with another splashy dazzler, Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto no. 3. Lang Lang, probably the world’s most popular pianist these days, is on hand to play it. Fast, flashy, boisterous, clangorous, not exactly probing or profound: These

event’s 50th anniversary, staged readings of Christina Ham’s play about the Birmingham church bombings.

Seattle Academy of Arts & Sciences Theatre, 1100 12th Ave. E., project1voice.org. Free. 4:30 p.m. Sun., Sept. 15.

N3RDZ! This “Geeky Gala of Nerdy Burlesque” stars Iva Handfull, Violet DeVille, Tawdry Quirks, Jesus la Pinga, and many others. Re-bar, 1114 Howell St., violetdeville. com/nerdz. $13–$40. 7:30 p.m. Fri., Sept. 13.

ROSEMARY RiOT [productions] debuts with Seth Tarkus’ punk-flavored drama about a girl trying to escape Bremerton. Inscape, 815 Seattle Blvd. S., 800-838-3006. $10. Opens Sept. 12. Runs Thurs.–Sun.; see brownpaper tickets.com for exact schedule. Ends Sept. 21.

SOFT CLICK OF A SWITCH MAP Theatre’s second production is Carter W. Lewis’ play about two ordinary guys who start building bombs. West of Lenin, 203 N. 36th St., 800-838-3006, map-theatre.com, brownpapertickets.com.

Pay what you can. Preview Sept. 12, opens Sept. 13.

8 p.m. Thurs.–Sat. plus Mon., Sept. 23. Ends Sept. 28.

TEATRO ZINZANNI: HAIL CAESAR: FORBIDDEN OASIS Frank Ferrante returns as mad chef Caesar,

with Dreya Weber as his sultry accomplice Cleo. Teatro ZinZanni, 222 Mercer St., 802-0015. $108 and up. Opens Sept. 12. Runs Wed.–Sun.; see dreams.zinzanni.org for exact schedule. Ends Jan. 26.

DANIEL TOSH Stand-up’s new frat boy-you-love-to-hate.

(Dane Cook is so over.) The Paramount, 911 Pine St., 6821414, stgpresents.org. $59.75–$75. 8 p.m. Fri., Sept. 13, 7:30 & 9 p.m. Sat., Sept. 14.

THE WILD PARTY Relive the Roaring ‘20s in Andrew Lippa’s musical. Bainbridge Performing Arts, 200 Madison Ave. N., Bainbridge Island, 842-8569, bainbridgeperforming arts.org. $20. 7:30 p.m. Thurs., Sept. 12–Sat., Sept. 14; 3 p.m. Sun., Sept. 15.

XANADU SEE THE AGENDA, PAGE 23.

CURRENT RUNS

THE BANYAN TREE “What happens when immigrant

Indians throw down roots in foreign soil?” asks this play.

Second Story Repertory Theatre, 16587 N.E. 74th St., Redmond, 425-881-6777, secondstoryrep.org. $15. 8 p.m.

Fri.–Sat., 2 p.m. Sat.–Sun. Ends Sept. 15.

BREAK-UP SONGS Your tales of romantic trauma become improv theater. Unexpected Productions Market Theater, 1428 Post Alley, 800-838-3006, unexpectedproductions.org. $12–$15. 8:30 p.m. Fri.–Sat. Ends Sept. 21.

LES MISÉRABLES Balagan’s production replaces Broadway epicness with “intensely intimate and immersive staging.” Erickson Theatre Off Broadway, 1524 Harvard Ave., balagantheatre.org. $5–$30. 8 p.m. Thurs.– Sat., 2 p.m. Sun. Ends Sept. 28.

LYSISTRATA Setting Aristophanes’ salacious tale—about a coalition of Athenian and Spartan women who unite in a sex strike against their warrior husbands to end the Peloponnesian War—as a play within a play, performed at a U.S. camp in Afghanistan, makes the heroines’ cru-

•

2013 Wed. September 11 STEPHEN KELLOGG

terms can describe both the concerto and Lang himself—or so says conventional wisdom. Hear him for yourself and see if he’s getting a bum rap.

Benaroya Hall, Third Ave. & Union St., 2154747, seattlesymphony.org. $76 and up. 4 p.m.

Sun., Sept. 15.

Impassioned Singer Songwriter Federal Courthouse

Fri. September 13 HEY MARSEILLES

ATTLE

E

NS NTOW W O D

YS FRIDA & S Y ESDA WEDN 12-1:30PM

JULY

Lang, looking uncharacteristically serene.

YES! !

FREE

10 - S

E

PT 20

Orchestral Folk Freeway Park

Wed. September 18 MANGO SON Latin Salsa Federal Courthouse

Fri. September 20 MARCHFOURTH MARCHING BAND

Kaleidoscope of Musical and Visual Energy Westlake Park

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

The Wow Technique

FOUR LITTLE GIRLS: BIRMINGHAM 1963 To mark the

PETER HOENNEMANN

B Y G AV I N B O R C H E R T

25

arts&culture sade more urgent. Directed by Sheila Daniels, it’s a forcible reminder of wars still being fought on the other side of the globe. Would an antiwar play like Lysistrata even be allowed on an Army base? MARGARET FRIEDMAN Cornish Playhouse at Seattle Center, 726-5190. $20–$50.

See intiman.org for exact schedule. Ends Sept. 12.

MEN OF ACTION Jet City’s improv takeoff of adventure movies and their intrepid heroes. Wing-It Productions, 5510 University Way N.E., 781-3879, jetcityimprov.com. $12–$15. 8 p.m. Thurs.–Fri. Ends Sept. 20.

MIDDLETOWN SEE REVIEW, PAGE 23.

THE RAFT Rock Paper Theater’s debut stars comics Ryan Sanders and Mike Mathieu as two men lost at sea and coping as best they can. TPS Theatre 4, Seattle Center, rockpapertheater.com. $10. 8 p.m. Fri.–Sat. Ends Sept. 14.

THE REALM OF WHISPERING GHOSTS Subtitled “If Truman Met Einstein,” Arne Zaslove’s Noh-inspired new play explores the legacy of the Hiroshima bombing.

Seattle Public Theater at the Bathhouse, 7312 W. Green Lake Ave. N., 800-838-3006, brownpapertickets.com. $15– $27. 7:30 p.m. Thurs.–Sat., 2 & 7:30 p.m. Sun. Ends Sept. 15.

SECONDHAND LIONS The premiere of a musical based on the Michael Caine/Robert Duvall fantasy/adventure film. 5th Avenue Theatre, 1308 Fifth Ave., 625-1900. $29 and up. Previews through Sept. 25, opens Sept. 26. Runs Tues.–Sun.; see 5thavenue.org for schedule. Ends Oct. 6.

STU FOR SILVERTON This new musical tells the absolutely true story of a small Oregon town and its transgender mayor. Cornish Playhouse at Seattle Center, 726-5190. $20–$50. See intiman.org for schedule. Ends Sept. 15.

TROUBLE IN MIND Alice Childress’ 1955 Obie winner catalogs the compromises (i.e., sellings-out) demanded of “negro” stage professionals trying to make it on Broadway. Wiletta Mayer (Tracy Michelle Hughes) arrives for her first day of Broadway rehearsal, where she and other black cast members are confounded by the destructively narrow vision of producer/director Al Manners (Tim Gouran). In a play about a lynching, he wants Southern dialect and old stereotypes; his performers are uncomfortable, but they also want the job. Intiman’s splendid rendering marries beautiful acting to the powerful architecture of a laser-sharp script. MARGARET FRIEDMAN Cornish Playhouse at Seattle Center, 726-5190. $20–$50.

See intiman.org for schedule. Ends Sept. 15.

WE WON’T PAY! WE WON’T PAY! Dario Fo’s 1974 farce about life in an exploitive, inflationary economy is an intelligently ridiculous examination of whether looting is justified under a corrupt regime—timely in our era of unprecedented income inequality. Director Jane Nichols deftly articulates the quick beats that can be so easily muddled in farce. MARGARET FRIEDMAN Cornish Playhouse at Seattle Center, 726-5190. $20–$50. See intiman.org for schedule. Ends Sept. 14.

WORDS, SOUNDS, SILENCE UP’s new improv show “illuminates three things present in a single moment . . . It is in the silence that we truly see the impact of the message conveyed between the lines of verbal language.” Market Theater, 1428 Post Alley, 800-838-3006, unexpected productions.org. $7. 8:30 p.m. Thurs. Ends Sept. 26.

• “Morning Glory” by Nicole

A Tongue-In-Cheek Comedy Celebrating The Power of Love... And Legwarmers

Tickets: (425) 392-2202 • Sept 12 - Oct 20 • www.VillageTheatre.org

T R O H S N I w T o h R s MAa variety

• SnoValley Tilth free farm tours same day: see www.snovalleytilth.org for deatils

TOWN HALL

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

Featuring: Ed Grimley

26

Jimin y Glick

And Many More

CIVICS

SCIENCE

ARTS & CULTURE

COMMUNITY

(9/13) David Montgomery A Geological Perspective on Noah’s Flood (9/13) Vedic Education & Development Academy presents Grand Violin Duo (9/16) Erik Assadourian & Annie Leonard with Chip Giller Is Sustainability Still Possible?

Dance

DANIEL LINEHAN New work from the choreographer: Not

About Everything and The Karaoke Dialogues. Velocity Dance Center, 1621 12th Ave., 325-8773, velocitydance center.org. $12–$18. 8 p.m. Thurs., Sept. 12–Sat., Sept. 14.

CARMONA FLAMENCO Traditional music and dance. Cafe Solstice, 4116 University Way N.E., 932-4067, carmona2@ comcast.net. $15–$20. 8 & 9:30 p.m. Sat., Sept. 14.

SPLINTER DANCE COMPANY Dance theater on the subjects of “gender (in)equality, economic disparity, war, and domestic violence.” The Neptune, 1303 N.E. 45th St., 877784-4849, stgpresents.org. Free. 7:30 p.m. Tues., Sept. 17.

Classical, Etc.

COMPOSER SPOTLIGHT Thomas Makucevich discusses

(9/16) Amanda Lindhout ‘A House in the Sky’

OCTOBER 3 I 8 PM THE PARAMOUNT THEATRE GROUPS OF 10 OR MORE CALL (206) 315-8054 FOR SINGLE TICKETS CALL (877) 784-4849

STGPRESENTS.ORG

(9/17) Standardized Testing in Our Public Schools (9/17) Gabor Zovanyi ‘The No-Growth Imperative’ TOWN HALL

EST. 1928 9TH AVE & PINE ST

CIVICS

SCIENCE

ARTS & CULTURE

COMMUNITY

WWW.TOWNHALLSEATTLE.ORG

his electronic music and explorations in computer-music languages. Jack Straw Studios, 4261 Roosevelt Way N.E., jackstraw.org. Free. 7:30 p.m. Wed., Sept. 11.

GRAND VIOLIN DUO Indian classical music performed by the father-and-son Subramaniam duo. Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave., 652-4255, townhallseattle.org. $25–$100. 8 p.m.

Fri., Sept. 13.

RUSSIAN KALEIDOSCOPE An evening of bonbons—or zakuski—from the Russian Chamber Music Foundation of Seattle. Mercer Island Presbyterian Church, 3605 84th Ave. S.E., Mercer Island, 425-829-1345, russianchamber music.org. $10–$20. 7:30 p.m. Fri., Sept. 13.

AUBURN SYMPHONY Light favorites: Bernstein, Delibes, Verdi, and much more. Auburn Performing Arts Center, 700 E. Main St., Auburn, 253-887-7777, auburnsymphony. org. $10–$34. 2:30 p.m. Sun., Sept. 15.

SEATTLE SYMPHONY SEE EAR SUPPLY, PAGE 25.

SEATTLE SYMPHONY SEE SEVEN NIGHTS, PAGE 33.

• •

WWW.5THAVENUE.ORG (206) 625-1900 GROUPS OF 10 OR MORE: 1-888-625-1418 Photo by Mark Kitaoka

2013/14 SEASON SPONSORS

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

Sept 7-Oct 6, 2013

27

arts&culture»Film

Opening ThisWeek

ing of this world and whatever issues have led these people to such extremes. Or maybe to some wildly imaginative fable-like zone, as in Lars von Trier’s Breaking the Waves, to name another movie that mashes up faith and punishment. But in Paradise: Faith, the insights get muddied in the nail-on-the-head cruelty—it’s an interesting film to think about, but grueling to sit through.

The Muslims Are Coming!

ROBERT HORTON

THEMUSLIMSARECOMING.COM

28

Interviewed in a laundromat, David Cross says he usually avoids identity-themed comedy nights— an evening of gay comics, black comics, Ukrainian comics, etc. Yet he and several other boldface names—including Janeane Garofalo, Colin Quinn, Lewis Black, and Aasif Mandvi—gladly lend their comments to this scrappy little documentary. Because, really, what could be harder than telling jokes onstage after 9/11 when you specifically identify yourself as Muslim-American? Yet two such comics, Negin Farsad and Dean Obeidallah, do just that; and they gathered a half-dozen of their cohort to tour the red states, offering free tickets to their shows. Somewhat padded with interviews ( Jon Stewart, Rachel Maddow, etc.), this doc follows their tour and gently attempts to rebut anti-Muslim stereotypes.

It’s all very admirable, but you may find yourself nodding in agreement more than doubled with laughter. With her bright lipstick and plunging décolletage, the L.A.-raised Farsad mocks her mother’s obdurate Persian ways like Margaret Cho. Polite white Southern audiences react better to her familiar family complaints than her I-am-not-a-slut tales from the barroom.

The smoother Obeidallah, a New Yorker from an interfaith marriage, uses his generic appearance to sly advantage. (You could see him doing guest shots on a sitcom, playing a programmer from some indeterminate country.) In one bit, when told “You don’t look like a Muslim,” he responds, “Good! That means our secret plot is going according to plan! Bwah-ha-ha . . . ” Most of their peers also joke about prejudice, but with care not to sound angry. It’s like they’re at the 1960s Bill Cosby stage of black humor: Make your point, but from behind a smile, and don’t make anyone too uncomfortable.

Likewise, the filmmakers are generous with the locals they meet, letting only one shop owner’s racism speak for itself. Their best bits are like Daily Show remote segments, as when they set up a sidewalk “Hug a Muslim” booth in downtown Salt Lake City. The funny part is that the Mormon hugs are entirely sincere. Their jokes might land better in Williamsburg or Silver Lake, but the human connection is what counts here. (Note: Directors Farsad and Obeidallah will attend Friday’s screenings.) BRIAN MILLER

Farsad tries her hand at the gun range.

have washed out of med school and works as the doctor’s receptionist. He depends entirely on his patron; but what Pinget gets in return for his largesse remains opaque. Only later in the film do we learn that Pinget entered into a sham marriage to bring Mounir’s sister to Belgium; otherwise he has no women in his life, and Lafosse never tips his sexuality.

Murielle proves quite fertile, and Mounir puts little thought into birth control. Three kids are a struggle, and the fourth forces Murielle to quit teaching and become a housewife. Even with their large family living under Pinget’s roof, dependent on his subsidies and gifts, they can barely make ends meet. Would it be cheaper, Murielle asks, to live in Morocco? It’s significant that the suggestion comes from her, not the seemingly secular Mounir. Yet Pinget is the one who explodes in anger. It’s not just his attachment to Mounir, but the entire clan’s dependency serves as a strange kind of validation. This king can’t let his vassals leave—else his power be revealed as symbolic, not ordained.

Arestrup and Rahim previously played master and pupil in the 2009 French jailhouse drama A Prophet; and here the younger man again seems in thrall to his benefactor. In the prior film, Arestrup gave explicit lessons on how to prosper in prison, how the system could be gamed. In the creepily clinical Our Children, the scam is outside the walls yet still hidden. Pinget eventually arranges another “paper marriage” between Mounir’s brother and Murielle’s sister. The whole thing reeks of incest—or, in a more French reading, colonialism, with Pinget arranging the intimate affairs of those he governs.

POur Children RUNS FRI., SEPT. 13–THURS., SEPT. 19 AT SUNDANCE CINEMAS. NOT RATED. 111 MINUTES.

This film’s original French title signals madness; even with the generic relabeling, its very first scenes indicate an unhappy outcome. Directed with a cool, almost voyeuristic lack of judgment

by Joachim Lafosse, Our Children is based on a shocking 2007 crime in Belgium that also became tabloid fodder for its peculiar family dynamics. Yet, skipping past the film’s intro, nothing seems amiss when vivacious schoolteacher Murielle (Émilie Dequenne) falls in love with handsome Mounir (Tahar Rahim), a Moroccan who lives with his adoptive father, Dr. Pinget (Niels Arestrup). Mounir seems to

Murielle (Dequenne) marries more men than she realizes.

FABRIZIO MALTESSE/VERSUS PRODS

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

RUNS FRI., SEPT. 13–THURS., SEPT. 19 AT GRAND ILLUSION. NOT RATED. 85 MINUTES.

Murielle, disastrously, discovers she has married two men: the puppet and his master. Overburdened and depressed, she becomes like the heroine of Rosemary’s Baby: lost in her marriage, a woman increasingly subservient and instrumental to male wishes. Dequenne, who burst into world cinema in the Dardenne brothers’ 1999 Rosetta, palpably crumbles under the strain. Is Murielle a monster or the true victim of the piece? Our Children is all the more disturbing because such ambiguity is never resolved. BRIAN MILLER

Paradise: Faith RUNS FRI., SEPT. 13–THURS., SEPT. 19 AT SIFF CINEMA UPTOWN. NOT RATED. 120 MINUTES.

The opening shot of Ulrich Seidl’s Paradise: Faith is both a character sketch and a warning. A woman enters a spartan room, partially disrobes, and kneels before the crucifix on the wall. She then whips herself across the back with a crude cat-o-nine-tails. At length. That’s the warning part: Seidl is serving notice that Paradise: Faith will be a test of endurance and not for the faint of heart. (The movie’s the middle installment of Seidl’s Paradise trilogy, bracketed by Paradise: Love—seen here in June—and Paradise: Hope; they are slightly but not significantly related.)

The woman is Anna Maria, played by the extremely brave Maria Hofstätter. After our startling opening glimpse, we see her as a neatly coiffed medical technician, beginning a staycation during which she’ll trudge though Vienna neighborhoods carrying a statue of the Virgin Mary and buttonholing strangers about joining the ranks of her extreme Catholic sect. Seidl frames her world as perfectly symmetrical, an order upset when her husband (Nabil Saleh) returns after a couple of years away. He is Muslim and also paraplegic, and his resumption of marital place upsets Anna Maria’s tightly wound existence. The movie whipsaws between unpleasant domestic scenes and unpleasant missionary doorbelling, with the occasional break for Anna Maria’s ecstatic and occasionally blasphemous worshiping of her Savior.

This is one of those movies that inspire concern for the actors onscreen. From the very first moments, I was worried about Hofstätter’s well-being (that cat-o-nine-tails must be fake—er, right?), and some of her punishingly long scenes with other actors are the stuff of welts and bruises, to say nothing of nightmares.

In a different kind of movie—maybe one in which some measure of sympathy was afforded the characters—Seidl’s unblinking depictions of brutality might lead us into a deeper understand-

PRising From Ashes OPENS FRI., SEPT. 13 AT SEVEN GABLES. NOT RATED. 80 MINUTES.

Now that the disgrace of Lance Armstrong is past and the yellow wristbands have come off, we need a new cycling cause to support, a different team jersey to wear on weekend rides. In place of the old Livestrong colors, let me suggest the handsome blue, green, and yellow of Team Rwanda. (You can buy one at teamrwandacycling.org.) Produced and narrated by Forest Whitaker, this powerful documentary unfolds over six years from the time when mountainbike industry pioneer Tom Ritchey first visited Rwanda. A dozen years had passed since the Hutus’ 1994 genocide against the minority Tutsi, and the country was still in a fragile rebuilding stage. Bicycles, used mainly for transport, were also being raced; and Ritchey brought along his friend and former pro racer Jock Boyer. An 18-year-old trounced the middle-aged pair— and everyone else—in one such race; from that, the idea of a national team was hatched. His life back home a shambles, Boyer stayed behind to coach the squad.

Rising From Ashes is vague about the team’s financial backing. (Faith groups helped support both the team and the documentary—from which all proceeds are promised to Team Rwanda.) It also interpolates Boyer’s redemption, from an underage sex-offense conviction and jail time, rather more than needed. The bigger story is that of Rwanda’s post-colonial history, and there are searing images from the ’94 slaughter. Then a child, Adrien Niyonshuti lost six of his brothers, he says, and 60 members of his mother’s clan. He’s the teenager who would beat Boyer and Ritchey, and as the team’s most talented member, he becomes the focus of Rising From Ashes Frankly striving for uplift and inspiration, T.C. Johnstone’s film isn’t always subtle, but what’s subtle about genocide? Niyonshuti and his Tutsi teammates don’t talk much about healing (that peculiar Western notion), and they evidently have to be coaxed into recalling the painful past. (The Hutus on the team aren’t pressed on such matters.) What they do best, of course, is ride, and Rising From Ashes is immersed in the particulars of cycling. The team first trains on old handme-down bikes through the gorgeous Rwandan countryside; then Boyer adds stern professionalism, takes them to South Africa and the U.S. to race, raises their horizons, and introduces them to the appreciative media. (The New Yorker’s Philip Gourevitch, who knows a thing or two about Rwanda, has profiled the team.) Financial support and new gear follow, leading Niyonshuti to marvel of a new rig, “The first time I rode a bike when you use the brakes, [and] it stops.”

Johnstone’s doc goes all the way through the London Olympics last summer. I won’t give away the results, but after being misled in so many recent Tours de France, everyone here emerges a winner. BRIAN MILLER

TickeTs available aT www.cinerama.com

big screen 70mm film festival

SEPT 13-19

PTouchy Feely OPENS FRI., SEPT. 13 AT HARVARD EXIT. RATED R. 90 MINUTES.

What compelling mysteries might be quietly thrumming inside the world of the dentist’s office? It is characteristic of the wistful, daydreamy universe of Lynn Shelton’s films that this unlikely question (has anyone outside the dental profession ever asked it?) makes up part of her latest project. Touchy Feely is the stubbornly—and, I think, wonderfully—low-key follow-up to Humpday and Your Sister’s Sister, the partly improvised comedies that put Shelton on the indie-movie map. This new one is again shot in Seattle, Shelton’s hometown. Two siblings experience unexplained eruptions in their professional skills: Massage therapist Abby (Rosemarie DeWitt, from Your Sister’s Sister) is suddenly repulsed by the touch of human skin, and dentist Paul ( Josh Pais) develops magical healing powers that can cure his patients’ jaw problems.

These phenomena are suspiciously related to the everyday issues afflicting the two, as Abby has been dawdling over an invitation to move in with her boyfriend Jesse (Scoot McNairy), and Paul has passively allowed his practice to dwindle because of his super-awkward manner.

Meanwhile, Paul’s college-age daughter Jenny (Ellen Page) is trapped in her job as a dental assistant, and carries around an unrequited crush on someone who probably won’t return the feeling.

With JANEANE GARAFALO JOHN STEWART RACHEL MADDOW DAVID CROSS LEWIS BLACK

Filmmakers in attendance on Friday!

GR ANDILLUSIONCINEMA.ORG ���� NE ��TH STREET | ���-����

“THE FINEST AMERICAN DRAMA SO FAR THIS YEAR. Brie Larson gives a star-making performance.”

–David Edelstein, NEW YORK MAGAZINE

“GRADE

A:

A DRAMA OF ASTONISHING EMOTIONAL PURITY.” –Owen Gleiberman, ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY

“BRIE LARSON IS

A REVELATION...

MAGNOLIA FILMS

DeWitt’s masseuse has lost her gift.

ROBERT HORTON E

film@seattleweekly.com

An exceptional film in every way.”

– Peter Travers, ROLLING STONE

“A WONDER. EXCEPTIONAL, MOVING AND INTIMATE. Honestly earns every bit of its emotional impact.”

–Kenneth Turan, LOS ANGELES TIMES

Week one 9/13 - 9/19 Fri. Sept. 13 5:30 Baraka 9:30 Vertigo

Sat. Sept. 14

1:30 Lawrence Of arabia 8:00 2001

Sun. Sept. 15

1:30 Sound Of Music Logos7:00 patton

SHORT TERM 12 LANGUAGE AND BRIEF SEXUALITY

DEMAREST F

I

L

M

S

ENDS THURSDAY 9/12 LINCOLN SQUARE STARTS 9/13 LANDMARK THEATRES LANDMARK THEATRES CINEMAS SEVEN GABLES 700 BELLEVUE WAY NE. VARSITY THEATRE 911 N.E. 50TH ST. (206) 632-8821 SEATTLE

(425) 454-7400 BELLEVUE

4329 UNIVERSITY WAY N.E. (206) 632-6412 SEATTLE

Seattle Weekly Wednesday, 9/11

MOn. Sept. 16 no Shows

tue. Sept. 17 7:00 Hamlet

Wed. Sept 18 7:00 Spartacus

tHu. Sept. 19 7:00 patton

SEATTLE’S WIDEST SCREEN SUPERIOR TECHNOLOGY Fresh Chocolate Popcorn, Cupcake Royale, Theo Choc & so much more

2100 4TH AVENUE, SEATTLE WA • (206) 448-6680

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

Except for the magical-realist touches, this story does not break new ground, and its resolutions are not surprising. But in the film’s exactly observed living rooms and offices, something human is going on, in a way too many movies don’t get. Maybe this film is about the need to see people in a new way, which also describes Shelton’s deep-tissue work with actors. For instance, veteran character actor Pais has dozens of movie and TV credits, yet this is a breakout role for him (if the word “breakout” applies to a movie this languid).

And Page, easily typed as a brittle comic performer after Juno, has never been more vulnerable and touching.

If Touchy Feely were a European film and had subtitles, it would probably get better reviews; it has audience-friendly moments, but mostly this is about mood and place. And speaking of place, Shelton’s filming in Pugetopolis is never pictorial, but always sunk into authentically lived-in locations. You’ve been to this dentist’s office before, though you might never have suspected what went on there. (Note: Shelton and actor/musician Tomo Nakayama will appear at the Friday- and Saturday-evening screenings.)

ONE OF THE YEAR’S BEST PERFORMANCES.

29

arts&culture»Film

BY BRIAN MILLER

Join NBC for a

SPECIAL AdvANCE SCrEENINg

Local & Repertory • THE BIG-SCREEN 70 MM FILM FESTIVAL SEE THE AGENDA, PAGE 23.

of the highly anticipated new drama

BOARDINGHOUSE/A NIGHT TO DISMEMBER The

THUrSdAY SEPTEmBEr 12 AT 7 Pm For your chance to win log onto gOFOBO.COm and enter code SWEEKS28E NO PUrCHASE NECESSArY. Tickets are limited and subject to availability. All federal, state and local regulations apply. A recipient of prize assumes any and all risks related to the use of the prize and accepts any restrictions specified thereon or required by the prize provider or venue. Location of seating (if any) is subject to availability.

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SEATTLE WEEKLY “WONDERFUL! [Experience] THIS ADspirits RUNS 9-11-13 the good of the riders as they 4.83" X 2.69" find their way in the strange new world of competitive cycling.”

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editors of Bleeding Skull, a new anthology of horrorfilm reviews, will appear first at Scarecrow Video (at 6:30 p.m.), followed by this double-feature of suitably gory fare from the ‘80s. (NR) Grand Illusion, 1403 N.E. 50th St., 523-3935, grandillusioncinema.org, $5-$8, Sat., Sept. 14, 9 p.m.

DANCING ABOUT ARCHITECTURE Matthew Witschonke presents his short film documenting a modern dance piece that explored our Rem Koolhaasdesigned library. (NR) Seattle Central Library, 1000 Fourth Ave., 386-4636, spl.org, Free, Thu., Sept. 12, 7-8 p.m.

DREAMING OF A TREE HOUSE SW critic Robert Horton will introduce this documentary about Berlin’s Ökohaus, designed by Frei Otto, an early example of sustainable green architecture, built in 1987. (NR) Frye Art Museum, 704 Terry Ave., 622-9250, fryemuseum. org, Free, Sun., Sept. 15, 2 p.m.

•

FIRST STORIES: EARLY FILM NARRATIVES, 19011913 Local film-appreciation group The Sprocket

Society presents a 90-minute compendium of silent-era shorts. (NR) Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., 829-7863, nwfilmforum.org, $6-$10, Mon., Sept. 16, 7 p.m.

FRAMING PICTURES Erstwhile SW contributors Richard Jameson and Kathleen Murphy join our current senior film critic Robert Horton to talk about Lynn Shelton’s new Touchy Feely and other films reviewed this week. Northwest Film Forum, Free, Fri., Sept.

13, 5 p.m.

– LOS ANGELES TIMES

“UpLiFtiNg,

•

mOviNg!

inherently powerful drama.”

– THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

THE HALL OF GIANTS: THE STORY OF FREMONT AND THE TROLL Created by a quartet of local artists

“WONDERFULLY iNSpiRiNg!” – NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

FirstRunFeatures.com

StartS FriDaY 9/13

DAILY: 5:15, 7:15 & 9:15PM ADD’L SAT/SUN: 3:15PM

www.risingfromashesthemovie.com

“i

tHinK it miGHt be my Favorite sHelton Film yet.

The cast is superb from top to bottom.”

-Whitney Matheson, UsA todAy

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

“Lynn Shelton has earned a reputation for

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intimate , deeply observational slices of life that lay bare the most vulnerable truths of human relationships, simultaneously mining them for maximum pathos and humor.”

-Ann Hornaday, WAsHington Post

magpictures.com/touchyfeely

EXCLUSIVE ENGAGEMENT

STARTS fRIdAY, SEpTEMbER 13 director Lynn shelton and tomo nakayama in person Friday and saturday!

in 1990, the famous Fremont Troll is profiled in this new doc by Michael Falcone, who’ll attend the screening.

(NR) SIFF Cinema Uptown, 511 Queen Anne Ave. N., 324-9996, siff.net, $6, Thu., Sept. 12, 7:15 p.m.

• THE KING OF KONG A FISTFUL OF QUARTERS

Some folks refuse to believe that Seth Gordon’s 2007 film about two men vying for the title of World’s Greatest Donkey Kong Player could be a true story.

No way could anyone swagger like Billy Mitchell, who talks about himself in the third person while wearing the gaming crown on a head of hair that screams “Party in the back, bitches!” No way Kirkland teacher Steve Wiebe really told his crying kid waitaminute, waitaminute while attempting to ascend Mount Dorkus.

But, yeah, it’s all true—every magical, exhilarating, infuriating, dumbfounding, jaw-dropping second of Gordon’s miniature masterpiece. Ostensibly about Mitchell, who began his reign as Donkey Kong world champ in 1982, King of Kong is as much about the perils of hubris and the price of heartbreak; like the trailer says, it’s about a loser who wants to be a winner and a winner “who refuses to lose” and comes off looking like an ass. (PG-13) ROBERT WILONSKY Central Cinema, 1411 21st Ave., 686-6684, central-cinema. com, $6-$8, Sept. 13-18, 8 p.m.

LE JOLI MAI SEE THE AGENDA, PAGE 23.

MIAMI CONNECTION Can we as a culture at last retire the idea that a movie can be so “bad” that it’s good? I ask this still pleasurably punch-drunk by Miami Connection, a rediscovered junkster piece of uncut ‘80s electro-pop chopsocky ridiculousness that is exactly what Purple Rain would have been if the Revolution traded Prince and much of their talent for black belts in tae kwon do and a commitment to bringing a message of peace to the world in between brutal martial arts street battles with a rival band of Orlando honkies. Absurd, yes, but director Richard Park and his game and guileless cast have the highest of spirits, and the nonsense bubbles like a bottle uncorked. Also choice are the fights, choreographed (by Young Moon Kwon) with imaginative elan. Each is appealingly sloppy, continually surprising, and never a bit believable—which is a serious clue as to why the very idea of “so bad it’s good” should have been chucked way back before Dragon Sound’s hexagonal digital drums went out of style: This movie has no interest in being “good” in that drab, competent Hollywood way. Instead, it’s going all in on awesome, and on its way, there it kicks every ass it meets. (NR) ALAN SCHERSTUHL Central Cinema, $6-$8, Fri.-Wed. 9:30 p.m.

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Send events to film@seattleweekly.com See seattleweekly.com for full listings = Recommended

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MUSIC CRAFT: LEONARD COHEN During his 1988

tour for I’m Your Man, the legendary folk musician is captured in concert by Spanish television. (NR) Northwest Film Forum, $6-$10, Sat., Sept. 14, 5 p.m.

PINK FLOYD: THE WALL Alan Parker directs this 1982 treatment of the famous concept album (released in 1979). Bob Geldof and Bob Hoskins are among the cast.

(R) Harvard Exit, 807 E. Roy St., 323-0587, landmarktheatres.com, $8.25, Sat., Sept. 14 at midnight.

RIDING GIANTS Director Stacy Peralta gives us an epic, action-soaked 1,500-year history of surfing culture in this 2004 doc. He stitches together archival footage with an autumnal glow, sassy animation, interviews with over-the-top tube-dwelling characters, and state-of-the-art modern surf footage. At first, the Kerouac-wacky surf dudes were a tiny minority; then the girl midget Gidget (a real person, duly interviewed) got huge, and the shores were overrun. Ever questing, surfers colonized bigger and bigger waves in Hawaii, Northern California, and finally way the hell out at sea, riding 70-foot waves via helicopters and tow ropes. The best moments are the human ones, as when a surf bachelor is befriended by a scruffy kid surfer who nervily introduces him to his mom, who marries the guy, then watches his stepson become the Next Big Thing in the sport. Next Thursday: Dick Dale: King of the Surf Guitar. (NR) TIM APPELO Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave., 654-3100, seattleartmuseum.org, $8-$13, Thu., Sept. 12, 7:30 p.m.; Thu., Sept. 19, 7:30 p.m.

SAMURAI CINEMA From 1962, Harakiri has an unemployed samurai (Tatsuya Nakadai) save a suicidal feudal lord. Bloody complications ensue. (NR) SIFF Cinema Uptown, $6-$11, Mondays, 7 p.m. Through Oct. 21.

SEATTLE DESIGN FESTIVAL Nine non-fiction films are screened on architecture, urban design, communes, and even the building-hopping sport of parkour. See siff.net for full schedule and details. (NR) SIFF Film Center (Seattle Center), 324-9996, $6-$11, Sept. 13-15 SCREENINGS AT SCARECROW Friday at 8 p.m. is Plain Clothes (1988), directed by Martha Coolidge, in which a cop goes undercover at a Seattle high school. (Yes, the movie was shot here.) Sunday at 1 p.m., Maggie Smith stars in the 1969 The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. On Monday at 7 p.m., part of the 1994 Showtime series Rebel Highway, Motorcycle Gang is a ‘50s-style biker movie directed by John Milius. Beer and wine are available from VHSpresso. 21 and over.

(NR) Scarecrow Video, 5030 Roosevelt Way N.E., 524-8554, scarecrow.com, Free.

TOTALLY ‘80S TUESDAYS The late, great Leslie Nielsen stars in 1980’s Airplane!, followed by John Cusack as suicidal teen in the 1985 comedy Better Off Dead. (PG) SIFF Cinema Uptown, $6-$11, Tuesdays, 7 & 9 p.m. Through Oct. 22.

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Ongoing

ADORE This adaptation of a Doris Lessing story tan-

talizes with its Oedipal displacement: Two mothers begins parallel flings, each with the other’s 18-year-old son. It’s totally inappropriate, but not quite incest.

Then, by mutual assent, these covert affairs drag on for years (and I mean drag). Fathers are mostly absent from the melodrama: One’s dead, leaving Lil (Naomi Watts) a widow, and the drama-teacher spouse (Ben Mendelsohn) of Roz (Robin Wright) soon departs the scene. (The sons, played by Xavier Samuel and James Frecheville, don’t figure much in the decision-making; lounging around shirtless and available is their primary function in the plot.) Are Roz and Lil fools, predators, MILFs, or what? Adore never really gets a handle on their behavior. English screenwriter Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liasons) expands the timeframe from Lessing’s 2003 novella Two Grandmothers, and French director Anne Fontaine (My Worst Nightmare) is nothing but generous toward her two stars. Both look great in one of the rare movies to be shot in 35 mm film these days. But the story only unfolds from shock to acceptance to soap opera. It needs to get smarter after the initial sex, but the opposite happens.

(R) BRIAN MILLER Sundance Cinemas AFTERNOON DELIGHT This movie is arranged around Kathryn Hahn, who—whether parachuting for the length of a story arc into ongoing series such as Parks and Recreation or cutting a bizarre path through Step Brothers—has been threatening to bring her particular brand of funny/weird to center stage for the best part of a decade. She plays Rachel, a stay-at-home mom whose disenchanted life is shaken by her encounter with an exotic dancer, McKenna (Juno Temple), during an evening when she and husband Jeff (Josh Radnor) double-date with friends at a strip club. McKenna is soon staying at Rachel and Jeff’s place, an awkward

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benefited from exploiting it more—at least for satirical points. Most of the time we’re on Earth, in a Los Angeles that resembles Mexico City. Damon knows exactly how to lock Max into focus; Jodie Foster (leading with clenched jaw) is on point as the Elysium security chief; and William Fichtner is scrupulous as a corporate jerk. If this movie lacks the startling originality of Blomkamp’s 2009 District 9, it’s still workable enough to qualify as satisfying old-school science fiction. (R) Robert Horton Alderwood 16, Cinebarre, Lincoln Square, Meridian, Thornton Place, others THE GRANDMASTER Wong Kar-wai’s U.S. cut of The Grandmaster, already a huge hit in China, relates often-filmed life of Ip Man (1893–1972), the celebrated martial-arts master who redefined kung fu and eventually tutored an eager young Bruce Lee. He’s played by Tony Leung, the ridiculously cool star of Wong’s In the Mood for Love, whose serene half-smile is as powerful a weapon as his fighting moves. A fair amount of 20th-century Chinese history is alluded to, including the Japanese invasion preceding World War II, but mostly as backdrop. More compelling is a long-burning attraction between Master Ip and the alluring Gong Er (Zhang Ziyi), which culminates in something dreamy and romantic in the final reels. You sense that Wong would rather be photographing furtive glances and cigarette smoke. (PG-13) ROBERT HORTON Oak Tree, Cinebarre, Varsity, Lincoln Square, Majestic Bay, Meridian, others IN A WORLD... Carol Solomon (writer-director Lake Bell) is a voice nerd, fascinated by the accents she covertly tapes with her ever-present Dictaphone, yet her career is confined to voice coaching, not doing voiceovers for movie trailers, her family trade. When her widowed father Sam (Fred Melamed) kicks her out of the house to make way for a young new girlfriend (Alexandra Holden), he condescendingly tells Carol, “I’m going to support you by not supporting you.” Implicit in his rebuke is that women, with their higher voices, have no place in his manly profession.

In a World… plays like an overstuffed sitcom, with Carol’s wacky friends and neighbors dropping in for brief, effective bits (these include Nick Offerman, Rob Corddry, and Tig Notaro). It’s a knowing industry satire, but not a mean industry satire. (R) BRIAN MILLER Sundance, Meridian, others SHORT TERM 12 Destin Cretton’s affecting little indie drama is set in a foster home where troubled young residents age out at 18. Deprived of real parents, they grudgingly look to staff members like Grace and Mason for guidance. Both in their 20s, Grace (Brie Larson) and Mason (John Gallagher Jr.) are a couple, a fact they try to disguise at work. Most of their charges have unhappy stories to share—or conceal, as is the case with 15-year-old Jayden (Kaitlyn Dever), a surly new arrival with much eyeliner and considerable attitude.

The girl arouses a protective, almost sisterly instinct in Grace, who also projects her own past traumas, gradually revealed, upon Jayden. Though it lurches from crisis to outburst to revelations of past abuse, Short Term 12 never loses your goodwill. This is a credit first to Larson (United States of Tara, Rampart), who convincingly guides Grace from poise to panic, and second to Cretton’s handling of his likable young cast. (R) BRIAN MILLER Seven Gables, Lincoln Square SPARK: A BURNING MAN STORY Steve Brown and Jessie Deeter’s doc concentrates on the 2012 gathering and its controversial new attendance cap of 60,000, resulting in a lottery system. It was a significant philosophical shakeup: This utopian experiment in radical inclusiveness now had to keep some people out. Longtime Burners, faced with not even being allowed to buy a ticket, were outraged, and the largescale art installations that for many are the festival’s raison d’etre were threatened: Why start planning and building if you don’t know whether you can go?

Another issue touched on in Spark: the controversial rise of fully catered “plug and play” or “turnkey” camps. But rest assured that scenes of the 2012 event are plentiful and dazzling; and if you’re like me, Spark will have you aching to return. (NR) GAVIN BORCHERT SIFF Cinema Uptown THE SPECTACULAR NOW In this agreeable adaptation of a 2008 young-adult novel by Tim Tharp, teen protagonist Sutter (Miles Teller) leads a wildly unsupervised life of partying and blown-off homework. He wakes up on a lawn, unsure where he left the car, which introduces him to smart-girl Aimee (Shailene Woodley, one of Clooney’s kids in The Descendants). They’re total opposites, and The Spectacular Now is the story of their unlikely yet plausible romance. Director James Ponsoldt’s young duo behaves with a likable, naturalistic ease. Every generation needs its new Say Anything.

This isn’t that movie, but it earns points for trying. (R) BRIAN MILLER Bainbridge, Sundance, others

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THE KING OF KONG: A FISTFUL OF QUARTERS

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

situation complicated by McKenna’s sideline as a prostitute. Writer/director Jill Soloway would have us believe that Rachel’s mid-life crisis might accommodate all this and more, and maybe in a better movie it could. Anytime Hahn is let off the leash—for instance, at a hen party where she tipsily insists on toasting her friends while staring soulfully into the eyes of each—she’s all skyrockets in flight. As funny as its isolated moments can be, Afternoon Delight opens too many cans of rubber snakes. Soloway seems to be aiming at the kind of observational groove that Nicole Holofcener and Lisa Cholodenko get in their films, but with some Judd Apatow stirred in. (R) ROBERT HORTON Sundance AUSTENLAND Let’s follow a naive young woman on her dream vacation to an immersive, role-playing theme park that brings alive the world of Jane Austen novels. Here be proud young men, haughty dowagers, and drawing rooms with tea—a Comic-Con for BBC addicts. Our heroine is Jane (the role’s a blank, but Keri Russell does her best with it), whose life-size cardboard cut-out of Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy just isn’t enough to fill her Pride and Prejudice fantasy.

She arrives at Austenland at the same time as a rich lady called Elizabeth Charming—the visitors all have vaguely Austenish names—played by the irrepressible Jennifer Coolidge. Once she begins mingling with the hired role-players, Jane is vaguely torn between Darcy-like Mr. Nobley (J.J. Feild) and rough-hewn stablehand Martin (Bret McKenzie, of Flight of the Conchords), but the film is too slack to generate even the rudimentary suspense that comedy needs. (PG-13) ROBERT HORTON Guild 45th, Pacific Place, others BLACKFISH This relentless documentary circles around the 2010 death of Dawn Brancheau, a supremely experienced SeaWorld trainer who was killed in a performing tank by Tilikum, a 12,000-pound whale. But that death is the starting point for a film that makes a couple of general thrusts: Killer whales should not be kept in captivity, and the sea parks that own them have done a suspiciously incomplete job of informing their trainers and the public about how they operate their businesses. Interviews with former SeaWorld trainers paint a sad picture of a happy-face culture that sugar-coated the containment of giant wild animals. If Blackfish outrages people, so much the better. The case is closed, and whales and dolphins are too high on the evolutionary scale to keep captive.

(PG-13) ROBERT HORTON Varsity BLUE JASMINE There’s nothing comic about the downfall of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, the inspiration for Woody Allen’s miscalculated seriocom. Blue Jasmine is an awkward mismatch of pathos and ridicule, less fusion than simple borrowing. Grafted onto the story of delusional trophy wife Jasmine (Cate Blanchett) is a Madoff-like fable of the recent financial crisis. In flashback, we see her husband (Alec Baldwin) buying her consent with luxury while he swindles the Montauk set. In the present timeframe, Jasmine is broke and living with her sister Ginger (Sally Hawkins) in a shabby San Francisco apartment. Jasmine is a snob who needs to be brought low, a task relished by Ginger, her boyfriend (Bobby Cannavale), and her ex (a surprisingly sympathetic Andrew Dice Clay). (PG13) BRIAN MILLER Harvard Exit, Lincoln Square, Lynwood (Bainbridge), Majestic Bay, Thornton Place, Sundance Cinemas, Ark Lodge, others DRINKING BUDDIES Working at a Chicago microbrewery, the amiable bearded Luke (Jake Johnson) can afford to kid around with colleague Kate (Olivia Wilde) because both are protected by the firewall of being in a relationship. Kate’s relationship with the older, more affluent Chris (Ron Livingston) appears to be shaky.

He’s the kind of guy who conspicuously offers books to help improve his girlfriend; worse, he’s not a beer drinker—as are Luke and Kate, by vocation and nearconstant thirst. The fourth leg of this stool is schoolteacher Jill (Anna Kendrick), a lot more together and mature than her boyfriend Luke. Naturally we expect some bed-hopping interrupts to ensue. Perhaps director Joe Swanberg (Hannah Takes the Stairs) rejects that expectation because we’ve all seen movies with similar plots; or more damningly, perhaps he simply doesn’t know how to write an ending for his conventional setup. (R) BRIAN MILLER SIFF Cinema Uptown ELYSIUM Elysium hangs in orbit, a giant spinning space station of deluxe McMansions and WASPy country clubs; it’s a brief supersonic ride from the filthy, overpopulated Earth of 2154. Down below, Max (Matt Damon) is a worker-drone who must find a way to get to Elysium and fix his decaying body after radiation accident at the factory. Already you can see the outlines of Neill Blomkamp’s allegory, a world divided between the haves and the have-nots. The orbital Elysium is so brilliantly visualized, Blomkamp might’ve

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arts&culture»Music

SevenNights

Who’s That?

It’s Pat . . . and Jill

E D I T E D B Y G W E N D O LY N E L L I O T T

Wednesday, Sept. 11 2013 has been a banner year for KID CUDI, who’s received some of the best reviews of his career for his recently released third studio album Indicud—which he says is based on a template set forth by Dr. Dre’s imitable The Chronic 2001. Whether he lived up to that album is up for debate, but Indicud is nonetheless a beautifully strange and twisted collection of tracks with cameos from an odd assortment of artists like RZA, Too Short, and Michael Bolton (yes, that Michael Bolton). Cudi offers a grand refocusing of both vision and ambition, touting more illustrative themes than in his previous releases. Consider “King Wizard”: “Like me I had to put my bid in/All this rose gold I’m dipped in/Juste un clou, while I coast through clouds.” This evocative line perfectly describe his ascent from his humble beginnings in Cleveland to his current status as a top hip-hop star. With Big Sean, Logic. WaMu Theater, 800 Occidental Ave. S., 381-7555. 7 p.m. $50.

CORBIN REIFF

Former SNL star and UW grad Julia Sweeney returns to Seattle with her friend, Jill Sobule.

BY KEEGAN PROSSER

LAUREN TOPEL PHOTOGRAPHY

Sweeney and Sobule

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that kind of goofy, funny, slapsticky thing. But she’s also really smart and poignant,” Sobule says. “And she can make something funny that underneath is really sad and depressing.”

For the most part, Sweeney’s anecdotes are directly inspired by songs Sobule has already written. As for the musical aspect of the show, Sweeney says that’s all up to Sobule. “I tried to do a tambourine once. And I tried to do a drum once—an Irish drum,” Sweeney says. “But I think I’d need to stop and practice for about 10 years before I could really play onstage.”

Ultimately, the pair concedes, they do the show because it gives them an opportunity to entertain people. “You’re seeing two friends enjoy each other onstage, and I think that kind of radiates out,” Sobule says. “Like I’m as amused as the audience is when she’s telling her stories. And I know she’s a fan girl of my songs.”

That said, Sweeney admits it’s more nervewracking to perform stories in front of the people who often inspire them. The Seattle show will be a homecoming of sorts for Sweeney, who grew up in Spokane and later graduated from UW. “I’m not sure if I can even identify a Northwest sensibility that’s in my creativity, but I think it is there,” Sweeney says. “I think a lot about Washington state. And I feel very grounded and at home there.” The Neptune, 1303 N.E. 45th St.,

SEATTLE SYMPHONY PRESENTS THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: SYMPHONY OF THE GODDESSES The

Zelda video-game series is one of the greatest things to happen to humanity. Utilizing the mystic power of the Triforce, the Seattle Symphony will perform classic songs from the game’s past 25 years for your pointed Hylian ears. Let’s cross our fingers for an ocarina solo. Benaroya Hall, 200 University St., 2154747, seattlesymphony.org. 7:30 p.m. $19–$127. All ages. KELTON SEARS For Tacoma’s SQUEAK AND SQUAWK MUSIC FESTIVAL, co-organizer Adam McKinney has planned “an extended five-day period of weirdness.” This year, the festival showcases approximately 30 different bands—mostly Tacoma-based, but also some regional and national groups. “Some of these acts, like Carletta Sue Kay,” says McKinney, “never really take tours up the Coast, while others are exciting up-and-comers that we can’t wait to share with everyone.” The Library at Sanford and Son Antiques, 744 Commerce St., 272-0334. New Frontier Lounge, 301 E. 25th St., 253-5724020. squeakandsquawk.com. $7 DOS/$50 for a festival pass. MICHAEL F. BERRY CEE LO GREEN rose to fame as a member of Goodie Mob, and the band recently reunited and released Age Against the Machine last month. He’s been a successful solo artist, half of Gnarls Barkley, and a judge on The Voice. His autobiography, Everybody’s Brother, comes out just in time for you to cram before the concert. Washington State Fair, 110 9th Ave. S.W., Puyallup, 253-845-1771, thefair.com. 7:30 p.m. $20–$60 (includes Fair admission). All ages. MFB

Friday, Sept. 13

BLUE SKY BLACK DEATH will provide the ideal

soundtrack for an autumnal Friday the 13th in the Pacific Northwest. Their new album, Glaciers, is due October 1. Apropos the album’s title, the new tracks are expansive and bleak, with dozens of transparent layers slowly shape-shifting. With Kid Smpl and Real Magic. Chop Suey, 1325 E. Madison St., 324-8005, chopsuey.com. 9 p.m. $10 adv./$12 DOS. MFB DANIEL ELLSWORTH & THE GREAT LAKES Hailing from Nashville—which, geography tip, is not near any Great Lakes, kids—Ellsworth and his band play a gentle style of heartland soul that, as heard on

PLANNED PARENTHOOD ’80S NIGHT BENEFIT

Dance your cares away at this event for the nonprofit health-care provider, because a night of drinking and dancing to hits from the Cars and the Go-Gos for a good cause is as good as it gets. With Nightwave, Rewind. Neumos, 925 E. Pike St., 709-9467, neumos. com. 8 p.m. $20 adv./$25 DOS. GE SHOOK TWINS Having recently wrapped up the recording sessions for their upcoming album (title and release date TBD) at the renowned Bear Creek Studios, this folk quintet, fronted by Katelyn and Laurie Shook, is poised to soon share another batch of intimate lyrics with the world. With Hannalee. Tractor Tavern, 5213 Ballard Ave., 789-3599. tractortavern.com. 9:30 p.m. $10 adv./$12 DOS. 21 and over. AP

Saturday, Sept. 14

It takes about five seconds of research to discover that DIARRHEA PLANET lives up to its name. The Nashville group’s bubblegum classic rock is gleefully puerile, from the song titles on down. (One of the better ones is called “Warm Ridin’,” and my inner middleschooler can’t stop snickering.) But more entertaining than scatological humor is the six-piece’s shameless embrace of outsized rock tropes. Singer Hodan Dickie’s ragged vocals smack of rock-god histrionics, and the band’s quartet of guitarists sounds like a group of 15-year-olds who met at Guitar Center and started a KISS cover band: all harmonized leads, hamfisted tapping solos, and power chord upon power chord. Titus Andronicus frontman Patrick Stickles is a fan, but then again so is Fred Durst. In short, it’s big, loud, dumb, and fun—rock ’n’ roll the way that some people say rock ’n’ roll is supposed to be. With the So So Glos. Barboza, 925 E. Pike St., 709-9951, thebarboza.com. 7 p.m. $12 adv. ANDREW GOSPE CAHALEN MORRISON COUNTRY BAND On banjo, mandolin, guitar, and vocals, Morrison made his name as half of a rootsy duo with Eli West; the two still perform together, though recently Morrison has been sitting in with the Tallboys and now fronts this band. His high and lonesome vocals hark back to a simpler time.

With Joy Mills Band, Nancy K. Dillon. Conor Byrne, 5140 Ballard Ave. N.W., 784-3640. 9 p.m. $8. GE

CMY

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

ulia Sweeney and Jill Sobule make a great couple. You remember Sweeney and Sobule. The former was introduced to the masses as Pat, the androgynous character she created on Saturday Night Live from 1990–94. She’s since become one of the most celebrated, thought-provoking monologists in the business, penning three one-woman plays: God Said Ha!, In the Family Way, and Letting Go of God. The latter is the clever creator of ’90s hits including “I Kissed a Girl” (the precursor to Katy Perry’s Chapstick-stained anthem of that name) and “Supermodel” (of Clueless fame).

The duo formed when Sweeney and Sobule met at a Technology Entertainment and Design (TED) conference in Monterey, Calif. That ignited a friendship between neighbors—they discovered they lived only blocks apart in Los Angeles—and grew into a creative partnership when Sobule invited Sweeney to perform with her at a local club. The two would go on to perform at the 2008 TED conference, and later decide to take the show on the road.

“I love [ Jill’s] music. I love her lyrics, I love her voice,” says Sweeney about why she decided to pursue the collaboration. “There’s something that’s really vulnerable yet really strong. I like that she’s so smart. Her lyrics are so intelligent.

They always make me laugh and feel strange at the same time; I just love that combination.”

Talking to Sobule, you’ll find the admiration is mutual—something both women attribute to a similarBOD_WKLY_Gin_6-4-13.pdf outlook on life. “[ Julia] can1 do 6/4/13

Thursday, Sept. 12

2011’s Civilized Man, can shift on a dime from slinking, slope-shouldered groove to minor psych freakout, with Ellsworth’s comely tenor leading the way. With Mikey & Matty, Lotte Kestner. Columbia City Theater, 4918 Rainier Ave. S., 723-0088, columbiacitytheater.com. 9 p.m. $8 adv./$10 DOS. MB CAMPFIRE OK This is the record-release show for Campfire OK’s latest orchestral folk pop album, When You Have Arrived. It’s an album worth celebrating, displaying the considerable pop songwriting talents, earworm melodies, and thoughtful lyricism of leader Mychal Benjamin Cohen—which all were overshadowed on the band’s debut by a lot of stomping and clapping and other folkie hullabaloo that has receded into the shadows. With Sean Nelson, Rafe Pearlman with Gold Dust. Crocodile, 2200 Second Ave., 441-4618. 8 p.m. $15 adv. MB JOEL SAVOY & JESSE LÉGE “We play Cajun music from southwest Louisiana with great joy,” the duo’s website explains. It’s a fact you can’t deny when you listen to their four-album-strong catalog; with Lége on accordion and vocals and Savoy on fiddle, the pair perform a delightfully sprightly blend of originals and traditional tunes plucked straight from the bayou.

Conor Byrne, 5140 Ballard Ave. N.W., 784-3640, conorbyrnepub.com. 9 p.m. GWENDOLYN ELLIOTT CHARLOTTE SOMETIMES Thanks to a recent appearance on NBC’s The Voice, Jersey girl Jessica Charlotte Poland, who made her debut with 2008’s Waves and the Both of Us (featuring the single “How I Could Just Kill a Man”), has experienced a bit of a resurgence, releasing her latest EP, Circus Head, last October.

With Jamie Nova, District, Amanda Markley, and Kari Jacobsen. El Corazon, 109 Eastlake Ave. E., 262-0482, elcorazonseattle.com. 7:30 p.m. $15 adv./$18 DOS. All ages. AZARIA PODPLESKY

K

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682-1414, stgpresents.org/neptune. $20. 8 p.m.

Fri., Sept. 13. E 2:17 PM music@seattleweekly.com

Send events to music@seattleweekly.com See seattleweekly.com for full listings = Recommended

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happy hour every day • 9/11 the true romans • 9/12 quinn • 9/13 lonesome locomotive • 9/14 spyn reset • 9/15 jeff crosby & the refugees • 9/16 monday night jazz w/ synthesis • 9/17 singer-songwriter showcase featuring: wren, the sky colony and perfect battery • 9/18 weatherside whiskey band TO ENSURE THE BEST EXPERIENCE · PLEASE ARRIVE EARLY DOORS OPEN 1.5 HOURS PRIOR TO FIRST SHOW · ALL-AGES (BEFORE 9:30PM)

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arts&culture»Music CHICKS WITH PICKS This small showcase of female

singer/songwriters featuring Star Anna is a bill long in the making, says Christa Fischer, who fronts Christa Says Yay. Both she and Christina Cramer, who leads country band In Cahoots, “wanted to play a show with Star for a long time,” she says. “We are very excited that it is happening.” With the Soft Offs (featuring Star Anna). The Mix, 6006 12th Ave., 767-0280. themixseattle.com. 9 p.m. $8. GE VALIENT THORR is a pretty good band name, but Ancient Warlocks, also on the bill of tonight’s Sabbathy metal-fest, is an epic band name. The Warlocks also have a single called “The Superwizard.” For those interested in dark magic, tonight is your chance for necromantic initiation. With Lord Dying, Ramming Speed. Highline, 210 Broadway Ave. E., 328-7837, highlineseattle.com. 8 p.m. $12. 21 and over. KS In a recent interview, JAMES MURPHY declared that getting people to dance is not an art—it’s something more primal. “It’s like food,” he said. “If they’re not eating it, you’ve screwed it up.” Two and a half years since he and his celebrated indie dance band LCD Soundsystem exited the spotlight, Murphy has been lurking in the shadows while spinning some great records, from the expected indie dance hits to deep disco and lost house tracks. Seldom does he screw it up. With Shit Robot. Neumos. 9 p.m. $25. 21 and over. MB LED ZEPAGAIN Led Zeppelin, also known as The Fathers of Heavy Metal, The Greatest Band of All Time, and Those Dudes Who Wrote That “AWWEEEYAHHHH AH!” song, unfortunately stopped playing in 1980 after drummer John Bonham choked on his own vomit.

Luckily, four other dudes decided to dress up like Led Zeppelin and learn all their songs, and apparently they’re really good at it. Showbox at the Market, 1426 First Ave., 628-3151, showboxonline.com. 8 p.m. $15 adv./$18 DOS. 21 and over. KS PARACHUTE The Charlottesville, Va.-based quintet behind 2009’s “She Is Love” and 2011’s “Kiss Me Slowly” is back with more pop-rock love songs, releasing their latest album, Overnight, featuring “Hearts Go Crazy” and “Can’t Help,” last month. With Matt Hires, Paradise Fears. The Vera Project, 305 Warren Ave. N., 956-8372, thevera project.org. 7:30 p.m. $13 adv./$15 DOS. All ages. AP

Sunday, Sept. 15

JULIA HOLTER’s newest album, Loud City Song, is loosely

based on Gigi, a 1958 movie musical based on a 1944 novel about a Parisian courtesan. Such unusual source material is appropriate for Holter’s often-inscrutable keyboard-led ambient pop; she boasts a classically honed attention to detail but often sounds lost in her thoughts.

With Nedelle Torrisi. Barboza. 8 p.m. $12 adv. AG

THE SCHOOL OF ROCK SEATTLE PRESENTS THE HISTORY OF PUNK When the kids of all ages,

shapes, sizes, and genders come together onstage for

2033 6th Avenue (206) 441-9729 jazzalley.com

one of the School of Rock’s tribute shows, they make it look pretty easy, and as fun as all get-out. This show, focused on the elemental, blurt-it-out, angsty punk of bands including the Sex Pistols, The Clash and Green Day, has the highest potential fun quotient of them all.

Chop Suey, 1325 E. Madison St., 324-8005, chopsuey. com. 5:30 p.m. $10 adv./$12 DOS. All ages. MB THE JULIE RUIN After a body of work spanning more than two decades—first in the brief but crucial Riot Grrrl movement of the ’90s with Bikini Kill, then in solo work in The Julie Ruin and later in electro-punk trio Le Tigre—singer and activist Kathleen Hanna has been noticeably absent from the dial for the past couple of years, fighting a private battle with what was recently diagnosed as late-stage Lyme disease.

During treatment, Hanna plotted her return by reprising The Julie Ruin with her “dream band”: former Bikini Hill bandmate Kathi Wilcox on bass, Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls instructor Sara Landeau on guitar, Carmine Covelli on drums, and Kenny Mellman (“Herb” of the cabaret act Kiki and Herb) on keyboards. With La Sera. Neumos. 8 p.m. $15. All ages.

TERRA SULLIVAN In KINSKI’S wickedest song, “Hot Stenographer,” the band plays a single note for five and a half minutes, and it slays. It takes truly elite shredding skills to milk one note as elegantly as these high-minded hard rockers do. With the DT’s, the Thingchangers. Slim’s Last Chance, 5606 First Ave. S., 762-7900, slimslastchance.com. 9 p.m. $8. 21 and over. KS

Monday, Sept. 16

THE OCTOPUS PROJECT On its website, this Austin-

based quartet describes its new album, Fever Forms, as “10,000 giga-pets doing flips in unison.” I’d say the chaotic experimental pop album is more like 20,000 acrobatic giga-pets, but who’s counting? With Paper Lions, the Hoot Hoots. Chop Suey. 8 p.m. $10 adv./$12 DOS. 21 and over. AP

Tuesday, Sept. 17

Now approaching the 40-year threshold, BLONDIE is set to release Ghosts of Download, its 10th studio album, early next year. The eclectic album features Gossip’s Beth Ditto, hip-hop group Los Rakas, and Colombian electronica artist Systema Solar. With X. Marymoor Park, 6046 W. Lake Sammamish Pkwy., 205-3661. marymoorconcerts.com. 7 p.m. $39.50–$59.50. All ages. AP BLOUSE At the time of its 2011 debut, this Portland trio was one of many bands making gauzy, art-damaged dream-pop. Its muscular sophomore album Imperium, out Tuesday, finds the group more evolved and emphasizing live instrumentation. With Feathers, Week of Wonders. Vera Project. 7:30 p.m. $10 adv. All ages. AG

JAZZ ALLEY IS A SUPPER CLUB

ROCKIN’ PIANO SHOW

You name it, We’ll celebrate it!

British/Scandinavian Jazz Trio “One of the most exciting bands on the planet today.” - Jazzwise

Anniversary Birthday Corporate Event Divorce Engagement Foreclosure Graduation Happy Hour Independence Day Just Because Kicking Back Looking for Fun Marriage Night On the Town

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Voted Best Piano Bar & Best Place to Take an Out of Town Guest.

EARL KLUGH THUR, SEPT 12 - SUN, SEPT 15 Grammy-winning master guitarist, statesman of contemporary jazz

JACQUI NAYLOR TUE, SEPT 17 - WED, SEPT 18 “Naylor remains one of the most superbly arresting vocalists around.” - JazzTimes

ELIANE ELIAS THUR, SEPT 19TH - SUN, SEPT 22 Sultry Brazilian pianist/vocalist/arranger combines the sensuous, sun-splashed melodicism of Brazil with the harmonic sophistication of New York City

PHRONESIS TUES, SEPT 24

91.3 KBCS Presents - “Meklit Hadero... combines N.Y. jazz with West Coast folk and African flourishes, all bound together by Hadero’s beguiling voice, which is part sunshine and part cloudy day.” - Filter Magazine

all ages | free parking full schedule at jazzalley.com

» CONTINUED ON PAGE 36

315 2nd Ave Seattle 206.839.1300 ilove88keys.com

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with The West, Happy Leviathan, These Young Fools Lounge Show. Doors at 7 / Show at 7:30PM ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $8 ADV / $10 DOS

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Jamie Nova, District, Amanda Markley, and Kari Jakobsen Doors at 7/Show at 7:30PM ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $15 ADV / $18 DOS

STOLAS with Strawberry Girls, Ascend From Silence, Minor Plains,

plus guests Lounge Show. Doors at 7:30 / Show at 8PM ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $8 ADV / $10 DOS

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MOVING UNITS with Some

Ember, DionVox, Station To Station, and The Brook Carlston Experience Doors at 7:30 / Show at 8PM ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $13 ADV / $15 DOS

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(REUNION SHOW) with The Skablins, and Original Middle Age Ska Enjoy Club Lounge Show. Doors at 8 / Show at 8:30PM ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $8 ADV / $10 DOS

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WE BUTTER THE BREAD WITH BUTTER

with Incredible Me, Never Met A Dead Man, Promethean Eulogy Lounge Show. Doors at 8 / Show at 8PM. ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $8 ADV / $10 DOS

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 16 Moon Block Party Presents:

DEAP VALLY with JJUUJJUU, Mystic Braves, plus guests Doors at 7 / Show at 8PM ALL AGES/BAR W/ID. $10 ADV / $12 DOS

THE GRAHAMS with Rebel Alley, Abi Grace, Carly Calbero Lounge Show. Doors at 8 / Show at 8:30PM 21+. $6 ADV / $8 DOS

JUST ANNOUNCED 9/24 LOUNGE THE TRIPLE SIXES 9/30 THE VENETIA FAIR 10/16 LIONS LIONS 10/21 THE ICARUS LINE 10/23 AXE MURDER BOYZ 11/26 THY ART IS MURDER 12/5 SMILE EMPTY SOUL UP & COMING 9/17 KAMELOT 9/18 THE REVEREND DEADEYE 9/19 ESCAPE THE FATE 9/20 LOUNGE CALABRESE 9/21 HUNTER VALENTINE / GIRL IN A COMA 9/21 LOUNGE THE VIBRATORS 9/22 JONNY CRAIG 9/25 GUTTERMOUTH 9/25 LOUNGE KONGOS 9/26 TEENAGE BOTTLEROCKET / THE QUEERS 9/27 POWERMAN 5000 9/28 PANCAKES & BOOZE ART SHOW 9/29 CANCER BATS / BAT SABBATH 10/1 TWIZTID 10/3 LISA DANK 10/4 BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME 10/5 HELLOWEEN

Tickets now available at cascadetickets.com - No per order fees for online purchases. Our on-site Box Office is open 1pm-5pm weekdays in our office and all nights we are open in the club - $2 service charge per ticket Charge by Phone at 1.800.514.3849. Online at www.cascadetickets.com - Tickets are subject to service charge

The EL CORAZON VIP PROGRAM: see details at www.elcorazon.com/vip.html and for an application email us at info@elcorazonseattle.com

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

KRISTIAN GARRARD AND ANDREW J.S.

Heatwarmer, Heatwarmer (out now, self-released, heatwarmer.bandcamp.com): Classifying Heatwarmer’s eponymous debut into one genre is a challenge, due to the numerous twists and turns the band takes throughout. Bits of “Magic Hearts,” for instance, sound like they could be played between circus acts. But just when you’re ready to grab popcorn and peanuts, Heatwarmer flips the switch on “Rejoice,” which features a very classic-rock solo

from guitarist Kristian Garrard. Then there’s “You Move,” which sounds like something one might hear at a Parisian cafe. This European vibe carries over into “All Clear,” where a flute solo from guest performer Ivan Arteaga (one of nearly a dozen guests on the record) transitions into a groovy bass line from lead vocalist/bassist Luke Bergman. “Jungle of Mystery” seem very contemplative, and features Bergman, from UW’s jazz studies department, singing over a collection of solemn jazz grooves until the tempo picks up halfway through. “My Life Is So Random,” on the other hand, is completely instrumental, scattered with spacey bleeps and bloops, and “Keep Shining Through” wraps up the sonic grab bag on a synth-heavy note. Such wild and unpredictable elements add a bit of excitement to Heatwarmer, as you don’t know what the band has in store from one song to the next. It’s almost as though the quintet—rounded out by Aaron Otheim on keyboards and vocals, Andrew Swanson on EWI (electronic wind instrument)/ keyboards/vocals, and drummer Evan Woodle (all rotating members of the Racer Sessions and the Table and Chairs record label)—composed the album inspired by that very idea. In that case, just sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride.

(Wed., Sept. 11, Neumos) AZARIA PODPLESKY

Call or Scan QR Code for reservations

El Corazon THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 12

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Out of Town guests Parent’s Night Out Quittin’ Time Reunion St. Patrick’s Day Tired of the Usual Scene Valentine’s Day Why Not? Naughty X-Rated party! (Just kidding!)

Don’t Wanna Miss Out Zany Fiends

35

NIGHTS AT THE

Local Releases » FROM PAGE 35

– FREE/NO COVER/NO FEES – A PEOPLE’S THEATRE JOINT

> SHOWCASING LOCAL TALENT ON THE NEPTUNE STAGE

Don’t miss this final 2013 Nights at the Neptune event!

Sept 17 – 7:30 pm SPLINTER DANCE COMPANY Splinter Effect Thank you to everyone who has participated in this project, artists and audiences alike. With your help, Nights at the Neptune has been a great expression of Seattle’s local talent, bringing together over 141 artists, and more than 1,000 supporters, turning the Neptune Theatre into A People’s Theatre Joint!

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PLEASE CONTINUE TO SUPPORT THESE ARTISTS AND PROGRAMS: Gay City, Brownbox Theatre and Kathya Alexander, Latino Film Festival and SuperSones, The Platform, Foster-hood,Treehouse & Critical Sun Records, Techung & Sonam Tshedzom, Rain City Rock Camp for Girls, ajusticenetwork & Splinter Dance Company.

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Monogamy Party, False Dancers (Sept. 17, Good to Die, monogamyparty.bandcamp.com): Monogamy Party is a great live band, if for spectacle alone.

Singer Kennedy Carda writhes shirtless around the room, his bandmates churning out screeching salvos of tinnitus-inducing distortion. It’s music for a specific time and place—late at night, being pushed around in a mosh pit in a dank, humid basement.

The challenge for debut full-length False Dancers, then, is one that faces any band whose live experience overshadows its music: Much of what makes Monogamy Party memorable can’t be recorded. It’s a common problem in punk, and one the band and engineer Austin Thomason overcomes by doubling down on the brute, dissonant force of the band’s live show. The band expanded to a four-piece by adding erstwhile Pleasureboaters guitarist Ricky Claudon, and his feverish touches abound on the new record.

Monogamy Party’s sound was already full and loud as a trio, so Claudon simply focuses on making a racket that’s an accessory to the band’s foundation.

The sounds that emerge from his instrument are jarring, shrill, and quite often unpleasant; the squall that opens “Wasted Time” is a good example of his preferred tone. If this sounds difficult to listen to, it is—False Dancers is a blunt-forcetrauma sort of record. And though gearheads will appreciate the sounds Claudon and bassist Yoswa strangle out of their instruments, the music isn’t as brainy as that of its chief influences: D.C. hardcore and early, noise-addled Sonic Youth.

False Dancers accurately captures Monogamy Party’s sonic assault, but also its limitations. (Sat., Sept. 14, Chop Suey) ANDREW GOSPE

tractor Times listed are show times.

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SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEM BER 11 — 17, 2013

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36

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the geekly report» Keeping the Dickwolves at Bay

BY TERRA CLARKE OLSEN “With great power comes great responsibility.”

—Amazing Fantasy #15

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geeklyreport@seattleweekly.com

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(206) 432-9537

SEATTLE WEEKLY • SEPTEMBER 11 — 17, 2013

s I wrote in this paper two weeks ago, I was excited to attend this year’s edition of the gaming convention PAX Prime held in Seattle earlier this month. Well, that was then; now my excitement and anticipation has been replaced by confusion and anger. The culprits? Dickwolves.

Wait. What is a Dickwolf ? OK, let’s back up a bit.

Way back in 2010, Penny Arcade—the web comic out of which the convention was born— ran a strip titled “The Sixth Slave,” into which PA cofounder Mike Krahulik inserted a rape joke.

The Dickwolves, creatures with penises for legs and tails, were responsible for said rape. As happens when rape jokes are made in public, there was an outcry from those speaking on behalf of rape survivors and others who felt uneasy with rape jokes. In response, PA made a joke about how they obviously don’t condone rape, and then proceeded to make Dickwolf shirts. More public outcry followed, after which the merch was thankfully pulled from PA ’s online store. And we all lived happily ever after.

Well, not exactly. Incidents have continued to create tension between Penny Arcade and the margins of the gaming community willing to speak up.

That tension came to a head at PAX Prime’s closing ceremony on Sept. 2 when Krahulik opened the old can of dickwolves, suggesting that the biggest mistake Robert Khoo, president of operations and business development at Penny Arcade, ever made was to pull the Dickwolves merchandise. He suggested that by doing so, PA was “engaging,” something they shouldn’t do.

And this is where it gets ugly: The PAX audience burst into applause and cheers of approval.

Someone shouted “Bring it back!”, and—in the scene’s only redeeming moment—both Krahulik and Khoo said “No!” Response from the margins was swift. Rachel Edidin wrote a great response at Wired, titled “Why I’m Never Going Back to Penny Arcade Expo.” She points out that by making the shirts in the first place, Penny Arcade decided to engage.

She writes, “These were not neutral choices.”

Very true. In addition, Christine Love wrote an

open letter to the PA ownership, stating that “an entire giant auditorium of men got excited at the idea of making rape survivors feel uncomfortable, and the idea of not listening to people when they say they feel unsafe. That is terrifying.” Well said, Ms. Love.

In response to this most recent outcry, Krahulik posted on the PA blog that “I absolutely regret everything we did after that comic.” However, at the end of the letter he wrote, “We don’t aspire to be role models, just normal people, but we try to do what’s best with the platform we have.”

This is where I have a problem. It’s clear that Krahulik doesn’t understand how influential he really is. He doesn’t realize that his words and tweets influence how the community as a whole reacts to those, both in the exhibition hall and outside, who think and feel differently. As the face of a company and a community, Krahulik and Jerry Holkins, his partner in PAX, are leaders.

Without them, the community threatens to be a rudderless ship, steered in dangerous directions by unaccountable voices in online forums that push those on the margins further away.

I’ve been monitoring the #dickwolves hashtag on Twitter, and it is clear that a very vocal segment of the community doesn’t understand that it is not OK to make rape jokes; it is not OK to threaten people with rape; it is not OK to insist that naysayers “just don’t get it” and need to “lighten up.”

These people won’t listen to someone like me or Edidin or Love. But they might listen to Krahulik and the others at Penny Arcade.

We can talk about this until we’re blue in the face, but it won’t do any good until a bridge is formed to the leaders of the community. Which is why I would encourage people not to follow Edidin’s example, and to continue going to PAX. It would be a great loss for the larger community not to be exposed to those on the margins of the gaming community. They are not going to openly seek different perspectives—why would they? So I’ll bring my perspective to them, and hope others do as well. I want an inclusive community, one with open dialogue. If we can achieve this, there would be so many more gamers—meaning a bigger market, more diversity, and more awesome games to play! Come on, who doesn’t want that?! E

37

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toke signals»By Steve Elliott Battle of the Bremerton Budmasters

E

vergreen Health Center, which ters is because after that year, other genetics opened June 1, was the very first were introduced into the mix), an exemplary storefront medical-marijuana indica, and to a $10 Cinex (also known as dispensary in Bremerton’s history.

Cinderella X or Cindy X), an 80 percent They held that distinction for all of a month, sativa-dominant. until competitor Emerald Coast Collective The Cinex would make excellent drivingand-listening-to-music weed—if Washington opened just down the street (both access state’s benighted “legalization” law didn’t points are on Waaga Way). And while Evercriminalize driving with anything over 5 nanogreen Health is a perfectly respectable shop, grams of THC per milliliter of blood. As it is, a couple of factors work in Emerald Coast’s you can still enjoy the musical part of Cinex’s favor in the head-to-head (pun intended) effects without the risk of negative legal conmatch-up. sequences; if you do, your homework is some Those are, quite simply, pricing and selecstoned, attentive listening to Seattle’s tion. While Emerald Coast own Supersuckers, in particular (reviewed here in the the song “Killer Weed.”

July 31 issue) has an The pre-’98 Bubba Kush across-the-board left a delightful catch in $10-per-gram rate my throat with each toke; for flowers, the these are deliciously potent four best strains at flowers that produce profound Evergreen Health are relief from body pain. The Bubba all $12 a gram. And also lends a pleasant soft-edged while Emerald Coast Newhas Hours: fuzziness to the thinking process. typically about M-F 15 12:00 – 7:00 10:00 – 5:00 It makes a good nighttime smoke, strains inSaturday stock, EverSunday 12:00 – 5:00 with each toke green Health had a scant six increasing your available the ad day for I visited— Bring this an extra 10% off relaxation level inFor other words, just two $10 weekly specials, follow us on Facebook all the way past strains in addition to the four 4023 Aurora Ave. N. Seattle, WA 98103 the point where at $12. www.samcollective.org your eyelids get Roger, who really is a very (206)apologetically 632-4023 heavy. good budtender, A non-profi t organization in accordance with chapter RCW 69.51A Evergreen Health also told me that Evergreen usually weekly specials, follow us on has Facebook a good selection of reasonhas a few $8 strainsFor in stock as ably priced medibles, many of well, mentioning that the shop them for $6 (mostly cereal bars of the was “getting ready4023 for the High Aurora Ave. N. Seattle, WA 98103 Rice Krispie Treats ilk), as well as tincTimes Cannabis Cup,” which, www.samcollective.org tures and concentrates. Notably, the shop when I visited, was two days away. has its own CO2 hash-oil extractor right But if a shop values serving its custhere onsite; the impressively scientific-looking tomers more than taking part in a superficial, chrome-covered machine is behind some plate glitzy glamfest (after all, ganja-fied glitz is still A non-profi t organization in accordance with just chapter RCW glass found behind the 69.51A bud counter. E just glitz), something as trivial as the Cannabis Cup competition shouldn’t affect the medicine tokesignals@seattleweekly.com inventory.

Steve Elliott edits Toke Signals, tokesignals.com, There may have been only half a dozen an irreverent, independent blog of cannabis news, strains to choose from, but Roger knew the views, and information. good points of each. He guided me to a $12 pre-’98 Bubba Kush (the reason pre-’98 matEVERGREEN HEALTH CENTER

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