40 07 willamette week, december 18, 2013

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WILLAMETTE WEEK PORTLAND’S NEWSWEEKLY

“WE’LL MAKE YOU A SANDWICH OR WASH YOUR CAR.” P. 33 wweek.com

VOL 40/07 12.18.2013

On the Rebound The Blazers broke our hearts.

Are we ready to get back with the NBA’s hottest team? P. 13

P. 32

J e r e m y O k a i D av i s

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CONTENT

Antoinette Estate Jewelry

EGGHEAD: Trinket’s fall hash under two runny eggs. Page 31.

NEWS

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MUSIC

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LEAD STORY

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PERFORMANCE 45

CULTURE

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MOVIES

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CLASSIFIEDS

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STAFF Editor-in-Chief Mark Zusman EDITORIAL Managing Editor for News Brent Walth Arts & Culture Editor Martin Cizmar Staff Writers Nigel Jaquiss, Aaron Mesh Copy Chief Rob Fernas Copy Editors Matt Buckingham, Jessica Pedrosa Stage & Screen Editor Rebecca Jacobson Music Editor Matthew Singer Projects Editor Matthew Korfhage Books Penelope Bass Dance Aaron Spencer Theater Rebecca Jacobson Visual Arts Richard Speer Editorial Interns Ramona DeNies, Ravleen Kaur, Lyla Rowen, Alex Tomchak Scott, Savannah Wasserman

CONTRIBUTORS Emilee Booher, Ruth Brown, Nathan Carson, Rachel Graham Cody, Pete Cottell, Jordan Green, Jay Horton, AP Kryza, Nina Lary, Mitch Lillie, John Locanthi, Enid Spitz, Grace Stainback, Mark Stock, Michael C. Zusman PRODUCTION Production Manager Ben Kubany Art Director Kathleen Marie Graphic Designers Mitch Lillie, Amy Martin, Xel Moore, Dylan Serkin Production Interns Emma Browne, Kayla Nguyen ADVERTISING Director of Advertising Scott Wagner Display Account Executives Maria Boyer, Ginger Craft, Michael Donhowe, Kevin Friedman, Janet Norman, Kyle Owens, Sharri Miller Regan, Andrew Shenker Classifieds Account Executive Matt Plambeck Advertising Assistant Ashley Grether Marketing & Events Manager Carrie Henderson Give!Guide Director Nick Johnson

Our mission: Provide Portlanders with an independent and irreverent understanding of how their worlds work so they can make a difference.

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

3

INBOX FEMALE POLICE OFFICERS

isn’t at all customer-hostile like Boxer Ramen is, despite being cheaper. I don’t get what Micah Camden is doing here.

I’ve lived in downtown Portland for 11 years.

I ride a fixed-gear bike. I get snobby about what coffee and beer I drink. I eat out most days and argue about the relative merits of Tasty N Alder vs. Tasty N Sons.

All that said, this place is even too pretentious for me. It actually makes me mad that it lacks basic services necessary for a pleasant restaurant just to be cool.

—“Kyle Meyer”

According to local news reports from a few weeks ago, male Portland Police Bureau officers want a clause in their collective bargaining agreement allowing them to take more “supplements” to enhance their performance. Steroids, basically.

Maybe the city could give them a little estrogen instead.

—“Michael Romano”

HOLIDAY HOMELESS DEBATE

HIPSTER VS. RAMEN JOINT

I totally agree. Who wants to see homeless people in full view of the holiday shoppers? The holidays are no time for those of us with homes to be forced to look at people without. This is the time of year for buying more things. Not for thinking about, or having to look at, those less fortunate.

That is what Portland is all about.

—“Marta”

For two decades, I have had problems with the Portland Police Bureau [“Gender Rap,” WW, Dec. 11, 2013]. I was a criminal defense lawyer before I retired.

Female officers are far better at reducing tension because that is what women do. Men have testosterone-secretion issues. Men have had it since high school. Men use strength, and it overrides intellect.

The point is, just get the job done. In that regard, women succeed.

—“James McHugh”

This place is competing for the Most Pretentious Portland Restaurant of 2013 award [“Punch Out: Micah Camden’s Boxer Ramen Delivers Quick, Hard Jabs,” WW, Dec. 11, 2013].

Small portions because you’re fat. No credit cards because that’s what big businesses do, and this establishment is quaint. No to-go containers because the integrity of the noodle would be tarnished. No condiments because the food is already perfectly seasoned, thank you very much.

What’s interesting is that Little Big Burger

Can you educate the masses regarding people from the ’Couv working in Portland? We pay Oregon income tax but receive no benefit from doing so. You Portlanders may abhor us, but at least appreciate what we “give” for the sheer bliss of working there.

—HAL (not 9000) I actually regard Vancouverites with some fondness. They’re like the slightly racist uncle at your family gathering—he’s kind of a handful, but it is pretty funny when he torments your vegan cousin with raw liver. (Also, he usually has liquor in his car.)

The question above refers to last week’s column, where a reader called Vancouverites property-tax dodgers. Locally employed Washingtonians do pay Oregon income tax, so the slam seems unfair. Still, HAL, I can’t agree that you receive no benefit from our tax base.

For starters, the fact that you have a job to go to depends on your co-workers’ and vendors’ 4

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

Beggars can’t be choosers [“Cold Dream,” WW, Dec. 11, 2013]. Maybe if Right 2 Dream Too stopped being ideological purists and insisting they be downtown, in full view, with an offer to stay for perpetuity, they would have better options.

—“Hamilton”

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR must include the author’s street address and phone number for verification.

Letters must be 250 or fewer words.

Submit to: 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210.

Fax: (503) 243-1115. Email: mzusman@wweek.com.

ability to read. Without Oregon’s education system and the post-Stone Age economy it supports, available jobs in Portland would look less like “Senior Network Engineer” and more like “Hunter-Gatherer II.” You also benefit from the fact that, in general, roving murder gangs don’t try to disembowel you every time you go out for a smoke break (unless you work in Tigard). Thank our public-safety budget for that.

It is true you don’t directly qualify for the human services that your taxes subsidize. Then again, you strike me as the sort to buy your gas in the ’Couv, where it’s cheaper, meaning you use our gas-tax-funded roads for free. Call it a wash.

The truth is, we all benefit from the public services that keep our multi-jurisdictional economy humming. So take off your three-cornered hat, put away your “Don’t Tread on Me” flag, and come down off the cross—we need the wood for a Wiccan bonfire.

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POLITICS: Are state agencies skimming money meant for roads?

ENVIRONMENT: A nuclear plant’s dirty trail.

REAL ESTATE: Support grows for saving a contaminated building.

COVER STORY: The Blazers are back. Do they deserve our love?

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Last month, Multnomah County parole officers cleared out three convicted felons living in a foreclosed North Vancouver Avenue house (“Haunted House,” WW, Nov. 13, 2013). Neighbors say they still can’t get the lending company or the city to secure the property. “Can you all work with Champion Mortgage to get the locks replaced and the property boarded up?” neighbor Justin Dollard wrote city officials Dec. 12. Apparently not. Emails between Dollard and local officials say one of the three original squatters, convicted identity thief Ronny Scott Medinger, has broken into the house since his Oct. 29 arrest.

Many politicians who lose re-election races turn lobbyist. Not former Clackamas County Chairwoman Charlotte Lehan. Lehan, who lost her seat to John Ludlow in 2012, last month opened a consulting firm called Graves Matter, which provides mapping services, records research and artifact conservation. Lehan says small, private cemeteries are at risk from encroaching development and farming. “Most of these historic cemeteries are not under the control of government or other institutions,” Lehan says. “That leaves them vulnerable to people who may be well-meaning but don’t know what they are doing.”

Local lawyers in solo practice without employees will soon be scrambling for health insurance. Multnomah Bar Association president Richard Vangelisti tells WW the company that provides coverage to sole practitioners through the bar association says the Affordable Care Act won’t allow those lawyers to be part of existing insurance pools. The association is searching for alternatives for hundreds of affected lawyers. “This is a shocker to us,” Vangelisti says. “We are very disappointed.”

Give!Guide Update: WW’s 2013 G!G passed the $1 million mark last weekend, $260,000 ahead of last year’s pace. You have two weeks left to visit giveguide.org and GIVE! Read more Murmurs and daily scuttlebutt.

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FRED NOLAND

THE DRIVING RECORDS RACKET THE STATE DIVERTS HIGHER FEES FROM OREGON’S ROADS TO THE INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY.

BY NIG E L JAQ UI SS

njaquiss@wweek.com

About 2 million times a year, Oregon companies small and big, from family-owned trucking firms to major insurers, pay for information from the state’s files of driver’s licenses. The companies need the driving records to obtain or renew insurance for drivers and to check whether potential employees are safe drivers.

Until recently, such transactions were cheap. The Oregon Department of Transportation charged $2 a record. Sales of the information generated about $4 million a year, which by law went into the state’s highway fund.

But in 2010, ODOT decided to jack up the cost of obtaining driving records, to nearly $10 a pop. The companies who got stuck with the bill say the department’s move was highway robber y—gouging them with higher costs and breaking state law while they were at it.

Kelsey Wood is president of Gordon Wood Insurance & Financial Services Inc., a seven-employee firm in Roseburg.

Wood says he and other insurance agents can’t fully pass on the higher costs to their customers.

“It sticks the turd in my pocket,” says Wood, who’s been in the insurance business for 31 years.

Wood’s firm and seven other companies and professional associations, including the Oregon Trucking Association, Associated General Contractors and the Property Casualty Insurers of America, have sued the state in Marion County Circuit Court. They allege ODOT is illegally funneling money collected from the higher fees away from road projects toward the development of state websites.

The case reveals how state agencies, left unchecked, wheeled out a plan to scrape millions more from businesses and consumers, despite the fact the Legislature had refused to authorize the move.

In some ways, state government acted like a business, responding to demand by charging more for its information.

From the perspective of those who regularly buy the drivers’ records, the decision was illegal.

“The unauthorized increase in cost of driving records and the unconstitutional diversion of the revenues from the sale of the driving records sacrifice Oregonians’ jobs and motoring safety so that state agencies may have nicer websites,” says the complaint filed by Greg Chaimov, the plaintiffs’ attorney. (The Oregon Department of Justice, which represents state agencies in court, declined to comment.)

In 2010, ODOT, facing a budget crisis after years of heavy borrowing, decided to jack up its fee for driving records to nearly $10. That decision is costing the companies that depend on driver’s license information dearly—an additional $15 million annually.

ODOT decided to raise prices through a clever arrangement with another state agency, the Department of Administrative Services. Under the plan, ODOT would lease records from its Driver and Motor Vehicle Division to the Department of Administrative Services, which would then allow a private company to resell them for a substantially higher price. In return, the company would provide $3 worth of Web consulting services for each record.

Problem is, money from selling those records is supposed to go into the highway trust fund, not state bureaucracies’ budgets.

The Oregon Department of Justice warned the two agencies in writing about the questionable legality of the plan at the time.

“Net income generated from the sale of those [DMV] records must accrue to the Highway Fund and cannot lawfully be diverted to other purposes,” wrote Associate Attorney General David Leith in a letter dated Aug. 10, 2010. “A court would likely scrutinize such a transfer to make sure the Highway Fund receives the amount to which it is entitled.”

Despite the warning, the two agencies took their plan to the 2011 Legislature.

Lawmakers didn’t approve it.

That didn’t stop the agencies from carrying out the plan anyway. One month after the Legislature adjourned, the Department of Administrative Services signed a 10-year contract with a Kansas data vending company, NICUSA, to sell Oregon driving records for $9.68 per record.

That meant trucking companies and other buyers of large numbers of driver’s license records faced a nearly fivefold

increase in costs.

In court filings, state lawyers say there’s nothing wrong with the new fee schedule.

What’s more, they say, the Kansas company will provide the state with valuable Web consulting. “These services will help provide much needed upgrades to, and expansion of, the state of Oregon’s Web presence, including ODOT’s Web presence,” David Kramer, a state attorney representing ODOT, wrote earlier this year.

State lawyers say ODOT comes out ahead—getting $6.68 per record, instead of $2—and any other benefit the state derives off the sales doesn’t have to go for highways.

Wood says the state’s decision to hike the costs of obtaining the records has a real impact: He and his customers, including one that employs 100 commercial drivers, are ordering fewer driving records for background checks because neither wants to eat the higher cost.

“That’s going to mean more unsafe drivers,” Wood says. “That’s bad for society.”

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

NEWS CHRIS DANGER

ENVIRONMENT

THE NOT-SOGREEN MACHINE THE HIDDEN ENVIRONMENTAL COST OF THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST’S LONE NUCLEAR POWER PLANT.

BY NIGEL JAQUISS

njaquiss@wweek.com

For a week now, the people running the Pacific Northwest’s only nuclear power plant have been on the defensive—and for good reason.

A devastating report about the Columbia Generating Station’s finances released last week shows it’s one of the most expensive of its kind in the U.S. to run, and it’s needlessly costing ratepayers $200 million a year in higher electricity bills (“Costly to the Core,” WW, Dec. 11, 2013).

The plant’s operator, Energy Northwest, disputes the findings of the report, written by Portland-based McCullough Research for Physicians for Social Responsibility, a group opposed to nuclear power. Energy Northwest, while acknowledging its high costs, says the region still needs the 29-year-old plant, located on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in southeastern Washington.

Energy Northwest—owned by a coalition of public utilities—also says the nuclear plant produces environmentally friendly energy. “[The plant] began delivering power to the region in 1984,” Energy Northwest said in a statement on its website. “Since then it has provided billions of dollars’ worth of electricity while emitting virtually no greenhouse gases or carbon emissions commonly associated with natural gas, coal and other fossil fuel-powered plants.”

The report’s author, Robert McCullough, says mining and processing Energy Northwest’s uranium fuel produces enormous amounts of greenhouse gases. “Energy Northwest has frequently claimed the Columbia Generating Station is carbon-free,” he says. “That’s not true.”

McCullough calculated that one year’s operations of the nuclear plant caused the emission of 490,000 tons of carbon—about the same amount a typical natural gas-powered generating plant in Washington would have released last year.

McCullough calculated the amount of carbon

released by mining the uranium, processing it with coal-fired electricity and enriching it through a decades-old process that releases carbon dioxide.

In 2012 and 2013, the United States Enrichment Corporation completed a massive order for Energy Northwest, producing the equivalent of more than 35 years’ worth of nuclear fuel.

McCullough also learned that the enrichment process generated substantial quantities of another harmful pollutant, Freon.

Freon is the brand name of a chlorofluorocarbon, or CFC. Beginning in 1987, U.S. and international regulators banned CFCs because they destroy the ozone layer that protects the earth from ultraviolet rays.

Only a few industrial users retained the right to continue using Freon, and the United States Enrichment Corporation was one of them.

Freon 114, released during the uranium enrichment process, is also a greenhouse gas, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says.

McCullough says the fact that the Freon and carbon-dioxide emissions entered the air in Kentucky, rather than the Pacific Northwest, does not change the fact Energy Northwest is responsible.

“When they say ‘carbon-free,’” he says, “what they mean is ‘carbon elsewhere.’”

Energy Northwest spokeswoman Angela Walz acknowledges that the fuel production process causes carbon emissions. But she says comparing those emissions to emissions from a natural gas plant is “questionable.”

Walz says the comparison should include emissions attributable to various plants, including construction and fuel consumption. That comparison, she says, favors nuclear energy.

“Even if the calculation had merit,” Walz says, “it is still compared improperly.”

McCullough disagrees. He says he sought to answer whether it makes economic sense to keep the plant running, and an accounting of carbon emissions attributable to the plant is part of the study.

Walz says the long-term fuel deal Energy Northwest struck with its now-defunct supplier will save ratepayers $88 million from 2014 to 2017 and potentially more after that.

But McCullough accounted for the purchase price of the fuel in his study, which found the plant will add $1.7 billion in unnecessary costs to ratepayers’ bills over the next two decades.

“We used their fuel costs and their 10-year plan,” McCullough says of how he reached his conclusions. “In my opinion, it’s not a very good deal.”

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

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WRECKING BRAWL NW NATURAL WANTS TO DEMOLISH A CONTAMINATED LANDMARK. WILL ANYONE STEP IN TO STOP IT?

BY R AV L E E N KAU R

rkaur@wweek.com

For years, Kathy Evans admired the dilapidated gothic building she saw whenever she drove on U.S. 30 just south of the St. Johns Bridge. Her four daughters always pointed out the structure and thought it looked like a haunted mansion.

“We’d always dream that we’d win the lottery, buy the building and fix it up,” Evans says. “Turn it into a ScoobyDoo Mystery Theater.”

The 1913 structure, a landmark with its classic lines and smashed-out windows, is actually a former office building for factories that refined tar into natural gas along the Willamette River.

Evans says she was upset to learn this month that the company that owns the property—one of the most polluted industrial sites along the Portland Harbor—wants to tear the building down.

“They went in and they created this huge ecological disaster,” says Evans, who works in marketing. “And the only thing that is good about that property, they’re going to destroy.”

Public interest in the building’s fate took off Dec. 4, when Portland architecture critic Brian Libby reported on his blog that NW Natural planned to tear down the building, and several media outlets, including WW and The Oregonian, linked to his post.

Evans and other advocates for preserving the Gas and Coke Building say NW Natural has a civic responsibility to the landmark. Her online petition has collected nearly 1,300 signatures.

In August 2012, NW Natural asked the city of Portland to remove the building from its Historic Resource Inventory, a survey of about 5,000 properties with historical and architectural significance. The city agreed.

A spokeswoman for NW Natural says the utility has a financial duty to its customers and shareholders.

“I’m not sure how a contaminated building would go on a historic list in the first place,” says NW Natural’s Melissa Moore. “The building has been decaying.”

Liza Mickle, a city of Portland historic resources spe-

“INDUSTRIAL CATHEDRAL”: Once the office for what was the only gasmanufacturing plant in Portland, the building has sat empty since 1957.

cialist, says the list of historic properties is wide-ranging, from converted industrial buildings to a Ford assembly plant, and doesn’t discriminate against a building based on its condition. “The list is not meant to be a reflection of what is viable or not viable,” Mickle says.

NW Natural is on the hook to help pay for a federally mandated Superfund cleanup of the Portland Harbor. The company claims it has spent $93 million in cleanup-related costs at the site.

The ground under the building is still contaminated.

The three-story concrete structure sits behind a chainlink fence, its copper gutters sagging, its mossy slate roof sloughing, and the portals of its former clock tower boarded up. A May 2012 inspection report found the building is contaminated with asbestos and lead, not to mention bird feces and dead rodents.

Moore says NW Natural hasn’t set a demolition date.

Its city demolition permits expire in February, and the company has already received one extension.

Libby, who first drew attention to the building’s fate, says Portland has a dearth of old structures and the city should move to preserve this one. (His blog’s readers proposed converting it to a McMenamins.)

“Even as a ruin, it still has value, architecturally,” Libby says. “Right across the river, we have Cathedral Park. This is almost like an industrial cathedral.”

A report issued last week by historical preservation group Restore Oregon says the building would be difficult and expensive to restore. The organization has shied away from officially backing a campaign to save the building but suggests mothballing it to keep the site’s options open.

“Once it’s gone, it’s gone,” says Restore Oregon executive director Peggy Moretti.

NW Natural’s Moore says the building ’s industrial location and zoning make it unlikely anyone will step up to take on the costs of protecting and preserving the site.

She also says she doesn’t know if the company would ever consider an offer.

“We can’t speculate on something that hasn’t happened,” Moore says.

Evans now plans to form a committee to back her efforts. She says the building could be kept as a historical ruin surrounded by public space—like a castle in Germany she once lived near.

“Every city looks the same,” she says. “The things that make us different are the things we should protect.”

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

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rip city revival: blazers fans are witnessing the team’s best start since the 1999-2000 season.

on the rebound THE BLAZERS BROKE OUR HEARTS. ARE WE READY TO GET BACK WITH THE NBA’S HOTTEST TEAM?

By Mike acker

243-2122

Maybe it was when Kobe’s alley-oop to Shaq sealed Game 7 of the 2000 Western Conference Finals.

Maybe it was when Greg Oden’s knee exploded for the third time or when Brandon Roy finally ground the last bit of cartilage out of his, forcing him to retire at age 27. Maybe it was Raymond Felton.

Somewhere between the coked-up Jail Blazers era when swingman Bonzi Wells declared the fans “really don’t matter to us” and the Felton-led mutiny against popular coach Nate McMillan, many of us gave up on the Portland Trail Blazers.

You don’t have to feel bad about refusing their comeons year after year. It’s been three seasons since the Blazers reached the playoffs. They haven’t gotten out of the first round of the playoffs since 2000, the longest such streak in the Western Conference.

The pain and heartbreak of disappointment, listening to promises that things would change if you gave

them just one more chance—you’ve heard it all before.

But now, out of nowhere, and for the first time in a generation, the team is the hottest squad in the league. It’s still early, of course, but as of press time the Blazers (21-4) had the best record in the NBA. You don’t even have to feel bad about underestimating the Blazers—everyone else did, too. As Sekou Smith of NBA.com put it, the Blazers “snuck up on all of us.”

But excitement is building. After Nicolas Batum hit a late 3-pointer to seal the team’s victory over Oklahoma City on Dec. 4, Bill Simmons of ESPN tweeted, “Rip City just threw its hat in the ring.” Former Blazers coach Jack Ramsay has compared this team to the one he won the NBA title with in 1977.

How did this happen, anyway? Are the 2013 Blazers for real? Are Portlanders ready to get back into this oft-dysfunctional relationship? Here’s the story, as best we know it. cont. on page 14

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

13

ON THE REBOUND

cont. c h r i s r ya n p h o t o . c o m

p h o t o s o n l e f t b y r ya n p r o u t y, p o r t l a n d t r a i l b l a z e r s

winning comBination: Blazers star lamarcus aldridge (above center) is having an mVp-type season playing under coach terry stotts (below left), who also relies on the steady play of nicolas Batum (below right).

power in the post: the addition of robin lopez has boosted the Blazers’ inside presence.

The position of Blazers general manager over the past few years has been, shall we say, a bit unstable.

Consider the fate of Kevin Pritchard, the general manager who drafted Seattle native-turned-Rookie of the Year Brandon Roy, current star LaMarcus Aldridge and spectacular bust Greg Oden as he shepherded the organization out of the Jail Blazers era.

Pritchard took over for “Trader Bob” Whitsitt, the GM who acquired players like shooting guard Ruben Patterson, a convicted sex offender who demanded to be traded unless he got 25 minutes per game and who once claimed “the devil” told him to curse out his coach.

Pritchard had an icy relationship with owner Paul Allen and was canned about an hour before the 2010 draft. His replacement, Rich Cho, lasted less than a year.

W hen Neil Olshey, who’d formerly been GM of the Los Angeles Clippers, was brought in, his mandate was simple: put out a product Portlanders will pay to see on a semi-regular basis.

He achieved that, in large part because of Damian Lillard. The sixth overall pick in the 2012 draft and the first player selected by Olshey, Lillard was a point guard out of tiny Weber State University 14

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

c h r i s r ya n p h o t o . c o m

THE BLAZERS ARE GOOD NOW BECAUSE NEIL OLSHEY BUILT THIS TEAM TO WIN NOW.

in Ogden, Utah, who shocked the league by having a historic rookie season. He became only the third player in history to be unanimously selected Rookie of the Year, besting the No. 1 pick and pre-ordained “future top-five player,” Anthony Davis.

but being marginally watchable for two seasons in a row wasn’t going to be enough.

But being marginally watchable for two seasons in a row wasn’t going to be enough. With a new mandate—keep Aldridge or, if that ’s not possible, get something for him— Olshey issued a public mea culpa, admitting he was not aggressive enough in his first season as general manager. He then went out and built himself a team.

The Blazers’ past team-building efforts included trading high draft picks on risky players and hoping they’d pan out, like journeymen center Marcus Camby and small forward Gerald Wallace, that came with an attached disclaimer: “He’ll be even better when Greg Oden is healthy enough to play 80 games.”

Not this season. Olshey made a decision that winning in 2013-14 was of the

neil olshey

utmost importance. He acquired veteran guard Mo Williams from the Utah Jazz to back up Lillard and brought in 3-point specia l i st Dorel l Wr ig ht , i n st a nt ly improving the Blazers’ previously woeful bench. He matched the Minnesota Timberwolves’ offer for Nicolas Batum, signing him through 2016. And he traded for Robin Lopez, the first true center the Blazers have had since Oden.

Olshey made a decision that winning now was of the utmost importance, and to reward his diligence, that’s exactly what the team is doing.

LAMARCUS ALDRIDGE AND DAMIAN LILLARD WORK WELL TOGETHER IN A WAY ALDRIDGE AND BRANDON ROY NEVER DID. Beckley Mason, a basketball writer for The New York Times, recently wrote a column about the emerging chemistry between Aldridge and Lillard. Mason’s story repeated all the well-trod clichés about teamwork and players assuming their roles, but added that the Blazers seem to embody it: “[T]he looseness in the locker room imbued the banalities with profundity.”

Aldridge is a jump-shooting big man in the Dirk Nowitzki mold. Lillard is a harddriving, take-it-to-the-rim-style point guard.

Aldridge prefers to hang out around the top of the key, setting picks for Lillard.

Because the Blazers’ young point guard is a tenacious rim attacker, big defenders leave Aldridge in an effort to protect the rim. This is just what Aldridge and the Blazers want, since there’s no better knock-down shooter from between 15 and 20 feet.

To mitigate LA’s dominance with the midrange jumper, teams have been sending a second defender, sometimes the same defender charged with guarding Lillard, to help out. This doesn’t work either, since Lillard has shown time and again his shooting range starts when he enters the building.

Aldridge is averaging career highs in points (23.5) and field-goal attempts (19.9)

CONT.

ON THE REBOUND

C H R I S R YA N P H O T O . C O M

L&L: Damian Lillard (0) and Robin Lopez (42) get set for a Blazers possession against the Houston Rockets.

per game as he learns where to position himself so that his young point guard can get him the ball.

But Mason’s story was about more than just on-court chemistry. Aldridge and Lillard are cut from the same cloth: Both are quiet and brooding, hyperknowledgeable about basketball, and loath to talk about anything else. Aldridge, a Texas native, has been open about his mother’s battle with breast cancer, while Lillard has described growing up “in the ’hood” of Oakland, Calif., but both clearly prefer to keep basketball their primary talking point.

Aldridge and his first co-star, Roy, got along fine. Roy was the star, on and off the court; Aldridge appeared comfortable with that and struggled to become a leader without him. With Lillard, he can once again share the spotlight, but in a way that complements and elevates both their games.

WESLEY MATTHEWS AND NICOLAS BATUM HAVE FIGURED OUT THEIR ROLES. Batum is the second-highest-paid player on the Blazers’ roster; Matthews is the third. At about $11 million and $7 million per season, respectively, some might be asking for these two guys to take on more important roles.

Luckily, Batum and Matthews haven’t listened to that chatter. Both of Portland’s wing players are doing exactly what they need to do. Matthews was never meant to be a leading scorer: He was originally brought in as a backup for Roy. This season, with Aldridge and Lillard humming, Matthews has had less of an offensive burden, and because of that, he’s come alive. He is currently hitting almost half of his 3-point shot attempts, while averaging a career high of just over 16 points per game.

And when you get into “advance metrics” like Player Efficiency Rating—a standardized measure of per-minute production—you find Matthews’ rating is the highest in his six-year career, 20 percent above the league average.

As for Batum, the 25-year-old Frenchman

is also having his best season, PER-wise. His real value, however, can still be shown in the meat-and-potatoes stats. Batum is ahead of or tied with his career-high averages in defensive rebounds, offensive rebounds, total rebounds, assists and steals.

This season, Aldridge is going to be an AllStar for the third time, and Lillard is likely to join him. Meanwhile, behind them Matthews and Batum have been steady as the team’s thirdand fourth-best players.

THEY’RE HEALTHY. The Blazers made a number of changes over the past few seasons in a concerted effort to get the team competitive again—new head coach, new general manager, new team president, new arena name, new fast-food promotion—but one of the most important has also been the most underreported.

In May, the Blazers parted ways with longtime head athletic trainer Jay Jensen, who, during his 19 years with the organization, was present during the premature destruction of the careers of Roy and Oden because of knee injuries.

To replace Jensen, the Blazers turned to Dr. Chris Stackpole. His techniques differ from his predecessor’s. Olshey characterized his new hire as having “a vision and blueprint for developing innovative and evidence-based sports medicine services.”

That’s some opaque praise, but clearly, the organization finally felt it was time to move on from Jensen, who became a lightning rod for criticism back when it seemed like a different Blazers player was getting carted off the court every other game.

And hey, the Blazers have been without a major injury since Stackpole came onboard.

Something is working. Will it work forever? No one knows. So far, so good.

CONT. on page 16 Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

15

ON THE REBOUND

cont. r ya n P r o u t y, Portland trail Blazers

to the rim: Lillard lays it in during the Blazers’ 90-89 victory over the Phoenix Suns on Nov. 13, beating former Blazer and Portland resident Channing Frye on the play.

16

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

CONT.

ON THE REBOUND

TERRY STOTTS IS A HEAD COACH WITH SOMETHING TO PROVE. The Blazers’ second-year head coach started his career in 1990, working under future Hall of Famers Rick Carlisle and George Karl. Stotts’ previous head-coaching stops were in Atlanta and Milwaukee. He posted losing records with both.

Stotts came to Portland with fewer ties to basketball in the Pacific Northwest than his predecessor, Nate McMillan. His first season wasn’t great. He did the best he could with a roster so thin that Luke Babbitt—currently playing ball in Russia— got nearly 12 minutes a night. The finer points of Stotts’ struggle were lost on everyday fans who probably couldn’t see past Portland’s season-ending 13-game losing streak.

This season, Stotts has been mixing and matching his assets to put the right personnel package on the court for every possession. He looks for favorable matchups, de-emphasizing isolation-style ball built around a superstar. Karl had success with the method in both Seattle and Denver.

COACH TERRY STOTTS HAS EMPLOYED THE USE OF IPADS TO ALLOW PLAYERS TO STUDY GAME FOOTAGE PRACTICALLY IN REAL TIME. So far, the Blazers’ head coach has coaxed all he can out of Thomas Robinson, a raw player traded twice in his rookie season. Stotts has looked like a genius for elevating Joel Freeland to backup center over Meyers Leonard. He’s also employed the use of iPads to allow players to study game footage practically in real time. Most of all, he’s managed his rotations, so that this season there are no second-quarter letdowns or blown fourthquarter leads.

In his first season, Stotts was stately, almost professorial, as he walked the sideline. As the Blazers have shocked the league, though, he’s grown incrementally more flamboyant. An outburst over a few bad calls in a recent home win over the defending Northwest Division champion Oklahoma City Thunder excited the Moda Center crowd and his assistant coaches. He’s even developing a trademark smirk.

If you’re having an unexpected level of success and are considered by Carlisle, your former mentor, to be a virtual lock for Coach of the Year, you’re allowed some swagger.

ROBIN LOPEZ CAME TO TOWN. The Blazers—on pace to win more than 60 games and projected to have a 98 percent chance of making the postseason—will go only as far as Aldridge and Lillard take them. But center Robin Lopez has been just as important to the team’s early fortunes.

Lopez, a 25-year-old Stanford product, is a late bloomer, accomplishing little with the Phoenix Suns before moving to New Orleans, where he started rounding into form. He’s not an All-Star like his twin brother, Brook, who plays for the Brooklyn Nets, but the addition of a serviceable center has turned the Blazers from a lottery team to a contender and transformed Aldridge from an All-Star to an MVP candidate.

Coming off the best stretch of his career last year in New Orleans, Lopez is averaging three more rebounds per game than he did last season. He’s also averaging 1.5 blocks a game, while shooting 50 percent from the field and 80 percent from the free-throw line.

Most important, though, Lopez is playing 30 minutes per game, the most of his career. This means that Aldridge is almost never forced to play center. Last season, Aldridge frequently played out of his natural position, which is part of the reason the Blazers couldn’t stop any of their opponents from scoring and ended the year ranked 26 out of 30 teams on defense.

Lopez, a gangly but deceptively strong 7-footer, loves comic books, has a goofy hairdo and eschews the fancy clothes of his teammates in favor of polo shirts, faded blue jeans and white Adidas shell-toe sneakers. He’s easily the most Portlandy Blazer since Channing Frye.

For casual fans, that alone is something worth cheering.

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

17

ON THE REBOUND

CONT. R YA N P R O U T Y, P O R T L A N D T R A I L B L A Z E R S

THE FAN WHO WASN’T THERE THE BLAZERS ARE SCORCHING. WHY ARE SEATS EMPTY AT THE MODA CENTER?

BY A A R O N M E S H

amesh@wweek .com

A seat at the Portland Trail Blazers’ Dec. 12 home game against the Houston Rockets should have been a hot ticket.

The matchup at the Moda Center featured the Blazers, the NBA’s hottest team, hosting two of the league’s superstars, Houston center Dwight Howard and guard James Harden. The game received marquee treatment by cable network TNT. And it was the most recent chance to see Blazers forward LaMarcus Aldridge cement his case as a surprise MVP candidate.

Little wonder the game was officially a sellout, with an announced crowd of 19,997.

But 36 minutes before the announced tipoff, I walked up to the Moda box office and bought a nosebleed Section 327 seat for its $25 face value.

I paid too much. Ten minutes later, prices on the online ticket resale site StubHub dropped to as low $11.20 for a seat in Section 326. (That’s the same cost as seeing The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug in theaters.) A seat in the 100 Level, typically priced at $168, was going for $78.

The bargain prices point to a strange Moda Center phenomenon: The best Blazers team in years is playing to crowds noticeably short of capacity and ticket demand weaker than you might expect for a team that went into Tuesday night’s games with the NBA’s best record.

At tipoff, I was the only person in my row, and during the game the arena looked to be about 85 percent full.

“We’re in first place,” said Jamie Unger-Fisk, a fan in Section 327. “How do you not come out to see the team when we’re in first place?”

It’s a question Blazers fans—and people in the team’s front office—are trying to answer.

The Blazers rank sixth in the league for announced home attendance, averaging 19,334 spectators a game.

But the size of the Moda Center—the league’s thirdlargest arena—means the Blazers are in the middle of the pack for filling up their building. The average of 93 percent attendance is 13th in the NBA, according to ESPN. Fans—after years of frustration, and a 13-game losing skid to end last season—remain wary about spending money to support the team.

“The fans in Portland are still getting used to having one of the best teams in the league,” says Syracuse University sports-marketing professor Rick Burton. “If you haven’t won in a long time, people can end up taking a wait-and-see approach.”

Chris McGowan, the Blazers’ president and CEO, says the front office faces a challenge in wooing back customers who have abandoned the team in recent years.

“Once you lose season-ticket holders, there’s a lot of statistics in the industry that suggest it’s hard to get them back,” McGowan says, noting season-ticket sales are climbing now. “It’s hard to get people to come night in and night out unless your team is really doing something special.”

Which they are. But the Blazers, like all teams in the NBA, boost their attendance figures by counting every seat they sell, even if the fans who bought them stay home.

They also count tickets they give away for free, mostly to charitable organizations like Big Brothers Big Sisters and Central City Concern.

The Blazers say about 90 percent of ticket holders 18

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

MISSING THE PARTY: Trail Blazers president and CEO Chris McGowan says the team has begun using a flexible pricing system to draw fans to the Moda Center. “I don’t want fans to miss out on what’s going on,” he says. “It’s electric.”

(those who bought tickets and those who received them as giveaways) are coming to games.

The team won’t disclose how many seats it gives away as freebies.

Dwight Jaynes, a commentator for CSN Northwest who has covered the Blazers for three decades, says attendance was never as high as reported during the 195-game sellout streak the team claimed from 2007 to last year.

“There have been empty seats in that arena for years,” he says.

McGowan blamed the empty seats at the BlazersRockets game on icy weather downstate, and on corporate sales to companies that bought group tickets and provided them to people who didn’t show.

“A crowd that’s perceived as bad in Portland is perceived as good in other markets,” McGowan says. “Just because there were a few empty seats in the stands, I don’t see that as an alarming thing. If there were 14,000 people in the arena, that might be alarming.”

Most NBA teams would love Portland’s problem— just watch highlights of the Blazers’ Dec. 15 road win in Detroit. The Palace of Auburn Hills looked like an IKEA chair showroom where a basketball game happened to break out.

The Blazers also need to establish a new identity that will keep fans coming back to the arena.

Brad Hoggans, a roofer, came to the Rockets game

because his son, Miles, received free tickets from SEI Academy, a charter school in North Portland.

Hoggans recalled how former Blazers guard Brandon Roy created excitement around the team when he played here from 2006 to 2011. Hoggans was wearing a vintage Roy jersey.

“A real star to get people excited,” he said, “is what we’re lacking.”

Burton, the sports-marketing professor, says even as the Blazers improve, they face fiercer competition for fan dollars: from the Portland Timbers, the resurgent Seattle Seahawks and even high-definition TV. “Sitting at home and drinking a 50-cent beer becomes attractive to some people,” Burton says. “They’re doing a value equation in their heads.”

But in Section 326 during the Houston game, the Nilsen family was attending a Blazers game for the 20th consecutive year.

In the third quarter, as Aldridge ripped control of the game from the Rockets, the six family members were at a loss as to why the seats around them were vacant.

Andrew Nilsen, 25, noted the Blazers are off to their best start since the 1999-2000 season, when Scottie Pippen, Rasheed Wallace and Damon Stoudamire led the team.

“It’s really exciting basketball, too,” Nilsen said. “I don’t know what isn’t to love.”

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STREET PG. 23 Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

19

CULTURE

SHOPPING

BRING THE RAIN

LOCALISH GEAR FOR THE WET, COLD DAYS OF DECEMBER.

MEN’S GEAR Bogs Carson boots Available at bogsfootwear.com, Next Adventure and REI. $120.

Portland’s permapuddle demands a good pair of rubber boots, stylish enough to wear into a bar, without any mud-coated laces to fiddle with. For men, the Bogs Carson is the best you can do. This Portland-based bootmaker makes rugged footwear with chemical-proof polyurethane and steel shanks for farmers and firemen, but these city-grade slip-ons are perfect for biking, walking the dog or a Forest Park hike. The boots look like leather, but they’re perfectly sealed and easy to hose off. Wear without the arched insoles for a loose, natural fit.

Columbia Zonafied softshell jacket Available at Columbia Sportswear, columbia.com, Nordstrom and REI. $180.

It’s amazing anyone in Portland owns an everyday jacket that’s not softshell. Sure, there will be two days a year when it’s raining hard enough to soak through the membrane—that’s what umbrellas are for. Meanwhile, it’s nice to have something soft against your skin that doesn’t rumple like tinfoil every time you raise your arm. And when it’s 40 degrees you need more insulation than the typical slicker provides. Columbia’s Zonafied softshell was clearly designed with locals in mind. It sheds drizzle, sprinkles and drops while the baffled insulation below the silver Omni-Heat lining makes you feel like a baked potato—in a good way.

Shedrain 2018 umbrella Available at shedrain.com. $50.

There’s a certain class of Portlander who refuses the shelter of an umbrella, even in the most torrential of downpours. Such people are idiots. Fact is, some of the best umbrellas on the market are made by Northeast Portland’s Shedrain. This comfy but sturdy canopy has Teflon coating to send drops skidding off and a system of overhanging vents that allow big gusts of wind to float through without the umbrella popping inside out or rain leaking inside.

Filson Redwood II Anorak rain jacket Available at Filson, 526 NW 13th Ave., 2460900, and filson.com. $190.

Most rain jackets are like the tarps you tie between trees to keep your picnic from getting soaked: sheerly utilitarian devices.

This handsome wax pullover is the glamping equivalent: stylish, with five front pockets and a sleek, casual design, but just as useful for shielding yourself from the elements.

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

SHOPPING

CULTURE

WOMEN’S GEAR Sorel Conquest Carly Glow boots Available at sorel.com, Columbia Sportswear and Nordstrom. $130.

Made from vulcanized rubber—which means it’s both durable and elastic—and full-grain leather, these waterproof boots are a serious upgrade from those polka-dotted ones you bought at Target last winter.

The brightly colored heel and side laces add a bit of flair without making things fussy.

Marmot ROM jacket Available at marmot.com, REI, U.S. Outdoor Store and Next Adventure. $185.

ROM stands for “range of motion,” and you’ll indeed be able to move—and ride and hike and ski and climb—in this stretchy softshell jacket. It’s windproof, so it retains heat and is highly water-repellent (read: You won’t want to stand in an hours-long downpour, but you’re all set for months and months of drizzle).

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Local company Nau prides itself on using sustainable materials. Here, that means making old water bottles and textile waste into recycled polyester and turning the whole thing into a waterproof jacket. It’s a sleek trench coat with an asymmetrical design, but the sealed seams and longer cut mean you’ll still stay dry in a storm.

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Bella Umbrella pagoda umbrella Available at bellaumbrella.com. $129.

Pacific Northwesterners may bristle at the thought of carrying an umbrella, but Seattle company Bella Umbrella is working to change that. This curvy design harks back to the pagoda style popular in the ’30s and ’40s—except this umbrella won’t turn upside down in a windstorm.

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

21

FORMS & DOCUMENTS

R A K P I E N R G U S T U U G F G L E U S F T P I ON L E H YOU PARKED ACROSS TWO SPACES

CUT HERE

Hey there Neighbor, We hope you’re having a GREAT day and enjoying the [sun/drizzle/permanent haze]. As we’re sure you know, Portland’s a VERY special place. Part of the way we keep it SO SPECIAL is by letting our neighbors know when they could be doing something in a BETTER way.

We’re really not trying to be “jerks” or “assholes” here, but we happened upon your vehicle and couldn’t help but notice that:

Curb space is extremely limited in this neighborhood so it would be very helpful if you could confine your automobile to a single space.

YOU PARKED THREE FEET FROM THE CURB This road is of limited width, and the extra space your car is using could be better used by passing cars or cyclists.

YOU PARK IN FRONT OF MY HOUSE TOO OFTEN We know we don’t own the street or anything, but we have a lot of [children/ groceries/musical instruments] and it’s SO convenient just to park right in front of our own place.

YOU PARKED TOO CLOSE TO THE INTERSECTION When you park your vehicle right up against the stop sign, you block visibility for cars approaching from cross streets. This is very dangerous. Please help us stay safe on Portland’s streets.

YOU’RE BLOCKING A DRIVEWAY We use our driveways to gain access to our garages and homes. When you block our driveway with your vehicle it becomes much more difficult to do that.

YOU’RE FROM WASHINGTON We all know Washington residency offers certain tax advantages over Oregon residency but, having paid our taxes to live here, we ask that you help us maintain Oregon’s high quality of life by remaining on your side of the river unless visiting to purchase goods or services from our local merchants. Please remember that you have your own Best Buy and your state government REALLY needs you to shop there and pay the required sales tax on your new Blu-Ray player and copy of After Earth.

Thank you SO MUCH for your help with this. We all REALLY appreciate it. Have an AWESOME DAY and good luck in your next parking spot!

22

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

Additionally,

Oh and

CULTURE

WHAT ARE YOU WEARING?

STREET

FUZZ CLUSTER THERE’S NOTHING MORE FESTIVE THAN HOLIDAY KNITS. PHOTOS BY KAYLA N GU YEN A N D MOR GA N GR EEN -HOPKIN S wweek.com/street

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

23

FOOD: Trinket serves brunch that’s on its game.

MUSIC: In the bomb shelter with Le Orchestre d’Incroyable.

THEATER: Oregon Ballet Theatre wields The Nutcracker.

MOVIES: David O. Russell’s love affair with bullshit.

31 33 45 48

SCOOP kickstart my art: The Portland Institute for Contemporary Art is wading into territory more often frequented by at-home lithographers and ukulele musicians. Oregon’s leading avant-garde art organization last week launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise $25,000 by Jan. 2 for the annual Time-Based Art Festival. Relatively speaking, that’s small change for PICA, a 17-year-old organization that brings in more than $1 million annually in grants and donations. But executive director Victoria Frey says other arts organizations of PICA’s size have also turned to crowdfunding. She says this campaign is just one arm of PICA’s year-end fundraising push, which also includes a tBa fEstivaL major-donor campaign and a New Year’s Eve fundraiser. “We have to fundraise 80 percent of our budget, so we’re using every vehicle we can,” Frey says. “I don’t send this out to major donors, but Kickstarter is a language that a lot of our participants understand.” And what does the Kickstarter campaign say about PICA’s overall finances? Asked if PICA will end the year in the black, Frey answered: “If we succeed in all of these plans, yes. There’s a perception that we’re swimming in money, but we have to piece it together in a lot of different places.”

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ChRISTIE’S

BaNNED at BELmONt: Portland’s most persnickety bottle shop and bar, Belmont Station, will no longer fill the bulbous swing-top glass growlers favored by Astoria’s Fort George Brewery and California’s Russian River Brewing. According to a Belmont bartender, that style of growler is “extremely wasteful” as it tends to foam up, wasting beer. “We don’t have a problem with the 64-ounce swing-top growlers here,” says Fort George spokesman Brad Blaser.

BriNGiNG HOmE tHE BacON: The most expensive piece of art ever sold at auction will soon be hanging on the walls of the Portland Art Museum—for a few months, at least.

Starting Saturday, Dec. 21, PAM will exhibit Francis Bacon’s Three Studies of Lucian Freud, which sold last month for $142.4 million at Christie’s in New York. The huge triptych from 1969 depicts Freud, a fellow painter who was both friend and rival to Bacon, sitting in different positions on a wooden chair. The work will be on display until March 30, when it will return to the private collection of the anonymous buyer.

Pay, PaL, Or DON’t: A group of restaurant workers plans to start a nonprofit, pay-what-you-can restaurant called Ne Si’ka at 9216 SE Ramona St. in Lents. James Layton, head prep cook at Southland Whiskey Kitchen in Northwest Portland, got the idea from Jon Bon Jovi’s Soul Kitchen in Red Bank, N.J., a donations-only restaurant with no prices listed on the menu. A Dec. 12 fundraiser at the Eagle Eye Tavern in Lents raised $1,200 for Ne Si’ka. “This’ll be an actual sit-down restaurant that anyone will want to go to,” Layton says. “It’s for everyone, not just people with food-insecurity issues.”

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

JAMES RExROAD

GOSSIP THAT KNOWS SANTA CLAUS IS BLACK.

HEADOUT PORTLAND, 1813 OUR CITY FROSTED IN TIME

PORTLAND, 1813

I

mag ine how Por tla nd looked 100 years ago. Pocket watches, raggedy handmade dolls, bicycles—basically the Modern Man barber shop without iPhones.

In 1913 , t he Haw t hor ne Bridge was already 3 years old, the clock tower at Union Station was already ticking, and the Benson Hotel was in its first year of operation.

To celebrate a century of clean sheets and fluffy pillows, the hotel commissioned a gingerbread replica of the city. In past years, the Benson’s lobby has displayed models of St. Vitus

that Lewis and Clark passed through on a canoe stolen from coastal people. Nothing else is recorded until 1843, when the Overton Cabin was erected in a clearing between Fort Vancouver and Oregon City. As best we PORTLAND, 1913 can tell, in 1813 the land that’s now Portland was mostly used Cathedral in Prague, Santa’s creation. We wanted to go back by Chinook, who rested their North Pole, and German castles. another hundred years, to 1813. canoes here on paddles between These models take about 300 So we went to the Oregon His- v i l lages on the Wi lla met te hours to complete and use about torical Society for help recon- and Columbia rivers. The city 100 pounds of gingerbread and structing downtown Portland wouldn’t be named until 1845.

This is Portland in 1813—a 25 pounds of white chocolate two centuries ago.

As it turns out, there’s very clearing in the pines. A century and marzipan.

We were so impressed, we little record of what happened later, there would be more to decided to make our own cookie in those years. In 1805, we know see. LYLA ROWEN.

GO: See the Benson Hotel’s gingerbread city in the hotel lobby, 309 SW Broadway, 228-2000. Open 24 hours a day. Free.

P O R T L A N D 1 9 1 3 : B E N S O N H O T E L , P H O T O B Y LY L A R O W E N . P O R T L A N D 1 8 1 3 : H E L E N B E R N H A R D B A K E R Y ( S U G A R ) , E L I Z A B E T H W E L C H A F F ( G I N G E R B R E A D ) , P H O T O B Y W W S T A F F.

WILLAMETTE WEEK

WHAT TO DO THIS WEEK IN ARTS & CULTURE

WEDNESDAY DEC. 18 RUSTIE [MUSIC] Whatever you want to call this Scottish producer’s brand of dance music—he prefers “aquacrunk” himself—it’s undeniably unique, taking club-worthy hip-hop, introducing a lot more melody, building to a drop and then suddenly slowing it all down. He hasn’t so much mastered the formula as buried it away, layering so many samples atop one another it obscures the fact it’s mostly rap beats with a little water added. Rotture, 315 SE 3rd Ave., 2345683. 9 pm. $12. 21+.

FRIDAY DEC. 20 ICONA POP [MUSIC] “I Love It,” the 20-something Swedes’ mosh-pop anthem, redefined “inescapable” in 2012, soundtracking everything from video games to WNBA commercials to the continuing misadventures of Snooki and JWoww. You’d think the oversaturation would spell doom for the group’s first album postomnipresence, which didn’t drop until this past September. Aside from a few skippable power-ballads, though, This Is...Icona Pop is stocked with balls-to-the-wall club bangers.

Wonder Ballroom, 128 N Russell St., 284-8686. 8 pm. $23 advance, $25 day of show. All ages.

THE BIG LEBOWSKI [MOVIES] A marijuana-addicted bowling enthusiast who helped write the original draft of the Port Huron Statement becomes ensnared in a plot to defraud a charity benefiting inner-city children of promise without the necessary means for a necessary means for a higher education. He is ultimately unable to prevent the fraud but escapes with his johnson intact after impregnating the daughter of the wheelchair-bound fraudster. Clinton Street Theater, 2522 SE Clinton St., 897-0744. 7:30 pm. $6. Continues through Dec. 26.

SATURDAY DEC. 21 BEL MIZIK [MUSIC] The group’s name means “beautiful music” in Haitian French Creole, and its mostly Portlandbred members blend ethnic and geographic roots to produce rhythmic neo-soul. This holiday-themed red-and-white party also features Balans, an all-Haitian band specializing in fast-tempo kompa. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $10. 21+.

SUNDAY DEC. 22 #NOFILTER [COMEDY] YouTube stars Grace Helbig, Hannah Hart and Mamrie Hart—all likable and funny gals— take to the stage for an evening of live standup. As the event’s name suggests, anything could happen.

Expect riffs on grilled cheese, Goldschläger, hair spray and Kanye West, and probably some comments about comments themselves.

Aladdin Theater, 3017 SE Milwaukie Ave., 234-9694. 7 pm. $25.

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

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FOOD & DRINK

By MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Editor: MARTIN CIZMAR. Email: dish@wweek.com. See page 3 for submission instructions.

Experience Lebanese cuisine at its best Bring this ad in for $10 off with a purchase of two entrees

Belly dancing Friday and Saturday evenings 223 SW STARK STREET PORTLAND, OR 503-274-0010 ALAMIRPORTLAND.COM

*certificate has no cash value nor can be exchanged. Not valid with any other offer, promotion or discount.

Karaoke 9pm nightly Hydro Pong Saturday night

Fun Indu Night!

Din Din Craft Fair

Following suit with luxury stores that have a champagne flute at the ready every time they catch a lingering whiff of Chanel No. 5, Courtney Sproule’s Din Din is hosting a craft fair with snacks and wine and cocktails. So you’re appropriately buttered up with (potentially) hot buttered drinks while you’re sifting through jewelry and leather and assorted items from local sorts like Emily Katz, Tomahawk and Annie McLaughlin.

Also, something we didn’t know that we learned from their press release? Din Din has a “curator.”

Her name’s Keia Booker. Huh. Din Din Supper Club, 920 NE Glisan St., 971-544-1350. 4-8 pm. $10.

Festibus Tour

Dragon Lounge

Chinese-American Restaurant

2610 SE 82nd at Division 503-774-1135 Ho Ti

THURSDAY, DEC. 19

FRIDAY, DEC. 20

I get HAPPY 4-6pm Tues-Fri $3 menu

Tuesdstaryy:

Read our story: canton-grill.com

The Portland Short Bus—so named because it’s a bus, and it’s short— will be taking people around to look at all the pretty, pretty lights at Portland International Raceway and Peacock Lane, interspersed with liquor at various bars. Because, honestly, the pretty lights are only all that pretty when you a) have children with you or b) are ragingly drunk and don’t actually have to deal with the traffic. Mandatory gift exchange.

BYOBooze. My Father’s Place, 523 SE Grand Ave., 971-209-2859. 7 pm.

Sold out. 21+.

SATURDAY, DEC. 21 Amnesia Solstice Sendoff

Jobs for the Food and Drink Industry Staffing solutions for owners and managers NYC/ CHI/ SFO/ SEA /PDX/ AUS

You’re going to need the beer.

Somehow it’s not actually winter until this day. Which, given the current lazy state of the mercury, is depressing as hell. It means it’s getting even colder. Also? As winter rolls in, Amnesia Brewing will be rolling out, to Washougal, Wash., exclusively. (One of their brewers, A. Rob Lutz, will be taking over the space and brewing a beer called Stormbreaker.) Beers from Double Mountain, Burnside, 10 Barrel and craploads more will be there. The event is a benefit for the cancer treatment of Brewpublic’s Angelo De Ieso II—so at least something, hopefully, gets better today.

Amnesia Brewing Company, 832 N Beech St., 281-7708. Noon-10 pm. $10, includes a commemorative glass and five drink tickets. $1 additional tickets. 21+.

TUESDAY, DEC. 24 Untitled-2 1

6/10/12 9:41 AM

Vegan Dishes Available

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

REVIEW ASHLEY ANDERSON

= WW Pick.

Highly recommended.

Cheap-Ass Christmas Eve

Look, Christmas is freaking expensive. So when the friends are in town and wanting to drink the local Portland brew, do so cheaply.

Every week EastBurn has between six and 10 of its 19 taps dialed back to $2.50 a pint. And dear lord, there is no better time to be a penny-pinching drunk who drinks good beer than on Christmas Eve. Remember when you made off like a bandit every Christmas? Like, relatives you didn’t even know gave you money, and that’s pretty much all you heard from them? That was awesome, but it’s over. Now you’re the one sending checks in the mail, and you’re drinking $2.50 beers.

Merry Christmas. EastBurn, 1800 E Burnside St., 236-2876. 4 pm-2 am. $2.50 per beer.

YOUR MEAT, MADAME: The grilled carne platter at Teote.

TEOTE Teote bills itself as an areperia, after the Venezuelan corn cakes that accompany most of the plates on the menu. But that’s a bit like calling a Chinese restaurant a rice house. However delightfully buttered and crisped, the arepas—much like the food at certain Russian restaurants—are a front. Leaving aside the handful of vegetarian options, this two-story Ladd’s Addition eatery is a high, unholy temple of meat, painted inside and out like a roll of tropical-fruit Life Savers.

The guy who greeted us in the ordering line was quick to point out that Teote—short for “the ends of the earth”—was not authentic Venezuelan food. It is instead a paint pot of various South American grilling traditions and Pacific Northwest sensibilities, Order this: La Cena Grilled Carne leading to lovely concoctions like ($38). the El Diablo ($6.50), crisped I’ll pass: Vegetarian items. pork belly in a sweeter-than-hot Best deal: Any of the $5.50-$6.50 chili maple sauce that absorbs arepa bowls. pickled onions and queso fresco into its caramelized, umamidrenched stew. It is a shameless Latinized rendition of General Tso’s, and it can be eaten with or without the halved arepas that stand at attention in its bowl like toast popped out of a toaster.

The simpler Pabellon arepa bowl—$6.50 worth of pulled beef, peppers and black beans, minus the rice that would have accompanied the dish in Venezuela—may best the El Diablo with its sweetness, balance and sheer tenderness, though you might want to avail yourself of the pleasantly blistering, fresh serrano sauce that’s hotter than the shop’s watery habanero.

The highlights on the menu, however, are the Mas Comida (“more food”) meat slabs, in particular a thick habanero-soaked pork chop ($14 with sides) that manages, with its gently spicy citrus sauce, to feel juicier than a fruit. The duplex of grilled lamb chops with morita pepper ($16), a variation on chipotle, are earthy and satisfying—the smoky notes of morita peppers combine with the grassiness of lamb so naturally it’s a wonder that they aren’t paired more often.

But however stunning the meats and stews, the sides can disappoint: The plantains were both dry and a bit undercooked, the cabbage salad mere cabbage, the greens stinting with their citrus dressing, the rice soaked in cloying sweet lime. (The beans, however, are lovely.)

So, advice: If you want stews with arepas, order singly and skip the sides. If you want the big cuts of grilled meat—and believe me, you do—order the $38 dinner for three even if you’re a pair, and receive the aforementioned pork and lamb, charred short ribs with a needle of serrano spice and side-dish filler. The ensuing decadence is thrilling, especially when accompanied by the brisk slap of a mango-habanero agua fresca laced with tequila.

That gong-sized platter is a beautiful reminder that from burgers to Lexington sweet-vinegar barbecue to Argentinian-Brazilian asado traditions, the Americas’ devotion to the beef and pork grill has perhaps been our greatest contribution to the world food lexicon. And as Teote demonstrates, it’s a worthy claim to fame.

MATTHEW KORFHAGE. EAT: Teote, 1615 SE 12th Ave., 971-888-5281, teotepdx.com. 11 am-11 pm Tuesday-Sunday.

FOOD & DRINK

Lavish Buffets of Indian Cuisine

JEREK HOLLENDER

REVIEW

Exotic Dishes of Lamb, Chicken, Goat Gluten-Free, Vegetarian, Vegan Options

DOUBLE DIP: Trinket’s French dip sandwich is more populist than the fare at its predecessor, the Kingdom of Roosevelt.

TRINKET SERVES CHEERY BRUNCH IN A DIM DEN OF HORNS AND SILVER.

eggs ($14) was rich with bacon pieces, thyme, onion and a dollop of chevre. Both are excellent— though, for my money, not quite worth double Waffle Window prices.

BY M A RT I N C I Z M A R mcizmar@wweek.com The French dip sandwich ($11), on the other hand, is peerless. A tall pile of moist sliced roast In August, wild-eyed chef Eric Bechard surren- beef topped with a tangle of sweet carameldered the Kingdom of Roosevelt after only six ized onions and a slick of spicy horseradish on months in business. The ambitious native-foods a toasted Grand Central roll, it’s juicy enough menu apparently out-weirded Portland with without the broth. After a few dips of extra wood-pigeon liver custard and a stew topped umami, and an excellent side of greens cooked with a pigeon head clutching a sprig of rosemary in chili and onion, I was sated until dinner. The in its mouth. Failing to attract crowds, and with fall hash ($10) of potatoes, parsnips and carrots autumn descending, Bechard left the lease in the blanketed by two sunny-side-up eggs was nearly care of proteges who promised to replace it with as filling but not as satisfying.

Trinket does much of its own pastry baking, “something cool for people in the neighborhood.”

Bechard now runs an Astoria sandwich shop. His with a daily selection displayed on a chalkformer Kingdom now houses a cozy brunch nook board. It’s hit-and-miss. The little pistachio rolls ($2 each) aren’t to be missed—they’re called Trinket.

Trinket quickly proved itself both useful and compact morsels of nutty joy. On the other popular. In Southeast’s sea of sausage gravy, hand, Norwegian-inspired fyrstekake ($5), a dense, herbal bread flavored it’s the rare brunch spot that with cardamom and almond, comforts without heavily didn’t do anything for me, larded pandering. It pushes Order this: French dip sandwich ($11) with greens and pistachio rolls ($2). and the housemade pear people ever so gently—think Best deal: Polenta with steamed eggs butter served with the wheat duck eggs Benedict, not deer and kale ($10). toast ($3) tasted a lot like heart tartare—and, within a I’ll pass: Fyrstekake ($5). sugar-free jam. month, it had a line on SaturFo r t h e f e w s u b j e c t s o f day mornings.

Trinket’s menu is broad and varied, but Bechard’s old Kingdom, much of Trinket’s intethe dish that first won me over was a basic but rior is familiar, and oddly so. I’ll not soon forget inventive preparation of kale, polenta and eggs the mismatched silver I used to eat raw deer ($10). Runny eggs drip down on stewed greens heart or the antler chandelier that hung above, flavored with onions, garlic and mushrooms. At but the dark wood and horned skulls are at odds the bottom of the dogpile, there’s a hearty por- with Trinket’s cheery fare. This extends to Trinridge of yellow-white polenta. Everything about ket’s beverage list, which includes several leftthe dish works, and it offers perhaps the best over sour beers and a $40 bottle of Willamette balance of fiber, protein and fat of any breakfast Valley brut rosé. I suspect the remaining bottles of Upright’s Billy the Mountain barrel-aged old platter in town.

On the carbier side, waffles of Belgian heft get ale will cellar into next summer before there are savory and sweet treatments. The sweet version enough oddball brunchers to finish them off.

Trinket will probably last long enough to ($10) on our first visit had some of the season’s last peaches, sauteed, with a puddle of heavy sell them all. When they do, they should pop cream whipped gently and to a consistency only some champagne and take down the rest of the slightly fluffier than aerated ice cream. It’s since antlers. been replaced with a fancy version of banana and Nutella. The “savory” topped with two over-easy EAT: Trinket, 2035 SE 39th Ave., 477-4252,

MUSIC PG. 33

HAND-ME-DOWN

Namaste

Parkrose since 2009 8303 NE Sandy Blvd 503-257-5059 Vancouver since 2001 6300 NE 117th Ave 360-891-5857

NamasteIndianCuisine.com

trinketpdx.com. 8 am-3:30 pm.

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

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FOOD & DRINK DRANK EXTRA

PORTLAND’S BREAKSIDE BREWERY MADE 100 DIFFERENT BEERS THIS YEAR. WE ASKED BEN EDMUNDS TO PICK FIVE FAVORITES AND FIVE DUDS.

By M a r t i n C i z M a r

MCizMar@wweek .com

It’s Friday night and a cabal of Portland beer writers are gathered in the back room of a chilly Milwaukie warehouse.

All these important beer people—familiar names like Lisa Morrison, Ezra Johnson-Greenough, Abe GoldmanArmstrong, Adrienne So and Rob Maletis—made their way to this suburban industrial park for a preview of the 100th beer Breakside made in 2013. The century beer is called Safe Word, a massive triple IPA in the mold of Pliny the Younger, weighing in at over 11 percent alcohol and dryhopped to the point of extravagance.

The brewery averaged two new beers a week all year long. The most impressive part of Breakside’s project isn’t the sheer number of beers—it released 83 in 2012 and 92 in 2011—but the fact that the brewery did it while also putting a small selection of bottles into wide circulation. Oh, and 62 of those 100 are brand-new recipes. When you’re experimenting so regularly, not everything will work. Yale- and Siebel-educated Breakside brewmaster Ben Edmunds has been transparent about admitting when his brews don’t come out how he wants. We asked him to tell us about his own favorite and least favorite Breakside beers of the year.

Here are Edmunds’ notes:

BEN’S BOTTOM FIVE Duck Duck Drunk Porter Easily our most ambitious experiment—a porter made with 100 pounds of roasted duck!—finished as a very nice porter, with nary a hint of duckiness. The beer that went into fermentation had an intense umami flavor, like a rich duck consommé. But as yeast flavors broke down the meat-flavored compounds in the beer, we were left with something that was very expensive to make and lacking the flavor profile we sought. Perhaps some of our customers were relieved—it was a very rich porter—but this was the most off-target beer we made this year. I’m working on how to make our meat beers meatier in 2014.

Hopfenbier Two years ago, we had the idea to make a version of our

Imperial Sour Apricot Developing sour beers with a wide range of acid levels was another project of mine this year. I wanted to explore beers that were extremely tart as well as beers that used acid in a supporting way. This Imperial Sour Apricot was a blend of an imperial golden ale and 15 percent sour golden ale, fermented entirely on apricots.

Perhaps the fruit wasn’t ripe enough or the 15 percent was too low, but this beer failed to deliver on any of its three names.

Munich Dunkel and Oatmeal Stout There are some classic styles that we still struggle to produce in a masterful way. Despite following very traditional guidelines for water, malt and fermentation, our Dunkel came off too sweet. Similarly, the Oatmeal Stout was a mess of malts that never really came together for me. Next time these two come around, they’ll be retooled to hopefully be exemplars of their style.

BEN’S FAVORITE FIVE Wanderlust IPA Our director of brewing operations, Jacob Leonard, knocked it out of the park with this golden IPA. Since its release in late September, people have been clamoring for it, and it’s rapidly catching up to our regular IPA in sales. I love that we have two very dry IPAs showcasing how different “big” hop flavor can be in our stable of full-time beers.

October Ale and Smallwares Saison These two collaboration beers challenged me to design beers in ways that I normally wouldn’t. We brewed October Ale, a “caramel malt stout,” with Ben Kehs of Deschutes for BenFest, a festival celebrating Portland’s many brewers named Ben. The malty, rich and roasty caramel notes created a beautifully full beer. Smallwares Saison was a beer inspired by a dish on Johanna Ware’s menu—a scallop sashimi with pink peppercorn, aji amarillo and lychee. We ditched the scallops but kept the spices, and the layering of flavors worked out beautifully.

Pilsner and American Lager We made a number of different lagers this year—probably as many as any other Oregon brewery except Full Sail—

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

EMMa BroWNE

100 KEGS OF BEER ON THE WALL

IPA using all German malts and hops. What would happen if we used German hops the way American brewers use American hops? Could we get tremendous hop flavor and aroma that had previously not been discovered?

Two years ago, the answer was yes. This year, when we changed the hops and added aroma hops from New Zealand, we found ourselves with a muddled herbal and fruity mess of hop flavors.

BEN THERE, BREWED THAT: Ben Edmunds heads a Breakside crew that made 100 different beers in 2013.

and these two were my favorites. Pilsner is a beer that we’ve tweaked ever so gently since we started brewing on our new system. Sam Barber’s take on an American adjunct lager—he brewed it with six-row barley, rice and corn—was as true to the style as it could be. It was my shift beer for months and proof that you can make PBR in a small basement brewery.

Passionfruit Sour This is a beer that we started brewing in May of 2012 and have retooled a number of times to get the acidity, fruit and finish just right. While it was a bit of a risk to jump from a three-barrel batch of sour beer to a 30-barrel batch without any recipe testing, we couldn’t have been happier with the results, and the fact that this beer won a medal at [the Great American Beer Festival] was just icing on the cake.

GO: Breakside Brewery has taprooms in Northeast Portland, 820 NE Dekum St., 719-6475, and Milwaukie, 5821 SE International Way. Edmunds blogs at breakside.com.

New Balance Portland Bridgeport Village 7385 SW Bridgeport Rd., Tigard • 503-808-9400 NewBalancePortland.com

MUSIC

dec. 18-24 PROFILE

= WW Pick. Highly recommended.

C O U R T E S Y O F M . K E v I N I N C R O YA B L E

Prices listed are sometimes for advance ticket sales. At-the-door increases and socalled convenience charges may apply. Event lineups are subject to change after WW’s press deadlines.

Editor: MATTHEW SINGER. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, go to wweek.com/ submitevents and follow submission directions. All shows should be submitted two weeks or more in advance of event. Press kits, CDs and especially vinyl can be sent to Music Desk, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Please include show or release date information with all physical mailings. Email: msinger@wweek.com.

Fax: 243-1115.

WEDNESDAY, DEC. 18 Old Age, Us Lights, Mothertapes

[BRAINIAC ROCK] Wax Fingers is dead. The beloved Portland krautrock trio disbanded last summer, but not all is lost. Introducing Mothertapes, made up of former Fingers Tommy Franzen and Pete Bosack. The experimental duo has only a few demo tracks to its name, but the same kinetic and highly percussive psych rock is at the core of its creation.

Mothertapes is jittery and involved like Battles, but floats in a more distant realm thanks to a fondness for mind-altering guitar-and-drums synchronization. Hard rock-’n’-roll favorites Old Age headline. MARK STOCK. Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison St., 2397639. 8:30 pm. $5. 21+.

Sun Angle, XDS, Summer Cannibals

[CHAOTIC DANCE PUNK] Bands usually give especially elated performances when booked with their friends. This is one such show: Sun Angle posted on Facebook that it will be giving free high-fives all night. The trio’s dependably irreverent stage antics should fuel that friendly fire.

Its sound is a jam-packed tidal wave, confusing at first, but it demands you let it wash over you. XDS produces a refined version of chaos, with a textural approach that is intriguing without being overwhelming. LYLA ROWEN. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $8. 21+.

Rustie, Chrome Wolves, Gang$ign$

CHRIS ODOM

[AQUACRUNK] I’m really not sure what’s in Scotland ’s water. It might be a better question for a scotch distiller, or for Rustie, who makes jams he labels “aquacrunk.” It’s a little obnoxious to hype your own genre,

but he’s certainly onto something.

Call it whatever you like: The Scottish sound is unique, taking club-worthy hip-hop, introducing a lot more melody, building to a drop and then suddenly slowing it all down. On both “Triadzz” and “Slasherr,” he hasn’t so much mastered the formula as buried it away. There are so many samples, layers and build-ups it can be hard to remember this is mostly just hip-hop with a little water added. MITCH LILLIE. Rotture, 315 SE 3rd Ave., 2345683. 9 pm. $12. 21+.

THURSDAY, DEC. 19 Future Historians, Ozarks, Charts

[MOOD ROCK] Nobody writes songs quite like Future Historians mastermind Dave Shur. His work bounds between forlorn longing and playful goofballery with such ease, it’s often hard to decide whether to laugh or cry. With two albums under its belt and one in the hopper, the band is among PDX’s tightest, most invigorating bands. It’s also one of the most overlooked, and that’s a goddamn shame. Shifting effortlessly between joyous pop rock, folksy lullabies and straight-up rock, it’s a rare band that can evoke, in one sitting, peak Paul Simon, David Byrne, Nick Jaina and some busted-down cowboy and emerge with something unlike anything else out there. Which is to say, Future Historians is waiting for you to discover it is your favorite band. AP KRYZA. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $10.

21+.

Swahili, Wishyunu

[PSYCHEDELIC DANCE] Exploring transcendental topics with its sound and album art, Portland’s Swahili has

CONT. on page 35

INTRODUCING...

UNICORN DOMINATION

BY GRACE STAINBACK

Who: Chelsea Unicorn, Lucia Luna, Clint “ClickAttack” Harvard.

Sounds like: ’80s French electro processed with glitter, Lucky Charms and a black widow spider.

For fans of: Air, Massive Attack, Goldfrapp.

Why you care: Founding member Chelsea Unicorn has been an avid painter for years, and she manifests her passion for multimedia in Unicorn Domination’s theatrical music videos, live production and general swag. Just take the videos for “Babblestacks”—featuring adolescent girls solemnly bending every which way in unison, Chelsea purring in a sexy fur coat and bare-chested drummer ClickAttack ablaze in glitter— or the haunting “SPKR,” in which Chelsea channels Gaga head-on, clutching an animal skull and gazing dramatically into nowhere and everywhere through mussy hair and bedroom eyes. “I’m fascinated by culture, art and all mediums,” Unicorn says. “Soundscapes and visuals are all intertwined for me, and I try to bring that multitextured approach to my work.” The sound is hypnotizing electro-pop, but the group isn’t all about the glitter, leotards and, well, unicorns: There is a tangible, trip-hop-inspired darkness to Unicorn Domination’s sound, enhanced by Chelsea’s reverb-heavy coos. Not just a release party for the group’s sophomore album, DRAZA, Thursday’s show will be your last chance to catch Unicorn Domination live in its hometown for some time. They’ve got a one-way ticket to Asia in January, with plans to tour for several months.

SEE IT: Unicorn Domination plays Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison St., with vice Device and SHK THT, on Thursday, Dec. 19. 8:30 pm. $5.

21+.

ONSTaGE HOmEmaDE: m. Kevin Incroyable (foreground) and Le Orchestre d’Incroyable.

THE GAS MASK ANTHEMS ONE SOCIETY’S JUNK IS L’ORCHESTRE D’INCROYABLE’S FOLK MUSIC. BY dAV e c A N TOR

243-2122

Traipsing through a Technicolor conception of our generation’s Old Weird America, some trashed would-be troubadour crops up with a pair of suspenders helping keep his pants at about waist level.

The pants may at one time have belonged to someone’s grandfather. On occasion, the guy wears a gas mask, too.

M. Kevin Incroyable isn’t a transient. But he does take it on the road, working to spread his stumbling take on Americana—one that’s tempered by punky intentions and subservient to a netherworldly cabaret show.

“There’s usually some burlesque. There’s some magic. And there’s always music,” the bandleader says over the phone from his Seattle home, going on to describe the time-warped scene he and his band, L’Orchestre d’Incroyable, inhabit. “There’s something very vital about it, even though it could be more stodgy than a punk party, because people are all dressed up.”

Last time the band hit Dante’s, it saw fit to bring along a few dancers. Though women aren’t slated to be in various stages of undress this time around, Incroyable might substitute a licentious verse for that missing visual experience. Or his band might just delve into a selection of gospel tunes.

Because of that wide berth, Incroyable, whether fronting the orchestra or performing as half of the Peculiar Pretzelmen, finds himself playing alongside some dissimilar groups.

“I think people don’t know what to do with us yet,” he says. “We have an upright bassist, a cello and a guy playing banjo. So, I guess, there’s an inevitable association [with folk music]. But there’s a theremin player, and our drummer’s a stoner-rock drummer.”

Adding to the general confusion is the band’s appearance. Donning those gas masks makes for a difficult fit on some folksy bills. But Incroyable says it’s not just for show.

“There’s an ongoing performance experiment I’m perpetuating that follows the bomb-shelter

band, traveling from city to city, carrying messages of dying societies in folk tale and song form,” he says. “Orchestre d’Incroyable was formed to embody this concept. And we have, on occasion, gone to great aesthetic and conceptual lengths to manifest the metaphor.”

The purposeful pastiche of culture started for Incroyable during his teens, when he gigged in Philly punk acts. The form proved too limiting, and the bandleader eventually found himself hooking up with some other folks.

“I started working with a couple of hip-hop groups in Philly around the time I started to get really enthusiastic about there not being rules about what sounds go together,” he says. “For this track, the drums’ll be tap dancing. For this track, there’ll be piano.”

Incroyable’s prismatic view of complimentary sounds colors his choice of instruments as well.

He makes many of them himself: It’s relatively low-rent—in part what attracted him—but building cigar-box guitars enables the multi-instrumentalist to fully realize the music he hears in his head.

“I’ve come across a lot of them,” Incroyable says of encountering various homemade stringed instruments. “I had an idea…from having played some that other people owned. The first one I made, I used a Leatherman [multitool]. That was my only tool.” That first attempt at working up a handmade guitar didn’t go too well, but with the orchestra, Incroyable plays a pair of instruments he made, each “tuned esoterically.”

The ensemble’s 2014 release schedule is a bit more tangible than its leader’s theories on music, though. A forthcoming series of six EPs, which will be released bimonthly, comes with a few subscription options. And since it’s Incroyable, there’s some novel scheme pushing through the project.

“We’re doing a home delivery service within a certain range. If you pay a little extra, we’ll come deliver [the records] to you. For a little bit extra, we’ll sing for you,” he says. “We’re trying to see if people want to pay a lot extra. We’ll show up and make you a sandwich or wash your car.”

SEE IT: L’Orchestre d’Incroyable plays Dante’s, 350 W Burnside St., with SDM and Strangled Darlings, on Thursday, Dec. 19. 9 pm. $5. 21+.

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MUSIC

The Lower 48, Minden, Tango Alpha Tango

untamed beasts: sallie Ford and the sound Outside plays doug Fir Lounge on Friday and saturday, dec. 20-21. been known for its global approach to noise and drone. Recently, though, the band has headed in a more danceable direction. Drawing from ’70s space disco and moody postpunk, newest track “Vestal” has the dissonant qualities of Swahili’s earlier music but without the lulls. It also added dub beats. This night is set up to be a party: Wishyunu’s upbeat spaciness should reiterate the desire to dance. LYLA ROWEN. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 2883895. 9 pm. Free. 21+.

X, the Blasters

[ROOTS PUNK] In his indispensable book Rip It Up and Start Again: Post-Punk 1978-1984, author Simon Reynolds suggests that punk’s “roots revival” of the early ’80s, epitomized

by L.A. bands X and the Blasters, was a reaction to the English invasion led by the Sex Pistols and the Clash. He infers that the embrace of unmistakably American idioms like blues and country represented a regressive move at a time when forward-facing British groups like Joy Division and Gang of Four were working to expand punk’s sonic boundaries. Maybe there’s some truth to that theory, but so what? Have you heard the combined oeuvre of these two? The first four X albums comprise some of the best music of the ’80s—period—and while the Blasters don’t quite have a signature record, the Alvin Brothers’ revved-up take on midcentury rock ’n’ roll remains thrillingly vital and, like the music that inspired it, utterly timeless. MATTHEW SINGER. Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., 224-2038. 8 pm. $21.50 general admission, $35 reserved balcony. 21+.

The Satin Chaps, Jeni Wren

[NEO-SOUL] Jeni Wren experienced a recent spike in local recognition with a stint as backup singer in Portland R&B baby-making outfit Shy Girls. She isn’t performing with the group for now, which is fine, because although she’s a great team player, Wren has her own career to attend to. The sultry singer’s first solo release, North Star, is a solid collection of martini-sipping, jazz lounge-ready, soul-influenced tracks.

It should pair nicely as a chilled-out primer for the swinging, retro-minded go-go of fellow local faves the Satin Chaps. GRACE STAINBACK. Secret Society Ballroom, 116 NE Russell St. 9 pm. $7. 21+.

Club Chemtrail 12: Kingdom, Massacooramaan, SPF666, Commune

[POST-BASS] In 2009, dubstep— and all the similar micro-genres it ate up in its bloated pursuit of heavier drops and wobblier synths—needed a new direction. Creativity was scarce, until L-Vis 1990 and Bok Bok’s Night Slugs EP. The album helped jumpstart the eponymous London-based label, which soon began snatching up forward-thinking bass-centric producers from across the world. The

first American was L.A.’s Kingdom, and his hits have been stacking up ever since. “Bank Head ” is the latest, released earlier this year on another spinoff, Fade to Mind. Military snares and claps push along singer Kelela’s jazzy, helium-infused vocals, and it’s beautiful and bassy—just don’t call it dubstep. MITCH LILLIE. The Rose, 111 SW Ash St., 971-544-7330. 10 pm. $6. 21+.

FRIDAY, DEC. 20 Holiday Sweater Spectacular: Portland Cello Project

[MERRY CELLOS] Portland Cello Project has established itself as a genre-blending act to say the least, its cover repertoire ranging from Kanye to Radiohead to Beck. This season, though, sees the flock of cellists trying its hand at winter-themed arrangements under the release of the Winter (The Best Nine Months of the Year) EP. Fleet Foxes’ “White Winter Hymnal” might not exactly scream “Merry Christmas,” but you can also expect arrangements of classics like the flurried, horn-tinged “Carol of the Bells” and the lively Spanish carol “Riu Riu Chiu.” The winter-sweater theme continues from PCP holiday shows past, and, this year, the group is joined by Oregon Symphony principal cellist Nancy Ives, Tuscon singer-songwriter Howe Gelb and local singers Laura Gibson and Laura Veirs. KAITIE TODD. Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 8 pm. $32.50$49. All ages.

Sons of Huns, Ancient Warlocks, Sleepcapsule, Red Cloud

[METAL] There’s not much to say about Sons of Huns that hasn’t been said already. The band has created a rowdy and raucous brand of garage rock that’s as frenetic on record as it is live. The trio’s Banishment Ritual LP is a tireless, skuzzy punk-metal hybrid that will be near the top of many Best of Portland year-end lists.

2014 should be an even bigger year for the guys, so this could be your last time to catch them in such an intimate (and loud) space. GEOFF NUDELMAN. Ash Street Saloon, 225 SW Ash St., 226-0430. 9 pm. $7. 21+.

Sallie Ford and the Sound Outside, the Kids

[THROWBACK POP ROCK] “You may think of me as just a little girl/ But I am here to prove you wrong” sings Sallie Ford on “Bad Boys.” And with her rockabilly swagger and the sharp growl in her vocals, you know she’s speaking the truth. Sallie Ford, accompanied by her band, the Sound Outside, is giving you the middle finger and really doesn’t care. On latest LP Untamed Beast, the four-piece continues the bluesy, early rock-’n’-roll sound established on 2011’s Dirty Radio, right down to

[THE GENRE FORMERLY KNOWN AS FOLK] The musical ambitions of the Lower 48 are a perfect mirror image of the personal aspirations that led the trio to Portland from Minneapolis: to get bigger, louder and more panoramic. Prior to joining the cultural gold rush of the Northwest, the Lower 48 managed a serviceable blend of male-female vocals over hushed guitars that brought to mind the ’60s sounds of the wideopen West—Gram Parsons, the Mamas and the Papas, et al. It’s only fitting that the move to Portland has added a much-needed swagger to its step, elevating the group to a plugged-in powerhouse that stomps through 4/4 numbers its prior Midwestern iteration may have stumbled over a few years back. PETE COTTELL. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $8 advance, $10 day of show. 21+.

End of the World Reunion: Justin Jay, Lassi, Ekoh, Bennyrox, Adventure Galley DJs

[HOUSE HIP-HOP] The world, like, didn’t end the first time. Former Portlander Lassi has rounded up a bunch of Best Coast talent for a reunion of the party that celebrated the nonstarter that was 2012’s Mayan apocalypse. The result is probably the most musically diverse show you’ll see this week. The locals representing this year are Whiskey Bar’s resident trap-master DJ Bennyrox and a DJ set from prog-poppers Adventure Galley. Lassi himself plays posi-vibe electro house, while Justin Jay—a prodigal DJ child who won numerous competitions as a teenager—spins deep house, completely opposite on the spectrum from Lassi.

MITCH LILLIE. Rotture, 315 SE 3rd Ave., 234-5683. 9 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+.

MUSIC

deeds and R&B relevance—around a digitized duet with her famous father. While the temptation to trade upon a royal ancestry needn’t be justified, the digitized duets only highlight her tendency to sweatily oversell jazz standards—hardly a level playing field, given that Nat essentially perfected the zipless croon—and further neglect her once significant popsoul legacy in favor of warmed-over retreads made, despite protestations, to be forgotten. JAY HORTON. Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 7:30 pm. $55$127. All ages.

Bel Mizik translates as “Beautiful Music” in Haitian French Creole, and its mostly Portland-bred members blend ethnic and geographic roots to produce rhythmic neo-soul. Bel Mizik will play alongside Balans, an all-Haitian group that remains firmly rooted in the traditional, fast-tempo style of kompa. You’re also instructed to wear red and white—not because those are the Haitian flag colors, but because, well, it’s Christmastime. GRACE STAINBACK. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $10. 21+.

Towers

SUNDAY, DEC. 22

[DOUBLE-BASS DESTROYERS] Towers are the Eolian Empire label’s low-end demons. The group comes armed with two basses and no guitars, and will rumble your chest enough to hold you over until it returns—which will, inevitably, not be for a long time. The band doesn’t play often but manages to keep the curiosity flowing in the heavy-music community. When will its debut album come out? No one knows! Just tell us already! Its track “Hell” was featured on this year’s Eolian Empire compilation, Keep Our Heads, and Towers has continued to smash through easy genre tags, along with everyone’s expectations. See you there. CAT JONES. Club 21, 2035 NE Glisan St., 235-5690. 9 pm. Free. 21+.

Bel Mizik, Balans

[HAITIAN X-MAS] Bel Mizik frontman Anael Jeannis may be the selfproclaimed “Haitian King of the West,” but his cozy stage candor and impassioned delivery on tracks like “Ghetto Gospel” liken him more to the Buddha of urban PDX soul.

Blesst Chest, Night Mechanic, Rllrbll

[PDX PROG] This year saw Rllrbll release 4 Corners, its 37th studio album (that’s an exaggeration, but only slightly), an ode to a real area in the Southwest where pianistvocalist Mae Starr makes semiannual pilgrimages. Some of the tunes sound appropriately pastoral, if blissfully damaged by krautrock. Other moments are positively New Wave, punk and funked-out and informed by myriad strains of experimental rock. You’ll never fit Rllrbll in a box, and why would you want to? Also appearing tonight is the instrumental prog supergroup Blesst Chest, featuring members of the Jicks, the Joggers and 31 Knots playing short, busy tunes that free them from the aesthetic confines of their day bands.

NATHAN CARSON. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 8 pm. $5. 21+.

CONT. on page 36

PREVIEW FREDRIK ETOALL

COURTESY OF BILLIONS

the simple drum shuffles, tinny electric guitar and booming bursts of upright bass. Only this time around, Ford ’s striking vocals are even more at the forefront, as she snarls, hollers and struts her way through songs mostly revolving around those good old standbys of sex and rebellion.

KAITIE TODD. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $15. Sallie Ford also plays Doug Fir Lounge on Saturday, Dec. 21. 21+.

thursday-sunday

Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project Benefit: Disemballerina, Hang the Old Year, Strangeweather

[HIPPY CVLT] Portland’s only acoustic metal group, Disemballerina, pokes its head out of its shell with the frequency of a lunar eclipse. So it comes as little surprise that this appearance is at a rarely used locale, and for a cause so specific. The gig is a benefit for the Blue Mountains Biodiversity project (read: save endangered species and their habitat from man’s meddling encroachment) and it takes place at Velo Cult, which is half bike shop, half bar. Also appearing is Hang the Old Year, the heavy post-rock alter ego of Burials’ Benjamin Caragol. Pedal on down and enjoy the bands, as well as a brief presentation from Blue Mountains founder Karen Coulter. NATHAN CARSON. Velo Cult, 1969 NE 42nd Ave., 922-2012. 7 pm. $5-$20 suggested donation. All ages.

SATURDAY, DEC. 21 Natalie Cole, Oregon Symphony

[A MERRY OLD SOUL] For her first appearance with the Oregon Symphony since Valentine’s Day two years back, Natalie Cole promises yet another holiday concert twinned to her massive back catalog and, much as her second career’s been borne upon Hallmark romanticism, the late discography looks a lot like Christmas. 2008’s Caroling, Caroling arrived as a perfectly serviceable stroll through the usual suspects built—like nearly all of her notable work since that early ’90s turn away from drug-addled mis-

MusicfestNW presents: Icona Pop, K. Flay, Sirah [POP TRIUMPHALISM] Banging into the global consciousness in 2012 with summer jam nonpareil “I Love It,” 20-something Swedes Caroline Hjelt and Aino Jawo have finally released a debut album proper, This Is…Icona Pop, a collection of balls-to-the-wall club hits alongside rather more mature (and skippable) power balladry—think t.A.T.u You. If the similarly styled empowerment anthems never quite reach the bonkers heights of that first single-cum-mission statement, they’re still leaping madly all the while. The music snaps and crackles with anime ebullience, casual hauteur and clubland sweat cinched together for a madcap frolic through darkened boulevards. It is the stuff of youth: adrenalized, commodified and, blessedly, digitized for our amusement and, in its way, our edification. Don’t diminish Icona Pop as just another bubble rising upward from a Diet Pepsi generation that believes caffeinated effervescence and manufactured disposability are birthrights. The end product’s less than reflective, perhaps, but the same hyper-attuned connectivity that sees no emotion wasted breeds an all-inclusive muse seething with precision and awareness.

In the bleakest view, they’ve inherited a world of fun-sized spectacle— an ecosystem drenched in artificial sweetener—and we’re a species famously keen to adapt. Set adrift on an ocean of pop, we should neither be surprised to discover they’ve a mighty thirst nor disappointed to learn it is loved. JAY HORTON. Wonder Ballroom, 128 N Russell St., 284-8686. 8 pm Friday, Dec. 20. $23 advance, $25 day of show. All ages.

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MUSIC

SUNDAY/CLASSICAL, ETC.

Divers, Street Eaters, Fine Pets

[HOARSE POP PUNK] Portland’s Divers might only have a 7-inch single to its name, but its live shows alone have people buzzing.

The quartet’s catalog features the kind of heart-on-your-sleeve pop rock that would fi ll Springsteen and the boys of the Gaslight Anthem with a wee bit of envy and terminal lust. Like any live act worth mentioning, the Brothers Rapp—that is, lead singer Harrison and guitarist Seth Rapp—aren’t afraid to throw in moments of delicate fi ngerpicking and raw emotion alongside their feisty, distortionfueled choruses and signature carry-on mentality. Seven-inch singles and Jersey-boy comparisons aside, Divers is a sonic fl urry of its own creation. The duo is joined here by lo-fi Portland dream-garage act Fine Pets, who released an indeed fi ne tape of self-immolated C86-style indie pop earlier this year. BRANDON WIDDER. The Know, 2026 NE Alberta St., 473-8729. 8 pm. Call venue for ticket information. 21+.

CLASSICAL, JAZZ & WORLD Mark O’Connor

[APPALACHIA CHRISTMAS] One of America’s most honored musicians, Mark O’Connor remains the only person to win the National Fiddle Championship, the National Guitar Flatpicking Championship and the World Mandolin Championship, and those are only a few of the dozens of awards the Seattle-born virtuoso has garnered over the past three decades.

Also a composer of everything from string quartets to concertos to symphonies, and a major studio player, O’Connor has developed a new stringed-instrument teaching method based on American music. He’s bringing his method to Portland, along with a sextet featuring Cia Cherryholmes and Carrie Rodriguez, to apply his warm blend of country, folk and classical music (in the vein of his popular “Appalachia Waltz”) to Christmas songs. BRETT CAMPBELL. Scottish Rite Center, 1512 SW Morrison St., 332-2714. 8 pm Friday, Dec. 20. $10-$45.

106 Keys

[20TH-CENTURY JEWISH CLASSICAL] This new duo featuring pianist Beth Karp (who’s starred at several Classical Revolution PDX events) and fl utist Amalia Blumberg (a onetime member of Israel’s Jewish Arab Orchestra) is dedicated to promoting Jewish music in Portland.

That’s a pretty broad portfolio.

Their debut concert includes music

by American minimalist pioneer Philip Glass; 20th-century French composer Darius Milhaud (who helped return popular music infl uences to classical sounds); Pragueborn composer Erwin Schulhoff, a student of Debussy’s and who incorporated jazz, ragtime and avant-garde infl uences into his dazzling palette before dying in a Nazi concentration camp; 20thcentury Israeli composer Paul Ben- Haim; and, happily, Portland’s own musical eminence, David Schiff. It proudly does not include holiday music. BRETT CAMPBELL. Portland Piano Company, 711 SW 14th Ave., 775-2480. 7 pm Saturday, Dec. 21. $10 suggested donation. 21+.

Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble, Kerry Politzer Quintet [LOCAVORE JAZZ] One of the city’s most valuable newmusic institutions, PCJE hosts performances, runs a record label and inspires Portland jazzers to create new, accessible homegrown chamber music for ensembles large and small. With the departure of London-bound founder and pianist Andrew Oliver, the present-

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

ing agency has rebooted with new leadership in PSU prof Charley Grey and an infusion of recent arrivals and veteran city musicians.

Four new pieces inspired by paintings from 20th-century abstract master Wassily Kandinsky will be displayed during the ensemble’s performance. The concert includes brand new music by pianist James Miley, guitarist Ryan Meagher (whose new album on the PCJE label is a winner), trombonist Lars Campbell and trumpeter Thomas Barber. Another welcome, recent arrival, pianist Kerry Politzer, opens the show. BRETT CAMPBELL. Secret Society Ballroom, 116 NE Russell St. 9 pm Saturday, Dec. 21. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21+.

Nowell Syng We: Songs and Carols From Medieval England

[MEDIEVAL ENGLISH CHRISTMAS]

Sure, you can go hear any number of concerts featuring the usual carols and other familiar holiday fare. Or you can experience rare, spellbindingly beautiful, seasonal songs from more than a half-century ago—from ancient English sources, including the Selden carol book and Ritson manuscript—and the world premiere of a brand new work by one of the greatest living choral composers, England’s Ivan Moody. The piece was commissioned and sung by the incomparable In Mulieribus octet, featuring some of the fi nest female singers in Oregon. Or you can do both. But this is certainly the top classical choral or vocal pick of Portland ’s holiday season. BRETT CAMPBELL. St. Philip Neri Church, 2408 SE 16th Ave., 764-7525. 7 pm Sunday, Dec. 22. See inmulieribus.org for ticket information.

ALBUM REVIEWS

BOMBS INTO YOU SHAKE (SELF-RELEASED) [HOUSE-PARTY ELECTRO-POP] Some music just sounds like it’s meant to be played in a basement. On its previous EPs, Portland three-piece Bombs Into You created grungy, electronic house-party music—heavy on distortion, synthesizer, filtered vocals and little else. Three years later, the band’s first fulllength album, Shake, shows the group relying on the same basic tools, but building layers upon layers to produce something a little more self-assured and cohesive.

Shake thrives when guided by floating, atmospheric guitars and the pulsing, full-sounding synth hooks that wobble and entrance throughout the album, especially on “Dizzy Air”, “Save You” and “Play It On.” The standout track, “Six,” takes a basic piano line, glitches it up and builds into a simple beat, with bursts of low synths and one or two notes that call out through the performance.

At one point reaching a beautiful, melancholy sound not unlike that of Explosions in the Sky, it’s the first song on the album that’s clean in texture, and it’s a fun, catchy little thing.

At times, the band’s frenetic energy becomes overwhelmingly garbled. Those moments, however, are less frequent than the successful ones. Perhaps Bombs Into You is finally ready to move out of the basement. KAITIE TODD. SEE IT: Bombs Into You plays Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., with Souvenir Driver and Hong Kong Banana, on Sunday, Dec. 22. 9 pm. $6 advance, $8 day of show.

VARIOUS ARTISTS GEORGE JONES (TRIBUTE ALBUM) (DEER LODGE) [JONESIN’ FOR GEORGE] The late George Jones was a troubled man. By the 1970s, the country great was known as much for his crippling addictions, visits to the psych ward, occasional high-speed car chases and tendency to no-show gigs as he was for his music. His offstage antics rarely belied his merits as an artist and his standing as one of country’s best songwriters, all of which is whimsically captured on the Portland-studded George Jones (Tribute Album).

Though the album spans Jones’ five-decade-long catalog, it often plays it too safe. Neon Renaissance’s reggaefied rendition of “Golden Ring” and Sassparilla’s distortion-sodden opener, “White Lighting,” offer a nice reprieve, but only the latter finds real grounding. Still, the album has its moments. The lone guitar and distant voice of W.C. Beck’s “Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes” is admirably twee. Hook & Anchor’s fiddle-driven take on duet “We’re Gonna Hold On” imbues the shuffling country-gospel with an air of sincerity. The album does show the range of Jones’ catalog, but like many tribute albums, most songs just don’t hold a candle to the hard-drinking, heart-aching originals. BRANDON WIDDER. SEE IT: The George Jones Tribute Concert is at Landmark Saloon, 4847 SE Division St., on Friday, Dec. 20. 7 pm. Donations encouraged. 21+. See Music Calendar, page 39, for full lineup.

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

MUSIC CALENDAR

[DEC. 18-24]

= WW Pick. Highly recommended.

Editor: Mitch Lillie. TO HAVE YOUR EVENT LISTED, send show information at least two weeks in advance on the web at wweek.com/ submitevents or (if you book a specific venue) enter your events at dbmonkey.com/wweek. Press kits, CDs and especially vinyl can be sent to Music Desk, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Please include show or release date information with all physical mailings. Email: music@wweek.com.

McMenamins Rock creek Tavern

10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro Feathers and Friends

Mississippi Pizza

3552 N Mississippi Ave. Wildish, Ed Haynes

For more listings, check out wweek.com.

MICHAEL kUO

Mississippi Studios

3939 N Mississippi Ave. Swahili, Wishyunu

Mock crest Tavern 3435 N Lombard St. Bob Mader

Muddy Rudder Public House 8105 SE 7th Ave. Sleepy Eyed Johns

Roseland Theater

8 NW 6th Ave. X, the Blasters

Savoy Tavern & Lounge 2500 SE Clinton St. SUS

Secret Society Ballroom

116 NE Russell St. The Satin Chaps, Jeni Wren

Sellwood Public House 8132 SE 13th Ave. Open Mic

Shaker and Vine

2929 SE Powell Blvd.

PDXV

Sky club at Ankeny’s Well

50 SW 3rd Ave. Soundscape Thursdays: Julius Major, Final Frequency, Ryan Frakes, PIA!!

SWeATeR TO THe OLdIeS: The Portland cello Project’s Holiday Sweater Spectacular is at the Arlene Schnitzer concert Hall on Friday, dec. 20.

Wed. dec. 18 Al’s den at the crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave. Petty Cash

Alberta Rose Theatre 3000 NE Alberta St. Celtic Yuletide Concert: Magical Strings

Alberta Street Public House

Goodfoot Lounge

2845 SE Stark St. The Way Downs, Erotic City

Holocene

1001 SE Morrison St. Old Age, Us Lights, Mothertapes

Jimmy Mak’s

221 NW 10th Ave. The Mel Brown Quartet

1036 NE Alberta St. Songwriter’s Carousel: Alexander’s Real Time Band

Kells

Amadeus Manor

426 SW Washington St. Le Printemps, Moniker

2122 SE Sparrow St., Milwaukie Open Mic

Andina

1314 NW Glisan St. Toshi Onizuka

Ash Street Saloon

225 SW Ash St. The 63 Fremonts, Mouthbreather, the Iron Works

Biddy McGraw’s Irish Pub 6000 NE Glisan St. Stringed Migration

dante’s

350 W Burnside St. Wanderlust Social: Wanderlust Circus Orchestra, Jason Wells, Jon Dutch, Jenna Summer Smith

doug Fir Lounge

830 E Burnside St. Sean Wagner and the Ne’er Do Wells, McDougall, the Cabin Project

duff’s Garage

1635 SE 7th Ave. Suburban Slim’s Blues Jam

east end

203 SE Grand Ave. Long Hallways, Quiet Countries, DJ Tan’t

eastBurn

1800 E Burnside St. Amorus

112 SW 2nd Ave. Bill Tollner

Kelly’s Olympian

Kenton club

2025 N Kilpatrick St. Sing Sing Kill

Landmark Saloon

4847 SE Division St. Jake Ray & the Cowdogs

LaurelThirst

2958 NE Glisan St. Simon Tucker Blues Band, Will West & the Friendly Strangers

Lodge

6605 SE Powell Blvd Pete Ford Band Jam

Lola’s Room at the crystal Ballroom

1332 W Burnside St. Josh Cole and Friends Holiday Show: The Rainbow Sign, Robert Holladay, Erin Leiker

McMenamins edgefield 2126 SW Halsey St., Troutdale Henry Kammerer

McMenamins Rock creek Tavern

10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro Billy D

Mississippi Studios

3939 N Mississippi Ave. Sun Angle, XDS, Summer Cannibals

O’connor’s Vault

7850 SW Capitol Highway David Friesen Quintet

Reed college, eliot Hall chapel

3203 SE Woodstock Blvd December’s Tale: John Vergin

Revival drum Shop

1465 NE Prescott St. Moongriffin, Bernstein Duo, Lee Elderton

Shaker and Vine

2929 SE Powell Blvd.

Maria and Dylan

Sky club at Ankeny’s Well 50 SW 3rd Ave. Gaea Soul

Starday Tavern

6517 SE Foster Rd. Nico Wind

The Blue diamond

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Fenix Project

The elixir Lab

2738 NE Alberta St. Open Mic Nite

The Old church

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church: Michael Allen Harrison

Tony Starlight’s

3728 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Tony Starlight Christmas Extravaganza

Valentine’s

232 SW Ankeny St. Hands In, Brakemouth, Initials

White eagle Saloon

836 N Russell St. Brad Parsons, Mimi, the Knots

Wilfs Restaurant & Bar 800 NW 6th Ave. Ron Steen Band, Linda Michelet

THuRS. dec. 19 Al’s den at the crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave. Floating Pointe

Alhambra Theatre

4811 SE Hawthorne Blvd.

Best of Friends, Josh Withenshaw, Dylan Jakobsen

Andina

1314 NW Glisan St. Neftali Rivera

Andrea’s cha cha club 832 SE Grand Ave. Pilon D’Azucar Salsa Band

Ash Street Saloon

225 SW Ash St. Stein, the Lovely Lost, the Want Ads

Biddy McGraw’s Irish Pub 6000 NE Glisan St. Train River

Buffalo Gap eatery and Saloon 6835 SW Macadam Ave. Cashflow, French Cuffs, Garage Voice

camellia Lounge

510 NW 11th Ave. Erin Parra, Randy Porter

crystal Ballroom

1332 W Burnside St. Big Sandy and His FlyRite Boys, the Rainieros, Johnny7 and the Black Crabs, DJ Murphy

dante’s

350 W Burnside St. Le Orchestra De Incroyable, SDM, Strangled Darlings

doug Fir Lounge

830 E Burnside St. Future Historians, Ozarks, Charts

duff’s Garage

1635 SE 7th Ave. Boyd Small

Goodfoot Lounge

2845 SE Stark St. Grateful For Garcia: Cats Under the Stars, Grateful Buds

Hawthorne Theatre

1507 SE 39th Ave. Ghost Town Grey, Paint Me Perfect, An Effortless Approach, Between Chaos And Creation, What They Fear

Holocene

1001 SE Morrison St. Unicorn Domination, Vice Device, SHK THT

Ivories Jazz Lounge and Restaurant

1435 NW Flanders St. Tom Grant Vocal Showcase: Warren Floyd, Tom Grant

Starday Tavern

6517 SE Foster Rd. Jim Wallace, Ed Neumann

The Arbor Lodge

1507 N Rosa Parks Way Hanz Araki, Colleen Raney, Johnny B. Connolly, Cary Novotny (Vocoform benefit)

The Blue diamond

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

Ben Jones

The Blue Monk

3341 SE Belmont St. The Daubers, Anna Blair, Michael Finn

The Know

2026 NE Alberta St. Tiger House, Talkative

The Old church

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church: Michael Allen Harrison

Jade Lounge

The Press club

Jimmy Mak’s

Tiger Bar

2346 SE Ankeny St. Jamie Leopold

2621 SE Clinton St. Sus Quartet

Aladdin Theater

3017 SE Milwaukie Ave. Christine Lavin, Uncle Bonsai

Alberta Rose Theatre

3000 NE Alberta St. A Circus Carol: 3 Leg Torso, Wanderlust Circus

Andina

112 SW 2nd Ave. Coming Up Threes

1036 NE Alberta St. Mexican Gunfight 1314 NW Glisan St. Nat Hulskamp Trio

Arlene Schnitzer concert Hall

1037 SW Broadway Holiday Sweater Spectacular: Portland Cello Project

Ash Street Saloon

225 SW Ash St. Sons of Huns, Ancient Warlocks, Sleepcapsule, Red Cloud

Beaterville cafe

2201 N Killingsworth St. James Faretheewell, Sam Densmore

Biddy McGraw’s Irish Pub 6000 NE Glisan St. Counterfeit Cash, Cascadia Crescendo

Buffalo Gap eatery and Saloon 6835 SW Macadam Ave. Brian Grayson, Lance Kinnaird

camellia Lounge

510 NW 11th Ave. Rebecca Kilgore Holiday House Concert

club 21

2035 NE Glisan St. Big Eyes, Marriage Cancer, Wounds

clyde’s Prime Rib

5474 NE Sandy Blvd.

Ocean

crystal Ballroom

1332 W Burnside St. 1964, the Tribute

dante’s

350 W Burnside St. Rock For a Reason: The Shoestringers, Ike Fonseca, Johnny Madcap, Joey Briggs

doug Fir Lounge

east end

1201 SW Jefferson St. Alan Jones Academy Jazz Jam

LaurelThirst

White eagle Saloon

4847 SE Division St. The Pickups 2958 NE Glisan St. Dust & Thirst, Ashleigh Flynn & Sneakin’ Out

Lodge

6605 SE Powell Blvd Ben Rice B3 Trio

McMenamins edgefield 2126 SW Halsey St., Troutdale Red and Ruby

836 N Russell St. Simon Tucker Group, the Mark Sexton Band

FRI. dec. 20 Al’s den at the crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave. Brad Creel and the Reel Deel, Sarah Mitchell

LaurelThirst

2958 NE Glisan St. Garcia Birthday Band, Michael Hurley & The Croakers

McMenamins edgefield 2126 SW Halsey St., Troutdale

Peter Pants, Dickens Carolers

McMenamins Rock creek Tavern

10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro The Twangshifters

Mississippi Pizza

3552 N Mississippi Ave. Melao d’ Cuba, Level 2

Mississippi Studios

3939 N Mississippi Ave. The Lower 48, Minden, Tango Alpha Tango

Mock crest Tavern 3435 N Lombard St. Sneakin’ Out

Muddy Rudder Public House

Original Halibut’s II

Ponderosa Lounge at Jubitz Truckstop

eastBurn

206 SW Morrison St. Andy Stokes

Vie de Boheme

West cafe

Landmark Saloon

4847 SE Division St. Deer Lodge George Jones Tribute Show: Countryside Ride, Hook & Anchor, Gabe Rozzell, The Tumblers, Brush Prairie, Copper & Coal, The Fall To Pieces, Bad Assets, NoPoMoJo, Bert Sperling, Meredith Brothers, Hearts of Oak, Drugstore Cowboys, Hank Sinatra, Keeter & Ali, Neon Renaissance

10350 N Vancouver Way Breaking Midnight

Hawthorne Theatre Lounge

Landmark Saloon

2025 N Kilpatrick St. Miss Massive Snowflake

203 SE Grand Ave. Appendixes, Fog Father, Haste

Gemini Lounge

2025 N Kilpatrick St. Sad Horse

Kenton club

2527 NE Alberta St. Kenny Levitz

1635 SE 7th Ave. Sultans of Slide

Tony Starlight’s

1530 SE 7th Ave. Dan Wilensky Group

426 SW Washington St. The Delines, Mike Coykendall

duff’s Garage

Kelly’s Olympian

Kenton club

Kelly’s Olympian

8105 SE 7th Ave. Alan Hagar

3100 NE Sandy Blvd.

Gary Hoey’s Ho Ho Hoey Rockin’ Holiday Show 3728 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Tony Starlight Christmas Extravaganza

Kells

830 E Burnside St. Sallie Ford and the Sound Outside, the Kids

Kells

426 SW Washington St. Beejan, BC Stargazer, Stem and Leaf Plot, Stay High Kings

Kells Brewpub

210 NW 21st Ave. Sami Rouisi

317 NW Broadway Karaoke From Hell

112 SW 2nd Ave. Bill Tollner

2809 NE Sandy Blvd.

A Punk Drunk X-Mas 3-D: Thundering Asteroids, The Bloodtypes, The Nervous, Lexxi Vexx & The Bastards

Alberta Street Public House

221 NW 10th Ave. The Mel Brown B3 Organ Group

Tonic Lounge

Katie O’Briens

1800 E Burnside St. Saucytown

Ford Food and drink 2505 SE 11th Ave. Aram Arslanian

6526 SE Foster Road Edewaard

1503 SE Cesar E. Chavez Blvd.

Utter Underground with Cory Utter

Ivories Jazz Lounge and Restaurant 1435 NW Flanders St. Sean Fred

Rock Bottom Brewery

Scottish Rite center

1512 SW Morrison St. Mark O’Connor

Secret Society Ballroom

116 NE Russell St. Boy & Bean

Shaker and Vine

2929 SE Powell Blvd.

Cody Weathers

Slabtown

1033 NW 16th Ave. Rotties, Fasters, Sharks from Mars, Lady Problems

Star Bar

Jade Lounge

639 SE Morrison St. Uncontrollable Urge: DJ Paultimore

Jimmy Mak’s

Star Theater

2346 SE Ankeny St. Audio Tattoo 221 NW 10th Ave. Patrick Lamb Band (7:30 pm, 10 pm)

13 NW 6th Ave. Capsula and the Pynnacles, Audacity

CONT. on page 40 Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

39

MUSIC CALENDAR 9pm. 21 & Over

QUEER NIGHT DJ BITCH SLAP

FREE! ROCK, POP, AND PUNK WITH A HEAVY EMPHASIS ON WOMEN ARTISTS.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 20 9pm. 21 & Over

ROTTIES FASTERS SHARKS FROM MARS LADY PROBLEMS SATURDAY, DECEMBER 21 9pm. 21 & Over

GANGSTER COMPUTER GOD

GANGSTER COMPUTER GOD WILL BE PERFORMING A LIVE REMIX OF THE VAST MUSLIMGAUZE REPERTOIRE. HEAVY BASS AND CHUNKY SICK CRACKLING RHYTHMS. IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN THE NEW RIG YET, YOU’RE IN FOR A TREAT!

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 22 6pm. 21 & Over

GRAND STYLE ORCHESTRA FREE!

Falafel House: 3 to Late–Night All Ages Shows: Every Sunday 8–11pm Free Pinball Feeding Frenzy: Saturday @ 3pm WITHIN SPITTING DISTANCE OF THE PEARL

6517 SE Foster Rd. Verbtones

The Analog

720 SE Hawthorne Mangled Bohemians, Atlas and the Astronaut, Race of Strangers

The Annex

5264 N. Lombard St. Down North, Analog Mistress

The Blue Diamond

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

Hot Tea Cold

The Know

2026 NE Alberta St. Disenchanter, Doomsower

The Old Church

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church: Michael Allen Harrison

The Press Club

2621 SE Clinton St. Eden Hana, Robert Deeble

Tiger Bar

317 NW Broadway Paulie Think, Leviticus Rex, Grape Juice Scott

Tonic Lounge

3100 NE Sandy Blvd.

Sempiternal Dusk, Pleasure Cross, Old Skin, Torture Rack

Tony Starlight’s

3728 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Tony Starlight Christmas Extravaganza

Trail’s End Saloon

1320 Main St., Oregon City Rae Gordon Band

Velo Cult

1033 NW 16TH AVE. (971) 229-1455

1969 NE 42nd Ave. Blue Mountains Biodiversity Project Benefit: Disemballerina, Hang the Old Year, Strangeweather

HAPPY HOUR: MON–FRI NOON–7PM

1530 SE 7th Ave. Toque Libre

OPEN: 3–2:30AM EVERY DAY

PoP-A-Shot • PinbAll • Skee-bAll Air hockey • Free Wi-Fi

BAR SPOTLIGHT B E T H L AY N E H A N S E N

Starday Tavern

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 18

DEC. 18-24

Vie de Boheme

LOOSE LIPS TAKE SIPS: People are the only problem with Bailey’s Taproom. First, there are always far too many of them crammed into the Southwest Broadway beer bar. Second, many of those people are techbros.

So I listened closely when, on a packed Thursday night, a regular disclosed the existence of The Upper Lip (720 SW Ankeny St., baileystaproom.com/ the-upper-lip), the bar’s second-floor event space, which recently opened as a bar of its own Tuesday through Friday from 5 to 10 pm. To get there, you must walk around the corner from Bailey’s—you aren’t allowed to carry your glass of beer—to a door marked with a bottle and up a flight of stairs, where you’ll fi nd a room just as large as the fi rst floor, six wellchosen taps and a massive case of bottles, including a 2008 Goose Island Bourbon County Brand Stout for $11. There’s a short bar, a long table for groups, a digital tap list, a bartender, a few high-top tables set on barrels and, on our visit, Mr. Bailey himself, drinking with a buddy and enjoying the view down Broadway. As beer bars go, it’s probably even better than Bailey’s downstairs. Don’t tell the techbros. MARTIN CIZMAR.

White Eagle Saloon

836 N Russell St. Matt Lande, the Stubborn Lovers, David E. Lane and the Tipsy Ramblers

Wilfs Restaurant & Bar

800 NW 6th Ave. Ellen Whyte, Jean & Gene

Wonder Ballroom

128 NE Russell St. Icona Pop, K. Flay, Sirah

SAT. DEC. 21 Agnes Flanagan Chapel at Lewis & Clark College 0615 SW Palatine Hill Road Handel’s Messiah: Portland Chamber Orchestra

Al’s Den at the Crystal Hotel

303 SW 12th Ave. Singing Santa and His Saucy Sidekick, Vivid Curve

Alberta Rose Theatre

3000 NE Alberta St. A Circus Carol: 3 Leg Torso, Wanderlust Circus

Buffalo Gap Eatery and Saloon

6835 SW Macadam Ave. Rockin’ Piano Party: Jorge Ramirez

Kells Brewpub

Clyde’s Prime Rib

Kells

Crystal Ballroom

Kelly’s Olympian

2035 NE Glisan St. Towers, Beringia, Hungers 5474 NE Sandy Blvd.

Ocean

112 SW 2nd Ave. Coming Up Threes

Dante’s

Doug Fir Lounge

4847 SE Division St. Tough Cowpyle, Haymaker

350 W Burnside St. Mbrascatu, No Passenger 830 E Burnside St. Sallie Ford and the Sound Outside

Duff’s Garage

East End

EastBurn

1800 E Burnside St. Sidestreet Reny, DJ Zimmie

Landmark Saloon

LaurelThirst

2958 NE Glisan St. Kory Quinn and the Comrades, Portland Country Underground, Peter Pants

McMenamins Edgefield

2126 SW Halsey St., Troutdale Kris Deelane’s Solstice Celebration

McMenamins Rock Creek Tavern 10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro Just Lions

1037 SW Broadway Natalie Cole, Oregon Symphony

Goodfoot Lounge

Ash Street Saloon

Harvey’s Comedy Club

3552 N Mississippi Ave. The Ukeladies, 3 for Silver Solstice Show

Hawthorne Theatre

3939 N Mississippi Ave. Bel Mizik, Balans

Beaterville Cafe

2201 N Killingsworth St. Well Swung, Amy Bleu’s Holiday Happy Hour

Beulahland

118 NE 28th Ave A Very Pokey Solstice

Biddy McGraw’s Irish Pub 6000 NE Glisan St. Max’s Midnight Kitchen, Acoustic Zappa Tribute

2845 SE Stark St. McTuff 436 NW 6th Ave. Rich Vos

1507 SE 39th Ave. Censure, Raines To Ruin, the Dead Horizon, Anchor Chain

Ivories Jazz Lounge and Restaurant 1435 NW Flanders St. Ezra Weiss Sextet

Jack London Bar

529 SW 4th Ave. Panorama Underground

Jade Lounge

2346 SE Ankeny St. JD’s Blues/Grass Sessions

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

210 NW 21st Ave. Sami Rouisi

426 SW Washington St. Joy Pearson, Jeff Donovan, Cody Raymond, Cory Tonna

1332 W Burnside St. Hit Explosion, Ancient Heat

Andina

225 SW Ash St. Othrys, Ditch Digger, Proven, 30 Pound Test

40

Ponderosa Lounge at Jubitz Truckstop

Club 21

203 SE Grand Ave. Chris Sutton, Happy Noose, Havania Whaal

Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall

Katie O’Briens

510 NW 11th Ave. Toque Libre

Alberta Street Public House

1314 NW Glisan St. Toshi Onizuka Trio

Original Halibut’s II

221 NW 10th Ave. Andy Stokes Band 2809 NE Sandy Blvd.

A Very Wobblies X-Mas: The Wobblies, the Tanked, Whiskeys Lament

Camellia Lounge

1635 SE 7th Ave. The Fondells

1036 NE Alberta St. Cedar Teeth

Jimmy Mak’s

Mississippi Pizza

Mississippi Studios

Mock Crest Tavern

3435 N Lombard St. Johnnie Ward’s Sharkskin Review

Muddy Rudder Public House 8105 SE 7th Ave. Lauren Sheehan

Nel Centro

1408 SW 6th Ave. Mike Pardew, Dave Captein, Randy Rollofson

2527 NE Alberta St. Sonny Hess

10350 N Vancouver Way Jessie Goergen

Rock Bottom Brewery 206 SW Morrison St. Corner

Secret Society Ballroom

116 NE Russell St. Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble, Kerry Politzer Quintet (9 pm); Everything’s Jake (6 pm)

Shaker and Vine

2929 SE Powell Blvd.

The Ice Breakers

The Annex

5264 N. Lombard St. Space Shark, Silverhawk, Kevin Darrow

The Blue Diamond

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

Sportin’ Lifers

The Conga Club

4923 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., Suite 102 Tropical Saturday Salsa

The Elixir Lab

2738 NE Alberta St. Bassment Jazz

The Know

2026 NE Alberta St. MDC, Stovokor, Here’s To Your Fuck, DJ Just Dave

The Lovecraft

421 SE Grand Ave. Railer, DJ Bar Hopper

The Old Church

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church - Michael Allen Harrison

The Press Club

2621 SE Clinton St. The Porch Cats

Tonic Lounge

3100 NE Sandy Blvd.

Betty on the Floor, Incendiary Nights, MJ12theband, The Edgar Allan Pose, Joseph Demaree and the Square Tires

dec. 18-24 Tony Starlight’s

3728 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Tony Starlight Christmas Extravaganza

Vie de Boheme 1530 SE 7th Ave. Soul Vaccination

White Eagle Saloon

836 N Russell St. The Twangshifters, Jon Koonce

White Owl Social Club 1305 SE 8th Ave. Control Top: Cakes Da Killa, Bomb Ass Pussy, II Trill, Ill Camino

Wilfs Restaurant & Bar 800 NW 6th Ave. Mia Nicholson, Steve Christofferson, David Evans

Wonder Ballroom

128 NE Russell St. Keep it in the Fam Holiday Show: Darol Anger, Emy Phelps, Alex Hargreaves, Tatiana Hargreaves, Mila PhelpsFriedl, Wesley Corbett, Jacob Jolliff

Zion Lutheran Church 1015 SW 18th Ave. Wish Upon A Star: Portland Symphonic Girlchoir

Sun. DEC. 22 Al’s Den at the Crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave. Scott Fisher

MUSIC CALENDAR

McMenamins Edgefield

2126 SW Halsey St., Troutdale The Columbians

McMenamins Rock Creek Tavern

10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro Eddie Parente, Thom Dudley

Mississippi Pizza

3552 N Mississippi Ave. Percy Twig Christmas Show

Mississippi Studios

3939 N Mississippi Ave. Bombs Into You, Souvenir Driver, Hong Kong Banana

O’Connor’s Vault

7850 SW Capitol Highway The Ex-Nashville Cats

Rock Bottom Brewery 206 SW Morrison St. Jacob Westfall

Rontoms

600 E Burnside St. Fringe Class, Tender Age

Scandals

1125 SW Stark St Laurent Nickel, Laura Cunard

Slabtown

1033 NW 16th Ave. Grand Style Orchestra

The Blue Diamond

Alberta Rose Theatre

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

Kevin Selfe and the Tornadoes

Andina

4923 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., Suite 102 VYBZ Reggae Night

Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall

2026 NE Alberta St. Divers, Street Eaters, Fine Pets

3000 NE Alberta St. A Circus Carol: 3 Leg Torso, Wanderlust Circus 1314 NW Glisan St. Ryan Walsh

1037 SW Broadway Comfort & Joy: Oregon Symphony

Ash Street Saloon 225 SW Ash St. Citizen Patrol, Earth Anchor

Central Library

801 SW 10th Ave. Rameau: Wildwood Consort

Clyde’s Prime Rib

5474 NE Sandy Blvd.

Ron Steen Jazz Jam

DAYA Foundation

0110 SW Bancroft St. Toque Libre

Doug Fir Lounge

830 E Burnside St. Blesst Chest, Night Mechanic, Rllrbll

Ford Food and Drink 2505 SE 11th Ave. Tim Roth

Hawthorne Theatre

1507 SE 39th Ave. Portland Battle Of The Bands: Finals, Fast Fox, Random Axe, The Raccoons, From The Eyes Of Cain, Brown Erbe, I Have No Friends, Feel Connected, BEYOND PAVED ROADS, Here From Apathy, Eight53, Colliding Fates, Summer Soundtrack

The Conga Club

The Know

The Old Church

426 SW Washington St. Eye Candy VJs

LaurelThirst

2958 NE Glisan St. Kung Pao Chickens, Portland Country Underground

Lola’s Room at the Crystal Ballroom

1332 W Burnside St. Goldwing, the Goddamned Animals

McMenamins Edgefield

2126 SW Halsey St., Troutdale Cellotronik

McMenamins Rock Creek Tavern

10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro Bob Shoemaker

McMenamins’ Kennedy School 5736 NE 33rd Ave. Homegrown Christmas: Michele Van Kleef, Naomi LaViolette, Christina Cooper

Mississippi Pizza

3552 N Mississippi Ave. Mr. Ben

Muddy Rudder Public House 8105 SE 7th Ave. Lloyd Jones

Pub at the End of the universe 4107 SE 28th Ave. Open Mic

The Blue Diamond

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

Sumo 3341 SE Belmont St. Bunker Sessions, Open Mic

Tony Starlight’s

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church: Michael Allen Harrison

Trail’s End Saloon

3728 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Tony Starlight Christmas Extravaganza

3728 NE Sandy Blvd.

The Tony Starlight Christmas Extravaganza

Tony Starlight’s

1320 Main St., Oregon City Arthur Fresh Air Moore

Valentine’s

Valentine’s

White Eagle Saloon

232 SW Ankeny St. Lisa Wells, Michael Heald

232 SW Ankeny St. Fanno Creek, Just Lions 836 N Russell St. Tonya Gilmore

Valentine’s

232 SW Ankeny St. Lisa Wells, Michael Heald

White Eagle Saloon 836 N Russell St. Rob Johnston

MOn. DEC. 23 Al’s Den at the Crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave. Scott Fisher

Andina

1314 NW Glisan St. Pete Krebs

Jade Lounge

Dante’s

2346 SE Ankeny St. The Druthers

350 W Burnside St. Karaoke From Hell

Kells

Ivories Jazz Lounge and Restaurant

2958 NE Glisan St. Freak Mountain Ramblers

Kelly’s Olympian

The Old Church

3100 NE Sandy Blvd.

Muffalufagus, Necktie Killer, the Longshots

1435 NW Flanders St. The Bylines

LaurelThirst

112 SW 2nd Ave. Pat Buckley

Tonic Lounge

510 NW 11th Ave. Vocalists’ Jazz & Blues Jam: Joe Millward

4847 SE Division St. Ian Miller

Kells

The Blue Monk

Camellia Lounge

Landmark Saloon

210 NW 21st Ave. Traditional Irish Jam Session

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church: Michael Allen Harrison

Ivories Jazz Lounge and Restaurant

112 SW 2nd Ave. Pat Buckley, Irish Sessions

Kells Brewpub

1435 NW Flanders St. Putter Smith Quintet

Jade Lounge

2346 SE Ankeny St. The Global Folk Club: Andrea Wild

Jimmy Mak’s

221 NW 10th Ave. Kate Davis

TuES. DEC. 24 Al’s Den at the Crystal Hotel 303 SW 12th Ave. Scott Fisher

Andina

1314 NW Glisan St. JB Butler Trio

Club 21

2035 NE Glisan St. X-Mas Eve with Texas Tim’s Smokey Mt. Christmas

Kells

112 SW 2nd Ave. Pat Buckley

McMenamins Rock Creek Tavern

10000 Old Cornelius Pass Road, Hillsboro Bluegrass Tuesdays

The Blue Diamond

2016 NE Sandy Blvd.

Gretchen Mitchell Band

The Lovecraft

421 SE Grand Ave. Bones

The Old Church

1422 SW 11th Ave. Christmas at the Old Church: Michael Allen Harrison (5 and 8 pm)

cont. on page 43 Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

41

THIs FRIDaY!

PreseNts

icona pop With k. Flay & sirah

Friday, deceMber 20 2013

wonDeR BallRoom 128 N rUssell st

all ages! on sale now tickets at MUsicFestNW.cOM/tickets & ticketFly.cOM

42

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

DEC. 18-24

MUSIC CALENDAR The Analog

720 SE Hawthorne A Very Trap Christmas

Give The Gift Of Music

The Whiskey Bar

WED. DEC. 18 Beech St. Parlor 412 NE Beech St. DJ Ghost Capital

Berbati’s

231 SW Ankeny St. DJ Seleckta YT

Bossanova Ballroom 722 E Burnside St. Wednesday Swing

Dig a Pony

736 SE Grand Ave. Battles

Ground Kontrol

511 NW Couch St. TRONix: Mike Gong, Bliphop Junkie

Jack London Bar

529 SW 4th Ave. Proper Movement Drums and Bass

Moloko

3967 N Mississippi Ave The Diamond Stylus: King Tim 33 1/3

Rotture

315 SE 3rd Ave. Rustie, Chrome Wolves, Gang$ign$

Slabtown

1033 NW 16th Ave. Queer Night: DJ Bitch Slap

The Firkin Tavern 1937 SE 11th Ave. Eye Candy VJs

The Lovecraft

421 SE Grand Ave. Event Horizon: DJ Straylight, DJ Backlash

Tiga

1465 NE Prescott St. DJ Hornet Leg

THURS. DEC. 19 Berbati’s

231 SW Ankeny St. Studyhall: DJ Suga Shane

Black Book

20 NW 3rd Ave. Modern(ist), DJ Troubled Youth, Ryan Biornstad

CC Slaughters

219 NW Davis St. Hip Hop Heaven with DJ Detroit Diezel

Dig a Pony

736 SE Grand Ave. Safi

Harlem

220 SW Ankeny St. Bounce: Tourmaline, Valen

Moloko

3967 N Mississippi Ave Brazilian Night: Nik Nice, Brother Charlie

The Lovecraft

421 SE Grand Ave. Synthicide: Tom Jones, Erica Jones, Jared White, Luke Buser

The Rose

111 SW Ash St. Club Chemtrail 12: Kingdom, Massacooramaan, SPF666, Commune

Gold Dust Meridian

31 NW 1st Ave. Kyau & Albert, WEB, Eddie Pitzul, Kyel & Collin Lake

Goodfoot Lounge

1465 NE Prescott St. Sweet Jimmy T

3267 SE Hawthorne Blvd.

DJ Disorder 2845 SE Stark St. Soulstew: DJ Aquaman

Harlem

220 SW Ankeny St. Ugly Christmas Sweater Party: LionsDen, DJ Stray

Holocene

511 NW Couch St. DJ Arya Imig

1332 W Burnside St. 80s Video Dance Attack

Moloko

3967 N Mississippi Ave 21st Century Rhythm and Soul Review: Hans Fricking Lindauer

Refuge

116 SE Yamhill St. Bringing Light To Darkness: Doc Martin, Solovox, Mr. Moo, Skny Mrcles

2433 SE Powell Blvd.

Activate: DJ Dot, Trevor Vichas

Beulahland

118 NE 28th Ave DJ Nik Fury

Dig a Pony

Harlem

220 SW Ankeny St. A Very Nykon Christmas

Savoy Tavern & Lounge

2500 SE Clinton St. Jason Bokoros

Star Bar

639 SE Morrison St. DJ Joey Prude

Star Theater

13 NW 6th Ave. Church of Hive

The Lovecraft

720 SE Hawthorne Electropolis: DJ Ian Page, Loco Potion, Uncommon Sense, Scizure, Spherex, EZ-A

The Matador

421 SE Grand Ave. Danger Zone: Acid Rick, Alan Park

315 SE 3rd Ave. End of the World Reunion: Justin Jay, Lassi, Ekoh, Bennyrox, Adventure Galley DJs 421 SE Grand Ave. Perforce: DJ Musique Plastique, DJ Sharpie 1967 W Burnside St DJ Drew Groove

The Rose

111 SW Ash St. Stewart Villain, Tyler Tastemaker, $u$pect, Chase Manhattan, Exodub

The Whiskey Bar

31 NW 1st Ave. Sound Remedy, Cory O, Hal-V, Spacecase

The Analog

Beech St. Parlor 412 NE Beech St. DJ Anjali and the Incredible Kid

Berbati’s

Club 21

232 SW Ankeny St. Ausland DJs

Dig a Pony

SAT. DEC. 21

The Analog

736 SE Grand Ave. Survival Skills 720 SE Hawthorne DJ Addiction, DJ Confuzer

The Lovecraft

736 SE Grand Ave. Mikee Lixx, Dirty Red

421 SE Grand Ave. Departures: DJ Waisted, DJ Anais Ninja

Gold Dust Meridian

Tiga

3267 SE Hawthorne Blvd.

DJ Gregarious, DJ Disorder

Shovels & Rope - O' Be Joyful • The Lumineers - The Lumineers • Phosphorescent - Muchacho • Volcano Choir - Repave • Toro & Moi - Anything In Return • Johnny Marr The Messenger • Eric Clapton - Old Sock • The Head and the Heart - Let's Be Still • Washed Out - Paracosm • Father John Misty - Fear Fun • Deer Tick - Negativity • Brett Dennen - Smoke and Mirrors • She & Him - Volume 3 • Townes Van Zandt - Sunshine Boy • Various Artists - The Music Is You : Tribute to John Denver • Tomahawk - Oddfellows • Jett, Joan & the Blackhearts - Unvarnished • Tame Impala - Innerspeaker • Mazzy Star - Seasons of Your Day • Paul McCartney - NEW • ALT-J - Awesome Wave

225 SW Ash St. DJ D Train

2035 NE Glisan St. DJ Bradly

Dig a Pony

S

MON. DEC. 23

Valentine’s

412 NE Beech St. DJ “Chains” Crumley

FRIEND

Ash Street Saloon

231 SW Ankeny St. DJ Henry Dark

Beech St. Parlor

AM

The Lovecraft

Tiga

1465 NE Prescott St. DJ Rndm Noise

23 GREAT GIFT IDEAS CDS FOR JUST S Y MONKE $9.99 POERVTIULGAL THE MAN ARCTIC

Ground Kontrol

Rotture

1465 NE Prescott St. DJ Audrey Horne, Wild Pillow

Holocene

1001 SE Morrison St. Gaycation: Mr. Charming, DJ Snowtiger

TUES. DEC. 24 Berbati’s

Lola’s Room at the Crystal Ballroom

231 SW Ankeny St. Soundstation Tuesdays: DJ Instigatah, Snackmaster DJ

Moloko

Dig a Pony

1332 W Burnside St. 70s Night Fever

Rotture

BC’s Restaurant

Gold Dust Meridian

Lola’s Room at the Crystal Ballroom

Valentine’s

FRI. DEC. 20

736 SE Grand Ave. Boom Wow 3267 SE Hawthorne Blvd.

DJ Mike-A-Nay

3967 N Mississippi Ave The Central Experience: Gulls, Mr. Peepers

232 SW Ankeny St. Psych Night: 4x4 DJs

SUN. DEC. 22 Dig a Pony

1001 SE Morrison St. Rockbox: Matt Nelkin, DJ Kez

Tiga

1465 NE Prescott St. DJ Magic Parlour

Tiga

315 SE 3rd Ave. Temptation: DJ Gregarious, DJ Dungeonmaster, DJ Vron Tron

Slabtown

1033 NW 16th Ave. Gangster Computer God (Muslimgauze tribute)

Star Bar

639 SE Morrison St. Go French Yourself: DJ Cecilia

736 SE Grand Ave. Team Atkins

East End

203 SE Grand Ave. DJ Nick Phit (Graves at Sea)

Star Bar

639 SE Morrison St. DJ Plucky

The Analog

720 SE Hawthorne S.Y.N.T.

Valentine’s

232 SW Ankeny St. Honest John DJs

736 SE Grand Ave. Jimbo, DJ The Beatles

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

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WIN A PAIR OF VIP TICKETS TO THE

DEC. 31 @ THE HILTON PORTLAND & EXECUTIVE TOWER!

GO TO WWEEK.COM/PROMOTIONS

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

Dec. 18–24

= WW Pick. Highly recommended.

Most prices listed are for advance ticket sales. At-the-door increases and so-called convenience charges may apply, so it’s best to call ahead.

Editor: REBECCA JACOBSON. Theater: REBECCA JACOBSON (rjacobson@wweek.com). Dance: AARON SPENCER (dance@wweek.com).

TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, submit information at least two weeks in advance to: rjacobson@wweek.com.

THEATER OPENINGS & PREVIEWS The Hullabaloo Red Goes Green

Jane a Theater Company presents a family-friendly update of Little Red Riding Hood, adding not only songs but somehow messages about global warming, too. LaSalle High School, 11999 SE Fuller Road, 659-4155. 7 pm Fridays and 2 and 4 pm SaturdaysSundays through Dec. 29. Free.

Tess on an Alien Planet

Echo Theater Company—one of two nonprofits into which Do Jump! recently split—stages its first live show.

An all-ages original performance incorporating acrobatics, aerial dance and physical theater, it’s a story about a scientist who winds up stranded in an unfamiliar world. Echo Theater, 1515 SE 37th Ave., 231-1232. 7:30 pm Fridays, Saturdays and Mondays and 1 and 4:30 pm Sundays through Dec. 30. $15-$22.

ALSO PLAYING American Fiesta

Initially produced in the Depression, Fiestaware is highly—or addictively— collectable, especially for playwright Steven Tomlinson, portrayed in this one-man show by the phenomenal Gary Wayne Cash. Tomlinson’s first problem is that he can’t stop buying Fiestaware on eBay. “Collect them all,” he says, “and you’ve got serotonin on tap.” The other problem is his parents won’t accept him as a gay man, and they certainly aren’t going to travel to Canada for his marriage to Leon.

Cash has at least seven major voices to incorporate, and he does so with grace and talent. Thanks to Cash and director Don Horn, American Fiesta is as riveting and colorful as a play about plates can be. MITCH LILLIE. Sanctuary at Sandy Plaza, 1785 NE Sandy Blvd., 239-5919. 7:30 pm ThursdaysSaturdays and 2 pm Sundays through Dec. 22. $15-$35.

Beauty and the Beast

Pixie Dust Productions presents a stage version of the Disney musical.

Newmark Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 7:30 pm Thursdays-Fridays, 2 and 7:30 pm Saturdays and 2 pm Sundays through Dec. 29. $36-$65.

A Christmas Carol

This rollicking version of A Christmas Carol manages to find surprises and intensity in a well-known story. From the moment viewers enter Portland Playhouse’s converted church, they’re enveloped in 19th-century London, with cast members acting as cockneyaccented ticket-takers and concessions vendors, making this production all the more attractive for those seeking some kid-friendly theater. Director Cristi Miles blends the story of greedy Scrooge with light-hearted Christmas tunes and fun choreography, making for a fast-paced, intermission-free show that feels shorter than its 90 minutes. When Marley, dragging clanky chains, appears in Scrooge’s bedroom and wails at him menacingly, it’s deliciously creepy. But there are plenty of merry moments to calm the goosebumps, including a sweet song by Tiny Tim and Bob Cratchit, and a lively finale of “Joy to the World.” JENNA GILROY. Portland Playhouse, 602 NE Prescott St., 488-5822. 7:30 pm Wednesdays-Fridays, 2 and 7:30 pm Saturdays and 2 and 5 pm Sundays.

Additional performances Dec. 23-24.

Through Dec. 29. $17-$38.

Dog Sees God: Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead

Portland Actors Conservatory stages Bert V. Royal’s play, which imag-

ines the Peanuts characters as teenage potheads and pyromaniacs.

Portland Actors Conservatory, 1436 SW Montgomery St., 274-1717. 7:30 pm Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 pm Sundays through Dec. 22. $10-$25.

Frogz

Imago’s long-running extravaganza returns for the holidays. It’s a familyfriendly, fantastical show featuring elaborate costumes and impressive acrobatics. Imago Theatre, 17 SE 8th Ave., 231-3959. Many showtimes through Jan. 5. See imagotheatre.com for schedule. $16-$31.

Irving Berlin’s White Christmas

A reprisal of the song-and-dance extravaganza. Lakewood Center for the Arts, 368 S State St., Lake Oswego, 635-3901. 7:30 pm daily (no shows Dec. 23-25) and 2 pm SaturdaysSundays through Dec. 29. $36.

It’s a (Somewhat) Wonderful Life

This jovial reinvention of Frank Capra’s classic film is indeed a (somewhat) wonderful holiday alternative to Tiny Tim monologues. Artistic director Scott Palmer continues the company’s retro algorithm by transplanting the tale into a 1940s radio studio run amok. Our story begins on Christmas Eve, with the cast assembling for its tired and traditional holiday production. But when the sound manager goes AWOL, mute stand-in Pete Paulson binges on rum-drenched fruitcake and scandalous radio virgin Lana joins in, the classic turns chaotic. It’s is not the “Dante-esque vision of drunkenness, despair and suicide” that a 1946 critic labeled the original film, but B&B’s production isn’t exactly dripping tinsel either. Overall, it lacks luster, and Christmas magic eventually and predictably ties up the tumult in a nice package. ENID SPITZ. The Venetian Theatre, 253 E Main St., Hillsboro, 6933953. 7:30 pm Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 pm Sundays through Dec. 22.

Extra performance 7:30 pm Monday, Dec. 23. $18-$32.

It’s a Wonderful Life

After premiering this new musical adaptation of Frank Capra’s classic movie last year, Stumptown Stages brings it back for a second round.

Brunish Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway, 248-4335. 7:30 pm ThursdaysSaturdays and 2 pm Saturdays-Sundays through Dec. 22. $25-$40.

The Lion in Winter

Northwest Classical Theatre’s production of The Lion in Winter might as well be called Game of Thrones: Christmas Edition. Director Elizabeth Huffman has given James Goldman’s play modern scenery, an upscale living room decked out with cheerful Christmas décor. But don’t let that fool you. The story, set circa 1183, centers on King Henry II of England as he and his queen Eleanor battle over which son will inherit the throne. There’s Richard, the warrior; Jeffrey, the forgotten; and John, Daddy’s favorite and the fool, right down to his untucked shirt and rainbow-colored vest. Tensions rise and fall as brother betrays brother, mother betrays son, father betrays everyone—but the real fun comes in watching Marilyn Stacey weave Queen Eleanor’s web as deliberately and gracefully as a spider intent on a big and delicious payoff.

KAITIE TODD. Shoebox Theater, 2110 SE 10th Ave., 971-244-3740. 7:30 pm Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 pm Sundays through Jan. 5. $20.

The Lover

As Sarah wiggles her way beneath the covers, Richard sits stiffly atop the sheets. “I think things are beautifully balanced, Richard,” Sarah purrs. That, I suppose, is one way of

seeing things in The Lover, a taut 1962 one-act by Harold Pinter, directed with aplomb by Imago Theatre’s Jerry Mouawad. Well-heeled Brits Sarah (Anne Sorce) and Richard (Jeffrey Jason Gilpin) have been married for 10 years. Richard has the play’s first line: “Is your lover coming today?” he asks. He is, Sarah replies, at 3 pm. It’s quite all right, though: Richard’s got a whore he regularly visits. Things are balanced, aren’t they? Gilpin departs, but soon after returns as a sort of Cockney cowboy, all dropped h’s and bowlegged swagger. Is he her lover?

Or is this a form of intricate role-play between the couple? It’s a fascinating, slyly constructed piece of theater, a psychosexual labyrinth of desire, delusion, uncertainty and jealousy. At one point, Sorce turns to Gilpin: “You’re having a lovely joke,” she says. “It’s no joke,” he icily replies. Indeed: The Lover may be an elaborate mind game, but these performers aren’t joking around. REBECCA JACOBSON. Imago Theatre, 17 SE 8th Ave., 231-3959. 8 pm Thursdays and Saturdays and 9 pm Fridays through Dec. 21. $10-$20 sliding scale.

No One Likes a Scrooge

Post5 Theatre brings out the grotesque clowns for this hourlong satire of A Christmas Carol. Milepost 5, 850 NE 81st Ave., 729-3223. 9:30 pm FridaysSaturdays through Dec. 21. “Pay what you can.”

Noises Off

Michael Frayn’s backstage comedy is perhaps the world’s most exactingly constructed play, and certainly one of its funniest. It centers on a thirdrate British theater troupe staging an abysmal bedroom farce, and it’s essentially the same thing three times over— just with snowballing levels of lunacy as the company’s disastrous personal dynamics and dubious talents collide in hellish but hilarious ways. This production is Third Rail’s first farce in years, and director Scott Yarbrough’s rendition is more than serviceable, even if the second act could use some polish.

Damon Kupper, in a garish orange shirt and (not orange) Carrot Top wig, has a command of physical comedy that’s simultaneously smarmy and daffy. Even daffier is the black bustier-clad Kelly Godell, who spends the play unflappably barreling ahead with careful line readings, even as everything around her crashes into smithereens. And we’d be nowhere without Maureen Porter as the de facto mother hen: She’s the glue holding together both the play and the play within the play. Despite some questionable casting (Isaac Lamb exudes far too much teddy-bear cuddliness to play the beleaguered, snarky director), these performers bring method—and, surprisingly, humanity—to the madness. REBECCA JACOBSON. Winningstad Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway, 235-1101. 7:30 pm Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 pm Sundays through Jan. 11. $20-$43.

One-Man Christmas Carol

Post5 Theatre brings back its one-man retelling of Charles Dickens’ yuletide tale. Thursday performances are at the Picnic House (723 SW Salmon St.) and include a three-course dinner ($30; $50 with wine pairings). Milepost 5, 850 NE 81st Ave., 729-3223. 7:30 pm Wednesday, Dec. 18 and FridayMonday, Dec. 20-23; 2 pm SaturdaySunday, Dec. 21-22; 7 pm Thursdays, Dec. 19 and 26. “Pay what you will.”

Plaid Tidings

In this schmaltzy sequel to Forever Plaid, the story follows a similar arc but the songs are dialed-in for Christmas.

In the beginning of that first musical, the Plaids—a guy group from the ‘50s—are killed in a bus crash. Here, they’re back with mostly white-bread holiday mash-ups and peppy dance moves. Stars Matthew Brown, Robert Head, Sean Powell and Jeremy Sloan are such a polished quartet it seems they could have been rehearsing since the ‘50s. JENNA GILROY. Broadway Rose New Stage Theatre, 12850 SW Grant Ave., Tigard, 620-5262. 7:30 pm Wednesdays-Saturdays and 2 pm Saturdays-Sundays through Dec. 22. $30-$40.

Rudolph: On Stage

Bad Reputation Productions’ Rudolph: On Stage pays loving homage to the longest-running Christmas TV special in history, the 1964 stop-motion Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. It tugs on deep-seated nostalgia without devolving into schmaltziness—or, crucially, trying for edginess with misguided scatalogical humor. Instead, we get Jed Arkley as a wide-eyed, clumsy Rudolph and Shelley McLendon as his gal pal Clarice, prancing delicately about the stage.

Things can be rough around the edges, but that’s forgotten during giddy songand-dance routines that perfectly ape the jerkiness of stop-motion animation.

And we’d be remiss to ignore Portland Mercury editor William S. Humphrey, who slathers his face with white makeup and dons an elaborate costume (that, the program notes, he built himself) as Sam the Snowman. All twinkly eye and swishy walk—the bottom snowball sways slowly side-to-side as he shuffles around—he presides over the yuletide proceedings in a fatherly and only occasionally creepy manner. REBECCA JACOBSON. CoHo Theater, 2257 NW Raleigh St. 7:30 pm Fridays-Saturdays through Dec. 21. $20-$24.

The Santaland Diaries

Portland Center Stage again presents the one-man stage adaptation of David Sedaris’ exploits as a Macy’s elf. Gerding Theater, 128 NW 11th Ave., 445-3700. 7:30 pm Tuesdays-Sundays, 2 pm Saturdays-Sundays and noon Thursdays through Dec. 29. $45-$60.

The Shoemaker and the Elves

Tears of Joy Theatre presents a family-friendly puppet show about two of Santa’s elves who help out a struggling shoemaker in 1940s New York City.

Markham Elementary School Theatre,

10531 SW Capitol Hwy, 248-0557. 11 am and 1 pm Saturdays and 1 and 3 pm Sundays through Dec. 22. $13-$18.

The Twelve Dates of Christmas

As Salt and Sage’s one-woman production begins, Mary (Melanie Moseley) has discovered her fiance is cheating on her. Over the following year, she introduces us to her string of dates, including the douchey Doctor John, the stalker-ish Psycho Joe and the saintly Edward the Great. Although she occasionally sounds rehearsed, Moseley jumps back and forth between characters with fluid and nearly unbreakable ease, and the lesson— though not hard to guess—arrives at a well-timed, refreshing moment. KAITIE TODD. The Back Door Theater, 4319 SE Hawthorne Blvd. 8 pm ThursdaysSaturdays and 3 pm Sundays through Dec. 22. $10-$12.

Twist Your Dickens

From the first gag to the last, Portland Center Stage’s spoof of A Christmas Carol serves up nothing but coal. The overlong show is structured loosely like that Victorian story, with Scrooge meeting various ghosts as he learns lessons of generosity and goodwill.

Along the way, he encounters everyone from George Bailey, to a Girl Scout who says she took a shit in his box of Thin Mints, to the entire Peanuts gang, who turn A Charlie Brown Christmas into a profanity-laced pageant. It’s a stiff and unfunny cash grab with an aftertaste worse than that of spoiled eggnog. REBECCA JACOBSON. Gerding Theater, 128 NW 11th Ave., 445-3700. 7:30 pm Tuesdays-Sundays, 2 pm Saturdays-Sundays and noon Thursdays through Dec. 22. $39-$67.

CONT. on page 46

REVIEW BLAINE TRuITT COVERT

PERFORMANCE

BUSBY GOES BIG: The Nutcracker makes Busby Berkeley seem like an austere minimalist. Compared to that ballet’s sumptuous, selfsatisfied bliss, synchronized swimming might as well be a hockey fight.

Oregon Ballet Theatre—one of only six companies in the country to get permission from George Balanchine’s notoriously litigious heirs to stage the most famous version of Tchaikovsky’s ballet—has accordingly taken its over-the-top sets right out of the playbook of golden-age MGM musicals. Fred and Ginger, in the form of the Nutcracker Prince and Clara, are getting the band together for the big show: a multi-tiered confection of hoop dancers, somewhat uncomfortable Chinese stereotypes and fairies in beautiful dresses. The score is, of course, long familiar from insurance commercials and Tom and Jerry cartoons, a mall CD of classical music’s greatest hits. “The Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” is so omnipresent in music boxes and snow globes that it is strange to see it performed sincerely rather than as quotation. The cast changes at most performances, but on opening night, Xuan Cheng’s lively grace in the role of the fairy felt like clear, fresh water. Such an unabashed ode to joy as The Nutcracker hardly exists anymore: It is a fantasia single-minded in its self-love. It’s possible to hate it for its reliance on spectacle, its sheer and almost numbing prettiness in OBT’s hands. But you would be wrong to do so. Joy is joy, and beauty beauty; it is right, sometimes, to affirm them. MATTHEW KORFHAGE. SEE IT: The Nutcracker is at the Keller Auditorium, 222 SW Clay St., 222-5538. 7:30 pm Wednesday-Monday, Dec. 18-23; 2 pm FridayMonday, Dec. 20-23; and noon Tuesday, Dec. 24. $27-$144.

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

45

PERFORMANCE

DEC. 18–24 OWEN CAREY

think it’s just trivia? think again.

RAMENS RAM N NOISES OFF

Xmas Unplugged

Monday

Thirsty Lion (Portland ) — 7:00 PM Hawthorne Hideaway (Portland) — 8:00 PM Rose & Thistle (Portland) — 8:00 PM (Starts Jan 6)

Thursdays @ 8pm Redwing Bar & Grill 4012 30th St • North Park Tuesday

The Dugout (Hillsboro ) — 7:00 PM Biddy McGraw's (Portland ) — 7:00 PM Cheerful Tortoise (Portland ) — 9:00 PM Shanahan's (Vancouver) — 7:00 PM Laurelwood Public House (SE) — 8:00 PM (Starts461 Jan27)Park Blvd - University Heights

Mondays @ 9pm Bourbon Street Bar & Grill

Wednesday

Saturdays @ 8pm Kelly’s Pub

Cheerful Bullpen (Portland ) - 8:30 PM Concordia Ale House (Portland ) - 8:00 PM Space Room (Portland ) - 7:00 PM Tonic Lounge (Portland — 7:00 • OldPMTown Diego )Ave 2222 San Buffalo Gap (Portland) — 7:30PM (Starts Jan 8)

Thursday m @ 8p ys (Portland da Tues 21st Avenue Bar & Grill ) - 7:00 PM st 14th Belmont Inn (Portland ) - 7:00 PM ) (starts Augu

South Park Abbey

1946 Fern Street • South Park www.geekswhodrink.com @geekswhodrink

facebook.com/geekswhodrink

All Deanna (Foss Curtis) and James (Chris Murray) want is a nice Christmas gift for their son.

But then Santa (Steve Coker) actually arrives, and, seeing no cookies, tries to leave. So Deanna and James piledrive and waterboard him. That battle comprises the majority of Matt Pelfrey’s The Reason for the Season, one half of the R-rated Xmas Unplugged.

We’re warned to leave the kids at home, and for good reason: F-bombs explode like chestnuts in the fire. Yet children are perhaps the only ones who would enjoy such a campy fight scene. In Anthony Nielson’s The Night Before Christmas, a limey lowlife (Murray) catches an alleged elf, so he ties him up and calls a very cynical friend (Coker). It’s a far more ideological critique of Christmas than the first short play, and at times darkly amusing. MITCH LILLIE. Artists Repertory Theatre, 1515 SW Morrison St., 241-1278. 7:30 pm Wednesdays-Sundays and 2 pm Sundays through Dec. 29. $25$55. 18+.

COMEDY & VARIETY The Call of the Laughs: A Comedy Showcase

A solid lineup of local comics packs the bill for this showcase. Expect standup from Amy Miller, Shane Torres, Bri Pruett, Andie Main and Sean Jordan. Jack London Bar, 529 SW 4th Ave., 2287605. 8 pm Thursday, Dec. 19. $5 suggested, or three cans of food.

Church of Comedy: A Holy Showcase A brunch o’clock showcase with standup from Shane Torres, Amy Miller, Curtis Cook, Philip Schallberger, Barbara Holm and Adam Pasi. Kenton Club, 2025 N Kilpatrick St., 285-3718. 2 pm Sunday, Dec. 22. Free. 21+.

Flying Fruitcake

In addition to original sketch comedy, improv and musical spoofs, this holiday revue also features aerial displays. Curious Comedy, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 477-9477. 8 pm Fridays-Saturdays through Dec. 21. $12-$15.

Golden Girls Live Christmas Special

Men don fluffy wigs and oversized glasses in this live stage adaptation of the TV show. Funhouse Lounge, 2432 SE 11th Ave., 841-6734. 7:30 pm Fridays and 7:30 and 10 pm Saturdays through Dec. 28. $15-18.

Jana & Lauren Presents

One-time Oregonians Jana Schmieding and Lauren Olson absconded for New York City a while ago, but they’re back for one night of sketch comedy.

Action/Adventure Theatre, 1050 SE Clinton St. 7 pm Saturday, Dec. 21. $10.

A Nightmare on Elf Street

Second City alum Caitlin Kunkel

46

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

directs a night of festive sketch comedy. Brody Theater, 16 NW Broadway, 224-2227. 7:30 pm Fridays-Saturdays through Dec. 21. $10-$15.

#NoFilter

YouTube stars Grace Helbig, Hannah Hart and Mamrie Hart take to the stage for an evening of live standup. As the event’s name suggests, anything could happen.

Expect riffs on grilled cheese, Goldschläger, Kanye West and hairspray. Aladdin Theater, 3017 SE Milwaukie Ave., 234-9694. 7 pm Sunday, Dec. 22. $25.

Ryan Hamilton

The Idaho native, who was tapped in 2012 by Rolling Stone as one of five comics to watch, brings his clean standup to Portland. Helium Comedy Club, 1510 SE 9th Ave., 888-643-8669. 8 pm Thursday and 7:30 and 10 pm Friday-Saturday, Dec. 19-21. $15-$30.

Sketch Comedy Show

The 3rd Floor presents an evening of (what else?) sketch comedy with potential subject matter ranging from Art Garfunkel to bad dates to Bigfoot. Miracle Theatre, 525 SE Stark St., 908-1141. 8 pm Fridays-Saturdays through Dec. 21. $14-$17.

Skootch

The improv ensemble again stages Multiverse, which relies on audience input to create a unique world and then to launch some fateful changes. Brody Theater, 16 NW Broadway, 224-2227. 9:30 pm Thursday, Dec. 19. $10.

A Very Christmas Secret Weapon Comedy Show

A holiday installment of the monthly show, with sets from Amy Miller, Nathan Brannon, Jason Traeger and Phil Schallberger.

Mississippi Pizza, 3552 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3231. 9:30 pm Wednesday, Dec. 18. $5 suggested.

DANCE Tracy Broyles

In an attempt to fi nd the place where science and spirituality meet, The Observer Eff ect is a “meditative, saturated, rumination on quantum physics,” says Tracy Broyles, who’s performed for 15 years in Portland. Through dance, live music, video projections and installation, the piece travels to Deepak Chopra-land and invites the audience to come along. After all, according to quantum theory, the audience is also creating the piece. Be prepared to feel feelings instead of fully understanding it.

The Headwaters, 55 NE Farragut St., No. 9. 8 pm ThursdaySaturday, Dec. 19-21; 2 pm Sunday, Dec. 22. $12-$20.

For more Performance listings, visit

VISUAL ARTS

DEC. 18–24

= WW Pick. Highly recommended.

By RICHARD SPEER. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, submit show information—including opening and closing dates, gallery address and phone number—at least two weeks in advance to: Visual Arts, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Email: rspeer@wweek.com.

background of shimmering gold leaf. It walks a delicate line between whimsy and opulence, irony and post-irony.

Through Jan. 25. Mark Woolley Gallery @ Pioneer, 700 SW 5th Ave., third floor, Pioneer Place Mall, 998-4152.

Contemporary Northwest Art Awards

The Art of Musical Maintenance

Expansive, thoughtful and dramatically installed, the biannual Contemporary Northwest Art Awards didn’t disappoint this year. Curator Bonnie Laing-Malcolmson has created a spectacular survey of artwork across a diverse fi eld of practices, fi lling—but not overfi lling—a generous exhibition space with work by artists from Oregon (Karl Burkheimer), Washington (Isaac Layman, Nicholas Nyland and the single-monikered artist known as Trimpin), Montana (Anne Appleby) and Wyoming (Abbie Miller). As heterogeneous as these artists’ works are, somehow LaingMalcolmson makes them cohere spatially and thematically. Through Jan. 12. Portland Art Museum, 1219 SW Park Ave., 226-0973.

NEWS Art Gym Names New Curator

of tall ships on the back gallery’s wall, the show is redundant Sturm und Drang without meaningful cohesion. The most satisfying piece is the simplest: a hollowed-out book with an intricately cut thimble inside. Its meaning is obscure but poetic, far removed from the overbearing grandiloquence of the rest of the show.

Through Jan. 11. Elizabeth Leach Gallery, 417 NW 9th Ave., 224-0521.

Marylhurst University’s beloved Art Gym has a new curator. Blake Shell is taking over from Terri Hopkins, who’s retiring after 33 years of innovative programming. Locally, Shell is probably best known for her three years as director of the Archer Gallery at Clark College in Vancouver, but her background extends to curatorial work at the University of Arizona and galleries in Tucson, Ariz., and Savannah, Ga. Hopkins will continue at the Art Gym through mid-January to ensure a smooth transition. She leaves behind an important legacy, having showcased impressive shows, among them unforgettable exhibitions by the “Eco-Baroque” duo of Bruce Conkle and Marne Lucas, conceptual artist Dan Gilsdorf, and performance artist extraordinaire David Eckard.

Among the highlights of the Portland Art Museum’s Contemporary Northwest Art Awards are the coolly minimalist paintings of Anne Appleby.

At fi rst, these works appear monochromatic color fi elds, but on closer examination they betray subtle layering and variations in hue. Appleby lives in Montana. The show at PDX is her fi rst solo exhibition in Portland.

Through Dec. 28. PDX Contemporary Art, 925 NW Flanders St., 222-0063.

SHOWING

Ben Buswell: We Live Only Through Ourselves

Ann Hamilton: a reading

Sometimes too much of a good thing is too much. Ann Hamilton slathers the front and back galleries of Liz Leach’s expansive spread with a veritable mess of wall pieces, sculpture, text-based objects and digital videos. It’s all part of a pathologically heterogeneous, thoroughly all-overthe-place show, vaguely titled (and preciously uncapitalized) a reading.

With the addition of (count ’em) four rotating projectors casting images

Anne Appleby: Woods

Ben Buswell’s show gets our vote for Most Flatulent Press Release of 2013.

For unfathomable reasons, it mentions the artist’s recently deceased grandfather, only to say that his death provided “a lens through which the artist examines how meaning arises from physical processes.” What physical processes, we are left to wonder—decomposition? The release blathers on about the artist’s “doubling of images and objects, surface violations, abstraction and mate-

rial choices” and his “use of emergent processes, where a multitude of insignifi cant marks and gestures accumulate into seemingly complex systems.” The release concludes by maintaining that “Buswell’s purpose is to undermine a sense a narrative and eschew the symbolic meaning of the imagery, collapsing the distance between perception of the object and apprehension of its meaning.” Writing like this—whether in press releases, artist statements or criticism—underlines just how disconnected much of contemporary art has grown from experiences that thoughtful art lovers can relate to. It’s endemic of an attitude that if you use big enough words in a long enough sentence, you can convince yourself and hopefully others that an artwork is worthwhile.

The photographic and sculptural work in Buswell’s show actually is worthwhile. The pieces have a witty minimalist elegance, but you’d never know that from the show description.

Through Jan. 25. Upfor Gallery, 929 NW Flanders St., 227-5111.

Bling Boutique

With a title like Bling Boutique, Mark Woolley Gallery’s 20th anniversary show was bound to be an exercise in glitz, and that’s just what it turned out to be. Some of the sparkliest works in this sprawling group show come courtesy of Wesley Younie. His sculpture of a miniature black volcano appears to be coated in glittery flecks of mica mixed with obsidian. Less majestic and more whimsical is his painting of a droll frog, sitting implacably on a

They have the same fi rst name: Jock Sturges and Jock Bradley. Sturges may be famous (and in some circles infamous) as the photographic chronicler of the nude body, but Bradley has made a name for himself by photographically chronicling the landscape in ways that evoke the nude body. His images of sand dunes in New Mexico and Colorado capture the sands’ peaks and troughs with an astute sense of shadow play that underlines their formal and thematic ties with the human body. Dunes and bodies are mutable; they rise and fall by the caprices of weather and time.

Bradley intuits this and captures it in sumptuous black-and-white. Through Dec. 31. Gallery 903, 903 NW Davis St., 248-0903.

Melange

The sometimes sexy, sometimes fleshmortifying allure of figure drawing endures among the six artists exhibiting in Melange. Braeden Cox, Kelsey Bunker, Scott W. Duff, Patrick Kernan, Christopher St. John and Erin Leichty finesse the divide between figuration and abstraction, sometimes with the addition of encaustic (wax-based) media. This artform stretches back to Rembrandt and beyond, with more recent exemplars including the great John Singer Sargent and the brilliantly perverse Willem de Kooning. It’s great to see young, emerging artists essaying this form with contemporary perspective and vigor. Through Jan. 11.

Gallery @ The Jupiter, 800 E. Burnside St., 230-8010.

Ryan De La Hoz: Fragments

Some of the most dynamic poster art in the world graces the Goodfoot this month, as more than 40 artists exhibit in the venue’s 10th annual exposition, The Art of Musical Maintenance. Using a continuum of techniques ranging from hand-drawn to computer-generated, artists from across the country fill the Goodfoot’s cavernous but still inexplicably cozy space with some 300 posters. David Welker designed the show’s promotional banner, which features a nude angel, legs turned outward in provocative contrapposto, standing beside a hellish bonfire.

Kudos to the Goodfoot for continuing to commingle the worlds of popular music and visual art. Through Jan. 27.

Goodfoot Lounge, 2845 SE Stark St., 239-9292.

The Big 400

Jock Bradley: Time Sands Still

THE SHOW POSTER FOR THE BIG 400

the old in ways that are incongruous but piquant. His works are exhibited alongside art by Russell Leng in the latest Breeze Block show organized by English curator Sven Davis.

Through Jan. 4. Breeze Block Gallery, 323 NW 6th Ave., 318-6228.

In a time when “new media” are all the rage in art and culture, Ryan De La Hoz is something of a throwback. He uses traditional materials in a way that emphasizes analog technology and the handmade. His imagery—TV static and ancient Greek iconography—combines the new and

Four hundred artists showing pieces priced at $40 a pop. If that’s not incentive for holiday gift-buying, we don’t know what is. The brainchild of artist-impresario Chris Haberman, this annual exhibition originated in 2007 as The Big 100, later became The Big 300, and has now metastasized into the current gargantuan open-call extravaganza. To make life more interesting for collectors, the artworks are hung randomly, without any title cards divulging artists’ names. So you’re not distracted by the reputation of a “name” artist; everybody’s equalized in a vast orgy of imagery, from representation to pure abstraction. Exhibited with the additional participation of the adjoining Mark Woolley Gallery, this is aesthetic democracy in action . Through Jan. 12. People’s Gallery, Pioneer Place Mall, 700 SW 5th Ave., third fl oor, Suite 4005.

Vlatka Horvat

London and New York artist Vlatka Horvat fi lls the ever-invigorating Disjecta exhibition hall with an integrated show of installations and works on paper. The artist uses mixed media to create the impression of overlapping fences. She asks us to reconsider the idea of the cordon: What is it, historically, to be allowed or disallowed entry, whether it be to the fabled velvet rope of discoera nightclub Studio 54 or, more sinisterly, through the Berlin Wall that defi ned the Cold War? Although the fences and barriers in this exhibition meander through the space, with miniature towers poking up within rubber-bandlike enclosures, the exhibition’s conceptual focus is refreshingly tight. Through Jan. 12. Disjecta, 8371 N Interstate Ave., 286-9449.

For more Visual Arts listings, visit

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

47

dec. 18-24 REVIEW

= WW Pick. Highly recommended.

FRANCOIS DUHAMEL

MOVIES

Editor: REBECCA JACOBSON. TO BE CONSIDERED FOR LISTINGS, send screening information at least two weeks in advance to Screen, WW, 2220 NW Quimby St., Portland, OR 97210. Email: rjacobson@wweek.com. Fax: 243-1115.

12 Years a Slave

A Twelve Years a Slave was part of

a literary tide. When the memoir was published in 1853, Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Frederick Douglass’ autobiography were bestsellers, helping to fuel the abolitionist movement. But Solomon Northup’s story was different.

Born a free man, he led a comfortable life as a carpenter and violinist with his wife and children in upstate New York in 1841, when he was kidnapped and sold into slavery. Northup managed to regain his freedom 12 years later and soon published Twelve Years a Slave, which became a bestseller of its own. But at some point, Northup disappeared and his book fell out of print. Now, it’s little-known outside the halls of academia. All of which makes British director Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave an even more staggering revelation. The film is agonizing but not lurid, compassionate but not melodramatic, patient but still thrilling. McQueen exposes the full extent of slavery’s physical cruelty, from the endless hours of cotton-picking to the capricious acts of violence, as well as the system’s psychological toll.

Alongside the film’s occasional brutality, McQueen stages takes of astounding beauty and surprising tranquility.

Most impressive is that 12 Years a Slave does not feel like an ethical or educational obligation. While its instructive value is undeniable, this is also a rousing portrait, a morally complicated tale and a masterful work of art.

R. REBECCA JACOBSON. Clackamas, Lloyd Mall.

20 Feet From Stardom

A- Life is unfair, and the music indus-

try is worse. If there were a rubric to figure out what makes one performer a household name and the other just another name in the liner notes, the history of pop would read much differently. Turning the spotlight on several career backup singers, Morgan Neville’s 20 Feet From Stardom shows, with great warmth and color, what it might sound like. Most are resigned to their roles in the musical ecosystem, content to have sacrificed their own aspirations for the sake of elevating the art itself. Whether that’s noble or a con, Neville never judges. He just lets them sing. And, in a more perfect universe, that would be enough.

MATTHEW SINGER. Living Room Theaters.

All Is Lost

B We all know Robert Redford too well. We know that, after nearly 50 years on the big screen, Redford the man is not an investigative journalist, a gadabout sidekick or a dark-horse power hitter. He is, however, a mildly eccentric and reclusive celebrity, one who might very well undertake a solo sailing trip around the world. As the only actor in All Is Lost, he does just that. Then, wood cracks and water rushes in. A shipping container has punched a hole in the hull, destroying the GPS and radio. He does his best to patch the hole, but it’s Redford vs. the world from here on out. The autobiographical parallels are striking, which is perhaps the reason Redford is out of the director’s chair and working with newbie J.C. Chandor, who became a rising star after 2011’s Margin Call. That movie thrilled with 24 hours inside an investment firm’s meltdown; All Is Lost does the same with much less. This is one man, alone, facing death. Redford is playing himself, and he’s not playing around. PG-13. MITCH LILLIE. Academy, Laurelhurst.

Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

Place, Sherwood, Wilsonville, Sandy, St. Johns.

The Big Lebowski

A [ONE WEEK ONLY, REVIVAL] A

marijuana-addicted bowling enthusiast who helped write the original draft of the Port Huron Statement becomes ensnared in a plot to defraud a charity benefitting inner-city children of promise without the necessary means for a necessary means for a necessary means for a higher education. He is ultimately unable to prevent the fraud but escapes with his johnson intact after impregnating the daughter of the wheelchair-bound fraudster.

Tara Reid steals the show as Bunny, a pornographic actress and alleged nymphomaniac. R. MARTIN CIZMAR. Clinton Street Theater. 7:30 pm FridayThursday, Dec. 20-26 (no showing Monday, Dec. 23).

Black Christmas

[ONE NIGHT ONLY, REVIVAL] A psychopath torments sorority girls. Wear your pajamas and bring a wrapped present for a white elephant gift exchange—might we suggest a sharp object or two? R. Hollywood Theatre.

7:30 pm Thursday, Dec. 19.

Blue is the Warmest Color

A- As soon as Abdellatif Kechiche’s

Blue Is the Warmest Color premiered in Cannes last May, frenzied discussion engulfed the film. Whether people found it exhilarating or exploitative, it seemed no one could shut up about this three-hour French saga about first love between two young women. The seven-minute sex scene monopolized much of the conversation, with a video montage that captures the responses of real lesbians eventually going viral. But for all the hooting it has unleashed, Blue Is the Warmest Color isn’t strident or demagogic. The film charts the evolution of the relationship between Adèle (Adèle Exarchopoulos, whose astounding performance will knock the wind out of you), and Emma (Léa Seydoux), who is a few years older. From the initial moment the two lock eyes, their connection is as electric as the shock of blue through Emma’s hair. Sometimes that connection plays out explosively, as in the aforementioned sex scene, but there are far more scenes devoted to quotidian routines and banal conversation. Minutes after exiting the theater, you’re unlikely to recall much of what Adèle and Emma talked about. But you’ll remember the frantically searching expressions on Exarchopoulos’ face, the looks of cool composure on Seydoux’s, the unrelenting urgency and desperation that infuse their exchanges. This isn’t a gayrights drama. It’s an epic tale of love between two people who just happen to be women, and that’s hopefully what will allow it to endure. Nc-17.

REBECCA JACOBSON. Cinema 21.

Blue Jasmine

B Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine isn’t

so much a fish-out-of-water movie; it’s a horse-with-a-broken-leg-in-water movie. You know how this thing’s going to end. Cate Blanchett’s Jasmine is a rarefied, half-delusional socialite tossed roughly down the slopes of her husband’s financial pyramid scheme after he is arrested. She lands in a strangely Bronx Guido version of San Francisco inhabited by her lowrent sister Ginger (played with wonderful sympathy by Sally Hawkins).

Blanchett’s performance is fascinating. She’s an Ingmar Bergman figure yanked straight out of Tennessee Williams: brittle, high-bred, wellguarded against reality but wretchedly vulnerable, snapping back and forth between high-class snob and raving drunk. Blue Jasmine cannot reconcile its broad comedy and pathos into coherence. But all the more impressive, then, that Hawkins’ and Blanchett’s twinned performances still manage to pick up most of the pieces. PG-13.

You already know what this is about.

Screened after WW press deadlines, but look for AP Kryza’s review at wweek.com. PG-13. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Mill Plain, Cornelius, Oak Grove, Cinema 99, Bridgeport, Hilltop, Lloyd Center, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV, Pioneer 48 Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

aRT aPPRaISaL: Bradley Cooper (left) and Christian Bale think hard about their hair.

GLITZ GETS REAL DAVID O. RUSSELL’S BRILLIANT AMERICAN HUSTLE FINDS TRUTH IN THE CON.

BY MATTHeW KOR FHAGe

mkorfhage@wweek.com

Director David O. Russell’s vision of America has always been Winesburg, Ohio, hopped up on trucker speed: a place of frantic grotesques distorted by their own need. In his new film, American Hustle—loosely based on the Abscam federal bribery scandal of the 1970s—everyone from New Jersey mayors to federal agents to small-time con artists are so warped by ambition that integrity and even identity become expensive luxury items. The film is a balls-to-the-wall, unbridled love affair with homegrown bullshit and piss-taking. American Bullshit was, in fact, the working title of the film, and in bullshit, it would seem Russell has finally found his true subject matter.

Russell’s early films, from Spanking the Monkey to I Heart Huckabee’s, were for the most part cynical romps in the fields of the neurotic. Even in last year’s charming revisionist romcom Silver Linings Playbook, the characters were bemired in distracting quirks. Maybe this was a statement about the lurking insanity of regular people, but often it seemed like a writer’s tic, a defense mechanism against accusations of boring sincerity.

But from the sincerely insincere, American Hustle builds genuine characters. The ersatz glitz of the ’70s—the shining polyesters and ambitious decolletage of both man and woman—might as well get a supporting actor credit. A nomination, even.

The film’s establishing shot is brilliant in this regard: a humorously long sequence of Christian Bale’s potbellied con man, Irving Rosenfeld, gluing a toupee to his head. In a world where appearances are more real than what lies beneath, it is the making of a man. When meticulously permed federal agent Richie DiMaso (Bradley Cooper) makes a move on Rosenfeld’s girl almost immediately thereafter, it’s an insult. When he musses his rug, it’s an unforgivable violation.

Rosenfeld and mistress Sydney Prosser (Amy Adams)—his partner in a series of hilariously implausible short cons—have been caught

by DiMaso in an undercover sting and are forced

to run confidence rackets for the feds in order to nab other grifters. The stakes, inevitably, inflate with DiMaso’s coke-fueled ego. By the time they’re done, they’ve invented a fake sheik meant to con the Mafia, a sea of U.S. congressmen and a New Jersey political whore with a heart of gold.

Meanwhile, the hapless Rosenfeld is playing the oldest con of them all: lying to his wife. Rosalyn Rosenfeld is played by Jennifer Lawrence as a creature of wised-up self delusion, a camp parody of crazy womanhood somewhere between Preston Sturges and Rainer Werner Fassbinder. It’s the showiest performance of the film—especially during a batshit-angry, lipstick-smearing kiss planted on the mug of her husband’s mistress. But as it turns out, American Hustle is the sort of film that loves the mistress more than the wife.

Adams is convincing as the perpetual other woman, trapped in the accent of an English aristocrat. She plays herself romantically against con man and federal agent while at the same time hilariously insisting everything has to be real. Her life is a con, but she wants true love. It is possible to believe in her and not believe a word she’s saying.

IT’S THE SORT OF FILM THAT LOVES THE MISTRESS MORE THAN THE WIFE. Russell has found equal muses in Cooper and Bale. Cooper’s DiMaso is a handsome face gone ticky and feral: a self-hating peacock with eyes animated by a near-constant, lacerating fear. Bale is the actorly equivalent of an extreme sportsman, one step from the abyss at all times. But in the role of a guilt-riddled, slack-bodied charlatan, he’s as comfortable as he’s been in years.

Halfway through the film’s wild pretzel of a plot it’s unclear who’s conning whom, but it’s clear everybody’s conning themselves. This is the high wire that makes American Hustle so exhilarating, with the quick turns of a David Mamet or Howard Hawks fast-talkie. Despite its ’70s high-criminal subject matter, it is far closer to His Girl Friday than to Goodfellas. Really, it’s the sort of flick we’ve rarely seen since the ’40s: a farce with a heart.

A SEE IT: American Hustle is rated R. It opens Friday at Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Oak Grove, Cinema 99, Bridgeport, City Center, Division, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Sherwood, Tigard, Mill Plain, Cornelius.

dec. 18-24

Die Hard

go for sisters MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Laurelhurst.

The Book Thief

C Markus Zusak’s bestselling novel The Book Thief follows Leisel, an illiterate daughter of communists who is sent to live with caretakers in a German village during World War II. Her sympathetic adoptive father teaches her to read and initiates her into the vivid and polemic world of words, which becomes the central theme of the book. Unfortunately, Brian Percival’s film adaptation, starring Sophie Nélisse as Leisel and Geoffrey Rush as her father, gets bogged down by too many subplots that are never fully fleshed out. And then there’s the fact that a bemused, chortling Grim Reaper narrates the film, reminding viewers that they “are all going to die one day” in the same tender manner that a parent might tell their children that Santa Claus isn’t real. Indeed, the garish theme of death is too stark a contrast to the warm, fuzzy glimpses of childhood and innocence. This is yet another example of a brilliant book falling victim to the big screen. PG-13. GRACE STAINBACK. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Movies on TV, Sandy.

Captain Phillips

A- You probably already know the

story behind Captain Phillips, because you heard it first from the helmethaired hagiographers of cable news.

Back in 2009, four Somali pirates boarded a freighter and kidnapped its captain, Richard Phillips (played in the movie by Tom Hanks). They kept him for five days on a lifeboat, demanding a ransom of $10 million, then got their brains blown out of their skulls

by Navy SEALs. In outline form, the politics of the plot are problematic for a film: It is the heroic triumph of superior, mostly white American forces against amateurish, violent African criminals. But Paul Greengrass’ film is no Black Hawk Down. Whenever the Navy SEALs emerge, they are seen in blank silhouette, accompanied by the ominous music of alien assault.

They look like a machine built only for death. Though shot with an eerie, disciplined neutrality, this is perhaps the most compassionate piece of filmmaking I’ve seen this year. PG-13.

MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Cinema 21.

Christmas in Space

[ONE NIGHT ONLY, REVIVAL] Two batshit Christmas TV specials from 1978. In space, no one can hear you scream. Hollywood Theatre. 7:30 pm Saturday, Dec. 21.

The Counselor

D+ The Counselor, directed by Ridley Scott and written by Cormac McCarthy (it’s the author’s first original screenplay), is an unmitigated mess. It’s a cautionary tale about drug trafficking and reckless romance, set on the U.S.Mexico border, but it’s so full of fauxpoetic mumbo-jumbo and so choppily assembled that the result is just frustrating and dumb. The titular character, played by Michael Fassbender, is an unnamed lawyer who has gotten himself into a mess involving a martiniguzzling client (Javier Bardem) and a cowboy hat-wearing middleman (Brad Pitt). As it becomes obvious things will unravel for Fassbender, Pitt turns to

him: “Counselor, I don’t know what you should do, but it’s out of your hands,” he says. The film, likewise, spirals out of Scott’s hands, lurching between disconnected vignettes and gruesome acts of violence. R. REBECCA JACOBSON. Valley.

Dallas Buyers Club

A The first time Matthew

McConaughey appears onscreen in Dallas Buyers Club, the reflex is to gasp. That carved-from-amber beach bod has been whittled down to a toothpick. It’s a transformation mirroring that of McConaughey’s career over the past year: The rom-com lothario has withered away. In his place arrives a performer at his peak, in a role that better damn well win him an Oscar, as an AIDS activist the movies have never seen before: a shit-kicking, homophobic redneck. That redneck actually existed, too. In 1985, Ron Woodroof, a Dallas electrician, bull rider and pussychasing, coke-snorting degenerate, became one of the rare straight men in the early years of the AIDS epidemic to contract HIV. Frustrated by the grinding inertia of Big Pharma, Woodroof went to Mexico, where, with a cocktail of natural supplements and non-FDA-approved meds, he was nursed back to health. Figuring there was a great racket in AIDS drugs that actually worked, he returned to Texas and opened a “buyers club.” Operating out of a fleabag motel, he skirted federal regulations by selling “memberships” at a rate of $400 per month and doling out the banned substances for “free.” To the credit of writers Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack and director Jean-Marc Vallée, Dallas Buyers Club has no weepy epiphanies, no soliloquies about newfound understanding. Woodroof may have been an asshole, but he was an asshole whose instinct for self-preservation eventually helped extend the lives of millions of better people. And, in the face of a plague, that’s worth more than one jerk’s enlightenment. R. MATTHEW SINGER. Hollywood Theatre.

Delivery Man

C- There’s a simple reason improv factors so heavily in many big-screen comedies: After only a few takes, the existing material can start to feel stale for everyone involved. Imagine, then, the lifelessness that plagues Delivery Man, which is writer-director Ken Scott’s scene-for-scene, line-for-line remake of his 2011 French-Canadian film, Starbuck. Transferred to New York and translated into English, this remains the story of David Wozniak (Vince Vaughn), a meat delivery driver who seems to be bad luck incarnate. A sperm bank severely mismanaged his deposits in the ’90s, resulting in him siring over 500 children. Upon discovering this, he does what any decent guy would do: stalk his unknown offspring and play fairy godfather. Apparently uncomfortable watching his leading man squirm— because when has that ever been amusing?—Scott forgoes a redemption story in favor of one hinging on unearned absolution. PG-13. CURTIS WOLOSCHUK. Clackamas, Movies on TV, Sherwood, Sandy.

Despicable Me 2

C This sequel to 2010’s blockbuster

[ONE WEEK ONLY, REVIVAL] Die Hard is Uncle Rich: that abrasive drunk who shows up at the Christmas party with a pocketful of firecrackers and a fifth of scotch. Uncle Rich fucking rules. If he had never been born, we’d be stuck watching George Bailey being a pussy instead. R. Hollywood Theatre. 9:30 pm Friday-Wednesday, Dec. 20-25 (no showing Tuesday, Dec. 24).

Don Jon

A- Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s debut as a

triple threat—writer, director and star, a la Clint Eastwood—is appropriately festooned with the time-honored totems of macho masculinity. We’ve got cartoonish muscles, unbridled rage, some good old-fashioned misogyny and, of course, sex that’s all about the man.

“Condoms are just terrible,” whines Jon (Gordon-Levitt), a Guido beefcake who likes porn better than real sex. “But you gotta wear one because, unlike porn, real pussy will kill you.” Or rather, real pussy—with all its trappings of commitment—will kill your bachelor lifestyle. Jon doesn’t have time for that.

He is so immersed in Internet porn that it’s hard to tell whether his attitudes about sex and love are the product or the cause of his obsession. GordonLevitt brings just enough depth to the character, and to the film overall, to turn a schlocky premise into an honest and approachable exploration of how porn—and really, any other addictive simulation of reality—can cheat us out of the richness of actual experiences.

R. EMILY JENSEN. Edgefield, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst.

Elysium

B+ In the year 2154, we’re told, the

rich don’t care about the poor. Neill Blomkamp, whose debut film was the alien-apartheid fantasy District 9, pretty much takes this for granted.

His sophomore film, Elysium, is essentially a political metaphor gone fiercely rogue in the physical world. Not only do the rich not give two flying figs about the poor, but they live in a utopian space station in the sky, constantly bathed in heavenly light. Below, on Earth, the abandoned residents of Los Angeles languish in a dreamily intricate slum that has fallen into apocalyptic steampunk, a world of shit and piss and dirt. Blomkamp’s cinematic vision may be stunning, but Elysium’s plot and characters are pure Hollywood camp. But goddamn if it isn’t good, solid, hardworking Hollywood camp— with absolutely brutal, inventive action sequences that include swords, hovercraft, force fields, exploding bullets and acrobatic killer robots. The film is what a sci-fi epic should be: a fantastical machine fueled by our own dreams and fears, made believable by its absolute devotion to these dreams. R. MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Laurelhurst.

Ender’s Game

B- Much in the same vein as The Hunger Games—and, of course, The Lord of the Flies long before it— Ender’s Game taps into the brutality and ruthlessness of which children are capable. In this speculative future, Earth is at war with an alien insectoid race, and children have become the military’s best shot at victory. The fact that the complex computer games and zero-gravity exercises leave the kids increasingly desensitized doesn’t seem to cost their commanding officers any sleep. Director Gavin Hood keeps a firm handle on the film’s somber tone, ensuring we’re never once at ease with the sadistic environment. PG13. CURTIS WOLOSCHUK. Eastport, Edgefield, Sherwood.

Enough Said

A- In Nicole Holofcener’s Enough Said,

you’re going to get a huge sitcom-cal-

iber calamity: Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ new best friend (Catherine Keener) turns out to be the embittered ex-wife of her new lover (James Gandolfini). The film is a rare thing: a portrait of middle-aged romance that feels genuine in its baby steps and lurches, the hesitations of people out of practice.

Louis-Dreyfus’ comedy is rooted in missed opportunity and sudden regret, Keener’s often in the brittle judgment of the alpha female. Gandolfini’s?

Apparently it comes from love. In his final role, he shows a tenderness and good-natured humor that imbues the film with an extra layer of pathos: that we will not know him this way again. One of his last lines in the film is “I’ve missed you.” Well, I’ll miss him, too. PG-13. MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Academy, Laurelhurst.

Free Birds

B While we wouldn’t quite call Free

Birds a good idea, there are so many children’s pics waiting to collide at the Christmas line of scrimmage that any cartoon set during November (even a mismatched pair of turkeys traveling through time to steer the first Thanksgiving away from poultry) seems, well, smart business. Helmed

by Horton Hears a Who! vet Jimmy Hayward and voiced by an enviable troupe of A-listers, the resulting feature arrives with sweeping inoffensiveness and large personalities.

If we must watch another iteration of an adorably feckless fellow wooing an officious overachiever, Owen Wilson and Amy Poehler know the roles pretty well. For a production so strictly manufactured, there’s an addled comedic sensibility given blessedly free range.

PG. JAY HORTON. Valley.

CONT. on page 50

REVIEW COURTESY OF CBS FILMS

KEVIN J. LONG

adds Kristen Wiig as high-spirited love interest and expands the animated repertoire to encompass 3-D thrills, but the story itself, which shoehorns Gru into the service of a global super-spy league for the flimsiest of reasons, arrives packed with exposition and shorn of coherency while allowing precisely no opportunities for expression of the dastardly hubris that named the franchise. PG. JAY HORTON. Academy, Laurelhurst, Valley.

MOVIES

window to nowhErE: oscar isaac.

INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS Lovable losers abound in the films of Joel and Ethan Coen. Even the most ardent admirer of Raising Arizona’s H.I. McDunnough or The Big Lebowski’s the Dude would be hard-pressed to call either man conventionally successful. But that’s kind of the point: The old adage about loving someone for his flaws holds true in these cases.

Keep that in mind when you meet the title character of Inside Llewyn Davis. A down-on-his-luck folk musician in 1961 New York City, Llewyn (Oscar Isaac) crashes on friends’ squeaky couches, gigs at the Gaslight Cafe and mills about while waiting for his big break. It isn’t much of a spoiler to say he’ll be waiting awhile. Llewyn himself seems aware of this, questioning whether to keep chasing fame or to admit defeat and re-enlist in the Merchant Marine.

Witnessing all this unfold is, in a word, lovely. That may seem an odd way to describe such a bittersweet portrait of failure and disenchantment, but the Coens are experts in drawing out the bitter and the sweet in nearly equal measure. Inside Llewyn Davis continues in the sincere, unironic register established (surprisingly, to some) by their 2010 remake of True Grit. But that’s not to say it lacks their signature black humor. At one point, Llewyn tells a fellow musician played by John Goodman that his former musical partner “threw himself off the George Washington Bridge.” Goodman wryly responds: “You throw yourself off the Brooklyn Bridge, traditionally. George Washington Bridge—who does that?”

Goodman’s role is essentially an extended cameo, as is that of Justin Timberlake, who plays yet another struggling musician. Colorful characters pop up here and there, as they do in all the Coens’ movies, but Inside Llewyn Davis is ultimately a one-man act. We follow Llewyn almost painfully closely as he tries to improve his lot, or at least make sense of it, and we root for him as we would a home team down by a point in the fourth quarter. All the while, Bruno Delbonnel’s soft-focus cinematography makes his fumblings seem even more desperate.

Llewyn eventually sees the words “What are you doing?” written on a restroom stall, and he seems genuinely taken aback. As the viewer, getting to share in Llewyn’s struggle to answer that question in any meaningful way is more than worth the accompanying sorrow.

MICHAEL NORDINE. The coen brothers hum a bittersweet tune.

B+ SEE it: Inside Llewyn Davis is rated R. It opens Friday at Fox Tower.

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

49

MOVIES

DEC. 18-24

Frozen

B Widely hailed as a return to the

classic animated features of yore, Frozen arrives as an uncomplicated triumph of traditionalism, for better or worse. A musical-theater retelling of classic Hans Christian Andersen tale The Snow Queen, hidebound Disney preservationists were worried the decidedly modern title foretold the goofy revisionism of 2010’s Rapunzel fan-fic Tangled.

But there’s a far easier explanation for the name change: Once again, it’s all about the princesses. Kristen Bell’s Anna takes center stage as a rambunctious royal eagerly awaiting the social possibilities accompanying her older sister’s imminent coronation. Compared to the pandering messiness of most kids’ movies, there’s plenty to excite the familyfriendly faithful. Widescreen 3-D visuals sculpt an endlessly inventive setting of ice palaces and snowcapped peaks, the original songs written by veterans of Avenue Q and The Book of Mormon soar and tickle as needed, and snowman sidekick Olaf giddily beats back the encroaching melodrama. It’s the sort of Disney film even Disney barely makes anymore, as majestic and problematic as a sudden snowfall, and, like all blizzards of youth, we’ll mourn its passing. PG. JAY HORTON. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Mill Plain, Cornelius, Forest, Indoor Twin, Oak Grove, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Sandy.

Go for Sisters

B Indie stalwart John Sayles’ Go

for Sisters tells the story of a female parole officer (LisaGay Hamilton) who heads to Mexico to look for her missing son. Along for the ride are a former friend-turned-parolee (Yolonda Ross) and a retired detective (the gravelly-voiced Edward James Olmos). Their journey takes them to A.A. meetings, strip clubs and sex shops, but Sayles doesn’t hover at these places to emphasize their seediness. Rather, he shows that the people who haunt them are just that: people. Flawed, troubled and often on the wrong side of the law, but people all the same. To call this a “sympathetic” portrayal runs the risk of wrongly implying that the writer-director is straining to understand his characters’ circumstances.

That understanding comes with apparent ease, and the easy chemistry between the three leads is Go for Sisters’ best feature. Few other filmmakers could handle this material with such an even hand, but this is hardly Sayles’ first rodeo: He’s explored the gray area between “illegal” and “immoral” in films like Eight Men Out and Lone Star for nearly three decades now. This is a worthy entry in that filmography, and one of the year’s most overlooked films. MICHAEL NORDINE. Living Room Theaters.

Willamette Week’s

BEER GUIDE February 5th • 2014

Gravity

A- Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity begins

The Great Beauty

A The Great Beauty begins with a

cannonball, followed closely by a heart attack, and concludes with a 104-year-old toothless nun crawling on her knees up the steps of a church. Paolo Sorrentino’s luxuriously sprawling film is both enchanted and repulsed by the decadence it depicts, a tension that makes for one of the richest cinematic experiences of the year.

At the center is Jep Gambardella (a wondrous Toni Servillo), a 65-year-old hedonist who wrote an acclaimed novel as a young man and now spends his days (and nights) living large in Rome. Toward the beginning of the film, he learns that his first love has died, which jolts him down a path of grief, nostalgia and, because he’s at times a pompous cad, pride. That journey is a sensuous feast, scored by haunting choral music and techno mariachi, and marked by appearances by washed-up socialites, a blue-haired dwarf, vanishing giraffes and dreadful performance artists, including a woman who runs naked and blindfolded into a stone wall. The loosely connected vignettes can meander, but taken together they compose a fascinating portrait of Berlusconi’s Italy, one that is too consumed by orgiastic terrace parties and neverending conga lines to realize how stagnant it’s become. REBECCA JACOBSON. Living Room Theaters.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

B+ When last we saw Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) and his band of dwarves, they were headed to confront a dragon. But along the way, they also took an awful lot of time to do the dishes and sing songs seemingly stolen from Led Zeppelin. That was a central complaint about Peter Jackson’s first entry in his Hobbit trilogy, and it made fans wonder whether swelling J.R.R. Tolkien’s shortest book into three films would result in stagnation. That fear goes flying out the window like a decapitated orc head in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, which justifies its nearly three-hour runtime not by cramming in tons of story, but by allowing the action pieces to play out with the lunacy of an ultraviolent Looney Tunes short. And so we have our heroes floating downriver in barrels as a battle between

elves and orcs rages overhead, and a freaky showdown with an army of spiders. It all leads up to a confrontation with the titular dragon, who instantly becomes the most terrifyingly beautiful winged beast ever put to film. It wouldn’t be a Tolkien film without the self-seriousness, but The Desolation of Smaug never loses its sense of fun, forgoing the confusingly labyrinthine setup of its predecessor in favor of watching its heroes escape ridiculous peril time and time again. PG-13. AP KRYZA. Bagdad, Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Mill Plain, Cornelius, Moreland, Oak Grove, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Roseway, Sandy, St. Johns, Lloyd Mall, Bridgeport, Lloyd Center.

Homefront

After Spring Breakers, the thought of James Franco as a meth kingpin doesn’t seem so far-fetched, even if he’s starring opposite Jason Statham and dealing with a screenplay adapted by Sylvester Stallone.

R. Movies on TV, Sandy.

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

B Taking what initially seemed like a watered-down version of Battle Royale, The Hunger Games series has created a sprawling and very grown-up world for young audiences. With Catching Fire, director Francis Lawrence further expands this post-apocalyptic universe where children are forced to slay one another in an annual gladiatorial event designed to tamp down discontent. This film finds heroine Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and her milquetoast co-champ Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) on a “victory tour” through a country where the rich bathe in luxury while the poor undergo flogging and execution in what resembles WWII-era Russia. Fearing Katniss will become a symbol for a simmering rebellion, the president (Donald Sutherland) forces her back into the arena with even deadlier stakes. As with the first film, Catching Fire goes slightly flat once the actual Hunger Games commence. But in the lead-up to the most violent episode of Survivor imaginable, the director crafts a dense dystopia full of political allegory, media satire and other elements that most YA films consider their core audiences too dumb to handle. PG-13. AP KRYZA. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Mill Plain, Cornelius, Oak Grove, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Sandy.

In a World...

B+ Lake Bell is on a crusade against

“sexy baby voice.” For those unfamiliar with this obnoxious tic, imagine if Betty Boop incorporated some of Ke$ha’s vocal fry—that low, guttural vibration—and ended every sentence as if it were a question. That’s Bell’s pet peeve, and she lampoons it to pitch-perfect effect in In a World…, which she wrote, directed, produced and stars in.

But as funny as that sendup is, it’s still far from the best thing in the film, which takes us into the idiosyncratic and competitive realm of

CO U RT E SY O F FO L LOW YO U R N OS E F I L M S

with a staggeringly brilliant and mesmerizingly staged 17-minute single take, which manages to encapsulate every single feeling the rest of the film will instill in its

viewers: tranquility, warmth, peace, trepidation, nervousness, endearment, wonder and, most of all, fear.

With Gravity, Cuarón and his screenwriter son, Jonas, take on the most primal fear possible, that of being lost in an abyss of nothingness. The film features only two actors, Sandra Bullock and George Clooney. Their simple space-station repair mission turns into a nightmare as debris from a destroyed satellite tears their shuttle to shreds and they’re left hopelessly adrift with a dwindling supply of oxygen. It is perhaps the most stressful experience to be had in a movie theater this year, and as such it’s nearly perfect. PG13. AP KRYZA. Cinema 21, Eastport, Clackamas.

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Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

LA CAMIONETA

dec. 18-24

Out of the Furnace

B+ From the outset, shades of Michael

persistence of vision voice-over artists. Bell plays Carol, an aspiring voice-over artist with a bear of a father (Frank Melamed) who’s big in the biz. But rather than help Carol get her foot in the door, he’s as vain and sexist as the rest of his industry.

“Women are flying planes now!” he gasps, lounging poolside in a velvet leisure suit. The movie is overstuffed, but its unassuming tone, its generosity of spirit, and Bell’s skillful performance redeem the uneven pacing and bumpy storytelling. R. REBECCA JACOBSON. Living Room Theaters.

Is the Man Who Is Tall Happy?

A Inside a flickering frame, direc-

tor Michel Gondry is furiously animating. Words slowly appear on the screen above as Gondry narrates in a thick French accent. “I think that Noam is telling me what it takes to do true science,” he says of a debate on Newton. That’s just one snippet from Gondry’s surprisingly cozy interviews with Noam Chomsky, which he recorded on a film camera that’s clearly audible throughout. These interview fragments appear within frames of Gondry’s neon-on-black animations, which are something of a cross between Schoolhouse Rock and Monty Python’s cutouts. Less expository than interpretive—which is probably how Chomskyites would have it anyway—Gondry’s childlike images add whimsy to Chomsky’s ideas.

Though the two have plenty to disagree about, their mutual respect shines through, especially after a few of Gondry’s questions touch on Chomsky the man: what makes him happy and how he met his late wife. Irreverent but respectful, Is the Man certainly covers the breadth of Chomsky’s oeuvre—from linguistics to politics to history—but doesn’t attempt to plumb its depth. All the better. Gondry has done the impossible: He’s rolled a tribute, a profile and an objet d’art into one. MITCH LILLIE. Living Room Theaters.

It’s a Wonderful Life

[ONE WEEK ONLY, REVIVAL] George Bailey is a pussy. PG. Hollywood Theatre. Friday-Wednesday, Dec. 20-25.

Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa

B+ As this narrative begins, Johnny Knoxville’s newly widowed, 86-yearold Irving Zisman is driving his grandson across the country to be dropped with his deadbeat dad. The farther they travel across America, the further Knoxville and talented child actor Jackson Nicoll press their man-onthe-street badinage toward creepiness. Nicoll’s unilateral decision to be adopted by friendly strangers probably wrings the most laughs, but Knoxville’s addled ferocity attains more intriguing dimensions. Older but no wiser, and still obsessed with seizing the easy laugh with lunatic aplomb, Bad Grandpa isn’t quite art, and it’s not quite growing old gracefully. This, though, you may want to try at home. R. JAY HORTON. Academy, Kennedy School, Laurelhurst, Mission, St. Johns, Valley.

La Camioneta: The Journey of One American School Bus

A- [ONE NIGHT ONLY] The journey of

the yellow school bus goes far beyond carting snotty preteens five miles to middle school and back. After 10-year tours of duty in the U.S., buses are driven to Central America, where they become camionetas. The story of one such bus, from Midwestern auction to busy Guatemalan route and all the ambitious businessmen in between, is the focus of Mark Kendall’s beautifully shot documentary La Camioneta.

Meticulously chromed and repainted, equipped with a roof rack and, on special occasions, outfitted with icons of St. Christopher and palm fronds, this camioneta bears little outward resemblance to its forebear. But, as is hinted by banal aphorisms (“Life is a journey!”), these buses foster an international connection, even if American drivers don’t have to pay off gangs to continue working. Superb pacing is the key to La Camioneta’s success: It keeps on truckin’. Tonight’s screening is a benefit for the Portland Central America Solidarity Committee. MITCH LILLIE. Clinton Street Theater. 6:30 pm Thursday, Dec. 19.

Last Vegas

C- John Turtletaub’s film thrusts four 60-something besties (Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Kline) into Sin City for a bachelor party/last hurrah in hopes hilarity will ensue. If that premise sounds familiar, so are the ensuing shenanigans: fanny packs, bikini contests, Viagra jokes, unearned nostalgia and shopworn musings on aging. Though intermittently funny and not entirely without their charms, Turteltaub’s half-hearted attempts to create a new Rat Pack mostly fall flat. The familiarity of the gags works against the movie rather than for it, and no one onscreen seems to be having an especially good time, a feeling likely to be shared by the audience. PG-13. MICHAEL NORDINE. Academy, Movies on TV, Valley.

Mondo Sahara

[ONE NIGHT ONLY, DIRECTOR ATTENDING] In the ’90s, British motorcyclist Austin Vince rode around the world on a tiny dirtbike. This time, he went across the Sahara. Vroomvroom. Clinton Street Theater. 9 pm Thursday, Dec. 19.

Nebraska

C Alexander Payne has built his brilliant career on examinations of pathetic characters—and I mean that literally, not pejoratively. In the blackand-white Nebraska, a combination Valentine and fuck-you to his home state, he continues this project, but to dishearteningly flat results. You can predict the emotional arc based on the premise alone: David (Will Forte) decides to accompany his near-senile father, Woody (Bruce Dern), with whom he has a fractious relationship, on a road trip from Montana to Nebraska to claim the million-dollar magazine sweepstakes prize Woody believes he’s won. Payne’s typically trenchant observations on humanity’s soft underbelly feel broad, perhaps due to his non-involvement in the script, a first. Instead, the film rests on lazy humor (get your overweight, mouth-breathing Midwesterners here!), forced provocations (crotchflashing at a cemetery!) and ingrati-

Cimino’s Vietnam drama The Deer Hunter permeate Scott Cooper’s Out of the Furnace: images of Pennsylvania steel mills, a PTSD-addled young soldier forced into a world of underground violence, and, well, actual deer hunting. Out of the Furnace centers on two blue-collar brothers: the elder Russell (Christian Bale), an everyman who is involved in a horrific tragedy that lands him in prison; and Rodney (Casey Affleck), an Iraq War vet struggling to acclimate to civilian life who turns to bare-knuckle boxing in an attempt to make ends meet. Were the film to focus solely on the brothers, it would be a solid, if slightly dull, meditation on returning to a mundane existence after a life of extremes. Cooper’s ambitions go beyond that, and it’s not long before Rodney crosses paths with Harlan DeGroat (Woody Harrelson), a lollipop-chomping, heroin-addicted hillbilly who runs a criminal empire amid the dilapidated trailers of the New Jersey mountains. Cooper, whose freshman film, Crazy Heart, coaxed a career-best performance out of Jeff Bridges, handles the expansion from quiet character study to mosaic thriller with panache. By focusing on the anguish of characters forced to drastic measures, Cooper spins a sophisticated tale that never resorts to melodrama. R. AP KRYZA. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Forest, Movies on TV.

Persistence of Vision

Philomena stands on its own two feet.

One of those feet is the enthralling, often emotional storyline. Philomena and Martin Sixsmith (Steve Coogan), a political journalist who’s taken on his first human-interest story, uncover secrets both cloistered in the nunnery where Philomena’s child was born and spread across America, where her son was taken as a child. Unfortunately, the other foot is the waiter-my-soup humor that Fawlty Towers made irrelevant four decades ago. After suggesting that Martin not print her real name in the story, Philomena asks, “What about Anne…Anne Boleyn? It’s a lovely name!” After the film ends, it’s Philomena’s story that sticks. Director Stephen Frears and company should be given credit only for staying out of the real Philomena’s way. PG-13. MITCH LILLIE. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV.

The Punk Singer

A Kathleen Hanna’s life story is stuffed

with enough incident and drama to fill a week’s worth of feature-length documentaries. She survived a strange and sometimes abusive upbringing, turned to feminist art and music as a means of self-expression, and fomented what she deemed “Revolution Grrl Style Now” through her bands Bikini Kill and Le Tigre. And for the past eight years, Hanna has dealt with the effects of Lyme disease. Narrowing all of it down to a 90-minute documentary was no mean feat. Yet director Sini Anderson’s hones this epic life journey into a film that is as empowered, energetic and fierce as its subject. Anderson doesn’t define Hanna by the struggles of the past and present but by the impact she has had and continues to have on women of all ages. And the key voices in this film (outside of Hanna’s husband, Adam Horowitz of the Beastie Boys) are all female, an especially rare feat in a music documentary. Seeing Hanna at her most fragile moments is heartbreaking, but that only serves to amp up the excitement of seeing her back in control. ROBERT

HAM. Hollywood Theatre.

Reel Feminism: Women of Faith

[ONE NIGHT ONLY, REVIVAL] Rebecca Alvin’s 2008 documentary centers on women’s experiences inside the Catholic church. Clinton Street Theater.

7 pm Wednesday, Dec. 18.

Thor: The Dark World

C Thor is Marvel’s most unidentifiable character, but his first solo cinematic outing worked because of how hilariously batshit it was. 2011’s Thor was part goofball sci-fi epic, part fishout-of-water comedy set in smalltown New Mexico, anchored by Chris Hemsworth’s charmingly boyish performance. Thor: The Dark World is the God of Thunder’s first post-Avengers romp, and it reverses the formula, transporting Thor’s scientist girlfriend (Natalie Portman) to his psychedelic space kingdom. It shows us a world of rainbow roads, elves with bazookas and giant rock monsters…only to make us long to be back in New Mexico. There’s some nonsense about dark elves and a forced teaming up with Thor’s a-hole brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston, great as always), but director Alan Taylor sucks all the fun out of the picture, creating a cornball drama that plays a lot like one of his episodes of Game of Thrones, minus the incest but with spaceships. PG-13. AP KRYZA. Cedar Hills, Forest, Indoor Twin, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV.

Tyler Perry’s A Madea Christmas

The pistol-packing, cantankerous grandma goes to the country for the holidays. PG-13. Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Cornelius, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV.

Walking With Dinosaurs

Giant dinosaurs POKING YOU IN THE EYE. PG. Cornelius, Oak Grove, Cinema 99, Bridgeport, City Center, Hilltop, Lloyd Mall, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Tigard, Sandy, Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Mill Plain.

B+ [ONE NIGHT ONLY] Last week in

L.A., the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences screened a film titled The Thief and the Cobbler for the first time ever. This was a capitalB, capital-D Big Deal. After watching this documentary about the making of that movie, you’ll understand why.

Oscar-winning animator Richard Williams—responsible for bringing Roger Rabbit to life in Who Framed Roger Rabbit—began work on the film in 1964. He continued working on it for the next 28 years, aided by the many talented artists who passed through his eccentric London studio during that time. The longer production went on, the greater the legend around the movie became. Artists slaved for months over mere seconds of film under the perfectionist visionary, but all agreed: It was truly groundbreaking work. The film’s backer, Warner Bros., was less dazzled, however, and eventually seized the production, getting an outside studio to turn it into the very thing Williams was railing against: a Disney-esque kids’ feature, with schmaltzy songs and a tackedon love story. This version, retitled Arabian Nights, was a box-office flop, and Williams—who appears in this film only through archival footage—has largely disappeared since. Last week’s screening of the original cut of the film, hosted by Williams himself, is a satisfying, unofficial postscript to this 2012 documentary. But even without it, Persistence of Vision stands as a fitting tribute not only to the masterpiece that never was, but to the dying craft of hand-drawn animation itself, and to one of its greatest craftsmen. RUTH BROWN. Hollywood Theatre. 7:30 pm Wednesday, Dec. 18.

Philomena

C- The hardest part about watching Philomena, a film based on the true story of an Irish woman’s search for the son she gave up for adoption 50 years previous, is accepting the amazing Judi Dench as a bumbling simpleton in the title role. “We don’t have Mexicans in England—we have Indians,” she excitedly explains to the Mexican-American cooks. If you can get over Dench as Grandma Goof—a role she plays as best she can—then

REVIEW C O U R T E S Y O F WA LT D I S N E Y S T U D I O S

COURTESY OF KEVIN SCHRECK PRODUCTIONS

ating moments of father-son bonding (David and Woody recover lost dentures near the train tracks!). After unsparing takedowns of self-delusion in Citizen Ruth and Election, more forgiving assessments in About Schmidt and Sideways and the line-walking of The Descendants, it’s disappointing to see Payne succumb to sentimentality untempered by insight or depth. R. KRISTI MITSUDA. Cedar Hills, Clackamas, CineMagic, Living Room Theaters.

MOVIES

GAG ME WITH A SPOONFUL OF SUGAR: Disney movies walk a fine line between warm-and-fuzzy feel-goodery and all-out cheese, but few straddle the line as frustratingly as Saving Mr. Banks. This is, after all, a film that casts Tom Hanks as Walt Disney himself, struggling to get Mary Poppins made by awakening the inner child of prim, proper and persnickety British author P.L. Travers, played with eccentric hilarity by the great Emma Thompson. There’s considerable joy to be had in The Blind Side director John Lee Hancock’s depiction of 1960s Hollywood, and in watching Travers slowly seduced by the infectious songs that made Poppins a classic. Alas, Travers suffers more flashbacks than Timothy Leary. Each time the film hits a stride, we’re forced back to turn-of-the-century Australia to witness her upbringing with her whimsically alcoholic dad (Colin Farrell, definitely playing to character). These endless flashbacks take the wind out of the film like a rip in a kite. For all its considerable joy and fantastic performances, Saving Mr. Banks gets greedy: It starts out tugging at the heartstrings but, with its strained sentimentality, eventually tears a ventricle. AP KRYZA. C SEE IT: Saving Mr. Banks is rated PG-13. It opens Friday at Cedar Hills, Eastport, Clackamas, Oak Grove, Cinema 99, Bridgeport, Tigard, City Center, Division, Hilltop, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Sherwood.

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

51

MOVIES

DEC. 20-26

COURTESY OF GRAMERCY PICTURES

Academy Theater

7818 SE Stark St., 503-252-0500 LAST VEGAS Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 07:15 JACKASS PRESENTS: BAD GRANDPA Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 03:00, 09:30 ALL IS LOST Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 02:35, 07:00 CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2 Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 05:10 ENOUGH SAID Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 04:55, 09:20 DESPICABLE ME 2 Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 04:30 A CHRISTMAS STORY Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 02:20, 06:45, 09:00

Living Room Theaters MAGIC CARPET RIDE: The Big Lebowski plays Dec. 20-26 at the Clinton Street Theater.

2735 E Burnside St., 503-232-5511 ALL IS LOST Fri-Sat-SunMon 07:00 DON JON FriSat-Sun-Mon 07:15, 09:30 ENOUGH SAID Fri-SatSun-Mon 07:30 JACKASS PRESENTS: BAD GRANDPA Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon 09:40 DIE HARD Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon 09:15 ELYSIUM Fri-SatSun-Mon 09:00 BLUE JASMINE Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon 06:45 DESPICABLE ME 2 Sat-Sun 01:15 CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2 Sat-Sun 01:45

DESOLATION OF SMAUG 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 10:45, 11:40, 12:35, 02:25, 03:20, 04:15, 06:05 TYLER PERRY’S A MADEA CHRISTMAS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 11:00, 01:45, 04:25, 07:15 FROZEN Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 10:50, 01:50, 04:40, 07:25 FROZEN 3D Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 09:55 AMERICAN HUSTLE Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 12:20, 03:40, 07:00 ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 10:30, 12:00, 01:30, 03:00, 04:30, 06:05, 07:30 WALKING WITH DINOSAURS 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 10:00, 03:00, 08:00 IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE Tue 02:00, 07:00 THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY Tue 05:00, 08:00 47 RONIN 3D Tue 08:00

Mission Theater and Pub

Empirical Theatre at OMSI

2013

GIVE! GUIDE TWO WEEKS LEFT TO GIVE! GIVEGUIDE.ORG

Regal Lloyd Center 10 & IMAX

1510 NE Multnomah St., 800326-3264 SAVING MR. BANKS Fri-Sat-Sun-Wed 12:25, 03:30, 06:45, 09:50 ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES Fri-Sat-Sun 12:25, 03:30, 06:30, 09:35 AMERICAN HUSTLE Fri-Sat-Sun-Wed 11:50, 03:10, 06:25 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG: AN IMAX 3D EXPERIENCE Wed 12:00, 04:05, 07:50 MANDELA: LONG WALK TO FREEDOM Wed 11:30, 03:00, 06:35, 10:05 THE WOLF OF WALL STREET Wed 11:40, 03:40, 07:40 THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY Wed 12:10, 03:20, 07:15, 10:10 47 RONIN 3D Wed 12:35, 07:05, 10:15 47 RONIN Wed 03:50

Regal Lloyd Mall 8

2320 Lloyd Center Mall, 800-326-3264 WALKING WITH DINOSAURS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 02:45, 07:45 WALKING WITH DINOSAURS 3D Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:15, 05:15 ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:00, 03:00, 05:55, 07:50 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG 3D Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 11:30, 03:25, 07:30 TYLER PERRY’S A MADEA CHRISTMAS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 11:45, 02:30, 05:10, 08:00 PHILOMENA Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:05, 02:50, 05:20 FROZEN Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 02:25, 05:30 FROZEN 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:40 THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 12:10, 03:35, 07:00 THOR: THE DARK WORLD Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 02:40 12 YEARS A SLAVE Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 11:35, 05:25 GRUDGE MATCH Wed 12:00, 02:55, 05:50, 08:45

Bagdad Theater and Pub

3702 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 503-249-7474 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 12:00, 03:45, 07:30

Clinton Street Theater

GIVEGUIDE.ORG 52

Willamette Week DECEMBER 18, 2013 wweek.com

2522 SE Clinton St., 503-238-8899 THE BIG LEBOWSKI Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 07:30 THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW Sat 12:00 OPERA IN CINEMA THE MAGIC FLUTE Sun 01:00

Laurelhurst Theatre & Pub

1624 NW Glisan St., 503-249-7474-5 CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2 FriSat-Sun 05:30 JACKASS PRESENTS: BAD GRANDPA Fri-Sat-Sun 07:35

Roseway Theatre

7229 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-282-2898 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 04:00, 08:00 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue-Wed 12:00

St. Johns Cinemas

8704 N Lombard St., 503-286-1768 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-TueWed 05:00, 08:30 ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue-Wed 05:25, 07:55, 10:25

CineMagic Theatre

2021 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 503-231-7919 NEBRASKA Fri-Sat-SunMon 05:30, 08:00 THE WOLF OF WALL STREET Wed 05:30, 09:00

Century 16 Eastport Plaza

4040 SE 82nd Ave., 800-326-3264-952 GRAVITY Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 02:35 GRAVITY 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:05 OUT OF THE FURNACE Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:05, 01:55, 04:45, 07:40 ENDER’S GAME Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 10:20, 01:10, 04:10, 06:55 THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:55, 03:30, 07:05 SAVING MR. BANKS Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 10:15, 01:20, 04:20, 07:20 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG Fri-Sat-Sun-MonTue 09:50, 01:30, 05:10, 07:55 THE HOBBIT: THE

1945 SE Water Ave., 503-797-4000 MYSTERIES OF THE UNSEEN WORLD FriSat-Sun 11:00, 03:00 JERUSALEM Fri-Sat-Sun 01:00, 04:00 GREAT WHITE SHARK Fri-Sat-Sun 12:00, 02:00, 05:00 THE POLAR EXPRESS Fri-SatSun 06:00 A CHRISTMAS STORY Sat-Sun 08:00

NW Film Center’s Whitsell Auditorium

1219 SW Park Ave., 503-221-1156 GHOST DOG: THE WAY OF THE SAMURAI Fri 07:00 YOJIMBO Sat-Sun 04:30 A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS Sat 08:00

Pionneer Place Stadium 6

340 SW Morrison St., 800-326-3264 ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:45, 02:00, 05:00, 07:30 WALKING WITH DINOSAURS 3D Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 02:45, 05:10 WALKING WITH DINOSAURS Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 11:30, 08:00 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG Fri-Sat-SunMon-Tue 12:00, 04:00, 07:45 THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG 3D Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:45, 04:45 FROZEN FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:30, 03:45, 07:00 THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:20, 03:15, 06:30 THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY Wed 02:00, 04:50, 07:45, 10:40

St. Johns Theater

8203 N Ivanhoe St., 503-249-7474-6 CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 2 FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 01:00 JACKASS PRESENTS: BAD GRANDPA Fri-Sat-Sun 08:50

341 SW 10th Ave., 971-222-2010 20 FEET FROM STARDOM Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue 11:55 GO FOR SISTERS Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 12:05, 02:40, 04:10 IN A WORLD... FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 02:10 IS THE MAN WHO IS TALL HAPPY? AN ANIMATED CONVERSATION WITH NOAM CHOMSKY Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 12:00, 02:50, 04:50 NEBRASKA Fri-SatSun-Mon-Tue 11:55, 12:25, 02:00, 02:30, 04:30, 05:00 THE GREAT BEAUTY FriSat-Sun-Mon-Tue 12:40, 03:40 THE NUTCRACKER IN 3D Sun 12:00

Century Clackamas Town Center and XD

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MUSICIANS MARKET FOR FREE ADS in 'Musicians Wanted,' 'Musicians Available' & 'Instruments for Sale' go to portland.backpage.com and submit ads online.

Ads taken over the phone in these categories cost $5.

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DECEMBER 18, 2013

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STUFF

(503)

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• 16 foot long x 8 foot wide.

• Utilites: All Electric • 8 foot high ceiling.

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• Lots of handy cabinet space!

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Time Shift–set it and forget it. on the edge (three hours ahead)?

66 Takes for a ride 67 Suitcase attachment 68 Kernel 69 Slip or square follower 70 “Gee, that’s swell!”

71 Places for peels

Across 1 “Armageddon” author Leon 5 Mos Def collaborator Kweli 10 Drains, as of energy 14 Jazz great Thelonious 15 Crack up 16 “___ se habla español” 17 Guy who avoids fighting (one hour behind)?

19 Litter critter 20 Bite-size 21 Handy children’s

game 23 Advance 26 Deep sleep 27 Consumer protection org.

30 On the Caribbean, poetically 32 Nobel Peace Center city 35 Scenic fly-fishing activity (one hour behind)?

40 Cookie in pie crusts 41 Drone, for instance 42 Frozen drink company with a

polar bear mascot 43 The key elixir (one hour behind)?

46 Short footrace 47 PayPal cofounder ___ Musk 48 Electronics co. whose slogan was once “So Real” 49 Baseball stat 52 “Carmina Burana” composer 54 2,640 feet 58 Bird in the constellation Aquila 62 Retail chain that offers meatballs 63 Airline hanging

Down 1 Strike callers 2 Go outside the service area 3 ___ Empire 4 Technique 5 Mai ___ (bar order) 6 “Breaking Bad” network 7 Coal unit 8 Late singer Hayes 9 Japanese box lunch 10 Snidely stated, perhaps 11 Pastel shade of blue 12 Jello Biafra’s genre 13 Web presence 18 Ice cream concoction 22 Singer/songwriter Tori 24 Beijing Olympic gold medalist sprinter ___ Powell 25 “Elysium” director Blomkamp 27 College VIP 28 Disinterested 29 “The ___ Vista Social Club” 31 Hayao Miyazaki genre

33 Allowed 34 How hair may sometimes stand 36 “Hold it right there, buster!”

37 “The Voice” judge/coach Green 38 Intense devotion 39 Person who’ll argue about Windows vs. Linux 44 Baba au ___ 45 Derive by reasoning 50 Promotional gimmick 51 Former Washington senator ___ Gorton 53 Viper features 54 The ___ from French Lick (Larry Bird) 55 “Konvicted” hiphop artist 56 Joking Jay 57 Shakira’s “___ Noche Voy Contigo” 59 Golf lesson subject 60 Maggie’s sister 61 CPR experts 64 Skin design, briefly 65 Star’s propulsion, maybe? last week’s answers

©2013 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com) For answers to this puzzle, call: 1-900-226-2800, 99 cents per minute. Must be 18+. Or to bill to your credit card, call: 1-800-655-6548. Reference puzzle #JONZ654.

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Week of December 19

JOBS

GENERAL

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES Stars Cabaret in BEAVERTONHiring (Beaverton-Hillsboro-SW Portland)

EMPLOYMENT SERVICES ARIES (March 21-April 19): “Life is best organized as a series of daring ventures from a secure base,” wrote psychologist John Bowlby. Some of you Aries enjoy the “daring venture” part of that formula, but neglect the “secure base” aspect. That’s why your daring ventures may on occasion go awry. If you are that type of Ram, the first half of 2014 will be an excellent time to correct your bad habit. Life will be offering you considerable help and inspiration in building a strong foundation.

And if you already appreciate how important it is for your pursuit of excitement to be rooted in well-crafted stability, the coming months will be golden.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Here’s a tale of three renowned Taurus brainiacs: Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill, and Bertrand Russell. They all had IQs over 175 and all made major contributions to philosophy.

Yet all three were physically inept. Kant had trouble keeping a sharp point on his writing instrument, the quill, because he was clumsy using a knife. Mill was so undexterous he found it a chore to tie a knot. Russell’s physical prowess was so limited he was incapable of brewing a pot of tea. Chances are that you are neither as brilliant nor as uncoordinated as these three men. And yet, like them, there is a disconnect between your mind and body -- some glitch in the way the two of them communicate with each other. The coming year will be an excellent time to heal the disconnect and fix the glitch.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): A horticultural company in the UK is selling TomTato plants to home gardeners.

Each bush grows both cherry tomatoes and white potatoes. The magic was accomplished through handcrafted hybridization, not genetic engineering. I foresee a comparable marvel in your long-term future, Gemini.

I’m not sure about the exact form it will take. Maybe you will create a product or situation that allows you to satisfy two different needs simultaneously. It’s possible you will find a way to express two of your talents in a single mode. Or perhaps you will be able to unite two sides of you that have previously been unbonded.

Congratulations in advance!

CANCER (June 21-July 22): “To destroy is always the first step in any creation,” said the poet E. E. Cummings.

Do you buy that idea, Cancerian? I hope so, because the cosmos has scheduled you to instigate some major creative action in 2014. In order to fulfill that potential, you will have to metaphorically smash, burn, and dissolve any old structures that have been standing in the way of the future. You will have to eliminate as many of the “yes, buts” and “I can’ts” and “not nows” as you possibly can.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): When did you first fall from grace? Do you remember? It has happened to most of us. We spend time being privileged or cared about or respected, and then, suddenly, we no longer are. We lose our innocence. Love disappears. Our status as a favorite comes to an end. That’s the bad news, Leo. The good news is that I think the months ahead may be time for you to climb back up to one of those high states of grace that you fell from once upon a time. The omens suggest that even now you’re making yourself ready to rise back up -- and sooner than you think, there will be an invitation to do so.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): Leonardo da Vinci created the painting *St. Jerome in the Wilderness* around 1480. It now hangs in the Pinacoteca Vaticana, a museum in Vatican City. For several centuries, though, the treasured work of art was missing. Legend tells us that in the early 19th century, Napoleon’s uncle found the lower half of the painting in a junk shop in Rome.

Years later he stumbled upon the top half in another back alley, where it was being used as a wedge in a shoemaker’s bench. I foresee the possibility of a comparable sequence unfolding for you in 2014, Virgo. You just may manage to restore a lost beauty to its proper place of honor, one step at a time.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): The Italian painter Tintoretto (1518-1594) was a Libra. He worked with such vigor and passion that he was nicknamed Il Furioso -- The Furious. One of his crowning achievements was his painting *Paradise,* which is 74 feet long

and 30 feet tall -- about the size of a tennis court. It adorns a huge wall in the Doge’s Palace, a landmark in Venice. I propose that Tintoretto serve as one of your inspirational role models in 2014. The coming months will be an excellent time for you to work hard at crafting your own personal version of paradise on earth.

You may not be so wildly robust to deserve the title “Il Furioso.” But then again, you might.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Between 2002 and 2009, Buddhist monk Endo Mitsunaga spent a thousand days meditating as he did a ceremonial walk around Mount Hiei in Japan. In 2006, English writer Dave Cornthwaite took 90 days to skateboard across the entire length of Australia, a distance of 3,618 miles. The first man’s intentions were spiritual, the second man’s adventurous. The coming months will be prime time for you to contemplate both kinds of journeys, Scorpio.

The astrological omens suggest that you will generate extra good fortune for yourself by seeking out unfamiliar experiences on the open road. To get yourself in the mood, ruminate on the theme of pilgrimage.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Many farms in California’s Tulare County grow produce for supermarket chains. Here’s the problem: Those big stores only want fruits and vegetable that look perfect. So if there are brown spots on the apples or if the zucchinis grow crooked or if the carrots get too big, they are rejected. As a result, 30 percent of the crops go unharvested. That’s sad because a lot of poor people who live in Tulare don’t have enough to eat. Fortunately, some enterprising food activists have begun to work out arrangements with farmers to collect the wasted produce and distribute it to the hungry folks. I gather there’s a comparable situation in your life, Sagittarius: unplucked resources and ignored treasures. In 2014, I hope you take dramatic action to harvest and use them.

MCMENAMINS GRAND LODGE RUBY SPA

is now hiring LMTs! Qualified apps must have an open & flex sched including, days, eves, wknds and holidays. We are looking for applicants who have prev exp related exp and enjoy working in a busy customer service-oriented enviro. We are also willing to train! We offer opps for advancement and excellent benefits for eligible employees, including vision, med, chiro, dental and so much more! Please apply online 24/7 at www.mcmenamins. com or pick up a paper app at any McMenamins location. Mail to 430 N. Killingsworth, Portland OR, 97217 or fax: 503-221-8749. Call 503-952-0598 for info on other ways to apply. Please no phone calls or emails to individ locs! E.O.E.

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Stars Cabaret in BEAVERTON is now accepting applications for Servers, Bartenders, Hostess, Security (DPSST preferred).

Part and Full-time positions available. Experience preferred but not required. Earn top pay + tips in a fast-paced and positive environment.

Stars Cabaret is also conducting ENTERTAINERS auditions and schedule additions Mon-Sun 11am-10pm.

ENTERTAINERS: Training provided to those new to the business.

Located @ 4570 Southwest Lombard Avenuein Beaverton Please apply at location.

Stars Cabaret in TUALATINHiring (Tualatin-TigardLake Oswego)

Stars Cabaret in TUALATIN is now accepting applications for Servers, Bartenders, Hostess, Security (DPSST preferred). Part and Full-time positions available. Experience preferred but not required. Earn top pay + tips in a fast-paced and positive environment.

Stars Cabaret is also conducting ENTERTAINERS auditions and schedule additions Mon-Sun 11am-10pm.

ENTERTAINERS: Training provided to those new to the business.

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I M A D E T HIS

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Derrick Brown has a poem entitled “Pussycat Interstellar Naked Hotrod Mofo Ladybug Lustblaster!” I hope that at least once in 2014 you will get up the nerve to call someone you love by that name. Even if you can’t quite bring yourself to utter those actual words, it will be healing for you to get to the point where you feel wild enough to say them.

Here’s what I’m driving at, Capricorn: In the coming months, you will be wise to shed any inhibitions that have interfered with you getting all of the free-flowing intimacy you’d love to have.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): “Artists who are content merely to hone their gifts eventually come to little,” says the Belgian writer Simon Leys. “The ones who truly leave their mark have the strength and the courage to explore and exploit their shortcomings.”

I’d like to borrow that wisdom and provide it for you to use in 2014, Aquarius. Even if you’re not an artist, you will be able to achieve an interesting kind of success if you’re willing to make use of the raw materials and untapped potential of your so-called flaws and weaknesses. Whatever is unripe in you will be the key to your creativity.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): In 2014, you will have the mojo to escape a frustration that has drained you and pained you for a long time. I mean you can end its hold on you for good. The coming months will also provide you with the chance to activate and cultivate a labor of love that will last as long as you live. While this project may not bloom overnight, it will reveal its staying power in dramatic fashion. And you will be able to draw on the staunch faith you’ll need to devote yourself to it until its full blessings ripen.

Homework What do you want to be when you grow up? Testify at Freewillastrology.com.

“The Waterfront”

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