Willamette Week, August 25, 2021 - Volume 47, Issue 43 - "Hydro Hogs"

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Join the Dive podcast every Saturday as we quickly cover the week’s headlines, and then dive deeper into the big stories of the week. Host Hank Sanders sits down with the paper’s staff as well as the biggest names in Portland to discuss the city and the events that change lives. The Dive podcast by Willamette Week is the best way to stay up to date with Portland’s news, sports, arts, and culture.

FINDINGS

CHRIS NESSETH

JORDAN CHILES, PAGE 16

WHAT WE LEARNED FROM READING THIS WEEK’S PAPER VOL. 47, ISSUE 43 An Instagram account posted graphic video of Portland’s 60th homicide of 2021. 5 More than 2,000 Black residents left the Albina District in the past decade. 6 A 200-pound limestone panel fell to the sidewalk during a February ice storm. 8 Proud Boys flipped a van, fired paintball guns, and shot fireworks into Northeast 122nd Avenue. 9 Last year, Paul Brenneke bought a sushi chain and spent $12,769 on water. 11 Ralph Shaw just wants to eat his toast in peace. 12 We saw new variations on mushroom hat fashion at Celtic Fantasy Faire in Hillsboro. 17

Dance organizations have questioned Oregon Ballet Theatre about the dismissal of its artistic director. 18 Modest Mouse’s new album makes earnest attempts at feelgoodery. 21 Holocene has the hypebeast dance party you’ve been dreaming about—with a vaccine mandate. 21 Sweedeedee got rid of all your old favorites. 23

The new Oregon-set film Pig inspired Cinemagic to screen double features starring Nicolas Cage and pigs. 26 Asylum seekers in Ireland were for many years prohibited from cooking their own meals . 28

Mary’s Club will move from

downtown but keep its iconic marquee. 18

ON THE COVER:

OUR MOST TRAFFICKED STORY ONLINE THIS WEEK:

Portland’s 20 biggest Hydro Hogs, photo by Brian Brose, design by Jack Kent.

Mary’s Club is moving.

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DIALOGUE Last week, Gov. Kate Brown issued doctors, nurses and teachers an ultimatum: Get vaccinated or lose your job.

On Aug. 19, Brown announced that Oregon will require vaccinations for health care workers and public school employees, no earlier than Oct. 18. By instructing state agencies to mandate vaccinations, Brown in essence overrode a 1989 state law that exempts health care workers from vaccine requirements. (The law gave state officials the authority to overrule it.) Brown faced swift backlash from the Oregon Nurses Association, which argues that the requirement would worsen staffing shortages. Here’s what our readers had to say: @Shadowfax2365, via Twitter: “I would be outraged to learn my health care provider was not vaccinated. I am a retired nurse. Back when I practiced, before the anti-vaxxer movement, we were required to have certain vaccines in order to work. Hepatitis B was but one.”

Jason Collins, via Facebook: “This should have been done six months ago.”

HowardD, via wweek.com: “I am a little curious if she can even legally do that. There used to be a state law against that very thing, and probably still is.” @kenabi, via Twitter: “Lawsuits incoming in 3…2…”

Jason Eff, via Facebook: “So, this entire thing began with ‘15 days to slow the spread’ so our hospitals and frontline health care workers could keep up with the demand…And now we’re firing doctors and nurses.”

CLUB GUNFIRE IMPACTS RESIDENTS TOO

Your article says nothing about the impact of “nightlife” on those of us who live in the neighborhood [“Hired Guns,” WW, Aug. 11, 2021]. I live on the 16th floor of the Pacific Tower Apartments, and my windows look down 4th Avenue. I can see the Hung Far Low sign from my bedroom window. Because I live on the 16th floor, bullets are less likely to reach my apartment, but what about my neighbors on the lower floors? Even if we do not end up with bullets coming through our walls or windows, the noise in the streets is really atrocious, especially for people living on lower floors. I have called 911 to report gunfire more times since the clubs have reopened than I have called it for any reason in my entire life up to this point.

You interviewed business and club owners, but you did not interview residents? Why not? I think that residents who are caught between violent clubgoers and hired guns are being ignored. The only reason I joined the board of the Old Town Community Association is because of the lack of resident representation in the neighborhood. Now I see that lack of representation in your article about our neighborhood.

Dr. Aisha Y. Musa Old Town Community Association board member

THE HIGH COST OF TEA PARKING

At the end of Jenni Moore’s otherwise nice article about a tea shop [“All Is Full of Tea,” WW, Aug. 18, 2021], she writes, “The only thing not so ideal about the new Smith Teamaker cafe is the sometimes lengthy search for a parking spot on Northwest 23rd.”

Flabpreaker, via wweek.com: “Why not just man- Uh, folks, we are in a severe climate crisis. Why are date vaccination for all Oregonians then? Health care your reporters driving to in-town destinations, and workers are not spreading the virus, and requiring assuming readers do the same? A shortage of parking the leftovers to get vaccinated by the end of October is a GOOD thing. Go by bike or transit, please. won’t help anything at the moment. Right Band-Aid, Steve Cheseborough wrong appendage.”

Northeast Portland WronkleDonkle, via wweek.com: “This is great news. If you are in health care and don’t want the vaccine, what the fuck are you doing in health care? Get the shot.”

OREGON SHORT

FILM FESTIVAL

The 8th Oregon Short Film Festival will screen 30+ international independent short films at the historic Clinton Street Theater on Sunday August 29, 2021.

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cstpdx.com 2522 SE Clinton St Portland, OR 97202

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Dr. Know

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

Letters must be 250 or fewer words.

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

Email: mzusman@wweek.com

BY MART Y SMITH @martysmithxxx

Why does Oregon require license plates on the front and back? My other travel states (Arizona, Florida and Tennessee) require only the rear plate. We could save money and time by doing the same, freeing up the front for something cool like “DR KNOWS.” —Paul B. While I appreciate the flattery, Paul, I’ve antagonized The Man enough as it is. The only thing cops hate more than a guy who drives around with no front license plate is a guy who drives around with a fake front license plate featuring a number he made up himself. And anyway, if I ever start sporting “Dr. Know” vanity plates, please kill me, because either I’m having a massive stroke or I’ve been replaced by a particularly tacky alien.

Favorite travel states notwithstanding, Oregon’s front-and-back plate requirement is actually the norm for the majority of the nation. Just 19 states embrace the rear-only model—I don’t have room for a list, but they’re mostly Southern, and (weirdly? obviously?) all but one went for Trump in 2016.

The remaining 31 belt-and-suspenders states (including all of our own state’s nearest neighbors) probably share Oregon’s official position on the mat-

ter, which is that displaying a license plate on both ends of the vehicle makes it easier to identify, both for law enforcement and for private citizens.

A cynical observer might add red-light cameras (which often photograph vehicles from the front) to that list. But in spite of what you might suspect, rear plate-only states are just as likely to have such cameras as the front-and-back crowd. This suggests that front plate laws aren’t just a conspiracy to give out more camera tickets. (Probably.)

Whatever the reason for them, the vast majority of drivers are perfectly fine with having front license plates. Those who object tend to fall into two groups: (a) people who think the front plate greatly detracts from the stylish appearance of their expensive sports car, and (b) people who are currently stuck behind a cop at a traffic light while driving a stolen vehicle.

Obviously, I have some sympathy for the latter group, but the former? Let’s be honest: People with strong opinions about their car’s stylish appearance tend to be a-holes. (The fact that a lot of the complaints are coming from Tesla owners doesn’t exactly dispel this impression.) In short: Just put on the damned plate, it won’t kill you.

QUESTIONS? Send them to dr.know@wweek.com.

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A POLICE CRUISER IN OLD TOWN

KRISTOF MOVES CLOSER TO GUBERNATORIAL BID: In response to questions WW raised about whether he meets Oregon’s three-year residency requirement to run for governor, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof released a 15-page legal opinion to the newspaper this week, making the case that he meets the standard—despite having voted in New York in November 2020. The document is the clearest evidence yet that Kristof intends to seek the governor’s mansion in the Democratic primary. Some observers are skeptical that Kristof qualifies: “In November 2020, Mr. Kristof attested that his ‘permanent and principal home’ was in New York,” says Greg Chaimov, an elections lawyer. But Kristof’s attorneys, who include Misha Isaak, former general counsel to Gov. Kate Brown, strongly disagree. They say his vote in New York is irrelevant and note instead that he grew up here, has long owned property and paid taxes here, and has always considered Oregon his home. “Kristof is eligible for the position of governor as he will have been ‘a resident within this State’ for a period of ‘three years next preceding his election,’ within the meaning of Article V, section 2 of the Oregon Constitution.” (Read their full analysis at wweek.com.)

INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT DISAPPEARS AFTER POSTING MURDER VIDEO: A Portland-based Instagram account with 87,000 followers disappeared Aug. 23, just hours after its moderator posted a graphic video of a murder that took place Friday night outside the 7-Eleven at Southeast 92nd Avenue and Holgate Street. The account reappeared Monday evening and,

by Tuesday morning, was gone again.

The Instagram account, called “Portland Looks Like Shit,” isn’t obscure. It’s gained notoriety and a massive following in the past year for posting mostly user-submitted videos and photos of homeless camps and homeless people, many enduring mental distress. But its post on Monday showing the graphic murder Friday of a man in the Lents neighborhood was a sharp escalation in content—and nothing like what has been posted before. It’s unclear if the account was shut down by Instagram. The video shows the Aug. 20 homicide of 30-year old Johnny Polanco, who appeared to be trying

to break up a fight outside of the convenience store when a man in the parking lot pointed a gun at Polanco and shot him in the head. The Instagram account owner did not respond to questions from WW. DEADLY SHOOTINGS CONTINUE IN OLD TOWN: The killing of Polanco was the 60th homicide in Portland this year. The 61st occurred the same weekend in Old Town, where a revived nightlife scene has played host to repeated shootings (“Hired Guns,” WW, Aug. 11, 2021). Rolando L. Mingledoff Jr., 22, turned himself in to homicide detectives Monday for the Aug. 22 killing of JaMarie Herring Sr., 25, in the nightclub Mingle Lounge. Mingledoff, of Happy Valley, is charged with second-degree murder. The night after Herring’s death, five men were wounded by gunfire at a vigil outside the same club. Police say no witnesses could be found at the scene.

INVESTIGATION CLEARS BOLI OF DISCRIMINATION: On Aug. 24, the Oregon Department of Justice released the 40-page results of an independent investigation into allegations of racial discrimination by two Black former employees of the Bureau of Labor and Industries. The investigation posed a threat to BOLI and its chief, Labor Commissioner Val Hoyle, because it is the state agency that investigates allegations of wrongdoing in the workplace, which frequently involve racial bias. The investigation, carried out by the Stoel Rives law firm, found the allegations lodged by former civil rights division administrator Carol Johnson and BOLI senior civil rights investigator Shaina Pomerantz “unsubstantiated.” One unusual detail: Although Johnson alleged that she received a bag of feces in the mail from a BOLI employee, the investigation discounted that claim.

“Ms. Johnson did receive a package of cow feces from a company doing business as ‘Poop Senders’ that markets ‘the ultimate gag gift’ and guarantees anonymity, [but] there was nothing in the record to substantiate any nexus between this incident and any BOLI employee or Ms. Johnson’s employment at BOLI,” the investigation concluded.

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5

NEWS

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW THIS WEEK

Moving Out

TIM SAPUTO

TRENDING

NEIGHBORHOOD NOTES: Demographics along North Williams Avenue have shifted dramatically over several decades.

The Black population of inner North and Northeast Portland continues to shrink.

BY NIG E L JAQ UI SS

njaquiss@wweek.com

Newly released U.S. Census Bureau data shows Portland’s historically Black neighborhoods continued to see an exodus of Black residents, even as city officials have focused money and energy on reversing that decline.

The demographic shift over four decades in the inner North and Northeast Portland neighborhoods of the Albina District is remarkable. In 1970, census data shows, 9 out of 10 Black Portlanders lived in those census tracts. Today, according to new calculations performed for WW by the Portland State University Population Research Center, just over 1 in 5 Black Portlanders live there.

Since 2015, the Portland Housing Bureau has been actively working to slow or reverse the decline, committing $80 million to a program called the North/Northeast Neighborhood Housing Strategy, which includes home repair loans, mortgage assistance and other investments aimed at keeping residents in Albina—or helping families pushed out by gentrification to return.

But that investment did not reverse the trend. In fact, the Black population of Albina shrunk again in the past decade—this time, by 2,500 people. (The previous decade, from 2000 to 2010, saw the same census tracts lose more than 8,000 Black residents.)

Shannon Callahan, director of the Housing Bureau, says she’s disappointed in the decline, which occurred even as Albina overall grew substantially—by 11,400 people. (Portland’s Black population as a percentage of total population remained unchanged from 2010 to 2020 at about 7.9%.)

“It’s unfortunate but not surprising that more Black households left,” Callahan says.

“Gentrification is continuing, and pushing BIPOC families out of their homes.”

Charles Rynerson, PSU’s census guru, did note one positive finding in his analysis 6

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

of the Albina numbers: Unlike in 2010, when every one of the area’s 25 census tracts lost Black population, four census tracts saw small double-digit gains, and a fifth added 335 Black residents.

Callahan says it’s too early to say for sure, but that gain may be the result of Housing Bureau developments, which have added 500 new affordable rental housing units in the area and have given preference to former residents pushed out by gentrification.

In addition to the Housing Bureau’s work, Prosper Portland, the city’s economic development agency, allocated another $32 million to preserve and bolster Black-owned businesses in the Interstate Urban Renewal Area, which includes Albina.

“The [census] numbers are a bit of a surprise to me,” says state Sen. Lew Frederick (D-Portland), who represents Albina in the Oregon Legislature. “I expected them to be worse—to show more folks had been chased out.”

Nkenge Harmon Johnson, CEO of the Urban League of Portland, says anybody who walks the neighborhood near her organization’s North Russell Street headquarters can see and feel the change wrought by developers who’ve gobbled up land along thoroughfares like North Williams Avenue.

Home flippers pepper homeowners with letters and text messages offering cash for homes. Hipster bars, restaurants and coffee joints contribute to jacked-up rents. It’s an onslaught inexorably pricing longtime residents out of their neighborhoods.

Harmon Johnson says the new census numbers show the city is “nibbling around the edges of gentrification” instead of attacking it head on. She wants a bigger commitment to subsidizing homeownership and bolstering financial capacity by helping young professionals with student debt. “Policymakers tend to be interested in the next flashy thing,” she says, “instead of workaday solutions that simply require more dollars.”

Black Portlanders continue to move out of inner North and Northeast Portland (below) even as the area’s population booms.

PORTLAND’S HISTORICALLY BLACK ALBINA DISTRICT

NEWS MAPPED

Counting to Five Democrats want to redraw congressional districts so they control Oregon’s new seat. Get ready for some gerrymandering.

Portland pollster John Horvick thinks Oregon Democrats have a math problem. The party’s leaders will have trouble securing five of the state’s six congressional seats without engaging in some contortionist geography.

“I assume the standard WW reader doesn’t like gerrymandering and wants to get to five Democrats” in the U.S. House, Horvick says. “The fact is that those two are just incompatible.”

Some context: Oregon’s population gains in the 2020 U.S. Census guaranteed the state would add a sixth seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. The increase comes as all states redraw congressional boundaries, as they do every 10 years. U.S. Supreme Court rulings say that House districts must be as close to equal in population “as nearly as practicable.” How states achieve equality—that’s politics.

State lawmakers get first crack and have formed bipartisan committees to draw the new boundaries. House Speaker Tina Kotek (D-Portland) even invited citizens to submit their drawings of where the districts should lie to the committee by Sept. 7.

Horvick, political director at polling firm DHM Research, started sketching two weeks ago, using an interactive website called Dave’s Redistricting (davesredistricting.org). He quickly recognized a puzzle: Democrats, who now hold four of five U.S. House seats, will struggle to add a fifth without obvious gerrymandering.

“It’s quite reasonable to think we’re picking up the sixth seat because Democrats moved to the state,” Horvick says,

noting that much of Oregon’s population gains came from college-educated transplants, a mostly blue constituency.

Democrats continue to build a massive voter registration advantage—now nearly 300,000—over Republicans. “The assumption was that the sixth seat would be Democratic.

But I think it’s pretty tough to get there. We’re very likely to add a seat that’s going to be Republican.”

Horvick says the dilemma boils down to this: Democrats cluster in Willamette Valley cities. The guidance given to lawmakers says districts, in addition to being

comparable in population, should take into account geographic and political boundaries, be connected by transportation links, and not split communities of interest. Those guidelines will make it difficult to distribute Democrats into five districts without creating the kind of tortuous shapes good government types associate with unprincipled opportunism. Horvick walked WW through two maps to help readers brace for disappointment.

AARON MESH.

Map 1: Makes Geographic Sense In this rendering of six districts, the lines are drawn in compact shapes that reflect known regions of the state while having roughly equal populations. “That will seem perfectly reasonable, visually, to people,” Horvick says. But the result on election days won’t: In this map, three of the five districts would have a majority of registered Republicans.

Map 2: Makes Partisan Sense for Democrats In this map, Democrats would have a puncher’s chance at winning five of six seats. The cost?

Districts that look unnatural to Oregonians—with East Portland and Gresham lumped in with Pendleton and Malheur County, and another L-shaped district linking Bend to the coast in order to scoop up enough Dems. Horvick says a glance at this map may explain why Kotek gave Republicans equal say at the redistricting table: “At the federal level, you’re probably not giving up that much,” he says. “It would be very difficult to get anyway.”

HOT SPOT

State of Emergency COVID infections are rising faster in Southwest Oregon than anywhere else in the United States.

Southwest Oregon is seeing the highest average daily growth rate of COVID cases in the past seven days of any hospital region in the nation—1.5% a day.

On Aug. 19, Grants Pass lawyer Holly Preslar typed an SOS to elected officials from her Southwest Oregon home.

Preslar started an online petition asking Josephine County commissioners to declare a state of emergency. The disaster? A swell of COVID-19 hospitalizations that had well outstripped the resources of hospitals in the Rogue River Basin.

At last count, 172 people were hospitalized with the Delta variant at Asante Three Rivers Medical Center in Grants Pass.

“As Dr. Megan Frost mentioned in her presentations last week, she has had to cancel cancer surgeries for patients because of this surge,” Preslar wrote. “People are having to wait for hours in the emergency department before they can be given a bed in our hospital. Our system is at the breaking point.”

She was not being melodramatic. As of Aug. 17, COVID cases were growing in the Medford region of Southwest Oregon at a faster rate than anywhere else in the nation. Data compiled by The New York Times and Dartmouth College show the nation’s COVID epicenters—including Honolulu; Gulfport, Miss.; and Lakeland, Fla.— cannot match the Rogue basin’s average daily case increase of 1.5% over the past seven days (see map at left). In fourth place? The counties surrounding Eugene.

The hot zone erupting in places like Josephine County and nearby Douglas County—where 161 people per 100,000 are getting sick each day—creates a new dilemma for Gov. Kate Brown and state health officials, weeks after they celebrated the reopening of Oregon.

Hospitals in Southwest Oregon are too jammed to treat other life-threatening emergencies. Gov. Kate Brown is under pressure from hospitals to ratchet up protections and, on Tuesday, she imposed an outdoor masking requirement.

But what’s fueling the surge creates a political nightmare for Brown. Asante Three Rivers Medical Center says 91% of its COVID patients are unvaccinated. That means any action by Brown to restrict the state’s economy risks alienating people who followed best health practices—not coincidentally, Brown’s political base—on behalf of people who are not likely to start following the rules now, even amid death. That’s a bleak political calculus, but it makes further steps, such as vaccine passports, unlikely.

“Gov. Brown is incredibly concerned by the record numbers of hospitalizations we are seeing in Southern and Central Oregon,” says her spokesman Charles Boyle. He says Brown wants everybody to get vaccinated and wear masks, but adds, “Statewide economic restrictions would not be as effective in a post-vaccine world as they were last year.”

Preslar tells WW she’s not sure what the governor can do for Grants Pass, where county commissioners downplay the seriousness of the virus.

“I was born here,” she says. “This has always been my home. I know it’s a conservative community, but I never thought that translated into being a community that didn’t care about its neighbors.”

NIGEL JAQUISS and AARON MESH.

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

7

NEWS

NEWS BRIAN BROSE

THE BIG NUMBER

CLOCKED

200 Pounds

That’s the weight of a fallen stone panel at the center of a dispute between Multnomah County and the general contractor for the new courthouse.

If a piece of limestone estimated to weigh 200 pounds falls off a brandnew courthouse and nobody tells the public for six months, did it actually happen?

Well, it did, WW has learned.

The good news is nobody got hurt back on Feb. 11, when a 4-by-2½foot section of the façade on the $334 million Multnomah County Courthouse fell from the building’s third story to the icy sidewalk below.

The incident occurred while the city, already shut down for the pandemic, went even deeper into hibernation during a rare ice storm.

County spokesman Mike Pullen says the county closed adjacent sidewalks and began immediate inspections. It did so quietly.

“Courthouse managers were notified, and the county took immediate steps to ensure public safety,” Pullen says. “In the county’s view, the incident did not warrant a news release.”

The county avoided disclosure—until now. But as negotiations continue over final payment for the building, the secret has rumbled to the surface. It’s a potentially sour conclusion for County Chair Deborah Kafoury, who shepherded the project through a difficult funding and design process.

Pullen says county contractors, including Hoffman Construction, the general contractor, are still sorting out the issue.

“Hoffman Construction’s subcontractor, Columbia Stone, is doing a check on some of the clips that connect the stone to the façade system,” Pullen explains. “They are checking all the stones at the top of a floor level as well as stones that were installed out of sequence due to construction methods. The stone that fell was installed out of sequence.”

(Columbia Stone did not respond to a request for comment.)

Hoffman, the Northwest’s largest construction firm, has built a host of state landmarks, including University of Oregon athletic facilities, portions of Portland International Airport, and much of Nike’s campus.

The cost of ensuring that more of the 17-story building’s stone sheathing won’t come crashing down is just one of the points of contention between the county and Hoffman. Pullen says there are six change orders worth $10 to $15 million still outstanding, including the stone work. “The county and county consultants have evaluated the change order requests and have requested additional information from Hoffman,” Pullen says.

Gerry Hein, Hoffman’s project manager for the courthouse, would say only that the fallen stone had been replaced. Hein declined to answer questions or comment on the substance of discussions between Hoffman and the county, which he said were ongoing.

The courthouse, located at the west end of the Hawthorne Bridge, opened last October after four years of construction. COVID-19 precautions have meant, however, that relatively few people have visited the 465,000-square-foot building, which features a soaring three-story atrium and 44 courtrooms. A faulty sprinkler caused flooding in January that left behind significant damage, including an elevator bank that is still out of commission.

But Pullen says those elevators will be fixed within two months and the building is otherwise solid. “There are no problems with the structure or mechanical systems,” he says. NIGEL JAQUISS. 8

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

Hunzeker Watch Somebody tried to sabotage Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty. We await news of who.

162 DAYS:

That’s how long ago Officer Brian Hunzeker resigned from his role as president of the Portland Police Association due to what the union described as a “serious, isolated mistake related to the [Portland] Police Bureau’s investigation into the alleged hit-andrun by Commissioner [Jo Ann] Hardesty.”

We still don’t know what he did. The mayor’s office says it doesn’t know what he did. Hunzeker has been on paid administrative leave since May 27.

173 DAYS:

That’s how long it’s been since the Police Bureau opened an internal affairs investigation into the leak of information that wrongly implicated Commissioner Hardesty in a March 3 hit-and-run.

It has released no results of its inquiry.

161 DAYS:

That’s how long it’s been since the city signed a contract with an outside investigative firm to probe the leak. TESS RISKI.

FREE REIN: Right-wing protesters (above) fired paintball guns at anti-fascists lobbing smoke grenades (below right) along Northeast 122nd Avenue.

Painting the Town Police handed over an outer Northeast Portland neighborhood to armed political extremists.

BY TESS R ISKI

tess@wweek.com

Kaysen Kerrick was working Aug. 22 at a Chevron ExtraMile convenience store on Northeast 122nd Avenue. Around 4 pm, she saw men dressed in military-style clothing and “black bloc” garb run into the gas station’s parking lot, armed with what were most likely paintball guns.

Then came the fireworks. “It was bad, especially when they came and were throwing the fireworks, especially right there by the pumps,” Kerrick tells WW. “If any of the sparks from the fireworks hit it, everyone could’ve been gone in a flash.”

Kerrick says her co-worker called 911. The emergency operator’s response, she says: Stay inside the store and you will be OK. (The city’s Bureau of Emergency Communications, which fields 911 calls, was unable to confirm by press deadline whether it received a call from ExtraMile.)

Kerrick and her colleagues did the opposite. Fearing for their safety if not their lives, Kerrick says, she and her colleagues locked up shop nearly six hours before the usual 10 pm closing time. “I didn’t want to stay and get hurt,” she says.

Kerrick was one of several Portlanders who inadvertently found themselves with a front-row seat to a mace-laden street brawl between ideological foes. A wall of trees and shrubbery separates the Chevron station from the parking lot of a shuttered Kmart, where Proud Boys and other extreme right-wing groups hosted a rally—and charged into the street when confronted by anti-fascists.

Portland police allowed the battle to happen. Two days before, Chief Chuck Lovell warned that the Portland Police Bureau would not intervene and would instead observe from a distance and only step in if a “life safety” event arose.

The result: a melee that spilled onto 122nd Avenue, to neighboring businesses, and into the parking lot of Parkrose High School.

On Aug. 23, the day after the rally, Mayor Ted Wheeler praised the city’s response, saying the hands-off tactics relegated the violence to those who chose to partake in it.

“With strategic planning and oversight, the Portland Police Bureau and I mitigated confrontation between the two events and minimized the impact of the weekend’s events to Portlanders,” said Wheeler, who serves as the city’s police commissioner. “Violence was contained to the groups of people who chose to engage in violence toward each other. The community at large was not harmed, and the broader public was protected. Property damage was minimal.”

Interviews with eight people who work or live along 122nd Avenue paint a different picture. They described feeling like police had surrendered their street—a main artery that connects some of Portland’s most racially diverse neighborhoods—to packs of costumed, weapon-toting extremists.

“It was lawless,” says Randy Blazak, an expert on extremism who chairs the Oregon Coalition Against Hate Crime. “There is a palpable fear among many people in the minority community that right-wing aggressors are allowed to roam freely in the city of Portland. By letting these groups go at it, you’re actually helping the Proud Boys and the extreme right wing because you’re giving them exactly what they want.”

Kerrick is more concise. “It’s not fun,” she says of what she witnessed. “It’s dangerous.”

On Monday afternoon, several gawkers pulled into the parking lot to get a closer look at what had become something of a roadside attraction: a white van that was overturned Sunday by right-wing protesters in the Kmart parking lot, its dusty, oil-stained undercarriage exposed to passersby.

An employee with Graffiti Removal Services, which has a $679,692 contract with the city, circled the toppled van and assessed the paint splattered across the massive lot.

Juliette Muracchioli, the city’s graffiti program coordinator, confirms the city sent the contractor Monday to clean up “tagging or paintball residue.”

The day before, the 7-acre property played host to the Proud Boys rally. A repeat brawler, Tusitala “Tiny” Toese— released from jail in December after violating his probation agreement from a prior assault conviction—was emcee.

Toese thanked multiple Oregon Proud Boys chapters, and his allies unfurled a sign from the roof of the abandoned Kmart building that read “Free Our Political Prisoners.”

In some ways, this was what city officials had hoped would happen. The Proud Boys’ “Summer of Love” rally unfolded nearly 10 miles from an anti-fascist gathering along the Willamette River. For hours, the groups remained separated—until anti-fascists arrived in the now-toppled van, among other transports, seeking a confrontation.

Police spokesman Sgt. Kevin Allen says command staff, including Lovell, were monitoring the event from a nearby undisclosed “incident command post.” He added that officers were available to respond within minutes “in the event of a life safety circumstance.”

That’s a far cry from previous police strategies in the past five years in which Wheeler deployed hundreds of officers in riot gear to place themselves between the groups.

It also contrasts with PPB’s response to Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, where officers used force over 6,000 times, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

To be sure, PPB is smaller now—Lovell says the bureau has shrunk by as many as 145 officers since last year. And in June, rank-and-file riot cops resigned en masse from the protest assignment after the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office indicted one of the unit’s members. Meanwhile, the city is in the center of a wave of fatal shootings.

Still, the Police Bureau’s tactics on Sunday meant that, for more than three hours, observers did not see a single police cruiser at or near the rally.

Zakir Khan, a Portland civil rights advocate, says police on Sunday abdicated their responsibility to protect minority communities.

“We learned lessons on Sunday that showed that East Portland and West Portland are treated like entirely different places, that one huge swath of the city will be disregarded and unprotected,” Khan says. “When you say you are not going to put a police presence in between groups that are going to fight each other—and especially between a Proud Boys group that has shown a propensity for hurting innocent bystanders before—you are saying that you are willing to accept collateral damage as a city. You can’t say ‘Black Lives Matter’ after that. You just can’t.”

The police response to such gatherings is significant, researchers say, because the threat of political violence has intensified.

Amy Herzfeld-Copple, deputy director of programs at Western States Center, which tracks extremism in the Pacific Northwest, says the risk of violence from Proud Boys, Patriot Prayer and similar extreme right-wing groups has increased since the failed insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

“The turnout numbers didn’t increase post-Jan. 6, but you are seeing a consistent core of folks who represent perhaps the most willing to engage in political violence— the most ideologically devoted, which has real escalation risks,” Herzfeld-Copple says.

Blazak echoed that observation, saying that, in the postTrump era, the Proud Boys are now less of a “coherent political movement but [rather] guys who are desperate to prove the legitimacy of their own fragile masculinity.”

The result? “It means violence,” Blazak says. “It means there are more street fights. It becomes pretty much an echo of the skinhead gangs that we saw [in the 1980s].”

Khan and Blazak agree: The safest approach is for police to keep opposing groups separate during such events. “That’s it,” Khan says. “It’s very simple.”

Workers at local businesses say they felt terrorized.

Employees at the Wendy’s directly across the street from the parking lot said they closed early Sunday after a protester sprayed mace into the restaurant. “It was kind of an emergency situation,” one worker told WW on Monday. The closure was unusually abrupt: Another worker recalled running up and down the drive-thru line on Sunday explaining to confused motorists that the Wendy’s had closed.

Kiley MC, a barista at the pocket-sized Brewed Life Coffee Company stand, told WW that someone had power-washed the pavement of the drive-thru lane Monday morning. White and red paint still speckled the ground by the afternoon. And more white paint, likely from a paintball gun, dotted the bottom right portion of the coffee stand’s façade.

“We got lucky,” Kiley says. “It could have been a lot worse.”

Like the Wendy’s and Chevron station, Yes Restaurant Chinese & Japanese also closed early Sunday because of the rally. One employee, who declined to share their name, described hearing what sounded like a gunshot close to 4 pm.

“We felt so scared. We closed all the open signs and doors and cleaned quickly and left,” the employee said.

The restaurant worker said Sunday nights—when they typically close at 9 pm—are usually busy, because many patrons are buying takeout for their families. All told, the employee estimates the restaurant lost $1,500 by closing early Sunday.

The employee added a refrain echoed by others working along 122nd Avenue: “We didn’t see any police.”

“It was lawless.”

BRIAN BROSE

BRIAN BROSE

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

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BRIAN BROSE

Most of Portland is parched.

But these 20 voracious water guzzlers are making it rain.

BY SO P H I E P E EL

D

speel@wweek.com

eep into August, most of Portland is painted in shades of brown.

This summer, the city endured a 46-day stretch without measurable rain. The grass from Powell Butte to Beaverton is brittle and dry. The fire risk in Forest Park is so severe that city officials are tossing out drunken teenagers and homeless people—for fear they’ll burn it down.

In other parts of the state, it’s worse. Nineteen of the state’s 36 counties are officially in a drought emergency. Along Oregon’s border with California, rivers are running so low that most of the newly hatched salmon have died.

But let’s be clear: Portland is nowhere close to a drought. It hasn’t experienced one in many decades. It’s hard to exhaust the supply of H2O that collects in the Bull Run Reservoir each winter.

And some Portlanders just love soaking their lawns in that sweet Bull Run water.

They grow enormous conifer hedges, decorative trees and rhododendron gardens. They fill swimming pools. They feed face-shaped fountains that spit out water through marble mouths.

For the ninth time since 2001, WW has pulled the water usage records from two municipal departments—the Portland Water Bureau and the Palatine Hill Water District, which serves the highend, unincorporated neighborhood of Dunthor-

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Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

pe—to find the 20 largest residential customers from June 1, 2020, to May 31, 2021.

We do so for a few reasons: First, the drought afflicting the southern reaches of our state is a reminder that Oregon’s natural bounty is not inexhaustible—and with the climate changing, an ethos of sustainability matters more than ever. Second, we like to think revealing these numbers may embarrass people into reducing their consumption (over the years, we’ve seen a steady reduction in the gallons guzzled at the high end of this list).

And lastly, we’d be lying if we didn’t admit this is fun: Knowing which of your neighbors run the sprinklers all summer makes for a lively conversation around the (ahem) water cooler.

Interestingly, individual water usage in this city is decreasing—over the past two decades, it dropped nearly in half, from 75 gallons per person per day in 2000 to 48 gallons today, thanks to modern technology, like fancy toilets and more efficient showers and plumbing.

So in short, it’s harder to use more water now than it was 20 years ago.

But not many of the homeowners listed here have reduced their usage.

“The outliers are still roughly in the same [range],” says Edward Campbell, director of resource protection and planning for the Water Bureau. “They’re using at these rates that are similar to what they were in those early WW Hydro

Hog articles.”

(By the way: If homeowners reported a leak to municipal water providers and had their bill reduced, we removed them from the list—the leak was the city’s responsibility, not theirs. In cases where property owners fixed the leak themselves, we’ve noted it—but they stay on the list.)

This year’s Hydro Hogs include titans of industry, a sushi king and some of Oregon’s biggest philanthropists. There’s a dentist, a former lawyer and even a sitting state senator.

What they all have in common is that they live on patches of green grass.

Craig Kiest has landscaped these types of grandiose gardens for decades and has worked on many of this year’s Hydro Hogs gardens. He says these properties are defined by their vastness, immaculate organization and seclusion. Kiest calls it “a place of hedges.”

“I don’t know if it’s for privacy,” he says, “or maybe for a sense of creating your own world.”

In the following pages, we take you inside the hedges. Pour yourself a glass of ice water, set out your camping chair on the brown patch of grass you still call a lawn, and enjoy.

#1

#2

Homeowner: Paul Brenneke Water used: 1,129,558 gallons Water bill: $12,769 Of all the Portlanders who spent the pandemic holed up in gated estates, Paul Brenneke probably made the most of his time.

His investment company, Sortis Holdings, spent 2020 investing in distressed companies—such as Rudy’s Barbershop and a camper company called Happier Camper—which he believes can turn profitable. Among his purchases: the company that owns Bamboo Sushi, the chain favored by Mayor Ted Wheeler and most of the starting lineup for the Portland Trail Blazers. Last November, he told Oregon Business he picked Bamboo because sushi is perfect for home delivery: “A lot of cuisines do not travel well,” he observed. “Sushi travels well because it is room temperature and it doesn’t get too cold. It is also something people don’t make at home.”

Brenneke’s grandfather started Portland-based Guardian Real Estate, where Brenneke learned the ropes. He then started his own real estate company and went on to be part of a crew of ambitious developers in the early 2000s that started building high-rises downtown.

Brenneke has no interest in discussing his water usage. He did not respond to requests for comment fielded by his investment company.

His 1.85-acre property on South Summerville Avenue, which he purchased in 2001, is cocooned by tall fir trees secluding him off from neighboring properties.

It’s outfitted with a pool, multiple porches and a covered pool area with reclining chairs. The 10,400-square-foot house is impossibly white and surrounded by neat squares of grass and trimmed hedges. In 2015, when Brenneke made the list at #9, he told WW that the list was “vilifying people with big houses.”

Homeowner: John Inskeep Water used: 1,082,431 gallons Water bill: $12,389 Inskeep ignored multiple calls, voicemails and a handwritten note scribbled on a torn piece of paper left on the gate in front of his brick Dunthorpe estate.

Inskeep’s father helped found the state’s first mutual fund firm, and Inskeep now runs multiple investments and the IFC Foundation, which provides college scholarships. An environmental learning center at Clackamas Community College is named after Inskeep’s grandfather.

His property, situated along Southwest Iron Mountain Boulevard and now valued at $4.3 million, is dotted with bushes, leafy trees and climbing plants that snake up the side. Unlike many of his neighbors, who just have hedges surrounding their properties, Inskeep has double protection from onlookers: hedges and a fence, which, at only 4 feet tall, is unlikely to deter anyone who takes a running start.

How much water did he use?

Enough to fill 25,772 standard barrels.

Prior Hog honors: 2007

How much water did he use?

Enough to put out 56 houses engulfed in flames.

Prior Hog honors: 2015

#3

Homeowners: Kate Lieber and Monique Matheson Water used: 988,925 gallons Water bill: $5,339 Sen. Kate Lieber (D-Beaverton) was not jazzed to hear she was one of the city’s biggest residential users of water. “Well, that’s not great,” she said.

Lieber is the first-ever Hydro Hog who’s a sitting state senator. She and her wife, Monique Matheson, are a powerful couple: Matheson is the chief human resources officer at Nike’s World Headquarters on the opposite side of the Southwest Hills.

Lieber was elected to the Oregon Senate last year after a career working as a prosecutor for the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office on child abuse cases. The couple met during law school in Indiana and have two kids together.

They bought the 1.8-acre property in 2013 in the Sylvan Highlands neighborhood, and it rests at the end of a long, gated driveway that’s lined with rhododendron bushes. The white house is surrounded by huge trees and lush ground cover and has a pool and tennis court.

Showing savvy political instincts, Lieber spoke with WW for 20 minutes about her family’s water usage—and graciously expressed her embarrassment. Lieber says when she told Matheson the news, she was embarrassed, too. “You think of Oregon as having a lot of water, but as a first year legislator, I really learned that’s not true. The drought is incredibly serious for all Oregonians. We all need to be concerned about water.” She added that they’ll be installing a whole new sprinkler system this winter.

How much water did they use?

Enough to run the dishwasher 329,641 times.

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

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#4

#5

Homeowner: Ralph Shaw Water used: 965,735 gallons Water bill: $7,077

Homeowners: Paul Schneider and Lauren Eulau Water used: 909,631 gallons Water bill: $4,734

Shaw’s wife, Elba, who goes by Ellie, seemed tickled to receive a phone call explaining that she and Ralph, a retired venture capitalist and real estate developer, had made the list for a fifth time. Without hesitation, Ellie Shaw, an irreverent and wildly funny Puerto Rican woman who met Ralph in New York when she was 18, invited WW over to see the property.

The immaculately straight lawn lines are accented by shapely bushes, roses, rhododendrons, and two different water features. Perched above the artificial waterfall are two sculpture renderings of two of their children. The French Renaissance-style house, perched between the Southwest Hills and Council Crest with a view of Mount St. Helens, is grand and ornate (Ellie Shaw has a fondness for 18th century 2-foot-tall dolls). The Shaws’ chihuahua, Paquita la del Barrio, pranced down the paved paths wandering through the backyard and to the pool, outfitted with its own separate bathhouse. Ellie Shaw says her gardener uses the property to train apprentices.

As she guided WW through the backyard, this reporter mused aloud about how expensive the water bill must be. “No shit, Sherlock,” Ellie Shaw said.

Ralph Shaw, meanwhile, was eating toast with butter, watching TV and flipping through a business newspaper the entire time we were there. When this reporter sat down to chat with him, starting with small talk, he said, “OK, so what are the questions?” He did not seem particularly tickled, or bothered, by making the list again. He just wanted to eat his toast in peace.

How much water did he use?

Enough to fill Disneyland’s Splash Mountain flume ride.

Prior Hog honors: The Shaws have made the list four other times: in 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2015.

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Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

Paul Schneider responded to WW’s inquiry by text: “Ugh. Not good. When we received our quarterly water bill in July, we immediately made adjustments to our irrigation system to lower our consumption. We’re absolutely committed to responsible water usage.” When asked if he would be up for a brief interview, Schneider texted, “No thanks.”

Schneider and Eulau, now of retirement age, are the founders of Twist, a boutique jewelry and design store with storefronts in Portland and Seattle. Their story is the stuff of crunchy Portland romance: The two met at the University of Oregon where one was a potter and the other a weaver. Their home, outfitted with a pool and “breakfast garden,” was featured in Architectural Digest in 2010 for its design by a Seattle architect (their courtyard was designed by a world-renowned landscaper, and their garden was designed by another esteemed landscaper).

The lawn of this 1.3-acre property in the Sylvan Highlands neighborhood is a landscape of wide swaths of concrete, sparsely placed Lorax-like trees, six slightly different textured grasses on different levels of the garden, and odd art structures plopped seemingly at random.

How much water did they use?

Enough to run a pressure washer for 1,895 hours straight.

#7 Homeowners: Genevieve Haldeman and Byron Lee Burkhalter/Mike and Cynthia Warn Water used: 846,794 gallons Water bill: $9,601

When we contacted Steve Heller, a retired investment banker, he said, “Oh, boy.” Heller told WW, “I’ve been on the side of the environment for forever, and this has been so embarrassing for me.”

Heller blames all that water use on years of rehabbing and planting the property after buying it in 2008, when it was completely overgrown with ivy and blackberries. He says they’ve been converting to drip watering where they can and “looking for and correcting any leaks we’ve had, and I think we’ve done that now. It’s too bad that we got caught up in it, because it’s not our intention to use more than our fair share. I really do care.”

His property borders Marshall Park. Heller is hoping his place on the list is a one-time stint now that the lawn and garden are established. He and his gardeners maintain mostly perennials: “The deer eat most of them.”

Heller made a second call to WW before publication, explaining that his latest quarterly water bill was down by a third.

Byron Burkhalter and Genevieve Haldeman own the Dunthorpe property—but they aren’t solely to blame for its water usage.

Property records confirm the family bought the house only last December— meaning six months of the year’s water usage we tracked belonged to the previous owners, Mark and Cynthia Warn. And the Warns showed proof that three separate leaks on the property last summer were fixed by a landscaping service.

Mike Warn is the manager of an airport hangar rental service in Aurora, Ore. (he comes from an auto parts manufacturing family).

The 6,800-square-foot house in Dunthorpe has two winding paths leading to a pool and clusters of colorful red, green and brown shrubbery. In the front of the house, bushes and trees are illuminated by ground lights.

The current owners, Burkhalter and Haldeman, recently arrived from San Francisco and run Out of Privilege, a company founded in 2018 that provides racism and privilege training to schools, companies and individuals. (Burkhalter, a former college professor, is Black, and Haldeman, a longtime communications director for various tech companies, is white.) “Out of Privilege helps people in individual and corporate settings do the hard work to recognize the privileges afforded them by the racism and white supremacy systemic in their everyday lives,” their website reads.

The couple says they’ll make changes.

“We are learning the specifics of the property and actively making changes to make the property more sustainable, including reducing water usage. We are committed to minimizing our impact on the environment and being responsible members of the Portland community.” They did not respond to requests for further information.

How much water did they use?

Enough for 14 Cokes for every Portlander.

How much water did they use?

Enough for 58 cows to drink for an entire year.

#6 Homeowners: Steven and Rachel Heller Water used: 868,488 gallons Water bill: $6,426

#10 #8 Homeowners: Kristine and Josh Collins Water used: 812,384 gallons Water bill: $8,958 When Kristine Collins reached out to us, after WW wedged a note in the door and asked two window cleaners in bright pink shirts to pass the message along, she said she had prepared talking points.

“We have a nice home and yard and that’s what we choose to spend our money on. We’re in good standing with the water authority, we work hard and pay our taxes. We’re not in violation of any regulations,” Kristine Collins tells WW. She says when Gov. Kate Brown recommended Oregonians cut down their water usage last month, “we turned our sprinklers back to half, and our backyard is turning brown like everybody else’s.”

The Collinses purchased the Dunthorpe home from former Trail Blazer Rasheed Wallace in 2018. The property had been unoccupied for 14 years, so the Collinses spent time and money reviving the land. It shows: There’s a beautifully green front yard with trimmed bushes, trees and impossibly green grass, with eight sprinklers going on a weekday morning.

Josh Collins was the longtime CEO of Blount International, a saw chain manufacturer, and before that served as a U.S. Marine. He’s now a partner in a private equity investment company. Kristine, once a lawyer, is now a stay-at-home mom for their three children. Josh Collins tells WW there’s an element of public shaming to the issue, and says reading the comments last time the Collins made the list—in a different home, in 2015—was hurtful. (In that instance, the Palatine Hill Water District confirmed a leak shortly before publication.)

How much water did they use? Enough to make 4,275 bottles of wine.

Prior Hog honors: 2015 (kind of )

#9

Homeowners: Timothy and Mary Boyle Water used: 770,493 gallons Water bill: $5,653 For a guy valued at $2.7 billion, Tim Boyle’s house in the West Hills seems fairly modest. Boyle is CEO of Columbia Sportswear—one of the largest private employers in the state. He and his wife are among the state’s biggest philanthropists, and Boyle has taken a particular interest in funding services for the homeless.

Boyle believes much of his water goes to keep alive the rhododendron plants that surround his 2.1-acre property. “If we wanted the gardens to go away,” he adds, “we could certainly not water them.” Boyle says almost his entire property is a garden of sorts, filled with roses, blueberry bushes, daffodils, “rhodies” and other cut flowers. On a dry August afternoon when WW visited, the ground on his property was damp from hydration.

How much water did they use?

Enough for 124 Portlanders to take an eight-minute shower every day for a year.

Homeowner: Henry Hillman Jr. Water used: 760,020 gallons Water bill: $8,244 When WW reached out to Hillman about coming in 10th on the list this year, he said it was “better than #1”(which was where he landed in 2015).

The heir of a Pittsburgh industrialist and a venture capitalist, Hillman, who owns a robotics company, dabbles in the finer things, like glass sculpture.

His property, situated in Dunthorpe on South Military Place and purchased for $6.5 million, spans 4.2 acres of bushes, trees, flowers and a private tennis court, where Hillman and his wife, Amber, were playing behind a thick hedge surrounding the property when WW visited.

“Ah, beautiful!” Hillman said to Amber, who, clad in all white, had just made a fine shot. WW asked a bearded man on the property if he was their gardener. He winked and snipped his garden scissors in reply.

How much water did he use? Enough for 19,000 moderately sized ice sculptures at your next dinner party.

Prior Hog honors: We have to credit Hillman. Since 2015, when he took the top spot, Hillman has halved his water usage from 1.5 million gallons.

#11

Homeowner: Barry Cain Water used: 736,831 gallons Water bill: $3,820 Cain, who owns a development company, owns a 2.4-acre property bordering Tryon Creek State Natural Area. The house has an Italian marble entry, a workshop, a private tennis court with overhead lights for nighttime play, and a pool and hot tub.

His development company, Gramor, builds shopping centers on the outskirts of Portland and Vancouver. The newly revamped Vancouver waterfront, a decadelong project, was developed by Cain’s company. He also owns Five Spice Seafood and Wine Bar in Lake Oswego, where the petit filet and lobster tail dinner runs $58.50.

After WW tried to contact him by phone, Cain emailed WW to ask what the story was about, then ghosted us after hearing the news.

How much water did he use? Enough to celebrate 73,683 Super Bowl wins by dumping the team cooler of Gatorade on the coach’s head.

Prior Hog honors: 2013

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

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#12 Homeowner: Hadi Nouredine Water used: 735,335 gallons Water bill: $3,808 Nouredine fled Lebanon as a teenager to escape political violence. He now owns a handful of dental practices around town and is president of the Arab American Cultural Center of Oregon.

His wife, Raina Nouredine, tells WW she met Hadi when she was a patient of his; now they have three kids together. His house, on 2 acres of riverfront property along the Willamette, is valued at $5.5 million. The driveway leading up to the house is bordered by a stone wall with two lion statues perched on top. Pruned vines and climbing plants cover thick columns at the front.

The light pink stucco house includes a four-car garage with a Range Rover in front, a cobblestone driveway, and a marble walkway to the entrance. Identical water features frame the massive wooden front door.

Hadi Nouredine did not return WW’s calls, nor did he respond after we visited his Dunthorpe home and Raina said he would reach out.

Raina Nouredine seemed unsurprised and unbothered when WW explained the reason for the visit.

When complimented on the beautiful house, she said, “Oh, you’re too sweet,” and stepped outside to pick up a package left on the doorstep.

How much water did they use? Enough to give 349 half-liter bottles of drinking water to every homeless person in Multnomah County during an outrageously hot summer.

#13

Kirk Day is an artist who paints everything from nude, buxom women to abstract renderings of his dad’s Army pilot days, and makes fused glass sculptures. The 70-year-old artist, who sits on the board of trustees for the Portland Art Museum, also uses a lot of water, something he tells WW he’s been trying to cut down on for years now.

Why? Because it’s expensive. “Believe me, for the last four years, I’ve been trying to rethink my water usage. It’s extremely expensive. I’d love to put more water on, but the monthly bills are shocking,” says Day. When told he was on this year’s list of top water users, he said, “Well, that’s a dubious honor.”

The property comprises 2.6 acres bordering Lewis & Clark College. About three-quarters of an acre is lawn watered by an automatic sprinkler system. The front of the house features a life-sized female figure in a light dress, seemingly floating above an impossibly green round of grass. Above the door is the word “Tranquility.” Day declined to share more about himself because he said he was “out of time right now” but added: “Hopefully, we can use less water.”

Crainic is the youngest Hydro Hog this year at only 33.

He’s CEO of Time Auto Group, a company that’s quickly acquiring car dealerships around the state, including one that sells luxury European cars. He graduated from Cleveland High School and has four young children with his wife, Domnika, and a dog named George.

He did not respond to multiple calls and voicemails from WW. His sister answered the phone at one point.

When WW said the story was about excessive water use, she asked, “Is this about the boats?” (We’re still not sure which boats she was talking about.) When WW reached out to the auto dealership where Crainic works, an employee named Andrew called back to “screen the request” and said Crainic was at a car show in Monterey, Calif.

WW later visited Crainic’s Georgian-influenced Colonial in Dunthorpe, outfitted with a wine cellar. It’s surrounded by perfectly shaped bushes and green lawn, and behind the house is a pool and a stepping-stone water feature.

At his home, a woman who identified herself as a friend said Crainic was in a meeting downstairs and couldn’t talk. She said she would deliver the message.

Crainic never got back to WW.

How much water did he use? Enough to water a 40-by-40-foot lawn for 530 years.

How much water did they use? Enough to keep 50 George-sized dogs hydrated for 75 years.

Homeowners: Jillian and Ronald Cain Water used: 709,153 gallons Water bill: $7,632

How much water did they use? Enough to run a garden hose for 41 days straight.

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

Homeowner: Daniel Crainic Water used: 688,207 gallons Water bill: $5,073

Homeowner: Kirk Day Water used: 689,704 gallons Water bill: $7,865

Upon hearing he’d made the Hydro Hogs list, Ronald Cain went silent for 10 seconds. “Are you there?” WW asked. “Yes,” said. When we asked if he’d like to comment, he said, “No comment,” and hung up.

Cain is president of Cain Petroleum, which has been in the family since its founding in 1937. He owns 30 Chevron gas stations and 11 Chevron convenience stores. In 2002, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality slapped the company with a $1.4 million fine for what the agency said was a failure to properly clean up fuel leaks (Cain appealed and settled with DEQ).

When WW visited the Dunthorpe property, three gardeners were trimming hedges behind two gates. An American flag was flying. Three older women walked a dog by the property, and one said, “Someday we’ll come to this house and they won’t be working.”

One of the gardeners declined to talk to WW.

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#15

#14

#16

Homeowners: Walter “Skip” and Judith Grodahl Water used: 670,254 gallons Water bill: $4,963 Skip Grodahl is CEO of a real estate development company specializing in mostly affordable housing complexes in Portland and New Mexico, but also complexes in Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Texas.

Judith Grodahl was surprised, mortified and a little distracted when she learned she and her husband had made the list: “Oh my gosh. We spent so much money, we don’t know what’s wrong. They’ve been looking for a leak underground. We were worried we were going to make this list. We don’t use that much water. There’s something wrong.” She said a leak detector company was coming out shortly to inspect.

Grodahl was in California at the time for her son’s wedding and, when she came back, shared documentation with WW that their landscaper had fixed a leak back in April, costing the Grodahls over $900: “We’re honestly trying to do everything we can to fix it.” The property, hidden behind 10-foot hedges, covers half an acre south of the Oregon Zoo. How much water did they use? Enough to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool, plus a hot tub on the side.

#19 #18 Homeowner: CCXL LLC Water used: 637,340 gallons Water bill: $7,801

#17 Homeowners: Steve and Jean Roth Water used: 638,836 gallons Water bill: $7,028 Steve Roth is president of an investment adviser firm, and he and Jean are considerable donors to a myriad of charities, including $16,000 to the Nature Conservancy in 2018. That’s just over double the amount of their annual water bill.

Fifteen-foot hedges surround their 1.3-acre Dunthorpe property on the east side of Tryon Creek State Natural Area. A mix of tall, bushy and thin trees, squat bushes and flowers adorn the perimeter of the white house.

The Roths did not respond to multiple phone calls, but WW left a note on their gate. (Their golden retriever, carrying a purple toy, stuck his nose through the gate.) Steve Roth emailed the following response: “We have over 350 trees and 300 shrubs on our property. Trees and shrubs store carbon and play an important role in reducing the effects of manmade climate change. These trees and shrubs need to be watered and cared for.”

How much water did they use? Enough to fill 4,259 water beds for a giant sleepover with your friends.

#20

This property presents a mystery. Unlike others on the list, it’s in shambles—and it’s unclear if someone lives there permanently. No one was at the Dunthorpe house both times WW visited, and no one responded to a letter left in the door. The roof is dotted with moss, twigs and branches. A covered pool with a diving board sits fallow, the cover sagging in the middle because of rainfall turned to a murky puddle. The grass, unlike every other property on the list, is mostly brown. The windows are opaque with dust and grime.

In 2007, this same property made the list and at the time was owned by now-deceased Robert Noyes Jr., a publisher. There’s been no registered voter associated with the address since Noyes’ death in 2010.

The 4.4-acre property was purchased in 2014, according to public records. Neighbors and associates think the owner of the property is Arthur Berg, who could not be reached through his company, First Commerce of America. In a lawsuit filed against CCXL in 2017 over a boundary dispute, Berg’s son John lived at the property. A former in-law of Berg’s told WW that the property sprang a major leak last summer and had been fixed. No evidence of the repair was provided by deadline.

How much water did the property use? Enough to drink the recommended amount of water daily for 3,492 years.

Homeowners: Greg Goodman and Susan Dee Schnitzer Water used: 629,859 gallons Water bill: $4,619 Greg Goodman and his wife, Susan Dee Schnitzer—owners of significant chunks of downtown Portland—were on their way to the beach when WW called to announced their place on the list. “Oh, great,” Goodman said sarcastically to Schnitzer standing nearby. “We’re Hydro Hogs.”

When Schnitzer seemed alarmed, Goodman told her: “They get it from the city. We can’t debate it.” They said they had reported a leak to their gardener, but not to the city. “My wife is emailing him or texting him right now,” Goodman told WW. Before deadline, they provided documentation of a leak fixed in late July by a gardening company—and showed proof that their most recent quarterly water bill had tripled since the one prior.

The house in the West Hills, while vast, doesn’t have the accoutrements we saw at many of the other properties on the list. No pool, no tennis court, no ornate features.

Goodman is co-president of the Downtown Development Group, a family business that owns real estate in every crevice of the city, and many properties in the heart of downtown. Goodman says for five months of the past year they weren’t even at their house; they were staying at the beach. “But I guess I’m a water hog so I’m not going to deny it, but it must be because of a leak, because I’ve lived in the same house for 35 years and have never before been on the list, with the same lawn and everything.”

How much water did they use? Enough for a water balloon fight with 12,597,180 medium-sized water balloons.

Homeowner: Patrick Donnelly Water used: 629,112 Water bill: $7,140 Donnelly, a 45-year-old soft-spoken senior vice president of finance for Intuit and a former Nike chief financial officer, seemed surprised to make the list this year when WW knocked on his door. He was in a Zoom meeting at the time and knew the property had been on the list in 2015 for a leak. He says he suspects it’s a leak again: “Now I’m very nervous, because I did see that the water bill was high. It was a real shocker on this one.”

Donnelly has been CFO for big-name companies in prior years, including eBay and Nike, and he spent 10 years working for General Electric.

The property has a long gravel driveway lined by tall hedges leading up to the house, which has immaculately trimmed bushes and green lawn and is outfitted with signifiers of children: a trampoline and a basketball hoop. Plants climb the brick exterior of the home, and hydrangeas line the property. As WW was leaving and stopped to peer through a gap in the hedges at a neighboring property, Donnelly’s wife and dog were coming up the driveway from a run. “Hi, are you looking for something?” she said, somewhat curtly. This reporter briefly explained she had spoken to Patrick, and his wife did not seem particularly pleased.

How much water did he use? Enough to take 14,978 baths in your clawfoot tub.

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STREET

MEANWHILE, IN THE REST OF THE WORLD Photos by Chris Nesseth On Instagram: @chrisnesseth

Lovely, surreal scenes could be found at both Saturday’s Celtic Fantasy Faire in Hillsboro and the weekend’s Wasabi Con anime expo at the Portland Airport Sheraton. On Sunday, proud locals lined the streets of Vancouver, Wash., to welcome home Olympic gymnast and silver medalist Jordan Chiles.

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STARTERS

• •••• ••••

A T R E A LRBO S ER E T •••• A E H T

THE MOST IMPORTANT PORTLAND CULTURE STORIES OF THE WEEK—GRAPHED.

RIDICULOUS SEAN BASCOM YELP

SEPT 10 + 11

JIMMY DORE SHOW

The Belmont Goats reopen their pen.

political comedy BFF podcast gone wild

THIS MIGHT GET WEIRD

SEPT 16

C O U R T E S Y O F C O R VA L L I S -T O -T H E - S E A

SEPT 15

NPR radio show

SEPT 17

the high priestess of cabaret

RIZO

DUFFY BISHOP

one night only!

AWESOME

SEPT 21 SEPT 25

WESLEY LAPOINTE

SEPT 29

SEPT 30 award-winning acoustic blues

blues rock guitarist

RUTHIE FOSTER

TOO SLIM & THE TAILDRAGGERS

+

+ Tevis Hodge Jr.

OCT 2

Mary Flower

Dance organizations question Oregon Ballet Theatre about the dismissal of artistic director Kevin Irving.

OCT 3

genius Americana songwriter

stand-up comedy

with special guest Gary Ogan

UPCOMING SHOWS

•••••••••••••

•••••

National parks announce mask mandates for crowded areas.

CHRIS NESSETH

DARRELL SCOTT

MICK HANGLAND-SKILL

PETE CORREALE

10/7 • BOOKER T. JONES | 10/8 • TONY STARLIGHT 10/9 • JOHN PRINE TRIBUTE | 10/10 • TOM WAITS TRIBUTE 10/12 • THE DEAD DAISIES |10/22 • BOOKLOVER’S BURLESQUE

Northeast Portland Chips Ahoy! makers launch a national strike.

albertarosetheatre.com

3000 NE Alberta • 503.764.4131 18

…but Moda Center doesn’t require vaxx proof for its first concert since the COVID shutdown, Guns N’ Roses.

WHITE BIRD

OREGON BURLESQUE FESTIVAL

NW favorite blues diva SEPT 24

…and concerns over the Delta variant causes Hip-Hop Week to restructure a number of its shows…

The Portland Timbers and Thorns now require vaccine proof or a negative COVID test for entry…

AWFUL

I PUT A SPELL ON YOU

MODA CENTER

RILEY BROWN

SEPT 18

Hawaiian supergroup

Mary’s Club will move from its downtown location but keep its iconic marquee.

The 60-mile Corvallis-tothe-Sea Trail opens.

IN THE FLESH

with special guest Jet Black Pearl

Nina Simone tribute

R E A D M O R E A B O U T TH E S E STO R I E S AT WW E E K .CO M .

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

SERIOUS

Multnomah County has no plans to require proof of COVID-19 vaccination for indoor spaces.

FLASHBACK

THIS WEEK IN 2012

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

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Need something to do?

Got a special event to share?

Check out

wweek.com/calendar to find out what’s happening around town.

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Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

INGEBORG GERDES / BLUE SKY GALLERY

GET BUSY

STUFF TO DO IN PORTLAND THIS WEEK, INDOORS AND OUT.

☛ DO |

Feast Family Reunions Known for its gluttonous events, hefty ticket prices and general party-hearty atmosphere, Feast returned this summer after a one-year, pandemic-related hiatus with a series of smaller, distanced events and local focus. Family Reunion is one of the few events not yet sold out. Picnic tables provide plenty of room in Southeast Portland’s Redd on Salmon industrial space. Sample creative foodie visions and summery beverages from 10 chefs at either of the two remaining Family Reunion events.

Saturday afternoon’s is kid-friendly. Ecotrust’s The Redd on Salmon, 831 SE Salmon St., 503-227-6225, feastportland.com. Noon Saturday, 6 pm Sunday, Aug. 28-29.

TA S T E O F C I N E M A

SEE | Battle Royale SEE | Out West

This week is your last chance to see Blue Sky Gallery’s Ingeborg Gerdes retrospective, containing both black-and-white and color photographs from 50 years of her work. Out West reworks common myths of the American West. Gerdes peels back layers of camp while carving out her own essential truths. Some of these truths are common— the unshakable, almost spiritual, sense of solitude on land that still remembers its own freedom, for example, or the unusual eccentricity of life in the region. Blue Sky Gallery, 122 NW 8th Ave., 503-2250210, blueskygallery.org. Noon-5 pm WednesdaySaturday, through Aug. 28.

After over two decades as the Pacific Northwest’s wry and moody standard bearers, Modest Mouse has released an album that’s kind of…happy?

Released in June, Golden Casket is the Portland band’s first album in six years. Sure, there’s some dark song about the evils of the internet age, but that cynicism is balanced by bright music and earnest attempts at feel-goodery. The album trades its expected guitar-heavy sound for a layered mix of banjo, marimba and eclectic percussion. And as if the music on Golden Casket weren’t already tender enough, the band’s first hometown show since the pandemic is sure to be extra sentimental. The first of two outdoor shows is already sold out, but there’s still time to grab tickets for the second night.

McMenamins Edgefield, 2126 SW Halsey St., edgefieldconcerts.com. 6:30 pm Friday-Saturday, Aug. 27-28. $44.50 advance, $50 day of show. All ages.

Set in a dystopian Japan, this action thriller follows a group of ninth graders taken to a remote island and forced by the governmenrt to fight to the death in a deranged attempt to curb juvenile delinquency. The hugely influential film, which came out in 2000, inspired an entire subgenre of video games like Fortnite; it’s basically The Hunger Games but bloodier, wilder and better.

Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy Blvd., 503-493-1128, hollywoodtheatre.org. 7:30 pm Monday, Aug. 30. $8-$10.

HOLOCENE

GO | Brewers & Their Bands While you may greatly appreciate Oregon brewers’ ability to craft consistently excellent yet continually innovative beer, fewer people know that many of the individuals in that industry have talent with a whole different category of instruments. Brewers & Their Bands is the rare event that prominently displays the overlap between the beer-making and musical communities. Although the showcase was canceled last year due to COVID-19, the performers are back and hungry for an audience. The lineup includes brewers from Breakside, Double Mountain and Ecliptic—the latter of which will blow your mind once you see brewmaster and industry legend John Harris rock a washboard. Ecliptic Brewing, 825 N Cook St., 503-265-8002, eclipticbrewing.com. 6-10 pm Friday, Aug. 27. Free; beer from each participating brewery available to purchase.

SEE | Modest Mouse

GO | Eastghost, Onhell, Maarquii, Quarry, Wokr Holocene is back—with a vaccine mandate. Hosted by artist collective Stylss, the venue’s Friday roster is everything fans of Holocene have missed—a five artist-deep lineup of bass music, deep house and futuristic R&B. Featuring everything from the glitchy and euphoric electronica of Eastghost to the industrial club of rapper Maarquii, it’ll be the hypebeast dance party you’ve been dreaming about for the past year and half. Except, hopefully, most of the allvaxxed crowd will be wearing face masks. Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison St., holocene.org. 9 pm Friday, Aug. 27. $12. 21+.

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ALL OF THE LIGHTS: Cocktails at Bellwether.

Belle Epoch Brand new Bellwether Bar fell fully formed into Portland’s pub scene.

BY S U ZE T T E SM I T H

suzette@wweek.com

The climb up Southeast Stark Street to 60th Avenue is steep. But in some ways that just makes the little pub at the top of the hill all the tastier for the effort.

Bellwether Bar opened at the beginning of August and honestly feels like it fell fully formed into this world. At golden hour on a weekday, it also feels not completely of this world.

Though there wasn’t any wildfire smoke in the air, the backyard patio of Bellwether had a hazy, romantic light.

Diners ate at picnic tables shaded by taut white umbrellas, surrounded by freshly planted flowering bushes and strands of fairy lights.

Indoors, hulking dark wood pub booths lent a level of seclusion despite the main room’s expected tall-ceiling din. No specific conversation stood out from its neighbors, but with ceilings like that you’ve got to expect a semi-constant roar. The front door that Bellwether left open to Stark probably didn’t help with the acoustics, but the breeze path from the entrance to the patio flowed nicely past the salvaged oak bar.

The regal-looking bar occupies approximately a fourth of the front room and seems to pull people into its gravity— though the bar itself has no seating. It’s the place for ordering and cocktail mixing, so there’s always some energy behind it, the cocktails at Bellwether being one of the bar’s main purposes.

Bellwether’s cocktails are named in an egalitarian manner, numbered from 1 to 8. The 1 is a perfect summer cocktail: rye whiskey, vermouth, cranberry grenadine 22

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

and salt, served with a curled lemon rind.

Not overly sweet, the tangy little number is like a loud, talkative friend whose energy you can’t help but find cheerful.

The menu’s craft ales and wine selection are also on point: Ex Novo Eliot IPA and Rosenstadt Kölsch both on draft when we visited, among others. Where Bellwether’s cocktails eschew clever titles, their wines pick up the slack. The selection includes an Orange Wine for Beginners and an Orange Wine for the Brave. For our purposes, we enjoyed the Adventurous Red, which was earthy and juicy without overpowering any of our snacks.

Snacks are where Bellwether really holds down its food menu. For entrees, there are only three options—a bacon cheeseburger, pan-seared chicken thighs, and a completely lush vandouvan curry, served with spiced creme fraiche.

The portions aren’t overwhelming, and we recommend splitting and sharing with items from the small plates menu. Seeing as Bellwether brought in Olympia Provisions chef Alex Yoder to plan its menu, we shouldn’t have been surprised that the meat plate was a delight of fatty, pickled, mustard flavors—easy to mix and match.

The chicory salad was light and sturdy, but the blue cheese dressing gave rich hints throughout. It was like being haunted by something savory in a bright forest.

If this review seems like a rave, that’s because it is. I can’t remember the last pub I liked as much as Bellwether. What it brings is at the top of what casual dining can be and flirts with breaking through to something finer.

DRINK: Bellwether, 6031 SE Stark St., instagram.com/bellwetherbarco. 4-11 pm daily.

CHRIS NESSETH

feature

FOOD & DRINK

FOOD & DRINK SWEEDEEDEE

RESTAURANT REVIEW

TOP 5

HOT PLATES

3. Miami Nice

2. Lolo Pass

BY S U Z E T T E SM I T H

suzette@wweek.com

Sweedeedee has always been a little hard to define. The line springs to mind.

The North Portland corner brunch spot was perpetually in demand pre-pandemic, so a wait was always something to expect—perhaps even look forward to, if you wanted to catch up with friends.

As it is, there’s a wait on a weekday evening to try Sweedeedee’s new dinner menu, but that could also be because it has only six outside tables—and is only serving outdoors at the moment. The white cafe tables are precarious on the uneven sidewalk slabs, but the chairs are sturdy and the evening light makes you wonder why Sweedeedee never did dinner before.

Of course, it did various dinnerlike things, hosting natural wine bar Sardine Head being one of them. But for this new approach, owner Eloise Augustyn partnered up with former Tusk chef Sam Smith to take what Sweedeedee does best and make it dinner.

“We really want it to feel like a neighborhood cafe,” Smith says. “It could be a casual place or a special occasion place, but we want it to feel affordable. It doesn’t have to be this fancy thing.”

The menu is deeply seasonal and farm fresh. While not exclusively vegetarian, it’s certainly vegetable heavy. A sign of Sweedeedee’s style is obvious in its summer tomatoes, served in olive oil with padrón peppers, basil and salt. It’s an incredibly simple dish but somewhat jaw-dropping for its colorful beauty and bursting, herb flavors.

Similarly unexpected is the menu’s

cucumber and watermelon salad, which isn’t very sweet at all. Instead, the yellow watermelon flesh provides a crunchy, firm texture, while most of the flavor is carried by the cucumber, chile oil and sprigs of dill.

“I love fruit in salads,” Smith says.

“Honestly, it doesn’t have to be sweet.

People’s expectations are changing. And, of course, in summer, there’s such an awesome variety of fresh herbs.”

Smith hopes patrons will order an assemblage of items and share. Perhaps the roast chicken, a vegetable dish, some Grano sourdough to sop up the olive oil and then a bottle of wine for the table.

Sweedeedee remains a great place to explore natural wines, but most on the menu are solid by the bottle.

“We’ll incorporate a cocktail program soon,” Smith says of upcoming menu changes—the menu is intended to always be shifting. “Sweet vermouth digestif, Negroni, Cynar spritz.” They’ve also completely done away with the old brunch favorites. He foresees peaches on the menu come fall. “Cheese, black pepper, chiles” are the flavors he lists.

And while those too few tables still seem a problem, Smith says the secret to swift service at Sweedeedee is coming in the off hours.

“Even when we’re really busy, food comes out pretty quickly. Tables aren’t really lingering for hours. We start serving dinner at 4 pm, and from 2:30 to 5 pm, well, I’m looking at one full table outside right now.”

EAT: Sweedeedee, 5202 N Albina Ave., 503-201-7038, sweedeedee.com. 9 am-9 pm Wednesday-Saturday.

2117 NE Oregon St., 818-200-5571, miaminicepdx.com. Noon-9 pm WednesdaySunday.

At Miami Nice, you may not immediately realize you’re eating vegan. The croquettas are fried up tightly, and the Cubanito is neatly pressed. Many menu items are versions of street/comfort food that owner Valerie Espinoza loves—with a vegan twist. The chop salad comes with marinated soy curls on top instead of chicken. The dish’s bright yellow sauce draws stares; it’s a mixture of curry, mustard and mayonnaise she worked on to get just right. Other menu items stand out for their Miami-specific flavor, like the Big Papi, which has green olives in the picadillo instead of raisins. The starchy food works well to stave off the high ABV in beers at Culmination Brewing, where Espinoza runs the kitchen.

4. Chayo

3601 SE Division St. 11:30 am-2 pm lunch, 4:30-8 pm dinner Thursday-Saturday; 11:30 am-6 pm Sunday.

When he dreamed of opening a loncheria in 2018, David Lizaola imagined serving classic Jaliscan lonches on lime- and beer-enriched birote. When he couldn’t find birote in Portland, he pivoted to ciabatta—and while it may not be traditional, it’s still damn good.

In the Hot Oli, Lizaola gives his pork loin an adobado treatment by massaging the cuts with a blend of guajillo pepper, herbs, alliums and warming spices. It’s a perfect sandwich.

5. Sweet Lorraine’s

1331 N Killingsworth St., sweetlorraineslatkes. squarespace.com. 11:30 am-3:30 pm Monday, noon-8 pm Thursday-Sunday.

It’s Hanukkah year-round at Killingsworth Station—or, at least, a reasonable facsimile of the Lower East Side of New York. The cart pod is where Aaron Tomasko and Rachel Brashear are serving voluptuous potato pancakes, as well as knishes, kugel, kasha varnishkes and East Coast sweets. The crispy, pillowy latkes are fried to order and come with the traditional accompaniment of sour cream and applesauce.

AARON LEE

1314 NW Glisan St., 503-953-1933, chichapdx. com. 4-9 pm Wednesday-Sunday.

A long-planned, takeout sister of Andina popped up this past May, with a menu featuring empanadas, croquettes and skewers that pay tribute to the street food of Lima and the neighboring seaside city Callao. Though Andina is reopening on Aug. 18, Chicha will remain, offering patio dining, delivery and pickup.

CHRISTINE DONG

Coveted North Portland brunch spot Sweedeedee opens for dinner.

1. Smith Teamaker 500 NW 23rd Ave.,503-206-745, smithtea.com. 9 am-6 pm daily.

Located on Northwest 23rd Avenue, the firstever Smith Teamaker cafe is a quiet space on a busy boutique street. The cafe serves 30 kinds of hot tea, but the curious come in for colorful lattes and aromatic tea mocktails. The Golden Light Latte is a major favorite and can be served iced or hot. It’s made by pulling Smith Golden Light tea—with turmeric, sarsaparilla root, and black pepper—through an espresso (or “teapresso”) machine, then adding maple syrup and dousing the blend with oat milk. The result is a beautiful, complex, sweet and softly spiced drink that goes mind-bendingly well with one of the pastry case’s sea salt-sprinkled miso-peanut butter cookies.

2. Chicha

Sweedeedinner

BUZZ LIST

Where to drink this week.

1. Momo Master

1533 NE Alberta St. 503-997-6901. Noon-8 pm Friday-Monday.

Regulars at Alberta’s Bantu Island Pod have a new appetizing option: the Momo Master. To try all of the titular Himalayan dumplings, get the “Plattery,” a sampler of the three styles the cart offers. The veggie dumplings made with Impossible Burger aren’t to be missed—generously packed into chewy dough folded like a fishtail, the sweet curry edge waits to be cut with the bright sesame oil tomato chutney that comes with it.

KEEP IT SIMPLE: Herbs and farm fresh ingredients drive Sweedeedee’s flavor.

TOP 5

Where to eat this week.

1616 E Burnside St., 503-908-3074, lolopasspdx.com. Coffee 7 am-2 pm daily, cocktails 4-10 pm daily.

Lolo Pass’ open floor plan lobby is a fine place to start or end a night, but the hostel-like hotel’s main attraction is the fifth-floor rooftop, which features a fire pit, a communal guitar, its own bar and no shortage of socially distant seating arrangements. The vantage offers a unique view of downtown and the Central Eastside, with everything from Big Pink to Buckman Field visible on the scenic smorgasbord. Lolo’s house cocktails trend toward sweet and fruity, as evidenced in the pineapple-infused old fashioned, the unmuddled schnapps in the Teaches of Peaches Sex on the Beach, and the pamplemousse and aperol of the metropolitan but off-cycle Gemini SZN.

3. Jackie’s

930 SE Sandy Blvd., jackiespdx.com. 4 pm-midnight Monday-Friday, 11 am-1 am Saturday, 11 am-midnight Sunday.

It’s easy to mistake Jackie’s for its predecessor Century Bar—all dolled up with a new paint job and potted plants—but for its chic veneer, Jackie’s is a sports bar at heart. There are widescreen TVs just about anywhere you look, playing the game at a volume level where your friends can talk trash but not scream in each other’s faces. The cocktail pitchers are technically the better deal per glass, but the signature house drinks are easier to switch between and worth the range. The gorgeous watermelon-hibiscus-lime agua fresca margarita was our favorite. We awarded the silver medal to the confectionary halva mule—the fruity, slightly bitter (and therefore gay icon) Ms. Pittman made due with the bronze.

4. Someday

3634 SE Division St., somedaypdx.com. 3-10 pm Thursday-Sunday.

Someday opened in January 2020 with dreams of becoming a buzzing, “shoulder-to-shoulder” watering hole. The timing was…unfortunate. But the bar has managed to maintain a communal energy, even if it’s less tight-knit. The setup is intimate—a few dainty tables for twosomes and two sturdy picnic tables that could fit a snug group of 10. There’s wine, sake and the Tiger Porch, a chilly tequila sour with tamarind particularly fit for the Vaccinated Summer of 2021.

5. Prost!

4237 N Mississippi Ave., 503-954-2674, prostportland.com. 11 am-2:30 am daily.

In a city filled with amazing beer bars, Prost stands out for its steadfast dedication to German food and beer—not to mention its back patio is now home to maybe the city’s best food cart pod. All beers here are imported from Germany and served in the style of glass called for by German tradition. The staff is knowledgeable and happy to guide your order from the unique and delicious menu.

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YOUR BACKSTAGE PASS TO THE WWEEK NEWSROOM Join the Dive podcast every Saturday as we quickly cover the week’s headlines, and then dive deeper into the big stories of the week. Host Hank Sanders sits down with the paper’s staff as well as the biggest names in Portland to discuss the city and the events that change lives.

The Dive podcast by Willamette Week is the best way to stay up to date with Portland’s news, sports, arts, and culture.

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Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE

POTLANDER

Hot Strains in the

Summertime

Six new strains to smoke down the last of summer’s pleasures.

BY BRIA N N A W H E E L E R

Even for the consummate pothead, this has been a challenging summer.

Despite the big-snuggle vibes of the vaxxed, waxed and relaxed contingent, some of us were content spending the solstice solo, vaping on alpine lake floats or puffing fat doinks in glacial waterfall foot baths, maintaining our tiny personal bubbles in the the safe, wide open spaces of the Northwest. That is, until it became a heatstroke risk to leave our homes, much less spend a day smoking weed under the usually limited sparkling rays of the summer sun.

Well, blazing hell season or nah, there’s an entire party flotilla of new cannabis summer strains to explore, and I don’t know about y’all, but I’m thrilled to resume smoking exotic blunts in my hammock without the threat of heatstroke. So, as this very intense season diminishes and we are returned to our beloved WAP (wet-ass Portland), let’s consider celebrating the vestiges of summer with these novel strains while there’s still time to shoehorn in some warm weather frivolity.

Dirty Taxi This nastily named cultivar is reportedly a hyperactive sativa hybrid with an aggressive amount of THC. It’s genetics are something of mystery, but rumor has it this phenotype was bred from a cross of GMO Cookies and Chem i95, the result of which is a bright green, sugary nug with a complex slate of effects. The high arrives with a boom and a deeply stoney cerebral buzz that, despite its intensity, supposedly spirals counterclockwise, away from sleepier effects. A toe-tapping body high that’s a straightforward path to housework, bodywork or, depending on your resting mood, summertime window twerking soon follows, so smoke with caution and/or clean windows, please.

Get it from: Archive Portland, 10645 SE Henry St,, 503-719-4229, archivedispensary.com.

Secret Formula Strains I associate with summer are typically euphoric cultivars bred for maximum daytime enjoyment (no matter when the users decide to claim their wakeful hours).

Despite Secret Formula’s genetics being decidedly indica dominant, this hybrid expresses itself as a loud sativa with precisely the type of bold, buzzy effects I love for sun-soaked afternoons. Users rally around this relatively new strain, however, not just for its peppy euphoria, but for effects that range from chronic pain relief to munchie motivation for those suffering from loss of appetite. In my opinion, that therapeutic energy is precisely the type of high we need after such an emotionally demanding few weeks, months, years or decades.

Get it from: kushcartpdx.com

Tang Breath For those of us who can’t be bothered with modesty in summer—and have been walking around with our butt cheeks out—maybe let’s just lean into all this humid sensuality and get horny high with this season’s botanical answer to a smoldering aphrodisiac. Whether putting the moves on yourself or on a partner or two, Tang Breath reportedly delivers a romantic head high so voluptuously coiled around a lascivious body high that users have no choice but to buckle, or unbuckle, if you catch my drift. Regardless, whether you’re turned on by your own sweat or the summer heat is drying up your libido, this phenotype supposedly feels especially designed to moisturize and prime its user’s sex engines for some powerful revving.

Get it from: Power Plant, 10215 SE Foster Road, 971-302-7283.

Cream Soda

Frozen Lemons The name alone implies summer whimsy—what other time of year is anyone paying any attention to frozen citrus? Frozen Lemons features Freezerburn and Lemon Fire strain genetics, and expresses its inherited qualities as a mostly peppy magic carpet ride, which is to say the body high is, typically, deeply effervescent, and the head high tends to be manageably yet brightly psychotropic. Users celebrate this cultivar’s energetic effects, and reportedly prefer it for daytime pursuits, but exercise caution—even the sunniest of sativas can interact with your endocannabinoid system in unexpected ways, so start slow lest your head pops off or you couchlock yourself into oblivion.

Get it from: Five Zero Trees Dekum, 909 NE Dekum St., 503-954-3844, fivezerotrees.com.

Lemon Pound Cake

If your ideal summer strain is anything but an eye-opening blast of clamorous euphoria, Cream Soda might be a strain for you. Cream Soda is a chilled-out phenotype with decidedly relaxing effects, according to users. This cultivar’s cannabinoid profile is tempered by 0.03% CBD, which may not seem like much alongside the strain’s average 20% THC, but it has been found by fans to bring the energy of this strain down to earth, and even make it a suitable pre-bedtime puff. Bred by the team at Grizzly Peak Farms, cultivators advise this strain is also efficient at treating anxiety, depression, indigestion, insomnia, inflammation and even the occasional minor pain.

Sometimes referred to as Lemon Cheesecake or simply Lemon Cake, this hybrid cultivar is bred from a cross of Lemon Skunk and a “dangerously powerful” strain of Cheese—and as such displays strong sativa genetics. This phenotype is reportedly powerful enough to repel novice users with highs that edge up against anxiety for the unprepared. For more seasoned users, though, this strain is supposedly a mind-opening, psychotropic thrill ride that glitters with glee. Users describe this Lemon Pound Cake as aggressively citrusy in both the nose and the exhale, so varsity cannathusiasts who prefer limonene-forward terp profiles may find it their ideal summer smoke. Pro tip: Top your bowl of this flower with a dribble of Frozen Lemon concentrate for a next-level mouthful of citrus-soaked summertime cannabis.

Get it from: Serra, 220 SW 1st Ave., 971-279-5613, shopserra.com.

Get it from: Chalice Farms, 5333 SE Powell Blvd., 503-788-9999, www.chalicefarms.com.

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

25

Editor: Andi Prewitt / Contact: aprewitt@wweek.com CINEMAGIC

SCREENER

MOVIES

GET YO UR REPS I N

Airplane! (1980) “Surely you can’t be serious.” “I am serious. And don’t call me ‘Shirley.’” Rightly hailed as one of the greatest comedies of all time, this laugh-a-minute parody follows a traumatized ex-fighter pilot (Robert Hays) tasked with flying an airliner when the captain (Peter Graves) and several passengers become ill. Leslie Nielson and Julie Hagerty co-star.

Hollywood, Aug. 26.

Vagabond (1985) The Clinton’s Agnès Varda Forever festival continues with the great director’s meditative character study about Mona (Sandrine Bonnaire), a nomad traveling across the French countryside. Beginning with an unforgettable image of Mona’s frozen corpse in a ditch, Varda skillfully backtracks, uncovering the events that led to her death. Clinton, Aug. 28.

IMDB

BEHIND THE CURTAIN: Cinemagic got a makeover this summer, but the iconic gold drape remains.

Movie Magic After a one-month closure this summer, Cinemagic has reopened with new amenities and an upgraded sound system.

BY C H A N C E SO L E M - P F E I FER

@chance_s_p

GO: Cinemagic, 2021 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 971-420-9350, thecinemagictheater.com.

26

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

Y Tu Mamá También (2001) In four-time Oscar-winner Alfonso Cuarón’s coming-of-age tragicomedy, two teenage boys (Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna) persuade a troubled woman in her late 20s (Maribel Verdú) to join them on a road trip through rural Mexico to a secluded beach—a fictitious location they made up just to impress her. Sex, drugs and general debauchery ensue. Clinton, Aug. 30.

Battle Royale (2000) Set in a dystopian Japan, this action thriller follows a group of ninth graders taken to a remote island and forced by the government to fight to the death in a deranged attempt to curb juvenile delinquency. The hugely influential film inspired an entire subgenre of video games like Fortnite; it’s basically The Hunger Games but bloodier, wilder and better.

Hollywood, Aug. 30.

LETTERBOXD

Ryan Frakes was 16 when he started working at a movie theater owned by Chuck Nakvasil, the Scappoose Cinema 7. A few months later, he was a manager.

“If the kid wants to live here,” Frakes approximates his former boss’s voice, “we might as well keep him busy.”

The Oregon native started pitching in at Nakvasil’s other theaters, including the Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard single-screener that Frakes would buy 13 years later: Cinemagic. Frakes purchased Cinemagic on June 9, after an intermediary decade working at Regal Cinemas, AMC Theatres, Cinema 21 and another six-year stint at Cinemagic.

The new owner calls the chance to apply the best of his many theatrical experiences a “total fantasy,” and during a monthlong closure this summer, Frakes and co-owner Nicholas Kuechler replaced Cinemagic’s carpet and beer taps, refurbished its marquee and iconic gold auditorium curtain, and upgraded the theater’s audio to Dolby 7.1 Surround.

Still, anytime employees buy a beloved business from its longtime owner, a dance begins: How much to embrace tradition, how much to evolve? Kuechler, who’s managed Cinemagic for the past seven years, says it’s a more complex dance than most people even realize.

“Even the things I see as a broken problem,” he explains, “somewhere out there is someone who finds that to be an endearing characteristic of the theater.”

Case in point, four years before the theater’s sale, Cinemagic finally replaced its notoriously springy and overstuffed auditorium seats (good for ambience, bad for backs).

Yet Kuechler was surprised to find that a small minority of filmgoers appreciated those seats, so when he helped yank

out well over 200 chairs, the staff rebuilt the 60 least creaky ones that still pepper the auditorium today.

Knowing what Frakes and Kuechler want to keep is easier: the beer selection on 10 rotating taps, the almost pubstyle neighborhood vibe, and a crowd of regulars so devoted they’ll show up for most any film.

“We’re trying to play toward our neighborhood crowd even stronger,” Frakes says. “The clientele’s taste…I would say they’re adventurous. They’re willing to try new movies, whether they’re really into movies or not.”

That likely means booking a combination of independent and mainstream films going forward (The Green Knight last month, the Candyman remake currently), with a few new programming wrinkles. Last week, alongside the new Oregon-set Nicolas Cage movie Pig, Cinemagic ran a pair of special double features: one half starring Cage and the other starring pigs. David Lynch’s Wild at Heart paired with Babe, and Mandy with Babe: Pig in the City.

Themed screenings are new territory for Cinemagic, but the response has nearly overwhelmed Kuechler and Frakes.

During a soft opening this summer, Frakes programmed There Will Be Blood (his favorite film), hoping to draw a few loyal Southeast Portlanders. That, and a John Carpenter double feature, sold out.

“They were supposed to be soft openings,” Frakes says, “but they were not soft at all.”

Kuechler observes that such rep screenings help him gauge Cinemagic’s core crowd. Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2007 epic may elicit hushed reverence in some cinephilic circles, but not among locals excited to watch a neo-classical favorite in their local movie haunt. “[During] the final scene in the bowling alley, the audience was viscerally and verbally reacting like they were watching a boxing match: gasping and cheering and laughing,” Kuechler says. “That one threw me.”

Kuechler anticipates curating more one-off screenings themed with regular releases, à la º, even adding levity to a fall theatrical slate full of moody horror movies and dramas.

For now, repertory screenings are capped at 75% capacity, while standard screenings are limited to a self-imposed 50%. But Frakes is eyeing those autumn releases and dreaming of normalcy.

“I’m really just looking forward to having packed houses and sharing the moviegoing experience with every single person.”

The Hunger (1983) Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie star as vampire power couple Miriam and John Blaylock, who dwell in a New York townhouse and teach classical music. When John begins aging rapidly, they frantically seek the help of a doctor (Susan Sarandon) who soon gets drawn into a twisted vampire love triangle. Hollywood, Aug. 31.

ALSO PLAYING: Academy: The Goonies (1985), Aug. 25-26. Fantastic Planet (1973), Aug. 25-26. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Aug. 27-Sept. 2. Easy Rider (1969), Aug. 27-Sept. 2. Clinton: True Stories (1986), Aug. 25. Mallrats (1995), Aug. 26. The Lego Movie (2017), Aug. 27. Heavy Metal (1981), Aug. 27. Dead or Alive (1999), Aug. 27. The Gleaners and I (2000), Aug. 31.

Hollywood: Jaws (1975), Aug. 27. Welcome to Woop Woop (1997), Aug. 27. The Omen (1976), Aug. 28-29.

MOVIES COURTESY OF APPLE

NOW PLAYING TOP PICK OF THE WEEK

CODA

Near the climax of CODA, audiences experience a much-foreshadowed concert from the perspective of a singer’s deaf family.

It’s not just sound’s absence that seals the Apple TV+ film’s best scene; it’s how the camera registers Frank and Jackie Rossi gauging the crowd’s reaction to their daughter Ruby (Emilia Jones) belting.

That’s the moment you know why CODA (or Child of Deaf Adults) won Sundance’s Grand Jury Prize and why, despite playing on a clear inspirational formula and remaking a 2014 French film, it’s a smart and heartfelt portrayal of deafness in mainstream American movies.

For one, there’s Ruby’s complex role as the only hearing member and de facto translator of her gruff yet charming New England fishing family. Playing her parents and brother, deaf actors Marlee Matlin (Oscar winner from Children of a Lesser God), Troy Kotsur and Daniel Durant are grounded and multidimensional, signing with Ruby in rage, mockery, hubris and shame. While some of the supporting performances pale—Ruby’s fastidious choir teacher is more irritating than aspirational and her love interest a classic doesn’t-deserve-her wet blanket—try not to be moved by this loving, needy, overwhelmed and surprisingly horny family confronting change. The formula works for a reason. PG-13. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. Apple TV+, Cinema 21.

Reminiscence

OUR KEY

: T H I S M O V I E I S E XC E L L E N T, O N E O F T H E B E S T O F T H E Y E A R. : T H I S M O V I E I S G O O D. W E R E C O M M E N D YO U WATC H I T. : T H I S M O V I E I S E N T E R TA I N I N G B U T F L AW E D. : THIS MOVIE IS A STEAMING PILE.

ALSO PLAYING Big House Big House answers the question none of us were asking: What if mumblecore met The Real World? The film opens on half-sisters Claire (Ellie Reed) and Ali (Paige Collins) arriving at their father’s vacation house. It’s Claire’s birthday weekend, and they’ve brought their boyfriends along to celebrate.

As the couples unpack, we learn more about this odd, tiki-themed pad where the ladies have set up shop. They’re staying at their father’s “honey house,” the tropical beach abode where he once took his mistresses. Even juicier, we discover that history is repeating itself: Claire has a fiancé, but she’s left him at home while she cozies up with the nerdy, endearing co-worker she’s taken as a lover. Big House was shot in just two days with improv-heavy dialogue, and you can hear it in the mumblecore-style exchanges. Often shot at close—even claustrophobic—range, with audio that lingers even after the scenes change, the movie has a hazy, confined quality. It’s a tone that fits with the broader questions about monogamy and transparency that writer-director Jack Lawrence Mayer is raising through the sisters’ romantic arcs. The script is witty, and the acting is natural and often resonant, particularly Michael Molina’s turn as Claire’s awkward, unappreciated lover String. The finale does take a turn for the Real Housewives, but after shaking the proverbial soda can for 90 minutes, the explosion feels earned. NR. GRACE CULHANE. Amazon, Apple TV, Google Play, Vimeo, Vudu, YouTube.

The Green Knight

With A Ghost Story, director David Lowery demonstrated he was a master of dreamy wonderment. Yet that film never hinted he was capable of creating The Green Knight, a romantic fantasy so overwhelming it leaves you shivering in awe of cinema’s possibilities. Dev Patel stars as Sir Gawain, a callow adventurer who must repay a debt to his nemesis, the Green Knight (Ralph Ineson). As their final confrontation looms, Gawain wanders, encountering giants, a talking fox and a noblewoman (Alicia Vikander) who challenges his sexual timidity. Vikander also plays Essel, a sex worker with whom Gawain is in love, creating the impression that a single soul is guiding his journey in different forms. All of this strangeness makes perfect sense in Lowery’s universe, which modernizes the 14th century epic poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. While Gawain hungers for greatness, Essel asks him, “Why is goodness not enough?”

The Green Knight matters, but not as much as Gawain’s acts of compassion, like helping a violated spirit (Erin Kellyman) find peace. It is possible to simply bask in the film’s surreal visions—like a beautifully haunting shot of Gawain and the fox walking along a ridge at night— but the wisest moviegoers will also cheer its rejection of hollow patriarchal glories and embrace its conviction that goodness is more than enough. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, Cinema 21, City Center, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Hollywood, Laurelhurst, Living Room, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, St. Johns Twin Cinemas, Studio One, Tigard.

Hearts yearn and minds cloud in Reminiscence, a futuristic film noir starring Hugh Jackman as Nick Bannister, a Miami-based dream master. Using virtual reality, Nick lets his clients relive their most cherished memories, from playing with a childhood dog to enjoying a tryst with a wealthy lover. Nick has a nostalgic obsession of his own—Mae (Rebecca Ferguson), a singer who beguiled him with her lustrous voice and then vanished.

Nick hunts for her across Florida and Louisiana, but the longer he searches, the more his quest seems like a romantic delusion.

Reminiscence, which was written and directed by Westworld co-creator Lisa Joy, is burdened with a frantic pace and a Jackman voiceover that echoes Harrison Ford’s bored yammering in the original version of Blade Runner. Yet Joy has created a vivid dystopia and a poignant meditation on the seductiveness of distorted memories.

Like her brother-in-law Christopher Nolan, she is fascinated with lies that consume men until they no longer believe in anything else. The images of Reminiscence—especially its shots of skyscrapers sticking out of a flood like drowning giants—are darkly beautiful, but when the film reaches its grim conclusion, Joy doesn’t flinch. Reminiscence may be flawed, but it is a deeply haunting portrait of a man too weak for this world. PG-13. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Clackamas Town Center, Cornelius, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Studio One, Tigard.

Small Town News: KPVM Pahrump A charming docuseries about an independent news station 60 long miles west of Las Vegas might seem the ultimate slice-of-life piece. Nothing seismic happens at KPVM. The station struggles to raise money and retain talent.

It reports on petty desert crimes

and livestock interest stories. Its founder, Vern Van Winkle, dreams of getting an antenna that will allow the broadcast to reach Vegas. But the mundanity of Small Town News belies its existence at an event horizon of creative nonfiction, reality television and 25 years of mockumentary comedy.

Some of the show’s riotous yet eerie highlights depict station employees giving self-deluded pep talks worthy of Michael Scott or revealing their secret soft rock à la David Brent. The new weatherman in Pahrump could rival Fred Willard in any Christopher Guest outing for witless mugging.

What’s more, the creators edit and score the show to play more like Waiting for Guffman than the actual documentary it purports to be. Two episodes in, that certainly renders Small Town News a gold mine of tomfoolery, but it’s never going to feel totally right finessing human beings into caricature, no matter how lucky the find or how funny the form. NR. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. HBO, HBO Max.

Free Guy

The premise of Free Guy is so smart it almost makes you forget the movie is stupid. In a video game called Free City, a background character (Ryan Reynolds) gains sentience and teams up with Molotov Girl, the avatar of a gifted game designer (Jodie Comer) searching for dirt on Antoine (Taika Waititi), the shameless, swaggering mogul behind Free City. The film is basically a comedic riff on The Truman Show and Ready Player One, and for a while, it’s clever fun. Director Shawn Levy (Night at the Museum) is an action ace—a garage battle that pits knife against steering wheel is a thing of kinetic beauty—and Comer relishes Molotov Girl’s goofy affections, including her artfully disheveled dark hair and faux-Emily Blunt accent. The movie is bursting with good vibes, but they get crushed by the climax: a bland brawl that bluntly reminds viewers they’re watching a Disney product. It’s sad to see storytelling shoved aside in favor of obnoxious cross-promotional gimmicks like Reynolds wield-

ing a lightsaber and carrying Captain America’s shield. It’s even sadder that next to abysmal recent Disney films like Black Widow and Jungle Cruise, Free Guy looks like art. PG-13.

BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, St. Johns Theater & Pub, St. Johns Twin Cinemas, Studio One, Tigard.

The Suicide Squad

In one of the most memorable scenes in The Suicide Squad, a giant shark with the voice of Sylvester Stallone is repeatedly bitten by a school of deceptively cute-looking fish. Why? Because the film was directed by James Gunn (Guardians of the Galaxy), who likes to blend sweetness and savagery until you can barely tell the difference. The Suicide Squad directs his gruesome imagination toward Task Force X, a gaggle of superpowered convicts who invade a fictional Latin American nation called Corto Maltese in exchange for reduced prison sentences. The cast—which includes Idris Elba, Viola Davis, Margot Robbie and John Cena—is charismatic, but it would take more than good acting to redeem Gunn’s warped world. While the film depicts the murder of a main character as a tragedy, it plays a boomerang slicing an anonymous soldier’s head in half as a joke, suggesting that Gunn thinks violence is funny as long as it happens to other people. It’s a disturbing perspective, especially since it goes hand in hand with the film’s absurd conviction that Task Force X’s brutal brand of American interventionism could actually bring democracy to Corto Maltese. The Suicide Squad may be based on a DC comic book, but its ideal audience isn’t your average superhero fan. It’s George W. Bush. R. BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON. Bridgeport, Cedar Hills, City Center, Clackamas Town Center, Dine-In Progress Ridge, Eastport Plaza, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, HBO Max, Lloyd Center, Movies on TV, Pioneer Place, Sherwood, Studio One, Tigard, Wunderland Milwaukie.

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

27

Editor: Andi Prewitt | Contact: aprewitt@wweek.com ADAM LIBERMAN

PERFORMANCE

MUSIC Written by: Daniel Bromfield | @bromf3

Now Hear This

Listening recommendations from the past, present, Portland and the periphery.

SOMETHING OLD Barker’s Utility imagines dance music as a flying machine: free from the constraints of gravity, head in the clouds, but always working and pumping madly to stay afloat.

Utility is short compared to most albums in the expansive genre of ambient techno, but it’s easier to get lost in than most—its comforting midrange and constant pulse belying its lack of a kick drum or most things you might call a beat. Don’t let the sinister cover alarm you—this is smooth sailing.

The Candidate An Afghan asylum seeker in Ireland runs for office in Sweet Afton.

BY BE N N E T T C A M P B E L L FERGUS O N

About four years ago, a transgender man named Delroy Mpofu fled Zimbabwe. He sought asylum in Ireland, becoming part of Direct Provision and Dispersal, a for-profit system of so-called accommodation centers— which can be anything from a former convent to a trailer park—where people in need of international protection live while their applications are pending.

If Mpofu, whose story was chronicled in a 2019 article in The New Yorker, had sought international protection in the United States, he probably would have been treated brutally. Yet when it comes to immigration, “better than the U.S.” is barely a compliment. Mpofu remained in Direct Provision for 11 months, and some refugees are detained for more than three years, an ordeal that can lead to depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.

In Corrib Theatre’s world-premiere audio play Sweet Afton, playwright Jaki McCarrick and director Tracy Cameron Francis imagine what would happen if a victim of Direct Provision tried to transcend their trauma by running for office. It’s a saga that merits a longer play, but Sweet Afton makes good use of its svelte 20-minute running time, telling a story of race, politics and mental health that is as moving as it is enlightening.

Sweet Afton stars Shahjehan Khan and Fatima Wardak as Kazim and Leila Karimi, two siblings who have fled Afghanistan and languished in the Direct Provision system for five years. When Kazim and Leila discover proof on an ancestry website that their grandfather was Irish, they realize that the connection will allow them to obtain Irish passports and enter Kazim as a candidate for local government.

McCarrick is less interested in the granular details of running for office in Ireland than she is in the emotional struggles of Kazim, Leila and Andrea (Lauren Bloom 28

Willamette Week AUGUST 25, 2021 wweek.com

HOT MIC: Shahjehan Khan plays Kazim, an immigrant who struggles in limbo after fleeing Afghanistan.

Hanover), who aids them in their battle to save others from the cruelties they have endured. She pays particular attention to the toll that Direct Provision exacts on Kazim’s mind in a subplot that starts coming into focus when Leila warns Andrea not to call her brother “crazy.”

In the first scene of Sweet Afton, we hear Kazim chatting with his mother on the phone, casually discussing topics like the weather in Ireland and whether he wears a hat. Several scenes later, Leila explains to Andrea that no one is on the other end of the line—their mother is dead. Even as Kazim looks toward his future as a politician, he is mired in the past, unable to stop conversing with a woman he knows is long gone.

The New Yorker article described how Direct Provision—which, for many years, prohibited asylum seekers from working or cooking their own meals—caused people to regress. That reality is what makes Kazim’s struggle not just the story of one man, but the story of many people who have come face to face with an establishment that essentially tries to turn them into helpless children.

While McCarrick’s script engages with these ideas emphatically, Sweet Afton leaves your mind swimming with questions, like what happens after the election and whether Leila had to flee Afghanistan because she is LGBTQ+. McCarrick is under no obligation to spell out all the answers, but the play’s mysteries and complexities cry out for a sequel.

A hunger for more shouldn’t overshadow McCarrick’s achievements. “Before I came to Ireland, I was a medical student,” Kazim says in a speech. “My sister, a professor of literature. We have been in DP for five years. By now, we have lost our skills.” With eloquence and passion, Sweet Afton speaks through Kazim, declaring that he, Leila and everyone else who has experienced the dehumanization of Direct Provision deserves more than a life in limbo. It’s a play, but it’s also a rallying cry.

Sweet Afton focuses on where Kazim and Leila are now and where they’ll go next, but the specter of their home looms. Now that the U.S. evacuation from Afghanistan is underway and the Taliban has retaken control of the country, the play is haunted by the reality that we’re on the verge of witnessing stories even more heartbreaking than Kazim’s and Leila’s.

In other words, the world needs more plays like Sweet Afton. They remind us that behind every headline is a human being.

LISTEN: Sweet Afton streams at corribtheatre.org through Sept. 5. Tickets are available on a sliding scale; free to $15.

SOMETHING NEW Walt McClements is best known as the mastermind of Lonesome Leash and as one of indie folk’s go-to accordionists, but in his solo work, he uses his instruments to open up the kind of vast, churning drones that usually get made on church organs by people like Sarah Davachi and Kali Malone. The six tracks on his new album, A Hole in the Fence, show just how dignified this stereotypically eccentric instrument can be in the right hands—and when run through a ton of electronics.

SOMETHING LOCAL Field recordings are a great way to keep a record of the transient moments in your life, helpful in a time when so many of our lives are in places of upheaval.

Jason Hovatter isn’t nearly so ambitious—he likes nature, recording nature, and taking pictures of himself recording nature—but his Bandcamp archive of sounds from around Oregon is a great way to travel around the state without going outside your window. Plus, if you’re interested in getting into field recording yourself, he exhaustively lists his equipment.

SOMETHING ASKEW Trout Mask Replica, the 1969 Captain Beefheart curiosity with a reputation as one of rock’s most difficult albums, is finally streaming. The secret to Trout Mask is how sentimental it is: Between the scatological gags and dissonant skronks are truly heartfelt and passionately sung lines about how the world is beautiful and magic is real (“a white elephant escaped from the zoo with love”). His more accessible ’70s stuff like Clear Spot is better for my money, but give Trout Mask a spin if only so patricians don’t think you’re copping out.

JONESIN’

by Matt Jones

"Locked In"--in memory of comedian Sean Lock (1963-2021).

Week of September 2

©2021 Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19) Aries poet Anna Kamienska wrote, "I've learned to value failed conversations, missed connections, confusions. What remains is what's unsaid, what's underneath. Understanding on another level of being." In the coming weeks, I suggest you adopt her perspective as you evaluate both past and present experiences. You're likely to find small treasures in what you'd assumed were wastelands. You may uncover inspiring clues in plot twists that initially frustrated you. Upon further examination, interludes you dismissed as unimportant or uninteresting could reveal valuable wrinkles.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20) After studying your astrological omens, I've decided to offer you inspiration from the ancient Roman poet Catullus. I hope the extravagant spirit of his words will free you to be greedy for the delights of love and affection. Catullus wrote, "Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred; then another thousand, then a second hundred; then yet another thousand." I'll add the following to Catullus's appeal: Seek an abundance of endearing words, sweet favors and gifts, caresses and massages, help with your work, and fabulous orgasms.

If there's no one in your life to provide you with such blessings, give them to yourself.

GEMINI (May 21-June20)

ACROSS

58 Response, part 2

34 Earlier

1 The "T" of MIT, briefly

61 Joined (up)

35 1989 Jack Nicholson role

5 Close friend

62 "Ich bin _ _ _ Berliner"

8 Lumps of dirt

63 Sports reporter Andrews

36 "Back to the Future" actress Thompson

13 Cream-filled Hostess cake

64 Insult from Bob and Doug McKenzie

14 2016 Olympics locale 15 Bucks 16 Question presented by Jimmy Carr that starts "If you could change ...", part 1

65 Holstein sound 66 "Curses, foiled again!"

37 Canadian-born hockey legend 38 "Switch" attachment 42 South American slitherer 43 "_ _ _ that what you will"

DOWN

44 Painter Modigliani

18 Grandmother, in Guatemala

1 Despite, in poetry

45 "_ _ _ that were in the mood" ("Vogue" line)

19 Question, part 2

3 Not too hard on the wallet

21 Daily news sources, still 23 Traveling through 24 Back muscle, for short 25 Crossword constructions 26 Singer _ _ _ Lipa

2 Long, long, long time

46 Driver's lic. issuer

5 Hybrid hatchback

47 Big name in chemicals (and audio tapes and floppy disks, once)

6 It just isn't ... "isn't"

48 Activist lawyer Gloria

7 Sluggish

51 Danny Pudi's character on "Community"

4 Place with a lot of activity

28 Rap duo Kris _ _ _

8 2018 series spun off from "The Karate Kid"

30 Plea at sea

9 Reed and Bega, for two

54 Zest of _ _ _

31 Comedian's asset

10 Palindromically titled 1976 album with "Evil Woman"

55 "Unexpected _ _ _ in bagging area"

11 Southfork Ranch setting

56 Home of Xenia, Youngstown, and Zanesville

32 Kung _ _ _ beef 33 Question, part 3 39 4, on a phone 40 Soccer official 41 Spheroid 43 "Finding Dory" actor Willem 46 "CSI" evidence 47 Hindu title of respect 49 Cockney's residence?

50 Improvise with the band 52 Rocky's surname 53 Pithy response from Sean Lock, part 1 57 "_ _ _ to think so"

12 Elevator passageways 15 The Rock, in "Moana" 17 _ _ _ d'oeuvres 20 IVF eggs 21 Family-friendly film ratings 22 Three in _ _ _ (tic-tac-toe win) 26 Metal singer Ronnie James _ _ _ 27 Mid-road maneuver 29 Go bad 31 "1917" backdrop 32 Adobe file format

52 It's good in Puerto Rico

59 "Boyz N the Hood" actress Long 60 Demolition compound

last week’s answers

blasphemy. Saying "God damn it" could theoretically get you fined in Massachusetts, South Carolina, and Wyoming. In the coming days, it's best to proceed carefully in places like those, since you've been authorized by cosmic forces to curse more often and more forcefully than usual. Why? Because you need to summon vivid and intense protests in the face of influences that may be inhibiting and infringing on your soul's style. You have a poetic license to rebel against conventions that oppress you.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21) Everyone dreams at least three dreams per night.

In a year, your subconscious mind generates over 1,100 dreams. About this remarkable fact, novelist Mila Kundera writes, "Dreaming is not merely an act of coded communication. It is also an aesthetic activity, a game that is a value in itself. To dream about things that have not happened is among humanity's deepest needs." I bring this to your attention, Scorpio, because September is Honor Your Dreams Month.

To celebrate, I suggest the following experiments. 1.

Every night before sleep, write down a question you'd like your dreams to respond to. 2. Keep a notebook by your bed and transcribe at least one dream each time you sleep. 3. In the morning, have fun imagining what the previous night's dreams might be trying to communicate to you. 4. Say prayers of gratitude to your dreams, thanking them for their provocative, entertaining stories.

Gemini author Elif Batuman writes that the Old Uzbek language was rich in expressions about crying. There were "words for wanting to cry and not being able to, for loudly crying like thunder in the clouds, for crying in gasps, for weeping inwardly or secretly, for crying ceaselessly in a high voice, for crying in hiccups, and for crying while uttering the sound 'hay hay.'" I recommend all of these to you in the coming days, as well as others you might dream up. Why? It's prime time to seek the invigorating release and renewal that come from shedding tears generated by deep and mysterious feelings.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21)

CANCER (June 21-July 22)

"I could do with a bit more excess," writes author Joanne Harris. "From now on I'm going to be immoderate—and volatile," she vows. "I shall enjoy loud music and lurid poetry. I shall be rampant."

Let me be clear, Capricorn: I'm not urging you to be immoderate, volatile, excessive, and rampant every day for the rest of your long life. But I think you will generate health benefits and good fortune if you experiment with that approach in the coming weeks.

Can you think of relatively sane, sensible ways to give yourself this salubrious luxury?

A blogger named MythWoven imagines an "alternate universe where I literally go to school forever (for free) so I can learn about art and literature and history and languages for 100 years. No job skills. No credit requirements. No student loans. Just learning." I have longings like hers. There's an eternal student within me that wants to be endlessly surprised with exciting information about interesting subjects. I would love to be continually adding fresh skills and aptitudes to my repertoire. In the coming weeks, I will give free rein to that part of me. I recommend you do the same, my fellow Cancerian.

In her autobiography Changing, Sagittarian actor Liv Ullmann expresses grief about how she and a loved one failed to communicate essential truths to each other. I propose we regard her as your anti-role model for the rest of 2021. Use her error as your inspiration. Make emotionally intelligent efforts to talk about unsaid things that linger like ghostly puzzles between you and those you care about.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19)

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18)

In 2016, the International Garden Photograph of the Year depicted lush lupine flowers in New Zealand. The sea of tall purple, pink, and blue blooms was praised as "an elegant symphony" and "a joy to behold."

What the judges didn't mention is that lupine is an invasive species in New Zealand. It forces native plant species out of their habitat, which in turn drives away native animal species, including birds like the wrybill, black stilt, and banded dotterel. Is there a metaphorically comparable phenomenon in your life, Leo? Problematic beauty? Some influence that's both attractive and prickly? A wonderful thing that can also be troublesome? The coming weeks will be a favorable time to try to heal the predicament.

While wading through the internet's wilder terrain, I found a provocative quote alleged to have been uttered by the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates.

He supposedly said, "My ultimate goal is to look totally hot, but not be unapproachable." I confess that in the past I have sometimes been fooled by fake quotes, and I suspect this is one. Still, it's amusing to entertain the possibility that such an august personage as Socrates, a major influencer of Western culture, might say something so cute and colloquial. Even if he didn't actually say it, I like the idea of blending ancient wisdom with modern insights, seriousness with silliness, thoughtful analysis with good fun. In accordance with astrological omens, I recommend you experiment with comparable hybrids in the coming weeks. (PS: One of your goals should be to look totally hot, but not be unapproachable.)

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22)

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20)

"I often wonder who I am and where is my country and where do I belong and why was I ever born at all," wrote Virgo author Jean Rhys (1890–1979). I don't think you will be agitated by those questions during the next eight weeks, Virgo. In fact, I suspect you will feel as secure in your identity as you have in a long time. You will enjoy prolonged clarity about your role in the world, the nature of your desires, and how you should plan your life for the next two years. If for some inexplicable reason you're not already enjoying these developments, stop what you're doing and meditate on the probability that I am telling you the bold truth.

"If you don't know what you want," writes Piscean novelist Chuck Palahniuk, "you end up with a lot you don't." Very true! And right now, it's extra important to keep that in mind. During the coming weeks, you'll be at the peak of your ability to attract what you want and need. Wouldn't you prefer to gather influences you really desire—as opposed to those for which you have mild or zero interest? Define your wants and needs very precisely.metaphorical in nature, but you still need to be forceful in banishing them.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22)

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22) Several states in the US have statutes prohibiting

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