Film

Q&A: Cult Star Mink Stole on Working with John Waters and Divine

Sat, 13 Apr 2013 22:36:00 -0700

The original Dreamlanders cast and crew of 'Pink Flamingos.' From left: Divine, Mary Vivian Pearce, Mink Stole, Channing Wilroy, John Waters, Edith Massey, David Lochary.

In 1972, an unknown director and a cast of Baltimore misfits released a no-budget film that would forever change the face of counter culture cinema, pushing every boundary of trash, taste, danger, and daring until they burst. The film was Pink Flamingos, and it introduced the world to director John Waters; drag queen Divine, who was willing to do anything on camera (more on that later, although likely you know); and a cast of actors known as the Dreamlanders.

As Waters’ crew continued to shock by playfully portraying rape, murder, abortion, and seemingly every form of filth and debauchery ever imagined (and then some), Waters won nicknames like the Pope of Trash, Prince of Puke, and Sultan of Sleaze, and the bigger-than-life Divine (seriously, 300 pounds), who was Waters idyllic cross of Jayne Mansfield and the clown from Howdy Doody, went on to a global stage as a disco singer. But just as their cinematic work began to flirt with mainstream success in 1988 with Hairspray, Divine died suddenly from a heart attack.

Along with his pencil thin mustache, Waters’ has two trademarks that all of his features share: they’re all filmed in Baltimore, and they all cast actress Mink Stole. One of the original Dreamlanders, Stole has played leading roles (Desperate Living), Divine’s various nemeses (Pink Flamingos, Female Troubles), and myriad other parts as Waters’ film grew slightly more glossy and palatable (Cry-Baby, Serial Mom, Cecil B. Demented, and A Dirty Shame). And with a lengthy resume beyond Waters’ outrageous oeuvre, Stole has become an indie icon of her own.

We’re excited to announce that QDoc, Portland’s queer documentary festival, opens on May 16 with the first doc to tell Divine’s larger-than-life story, I AM DIVINE. Stole will be in the audience seeing the film for the first time and will stay for a Q&A, along with director Jeffrey Schwarz.

QDoc will announce the full schedule and put tickets on sale shortly. [Ed. note: the program and tickets are now up].

In utter anticipation, we caught up with Stole by phone to talk about the early days, what it was like to work with Divine, the one thing she wasn’t willing to do on film, and moving back to Baltimore after many years away.

John Waters and Mink Stole

Mink Stole: We’re having our first day of hot weather today. It’s going to be 90. There’s a cardinal out my window right now. I love where I live.

Culturephile: You live on the street you grew up, right? What was it like to move back to Baltimore after all your films and their notoriety?
When I was feeling like it was time to make the big move out of LA and thinking, where would I go, the only place that made any sense was Baltimore. My mom was getting very old and only lived two months once I got here. Had I not come back, I would’ve missed her.

What’s it like to walk the streets where you all made your films now, 40 years later?
It’s all incorporated into who I am. I don’t think of it as ‘History,’ but as history with a small h, personal history. It is nice to go, ‘that’s where so-and-so lived,’ but as far as going to old movie sites, I would never do that. That’s like watching my own movies in the dark.

John still has a house there, right? Do you see him much?
Yes, his main office and house are here. We had dinner last week. When we go out to dinner, people ignore me completely, but he is so famous, it never fails to happen that people will stop him. They’re always nice, but it can be difficult to enjoy an evening alone with him.

How did you two first meet?
We didn’t meet until he was 20 and I was 18. We were both in Provincetown. We met at the beginning of summer, and by the end he and I and my sister and like four others were living together in this incredible place that was at the end of town that no longer exists.

We clicked right off the bat. There were lots of things that we had in common: Baltimore, a certain societal anger, a loathing for Catholicism. I hate the word ‘values’…

Those sound more like anti-values.
We had certain anti-values that were similar. I found John fascinating from the beginning. He was amazingly charismatic then, as he is now. He was smart and so well read; he was incredibly influential to me.

What about Divine? What’s your first memory of Divine?
At the end of the summer, we [John and I] both came back to Baltimore and moved back in with our respective families. We used to get together periodically on weekends and all take LSD and have great parties. I met Divine at one of those parties.

So much was going on; my life was changing so drastically. The neighborhood I grew up in was very socially conservative: wraparound madras skirt, cardigans, and knee-highs. When I started wearing jeans and had my ears pierced, it was a huge social statement. I’m one of 10 kids, but I felt as big a misfit as anyone else, so when I met John and the other people, I was like, ‘oh my god, you’re weird too.’

So a bunch of outsiders together on LSD. What was it like to film those early movies? Did you know what you were getting into?
I had no idea. John called up and said, “I want you to do scene.” The first movie that I did was Roman Candles. It takes three 8 mm projectors and a tape recorder to show. It was very much influenced by Chelsea Girls, the Warhol film with triple projection. We showed it in a church basement, but people came and liked it. It was a very exciting thing to have going on in my life that had been very dull up to then.

The next movie was Mondo Trasho. That was Divine in a gold lame capri outfit. I’ve always loved watching Divine work and loved working with Divine. He was an amazing performer.

You say in the documentary that it required 100 percent commitment to be in John’s films. What did you mean?
You were expected to show up on time, camera ready, knowing your lines, prepared to do what you needed to do. We had a good time, we had a lot of laughs, but when the camera was rolling, we were working. Look at Pink Flamingos: it’s all done in master shots. The scenes are long with no cutaways. If you do a five-minute long scene, and someone blows their line four-and-a-half minutes in, the scene had to be started over. We were all aware of the budget we had—film was expensive—so none of us wanted to make John mad. John ran a very tight ship.

Mink Stole as Connie Marble in Pink Flamingos:
[The language in this video is not appropriate for all audiences]

Back to Divine. You said you loved working with him. What was it like?
He was a very generous actor. If he was having dialogue with me, he would look at me and not cheat to the camera. It made it easy to work with him, although I had to work very hard because he was so visually staggering. If I wasn’t strong, I wasn’t going to be seen at all.

Particularly in Pink Flamingoes, where the very plot was a fight over being the filthiest person alive, involving one-upmanship of the nastiest kind. All of you did some very wild, provocative, and even dangerous stuff—stuff that hasn’t really been topped—from a sexual encounter that involved a live chicken to Divine’s infamous consumption of dog poop. Was there ever anything that was too much for you?
John always asked. In Pink Flamingos, I agreed to set my hair on fire and didn’t fully realize what that meant. When the scene came closer, I started to panic. What he wanted was for me to sit in a chair and have dialogue and not notice when someone put a match to my hair and have someone standby with bucket of water. The people that would be doing it were not practiced stunt people; there were friends of ours. All I could think was: I’m going to be bald. I will have burned scars on my head, and it will hurt, and I’M NOT DOING IT! But I had told him I would, and he expected me to hold to my agreement.

In retrospect, if it hadn’t worked the first time, there wouldn’t be a second time, and there I would be bald and nobody would remember it anyway, because what people remember about Pink Flamingos is that Divine eats dog shit at the end of it. I never regretted not doing it.

You’ve said before that John was a one-man band, handling every aspect of production, including picking everybody up in a van. What did you tell your parents you were doing when he would come get you for shoots?
My dad was no longer living. My mother was mortified—absolutely mortified. She had come to see the first movie, Roman Candles, and in one of the scenes a woman is dressed as a nun in full makeup smoking and drinking a beer and making out with a priest. My mother was a devout Catholic, and she didn’t come to another film until Polyester. Which was fine—I didn’t need her seeing me f**king someone’s toes in Pink Flamingos.

Throughout all of this time, she always adored John. It was so hard for her because she didn’t want to like him, but she was charmed. I would get ready to go, and she’d just look at me and sigh. She really, truly hated it, until the world at large started talking about John being a genius, and the city of Baltimore started making a big fuss, and then my mom wanted to go to all the premieres and parties. She changed. She’s an extra in Hairspray.

That’s amazing. Speaking of roles, what was your favorite?
Taffy Davenport [in Female Troubles]. I say that automatically because I relate to the misunderstood child. But I’ve loved every one. Peggy Gravel [in Desperate Living] was a wonderful character to play. She got to be so hateful. John always liked me hateful; he likes me to cuss and be mean and nasty.

So often in the films with Divine, I played the foil. I always knew in films with Divine that I was going to come out on the losing end.

The opening scene in Desperate Living with Stole as Peggy Gravel:

What is something people never ask about Divine but should?
He was good to his mom. I think people know that. One thing people do ask: did I call Divine ‘he’ or ‘she,’ and I always called Divine ‘he.’ Off camera he was male. He enjoyed very much playing men’s parts. My biggest regret is that he didn’t get to explore that more and become better known as an actual actor.

Where were you when you heard about his death?
I was home in New York. I lived right around the corner from Divine. I had just come home from the premiere of Hairspray in Baltimore. His mother was there, and it was the first premiere she had ever attended to my knowledge. He looked wonderful, so happy. A week later, I came home and there were a lot of phone messages, a lot of ‘call me’ messages, and then one from my mom that said, ‘I’m so sorry about Divine.” And I knew.

It was such a shock. I had just seen him—it can’t be true. Those of us who lived in New York stayed home together the next few days until we came down to Baltimore for the funeral.

What do you think his most enduring impact is?
I think it’s the triumph of the outsider—the triumph of the other. It’s that somebody who was picked on in school, who was perceived to be fat and effeminate, was able to take the negatives and transform them—with the help of John—into amazing positives that have had an enduring affect on so many people who have come after. I can’t tell you how many drag artists tell me they wouldn’t be who they are if not for Divine.

Divine had such a zest for life, such energy about him. He threw himself into whatever he was doing with total commitment and enthusiasm, and it shows. He took effeminacy and the desire to wear woman’s clothing into a whole other world that wasn’t about passing as a woman. It became a larger-than-life personality, and so drag becomes a cultural thing.

I totally think that for those people who feel they have no where and no one, for those people who live in places where being gay is still not okay, still villified, you can look at somebody like Divine and say, ‘this person made it big, and 25 years after his death people still care about him.’

Periodically I visit his grave, and there’s always a token of tribute that someone has left there. I find this to be so lovely, and who knew? I think Divine would be more than pleased to know that even after he’s gone, he’s very much alive.

Are you surprised that the movies you all made as kids have had such an incredible, enduring life?
We all knew we were going to do things other people found odd, but that was part of the fun of it. None of us, Divine included, expected while making these films that they’d have the life that they had and the importance they had in other people’s live. I didn’t anticipate that. I’m glad I didn’t, because I probably would’ve been insufferable if I thought people would care in 40 years.

You’ve been working on an album with your Wonderful Band for a couple years now, and I’ve read it’s almost done?
The recording is finished, the cover is with the designer, and after that it will get pressed and it will be available on Amazon and iTunes. It’s called Do Re MiNK. It’s almost three years in the making. I’m very happy with it. The first song on the album is my version of “Female Trouble” [the theme song to the 1974 movie that Divine sang].

QDoc
Bagdad Theater and the Kennedy School
May 16–19You’ve never been to Portland, right? What are you expecting?
I’ve watched Portlandia, which spoofs the hippie-dippy side. So I’m aware that it’s not as much a—what I’ve called an ‘earth shoe’ environment. So if there’s a Culturephile blog, there’s culture in Portland, but I’m totally unaware of it. I’m coming to Portland as a Portland virgin, but I have a feeling I’m going to feel very comfortable there.

Stole sings "Female Troubles" with SF drag performer Peaches Christ:

For more on Portland arts and culture, sign up for our weekly On The Town newsletter, subscribe to our RSS feed, and follow us on Twitter @aarondavidscott. Visit our Arts & Entertainment Calendar for our editors’ event picks.

Video Stars

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 21:10:00 -0700

Eluvium, “The Motion Makes Me Last” (directed by Matt McCormick)

“A seemingly effortlessly beautiful and almost transcendental meditation on the look and feel of our fair city.”

Onuinu, “Happy Home” (directed by Andrew Sloan)

“A perfect visual representation of the artist’s desire to break down lines between genres.” (Specifically hip-hop, dance, and electronica.)

And And And, “I Want More Alcohol” (directed by Kyle Glenn)

“This looks like it cost five dollars to make, but was also lavished with love. A video doesn’t need flashy production to be compelling.”

The Portland Music Video Festival takes place May 30 at the Hollywood Theatre

LAIKA Announces Its Third Film

Fri, 08 Feb 2013 15:58:00 -0800

The local animation pioneers LAIKA, along with film partner Focus Features, who together are responsible for Coraline and the recently Oscar-nominated ParaNorman, just announced their third collaboration: The Boxtrolls. Production on the 3D stop-motion, CG hybrid is already in progress, and the release date has been set for October 17, 2014.

The Boxtrolls is based on Alan Snow's fantasy novel, Here be Monsters, which is set in the Victorian-era town of Cheesebridge and populated by the super rich who are consumed by their love of money, children, the smelliest cheeses, and a fear of the Boxtrolls who live below ground. According to legend, these creatures appear from the sewers to burgle the townspeople of their most prized possessions (cheese, children, $$$). In reality, these dumpster-diving and inventive creatures live in large customized communities underground, dress in cardboard boxes, and survive with the help of an ingrained charming wackiness. They have raised an orphan boy who will come in handy when an ambitious and crazed exterminator shows up to destroy their world underground.

The voice cast includes Ben Kingsley, Toni Collette, Elle Fanningm Issac Hempstead-Wright, Jared Harris, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Richard Ayoade and Tracy Morgan.

In the press release, LAIKA president Travis Knight said: “The Boxtrolls is a visually dazzling mash-up of gripping detective story, absurdist comedy, and steampunk adventure with a surprisingly wholesome heart. It’s Dickens by way of Monty Python. Tony and Graham have crafted a strange and beautiful world replete with fantastical creatures, good-for-nothing reprobates, madcap antics, and rip-roaring feats of derring-do. But at its core, like all LAIKA films, The Boxtrolls is a moving and human story with timelessness and powerful emotional resonance.”

For more on Portland arts and culture, sign up for our weekly On The Town newsletter, subscribe to our RSS feed, and follow us on Twitter @PoMoArt. Visit our Arts & Entertainment Calendar for our editors’ event picks.

PDX Int'l Film Fest Preview

Thu, 07 Feb 2013 15:24:00 -0800

As much as we love acting locally, we depend on the Portland International Film Festival (along with other fests like this month’s PDX Jazz Festival) to keep us thinking globally. With some 135 films from more than three-dozen countries, it offers two-plus weeks of stories about the world outside our verdant valley. We can't possibly cover all the films here, but we wanted to offer suggestions on some of the bigger award winners and buzz makers, then open it up for you to explore the world of film that the NW Film Center has painstakingly brought to our small shores.

Blancanieves + The Opening Night Party
Feb 7 at 7:30pm, Newmark Theatre

Blancanieves, the festival's opening-night film, is a Spanish-inflected, The Artist–reminiscent silent treatment of the Snow White fairy tale. It is Spain's submission for the Best Foreign Film Oscar, and it will kick off the opening party.

The Sapphires
Feb 8 at 6pm, Whitsell Auditorium
Feb 10 at 5pm, Cinemagic

A true-life Australian movie about a country-western group made up of four young Aborigines women who struggle in a remote Outback town in 1968, facing racism and musical obscurity, before getting their break in the form of talent scout, played by Chris O'Dowd (Kristin Wiig’s charming cop suitor in Bridesmaids). He changes their musical track from country to Motown, dubs them the Sapphires, and sends the four women to Vietnam to sing for American troops, a trip that marks the beginning of these young women's journey to adventure and success. Based on screenwriter Tony Briggs' own family history, the film interlaces humor and tension with great Motown tunes. Read a review in the Telegraph that calls the film “a cute comic drama that grapples with some hard truths.”

Caesar Must Die
Feb 8 at 9pm, at CineMagic
Feb 11 at 6pm, at CineMagic

Selected as Italy’s submission to the Oscars, this film by Italian co-directors and brothers Paolo Taviani and Vittorio Taviani's takes place in a Roman prison, where the inmates rehearse and perform Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. Melding documentary and narrative (along with the Shakespearean drama-within-a-drama), the movie explores the many themes that parallel the lives of the prisoners with their characters in Shakespeare's famous play of power, fraternity, and betrayal. Paolo Taviani said upon his acceptance of the Golden Bear Award, the Berlin Film Festival’s highest prize, that he hoped moviegoers would "say to themselves or even those around them... that even a prisoner with a dreadful sentence, even a life sentence, is and remains a human being."

Barfi!
Feb 9 at 2pm, Regal Lloyd Center
Feb 10 at 6:45, Regal Lloyd Center
Feb 12 at 7pm, Regal Fox Tower

Originally submitted as India’s entry for a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, Barfi!, which is dedicated to Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, ceased to be a contender when it was criticized for copying scenes from several American films. Despite this (or perhaps because of it), Barfi! was a huge success upon its release in India in 2012, becoming one of the highest earning Bollywood films of all time. Part enchanting fable, part slapslick comedy, it follows a deaf-mute (Bollywood star Ranbir Kapoor) in Darjeeling as he pursues first one failed love and then a second (who is autistic) in an adventure involving a bank robbery, kidnappings, and not end to slapstick. While the three’s paths are initially intertwined in the pursuit of love and success, eventually their lives end up permanently connected to one another's.

Pieta
Feb 9 at 6pm, CineMagic
Feb 11 at 6:30pm, Regal Lloyd Center 4

The South Korean movie Pieta, by festival favorite Kim Ki-duk, won top prize, the Golden Lion, at the Venice International Film Festival, as well as a myriad awards at other film festivals, including several for its leading actress, Jo Min-su. Filled with extreme and often sickening violence, Pieta tells the story of Kang-do (Lee Jung-jin), a loan shark seemingly gripped by pure evil whose strategy is to take disability policies out on his clients and then disable them if they can’t pay him off, who undergoes something of a transformation when a woman (Min-su), claiming to be the mother who abandoned him long ago, reappears in his life with some secrets of her own. Read the Hollywood Reporter's review.

Reality
Feb 10 at 7:30pm, Regal Fox Tower
Feb 14 at 5:45pm, Regal Lloyd Center

Italian director Matteo Garrone intended to make Reality a comedy, but as the filming went on, the story took on darker dramatic tones. Following one man's obsessive quest to gain a spot on an Italian reality TV show, Garrone examines and exposes the uglier side of celebrity culture and the pursuit of fame. This satirical, ironic, but ultimately sentimental and thoughtful film, equal parts Fellini and Neapolitan realism, won the Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival.

Lore
Feb 10 at 7:30pm, Whitsell Auditorium
Feb 11 at 5:45pm, Regal Lloyd Center

Set in Germany at the end of World War II, the movie tells the story of five German siblings whose parents were Nazi SS members during the war and who were arrested by the Allies when the war ended. The siblings become orphans who must find their way hundreds of miles across Germany to live with their grandmother, a journey both aided and challenged by the help of a Jewish soldier who poses as their older brother. A story about guilt and forgiveness directed and co-written by Cate Shortland (whose 2004 Somersault swept awards and widely introduced Abbie Cornish), Lore aims to show a human side of the aftermath of WWII that hasn’t often been portrayed on the screen. Winner of the Piazza Grande audience award at the Festival del film Locarno in Switzerland, Best Film at the Stockholm International Film Festival, and this year’s Australian submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar.

Roundup: Valentine's Day

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:28:00 -0800

Valentine's Day—ugh, right? It's become practically cliche to point out that Hallmark has turned the holiday into a consumerist farce, and people with dates resent the day for its attendant high expectations almost as much as those without dates resent it for its attendant Love Actually re-viewing. But it doesn't have to be that way! This February 14 (or thereabouts), Portland's event calendar offers something for everyone, from daunted date-planners to bitter boycotters.

Roberta Flack

Roberta Flack with the Oregon Symphony
Feb 14 at 7:30 R&B singer Roberta Flack had a string of hits in the ’70s, no small number of which had to do with amour: “The First Time I Ever Saw Your Face,” “Killing Me Softly with His Song,” “Where Is the Love.” In her paean to St. Valentine with the symphony, it’s these mushy-gushy selections from her catalog Flack will focus on. $32–128

It's Not Me, It's You: Stories from the Dark Side of Dating
Feb 12 at 7 Local lit luminaries including writer Michael Heald, Back Fence PDX producer B. Frayn Masters, and Sex Diaries Project author Arianne Cohen celebrate the holiday by telling bad-date stories for this Planned Parenthood Advocates of Oregon benefit. $18–20

Kiss & Tell
Feb 14 at 8 Portland Story Theater presents its annual Valentine’s Day show, an evening of amorous and amusing storytelling by some of the company’s most masterly narrative artists. Eric Stern, the theatrical front man of local cabaret ensemble Vagabond Opera, emcees. $18–36.

Mortified

Mortified's "Doomed Valentine's" Show
Feb 12–13 at 8 Mortified, the live-storytelling event where people read selections from their teenage diaries and other "childhood artifacts," presents two evenings of presentations on the shudder-inducing theme of "doomed Valentine's." $12–15.

I Heart Improv
Feb 14 at 7:30 The improvisational-comedy vets of Brody Theater, prompted by call-outs from the audience, perform sketches around the theme of dating and romance—the good, the bad, and the ugly. $15

Wild at Heart
Feb 14 at 8 Here's a sure way to creep out your date (or please your creepy date): Hollywood Theatre is screening David Lynch's 1990 thriller/romance about a young outcast couple, Sailor Ripley (Nicolas Cage) and Lula Pace Fortune (Laura Dern) who run away from Fortune's overbearing mom but wind up pursued by the mafia. For $25, the theater will kick in champagne and chocolates. $7

Now that you've got one half of dinner and a show covered, head over to Culturephile's cousin blog, Eat Beat, for a bevy of recommendations on your pre- or post-show meal. Eat Beat also has a roundup of Valentine's events in wine country, while another member of our blog fam, Tripster, goes further afield with a daydream-inducing slideshow of the Northwest's most romantic retreats.

Review: Promised Land

Wed, 09 Jan 2013 15:41:00 -0800

Co-writers and actors John Krasinski and Matt Damon on the set for Promised Land with director Gus Van Sant. Photo courtesy of Focus Features.

"You people baffle me," a drunken Matt Damon mumbles to a crowd of hostile Pennsylvanian farmers seconds before a well-deserved punch to the jaw beats his once confident corporate demeanor further into the ground.

With Promised Land, co-written by Damon and directed by Portland’s own Gus Van Sant, the duo return to the rough cinematic idealism of Good Will Hunting, which won Damon an Oscar for screenwriting and Van Sant a nomination. But this time Damon’s not the cocky genius handing people their pride at the bar (“How do you like them apples?); instead, he’s the formerly cocky corporate drone getting served. And instead of being refreshingly new, the story is one we've all seen before, with Van Sant’s efforts paling to his previous work, though he alone is not to blame.

The film centers around the controversial practice of fracking, an invasive method of extracting natural gas that is neither sexy nor glamorous. From a script written by Damon and John Krasinski, Van Sant attempts to make a compelling drama out of the conflict between the big business that needs land to drill and prideful farmers, who are conflicted about their duty to home and family and their financial security in an increasingly dire economy.

Throughout, Van Sant utilizes his iconic tracking shots and a melancholic score as his tough characters wander through the sweeping Pennsylvania countryside. These moments, devoid of clichéd dialogue and full of that nameless existential weight Van Sant captures so well, may be the best part of the film. Instead of burdening the viewer with predictability, they allow the audience to relax and connect with a genuine wordless sadness. But these moments of sincerity, unlike the abundant natural gas the characters are chasing, are precious because they are rare, as the script inevitably pulls actors and director alike back onto a well-worn cinematic path.

Damon plays Steve Butler, who swoops into our downtrodden, pastoral Pennsylvania with his sidekick Sue Thomason (Frances McDormand, who radiates warmth with her usual no-nonsense demeanor) to snatch up land for the Global Cross Power Solutions. Both represent the cold arrogance of corporate greed—wolves in sheep’s clothing who smile and crack deceptively original jokes with the locals.

Butler is originally an Iowa farm boy who rose beyond his agricultural destiny for a big-time job with the $9 billion energy company, and he uses this past for manipulation and profit. Haunted by the ruination of his own hometown and pressured by ruthless executives and the need to maintain his numbers, Butler attempts to steamroll through rural communities, seeing himself as a realist, a savior who has arrived to save the farmers from their “dying” way of life—intangibles like generational pride and honor be damned.

Damon carries the weight of the film, sparring with locals, the most eloquent of whom is a scientist and teacher played with grouchy wisdom by Hal Holbrook; an agitator environmentalist (the eternally grinning, charming Krasinski), and of course, himself. But as local resistance builds, Butler’s own identity disintegrates, and he begins to spin adrift between his adherence to corporate money and a newfound belief in a past he had all but forgotten.

But despite decent performances and Van Sant’s steady hand, the film never takes off, unable to overcome the script’s subservience to a clichéd story structure and plot devices. There’s the challenging female love interest, the conflict with locals, the re-discovery of an earnest moral compass, the sacrifice of money for the sake of doing the right thing. It is a film we have all seen a thousand times, a film without spark that eventually goes absolutely nowhere and has even won the nickname Promise Bland. At least we get to revel in Damon’s cool baby blue eyes as he predictably shacks up with the past he once abandoned, his fate left to anyone’s guess. But unfortunately, by the time it happens, no one really cares.

Download the Portlandia Winter Special for Free

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 13:07:00 -0800

Portlandia’s not very good at taking time off. Instead of curling up with a crafty project or vacationing in Bali before the premiere of Season 3 on January 4, they keep throwing out juicy morsels. First, Carrie and Fred were on The Simpsons (with the Decemberists). And now, a special “nondenominational, optionally religious winter holiday celebration timed around the solstice” they’re calling “Winter in Portlandia.” Just don’t call it the Christmas special.

If you missed it on IFC, you can still download it free on iTunes. Watch for Gabriel Rucker and Le Pigeon, SNL’s Bobby Moynihan as Candace’s scarred son, and the imaginary Mississippi Avenue foodcart Stu's Stews that harrassed me on the way to work two days in a row. For a full lineup of the special guests on Season 3—including Chloe Sevigny, George Wendt (Norm!), and Roseanne—see our earlier post.

Also new, comedian Kumail Nanjiani is doing a special webseries Kumail Visits Portlandia. His first visit takes him, where else, the real feminist bookstore.

The following video might not be safe for your workplace. Read the title first.

Holiday Shows Not to Miss

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 10:58:00 -0800

THEATER

A Tuna Christmas

Thru Dec 23 The family-friendly holiday comedy, starring Jeffrey Jason Gilpin and Alan King as all 22 residents of the fictional third-smallest town in Texas, is back by popular demand. It’s like A Prairie Home Companion, if Garrison Keillor played all of Lake Wobegon’s townspeople and the idyllic Minnesota community were a cracked-up Texas backwoods. For showtimes, see calendar entry. $28.25–52. Dolores Winningstad Theatre, PCPA, 1111 SW Broadway. 503-248-4335. pcpa.com

REVIEWED The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of A Christmas Carol
Thru Dec 23 In this Bag & Baggage–produced play-within-a-play, the well-born, ill-bred women of Farndale Avenue’s Dramatic Society (played by men in drag) stage a performance of A Christmas Carol that’s as much of a train wreck as its title—to so-bad-it’s-good effect. Read our review. Wed–Sat at 7:30; Sun at 2. $15–28. Venetian Theatre, 253 E Main St, Hillsboro. 503-345-9590. bagnbaggage.org

The Santaland Diaries

REVIEWED The Santaland Diaries
Thru Dec 30 Though it’s been 20 years since Sedaris first read it on NPR’s Morning Edition (launching his career), the humor writer’s tale of working as Crumpet the Elf at Macy’s still holds up as an uproarious, antimaterialist Christmas classic. For this year’s production of Joe Mantello’s one-man adaptation, actor Darius Pierce steps into David’s/Crumpet’s elfin booties for the first time (for more about the show but not the actor, see our review of last year's production with Jim Lichtscheidl). Tue–Sun at 7:30; Sat–Sun at 2. $44–59. Ellyn Bye Studio at the Armory, 128 NW 11th Ave. 503-445-3700. pcs.org

REVIEWED Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Christmas Carol
Thru Dec 30 Artists Repertory Theatre reprises its 2011 holiday show (read last year's review), a mash-up of sorts of A Christmas Carol and the Sherlock Holmes stories. The play, written by Seattleite John Longenbaugh and directed by Jon Kretzu, visits ghosts past, present, and future upon a retired Holmes to spook the detective-extraordinaire back into the mystery-solving biz. Wed–Sun at 7:30; Sun at 2. For ticket prices, call 503-241-1278 or visit artistsrep.org. Artists Repertory Theatre, 1515 SW Morrison St

Christmas on Broadway

Thru Dec 23 The conceit of this new holiday musical revue from Broadway Rose is actually rather believable, for once: a quartet of would-be actors is snowed in at a Broadway theater on Christmas Eve with only costumes, props, and set pieces. What to do but make the best of it by performing seasonal standards from Broadway shows? Portland Center Stage’s musical director, Rick Lewis, directs. For showtimes, see calendar entry. $25–40. New Stage Auditorium, 12850 SW Grant Ave, Tigard. 503-620-5262. broadwayrose.org

It’s a Wonderful Life
Thru Dec 23 Stumptown Stages adds some tinsel to the beloved 1946 film and Christmastime staple by adapting it as a musical for the first time in Bedford Falls history. The world-premiere score was co-composed by prominent Portland pianist and songwriter Michael Allen Harrison. Thu–Sat at 7:30; Sun at 2. $15–30. Brunish Theatre, Portland Center for the Performing Arts, 1111 SW Broadway. 503-248-4335. stumptownstages.com

A Very Joan Crawford Christmas
Thru Dec 23 Triangle Productions presents a funny, fearsome Yuletide evening with Joan Crawford. A pencil-eyebrowed, vodka-soaked Kam Sisco plays Mommie Dearest, while James Sharinghousen portrays her gentleman companion. For showtimes, see calendar entry. $15–35. The Sanctuary at Sandy Plaza, 1785 NE Sandy Blvd. 503-239-5919. tripro.org

CLASSICAL MUSIC

NEW Classical Revolution PDX

Dec 26 at 9 For the British Commonwealth, Boxing Day—December 26—has been a tradition for hundreds of years, beginning as the designated time at which masters bestowed gifts upon their servants before evolving into a day of charity and goodwill. For Portlanders, Bachxing Day is a time to unwind after the stress of the holidays with booze and Bach. Classical Revolution PDX will be performing interpretations of their Bach favorites, and encouraging audience members to do so as well, remembering the three rules: "Any Bach. Any Instrumentation. Any Interpretation." Suggested donation of $5–20. Someday Lounge, 125 NW 5th Ave. 503-248-1030. classicalrevolutionpdx.org

NEW Oregon Symphony

Christmas with Johnny Mathis

Dec 22 at 7:30 Christmas with Johnny Mathis Mathis was perhaps the last of the great pre-rock crooners to gain popularity before Fender electrified pop music forever—but “Chances Are” you already know him. For this special holiday concert, Mathis, with the symphony as his backing band, sings the seasonal standards. $35–200. Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway. 503-228-1353. orsymphony.org

DANCE

The Nutcracker
Thru Dec 23 Oregon Ballet Theatre brings the visions of sugarplums dancing in our heads—yours, too!?—to life through its annual performance of Tchaikovsky’s beloved ballet. Some 27,000 people turned out last season to see the flowers waltz, the fairy dance, and the Nutcracker/Prince defeat the Mouse King, making this one of Oregon’s most popular holiday events. For showtimes, see calendar entry. For ticket prices, call 503-222-5538 or visit opb.org. Keller Auditorium, 222 SW Clay St

FILM

The Big Lebowski

NEW The Big Lebowski
Dec 21–27 Take a night off from the holiday spirit for a, well, different sort of tradition: Clinton Street Theater’s yearly screening of the Coen brothers’ classic. Jeff Bridges plays “the Dude,” a slacker par excellence who, after being mistaken for the title character, is spooled into a web of intrigue featuring porno kingpins, feminist artists, and German nihilists. Patrons are encouraged to wear pajamas. 6:50 & 9:20. $6. Clinton Street Theater, 2522 SE Clinton St. 503-238-5588. clintonsttheater.com

NEW Charles Dickens
Thru Dec 23 The Northwest Film Center screens three cinematic adaptations of Dickensian works, in celebration of both the great Victorian novelist’s 200th birthday and the season. (Even putting aside A Christmas Carol, there’s a certain Yuletide feel to all of Dickens’s wintry, moralistic tales, isn’t there?) In addition to Brian Desmond Hurst’s essential 1951 version of Christmas Carol, NWFC is showing David Lean’s Oscar-winning 1946 Great Expectations and an Alberto Cavalcanti–directed 1947 film noir rendition of Nicholas Nickleby. For showtimes, see calendar entries. $9. Whitsell Auditorium, 1219 SW Park Ave

CONCERTS

Wanderlust Circus' White Album Christmas

NEW Wanderlust Circus’ White Album Christmas

Dec 21–23 The city’s top circus-arts troupe teams up with the Nowhere Band—made up of members of MarchFourth Marching Band, Trashcan Joe, and others—in a stomping holiday celebration for those fed up with the same ol’ holiday fare. For the fifth year running, they cover the decidedly un-Christmas White Album in its entirety with decidedly un–Sugar Plum Fairy circus spectacles, without surrendering any of the seasonal cheer. Fri–Sat at 9; Sun at 8. $25. Alberta Rose Theatre, 3000 NE Alberta St. 503-719-6055. albertarosetheatre.com

SPECIAL EVENTS

The Grotto’s Christmas Festival of Lights
Thru Dec 30 The Grotto’s Catholic shrine and botanical garden are unusual and beautiful enough the rest of the year, but during the sanctuary’s holiday-season light display and choral festival, it is truly a sight to see. More than 500,000 lights deck the 62-acre, cliff-straddling grounds; performances by area choral groups—170 in total—take place nightly; and hot chocolate is as abundant as Christmas spirit. Daily 5–9:30; closed Christmas Day. $9. The Grotto, 8840 NE Skidmore St. 503-254-7371. thegrotto.org

FAMILY

The Peppermint Bear Show: Who Needs Sneeds?
Thru Dec 22 Rise and shine for a continental breakfast and to cheer on Peppermint Bear and Santa’s elves as they fight to save Christmas from the Grinchlike Sneed siblings. Lakewood Theatre Company is staging Peppermint Bear for the first time in the 35-odd years since it premiered (as The Cinnamon Bear Show) at the old Lipman’s department store. Sat at 9 and 11. $12. Lakewood Center for the Arts, 368 S State St, Lake Oswego. 503-635-3901. lakewood-center.org

For more about Portland arts, visit PoMo's Arts & Entertainment Calendar, stream content with an RSS feed, sign up for our weekly On The Town Newsletter, or follow us on Twitter @PoMoArt. Blog content reflects the views of the individual author and not necessarily SagaCity Media, Inc.

NWFC Announces PIFF's Opening Film and Dates

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 13:19:00 -0800

The NW Film Center announced today that the 36th Portland International Film Festival will kick off on February 7 with the opening night film The Sapphires, a true-life Australian comedy about a group of Aboriginal girls who were plucked from obscurity by their manager (played by the Irish comedic actor Chris O’Dowd, best known as Kristen Wiig's cop courter in Bridesmaids) and thrust onto the international stage as Oz's answer to the Supremes. We can cross our fingers that O'Dowd will be in attendance for the opening-night party. (The attendance of directors and actors at film festivals is always a bit of a guessing game, even for the organizers, dependent upon how well the film does at other festivals and what other movies they're working on at the time.)

The festival will run through February 23 and will screen over 125 films—narratives, shorts, and documentaries—from over three dozen countries. The full lineup will be announced on January 24.

Culturephile confirmed with NWFC that the festival will include the premieres of at least one local documentary, including the much anticipated Alien Boy: The Death and Life of James Chasse. About the 2006 death of local artist Chasse after a stunning case of police brutality that sparked a firestorm of public outcry over how the police handle mental illness, the film is directed by Brian Lindstrom—whose credits include the documentaries Kicking and Finding Normal, about drug detoxification and recovery, respectively—with cinematography by John Campbell, a Hollywood vet who filmed, among many others, Gus Van Sant's Mala Noche and My Own Private Idaho.

The Oregonian and NWFC confirmed several additional films, including the winner of the 2012 Cannes Film Fest's Best Director prize, Carlos Reygadas's Post Tenebras Lux; Pieta from Kim Ki-Duk (The Bow); the documentary tribute Love, Marilyn, wherein contemporary celebrities read recently discovered diaries from the blonde bombshell; Lore, the long-awaited follow-up to Australian director Cate Shortland's Somersault, about the children of a German family trying to put their lives back together after World War II; the eyebrow-raising Paradise: Love, an Austrian film about a middle-aged woman traveling to Kenya for sex tourism; and the Chilean film No, starring Gael Garcia Bernal.

5 Questions for Buoy Director Steve Doughton

Mon, 26 Nov 2012 15:08:00 -0800

Portland filmmaker Steve Doughton describes his debut feature, Buoy, as “My Dinner with Andre meets The Deadliest Catch.” An apt comparison, given it sustains the minimalist and dialogue-heavy approach of the former without sacrificing the palpable, ever-present tension of the latter, as it explores the complicated connection of siblings—“a relationship that is underrepresented,” says Doughton.

The film stars Tina Holmes as T.C., a 30-something suburbanite mother of two, who receives an unexpected phone call from Danny, her brash-but-charming wayward brother (voiced by Matthew Del Negro). The entire course of the ballsy 85-minute film consists simply of their phone call, ranging through topics of fidelity, near-death experiences, psychotropic drugs, and their shared past, as T.C. goes about her household routines.

With a background in experimental film, Doughton isn’t afraid of taking artistic risks. Here, he offers an evocative, stripped-down, starkly beautiful film that was named Favorite Narrative Feature at the 39th Annual Northwest Filmmakers’ Festival. “Buoy is a powerful, deeply engrossing meditation on family, middle class alienation, and love…a dramatic, emotionally gripping excavation of contemporary life, exquisitely controlled and grounded in its pitch-perfect performances, writing, and direction,” says the film’s executive director, Todd Haynes, who you might know for his own films, including I’m Not There, Far From Heaven, and Velvet Goldmine.

Buoy plays at the Hollywood Theatre from Wednesday through Monday at 7:30. Doughton will be in attendance for a Q&A with the audience after Wednesday’s screening.

Culturephile: There’s been a lot of response to the minimalist approach to the film. How did you decide to focus the film on T.C.? Was that the idea all along or a choice you made along the way?
Steve Doughton: That started at the inception. Once I decided it would be a phone call, I decided the film would be entirely on her. I like the idea of the radical purity of it. Tina had the whole script memorized like a play. I think the longest take we shot was 20 minutes, and she did the whole thing beginning to end multiple times. She’s an outstanding talent. Matthew was great but he had the script in front of him. He was not on camera, so he didn't have to do that memorization. He was in another room in the house on a microphone.

I wanted to go for the static camera because it would allow us to shoot quickly and efficiently—we had little money and only five days to shoot—but it also helps give a sense of [T.C.'s] isolation. I thought, if I start moving the camera, it'll look like I'm afraid, that I have to jazz up the film. I thought, just go for it. It's a woman on the phone. That's what we're going to see. And how do we make that visually beautiful?

Tina Holmes is fantastic in this role. How did that collaboration come about?
I’ve known Tina for 20 years. We formed a little production company in the early 90s, and we did music videos for Iggy Pop, Pavement, Blonde Redhead, Aphex Twin.

I sent her the script a couple of years ago. I wrote it with her specifically in mind. We were supposed to shoot in the summer of 2010, but she had just had her second child and was afraid she wasn’t able to do it, and I said I’d being willing to postpone the filming for a year.

The film’s producers include a plethora of local talent, such as Todd Haynes, David Allen Cress, Jonathan Raymond. How did they come to be involved?
Pure nepotism. I met Jonathan Raymond [in New York]. I was at a Bruce Nauman exhibit at MOMA. I saw this group of kids, and one of them was wearing a “Portland” t-shirt. I approached them and asked if they were from Portland, Oregon or Portland, Maine. It turned out to be Jon Raymond.

A few years later, I made this film that he had heard about, and he wanted to interview me for this magazine in Seattle. So, he got my number and called me up: “My name’s Jon Raymond, I’m writing for a magazine and, by the way, were you at that Bruce Nauman exhibit?” We became friends and collaborated on a couple of scripts together. In the meantime, he and Todd [Haynes] became friends, so I got to know Todd through him. I knew David [Cress] in high school. He’d expressed interest in making a film with me.

It’s really through friendship that their involvement came about.

Why do you think creative folks flock to Portland?
You can be here and be broke. If you're going to have no money—like most young artists—this is a good place to do it. New York now is so expensive. I don't know how young artists survive there. I can't imagine. I moved to the East Village in 1983 with $600 and no job. You can't do that now. I think you can do the equivalent here in Portland.

What’s next for Buoy, and what’s next for you, Steve Doughton?
I'd love to screen it in Ashland, in New York—you know, do a tour with it. Our plans are to release the DVD on Amazon sometime soon. We'd like to do video on-demand with it.

My next plan is to adapt a short story from Jon Raymond. I've got three other scripts ready to go, and a fourth I'm working on. I've spent the past 15 years writing, stockpiling things. I've realized it's good to have a next project in the wings because if not, you can stop the momentum.