Zach Braff, the twee-est director in the world, cements his irrelevance.
Posted inMovies & TV
Stop Trying to Relate to Me
Zach Braff Is an Emotional Terrorist Who Must Be Stopped
Alison Hallett
Alison Hallett served nobly as the Mercury's arts editor from 2008-2014. Her proud legacy lives on.
Posted inMovies & TV
Boys on Film
Growing Up Onscreen in Boyhood
Filmed over 12 years, Boyhood is like nothing you’ve ever seen.
Posted inBooks
Coming Out Party
Todd Glass Breaks the Mold of the Stand-up Memoir
Todd Glass breaks the mold of the comedian memoir.
Posted inMovies & TV
Spies in the Shadows
Philip Seymour Hoffman Takes on John le Carré’s A Most Wanted Man
Philip Seymour Hoffman takes on John le Carré’s A Most Wanted Man.
Posted inComedy
Steven Wilber Is Portland’s New Funniest Person
Photo via Jason Traeger’s Portland Stand-Up Comedy Photo Album From left to right: Adam Pasi, Steven Wilber, Gabe Dinger Well, that was unexpected! Last night was Helium Comedy Club’s annual Portland’s Funniest Person contest. The final round is always hosted by the previous year’s winner; last night’s host, Shane Torres, said that 180 people signed […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
New Theater Ensemble Asks “Who Made This Art”?
This is rad. In June, members of a new experimental theater group calling themselves “overunder” stood out front of the Drammys, Portland’s annual theater awards, and asked attendees pointed questions about the racial makeup of Portland’s theater scene relative to the city as a whole. They’re not the first people to raise these questions—hey, I […]
Posted inEvents
It’s Happening Tonight!
COMEDY—After more than a month of side-splitting hilarity, the time has come for a winner to be crowned in the Portland’s Funniest Person Contest at Helium. Local comedy stalwarts Gabe Dinger, (occasional Mercury columnist) Bri Pruett, Curtis Cook, Anthony Lopez, and many more have been fighting their way up through the preliminaries. Find out who […]
Posted inEvents
It’s Happening Tonight!
READING—William T. Vollmann—an essayist and sometimes journalist famed for chronicling the mucky lives of soldiers, fanatics, and the poor—will also dip his toes into fiction. They never come out any cleaner. Get grimy with Vollmann at Powell’s, where he’ll be reading from his first fiction work in nine years, the supernatural short story collection Last […]
Posted inEvents
What Are You Doing this Weekend?
Ned Lannamann: “PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop Now! PDX Pop […]
Posted inEvents
It’s Happening Tonight!
MUSIC/SPORTS—PDX Pop Now! is back with three days of free, all-ages local music from bands like Blouse and Hustle and Drone—though the best part of the experience is discovering something new. Plus! It’s where the famous Rigsketball tournament will kick off, the best tour-van-meets-basketball-court in the world! MSAudioCinema, 226 SE Madison, Fri 6 pm-1 am, […]
Posted inEvents
It’s Happening Tonight!
COMEDY—Comedian TJ Miller is one of the best parts of Mike Judge’s great HBO series Silicon Valley—and he did an amazing job getting melted into molten lava in Michael Bay’s Trans4mers: Dinopocalypse. This weekend he comes to Portland, both with his stand-up and to do a live taping of his podcast Cashing In. EHHelium Comedy […]
Posted inBooks
Tin House Summer Readings
If you haven’t yet been out to one of the summer readings Tin House holds at Reed College every year, as part of their Summer Writer’s Workshop, I really recommend it: It’s hard to find a more pleasant place to see a reading than Reed College’s outdoor amphitheatre—plus, the lineups they put together are always […]