The 2002 hit L’Auberge Espagnole followed the adventures of Xavier (Romain Duris), a moody young Frenchman, as he shared an apartment in Barcelona with six other young people from around Europe. During their year together, the roommates taught each other valuable lessons about identity and friendship—whilst simultaneously getting loaded and having lots of sex. The […]
Alison Hallett
Alison Hallett served nobly as the Mercury's arts editor from 2008-2014. Her proud legacy lives on.
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Pine Street Redux
Simpatica’s Brunch is Music to My Mouth
The building on SE 9th and Pine will always be “the old La Luna” to me; I can’t walk past it without catching a glimpse of my 15-year-old self sitting on the curb wearing a Sleater-Kinney shirt and drinking a rum-spiked Slurpee. La Luna is long gone, of course, and so is the Pine Street, […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
Theater District
Praising the Artists’ Repertory Theatre (ART) starts to feel redundant after a while, so I’m going to skip the complimentary introduction and get on with the meat and potatoes. ART’s new show has a compelling claim to fame, at least to anyone who was a teenager in the ’90s: It was penned by Richard Kramer, […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
By the Bog of Cats
By the Bog of Cats opens with Hester Swane dragging the corpse of a black swan across the stage, preparing to bury it in the frozen ground of the bog on which she lives. Hester is obviously upset, and the reason soon emerges: Her ex-lover, Carthage (Jason Maniccia), is forcing her out of her home. […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
Assassins
ART wraps up their Second Stage’s inaugural season with a “lesser Sondheim” (if there is such a thing), the strange and compelling Assassins, a musical about presidential assassinations. Assassins introduces the audience to nine historical characters, all of whom at some point attempted to kill a president. Through a disjointed series of songs and vignettes, […]
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Making the Grade
The Mercury Food Issue Checks In with Old Standbys
Making the Grade
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“Beloved and Adorable”
Redwing is Worth the Wait
Those of you who were paying attention last week may remember that this week I promised a review of a “beloved and adorable” neighborhood dining establishment—if only I could manage to get there on a day they were open. Well, last Wednesday I checked and double-checked my schedules, then made the long, dusty trek from […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
Mitlaufer
Fever Theater is a stylish, witty, brainy ensemble with a tendency to aim high—sometimes too high, yielding mixed results. I caught a preview of Mitlaufer last Wednesday, where it was obvious that Fever has finally managed to effectively harness their prodigious talents without sacrificing any ambition. Without giving away too much about the plot, the […]
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Best in the ‘Hood
Crema Does Everything Right
This week I was supposed to write a review of a beloved and adorable spot in inner SE Portland that will remain nameless until next week, when I visit it on a day when it’s not closed. I should have called first, I suppose (though who in the Christ closes their business on Sunday anymore?) […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
Going All the Way
Club Posse, the newest of the new kids in town, is yet another of the fly-by-night comedy troupes that often seem to live long enough to put on one production, and then disappear forever. Based on their first show, Going All the Way, they’ve got a lot of work to do if they plan to […]
Posted inTheater & Performance
A Thought About Raya
At a certain point during A Thought About Raya, somewhere after Paul Thureen’s hands are replaced with giant silverware, but before Hannah Bos ate an entire stick of butter, I accepted the fact that the piece was quite simply never going to make any sense to me. But when it finally registered that I didn’t […]
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Raw Talent
Chef Stuart Reiter’s Newest Vegan Enterprise
Recently, The New York Times described the raw food movement as the newest trend in resort cuisine—lucky for Portlanders, we don’t have to head to San Benito to get raw. Blossoming Lotus, a tiny vegan cafe located in the lobby of Yoga in the Pearl, offers uncooked food options to cleanse the spirit and the […]