Eugene weekly., March 23, 2017, Image 27

T H E AT E R
BY BOB KEEFER
PAUL CALANDRINO & HAILEY HENDERSON IN
THE LAST CHAPTER BY BARBARA CORRADO POPE
NORTHWEST TEN
Eight New Plays — and Beatles’ References — in a Single Evening
T
here’s nothing quite like very short plays to whet
or renew your appetite for live theater. Don’t like
what you’re watching? Wait a few minutes, and
you get a brand-new story.
That constant variety helps explain the
popularity of the Northwest Festival of Ten-Minute Plays,
which premiered its ninth annual incarnation last weekend
with an evening of eight 10-minute new plays at Oregon
Contemporary Theatre.
Dubbed Northwest Ten: Number Nine by its producers
— playwrights Paul Calandrino and Connie Bennett, who
also happens to be Eugene’s librarian, along with actor
Eric Hadley and director Maggie Hadley — this year’s fest
riffs on the “Number Nine” of its title by requiring each
play to include a line from a Beatles’ song.
That slight conceit gives audience members a bit of
extra entertainment as recognition dawns during each show
— a bit like catching all the Alfred Hitchcock references
in OCT’s recent “39 Steps” — but doesn’t otherwise shape
the evening, which sprawls from an intensely abstract one-
woman show involving a rope (Nancy Hopps’ End of the
Rope) to Dale Light’s light cosmic fantasy Department of
Regrets.
In that play, directed by Tim O’Donnell, a trio of agents
from the future (Jessica Ruth Baker, Sarah Glidden and
Bruce Lundy) arrives to prevent Joel (Thomas Weaver)
from making a bad mistake in his life.
Some of the best work of the evening came in Paul
Lewis’ Timmy Perlmutter Goes Flying, in which young
Timmy (played with perfect boyish charm by Jane
WINE
Brinkley) assembles a mail-order flying kit and, to
considerable parental shock, flies higher and higher into
the sky. The story has echoes of Bridget Carpenter’s 2006
Up!, about the man in the flying chair. Inga R. Wilson
directed.
Barbara Corrado Pope’s The Last Chapter, which opens
the evening, packs a lot of story into its 10-minute slot as
two writers (Paul Calandrino and Mary Hoffman) work
on dueling biographies, only to have their plans overtaken
in a surprise ending delivered by the appearance of Kathy
LaMontagne. Rebecca Nachison directed.
Rachel Carnes’ Complimentary WiFi is a perfect
depiction of a couple (Michael Fitch and Lisa Hammond)
caught in hotel and relationship hell. (Full disclosure:
Carnes is a regular theater writer for Eugene Weekly, and
Jane Brinkley, already noted above, is her daughter.)
The other plays on this year’s bill are Nancy West’s
Dancing Out of Reach, Grant Thackray’s Unpocalypse
and Calandrino’s The Paris Accord.
Sets and overall design of the shows are simple, as you
might expect.
This is a fine evening’s entertainment. If I’ve got one
pick, it’s that Northwest Ten, in its ninth incarnation,
remains pretty Eugene-centric; just two playwrights come
from out of town this time: Thackray, from Portland, and
Lewis, from Seattle. I can sympathize with the difficulties
of branching out, but it would be good to find new voices
from farther afield.
Northwest Ten: Number Nine continues at Oregon Contemporary Theatre at
7:30 pm March 23-25 and at 2 pm March 26. A talkback follows the March
26 matinee. Tickets are $17, some discounts available, at OCTheatre.com.
B Y L A N C E S PA R K S
WASHINGTON WINE MONTH
Head north young (or old) wine drinker, head north
M
arch is Wine Month in Washington (that state north of ours). Unless you
have a passion for wine, that fact is not very important.
If you do suffer from such passion, additional facts come into play:
One, they make some awfully good wines in Washington, especially
Big Reds; two, Washington wineries support avid marketeers, given
to making deals that will appear in your supermarkets in the form of endcaps and
displays; three, wine writers (online and on paper) will receive (unrequested) free
samples and will be chatting up the wines — as, ahem, here.
Washington is the second-largest producer of wine in the U.S., behind that
state just south of us; in fact, Washington now might be third, passed by New
York, making Oregon fourth. Washington is blessed by having the Columbia
River’s valleys and hills, nearly perfect areas for growing grapes — lots of
sun, enough water, well-drained soils.
We predict that decades from now (assuming the world continues
pretty much as is), Washington wines, particularly its “star wine,” cabernet
sauvignon, will be recognized as among the best — from anywhere.
For now, Washington doesn’t rank highly against Oregon’s “star
wine,” pinot noir, considered by many wine-wags to be the pinnacle
of vino. Washington wines are drinkable, arguments go, but they’re not
the “best” (i.e., pinot noir), so whatever. But, as they say in Washington
(D.C.), that’s just us being us.
Silly stuff, sure, but why waste time arguing about taste? Because
that’s our business? Okay, so pinot noir is our favorite, too. Still, these
Washington wines are undeniably good glug.
A box came, and in the box were four wines, all very tasty: Tall
Sage 2015 Chardonnay ($10), smooth and crisp, flavors of apples and
pears with tropical and floral notes, nice wine for some light foods; Nine
Hats 2015 Red Wine ($20), charming blend, mainly syrah and cabernet
sauvignon with some merlot and a dash of malbec, flavors of red and
black fruits, sprinkling of pepper, competently balanced for food and
finish; DeLille Cellars 2014 D2 ($45), super wine, Bordeaux-style blend,
mainly merlot and cab, richly fragrant, deeply colored, flavors bursting
with dark berries and chocolate, a natural match with roast beast; G3 2015
Cabernet Sauvignon ($15), fine expression of pure cab, estate-grown by a caring
family with a superb vineyard, balanced, with long flavors (pure dark cherries)
and still-stiff tannins that promise development with longer aging.
Yep, Washington winemakers are bottling some good juice from their fine
vineyards, but some clever Oregon makers are also getting those warm-climate
grapes and putting them to good use. Peter Rosback, owner and winemaker of
the superb Sineann label, has proven that he’ll go a long way for grapes with the
flavors he favors. For instance, he makes an annual excursion to New Zealand for
juice that goes into Sineann 2014 Sauvignon Blanc ($18), terrific wine, loaded
with fruit flavors.
Rosback drew from the Celilo vineyard in Washington to yield Sineann
2014 Gewurztraminer ($18), made in Alsatian (dry) style, acutely balanced,
with citrus and mineral flavors. He also bought Washington grapes from the
super-fine Mercer Ranch vineyard owned by Paul Champoux to produce
Sineann 2014 Cabernet Sauvignon “Baby Poux” ($42), spendy, true,
but worth every dime.
It’s also worth noting that Sineann wines make use of the new screw-
caps that have the virtue of easy opening while mimicking cork tops
that encourage aging in the bottle, very important for big cabernets like
“Baby Poux,” which will develop finesse over time.
Owners, growers and winemakers in Washington’s 600-plus
wineries have cause to celebrate: They’ve taken their industry into the
stratosphere in a very brief time and are now making world-class wines
from their dazzling valleys — and they’re still just beginning. Their
biggest producers have also shown, in many cases, remarkable market
sense, putting quaffable glug on supermarket shelves and endcaps, priced
to compete with big producers’ wines from anywhere.
But let’s not forget that Oregon is a big state and has the climates and
vineyards capable of yielding warm-climate wines — whites and reds —
that can rival the best that Washington can bottle.
We’ll explore those potentials soon in future columns.
eugeneweekly.com • March 23, 2017
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