Billy Thomas 
By ALEC CLAYTON This year’s Capital City Pride award for activist of the year goes to Cameron Combs, activist, trans man, writer and president of the Pizza Klatch board of directors. Combs grew up in Thurston County and went to Tumwater schools. “I know firsthand,” says Combs, “what it’s like to be an LGBTQ+ youth …
By Ned Hayes In February, the Washington Post reviewed the state of the American bookstore and discovered two key, distinguishing characteristics that are keeping bookstores afloat. “How do indie bookstores compete with Amazon?” said the Post’s headline. “Personality — and a sense of community.” Orca Books has been a bookstore with personality for 27 years, …
By NOAH SHACHAR A film takes a village. The Olympia Film Collective (OFC) gathers that village and provides resources to catalyze its talents. OFC’s produced dozens of short films since its establishment in 2012, and one of its production venues is the OFC Studio. We spoke with Brendon Thompson, a member of the studio committee, …
By Karen Lunde Comedian Drew Carey once said, “Oh, you hate your job? … There’s a support group for that. It’s called everybody, and they meet regularly at the bar.” Not everyone in Daphne’s Dive, a play by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Quiara Alegría Hudés, hates his or her job; but everyone has a story, and …
By CHRISTIAN CARVAJAL Lacey will soon have its own theatrical troupe. Artistic director Kevin McManus explains, “Seven of my closest friends and I gathered together to form a theater company. We got ourselves a little 501(c)(3) license and are heading toward a three-production, inaugural season.” That fledgling company is Goldfinch Productions. “It’s exciting and a …
By MELINDA MINTON Art Beat Olympia is working to bring art-education equity to Olympia schools. Because art is essential for all students, this program offers a high-quality arts-learning format that teaches sequential skills and techniques, develops students’ 21st-century skills and is culturally responsive. Art Beat’s protocol includes training teachers to integrate arts with other subjects, …
By Alec Clayton Tumwater High School is presenting a student-written play, “Other People’s Lives” by Caelyn White, an 18-year-old graduating senior. “Other People’s Lives” is structured like seven interconnecting short stories, all loosely related with different principal characters. It focuses on a single neighborhood and the conflicts the various neighbors face. “I think it is …
By Melinda Minton Rumors, a local wine bar, has expanded and moved from Fourth Avenue into an airy space on Washington Street in the heart of downtown Olympia. Rumors offers curated selections for every type of palate—old world, domestics and imports from the finest variety of wineries around. Rumors is all about wine and the …
By Billy Thomas As the weather continues to warm up, and the sun — that’s that bright thing in the sky, for those of us who have forgotten, due to its infrequent presence — begins to shine brighter, the promise of a long weekend is a reprieve from the slog. For readers who are looking …
By CHRISTIAN CARVAJAL On June 2, Harlequin Productions will offer one performance, the name of which all but dares critics to slam it. That show, concocted by Aaron Lamb, is entitled Miscast! (The exclamation mark is very much Harlequin’s.) Usually when actors are accused of having been miscast, it’s no compliment. Consider, for example, the …