Adam McKinney

posts by Adam McKinney

Patton Oswalt Presents Pig and McCabe & Mrs. Miller

These two films depict the Pacific Northwest in two radically different times. In Robert Altman’s classic revisionist Western, McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Warren Beatty moves into a mining town in 1900s Washington, trying his best to become a big shot in the middle of a boom period. Michael Sarnoski’s new classic, Pig, explores the fringes of modern-day Portland, with Nicolas Cage starring as a reclusive former chef whose truffle pig gets stolen. The films – showing at Capitol Theater November 15 & 16 – showcase the Pacific Northwest’s natural wonders as an overwhelming force that has to be bent to, not conquered; and both films have an elegiac atmosphere that hangs over them.

Oly Arts Fall Winter 2025 Print Edition

The Fall/Winter print edition of OLY ARTS N0. 34 is published! Here is a list of the articles and where in the Olympia area you can pick up your FREE copy. Enjoy!

25 Years of Oly Ink

The Sunday, August 10 art show celebrating Spidermonkey’s 25th anniversary features artists that have become part of the Olympia tattoo circle over the past few decades, some stretching as far back as Bryan Childs’ early days over 30 years ago. As Childs says, these pieces will not be physical tattoos, but rather “a gallery of paintings that dream of being tattoos tailored for the back.”

Lynn Di Nino talks TRIPOD in Tacoma

Tacoma’s TRIPOD began more than five years ago, where Lynn Di Nino brings artists of all stripes around to show off what they’ve done, what they’re working on, and where they’re going. Artists will come up on stage, readied with a projector, and show off 50 images over 15 minutes, guiding the audience through a story, or just giving them an inside look at their creative processes. The effect is somewhere between a TED Talk, show-and-tell, and a friend sharing their vacation slides.

Oly Arts Summer 2025 Print Edition

The Summer print edition of OLY ARTS N0. 33 is published! Here is a list of where in the Olympia area you can pick up your FREE copy, and a link to the PDF file so you can read it online. Enjoy!

For Colored Girls who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow is Enuf

“For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow is Enuf,” now being staged at Lakewood Playhouse, is a show that mainly consists of poetic monologues delivered by seven emphatically engaged performers, interspersed with wildly physical musical numbers. It’s a show that demands that you be as present as possible — a show of giddy highs and devastating lows.

Bug at Tacoma Little Theatre

In Tacoma Little Theatre’s production of Bug, Peter starts to see bugs in Agnes’ room, and soon enough, Agnes thinks she might see them, too. Bug, written by Tracy Letts, and directed for Tacoma Little Theatre by Blake R. York, has a reputation for its intensity, and it’s well-earned: once tensions begin to mount, they never let up, building to a manic crescendo as we helplessly watch two people spiral into madness. The play elicits plenty of nervous laughter from the audience, as they witness some truly horrifying events, but there are also audacious moments of humor.

Bloomsday at Dukesbay Theater

Past and present blend together in “Bloomsday” at Dukesbay Theater through April 6. If you could talk to your younger self, would you try to change the past? Should you? Is it possible to turn back the hands of time and make things right with the one that got away? “Bloomsday” is a melancholy play, but not without its world-weary laughs. As the older Robert and Caithleen, Gonzales and Lockett are suitably impatient with their younger selves, lamenting their tastes in clothes, literature and partners.

Lorca in a Green Dress — a Surreal Eulogy for a Poetic Mind

In Lorca in a Green Dress at Tacoma Little Theatre, the “Lorca Room” is neither heaven nor hell, but rather a space for the poet Lorca to spend 40 days coming to terms with his death, and the Lorcas around him represent different sides of his personality. …the conversations and events that take place feel very much like a dream. It’s as if the mind of Lorca has shattered into pieces, creating the hall of mirrors that is the Lorca Room; everyone’s dialogue shares a musicality, as they trip through lush language and finish one another’s sentences.

Speaking for Laramie at Lakewood Playhouse

The overwhelming sensation in The Laramie Project, playing at Lakewood Playhouse through March 9, is not one of anger or of sorrow, but of a kind of cautious hope. Because of our society’s “one step forward, two steps back” approach to LGBT rights, any one of The Laramie Project’s performances since its opening in 2000 could be said to be unfortunately timely, and now is no different. This terrific ensemble cast comes together to paint a picture of a town trying to process a tragedy.

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