CHICAGO’SFREEWEEKLYSINCE | FEBRUARY | FEBRUARY CHICAGO’SFREEWEEKLYSINCE How immigration policies and deportation fracture American families Clarissa Donnelly-DeRoven 12 THIS WEEK CHICAGOREADER | FEBRUARY | VOLUME NUMBER IN THIS ISSUE T R - @ inthedarkartofthedealin ChicagohiphopseriesBlue Labyrinthandan“empathycoach” GrooveLoungeinthewordsofthe PTB ARTS&CULTURE entersaworkplacehornet’snestin peoplewhomadeitwork ECS K KH 17 LitEvanstonnativeElaineKahn’s DoYouFeelAnger? 42 ShowsofnoteKahilEl’Zabar CLRH MEP M newbookofpoetryexploreslove KembeXMetronomyandmore TDKR lossandpain 47 EarlyWarningsBauhaus CEBW 19 VisualArtAnexhibit JumexMidnightandmorejust AEJL SWMD L G accompanyingTheatreY’sJuliet announcedconcerts DIBJ MS putsmotherhoodfrontandcenter 47 GossipWolfSpektralQuartet EAS N L 20 ListingsAcelebrationof bringamindexpandingprogram GD AH L CSC -J FOOD&DRINK polyamoryaphotographic andJuliaHoltertotheMusicBox CE BN B 04 RestaurantReviewJulia explorationofslashiesandmore theSynthesizerChiliCookoff signs L C MDLC M GhamisthePowerhouseofWest artsandculturehappenings off withitstenthinstallmentand C J F SF J H IH C MJ Africancuisine more M K S K SK N DLJL NEWS&POLITICS MMA M-K JRN JN M 08 Joravsky|PoliticsMichael O M S C S Bloomberg’sbillionsenabledhim FILM ---------------------------------------------------------------- tobuyhiswayintotheDemocratic 28 FestivalReviewingwhileBlackat DD J D presidentialrace Sundance DPE &P 32 SmallScreenBoJack K K SMCJ G Horseman’spenultimateepisode MPC secureditslegacy YD 33 MoviesofnoteHoney A ATA THEATER Boyfeaturesatourdeforce ADVERTISING 22 PreviewUnderscore’ssixth performancefromShiaLaBeouf -- - @ annualChicagoMusicalTheatre Secondsisaprofoundlyunique OPINION C @ Festivalsurvives hiddengemfromaJapanese 48 SavageLoveDanSavageoff ers SDP F 24 ReviewTracyLetts’sBugfeels fi lmmakerandDyingtoSurviveis advicetoaformersexworker VPSA M evenmorerelevantnearlya enjoyablethoughtprovokingand whoseyearolddaughterjust CRM T P SAR quartercenturylaterPorchlight’s hugelysuccessfulinChina cameoutasacamgirl L M-H L S SophisticatedLadiesearnsallthe CSM WR imperatives FEATURE CLASSIFIEDS NA 12 SeparationThisishow 26 PlaysofNoteDesireandself MUSIC &NIGHTLIFE 50 Jobs V M G - - - ­­ deportationfracturesAmerican defenseclashinHowtoDefend 35 Galil|FeatureThehistoryof 51 Marketplace families Yourselfabankergetstrapped DJJessedelaPeña’sfoundational 51 RealEstate J L SB ---------------------------------------------------------------- DC [email protected] THIS WEEK ON CHICAGOREADER.COM -- CHICAGO READER L C BPD R L TE R S J S A- S V CC E B ---------------------------------------------------------------- R ISSN­-­ R LC SM S C IL­­­ -- C ©C R P C IL A C R R The fi ght to release Beto Local arts reviews, like Matches are back! RR T ® A er ICE detained Beto on his drive home Oscar nominations, aren’t Let’s party like it’s 1999, back when the from camping, one family has banded Reader was the place in Chicago to meet together to challenge his detention and covering America your match. Submit a free Matches ad by deportation. Coverage and awards send a disappointing— 11:59 PM CT on Friday, February 7, 2020 but not unexpected—message about whose at chicagoreader.com/matches. stories really matter, writes Coya Paz Brownrigg. 2 CHICAOREADER - FEBRUARY ll ll FEBRUARY - CHICAOREADER 3 Drag Brunch V. FOOD & DRINK 3157 N Southport Ave Southport N 3157 House Tied Saturday February 8 12p - 1:30p featuring performances from Chicago's very own Bambi Banks and Khloe Park Pounded yam fufu and egusi with goat and fi sh ANJALIPINTOFORCHICAGOREADER RESTAURANT REVIEW Julia Gham is the Powerhouse of West African cuisine Her spot near McCormick Place is the city’s only Cameroonian restaurant. By MS ulia Gham was seven months preg- out of your restaurant?” Plantain and bobolo (on the plate) and crevette (in the bowl) ANJALIPINTOFORCHICAGOREADER nant, with a toddler and just $100 to Gham ditched the insecure man and sunk her name in 2015 when the fi nancing her savings into a West Rogers Park rental for her restaurant fell through. For ten condo. “I had to start all over from the bottom years she’d had multiple jobs—sling- up,” she says. When her daughter was born, Jing ice cream, working hotel gigs, driving a she resorted to what she knew best. “I love cab—preparing an ambitious business plan to cooking. If I’m not doing it, I’m not happy.” open a spot specializing in the food of her na- Gham wasn’t always so desperate. She was tive Cameroon. Just as she’d attracted enough born in the village of Jakiri and grew up in her backing to make it happen, an angry text from mother’s restaurant in the northwestern city her jealous fi ancé scared o her investors. of Bamenda. The food of Cameroon, which “Julia, you were so perfect,” her main is situated at the crossroads of west-central backer told her. “We’d been looking for one Africa, is among the continent’s most diverse, thing that was going to take you down, and we incorporating staples from various countries just found it. How are you gonna pay all your and infl uences from some 250 tribes, as well investors back if you have an insecure man in as colonizers from Portugal, Germany, Britain, your life that’s gonna send all your customers and France. 4 CHICAOREADER - FEBRUARY ll FOOD & DRINK POETRY CORNER At the Chicago Marathon By H. Melt a woman drapes the canadian flag over a barricade I dangle the trans flag & she asks what country is that? when Logan rounds the corner with his sister by his side I hand him the trans flag he wraps it around his newn chest like a cape as he flies through the city beaming with pride. H. Melt is a poet, artist, and educator whose work focuses on trans liberation. They are the author of The Plural, The Blurring, On My Way to Liberation, and editor of Subject to Change: Trans Poetry & Conversation. A biweekly series curated by the Chicago Reader and sponsored by the Poetry Foundation. This week’s poem is curated by poet Yvonne Zipter. Free events at the Poetry Foundation Plantain and bobolo (on the plate) and crevette (in the bowl) ANJALIPINTOFORCHICAGOREADER Poetry & Music: Poetry in Russian Music A night in Russia with art songs Thursday, February 6, 2020, 7:00 PM At 19, Gham moved to Germany for fi ve years threw a few parties and saved enough for a Poetry off the Shelf: Patricia Lockwood and cooked in Turkish, Italian, and Chinese $150 insulated food carrier and a Chevy Mali- Acclaimed poet and author of Priestdaddy restaurants. “I learned a lot and I wanted to bu she rented from a friend. Strapping the kids Thursday,Thu February 13, 2020, 7:00 PM take that to my mom’s restaurant to make a into car seats, she made the rounds of down- few changes, and I thought it would be nice town cab stands selling prepackaged contain- Open Door Series: Rashayla Marie Brown & Philip Jenks Highlighting Chicago’s outstanding writing programs to have a Cameroonian restaurant out in the ers of rice, beans, plantains, and beef and fi sh Tuesday, February 18, 2020, 7:00 PM west.” She settled on Chicago for its diversi- stew. She knew operating outside the law was ty, and in 2005 got her first job stateside at a precarious business model, and while she’d A.R. Ammons: Watercolors Works of a prolific poet and painter Ghiradelli on the Mag Mile. She also started already applied for her food service manager’s Exhibition open ththrough April 30 hosting house parties at her condo and cook- certifi cation, she was the benefi ciary of both ing for homesick African friends—jollof rice, goodwill and hostility from her competitors. Poetry Foundation egusi soup, ndole. One of them o ered her a good deal on an idle 61 West Superior Street poetryfoundation.org/events Fast forward to 2015, which found her with food truck, but once she got that rolling, an- two kids to feed and vanished investors. She other called the cops on her. ll FEBRUARY - CHICAOREADER 5 T| R S. State -- thepowerhouseil.com FOOD & DRINK Pounded yam fufu and egusi (center) with goat and fi sh; around the center clockwise: corn fufu, plantain and bobolo, jollof rice, crevette, and khati khati ANJALIPINTOFORCHICAGOREADER “A police o cer did show up,” she says. “It Street she’d outfi tted with plush lemon-lime ndole, based on ground peanut, and served paradise. was illegal for me to have my baby up front, high back chairs, and a broad menu encom- with a choice of protein (particularly good If you’re new to Cameroonian food, there’s and he was going to write me a citation. I said, passing western breakfast plates, fresh juices, with shrimp, aka ndole crevette). a lot to discover on Gham’s menu. She named ‘O cer, I am here trying to feed my family to burgers and sandwiches, grilled “aphrodisiac” Many of these stewy dishes are served with her restaurant Powerhouse because she has a make sure I secure a roof over my kid’s head proteins, and a deep selection of West African some form of fufu, which in Cameroon doesn’t lot going on. She’s a presenter on a weekend and also try to build something good. I have dishes prepared the Cameroonian way. just mean doughy orbs of elastic pummeled talk show on the pan-African station WGHC registered to have a food truck license. I am in Gham’s mom joined her in the U.S. in 2017 yam, but any kind of pounded starch—corn, (98.3 FM), she runs a multimedia company the process. I am raising money. I am putting after violent unrest made things unsafe back cassava, cocoyam, even oatmeal. Gham knows based in Ghana, and has worked as a talent it back to make sure I get this right. I am not home, and they cook everything to-order, precisely which variety goes with which dish scout and party promoter for Cameroonian robbing a bank. I am not shooting anybody.’ from scratch, including khati khati, a grilled (corn with ndole, yam with egusi), and every artists. A movie she produced, Saving Mban- He looked at me and smiled and said, ‘You and baked chicken dish seasoned with sharp month or so she hosts pounding parties where go, just premiered in Cameroon, and it’ll get know what? I am so proud of you.