• STAGED: Portland’s newest venue for live theater has already seen its share of divas. This Sunday, Tom Enyart’s play The Circuit inaugurates the stage career of the back dance floor at the Embers, a 22-year-old gay bar on Northwest Broadway. Owner Steve Suss says the space, which is used with some regularity for non-theatrical performances, has never hosted a stage play before, but The Circuit won’t be the last. “I’ve had two requests to use it for plays,” he told WW, “so I think this will continue.”
  • REFRIED: The resurrection of El Grillo is upon us. New owners Wade and Rebecca Roark hosed out the downtown eatery adjacent to Mary’s Club, added a full-service bar, extended business hours to 2 am daily, and renamed the beloved taquería Santeria (703 SW Ankeny Ave.). It’s like El Grillo went through puberty and emerged a sexier, more put-together version of its former self. Luckily, the metamorphosis kept some of the elements that made the original a drunk-food fave—namely, chef Roberto. “He’s the magic man,” says waitress Hilary, who used to work at Mary’s next door. “He’s the only reason we’re an authentic taquería.” And yes, the space still shares a restroom with the strip club, so customers can continue to get their chilaquiles and carne plates with a side of bare breasts.
  • ASS-OUT: This past weekend, 48 local bands played the sixth annual PDX Pop Now! festival—but only one came out with a drum kit with a picture of Dat’r’s Matt Dabrowiak surrounded by a bunch of thong-clad asses. (PHOTO: NICK ALBERTSON) Experimental pop trio Menomena closed out the three-day fest at Rotture with a triumphant set that featured one new song (the slow, stately and tentatively titled “Caught”), an encore of Friend and Foe’s “Evil Bee” and drummer Danny Seim’s newly decorated kick drum. We’re still not sure why he did it, but it sure would make for one helluva album cover.
  • CLARIFICATION: In WW’s “Best of Portland” cover package last week, Matt Korfhage’s story celebrating the late-night parties of the “Cart Village” at Southeast 12th Avenue and Hawthorne Boulevard and mourning the attempts of some neighbors and businesses to end said parties was interpreted by some readers as implying that the Village was ceasing operations. This is not the case. So, to those readers who are worried that they won’t be able to get fried pies and french fries after midnight, calm down. No one is forcing the carts to leave; they just want everybody to keep the noise down to a low roar.