The waifs that Walter Keane made famous were known for their huge peepers. But look down at their mouths: Every one kept its lips pressed tight, as though to prevent a secret from escaping. That’s where you see the real artist: Walter’s shy wife, Margaret (Amy Adams),who bitterly allowed her…
Anything Goes. Anything Goes premiered in 1934, after a hasty rewrite: The original plot concerned a shipwreck, and shortly before the scheduled opening night, a fire broke out on a cruise liner and 137 passengers were killed. By then the writing team, which included P. G. Wodehouse, had moved on,…
Ann Hamilton and Jae Ko et al. For Ann Hamilton: Selected Works, the initial enfilade of spaces at Robischon Gallery is taken over by works on paper by this noted conceptualist. The first group is from her “visite” series, the name of which is taken from the term “carte de…
There’s something curiously airless about director Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken, the story of real-life Olympian and WWII P.O.W. Louis Zamperini. Early on, Louis (Jack O’Connell) and his fellow American soldiers are zipping through the golden skies, dogfighting with Japanese planes — and even though the B-24’s doors are open and the…
Before worrying ourselves over its qualities as an adaptation or its findings as an experiment in just how much tumpety-tump parump-pa-bump the human mind can endure, let’s take a moment to marvel that Rob Marshall’s Into the Woods even exists — as a PG from Disney, no less! No matter…
“Politics really isn’t my specialty,” shrugs Alan Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch) to a naval commander (Charles Dance) in an early job-interview scene in Morten Tyldum’s choppy biopic The Imitation Game. Yet no less than Winston Churchill would credit Turing as the main cause of the Allies’ victory over the Nazis. Turing…
A lecture about space might sound as boring as an after-school special, but not the way Space in Your Face! does it. This seasonal event, founded two years ago by planetary-science Ph.D. student Julia DeMarines, combines science and art to show how cool and interesting space can be. “It’s geared…
Making an effective horror film that is both original and scary is a difficult puzzle to assemble in Hollywood, so when a filmmaker gets it right, it’s fun to break it down and see how all of the pieces fit together. One filmmaker doing it right is Denver native Scott…
Do you make an annual resolution to forgo tacky New Year’s Eve parties — and then forget to keep it? You’re not alone, as proved by the crowds drunkenly tipping champagne glasses and kissing strangers under confetti each year. But there is hope. Howl New Year’s Eve, a soirée and…
Back in 1939, after President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Works Project Administration workers installed the first rope tow at Monarch Mountain, skiers were pulled up under the power of a Chevy engine. Once they got to the top, they came down much the same way skiers and snowboarders still do today:…
Opened in 1928, the Aztlan Theatre is the perfect location for a gangster-era murder mystery. Start off the new year with a bang — literally — and spend the night solving the double murder mystery of who killed Bob Webb and Theresa Cocas. Suspects include Al Capone, Timmy the Tooth…
Two of Denver’s top-notch dance nights, Lipgloss and Mile High Soul Club, have teamed up to ring in 2015 with Soul Gloss New Year’s Eve, a party for audiophiles and vinyl purists. The Meadowlark’s intimate main room will transform into a sweaty dance floor as Lipgloss DJs Michael Trundle, aka…
There’s a holiday for everyone, and in parts of the African-American community, today marks Umoja. It’s the first of seven days of Kwanzaa, which kicks off with a nod to unity and, in Denver’s Five Points community, with the lighting of the first candle on the Grand Kinara — a…
Most miniature golf courses go to sleep in the winter months, but what do they dream about? At the Hyland Hills-run Adventure Golf and Raceway in Westminster, those dreams are live and lit up in technicolor hues for Adventure Golf Lights, a new holiday lighting attraction with 35,000 strands of…
As a die-hard fan of the Broadway musical Dreamgirls, Ignite Theatre director Keith Rabin had no problem picturing it on stage at Ignite’s home in the Aurora Fox Arts Center as the company’s 2014 season topper. Getting it just right was another story. “I was nervous about finding the right…
Since Christmas falls on a Thursday, many of us get a four-day weekend. To get through this long, intense weekend we’re going to laugh at people, explore magic and dance to some heavy psychedelics. Click your way over to the Westword calendar for even more bargain events and let us…
New Year’s Eve is the night for premium parties, costume balls and epic, end-of-the-year blowouts. On December 31, Denver will be filled with everything from sweaty dance floors packed with crowds getting down to the best DJs to dress-to-impress galas. We’ve rounded up ten of the best New Year’s Eve…
In just over a week, 2014 will come to a close. That means it’s time for that most joyous of traditions — the year-end list! Everywhere you turn, lists of the best, the worst, the most and the least are springing up, informing you about all the cool shit that…
Editor’s note: It’s time to put 2014 into the history books and look forward to 2015 — but not before one last bash to kick off the transition in style, something you can plan with our New Year’s Eve Guide listings. Do you have even bigger plans for the coming…
Miss Saigon Vintage Theatre 303-856-7830 Miss Saigonis one of those ponderous English musicals that lumbered onto West End and Broadway stages during the 1980s and early ’90s. Like Phantom of the Opera and Les Misérables, it’s reliant on a throbbing score, big displays of emotion and stunning special effects –…
If you’ve spent any time on Brighton Boulevard in the last few years, then you know there’s art happening there. A lot, actually. Since it opened almost a decade ago, Rhinoceropolis and its neighboring venue, Glob, have put hundreds of bands, performances, festivals and films before all-ages crowds in Denver…
All I want for Christmas is…what, exactly? The tiny house done, that’s the big thing. Which, given my need to earn a living and function in the world, is happening much more slowly — and expensively — than my initial unrealistic expectations had predicted. Isn’t that always the way? When…
