Laura Norman is an actors’ actor who’s been on the theater scene for years, but hasn’t made much of a public splash. In his recent True West Awards, arts journalist John Moore called her “the best local actor you hardly ever get to see.” Perhaps that’s because she’s quietly self-effacing…
New year, new seasons: Local theater companies are kicking off 2015 with glittering reruns, romantic comedies and repertory fare, among other things. Here are four of the noteworthy openings this weekend. See also: Charles Ives Take Me Home…
Adam Stone, a 2014 Westword MasterMind who often works under the moniker of Screw Tooth, has less than one week left on his indiegogo campaign to raise money for 2015 projects. And he has a lot on his (lower) plate. See also: Buntport Theater Revives an Audience Favorite About Tommy…
For the first time since 1991, Elitch Gardens Theater will be showcasing live performances. For the weekend of August 20-22, six original works that will be performed by Denver theater professionals in the New Works Festival. “The goal of the festival is to discover strong stories and foster them from…
By popular demand, Buntport Theater Company is bringing back Tommy Lee Jones Goes to Opera Alone after two years off the stage. Like every Buntport production, this show was a collaborative creation by all six members of the company. The idea for the show was inspired by a sighting of…
2014 was a strange year for comedy, marred by scandal, controversy, and the tragic loss of legendary talents. New comics seized the spotlight, blossoming into full-fledged stardom on the strength of career-best showcases and others saw their acclaim diminish. Frankly, it made us shudder a bit to see the lead-in photo of Bill Cosby from last year’s list. Fittingly, Hannibal Buress, the comedian who launched a thousand think-pieces by refusing to remain silent about the accusations against Cosby, is having a banner year. Admittedly whittling down the ranks from ten to five necessarily omits some fine hours of comedy from the list. Specials like Patton Oswalt’s Tragedy Plus Comedy Equals Time and Jim Gaffigan’s Obsessed are worth seeking out, but lack the distinction of their finest work. Meanwhile, performers like Nick Offerman and Wyatt Cenac, whose American Ham and Brooklyn were released last year, seemed to merely coast off the goodwill of their TV careers, experimenting with interesting formats but mostly stumbling through laugh-free hours. Every comedian listed here, however, is at the top of their respective games, turning in their funniest work yet.
Fiddler on the Roof. This production of Fiddler on the Roofdoes full justice to Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick’s brilliant songs, tells the evocative story with clarity and feeling, and also — uniquely — sounds the musical’s deeper, darker chords. The action is set in a rural Russian Jewish community…
Forbidden Broadway Garner Galleria Theatre The Broadway musical is a big, bloated, conventional, endlessly copycatting phenomenon that cries out to be skewered, and Forbidden Broadway has been skewering it for more than three decades, ever since underemployed actor Gerard Alessandrini turned his hand to writing satire and staged the first…
January is an overrated month. Resting on its New Year’s laurels until Martin Luther King Jr. day, January battens against the treacherous snow and punishing cold, assuaging its regret over resolutions broken with indica, hot toddies and Netflix marathons. Comedy, however, has the dubious fortune of being impossible to over or underrate. Either you’re laughing or you’re not. Whatever it is that happens to tickle your fancy is at once both entirely subjective and impossible to equivocate with rhetoric. With that in mind, here’s a collection of comedy shows for you to laugh or not laugh at. With perennially listed local favorites and returning visits from high profile headliners, there are plenty of reasons to bundle up and check out a comedy show this wintry month.
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,…
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 –…
In a world where nearly nothing is free, especially at Christmas, the comedy sketch team Urban Brain is giving it away, complete with charitable messages, on its website, where you can watch the Holiday Hoopla Comedy Show at your leisure. It’s just a click away, but if you need convincing,…
Josh Blue is truly a singular talent with an undeniable facility for hilarious riffs that seem casually tossed off. He has an uncanny ability to be instantly likable from the moment he grabs the mic, even as he doesn’t shy away from challenging suspects. Blue has been a pillar of the Denver comedy scene for several years now, but he first broke out nationally when he won NBC’s Last Comic Standing in 2006. Throughout his illustrious career, Blue has found triumph mining his cerebral palsy diagnosis for comedic gold. A man of multitudes, Blue is also a skilled athlete who played on the U.S. Paralympic Soccer team.
Blue is closing out a pretty stellar 2014 at the home club where he developed his skills. Aside regularly performing in state and across the world, he also appeared in a prominent role in the baseball comedy 108 Stitches.
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,…
The Familiars Edge Theatre Company Serious about working with local playwrights, the Edge Theatre Company commissioned a holiday show from Ellen K. Graham, whose enigmatic, razor-sharp How We May Know Him won a Best of Denver award some years back, and who has since earned national recognition. The result is…
Songs for a New World Miners Alley Playhouse Musical theater takes many forms, and a small, heartfelt evening can be every bit as satisfying as a glittery Broadway effusion. Composer Jason Robert Brown’s intriguing The Last Five Years, produced in Denver in 2005 by Modern Muse and at the Garner…
In addition to providing the pizza-soaked lifeblood of the Denver comedy scene and sponsoring some of the town’s best local showcases, the SexPot brand has really hung its hat on its namesake showcases at the Oriental Theater. Producer Andy Juett has pulled out all the stops for the one-year anniversary show, “A Chilly Evening with Todd Barry,” and thusly landed SexPot’s biggest headliner yet. Barry is a veteran standup best known for his appearances on such TV shows as Flight of the Conchords and Louie, as well as films like The Wrestler. Fresh off his last special, The Crowd Work Tour— which consisted of nothing but crowd-generated riffs and good-natured mockery — Barry has a fresh bundle of jokes for SexPot’s loyal crowd. Although this month’s showcase concludes SexPot’s monthly engagement at the historic Oriental, (which will hitherto be reserved for high-drawing headliners and special occasions) the brand is charging forward, and relocating the monthly show to the Baker staple, 3 Kings Tavern.
In celebration of SexPot’s special showcase, Westword caught up with Todd Barry to discuss working on new jokes after spending last year focusing on audience riffs in his Crowd Work Tour special, his European podcast fans and his most well-known film and TV roles.
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,…
Podcasts are in tune with the democratized spirit of Internet media; anyone with a microphone and a computer can offer their listeners unlimited hours of recordings, usually for free. Limited only by their imaginations, podcasters have a freedom of expression unrestricted by commerce, censorship or geography. Indeed, several great podcasts have blossomed from Denver’s own flourishing arts community. Here to celebrate them is Podcast Profiles, a new series documenting the efforts of local podcasters and spotlighting the peculiar personalities behind them.
Moulin Scrooge Bug Theatre Moulin Scrooge mashes together the well-known story of A Christmas Carol with the plot of Baz Luhrmann’s overheated Moulin Rouge, a film about the love between a writer and a consumption-wracked cabaret dancer named Satine. With songs. The primary claim to fame of the play’s author,…
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, and…
Fiddler on the Roof BDT Stage Do we really need another Fiddler on the Roof? Since being amazed and delighted by the movie many years ago, I’ve attended several stage productions — high school, professional and, recently, a very good Phamaly version. So when BDT Stage (formerly Boulder’s Dinner Theatre)…
