Phantom. While playwright Arthur Kopit and composer Maury Yeston were still putting together Phantom, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom of the Operatrundled onto the scene, and their backers vanished — along with any chance of a Broadway opening. This Phantom is much smaller-scale than Webber’s, with less spectacle and more emphasis…
The Black Actors Guild was originally founded by five juniors at the Denver School of the Arts who were frustrated with the available material and also by the stereotype of the black actor, according Ryan Soo, the guild’s director of operations. “A lot didn’t apply to them, and a lot…
Any new production of West Side Story has to stand up to the dozens of high-school productions we’ve seen over the decades, as well as our communal memory of the movie and intimate knowledge of the score: Sing the first phrase of “Tonight” or “Maria” or “I Feel Pretty” to…
Vaclav Havel, the unassuming playwright dissident who helped spearhead the Velvet Revolution of 1989 that overthrew Communism in Czechoslovakia, died on December 18. He became the country’s president after the revolution, presiding over its peaceful break-up into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, leaving and then returning to the office, before…
It’s a Wonderful Life. The film It’s a Wonderful Life is a much-loved American classic. Some families watch it together year after year at this time, like Miracle on 34th Street and varying versions of A Christmas Carol. What makes It’s a Wonderful Life interesting and original is the twist,…
If performance-on-the-fringe is your cup of tea, here’s a great way to support it — Silver and Gold: A Holiday Extravaganza, hosted by Band of Toughs at Naropa University at 7 p.m. Friday, focuses on a handful of qualifying Boulder fringe ensembles and their friends buy presenting three-minute, holiday-tinged introductions…
Looking for a quick — if pricy — gift for theater lovers? You can name a seat after them in the Ricketson Theatre in the Denver Performing Arts Complex. The price is $1,000 per seat, but this is a gift that keeps giving — the money goes to the New…
After a seven-and-a-half-year run, Greg Baumhauer is pulling the plug on the Squire Lounge’s open-mike comedy night. “We’ve crushed enough dreams,” he says. And tonight, you have one last chance to catch Baumhauer and the Wrist Deep crew in action at what was once hailed as the meanest open-mike night…
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Book-to-stage adaptations are often wooden, but playwright Laura Eason has done a terrific job with Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Her playhas energy and charm, and it really does communicate the fears, uncertainties and joys of childhood, as well as the atmosphere of…
Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep tackles health, care, death and dying in the United States, and finding material should be easy. Is there anyone — beside those who profit from it — who is happy with our country’s medical system? Is there anyone who hasn’t experienced some level…
The film It’s a Wonderful Life is a much-loved American classic. Some families watch it together year after year at this time, like Miracle on 34th Street and varying versions of A Christmas Carol. So the first question that arises when you hear that author Joe Landry has made a…
Performance artist Michelle Ellsworth’s onstage persona is a fascinating mix of humility and daring, mockery and gentleness. She comes across as a deferential satirist, a playful deep thinker, someone who expresses serious concerns with effervescent humor, operating sideways and using movement, objects and a highly eccentric take on everyday concerns…
While many people might recognize Bill Pullman as Lone Starr in Spaceballs or the President in Independence Day, the movie star is also an accomplished stage actor who’s passionate about helping the performing arts. He’ll be at the L2 Arts & Culture Center tonight to support Visionbox, the Denver actors’…
It hit home for members of the theater community Sunday, when they opened the Denver Post and found a gaping void in the arts pages: There was no column by longtime critic and commentator John Moore. No review. Everyone had known John was taking the Post’s buyout. His Facebook fans…
The setting for The 1940’s Radio Hour is the Algonquin Room at the Hotel Astor in New York, where WOV radio (the V stands for Victory) is about to go on the air. In these days before social media and effortless continual connection, the excitement of radio is intense. WOV…
Book-to-stage adaptations are often wooden. Although the Denver Center Theatre Company had great success with Eric Schmiedl’s adaptation of Kent Haruf’s Plainsong, a novel that reads rather like an unfolding tapestry, its versions of Pride and Prejudice and To Kill a Mockingbird felt like lectures. But playwright Laura Eason has…
The sixth annual round of the USA Fellowship grants — fifty awards of $50,000 each — were announced last night in Los Angeles, and exactly one went to a Colorado artist: Michelle Ellsworth of Boulder, for her work in the field of dance. Ellsworth has an MFA in dance from…
Buntport Theater’s Kafka on Ice — created by the company in 2004 — combines events from the author’s life with incidents in his famous novella Metamorphosis (you know, the one that begins, “As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a…
A Shirley Delta Blow show ain’t your momma’s drag tradition: though Saturday night’s performance at Hamburger Mary’s Club M is all queens, it’s not just glitter, choreography and lip-syncing. Blow and Co. bring a little comedy, some song and dance, and a whole lot of audience participation to the intimate…
In his comedy act, Anthony Jeselnik plays the asshole, cracking dark, arrogant, and hilarious one-liners. The persona has gotten him far; Jeselnik is now a prominent figure on Comedy Central’s roasts, has a successful stand-up career, and is in development for a television show on the same network. Jeselnik will…
A few years ago, when actor Gary Culig abandoned his beloved longtime role as Crumpet the Elf in the Bug Theatre’s perennial holiday production of The SantaLand Diaries, he left the local field wide open for a new kind of Crumpet, the sourly wry Macy’s elf based on the true…
Denver’s Vintage Theatre took on a major project when its members decided to take on Avenue Q: The Tony Triple Crown-winning adult musical featuring Muppet-like puppets, made from scratch with big, flappin’ dirty mouths, isn’t cheap to to stage, nor is it your everyday song-and-dance…
