The power of Charles Dickens’s famous novella A Christmas Carol — and the reason it keeps getting resurrected in so many forms, Christmas after Christmas — stems from the depths of sorrow that underlie the joyously optimistic resolution. Ebenezer Scrooge lives in a London where poor people face the kind…
Jackie and Me. Jackie and Me ,Steven Dietz’s dramatization of a young-adult book by Dan Gutman, is a kids’ show, and also a remarkably flat and didactic one. It tells the story of a baseball-crazed boy named Joey Stoshak, who, with the help of a magical baseball card, goes back…
Luis Valdez, whose Christmas play La Pastorela just opened at Denver’s Su Teatro, first met Cesar Chavez when he was six, growing up among the migrant workers of Delano, California, where the United Farm Workers movement took root in the nonviolent strikes and grape boycotts of the ’60s and ’70s…
When she tours fringe festivals around the world, Gemma Wilcox sees a lot of performances. “When I see an incredible show that blows everything else out of the water, it’s very rare,” says Wilcox. But when she finds something special, she likes to bring it to Boulder. 6 Guitars is…
This is it: Merry Christmas to All, and to All a Good-Bye is the last show at Heritage Square Music Hall — a strange venue that’s half true Western-style building, half pure Disney-level kitsch. If you’re already a fan of the 25-year-old troupe, catch this show immediately. And if you’re…
Jackie and Me. Jackie and Me, Steven Dietz’s dramatization of a young-adult book by Dan Gutman, is a kids’ show, and also a remarkably flat and didactic one. It tells the story of a baseball-crazed boy named Joey Stoshak, who, with the help of a magical baseball card, goes back…
Reading is about more than following a narrative or learning facts; it can also be a profound shared experience that culminates in a better understanding of ourselves and each other. In that spirit, welcome to the Westword Book Club, a weekly feature celebrating the books that inspire Denver artists
This holiday season, the heathen’s tree of Denver comedy is stocked with gifts for every kind of chuckle fan. Denver and its surrounding area are blessed this December with a live paranormal podcast recording, a rare post-90s Bill Bellamy sighting, a visit from High Times 2009 Stoner of the Year, family-friendly entertainment, and Rory Scovel, whose singular comedic flair needs no further adjectives. Fortunately for people on a holiday gift-buying budget, many of these shows are free, and even the most expensive tickets are a comparatively cheap $25.
Brent Podosek wants to make you laugh — but he wants to get you drunk first. The local comedian’s new showcase at The Lobby every Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. aims to not only share some jokes but kick the keg. Podosek is the father and host of Kick the Keg…
Halloween is long gone, but costume fiends don’t care: they’re always on the hunt for the next party. Which is why the Denver mask shop ArtSmyths is presenting Puttin’ On The Ritz at the Mercury Café this Saturday, November 30. ArtSmyth’s owner, Tiffany Smyth, is throwing Jazz-era dead-celebrities funeral party,…
I’m no sports fan, but I am capable of responding to the myth and magic of baseball. A couple of years ago, I was absorbed and delighted by Ken Weitzman’s The Catch, which grew out of the Denver Center’s New Play Summit to receive a full production. This play presented…
Rancho Mirage. The dialogue in Rancho Mirageis swift and clever and the characters are vivid, if not particularly deep or likable. But while the trials and tribulations of the three couples involved are standard-issue — infidelity, money problems — they’re presented in ways that are completely, off-the-map absurd. We start…
Reading is about more than following a narrative or learning facts; it can also be a profound shared experience that culminates in a better understanding of ourselves and each other. In that spirit, welcome to the Westword Book Club, a weekly feature celebrating the books that inspire Denver artists.
We all love Christmas. And we all hate Christmas. For the side of us that bitterly embraces the latter, David Sedaris’s The SantaLand Diaries essay is the ideal method for steeping in your own Scroogeness. Chronicling the true story of Sedaris’s move to New York, where he becomes depressed and…
On the heels of his dual reading with Lena Dunham in New York and a sold-out show in Denver last Monday, David Sedaris lit up the Paramount Theatre yesterday afternoon with his comfort-food storytelling style. Delivering stories from last summer’s’ Lets Explore Diabetes With Owls, as well as his recent…
Rhonda Brown got the kind of reviews actors dream about for her work in last year’s one-woman play Red Hot Patriot: the Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins, and the production won a Best of Denver 2013 award for Best Political Theater. Produced and directed by Brian Freeland, it sold out…
Dance concerts might not be the hottest tickets in town, but the metro area has plenty of companies with stamina, including the long-lived Kim Robards Dance, which is experiencing a growth spurt since relocating to the Aurora Cultural Art District on East Colfax Avenue. And Robards will demonstrate what leaps…
Who knew Jerry Lewis was God? I certainly didn’t. But it’s the unmistakable voice of Jerry Lewis you hear when God appears to King Arthur in Spamalot at Boulder’s Dinner Theatre and instructs him to seek the Holy Grail. Lewis doesn’t actually appear on stage, of course, but it turns…
Rancho Mirage. The dialogue in Rancho Mirageis swift and clever and the characters are vivid, if not particularly deep or likable. But while the trials and tribulations of the three couples involved are standard-issue — infidelity, money problems — they’re presented in ways that are completely, off-the-map absurd. We start…
Literally the biggest comedian working today, Ralphie May has been charming the pants off of comedy fans for the last decade and a half. Playing a slack-jawed wise-ass, May will often twist his audience’s perception by using a Southern accent to deliver an insightful crack about controversial subjects that would…
Trends in comedy come and go, but there’s something classic about Kevin O’Brien’s monthly Arguments and Grievances night. The simple twist of pitting local comics against one another for debates on inconsequential themes — which garnered a Best of Denver award this year from Westword — has been working for…
The best part of Electra Onion Eater, which opens Buntport Theater Company’s thirteenth season, comes at the beginning, when Erin Rollman stages a television show called Cooking With Electra and proves yet again that she’s one of the top comic actresses around. Poor Electra is aiming at Julia Child-style chumminess…
