Artbeat

Though the main spaces at William Havu Gallery (1040 Cherokee Street, 303-893-2360) are dedicated to celebrating Denver’s “Month of Photography” (“Photo Play” ), the intimate areas beneath and on the mezzanine are given over to Painting exhibition: Julia Rymer and Kate Thompson, a show that has nothing to do with…

Now Showing

Ansel Adams Edwin Land and Persistence of Myth and Tragedy. At the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, two legendary figures from the history of photography have been brought together in Ansel Adams Edwin Land: Art, Science, and Invention: Photographs From the Polaroid Collection. In the ’60s, Adams was invited by…

Passionless Christianity

Everything about The Chancellor’s Tale screams Quality Production. Pay Attention. Serious Topic. And, indeed, it’s a timely exploration of some of the issues currently tearing at the fabric of the Church: homosexuality, the Church’s responsibility for the poor, the struggle of priests to contain their own sexual drives. But the…

Single-Minded

The auditorium at the University of Colorado is full of students for this performance of Company: The Musical. Not a parent or a professor in sight, no one who appears older than 25. I see a few young men wandering the aisles looking lost, couples seated quietly together, women with…

Encore

84, Charing Cross Road. A fascination with the life of old books provides a lot of the charm of this play, which is based on the correspondence between New York writer Helene Hanff and Frank Doel, a London bookseller. In the early letters, she simply inquired about out-of-print books and…

Like Moths to a Flame

It was only a matter of time before Hollywood capitalized on the sympathy and admiration that have enveloped the nation’s firefighters since 9/11, and here we are. Jay Russell’s action-packed, flame-broiled Ladder 49 is an all-out valentine to the firehouse fraternity; it might never have gotten to the screen were…

Too Ché

Revolutionary idolatry is an odd business. Just ask unruly pop singer Stew, of the unruly pop group the Negro Problem. On his Naked Dutch Painter album, the melodic rebel dares to challenge a very sacred image. “Don’t you wish there was, like, another picture of Ché Guevara?” he inquires. “Like,…

Floundering

Shark Tale is an animated film, though after you see it you might wonder whether the term is intended as oxymoronic. Put simply, it has no life in it at all. Not even the kids roped into an afternoon preview screening seemed terribly interested. Perhaps they’ve grown tired of computer-made…

Rebel, Rebel

It’s the tenth anniversary of John Duigan’s smart, sensual and superb movie Sirens, and I’m reflecting on the comment of a female friend when I asked her how she liked it. At the time, in American pop culture, we were experiencing the last original gasps of the riot-grrrl movement, and…

Flick Pick

In case you missed Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind earlier this year — or can’t remember if you saw it or not — the University of Colorado International Film Series stands ready to fix you up. One of the quirkiest romantic comedies of recent years, it features rubber-faced Jim…

What the Yell?

“I’m the meanest guy in Denver,” confesses professional stand-up comedian Chuck Roy. “Being known as mean is cutting in on the amount of ass I get, so I have to make someone else out to be the biggest jerk in town.” That ceremonial transfer of power will take place tonight…

This Week’s Day-by-Day Picks

Thursday, September 30 In the film A Day Without a Mexican, Californians wake up one morning to find that nearly a third of their state’s population has vanished. As the day goes on, they discover that the only characteristic shared by the 14 million people who mysteriously disappeared is that…

Capitol Idea

Fledgling authors are generally counseled to write about what they know — but if there’s anyone with an incentive to ignore that advice, it’s Kristen Gore. The second daughter of former veep/failed 2000 presidential candidate Al Gore and his wife Tipper, she bears a lot of baggage simply by virtue…

Memorable Spin

FRI, 10/1 As a kid, I hated, hated Lakeside Amusement Park. It probably had something to do with the early trauma of riding that godforsaken roller coaster known as the Chipmunk. And even though my grandfather took me on the Cyclone every year on Samsonite Day — promising me that…

A Tasty Treat for Dog Owners

FRI, 10/1 Dogs are only as good as their trainers. That’s why the Association of Pet Dog Trainers is unleashing its Rally Obedience Trial today at 2 p.m. in tandem with Educanines, a local canine trainer. Organizers have set up a course that teaches classic obedience skills and lets pet…

Hop-Heads Unite

THURS, 9/30 Q: What’s the connection between English artist Ralph Steadman and a microbrew called Broken Keg Ice Bock? A: Both will be appearing somewhere between the long rows of kegs at the 2004 Great American Beer Festival at the Colorado Convention Center from Thursday, September 30, to Saturday, October…

East Meets West

TUES, 10/5 Composer Tan Dun unites sounds from Western classical music, nature and the East in Water Passion After St. Matthew. The acclaimed composer’s composition will fill Gates Concert Hall at the University of Denver at 7:30 p.m. tonight. Dun, who won multiple awards for the score of Crouching Tiger,…

Home on the Range

Some of the best art shows around are those unwieldy wide-ranging group presentations — though in truth, solos are the heart of the art-show business. What makes a group show interesting is its inconsistency and its multiplicity of visions, which, of course, are just the opposite strengths of a solo,…

Artbeat

There’s an extremely coherent twosome at the + Gallery (2350 Lawrence Street, 303-296-0927) called Manifesto Abstractos, which features non-objective paintings that are influenced by Hispanic culture. To put this excellent show together, gallery director Gilbert Barrera tapped the talents of an old friend from Houston, Ibsen Espada, and a new…

Now Showing

digital.movement.04. Tracy Weil, owner of the weilworks gallery, has a passion for computer-aided art. That’s why he organized digital.movement.04: Installations in video, sound & digital animation, the first in a planned series of annuals featuring art that employs digital technologies in its creation. Weil put out a call for entries…

Ring-a-Ding Dog

When musicals come to Denver, they often come without the A-list Actors’ Equity performers who made them successful in the first place. So we get the show that was lauded in London and New York, but with an inferior cast, and we’re left wondering why the critics were so impressed…

A Room With a Viewpoint

Playwright A.R. Gurney is angry. He considers the Bush administration a disaster; he condemns its boneheaded policies, its indifference to the plight of the poor, its preemptive war on Iraq. But Gurney is a kind-spirited, bourgeois, WASP kind of guy, and in The Fourth Wall, his anger is expressed through…