SAT 4/26 Three cheers for choreographer Deborah Reshotko’s Speaking of Dance: The local company has bravely squeaked through ten years on the planet — not a bad track record in a state that trails the nation in arts funding. But successes of this sort don’t come without a modicum of…
The morning of April 9 was absolutely flawless here in Denver, with the temperature hovering in the mid-sixties under a stunningly clear blue Colorado-brand sky. On that perfect day, several hundred people had gathered in the former parking lot at 13th Avenue and Acoma Street to witness a celebration of…
Further evidence of the widespread representational painting craze that is all the rage right now is The Price of Illusion, a duet that features works by Denver painter Wes Magyar and those of nationally known Arizona painter Beverly McIver. The exhibit is the main attraction at the enormous Judish Fine…
It’s hard to know what there is left to say about the Holocaust. Or how one begins to evoke its horror on stage. The concentration camps have become iconic as the subject of countless memoirs, histories, artworks, films and television movies; they’re used to justify or condemn all kinds of…
Victor/Victoria, which made its first appearance in 1982 as a movie starring Robert Preston and Julie Andrews, was daring in its day. Set in 1930s Paris, it’s a mixture of sophistication and nostalgia, a gentle, funny exploration of sex roles told in songs and skits and held together by a…
A few things learned from the memoirs of Marines who served in Gulf War I: They’re more terrified of being killed by friendly fire than enemy artillery; they’re bored brainless most of the time; they harbor fantasies of being shot, but never somewhere too painful or where it might inflict…
The Harry Potter phenomenon — on the page, in the movies, at the bank — has aroused in publishers and studio heads alike a sudden new appreciation for our children’s needs. These people understand that no consumer is more motivated than the parent of a kid in the heat of…
I’ll just admit this up front: My ideal concept of musical comedy involves Bryan Adams and Dave Matthews garroting each other on stage with their own damnable guitar strings. Nonetheless, even viewers with a more centrist appreciation of the genre may feel disappointed by this friendly new folk-music curiosity called…
Can we please, for the love of God, declare a moratorium on the use of Wild Cherry’s “Play That Funky Music” on the soundtrack of any and all movies? (While we’re at it, “We Want the Funk” can go, too.) At the very least, if the plot of the movie…
I don’t know about you, but I love Billy Ray Valentine. Whenever Trading Places pops up on the boob tube, I tune in to watch the ebullient Eddie Murphy in one of his most uproarious performances and what could be his most deftly directed comedy. A penniless street hustler refurbished…
Cooking School of the Rockies teacher Jason Aili is talking about the upcoming Battle of the Chefs contest between him and the Vesta Dipping Grill’s Matt Selby: “For me, it’s not as much a competition with him as with myself,” he explains. “If he’s better, I’ll try to pick his…
Thursday, April 17 Most of us probably don’t know that the City of Englewood, an ordinary urban ‘burb, is leading up to a big centennial celebration next month. But its inhabitants know that the town is a unique mixed bag of high and low culture, and that’s exactly what you’ll…
Ashara Ekundayo knows full well that there’s more to people of African descent than what’s on view at the typical multiplex. “If the only thing you see of yourself is what Hollywood wants to sell you,” says Ekundayo, who founded the Starz Denver Pan African Film Festival, “you don’t get…
FRI 4/18 Harry Potter, meet Frodo Baggins. And while you two are getting chummy, make room for R2D2 and a Renaissance juggler. Oh, and did you remember to bring your swords, wands and battle-axes? Because at the first-ever Opus: A Fantasy Arts Festival, anything fantastic goes. “It’s an escape,” says…
Ladies, if your significant other has been pestering you to do a sexy little foreplay number for him, forget the stripper pole and tassels and try Belly Dancing With Dahlia instead. Contrary to popular belief, hip shaking is not a lost art.”You’ll just fall in love with the dance,” promises…
SAT 4/19 Granted, northwest Denver resident Timber Dick is running for city council, but put that aside: Dick and his extended Tillemann-Dick family are good sports to host the first Great Northwest White House Egg Roll on their own front lawn. What is an Easter-egg roll, anyway? “It’s this rather…
WED 4/23 Jennifer Hendricks, a 25-year-old Denver woman who lost her battle with anorexia in 1998, weighed only 45 pounds when she died. Slim to None: A Journey Through the Wasteland of Anorexia Treatment, is the story of her tragic suffering.”It took three weeks for my body to shut down,”…
SAT 4/19 Naropa University graduate and poet Mary Kite says she doesn’t like things to be too easy, and that credo is made even clearer by the projects she willingly takes on: In addition to helping compile Naropa’s massive Audio Archive Project of recorded poetry performances, Kite is also at…
Surely the most persistent current in painting is the representation of recognizable things, particularly the figure. In one form or another, representational painting has been around for about 15,000 years, ever since the cave paintings in France and Spain were created. Things went along fine after that, with countless landscapes,…
Artists often encounter difficulties when they address politics in their work. Remember those severed ceramic penises that were stolen from a show at the Boulder Public Library last year? Their ostensible theme was violence against women, but those dismembered members didn’t actually say anything about that; they just illustrated the…
Chekhov’s people are unhappy. Their unhappiness never rises to the level of tragedy, but it isn’t pathos, either. These characters are vague and muddled. They can’t think clearly about their own grief; they blame this and then that, latching onto explanatory catchphrases and repeating them. They complain, bicker and snap…
The music is nice, and the two actors play the piano amazingly well, but in all honesty, the Denver Center Theatre Company production of 2 Pianos, 4 Hands feels like pretty thin gruel. In a series of short, comic vignettes, it details the struggles of two youngsters bent on careers…
