Tuesday, March 28
Hot off the heels of his latest chart-topping album, I Decided, Detroit-based rapper Big Sean is bringing his massive tour to Denver. After getting signed to Kanye West’s GOOD Music in 2007, Big Sean has maintained a prolific touring and recording schedule, releasing four studio albums, four mixtapes and countless guest verses, where he often outshines his peers. Fans can see Big Sean, along with opening acts MadeinTYO and DJ Mo Beatz, starting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, March 28, at the Fillmore Auditorium, 1510 Clarkson Street. Call the Fillmore box office at 303-837-0360 or visit ticketmaster.com for information and tickets, which start at $49.50.
It's crazy to think how we can manipulate photos in mere seconds on our phones. What's even crazier is to think about how photographers in the 1820s also edited pictures in an era when it took a full eight hours to get an exposure. Take a humorous and informative journey with shutterbug historian Mark Osterman at Photographic Truth: A Lecture by Mark Osterman, and find out why pictures have lied to us since their inception; he'll show re-creations of the photo-editing techniques used by the first photographers. The lecture starts at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, March 28, at RedLine Contemporary Art, 2350 Arapahoe Street. For more information, visit redlineart.org.
Wednesday, March 29
Fort Comedy’s standup series at the Aggie Theatre, 204 South College Avenue in Fort Collins, has great shows planned all month long, but Rory Scovel’s show on Wednesday, March 29, might be its best. Scovel has appeared on @Midnight, Inside Amy Schumer and Conan, and commits fiercely to absurd premises, dropping non sequitur chuckle bombs on the audience from seemingly out of nowhere. “You guys ever steal an old person?” Scovel begins in one bit, scanning the crowd’s nervous reaction before doubling down. “Here’s a tip: Old people in wheelchairs rarely turn around to see who’s pushing them.” While Scovel has enjoyed the acclaim of being a comedian’s comedian for the past few years, the entertainment industry is finally catching on to his talents. Rounded out by Denver favorites Ben Bryant and Zach Reinert, the show, which starts at 7:30 p.m., is well worth the shlep up I-25. Tickets, $20, are available via ticketfly.com.
In an era when tacit hate speech rings loudly from the highest corridors of power, heartening reminders of the power of peaceful resistance are sorely needed. It’s this spirit that motivates the Mizel Museum’s film series, which continues on Wednesday, March 29, at 7 p.m. with a screening of the documentary Get in the Way: The Journey of John Lewis at the Sie FilmCenter, 2510 East Colfax Avenue. A profile of civil-rights leader and Georgia congressman John Lewis, Get in the Way chronicles his lifelong struggle for social justice, particularly his early days protesting the worst abuses of Jim Crow. Visit mizelmuseum.org to learn more and buy tickets, $10.
Thursday, March 30
303 Magazine’s Denver Fashion Weekend at the Exdo Event Center, 1399 35th Street, gives it up for local designers and beauty professionals over one fast, hot and heavy weekend that begins with a runway show on Thursday, March 30, providing an overview of 2017 fashion trends here and across the nation. The weekend continues down the runway on Saturday, April 1, and wraps up Sunday, April 2, with the Hair Show, a DFW tradition that showcases Denver’s most exclusive and creative hair salons and stylists. Each evening begins with a 7 p.m. red-carpet reception, followed by the main events at 9 p.m.; catch celebrity model Madeline Stuart, who has Down syndrome, on Thursday, when she’ll present her 21 Reasons Why clothing line, and again on Saturday, when she’ll walk the runway for Denver designer Gino Velardi. For tickets, $10 to $400 nightly, and a full schedule, visit 303magazine.com/DFW.
Hemp leaders from around the world will flock to Colorado for the NoCo Hemp Expo, the largest hemp-centric event in the country. The convention and trade show kicks off on Thursday, March 30, with a concert at the Aggie Theatre, 204 South College Street in Fort Collins, with Marco Benevento and Musketeer Gripweed. Then, starting on Friday, March 31, the Ranch Events Complex, 5280 Arena Circle in Loveland, will be packed with panels, presentations and workshops all led by hemp experts from around the world. Friday’s events are solely for folks in the industry, but the expo opens to the public on Saturday, with consumer-oriented sessions dedicated to hemp education from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Find tickets, $15 to $395, at nocohempexpo.com/ticket-sales.
Friday, March 31
Vikings are huge these days, what with a hit show on the History Channel and dudes all around town sporting big beards and partially shaved heads, just like Ragnar Lodbrok. The Museum of Nature & Science taps into the Scandinavian zeitgeist on Friday, March 31, with a Viking Bash (as in party, not a blow to the skull) from 7 to 10 p.m. The 21+ event will celebrate the museum’s temporary Viking exhibit, Vikings: Beyond the Legend, with drinks (one each; this is a place of learning, after all), appetizers, and demonstrations by the Fjellborg Viking Reenactor Society, complete with steel-weapon combat. Registration is $38 to $43 per person and includes a tour of the exhibit; sign up at dmns.org. Costumes are encouraged, so give it your best Lagertha or Ragnar! The museum is at 2001 Colorado Boulevard.
A powder-keg premise more than hints at what audiences will be in for when the cultural can of worms that is Ayad Akhtar’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play Disgraced, directed by Carl Cofield, opens on Friday, March 31, in the Ricketson Theatre. Amir Kapoor, a lawyer and lapsed Pakistani Muslim, and his WASP-y artist wife, Emily, sit down to dinner with Kapoor’s black colleague and a Jewish art curator in their Upper East Side apartment, and the sociopolitical sparks begin to fly. Short, fast and quick, with hotly pointed dialogue, Disgraced runs through May 7 at the Ricketson, located in the Denver Performing Arts Complex. For tickets, starting at $35, visit denvercenter.org.
Foreplay techniques a bit rusty? Interested in expanding your twosome to a threesome (or more)? Learn from the best at Exxxotica, a three-day convention starting on Friday, March 31, that will bring 150 adult stars and a plethora of vendors to the Crowne Plaza Airport Convention Center, 15500 East 40th Avenue. Seminars will cover topics like swinging, keeping your sex life fresh and more. For more information and to buy tickets, $39.99-$139.99, visit co.exxxoticaexpo.com.
Keep reading for more of the best events this week.
Vintage Whites Market began as a small garage sale in Montana in 2010.
Courtesy Vintage Whites Market
There will be no excuse for having nothing to do in Boulder in the coming week: Boulder Arts Week 2017 offers folks a free checklist of cultural events blossoming over the next nine days, from March 31 to April 8. “Boulder has the third-highest concentration of artists in the nation,” notes Arts Week director Emily K. Harrison, and the week’s events showcase places that are brimming with art shows, concerts, plays, movies and performances throughout the year in the shadow of the Flatirons. Boulder Arts Week kicks off with a free opening party at 5:30 p.m. Friday, March 31, at Twisted Pine Brewing Company, 3201 Walnut Street; for a complete list of arts week offerings, visit boulderartsweek.org.
After a brief hiatus, Lucha Libre & Laughs surges back into the ring with color commentators Sam Tallent and Nathan Lund resuming their rightful places in the booth. Referee/producer Nick Gossert has assembled a knockout lineup both in the ring and on the mic to close out March in classic LLL style at the Oriental Theater, 4335 West 44th Avenue, on Friday, March 31. With the comic stylings of Kyle Pogue, Mallory Wallace, Preston Tompkins and headliner Dante Powell, LLC also boasts a heated match that pits Mike Sydal against Denger Dean, and a triple-threat heavyweight championship bout between Caleb Crush, Zema Ion and current title-holder Lonnie Valdez. Doors open at 7 for the 8 p.m. show. Find tickets, $10, at theorientaltheater.com.
Saturday, April 1
April Fool’s Day is for throwing up your hands and giving up trying to make sense of a world that’s always trying to trick you into believing nonsense. Kickstart that process at Party America’s Denver Onesie Pub Crawl, an excuse to dress up in one-piece pajamas or kigurumi costumes and wander from bar to bar with hundreds of your fellow fools. The party runs (and walks, skips and crawls) from 5 to 12 p.m. Saturday, April 1, beginning at the Church, 1160 Lincoln Street, where you can check in from 5 to 7 p.m. before heading out to enjoy drink specials in your PJs at multiple participating venues. Tickets are $15 in advance at partyamericaevents.fwscart.com.
Beyond nourishment, food is a link to the past, a means of carrying on family and cultural heritage. The Fourth Annual Forward Food Summit highlights this aspect of food through education and entertainment. Interactive conversations will focus on indigenous perspectives on food and passing traditions between generations. Organized by the Denver, Boulder and Colorado Springs chapters of Food Rescues, the summit ties into the nonprofit’s mission to deliver fresh produce, by bicycle, to food-insecure neighborhoods in Colorado. The two-day event starts at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, April 1, at the Mercury Cafe, 2199 California Street. Tickets are $15 to $35, with scholarships available. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit denverfoodrescue.org. Proceeds benefit the three Front Range Food Rescues.
On Saturday, April 1, test your flexibility, balance and sense of adventure with yogini and healer Devine Willerth. To celebrate the grand opening of AIReal Yoga, her new aerial yoga studio, Willerth is hosting a daylong event packed with thirty-minute sample classes, lectures on aerial yoga, and drawings for free classes and goodies. You don’t have to be a devout yogi to get in on the action. With aerial yoga, Willerth explains, “Silk slings allow users to get inverted with ease, without putting pressure on the joints.” The result? “Practitioners get into the body on a really deep and centered level,” Willerth says. “It’s safe and supportive — plus it’s fun.” AIReal Yoga classes will run every 45 minutes, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., at Sukha Healing Arts, 77 East Vassar Avenue. Class space is limited; reserve a spot in advance online for $10 at vagaro.com/sukhaheals/online-scheduling.
Inspired by an unsent love letter back in 2002, Mortified has spent the past fifteen years expanding, with outposts cropping up everywhere from Austin to Oslo. Combing through the detritus of adolescence, Mortified scours the world for old poems, journals and even home movies, and lets their owners showcase them on stage. Hailed by This American Life, The Today Show and the AV Club, Mortified unites its listeners in gratitude that their teen years are behind them. We can think of no finer way to celebrate this April Fool’s Day than commiserating with Mortified’s embarrassed speakers on Saturday, April 1, at 8 p.m. at the Boulder Theater, 2032 14th Street in Boulder. Tickets, $18, are available at bouldertheater.com.
Giving blood isn’t particularly funny, especially if you’re squeamish about watching your own veins get sucked dry. But it is an honorable and generous act, which is why Bloodlines: Blood and Punchlines aims to also make it fun for you. Bloodlines, a comedy showcase in partnership with Bonfils Blood Center, will bring a dozen Denver comedians to VFW Post 2461, 1350 South Broadway, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 1, to entertain folks before or after they roll up their sleeves; anyone feeling particularly jovial can even sign up to be bone-marrow donors. The laughs start up at noon (a $5 donation is suggested); call 720-838-3980 or visit facebook.com/events/1920493288172687 for details.
Sunday, April 2
Get swept up in free fun from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sunday, April 2, at the sixteenth annual Arvada Kite Festival, held at the Stenger Soccer Complex, 11200 West 58th Avenue in Arvada. Attendees can bring their own kites, buy new ones from on-site vendors, or simply watch high-flying exhibitions from professional flyers. Little ones can burn off their surplus energy in the Fit2beKids Kids’ Zone, where they can complete a speed and agility camp, jump for joy in a bouncy castle and roll around in human-sized hamster balls. With shopping, face painting and a range of food options, the Arvada Kite Festival soars to the highest heights of fun. Learn more at arvadafestivals.com.
Su Teatro’s annual four-day XicanIndie Film Fest has long been the place for cutting-edge works by independent Chicano filmmakers, as well as works of world cinema that rarely make the local multiplex. That makes it the perfect venue for Clever, a poignant study of the life and work of Gerardo Lopez, a former gangbanger with L.A.’s notorious MS13 who now works as a gang interventionist in Denver. Local documentarian Alan Dominguez (The Holes in the Door) deftly traces his subject’s battle for survival on the mean streets and the events that led up to his break with gang life. Lopez will be on hand for a question-and-answer session after the screening, which kicks off at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 2, at Su Teatro, 721 Santa Fe Drive. For tickets, $7 to $10, call 303-296-0219.
Monday, April 3
Throughout the tumultuous rise and fall of yacht-rock superstars Hall & Oates, guitarist and backup singer John Oates documented his experiences in handwritten journals. These formative scribblings form the basis of his new memoir, Change of Seasons, a thorough account of his career, replete with a songwriter’s flourishes. On Monday, April 3, at 6 p.m., the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer will be at the Tattered Cover, 2526 East Colfax Avenue, for a reading, book signing and meet-and-greet. The $29.99 ticket, available at eventbrite.com, includes a copy of the book. Find out more at tatteredcover.com.
Curmudgeon historian Phil Goodstein returns to City Stacks Books & Coffee, 1743 Wazee Street, on Monday, April 3, for Denver History Night, an ongoing lecture series that focuses on a different formative era each month. This month, to mark the centenary of World War I, Goodstein will deliver a lecture detailing the Great War’s impact on the home front, particularly how the pro-war propaganda campaign came to influence both public policy and discourse. The lecture begins at 6 p.m., and admission is free. Learn more at facebook.com/events/221897568284340.
