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Best movie theater -- high-tech

IMAX, Denver Museum of Nature and Science

Last December, the newly renamed Denver Museum of Nature and Science in City Park updated its 441-seat IMAX theater with a 15,000-watt (up from 8,500) digital sound system featuring six-track reproduction and -- count 'em -- 58 giant speakers. The sonic effect is rather like taking a front-row seat at the Battle of Verdun. There's also a brand-new screen -- four and a half stories tall, six and a half stories wide -- manufactured by the British firm Harkness. So if you're in the mood for a gigantic view of Dolphins, or some eye- and ear-popping Adventures in Wild California, or a trip to Cirque de Soleil: Journey of Man, IMAX is the place to be. All three films, shot in oversized 70 millimeter, are currently on view, a total of 35 times per week.

Best local gallery show -- group

Twentieth Anniversary Celebration

Last summer, art history of the recent past came alive when the first-generation members of Spark Gallery, Denver's oldest artists' co-op, were brought together in the fabulous Twentieth Anniversary Celebration exhibit. Back in 1980, these aging hippies -- among them Andy Libertone and Paul Gillis (the official founders of the group), Clark Richert, Margaret Neumann, George Woodman, Marilyn Duke and John Fudge (who died late last summer) -- were already key figures in the local art scene. All played a significant role in the development of contemporary art in Colorado, and many still do, as does their still-thriving co-op (though none of the originals have remained involved with the group). For the twentieth-anniversary show, these artistic communards each brought out an old piece and paired it with a new one, for an intriguing glimpse of Denver then and now.

Readers' choice: Kung Fu Kitchen

Best local gallery show -- group

Twentieth Anniversary Celebration

Last summer, art history of the recent past came alive when the first-generation members of Spark Gallery, Denver's oldest artists' co-op, were brought together in the fabulous Twentieth Anniversary Celebration exhibit. Back in 1980, these aging hippies -- among them Andy Libertone and Paul Gillis (the official founders of the group), Clark Richert, Margaret Neumann, George Woodman, Marilyn Duke and John Fudge (who died late last summer) -- were already key figures in the local art scene. All played a significant role in the development of contemporary art in Colorado, and many still do, as does their still-thriving co-op (though none of the originals have remained involved with the group). For the twentieth-anniversary show, these artistic communards each brought out an old piece and paired it with a new one, for an intriguing glimpse of Denver then and now.

Readers' choice: Kung Fu Kitchen

Best local theater production

The Winter's Tale

While William Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale might seem contrived or even impossible to stage, the Denver Center Theatre Company's seasonal production was a superbly realized dramatic poem about redemption and renewal. The lyrical currents that twist beneath the play's prosaic rime were marvelously shaped into a vibrant whole by director Laird Williamson, whose aesthetic increasingly reflects a mature artist's appreciation of life's ambiguities. And it didn't hurt that the mystical drama was performed against a stunning backdrop of giant steel trees rooted in a cracked alabaster floor, costumed and lighted to perfection and accompanied by an original musical score of Byzantine-like chants. Along with the efforts of a splendid cast, Williamson's artful touches brilliantly evoked the Bard's twilight observations about "unpath'd waters" and "undream'd shores."

Readers' choice: Suddenly Last Summer , Germinal Stage Denver

Best local theater production

The Winter's Tale

While William Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale might seem contrived or even impossible to stage, the Denver Center Theatre Company's seasonal production was a superbly realized dramatic poem about redemption and renewal. The lyrical currents that twist beneath the play's prosaic rime were marvelously shaped into a vibrant whole by director Laird Williamson, whose aesthetic increasingly reflects a mature artist's appreciation of life's ambiguities. And it didn't hurt that the mystical drama was performed against a stunning backdrop of giant steel trees rooted in a cracked alabaster floor, costumed and lighted to perfection and accompanied by an original musical score of Byzantine-like chants. Along with the efforts of a splendid cast, Williamson's artful touches brilliantly evoked the Bard's twilight observations about "unpath'd waters" and "undream'd shores."

Readers' choice: Suddenly Last Summer , Germinal Stage Denver

Best musical

Side Show

Unlike their previous efforts, which have blurred the boundaries that separate the disabled from the rest of society, the Physically Handicapped Amateur Musical Actor's League production of Side Show emphasized those differences to the point of transcending them. A magnificent theatrical achievement, PHAMALy's regional-premiere mounting of the Broadway musical conveyed the idea of abiding self-acceptance without glossing over a few uncomfortable moments -- like, say, the opening number's repeated chant, "Here come the freaks/Only pennies for peeks!" The book on PHAMALy has always been that they're just a bunch of well-meaning though talented folks in wheelchairs who deserve a properly sympathetic audience. In light of this production, though, that nugget of wisdom seems soft-centered. For this troupe, as for the characters in Bill Russell and Henry Krieger's songfest, "Anything's possible -- when everything's right."

Best musical

Side Show

Unlike their previous efforts, which have blurred the boundaries that separate the disabled from the rest of society, the Physically Handicapped Amateur Musical Actor's League production of Side Show emphasized those differences to the point of transcending them. A magnificent theatrical achievement, PHAMALy's regional-premiere mounting of the Broadway musical conveyed the idea of abiding self-acceptance without glossing over a few uncomfortable moments -- like, say, the opening number's repeated chant, "Here come the freaks/Only pennies for peeks!" The book on PHAMALy has always been that they're just a bunch of well-meaning though talented folks in wheelchairs who deserve a properly sympathetic audience. In light of this production, though, that nugget of wisdom seems soft-centered. For this troupe, as for the characters in Bill Russell and Henry Krieger's songfest, "Anything's possible -- when everything's right."

Best musical ménage

Bed and Sofa

An opera based on a Russian silent film would seem the sort of artsy endeavor that invites dismissive sneers from musical and movie buffs alike. But with its lilting score and frank take on age-old questions, Bed and Sofa proved an enjoyable mixture of high-minded music and melodramatic fun. What's more, the latest offering from Boulder's Trouble Clef Theatre Company boasted three outstanding performances that bolstered the troupe's reputation as a premier presenter of musicals. Founded six years ago "to pursue new directions in musical theater," the group has taken on ambitious projects that, if not always polished to perfection, have been marked by their inventive staging, crisp musical direction and top-notch performances. It was altogether gratifying, then, to witness the company's years of hard work pay off in a production where art took precedence over personality and where every note, gesture and utterance felt right at home.

Best musical ménage

Bed and Sofa

An opera based on a Russian silent film would seem the sort of artsy endeavor that invites dismissive sneers from musical and movie buffs alike. But with its lilting score and frank take on age-old questions, Bed and Sofa proved an enjoyable mixture of high-minded music and melodramatic fun. What's more, the latest offering from Boulder's Trouble Clef Theatre Company boasted three outstanding performances that bolstered the troupe's reputation as a premier presenter of musicals. Founded six years ago "to pursue new directions in musical theater," the group has taken on ambitious projects that, if not always polished to perfection, have been marked by their inventive staging, crisp musical direction and top-notch performances. It was altogether gratifying, then, to witness the company's years of hard work pay off in a production where art took precedence over personality and where every note, gesture and utterance felt right at home.

Best urban legends

Shadow Theatre Company

In only its third full season, Shadow Theatre Company managed to up its entertainment quotient while maintaining its commitment to produce works that are non-exclusive to other cultural groups. The predominantly African-American company held audiences rapt with its multiracial production of Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; Carlyle Brown's The African Company Presents Richard III was particularly stirring when the characters bucked tradition and embraced invention; Laurence Fishburne's bare-fisted Riff Raff made contemporary discussions about social issues sound like wholesale plea-copping; and Ntozake Shange's choreopoem, From Okra to Greens, evoked the slight yet seismic forces -- and urban perils -- that shape male-female relationships.

Best Of Denver®

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