Before you could see them, you could hear it: that wet, phlegmy sound of air sucked into fatty passages made too tight through centuries of inbreeding. Of all the dog breeds, pugs are, bar none, the most grotesque, with their weird, punched-in ewok-looking faces and their constant breathing difficulty (which…

Romantic comedies aren’t known for their mind-bending plot twists, but even in the template-governed world of Hollywood, they tend to be especially formulaic. To wit, every romantic comedy must conclude with one of two possible outcomes: Either, a) The female lead will end up with the dude who initially repulses…

In the sixteen years it’s been around, This American Life has been more than just a radio show: It’s been the parent of movie scripts as diverse as Unaccompanied Minors and The Informant, a major influence on countless other experiments with the radio format, from Radiolab to The Moth, not…

Other than possibly your grandpa’s basement, there aren’t too many places to drink swill beer and play ping pong in this town — and that’s a damn shame, especially considering it’s an excellent sport for hipsters. Luckily, hardly any sooner had we pointed that out than the clever folks down…

Though it’s seldom as conspicuous as, say, editing or lighting, scoring is a subtle integral component of any film’s stylistic mix; take last week’s excellent Drive, for example, which set itself apart from the typical action-movie morass at least in part with its use of quiet new-new-wave, as opposed to…

The intersection of love and technology is a dangerous one, fraught with awkwardness, insecurity, misunderstanding and pain. In short, it’s a recipe for hilarity, and it serves as the focus of Love, Sex & the Second City, a “romantic dot comedy” (whatever that means) from the legendary troupe that shares…

The Pirate King is a novel that prominently features both Sherlock Holmes and pirates — and while that’s probably about as much selling as author Laurie R. King’s (who’s been known to call herself “Laurie Arrrrgh King”) appearance at the Tattered Cover requires, here’s a bonus: It’s also Talk Like…

Ballet is often called “poetry in motion,” but that turn of phrase becomes literal tonight in Intersection, a poem penned by Lighthouse Writers Workshop executive director Mike Henry and set in motion by Ballet Nouveau Colorado artistic director Garrett Ammon. The BNC has a long history of working with a…

On this day in 2001, thousands of Americans lost their lives in the most deadly terrorist attack ever to hit U.S. soil. Ten years later, there’s only one way to commemorate that tragic day: Let freedom ring. And there’s no better place to do that than at the 9/11 Freedom…

It’s tough to be a dude these days — tougher than it used to be, at any rate. “For 5,000 years, the patriarchy has been in place, and in the last thirty years, that’s changed significantly,” observes Jim Sharon, editor and curator of the recently released men’s anthology Ordinary Men,…