Last night a Daily Show report by comedian Jason Jones reported on high levels of apathy among Colorado voters. Looking at statistics as well as conducting interviews on Denver’s 16th Street Mall, Jones found that an overwhelming majority of people (80 percent) did not vote in last September’s recall election,…
“Blue collar comedy” is often viewed as synonymous with words like “dumb,” “cheap” and “Republican.” It was largely co-opted by Jeff Foxworthy’s low-brow comedy tour, and since then you really can’t discuss the humor that comes out of labor-work without everyone assuming you have a Support the Troops bumpersticker on…
With nine shows down and three more to go, Dave Chappelle has been running a comedy marathon this week at Comedy Works. With almost no promotion outside of the club’s e-mail list, tickets have been selling out in record time, and no matter how many extra shows are added (sometimes…
Whenever someone lays the “I find that joke offensive” line on me, I always silently wonder: Do you really? Or do you just want people to know that you do? Nowhere does this happen more often than in comedy clubs, and it’s no surprise that comedians love to find and…
With three female comedians, three Davids (Spade, Chappelle, Sedaris) and a whole lot of masked wrestlers on the schedule, November is shaping up to be a delightfully eclectic month for Denver comedy. We have secret shows from Comedy Works, a Scottish wunderkind and another performance on the budding Boulder standup…
CD sales have plunged over the last decade, but vinyl LPs have become increasingly trendy, with music fans still desiring a physical product to clutch to their chests on their way home. Recognizing this trend, several years ago musician Adam Baumeister (formerly of Bad Weather California) purchased a record lathe…
“The New York Times calls it ‘You had me at Wes Anderson,'” say the credits of Saturday Night Live’s recent Wes Anderson horror-film parody, The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders. By assembling the usual suspects of every Anderson film (pastel aesthetics, mod soundtrack, Owen Wilson) while mocking the public’s appetite…
One of the largest looming and most influential icons in the history of rock and roll, Lou Reed died on Sunday at the age of 71. No word has been received regarding the cause of Reed’s death, though the “Walk on the Wild Side” songwriter underwent a liver transplant last…
While the surge in popularity of the Denver comedy scene can be mostly attributed to the catalogue of top class talent in the city, a lot of that talent wouldn’t be reaching as wide an audience without Sexy Pizza’s Kayvan Khalatbari. The marijuana activist and Denver Relief MMJ dispensary founder…
One of the most revered dramatic series in television history, The Twilight Zone continues to intoxicate viewers 54 years after it debuted on CBS. While still considered the crowning achievement within its TV sci-fi designation, it’s also appreciated outside the genre as a consistently engaging adventure of complex characters and…
After debuting its first slice dispensary in Capitol Hill in the fall of 2008 (taking over the space once occupied by defunct Pizza Vera), then adding a South Pearl location in 2012, Sexy Pizza has become an unstoppable force in Denver, dipping its fingers into the pies of all kinds…
The Old Curtis Street Tavern was a beloved watering hole for many young artists in Denver’s music and comedy scene until it closed last January. Now the space has been transformed into the Curtis Club, an old West-styled gastro-pub with a contemporary menu of locally sourced produce and plenty of…
After six grueling months of weekly competition that whittled 140 comics down to one, the 2013 Comedy Works New Faces Competition has a winner in Jordan Doll. He’d delivered heavily talked-about performances at UMS and High Plains, and there had been a lot of hype in the comedy scene that…
It’s probably the biggest cliche in the history of dating: You’re looking for someone with a sense of humor. But since it has nothing to do with money, social stature or good looks — things people are often most insecure about in dating — why is humor such a big…
It’s been a long ride since last spring, when the Comedy Works New Faces Competition 2013 began. And now, with 130 comics eliminated, we’re down to the final ten, who will compete tomorrow night for a cash prize and the prestige of joining the ranks of previous winners, including Ben…
Every comedian has to deal with being vulnerable in front of a crowd of strangers. But few of them have as tough a job as transgender comedian Jordan Wieleba. While her comedy colleagues and large swaths of the Denver scene are endlessly supportive of, and charmed by, Wieleba, the club…
Anyone over 25 remembers him as heroic single dad Danny Tanner on Full House, or the jolly host of America’s Funniest Home Videos. But anyone plugged into standup comedy over the last decade also knows him as the desperately foul-mouthed comic with jokes so vivid and foul he makes William…
Ian Cooke has always been known for his stunning lyrical imagery, and while he’s dropped a handful of interesting video accompaniments in the past, he’s never attempted anything like this before. In a project spanning two years, Cooke collaborated with local artist Adam Singer and bandmate Ian O’Dougherty to produce…
Yes, it’s true. Over the weekend, one of the interchangeable blond anchors on Fox and Friends reported that, despite the WWII memorial being closed during the government shutdown, “some things are continuing to be funded . . . President Obama has offered to pay out of his own pocket for…
After the pilot’s debut, comedians Ben Roy, Adam Cayton-Holland and Andrew Orvedahl thought their Amazon-produced Grawlix comedy series, Those Who Can’t, was dead in the water. While two other shows were picked up, The Grawlix crew heard….nothing. But now Amazon has commissioned the Denver comedy team to write six new…
“I fired a manager after he said to me, ‘Do something crazy and it’ll get on YouTube and your career will take off!'” comedian Christopher Titus told me in an interview this summer. “I looked at him and was like, ‘Really, that’s your plan? Really?'” While Titus may be cynical…
As much an icon of African-American comedy as Richard Pryor or Eddie Murphy, Keenen Ivory Wayans pioneered a new style of televised sketch comedy with In Living Color, introducing mainstream Americans to the stylish humor of early ’90s black culture. The show also launched the careers of Jim Carrey, Jennifer…
