I think of Alan Bennett as a chronicler of the lives of those inhabiting a certain stratum of British society: lonely, middle-class people, conventional, self-conscious and always slightly embarrassed at themselves, like the monologuists of Talking Heads or Bennett’s self-depiction as the unwilling host of The Lady in the Van…
In a culture where popular definitions of manhood are as rigid and narrow as they are in the United States (real men chop down trees, play sports and don’t drink lattes), the age-old ideal of the warrior-poet seems a contradiction in terms. Without question, however, this mythic figure was in…
Cats. This company does as good a job with Cats as one can imagine. The dancing, choreographed by Stephen Bertles, who also directed, is seamless. The cast is lithe and graceful. They slither like snakes. They leap high and land without a sound. They’re wonderfully into character, batting at each…
Alex Gibney’s Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is a thoroughly professional, frequently spectacular piece of muckraking. But any American who hopes to watch this portrait of unfettered corporate greed, cynical power-lust and outrageous deception without going postal about an hour into the thing would do well to bring…
Agent Fox Mulder, the coolly instinctual sleuth of The X-Files, got pretty good at unraveling paranormal mysteries. If only the actor who played him were as adept at solving the riddle of his movie career. David Duchovny’s new vanity project, House of D, is the tortured tale of a thirteen-year-old…
It seems unlikely that any American outside of a cloistered, sports-averse, PBS-watching film reviewer would have failed to notice the 2002 arrival of Yao Ming, the 7’6″ gentle giant also known as China’s national basketball hero and, in the U.S., the number-one pick in the NBA draft — especially since,…
One attraction of foreign films is the glimpse they provide of exotic lands. But after viewing a startling coming-of-age drama called Schizo, you probably won’t call the travel agent to book ten days in Kazakhstan. Or ten minutes. As revealed by first-time director Guka Omarova and cinematographer Khasanbek Kydyraliyev, this…
Author Douglas Adams died at age 49 on May 11, 2001, of a heart attack suffered during a workout at a Santa Barbara, California, gym. His biographer, M.J. Simpson, blamed Adams’s demise in part on his unending battle to get The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy on a big screen,…
Can eleven years really have passed? Quentin Tarantino cultists own it on DVD (or at least VHS), and they’ve all watched it nineteen times. But there’s something special about seeing Pulp Fiction again on the big screen, in the company of your yawping, warped, movie-crazed fellow enthusiasts. Where do you…
Boulder’s Nomad Theatre, a converted World War II Quonset hut, has a long history. In 1951, the owner of the land on which the building stands deeded it to the Nomad Players — so called because their first-ever production took place in a tent furnished with chairs from a local…
Thursday, April 28 Being charitable has never been easier: All you have to do to participate in today’s Dining Out for Life event is eat at any of nearly 300 metro-area restaurants — not just the ritzy places, either — and at least 25 percent of your meal ticket will…
The next time the old-boy network starts casting about for a female entrepreneur to elevate to Colorado’s Business Hall of Fame, they should take a look at Marilyn Megenity. They won’t find her in some power- and fuel-mad Lexus: She’s retrofitted her car to run on vegetable oil, and drives…
MON, 5/2 Bush bashers refer to the powerful triumvirate of George W., Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney as the real “Axis of Evil.” In her best-selling book, Bushwomen: Tales of a Cynical Species, Laura Flanders regards the women in and around the White House as an equally diabolical force. Combining…
THURS, 4/28 We all want to believe that there are still pristine places around, but reality says otherwise: Park designation in America is often just a protective stopgap meant to halt further damage beyond what’s already been done. With that in mind, veteran park ranger Jordan Fisher Smith ushers in…
FRI, 4/29 Need to brush up on your Klingon? Have a hankerin’ to gorge on Gagh? Then don your best Starfleet dress uniform, strap on your Jedi Knight light saber, and beam yourself up to the Marriott Denver Tech Center, 4900 South Syracuse Street, for this weekend’s Starfest 2005. KathE…
THURS, 4/28 The off-Broadway satire Newsical is coming, and it’s going to be a bona fide celebrity shish kebab. The rowdy roast skewers household headliners such as Anna Nicole and Jacko while also sinking its fangs into any fresh tabloid fodder that slinks across the front page. “We poke fun…
Although Denver has long been the largest city in Colorado, historically it was not the art-making center of the state. No, that distinction was held by Colorado Springs — even before the launch of the Broadmoor Academy in 1918, which transformed the town into a full-fledged art colony. That knowledge…
The young artist with the epic name of Jared David Paul Anderson is a one-man art movement. Not only is he a serious painter, as he demonstrates in Red, White and Black, now at the Assembly (766 Santa Fe Drive, 303-573-5501), but he’s also the founder of an artists’ collective,…
Balance. Rarely has Walker Fine Art come up with an exhibit as successful as Balance, which pairs recent abstract paintings by Denver artist Don Quade with abstract sculptures by Colorado Springs-based Bill Burgess. Quade was formerly at Fresh Art Gallery, but Walker picked him up when Fresh Art closed last…
Pigeons on the grass, alas. — Gertrude Stein It is neither just nor accurate to connect the word alas with pigeons. Pigeons are definitely not alas. They have nothing to do with alas and they have nothing to do with hooray (not even when you tie red, white, and blue…
Normally, I would trek through broken glass — well, okay, walk several city blocks in new high heels — to see Nicholas Sugar perform. It’s not just his humor and intense stage presence; it’s the fact that in the past he’s added interesting colors to roles that could easily be…
Cats. This company does as good a job with Cats as one can imagine. The dancing, choreographed by Stephen Bertles, who also directed, is seamless. The cast is lithe and graceful. They slither like snakes. They leap high and land without a sound. They’re wonderfully into character, batting at each…
