WED, 3/23 “I am awakened at Dingboche by a sound drifting in from the edge of consciousness,” writes Peter Potterfield in his new book, Classic Hikes of the World, about getting acclimated at the foot of Mt. Everest. “Soothing and exotic, but not identifiable. As sleep fades, my oxygen-starved brain…
FRI, 3/18 Charles Dickens once said that “home is a name, a word,” but for the students at P.S.1, the concept of “home” can also be expressed in images. For the past month, more than a dozen students from the charter school have been working with digital storytellers Daniel Weinshenker,…
THURS, 3/17 As a veterinary doctor, Dr. Kevin Fitzgerald has appeared on Animal Planet’s Emergency Vet hundreds of times. As a standup comedian, he’s opened for no less than Emmylou Harris, the Temptations and, oh, yeah, Bob freakin’ Hope. He’s appeared on NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, been on…
The Museo de las Américas has had a bumpy ride over the past few years, and surely many in the art community thought the small but significant institution was headed for the trash heap of Denver history. Luckily, that hasn’t happened, and the Museo looks as though it’s on the…
The members of Denver’s oldest artist cooperative, Spark Gallery (900 Santa Fe Drive, 720-889-2200), have had a hard time figuring out how to effectively use the 1,200-square-foot space that they moved into last year. Every show I’ve seen there has been awkwardly installed, because there’s not even one good wall…
BOCTOK. Steve Antonio is not a former Soviet artist, although his large paintings at Capsule, the gallery part of Pod, might make you think he is one, since these neo-pop compositions depict the first generation of Soviet cosmonauts. The little room at Capsule looks great and is perfectly filled by…
It’s hard to assign a genre to John Guare’s Landscape of the Body, currently being produced by Paper Cat Theatre. It’s absurdist and unrealistic; it mingles horror and slapstick. “I’d like a laugh track around my life,” says Betty Yearn, being interrogated as a suspect in the murder of her…
I’m a huge fan of the Heritage Square Music Hall. Going there to review feels like a break from school and from all those plays — whether deep and thoughtful or annoyingly pretentious — to which I have to give serious critical consideration. Heritage provides solace for mind and spirit,…
Always…Patsy Cline. Always Patsy Cline is a light, mildly entertaining evening. You get an efficiently evocative set that’s divided into three parts: a down-home apartment; an old-fashioned country bar, complete with jukebox; and, in the center, the stage of the Grand Ole Opry. There are two skilled singer-performers, one of…
The chilling oddity of Oliver Hirschbiegel’s Downfall is not limited to the fact that it is the first mainstream German film to grapple with Adolf Hitler — six decades after his death. Set, for the most part, in the underground Berlin bunker where the Nazi dictator spent his last days,…
Everyone with a TV remembers President Bush in the flight suit, landing on that aircraft carrier, standing in front of a “Mission Accomplished” banner and triumphantly declaring that major combat operations in Iraq were over. Two years on, many feel like asking what, exactly, he meant by that. Gunner Palace…
If you’re looking for an escapist shoot-’em-up action adventure and figure a Bruce Willis flick is a reliable option, think twice. Hostage certainly delivers violence and heroics, but not in a way everyone will enjoy. Children and dogs die brutally, and the villains are so thoroughly hateful that even the…
“From the creators of Ice Age,” boasts the poster for Robots, which is no ringing endorsement. That 2002 animated feature, a sort of Three Mammals and a Baby in a prehistoric setting, looked and felt every bit as frigid as its snowbound scenery. It was impossible to warm to a…
Almost as wide as he is tall, with a round but unremarkable face, Schultze doesn’t look like a rebel. Truthfully, he looks like Curly of Three Stooges fame or, less kindly, a mass murderer (well, he does bear a passing but disturbing resemblance to John Wayne Gacy). Schultze — whether…
The late director Yasujiro Ozu (1903-1963) was long regarded as the “most Japanese” of all Japanese filmmakers, a fact that sometimes alienated younger audiences as dramatically as it enthralled traditionalists. A three-film series at Starz called Celebrating Ozu now gives lovers of world cinema a rare opportunity to revisit the…
Just as sounds and symbols are organized to create meaning in language, so, too, does the built environment give structure to our everyday lives. From the Ballpark Lofts to the abandoned Evans School to the Qwest tower, each building projects a certain meaning that contributes to our urban experience. To…
Thursday, March 10 While Jose Rivera is probably best known for his screenplays — he wrote the script for The Motorcycle Diaries and was writer and creator of the short-lived but excellent TV series Eerie, Indiana — he is also regarded as an innovative playwright. The winner of two Obie…
From King Henry V to Louisiana’s Huey Long, history is filled with figures who balanced personal corruption against great achievement — and whose achievements, in fact, arose from their corruption. For playwright Joan Holden, Robert Speer, mayor of Denver during the first decade of the twentieth century, was just such…
THURS, 3/10 Fionn mac Cumhail, better known as Finn MacCool, was set the task of cooking a salmon one day by his tutor, the Druid Finegas, who had caught the fish after it ate nuts fallen from the hazel tree. According to ancient teachings, salmon that ate these nuts possessed…
FRI, 3/11 This year, the coffin-carrying competition at Nederland’s Frozen Dead Guy Days gets seriously stiff. The annual festival, which begins today, celebrates Bredo “Grandpa” Morstoel, the cryogenically frozen Norwegian who occupies a Tuff Shed behind the home of his dearly deported grandson. The festivities include the Cryogenic Parade, tours…
THUR, 3/10 New Yorker Chakaia Booker is making tracks across the contemporary art scene. The mixed-media artist conveys her images of struggle by twisting and contorting raw materials like wood, fiber and metal, but her signature works are created through manipulations of used, mangled tires. She weaves the discarded rubber…
FRI, 3/11 Most of us dance to get to know someone a little better or maybe to burn a few calories. But the Speaking of Dance troupe has another goal: peace on earth. Working for Peace, the company’s newest work, will be performed this weekend by SOD members and participants…
