As the Aurora Cultural Arts District continues to take strides in its bid to shape a vital city center, ACAD director Tracy Weil and staff find new ways to draw attention to downtown Aurora’s eclectic cultural community. The latest event, tonight’s Poetry@Play, will celebrate wordsmiths and artists alike with two…
During the course of its seven years, the Create Denver Expo has grown to encompass more and more of its original goal of kickstarting local creatives and independent business owners with better access to resources. But this year there will be some changes, not the least of which is the…
Peeling back the shiny top layer of a completed radio broadcast, tonight’s Reinventing Radio: An Evening With Ira Glass reveals what it takes to produce a program from start to finish. But Glass, the host and co-creator of National Public Radio’s This American Life, doesn’t just take listeners behind the…
What’s been the best development on the Denver dining scene over the past twenty years? That’s what we asked readers last month, and they responded with craft beer, increased competition, chef-driven restaurants, local ingredients. And “the fact that we have a dining scene today.” Denver’s dining scene has changed a…
For her best-selling debut, Special Topics in Calamity Physics, novelist Marisha Pessl precisely mapped out her characters and plot using spreadsheets, graphs and tables. But for her followup, a psychological thriller called Night Film, she took a more exploratory approach. “The book takes on a life of its own,” she…
Standup comedy isn’t just for freewheeling, up-all-night youngsters with no limits or responsibilities. Sometimes the in-by-ten mommies deserve a night of cocktails and belly laughs, too, says comedian Shayna Ferm, creator of the Pump & Dump comedy night. “Because of my own fucked-up experiences as a new mom, I thought…
For a kids’ movie, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory sure is full of weird shit. Oompa Loompas. psychedelic interludes. A seemingly psychotic Gene Wilder. And, of course, the candy — the crazy, colorful candy. “That film, at least for me, created such wild ideas about fantasy and candy,” says…
Walk into the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design’s Philip J. Steele Gallery tonight and you might have a strange sense of déjà vu: English artist Daniel Eatock’s new show, An Empty Room: The Sequel — which is in part a reaction to elements left over from a previous…
If you’re looking for an undead-killing experience that’s a little more visceral than shooting zombies in video games, a trip to Anderson Farms for a Zombie Paintball Hunt may be in order. You’ll jump on a wagon with a handful of other would-be ghoul slayers, grab one of the mounted…
Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five, Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series are only a small sample of the top 100 banned or challenged books of the past decade. Banning books might sound like a problem of the past, but there are still attempts to…
For Racheli Mendelson, a former EMT who’d been creating performance-art pieces since she was thirteen, it just made sense to explore her time serving in the Israeli military through a red-nosed clown performance. See the result at Mendelson’s Boulder International Fringe Festival debut, Shoot, Cry & Forget About It!: A…
To hype the upcoming Passport to Paris exhibit at the Denver Art Museum, the DAM recreated a Parisian street scene in its outdoor plaza yesterday, complete with ten local artists painting that scene. One of those artists was Ron Hicks, and his fashionable wife was present as well, posing as…
Often overlooked for its bigger, brasher cousin, East Colfax Avenue, the quaint little strip of 13th Avenue between Downing and Sherman streets is one of the few remaining arteries of pedestrian shopping, historic buildings and authentic culture in the Denver area. Its lack of recognition may actually be the secret…
A decade of continuity for the Denver Film Society ended with the departure of programming manager Keith Garcia last month. Denver film fans who came to trust Garcia’s vision needn’t worry, though — the show will go on, and the newest addition to the DFS family is already on the…
The show must go on, and for Laura Ann Samuelson and Joanna Rotkin, a helicopter rescue was the only way to keep their production THE GREAT GREEN on track for the Boulder International Fringe Festival, which starts today. Rotkin, creator and star of THE GREAT GREEN, resides in Jamestown, which…
An Emmy-winning actress best known for her work on Family Ties and as a regular in Lifetime Original Movies, Meredith Baxter has been an endearing force in Hollywood for more than four decades. But her path has not been an easy one, and the film and television star makes a…
In the fall of 1998, I took my then four-year old sister to the steps of the State Capitol for a memorial gathering for Matthew Shepard, not long after his death in Wyoming. Nothing makes a vicious hate crime seem more horrific and pointless than trying to explain to a…
On Sepember 19 Denver crowds will unload a serious amount of cash on an event titled “The Clean Guys Comedy,” which features such stand-up legends as Jamie Kennedy (Scream), Uncle Joey from Full House, and some other folks you vaguely remember from somewhere. The comics themselves aren’t what’s selling this…
Adam Lichty wants Denverites to walk more — and see a lot more. That’s the motivation for Denver Streetheart, which collects street art from around the city and shares photos on Instagram with Lichty’s 1,500 followers. But he doesn’t want the experience to stop there. He wants people to go…
Reading is about more than following a narrative or learning facts; it can also be a profound shared experience that culminates in a better understanding of ourselves and each other. In that spirit, welcome to the Westword Book Club a weekly feature celebrating the books that inspire Denver artists.
#46: Dave Ortolano Dave Ortolano is both a theater Renaissance man and a friend of theater. Naropa-trained and a collaborating member of Boulder’s Band of Toughs company, his first love and major creative focus is his role as executive director of the Boulder International Fringe Festival, which kicks off another…
After all the flooding of the past week, it was uplifting to see the sun shining on a Monday morning. So was the sight of local student Jovan Bridges, rocking a style that could have pushed passersby out of their comfort zone. Read on to learn about who inspires his…
