Screenwriter Dustin Lance Black (Big Love, Milk, J. Edgar), one of the most recognizable names in the LGBT-rights movement, is once again using his storytelling prowess to teach a history lesson, this time about the 2011 courtroom drama that overturned California’s gay-marriage ban, Proposition 8. The documentary play, called 8,…
There’s nothing like the crisp fall air to pump up a great run, and that will definitely be a plus for today’s Run the Rocks 5K. The sixth annual autumn race — which follows the paved-road trails surrounding Colorado’s picturesque Red Rocks Amphitheatre — offers a chance for participants to…
Much like political ads and zombies in October, found-footage flicks are starting to get old, but now and then comes a twist that makes the trend relevant again — even the second time around. Just in time for the witching season, Grave Encounters 2, the second in a series of…
It’s been 25 years since Gabby Gourmet Pat Miller and the late Noel Cunningham co-founded the Taste of the Nation, one of the city’s oldest and best-attended foodie events, featuring up-close sessions with top chefs and mountains of great local food and drink for charity. That alone makes tonight’s annual…
Not many emerging playwrights would take on a New York Times critic, but Kristoffer Diaz, author of the Curious season opener, The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, had no qualms about rebutting a blog post by Charles Isherwood. Isherwood had complained about the number of contemporary plays where characters break…
With artists working in so many mediums on campus at the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design, it’s hard to create exhibitions that appeal to everyone. That’s why curator Cortney Stell has focused on something that all of the artists can relate to in her latest show: the human…
Local artist Ravi Zupa’s large-scale paintings of rabbits, bison and other prairie critters have adorned the walls at WaterCourse ever since Denver’s vegetarian mecca relocated to its current spot at 17th Avenue and Emerson Street, lending an earthy, mythical feel to the space and hinting at a larger narrative that’s…
New science suggests that when women and men face danger, their brains are hardwired to produce very different reactions. Men do the traditional fight or flight, but women move toward danger to tend to or befriend it, says author Alexia Parks. “They diffuse conflict. So if you want leadership in…
When playwright Mark Jackson was paging through Shakespeare A to Z, a book that lists all of the characters from every one of the Bard’s plays, he was struck by the vast number of nameless messengers that exist in the catalogue. From this realization came the play Messenger #1, an…
If you tried to count the number of artists who also have day jobs, it’d be like counting stars in the sky. Within the governmental agencies of Denver and Colorado, there’s a similar microcosm, and that’s the whole reason for the annual On My Own Time art exhibitions curated through…
Welcome to Hogwarts, post-Voldemort: The mythical school has been rebuilt, and the children of Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Draco Malfoy are now learning about wizardry and witchcraft themselves. This is the setting for Bovine Metropolis Theater’s latest series, a futuristic fan-fiction parody called The Heirs of Hogwarts: An Improvised…
People who are truly fashion-forward are often forward regarding things other than street-style, too. This week we focus the spotlight on Malarie Parks, a young woman from Fresno, California, and a former Rocky Mountain of College of Art and Design student who puts all of herself out there — and…
Today at the Denver Art Museum, employees uncrated and hung a very special piece by Vincent Van Gogh. In this particular painting, “Edge of a Wheatfield with Poppies,” Van Gogh lightened up his palette considerably, using magentas against indigo with crisp reds. The piece will join more than seventy others…
Update: Congratulations to asya92 and Cerealluna! You have both won tickets to these area haunted houses. Thanks for reading! Original post: Those of you who are not willing to a) cry in public, b) scream until even strep would be better, c) bring an extra pair of pants, or c)…
Once you recognize Kevin Hennessy’s singular style, it’s hard not to notice his work all over Denver. “I used to do the specials on the chalkboard at City, O’ City when I worked there — they’d leave me on the clock and let me (design),” says Hennessy, whose official job…
Despite the “Cupcakes from the Crypt” title, this event is not an exhumation of thousand-year-old cupcakes, nor a Halloween-themed bake sale. No, Johnny “Cupcakes” Earle is in the T-shirt business, and he got his start over a decade ago selling shirts out of a suitcase in the trunk of his…
Any true city rises on a foundation of stories, and Denver, with its Wild West roots and City Beautiful continuum, more than qualifies as a storied metropolis. Plenty of the best ones are set along the 16th Street Mall, which celebrates its thirtieth birthday — only a drop in the…
Many well-known TV series have been set in Colorado over the years, everything from Mork & Mindy to Everwood to South Park. But there have also been plenty of obscure shows set in this state, and we dredged up ten of those in “Ten TV shows you didn’t know were…
Although the 16th Street Mall officially turned the big 3-0 on Thursday, today was the big party. In Skyline Park, Mayor Michael Hancock presented a proclamation that recognizes the anniversary, RTD and Downtown Denver Partnership. Hancock congratulated both organizations on “all that you have meant to this city — and…
Comic T.J. Miller will be premiering his new series, Mash Up, on Comedy Central tonight. Known for his white-boy ode to Denver, being stabbed in Get Him to the Greek, and feuding with Dane Cook, Miller has become one of the most recognizable comedians to come out of this city…
For Now Showing, our fall arts guide inserted in the September 27 issue of Westword, we asked dozens of luminaries on the local arts scene — including winners of the Westword MasterMind awards — to take a survey about the state of the arts. We published many of the responses…
As we get deeper into fall, it’s sometimes hard to tell if that seasonal chill is from the cold or the pre-Halloween horror. That’s especially true if you’ve been to Field of Corpses or City of the Dead, two of Denver’s most terrifying haunted houses, which feature blood, gore, undead…
