The Doctor Is In

Cherry Creek High School grad Matt Iseman has covered as lot of ground since leaving the Creek behind for Princeton, then med school at Columbia and a residency back home at CU. That’s when he pulled the old switcheroo and quit doctoring altogether to stand up and tell jokes in…

Getting Real

Group shows that include several artists in a gallery’s stable of talent are summertime standards in the art world. It’s easy for gallery directors to simply pull stuff out of the racks in the back room during the downtime of the dog days. But that doesn’t mean these exhibits aren’t…

Life Is Short, Art Is Long

In 1991, Russell Bay McKlayer — then known simply as Russell Bay, since he hadn’t yet added the made up “McKlayer” part — came together with Ken Petersen and Mark Brasuell to launch the Edge Gallery co-op, and he put on a solo exhibit there every year until he died…

Flick Pick

The astronaut drama Countdown is a curio from both a historical and filmic standpoint. The movie, co-starring James Caan and Robert Duvall, both pre-Godfather, arrived in 1968, a year before the initial moon landing, but at a point when it was clear the United States was on the verge of…

Back to the Future

For anyone who was around to witness the Apollo 11 lunar landing forty years ago on this date, the moment was unforgettable – a physical and visual embodiment of the nation’s collective desire to, well, fly to the moon. And the whole Neil Armstrong “giant step for mankind” sensibility was,…

In the Haus

The folks at CultureHaus, the Denver Art Museum’s social and educational group for a younger adult demographic, are always looking for a new way to raise money or have a good time, and the resulting parties never fail to raise the bar on hip entertainment. So expect their latest tony…

Food Fête

It’s back to basics this year at the annual Taste of the Nation benefit for Share Our Strength: thirty presenting restaurants, a compendium of sips from Colorado breweries and wineries from across the nation, a silent auction and some live entertainment. There’ll be no stuffy sit-down dinner, either; instead, you’ll…

Buddha Speaks

“I’m not so interested in giving answers as I am in posing questions,” says writer/actor Evan Brenner about his one-man play The Buddha — In His Own Words. “The Sutras were originally an oral tradition, and I’m interested in the process of making these scriptures oral again.” In this ninety-minute…

It’s a Date

Are you looking for love in all the wrong places? The Denver Public Library’s Fresh City Life is here to help, with The Overdue Love Club, described as “a singles’ night for intelligent people.” And unlike some other singles’ nights, this one comes with a host perfect for breaking the…

Tag! They’re It!

There’s a surprise waiting at the sixth annual Latino Rhythms concert at Lincoln Park today. To catch a glimpse, stroll over to the La Alma Recreation Center at 11th Avenue and Mariposa Street for OFF the WALL — Urban Art Festival, a youth art competition designed to encourage kids to…

Gamers On

Today, video-game competitions are serious business, with tens of thousands of dollars in prize money at stake, sponsorship deals and all the other trappings of a big-league sport. But there was a time when video game competitions were much simpler – and probably a lot more fun, too. If you…

Natural Energy

With six galleries, there’s always something eye-catching and thought-provoking at MCA Denver, and tonight the museum will unveil two exhibits at the same time. On the first floor, in the Photography Gallery, is Kevin O’Connell, a show curated by former MCA staffer John Grant. O’Connell is a well-known Colorado photographer…

Cultural Visionaries

Herb and Dorothy Vogel are not typical art collectors. They began quietly, buying works here and there in the early 1960s, when nobody was paying attention to the minimalist and conceptual artists littering the landscape. To continue growing their collection, they decided to live on Dorothy’s librarian salary alone and…

Busch League

In the right hands, the Charles Busch formula – camp up a film niche, turn it into a simultaneous homage and parody, then throw in a guy in drag – is fail-safe funny for anyone already enamored with pop culture. Such is the case with a new production of Die…

Dog Wild

Any metro-area denizen who’s ever been surprised by a fox crossing the alley or a blue jay squawking in a backyard tree won’t be surprised to learn that the city is teeming with wildlife, if you just know where to look. But with that knowledge comes a certain responsibility, and…

Let’s Roll

There’s no community like bike community. It’s a cooperative society that rolls softly and carries a big wrench, so it’s no wonder Chris Loffelmacher at the Denver Public Library’s Fresh City Life saw in it a big DIY-inspired opportunity just waiting to be mined. “People (heart) their bikes,” he says,…

Mountaintop Mateys

Renaissance fairs are pretty much old hat: Dress up in tights, speak in faux olde English, eat a roast turkey leg, watch the Society for Creative Anachronism knock the hell out of each other with padded swords, yadda yadda. So to spice up the local medieval festival, Pagosa Springs added…

Now Showing

Damien Hirst. You’d have to be living under a rock — or have absolutely no interest in contemporary art — not to know that Damien Hirst is a superstar, and that everything he makes is worth millions of dollars apiece. The tight solo at MCA Denver (formerly known as the…

Now Playing

Annie. Boulder’s Dinner Theatre is at the top of its form; it has to be. How else could the company make Annie — its mandatory summer family show — anything but a smirking sentimental bore? As everyone knows by now, the story of Annie concerns a little red-haired girl’s rough…

Countdown at the Boulder Public Library

The astronaut drama Countdown is a curio from both a historical and filmic standpoint. The movie, co-starring James Caan and Robert Duvall, both pre-Godfather, arrived in 1968, a year before the initial moon landing, but at a point when it was clear the United States was on the verge of…

An unlikely couple shares history in A Hint of Winter

In terms of both sensibility and mission, theater director Terry Dodd and the Barth Hotel are made for each other. The Barth, a beautiful nineteenth-century structure, is owned by Senior Housing Options, a charitable organization originally created to provide shelter for the poor and homeless displaced during Denver’s 1970s oil…