Even the most accomplished guitarists do a double take when they hear Pat Donohue on A Prairie Home Companion, where the versatile finger-style picker has masterfully performed in the shadow of host Garrison Keillor for at least a decade. Donohue can finesse anything acoustic — jazz, blues, folk, you name…
Anybody can take a tour and be told what to think about a work of art. Alison Croney at the Museum of Contemporary Art would rather get adults — and their kids — thinking for themselves about what they see. Enter Smart Brunch Sundays. Every other week, Croney leads parents…
These days, most folks who attend standup gigs featuring British transplant John Oliver, who arrives for a two-night run today, know what to expect from his contributions to The Daily Show — and that’s lucky for him, since those who come in cold aren’t always as receptive. “You have to…
“Sassy, strong and relevant” is how the Urban Bush Women describe themselves. Since 1984, this New York City ensemble has sought to bring the untold and under-told histories and stories of the disenfranchised to light through dance. Their latest collaboration — in which they join the men of Compagnie Jant-Bi,…
“There’s an untold story about this guy who was a muse for several different social movements, and he was born and bred in Denver,” says KBDI Channel 12’s Heather Dalton. She’s talking, of course, about Neal Cassady, aka the notorious Dean Moriarty from Jack Kerouac’s Beat bible On the Road…
Zen master, artist and author John Daido Loori has a point to make. At a reception, film screening and gallery talk titled “Art and Environmental Activism” — which takes place tonight in conjunction with Loori’s fine-art photography exhibit, The Tao of Water — the artist says he’s going “to try…
The organizers of this year’s Bud Light Spring Jam in Aspen/Snowmass are pulling out all the stops. The eighth annual snowfest will extend over three weekends, continuing each Friday, Saturday and Sunday through April 6. Brand-spankin’-new this year is the Gretchen Bleiler Invitational, bringing together the world’s top female snowboarders…
When choosing this year’s MasterMinds — five arts groups that are changing the cultural landscape of Denver — Creative Music Works was a no-brainer. And that was before we knew that CMW — an unsung hero of the local scene that has been bringing great, far-from-mainstream acts to town for…
When George W. Bush was elected president, he promised to work with Republicans and Democrats alike. But former Colorado senator Gary Hart’s efforts to reach across the aisle were rebuffed, and he admits that he feels “silly, because it now turns out that they didn’t have even a thin idea…
Yup. It’s true. Sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words, huh? Now if you’ll excuse me, I suddenly feel some pressure to go do about a bazillion crunches. — Steven J. Burge…
Here begins the saga of the pajamas letter. One evening several weeks ago, I stopped by the Wells Fargo branch at 17th Avenue and Broadway to deposit the considerable amount of money I regularly make as a gainfully employed writer. Unfortunately, the deposit-envelope receptacle next to the machine appeared to…
Move over, Brangelina! Peace, out, Zac and Vanessa! Denver’s got its own version of the Entertainment Power Couple in the form of this delicious duo now appearing in Conundrum Production’s Contrived Ending. Jamie Ann Romero stars alongside her real-life love interest, Matt Mueller, in this Breakfast Club-inspired coming-of-age story by…
This year, Converse celebrates its hundredth anniversary — and it’s launching the Century footwear collection to commemorate the occasion. There is plenty to celebrate, too, since Converse shoes have been a staple in the wardrobes of fashion icons from James Dean to Kurt Cobain. Converse first appeared on my style…
Was Dr. Seuss, né Theodor Seuss Geisel, oblivious to his own genius? The allegory of his charming Horton Hears a Who! remains fluid today, and like its crafty rhymes, ebbs and flows with the times. The conviction of an innocent pachyderm known as Horton to stand up against tyranny and…
Near the beginning of The Counterfeiters, a fact-based Holocaust drama by Austrian filmmaker Stefan Ruzowitzky, we meet Jewish money forger and former jailbird Salomon Sorowitsch (brilliantly played by Karl Markovics), packing to flee Berlin in 1936 with a suitcase full of fake money. We know from an opening coda that…
For the crime of obliterating high culture, for the crime of getting off on vicarious degradation — and, above all, for the crime of sitting through any movie that resembles the one he’s (re)made — Michael Haneke sentences you (me, us) to Funny Games. Scratch that: to a second fucking…
You’ll know in the first few minutes exactly what Patapon has going for it. There’s the goofy premise, which casts you as the tribal god Patapon, lord of a band of creatures called, imaginatively enough, Patapons — little savages that are basically eyeballs with arms and legs. Then there’s the…
…And Justice for All: Special Edition (Sony) Appleseed Ex Machina (Warner Bros.) August Rush (Warner Bros.) Bee Movie (DreamWorks) Black Widow (Fox) Dan in Real Life (Buena Vista) Def Comedy Jam: D.L. Hughley (HBO) Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Heroes Volume 3 (Fox) Hitman (Fox) Housewife, 49 (Acorn) Lil’ Bush: Resident…
Over the last few years, Curious had become somewhat peripheral on the mental map where I chart the progress of Denver’s serious theater companies. Curious’s casting was often uneven, and its choice of material occasionally poor. With last month’s 9 Parts of Desire, however, the company moved into strong focus,…
I really don’t know why I get such pleasure out of returning to Heritage Square Music Hall again and again to watch pretty much the same kind of entertainment — though obviously with variations — but I do. The current production, The Baseball Show, is actually a remount of Take…
Contrived Ending. This play is local author Josh Hartwell’s homage to the movies and, in particular, to the old-fashioned art house. All the action takes place on a beautifully detailed and realistic facsimile of a cinema lobby, and the play actually sounds and feels like a lot of movies — Reality…
The Society for Photographic Education (www.spenational.org) will hold its 45th annual national conference at the Adam’s Mark Hotel this weekend, bringing about a thousand professionals in photo-based occupations to town. It’s too late to register, but there are limited day and sessions passes available, as well as an Exhibits Fair…
