Lonely Hearts and Lofty Ladies shares the history of aircraft nose art

When it comes to home-grown decoration of military aircraft, Matthew Burchette knows it all — from topless cherry-picking pin-ups of the ’40s to the consumer-culture imagery of the present. And the high-flying Wings Over the Rockies air and space museum curator will share his knowledge during a free lecture at…

Rudy Ch. Garcia takes us inside The Closet of Discarded Dreams

In Rudy Ch. Garcia’s debut novel, The Closet of Discarded Dreams, a man awakens in a strange, surreal world made up of dreams — his own, and everyone else’s. In this bizarre place, Che Guevara and Marilyn Monroe debate philosophy and no one ever dies, but not everything is as…

Everything adds up as the LIDA Project embarks on its 18th season

Remember when you turned eighteen? Maybe you felt like you’d seen it all — but more likely, you knew that a grand personal story was about to unfold. You felt excited and afraid. But how about a theater company? What about Brian Freeland and the LIDA Project, a company that’s…

Reader: You can’t trust a pit bull type dog

Have pit bulls gotten a bad rap? That’s the premise behind Beyond the Myth, Libby Sherrill’s documentary on the misconceptions about the animals that screened last night at the Mayan, in the heart of a city that bans the breed. And despite all the information that Sherrill lays out in…

Pit bull paranoia: Screening of Beyond the Myth tonight

Denver is no stranger to pit bull controversy. As one of the pit-bull hotbeds of the country, the city has seen breed-specific legislation prevent the animals from residing within city limits. But tonight, director Libby R. Sherrill hopes to enlighten residents of Denver with a special, one-night-only screening of her…

Photos: Meet the local artists behind Westword‘s best-looking boxes

The annual Westword Music Showcase is always a good time, but in one small but noticeable way, this year’s event has become a permanent street party. During the course of the 2012 musical mayhem, eight local artists shared their time, paint and skills with Westword to completely re-envision our traditional…

Gary Hart on his new novel, Citizens United and stubborn Republicans

Over the last four decades Gary Hart has been a major force in politics — from “inventing” the Iowa caucuses while managing George McGovern’s 1972 presidential campaign, to unintentionally creating the template for political sex scandals with the “monkey business” photo during his 1987 run for the Democratic presidential nomination,…

Help Luminous Thread Productions kickstart their dream in Denver

If you were at the Denver County Fair in August, you might have caught a steampunk vibe in the air — thanks to the amassed presence of the Colorado Steampunks and the Denver Victoriana & Steampunk Society, all decked out in their beautiful costumes. Among their ranks were world travelers…

Reader: Noah Van Sciver’s illustrations suck

The city of Denver is known for its various breeds of beer geeks, outdoor enthusiasts and sports nuts, but the varied climate of the Denver music scene inspires a particularly diverse group of enthusiasts. Over on the Backbeat blog, our field guide to music fans offers some useful tips for…

Now Showing

Clyfford Still. For the opening of the Clyfford Still Museum, director Dean Sobel has installed a career survey of the great artist that starts with the artist’s realist self-portrait and features his remarkable post-impressionist works from the 1920s. Next are Still’s works from the ’30s, with some odd takes on…

An amoral Richard Gere explores extreme privilege in Arbitrage

Slick and grown-up as Richard Gere himself, this intricate fiscal thriller gets a dead bead on extreme privilege, with Gere’s Madoff-like billionaire fund-runner scrambling to keep his personal empire from crumbling like crackers. He has everything — including a loving family, a hot French girlfriend (Laetitia Casta) and that warm…

Sleepwalk With Me tells more than it shows

It’s pretty Pollyannaish to complain when companies that are in the business of making money on movies make certain movies solely to make money. And yet it seems to be widely acceptable to be cynical about big-budget movies that are made, marketed and released in order to sate an appetite…

By going undercover, The Ambassador earns its suspension of disbelief

The blitzkrieg of award season is right around the corner, and with it, we can expect an onslaught of stunt performances designed to wow Academy voters and feature editors (and also viewers?) with their evident degrees of difficulty and demonstrable totality of transformation. With Daniel Day-Lewis having strapped on the…

The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity is absorbing, funny and smart

The opening moments are pulse-poundingly exciting — music, live wrestling, flashing lights, tons of adrenaline from an already hyped-up audience. But the actual scripted beginning of The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Diety is quiet, as a Puerto Rican kid called Macedonio Guerra — Mace — describes his lifelong fascination with…