Blonde Leading the Blonde

When Reese Witherspoon agreed to star in the 2001 vehicle Legally Blonde, she probably had no clue that the lighthearted comedy — about a sorority sister who follows an ex-boyfriend to Harvard Law School to prove she’s, like, got substance, too! — would be nominated for a Golden Globe, spawn…

They Really Are a Scream

The Addams Family debuted in the pages of The New Yorker in 1938 as cartoonist Charles Addams’s creepy creation: a wealthy family who loved all things macabre — from dressing in black to reveling in misery. More than seventy years later, the family is deeply embedded in cultural history, with…

Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber: “Jesus-y while being socially progressive”

Nadia Bolz-Weber is an ordained Lutheran minister and founder of the House for all Sinners and Saints — but her sleeve tattoos and sailor’s mouth are an immediate tip-off that this woman ain’t your momma’s minister. Beyond these obvious social cues, Bolz-Weber’s view of theology also sets her apart: Tapping…

Now Showing

Bryan Nash Gill. The front space at Goodwin Fine Art is filled with an installation by nationally known Connecticut artist Bryan Nash Gill, who uses wood as both his material and his method. Nash has created two cubes made of cut-up pine beams. One, left in its natural color, has…

Lorene Scafaria’s apocalypse film lacks a sense of urgency

Apocalypse movies are a venerable enough genre (and reliable box-office cash spigots) to support a few lightweight, funny-sad-romantic entries every once in a while. Given the right touch, this approach can be just the antidote to the idea-free, effects-laden blockbusters and art-house pity parties that dominate the form; it’s conceivable…

The heroine of Brave socks it to Disney’s pink princesses

With her flame-colored ringlets, Merida, the barely adolescent heroine of Pixar’s thirteenth feature, looks like a wee Rebekah Brooks, maybe a pint-sized Florence Welch. Despite these resemblances, Merida remains an original: Brave, set in the Scottish Highlands in the tenth century, is the animation studio’s first film with a female…

The Oscar Wilde Experience feels like a warm evening among friends

The Oscar Wilde Experience feels less like a full-fledged theater production than a warm, pleasant evening spent with friends. The show is in the Byers-Evans House, which was built in 1883; with its dark wood furnishings, shadowy corners and shelves of old books, it provides the perfect backdrop for an…

A teacher helps a community heal in Monsieur Lazhar

A blanket of white covers Montreal inside and out in Monsieur Lazhar, the understated, affecting Canadian drama recently nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar. The schoolyard where Alice (Sophie Nélisse) and Simon (Émilien Néron) exchange their usual morning jabs is capped with snow, and their classroom is filled with…

Noah Van Sciver goes to the Denver Zoo

Editor’s note: Westword cartoonist Noah Van Sciver paints the town like nobody else, as demonstrated in his recaps of visits to the Denver Art Museum, the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, our own Artopia, MCA Denver and StarFest 2012. (Make sure you read Noah’s blog for more comics and…

Top five: Stop whining and enjoy the summer already

In the midst of these 100 degree days, it’s easy to forget how much summer rules. We spend all of this time talking — or worse, complaining to total strangers in line at a coffee shop, on the bus, at the gas station — about how hot it is (as…

Cupcake Wars champ Doron Petersan on Sticky Fingers’ Sweets

Doron Petersan is the owner of Sticky Fingers Sweets & Eats shop in Washington, D.C., but folks around here know her as the vegan cupcake warrior who slayed the Food Network’s Cupcake Wars and Cupcake Wars All-Stars competition, alongside Sticky Fingers’ head baker Jenny Webb. Petersan’s become something of a…

Photos: People in their undies at PrideFest 2012

What better time to strip down than on a hot June weekend? And what better place to do it than at Denver PrideFest, where we found attendees fighting for their right to get nearly naked all weekend long, from Friday night’s Drag Nation at Tracks nightclub through the Pride Parade…

Captain America is really popular in Denver

This past weekend we saw Captain America at a few different spots in Denver and Boulder, and while last summer’s film left movie-goers unsatisfied, his role in The Avengers has returned him to the list of most popular super heroes. Here’s where we spotted Captain American this weekend…