Bovine Metropolis is a fine, cozy venue, the people who run it are lively and friendly, and I’ve seen good comedy there. But The Mammas & the Papparazzis is simply not ready for prime time, either in terms of material or performance quality. Each and every one of the six…
A year or two ago, the Industrial Arts Theatre Company took over an old movie house on Federal Boulevard. It’s always a good thing when artists move into a funky neighborhood, and the Industrial group is no exception. But the company needs to put more thought and care into the…
Cabaret. Cabaret is grim and distressing, and there’s not a hint of redemption anywhere in it. Quite the contrary. But this is a bloody good production, the kind of production that could — and should — attract all kinds of people who might never think of setting foot in a…
Of this summer’s three productions, The Comedy of Errors is the one most in tune with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s slogan, “Shakespeare Under the Stars.” It’s funny, bright, relaxed and magical, the perfect amusement for a soft summer night. Comedy of Errors is an early work based on the comedy…
Menopause The Musical is as much a phenomenon as a piece of theater. As my friend and I entered the New Denver Civic Theatre, we walked into a wall of laughter and chatter. There were women everywhere — in twos and threes, in throngs, elderly women, middle-aged women, young women…
Antony and Cleopatra. Director Robert Benedetti states in the program notes that he has brought a Hollywood sensibility to this text, but the CU production remains stagnant and difficult to follow, perhaps because so many of the actors garble their lines. Antony has been neglecting his duties in Rome for…
When I was in my early teens and an aspiring actress, I read a book by Richard Boleslavsky titled Acting: The First Six Lessons. As I remember, one of these lessons is about a young actress who’s been cast as Ophelia. Although she has found the necessary emotion in herself,…
Jules Massenet’s The Juggler of Notre Dame (Le Jongleur de Notre Dame) was first performed in 1902, and until Central City Opera took it on, it hadn’t been staged in the United States for half a century. It’s a medieval tale, with an essentially timeless theme — the same story…
Antony and Cleopatra. Director Robert Benedetti states in the program notes that he has brought a Hollywood sensibility to this text, but the CU production remains stagnant and difficult to follow, perhaps because so many of the actors garble their lines. Antony has been neglecting his duties in Rome for…
All right, I’ll confess: I really didn’t want to see the PHAMALy (Physically Handicapped Amateur Musical Actors League, Incorporated) production of Guys and Dolls. In principle, I’m all for the idea of a troupe of handicapped actors putting on a show, and I had no doubt such a project would…
I suppose if I’d done my homework, I’d have been less disappointed by Central City Opera’s production of The Student Prince. Other than a vague memory of some infectiously rousing drinking songs, I knew nothing about the operetta. I thought it would have the dizzy, stylish melodiousness of Johann Strauss…
Antony and Cleopatra. Director Robert Benedetti states in the program notes that he has brought a Hollywood sensibility to this text, but the CU production remains stagnant and difficult to follow, perhaps because so many of the actors garble their lines. Antony has been neglecting his duties in Rome for…
I’d like to write one of those judicious “on the one hand this, on the other hand that” reviews of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s Antony and Cleopatra. I’d like to draw attention to sparks of life and ingenuity, fine moments in the major performances and interpretations of the smaller roles…
Cabaret. Cabaret is grim and distressing, and there’s not a hint of redemption anywhere in it. Quite the contrary. But this is a bloody good production, the kind of production that could — and should — attract all kinds of people who might never think of setting foot in a…
Joel Fink’s Romeo and Juliet at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival could have been called The Nurse and Mercutio Show, because those two characters almost romped off with the play. Okay, that’s a bit reductive. The production had other strengths and floated a few good ideas, but the climax wasn’t heart-wrenching,…
There’s the occasional salacious gesture in Cabaret, a vanishing flash of naked butt, a blurring of sexual “isms” — homo, tran, pan, hetero, who cares? — a lost and libidinous leading lady who has an abortion. But I don’t think that’s what is keeping much of the regular Boulder Dinner…
Born to Be Loud. Born to Be Loud consists of a string of songs from the late ’50s to the ’80s. Some are sung straight, some satirized, some clearly intended as an homage to a particular band or performer; they’re stitched together with all kinds of humor and hokum, and…
South Pacific is so filled with terrific music — beautiful love songs like “Some Enchanted Evening,” “This Nearly Was Mine” and the haunting “Bali Ha’i,” lively comic songs like “A Cockeyed Optimist,” “There Is Nothin’ Like a Dame” and “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair” — that…
There are a lot of people who wouldn’t dream of attending an opera. They think of operas as outdated, frequented by the old, rich and pretentious, and featuring incomprehensible plots, elaborate costumes and scenery, great washes of sentiment, fat people pouring out endless arias, and dead people who inexplicably get…
Circe. “Circe” — Chapter Fifteen evokes a stream of ideas and images that flow by faster than they can be absorbed, although on one level they’re very familiar — all that grotesque and hilarious stuff dealing with sex, shame, religion, transsexuality, myth, politics, food, lust, greed, shame, sex, religion, dirt,…
My reaction to Germinal Stage’s “Circe” — Chapter Fifteen was a lot like my reaction to James Joyce’s Ulysses in general. It began with impatience and drifting attention. Then I found myself fascinated and riveted as the play evoked a stream of ideas and emotions that flowed by faster than…
George Burns, having just died, finds himself in limbo. To enter heaven and reunite with his professional partner and beloved wife, Gracie Allen, he has to audition for God. The audition is a recounting of his life. Burns was born Nathan Birnbaum on the New York’s Lower East Side. The…
