It’s March, the month of college basketball brackets and St. Patrick’s Day. But don’t worry: While the rest of your office is busy throwing money away pretending to care about college hoops and drinking shitty green beer, there’s plenty of great geek fun to be had. March’s ten best geek…
Nikki Glaser is a New-York based comedian with a formidable list of credits and an immediately engaging performance style. Despite their raunchy subject matter, Glaser’s jokes are wryly observant and leavened by her considerable charm. Glaser has appeared on @Midnight and Last Comic Standing, as well as the The Tonight Show with Jay Leno until recently, Glaser could be seen co-hosting The Nikki and Sarah Show on MTV. Glaser has a soft spot in her heart for Colorado; she performed her first set at CU Boulder and appeared the pilot episode of the Grawlix’s Those Who Can’t.This friday, Glaser returns to our beloved city to headline Sexpot Comedy’s Weirdo Olympics.
The Weirdo Olympics will also feature sets from David Gborie, who’s one of San Francisco’s funniest dudes, as well local favorites Kevin O’Brien, Sam Tallent and Sexpot’s go-to emcee, Jordan Doll. The show starts at 8 p.m. Friday, February 28, at the Oriental Theater. Tickets are $15.
In advance of the Weirdo Olympics, Westword caught up with Glaser to discuss the end of her show, having a bit stolen, and why she’d move to Denver if she could.
Last produced four years ago, Jugged Rabbit Stew is one of Buntport’s best shows, a startling and peculiar mix of comedy, sadness, magic, craziness and erudition that only this troupe could produce. And this revival brings back Evan Weissman, a longtime member who left — sort of — a while…
The Lyons begins with a fairly familiar premise: a deathbed vigil featuring the protracted dying of a Jewish patriarch, Ben, and the shallow chatter of Rita, his wife. This cancer-ridden father isn’t wise or long-suffering, however. He’s a mean-spirited monster of blind ego with perhaps one single redeeming feature: He…
Comedian TJ Miller has a commitment to comedic absurdity that has served him well throughout his career. From his roots in the Chicago improv scene, Miller emerged as one of the city’s most unique standups, remarkable for his madman charisma. In short order, Miller stole scenes and joined impressive ensemble casts in movies like Our Idiot Brother and Yogi Bear 3D. All the while, Miller’s hometown of Denver has remained close to his heart and channeled into song on Miller’s Extended Play E.P.from Comedy Central Records. It’s an exciting time for Miller, with Silicon Valley a new HBO series set to premiere on April 6th and a movie, Search Party, due this summer.
This week, Denver’s prodigal comic returns to his hometown for two nights of shows as a part of his No Cancellations tour. He’ll performing wednesday night at Boulder’s Fox Theatre. Doors open at 8:30pm for the 9:00pm show. General admission tickets are $20. On thursday, he’ll be at the Gothic Theatre. Doors open at 7:00pm for the 8:00pm show. Tickets are $20.50 in advance and $23 on the day of show.
Westword caught up with Miller for phone interview to discuss his tour, bringing absurdity to morning news shows, and why he always brings his best to Denver.
The tech crew at the Denver Center Theatre Company includes some of the best people in the country, and their budget is clearly generous, but their work can only carry a production so far. The set for Hamlet is a subtle wonder of stone and steel, offering frequent glimpses of…
Black Odyssey. Based on Homer’s epic, Black Odyssey tells the story of a soldier, Ulysses Lincoln, coming back from a tour of duty in Afghanistan. Like his namesake, he is forced to wander for many years before he can return home, encountering supernatural beings and many strange adventures along the…
Ulysses is dying alone in a decrepit trailer in Paonia. When we first see him, there’s an oxygen tube taped to his chest and he’s frying sausages, naked except for an apron — which he’s put on not out of modesty, but to protect his private parts from splattering grease…
Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap opened at London’s New Ambassadors Theatre in 1952, moved to the St. Martin’s Theatre in 1974 and has continued its majestic trundle through theater history to become the longest-running show in the entire world. It’s like a lot of other English institutions — tea cozies, the…
Black Odyssey. Based on Homer’s epic, Black Odyssey tells the story of a soldier, Ulysses Lincoln, coming back from a tour of duty in Afghanistan. Like his namesake, he is forced to wander for many years before he can return home, encountering supernatural beings and many strange adventures along the…
February is winter’s death rattle. The roads are sludgy, the calendar is wonky, and there’s nothing to look forward to except Valentine’s Day –which can often seem more of a solemn obligation than a holiday anyway. Fortunately, there’s a diverse range of comedy events available to light up the otherwise bleak February entertainment landscape. Whether taking in comedian-produced shows with gross names like Tongue Stuff and Tits & Giggles, checking out veteran acts like Paul Mooney, Norm MacDonald, and Jeff Ross, or being a spectator at an Olympics for Weirdos, Denver comedy has a myriad of ways to keep you laughing until the sun comes back.
Playwright Marcus Gardley has won prestigious awards and been compared with such giants as August Wilson and Tennessee Williams for the poeticism of his language. But he’s also been criticized for writing plays that lack structure and for creating characters more symbolic than real. The Denver Center Theatre Company commissioned…
The Legend of Georgia McBride. Matthew Lopez’s The Legend of Georgia McBride makes for a bright, fast, entertaining evening, but there isn’t a lot of there there. Casey, an easygoing dreamer, has a wife he adores, Jo, and scrapes out the barest of livings as an Elvis impersonator at a…
It’s been in the works for a while, but Impulse Theater is finally parting ways with its home within the Wynkoop Brewing Company, where the performance space has been located for more than two decades. The long-running improv spot isn’t calling it quits; it’s looking for a new location. And…
Beth Stelling is a Los Angeles based comedian who has appeared on Conan, and recently won the internet on Comedy Central’s @Midnight. Her debut album Sweet Beth is available from Rooftop Comedy. Stelling, who cut her teeth in Chicago’s vibrant comedy scene is visiting Denver to co-headline Sexpot Comedy’s Ice Queens and Ice Wizards comedy showcase with Kate Berlant. In advance of the show, Westword caught up with Beth Stelling for an early morning phone interview punctuated by adorable kitten yawns to talk about Ice Queens, the tiny failures of open mics, and co-writing her play Five Lesbians Eating a Quiche.
The entrance to Edge Theatre is in a small, gray Lakewood strip mall, but once you open the door and step inside, you encounter a warm, colorful space that includes three rooms serving as galleries for local artists, a bar and — of course — the auditorium, cunningly curtained and…
Matthew Lopez’s The Legend of Georgia McBride, now receiving its world premiere at the Denver Center Theatre, began as a staged reading at last year’s New Play Summit. Lopez has two plays running in Denver right now, and both feature original and intriguing central concepts. In The Whipping Man, currently…
While beloved Colfax watering hole, the Park House tavern has been a well-regarded live music venue since opening their doors back in 2012, their foray into hosting comedy performances has been a more recent development. Beginning with Bobby Crane’s whimsically named “Jolly Trolley” open mic, the amiable Park House staff has welcomed Denver’s unwashed comics into the fold to utter deplorable things into their high-class sound-system week after week, quickly emerging as an essential part of a local comedian’s tuesday night itinerary. This friday, however, the Park House is doubling down on comedy, by mounting a new showcase featuring some of the funniest comics in town.
Chay Yew is a hot director who was in the news a year or two ago when he took over Chicago’s acclaimed Victory Gardens Theatre and made several controversial changes. The strife at the time, according to the New York Times, “recalls family melodramas like August Osage County or even…
Pablo Francisco is a comedian who has performed all over the world and appeared on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Mad TV. Reknown for his spot-on impressions and high-energy performances, Rodriguez is in town for a weekend of shows that kick off at 7:30pm tonight at the Denver Improv Westword caught up with Francisco to discuss his Dog the Bounty Hunter, performing comedy overseas, and Shotgun WIllies in a phone chat peppered with digressions and spot-on vocal impressions that print can’t really capture.
There are many narratives that celebrate the coming together of once intractable enemies — Arab and Israeli, peasant and landowner, torturer and tortured — with scenes showing growing comprehension, forgiveness, even respect and affection. But in 1865, immediately following the defeat of Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Appomattox,…
Two bastions of Denver’s DIY are closing up shop this year. The Festivus Film Festival, which was founded in 2007, and its spin-off the Laugh Track Comedy Festival ceased operation before the end of last year. Aside from providing many local comedians and filmmakers with a valuable opportunity to network and hone their craft for a hip audience, the festivals coalesced our scenes and paved the way for future festivals, like August’s High Plains Comedy Festival. Westword reached out to the founders and organizers of both festivals for their thoughts on the unfortunate conclusion of their passion project. Read on for their quotes and clips of highlights throughout the years.
