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Best Gender-Bending in a Musical

B. Hamlette, Chicago, Boulder's Dinner Theatre

Okay, his name is actually Brian Mallgrave, and he's an excellent and very intense young actor, but we'd never seen him like this before. It took several seconds after B. Hamlette's gliding, swooping entrance in Chicago before most of the audience realized he wasn't a she. As gossipy, credulous reporter Mary Sunshine, Mallgrave was simultaneously elegant and silly, stealing every scene that the character graced. And though it was hard to decide if it was a soprano or a countertenor, the voice was soaring and rich.

Best Singing in a Musical

Sweet Corner Symphony, Shadow Theatre Company

Sweet Corner Symphony was a doo-wop a cappella concert with amazing singing by Vincent Robinson, Ed Battle, Ken Parks, Dwayne Carrington and Hugo Jon Sayles. "Swanee" got the group's own satiric spin, and they also performed dozens of lesser-known songs. Ken Parks was mesmerizing as the ringleader: tall and heavyset in a gold-and-black dashiki, deploying his strong, mellow, expressive voice, shaking his head, gesturing, constantly on the move. Carrington provided powerful support with his bass baritone, and Hugo Sayles offered up a terrific falsetto. Vince Robinson radiated rhythmic good humor, and Ed Battle -- another knock-out performer -- had a couple of moving solos, including a version of the Lord's Prayer.

Best Dance Performance in a Musical

Savion Glover, Bring in 'Da Noise, Bring in 'Da Funk, Denver Center Attractions

Those Denverites who saw Savion Glover perform at the Buell will someday tell their children about it. He just may be the best tap dancer alive, certainly one of the best who ever lived. Glover, who began dancing at the age of eleven, makes music with his feet. Bring in Da Noise, which he also choreographed and for which he won a Tony, used tap, hip-hop, blues and percussion to tell the story of black people in America. This is not the tap we associate with Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly -- although Shirley Temple puts in a dizzying appearance. This dancing was loud, rough-driving and exuberant, but also complex and sophisticated. Glover alone could carry an evening, but for this production he gathered an extraordinary group of dance talents and gave them generous stage time. Unforgettable. Mind-blowing. Dazzling. Glover's show was all this and more.

Best Musical Number

"Springtime for Hitler", The Producers, Denver Center Attractions

Though some of us wondered why New York kicked up such a fuss about The Producers, the

"Springtime for Hitler" number made everything clear -- or almost so. The entire show builds to this moment, and when it comes, it's got the lot: a tease of a beginning, catchy tunes, chorines prancing about in '30s-style Hollywood headdresses that feature a beer stein, a pretzel and a sausage, black-helmeted storm troopers gliding forward in nightmarish rows, and a Hitler (Lee Roy Reams) who adopts a chilling world-conquering pose and then drops it to camp blithely all over the stage.

Best Actress in a Musical

Charley Izabella King, The Producers, Denver Center Attractions

Ulla was a Swedish sex bomb who longs to be a star. She was almost a cartoon, a flesh-and-blood Jessica Rabbit, and Charley Izabella King was a wonder in the role. Inhumanly gorgeous, wearing clothes that loved her body, she vamped around the stage and spoofed her own exaggerated accent. While limited to prancing, splits and high kicks, it was clear that King is a ballet-trained dancer. We'd never experienced seduction until we heard her croon, "Ulla likes Bblllllooom," lingering on each syllable like a cat lapping at cream.

Best Delivery of a Monologue

Dennis Rodriguez, Waiting for Godot, Bug Theatre

As Godot's Lucky, Dennis Rodriguez was called on to stand for long periods of time with his mouth open, his feet turned out and his knees slightly bent, looking like a clown, a puppet, something inanimate. His silent presence remained infused with feeling nonetheless. Then he began his speech, an incomprehensible monologue that must have been at least ten minutes long. Usually, audience attention wanders within a minute or two, so it's a testament to Rodriguez's conviction and the deftness of the direction that we listened to every word he spoke, trying to piece them together and make meaning even as Lucky spoke on and on and finally sputtered into complete incoherence.

Best Season for an Actor -- Small Company

Brett Aune, Curious Theatre Company/ Bug Theatre

Brett Aune is one of the finest actors around. He brought both passion and particularity to the role of Hal, the mathematics professor whose flirtation with the moody Catherine was tainted by self-interest in Curious's Proof. We believed he was brainy, yet he was also nerdily charming. As Vladimir in the Bug's Waiting for Godot, he was almost dapper, a spry music-hall figure in a neat black suit, and his delivery of Vladimir's final speeches was quietly moving. He also works generously with other actors. His patter with Gary Culig's Estragon was empathetic and perfectly timed; with Rebecca Buric Luna in Proof, he was vulnerable and disarming.

Best Season for an Actor -- Large Company

Keith L. Hatten, Denver Center Theatre Company

Keith L. Hatten has brought grace and vitality to a number of small roles over the past few years. No matter how little he has to do or say, you can always sense his character's inner life. Hatten was charming and funny in this year's Christmas Carol, stalwart as a servant in The Three Sisters. In John Brown's Body, he played a house slave, imbuing the role with such feeling and dignity that you didn't know whether to laugh or cry when he said he was "proud of my white folk. Proud of it all." With Blue-Orange, Hatten was finally given a lead role, and he performed it with jittery energy and humor.

Best Theater Season

Curious Theatre Company

Courtesy Buntport Theater Facebook page
In the past year, Curious Theatre Company has demonstrated its commitment to variety, quality and audience outreach. Under Chip Walton's direction, the company staged Proof, a well-made contemporary play illustrating the abstract beauty of mathematics; Nickel and Dimed, a piece that evolved from Barbara Ehrenreich's exposé of the plight of working Americans; and the farcical Bright Ideas. The standard of acting was high in all three, as were the technical values. The set for Proof was a meticulously designed house front and porch, while the Bright Ideas set looked like a tumble of children's blocks. And despite Nickel and Dimed's theme, the play was anything but polemical. Instead, it was full of laughter and shared humanity.

Best Eclectic Theater Season

Germinal Stage Denver

Where but at Germinal Stage Denver could you suffer through Edward Albee's truth-saturated Three Tall Women, giggle at the light comedy of Relatively Speaking, puzzle through one of Harold Pinter's most mysterious offerings, No Man's Land, and be reintroduced to Arthur Kopit, whose Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad was a 1960s sensation that is still savagely contemporary? Ed Baierlein has been expressing his own artistic vision at Germinal for thirty years, making no concessions to marketing, fashion or focus groups. The result -- whether you're watching Tennessee Williams or an obscure European playwright -- is independent, uncompromisingly intelligent theater.

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