Best Actor in a Musical 2007 | Scott Beyette | Best of Denver® | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Denver | Westword
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Best Actor in a Musical

Scott Beyette

With the theater's skilled performers having all kinds of fun with the nugatory plot and animating Gershwin's fabulous songs with their fine voices, Crazy for You was an evening of pure froth and fun. Scott Beyette was a lithe, leaping, tapping wonder as Bobby, a young man trying to revive an old theater out west and win the heart of a skeptical local lass. In furtherance of his plan, Bobby impersonated impresario Bela Zangler. When A.K. Klimpke as the real Zangler arrived in town, he and Beyette mimicked and mirrored each other's astonished reactions in a priceless extended sequence of mime.

Best Actress in a Musical

Jean Arbeiter

Aldonza is the peasant wench that Don Quixote insists is his beloved Dulcinea. Jean Arbeiter, a fine singer and actress, made her so dirty and fierce, so angered by Quixote's fulsome praise ("Once, just once, would you look at me as I really am?") that when she finally capitulated, singing gently to the dying old madman, it was hard to hold back tears.

Best Supporting Actor in a Musical

Geoffrey Kent

Among many fine performances in musicals this season, Geoffrey Kent's Officer Lockstock stood out. It's a very clever, funny role as written, and Kent played it with relaxed authority: He made the officer-narrator stiff-necked and formal, but every now and then threw in a moment of pure gyrating lunacy.

Best Supporting Actress in a Musical

Genevieve Baer

The best comics actually get inside their characters; no matter how outrageous the people they play, they force themselves to believe every idiotic word and gesture. Think of the rich gallery of characters created by Carol Burnett and Tracey Ullman. Genevieve Baer is in this camp. She's a very talented mimic (as well as a good singer), but the best thing about her portrayal of Little Sally in Urinetown was that she resisted the temptation to parody a part that's pure parody itself, making the character part knowing street kid, part wistful innocent and altogether funny and watchable.

Best Season for an Actor

Leonard Barrett

Leonard Barrett is a tremendously appealing actor whose jazz-singing background shows in his work; there's always something improvisational and unexpected about it, and also a hint of hidden depths. There's kindness and humor, too. As Norman in Bas Bleu's The Dresser, Barrett's job was to get an egotistical actor whose mind and career were both waning on to the stage as King Lear. A fussy, sad clown with a will of iron, Norman's entire life was wrapped up in the old actor's career. In another extraordinary performance, Barrett played the Stage Manager in PHAMALy's Our Town, a role that calls on the actor to speak directly to the audience. It wasn't that Barrett breached the fourth wall, exactly, but that when he spoke, it simply wasn't there. There was just the actor talking quietly, humorously and profoundly to your very soul.

Best Season for an Actress

Simone St. John

We saw a lot of Simone St. John this season, from her tightly wound Jocena in Shadow Theatre Company's Four Queens through the angry little spitfire she created for the same company's Waitin' 2 End Hell. But she really outdid herself in the lighthearted comedy Plenty of Time, aging convincingly from a bratty sixteen-year-old to a dignified matron as her character explored politics, work, marriage and the meaning of love. Finally, St. John appeared as Martha Washington's slave, Ona Judge, in Curious Theatre Company's production of A House With No Walls, bringing passion to an otherwise rather talky and didactic play. We can't wait to see who she becomes next.

Best Performance in a One-Person Show

Diana Dresser

This light comedy by Theresa Rebeck had many sharp lines, but it pretty much stayed afloat on the charm and talent of Diana Dresser, playing a young mother about to re-enter the dating scene. Dresser tried on various items of clothing and a few pairs of shoes, periodically asking the audience for an opinion. Prone on the bed, she wriggled into her pantyhose in one of the funniest scenes we'd encountered all year. She was scatty; she was brash; she was scared; she was vulnerable. And we were with her every step of the way. It's almost de rigueur for a female comic to be plain and to make a trademark of rueful comments about her looks, but there's also a tradition of scatty, beautiful comediennes, from England's gorgeous Kay Kendall, who died far too young in the late 1950s, to the effervescent Jenna Elfman of Dharma & Greg. Dresser could easily join these ranks, but we have a suspicion she's equally good at the serious stuff.

Best Direction of a Comedy

Jamie Horton

Okay, a cast consisting of John Hutton, Martha Harmon Pardee and Karen Slack gives a director a lot to work with, but under Jamie Horton's direction, these already fine actors shone even brighter. They worked with feeling and discipline, every gesture and intonation perfect. Written by Steven Dietz, Fiction was a great choice for Curious -- wordy and witty and raising questions about the link between fiction and reality, truth and lies. The cleanness and precision of Horton's production offset the ambiguity of the work the way a few drops of lemon juice can zing up the flavor of a dessert. Horton left Denver last year after decades of performing with the Denver Center Theatre Company, and we're only beginning to understand the depth of the loss we've sustained.

Best Season for a Director

Terry Dodd

This year, Dodd gave us both a beautifully conceived and executed version of Pinter's The Caretaker and the best production of The Weir we've seen in Denver. The Weir is an odd, spooky piece, a collection of ghost stories told by lonely souls in an isolated Irish pub. Dodd knew exactly how to bring out the strands of longing and meaning beneath the script, and his cast, led by the luminous Laura Norman, was uniformly compelling. In addition to a deep love and respect for theater, Dodd brings to his work a gentleness and sensitivity unique in this area.

Best Set -- Large Theater

The Clean House

Sarah Ruhl's play weaves elements of magic and mystery. Set in the expensive home of a couple of New York doctors and moving to a bright, sunny balcony, with a thematic focus on cleanliness and creative chaos, it requires a designer with a strong sense of color and contrast who's also interested in the dynamic between freedom and enclosure. Alexander Dodge created a gray-and-white set with cool, elegant lines that featured an abstract but vaguely human-looking sculpture. For the second act, walls began to dissolve along with the characters' limitations. The production's visual elements were so beautiful, they provided a stunning aesthetic experience in themselves, quite apart from the play.

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