The musical Water for Elephants is bringing the circus to Denver this February. In preparation for the titular pachyderm’s arrival, I spoke with Maura Davis, curator of large mammals at Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance, to learn more about Denver Zoo’s six Asian elephants: Groucho, Bodhi, Billy, Jake, Baylor, and Duncan. Our following conversation has been […]
How Water for Elephants unlocks the third dimension Most musicals are two-dimensional. That’s not a put-down; it’s a spatial reality. Stages are two-dimensional surfaces, and the actors who travel them are typically limited to two degrees of freedom: they can move upstage or downstage, stage right or stage left. A notable exception is if the […]
With winter solstice fast approaching and Goodnight Moon about to enter the final month of its Denver Center run (now through Jan 25, 2026), there’s never been a better time to say “Hello, Moon.” So I met up with Mitch Slevc, Educator Performer at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, in order to […]
In Dracula, the 19th-century novel by Bram Stoker, the eponymous count travels from Transylvania to the English town of Whitby. It’s a long trip (more than 1,200 miles as the bat flies), but not quite as long as the journey that’s taken Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors from New York City to its six-month run […]
Denver’s lion population will soon be doubling. On October 23, Simba, Nala, and their fellow big cats will return to the Buell Theatre for the Denver Center’s production of The Lion King. In anticipation of the pride’s arrival, I spoke with some of the wildlife experts at Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance, where Denver’s real-life lions […]
Fall. Autumn. The Great De-Leafing. No matter what you call it, harvest season is upon us, and with it comes an array of corn-themed activities for the discerning Denver pleasure seeker. From Denver Botanic Gardens’ annual corn maze to the Denver Center for the Performing Arts’ upcoming production of Shucked, Denverites have more ways than […]
Theatre job titles are often self-explanatory. Actors act. Playwrights write plays. Costume designers, surprise surprise, design costumes. By these standards, the title of dramaturg is downright cryptic. So I reached out to Martine Kei Green-Rogers, dramaturg for the Denver Center Theatre Company production of The Hot Wing King, to gain some more insight into dramaturgy […]
Horror comedies are like Hawaiian pizza: they combine two elements that, on paper, should never work together. Ham and pineapple seem destined to clash, but there’s something about the pizza format that turns the meat-fruit combo into something greater than the sum of its parts. The same goes for the onstage horror comedy; except in […]
I will be frank: the Denver Center Theatre Company production of Little Shop of Horrors has shaken my gardening confidence. If the story of Mushnik’s Flower Shop taught me one thing, it’s that plant care is a life-threatening and morally fraught enterprise. So, with spring and a sense of doom in the air, I made […]
Less than a year after her Henry Award-winning production of The Lehman Trilogy, Margot Bordelon is returning to the Denver Center Theatre Company (DCTC) to direct the world premiere of Sandy Rustin’s The Suffragette’s Murder. Set in 1857, The Suffragette’s Murder follows the eclectic residents of a New York City boarding house as they try […]