The (Emergent) Play’s Still the Thing

The Colorado New Play Summit at 20 What follows is an anecdote — “as told to” but hardly apocryphal. During the recently concluded Colorado New Play Summit, a group of theater-fond women, who had walked from their towering apartment building on 15th street to the Helen Bonfils Theatre Complex, expressed their concern about the annual […]

Denver Center Theatre Company Announces Full Cast and Creative Team for Rock Musical, Next to Normal

DCTC announces cast and creative team for the Tony Award-winning rock musical, Next to Normal, opening in Spring 2026. OFFICIAL TICKETS: Visit the Next to Normal show detail page for verified tickets, seat maps, and pricing. “What moves me most about Next to Normal is its unflinching honesty. This musical invites us to confront the complexities of mental […]

The Best Ways to Relax Before an Audition or Interview

From deep breaths and nutrient-dense food to arriving on time, these five tips can make that next audition or interview go smoothly.   It’s completely normal to be nervous before an audition or interview, but you don’t have to let that control the situation. In fact, calming the nerves before the big event helps tremendously, […]

Denver Fencing and Sword Fighting Classes for the Swashbuckler in You

This article was originally published in 2024 and was updated in 2026.   Whether it’s William Shakespeare’s Hamlet or Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera, period stories of love and revenge often feature sword fights, duels, and derring doo. Feeling like a swashbuckler, yourself? While DCPA Education regularly offers various classes in stage […]

34-Year DCTC Veteran, Lisa Orzolek, Discusses Scenic Design and Problem Solving

When Lisa Orzolek first began working as the second scenic assistant at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts in 1992, the Theatre Company was producing The Grapes of Wrath based on John Steinbeck’s novel about the Joads of Oklahoma, forced to migrate west by a convergence of Depression Era economics and environmentally wrought disaster.  […]

All the World’s Our Stage

Impact of the Denver Center Theatre Company’s New Play Development In its inaugural season, the DCPA’s Theatre Company offered a five-play season including its first-ever world premiere, Passing Game by Steve Tesich. By season five, the Company’s commitment to new play development was formalized with a festival of public readings lasting 15 seasons. In 2005/06, […]

The Historical Setting of Godspeed

POST- CIVIL WAR In 1865 Texas, chaos prevailed. The Civil War ended on April 9 of that year, but the news spread sporadically and in much of the state, enslaved Black people didn’t learn they were free until June 19, when Union Gen. Gordon Granger proclaimed it upon landing in Galveston. Although Black people were […]

Set Design: Putting a Western in Motion

To create the 1865 Texas of Terence Anthony’s Godspeed, the design team had several challenges to confront. The first was how to create the journey at the heart of the play when the theatre was in the round.  “It was actually quite a big challenge in terms of the conceptual shift that everybody had to make, since the […]

Playwright Terence Anthony discusses Godspeed

Playwright Terence Anthony spoke with the DCPA when his play, Godspeed, was featured in the 2024 Colorado New Play Summit. Now, it comes to the stage in a fully produced world premiere running January 30-February 22, 2026 in the Kilstrom Theatre. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. View the original interview on […]