Podcast: November reviews, news and headliners

John Moore winds downs True West Awards, Lincoln Center upgrades its sound and more

In this episode of the OnStage Colorado Podcast, hosts Toni Tresca and Alex Miller jump into what they’ve seen lately on stage, run through some arts news from around the state and discuss the week’s Top 10 Colorado Headliners. This week’s list:

• Job, Curious Theatre, Denver, through Dec. 7
• Jerry’s Girls, Veritas Productions/Mizel Center Denver, Nov. 13-23
• Daisy Violet the Bitch Beast King, Feather Fall/Dairy Arts Center in Boulder, Nov. 13-30
• Drag Queen Magic, Local Theater Company/e-Town in Boulder, Nov. 18
• Million Dollar Quartet Christmas, Candlelight, Johnstown, Nov. 20-Jan. 11
• Murder on the Orient Express, Viva Theater, Boulder Dairy Arts Center through Nov. 23
• The Elixir of Love, Boulder Opera at Dairy Arts Center, Nov. 15-16
• Angry, Raucous and Shamelessly Gorgeous, Vintage Theatre, Aurora, through Nov. 23
• Sherlock Holmes & the Greek Chorus, Theater Company of Lafayette, through Nov. 23
• A Doll’s House, Millibo Art Theatre, Colorado Springs, Nov. 13-23

Chapter Summary

Opening & Recent Viewing (00:00-10:00)

• Toni returned from Chicago visit, tried deep-dish pizza
• Alex reviewed John Elway documentary at Denver Film Festival
• Toni discussed Creed USA documentary about rural Colorado town’s political divides

Event Updates (10:00-14:00)

• Ballyhoo new venue grand opening in Denver’s Highlands (currently showing Hedwig and the Angry Inch)
• Dinos Alive exhibition at Exhibition Hub (recommended for kids under 7)

Colorado Theater News (14:00-23:00)

• Colorado Shakespeare Festival: No Original Practices in 2026 due to Mary Rippon Theatre renovation
• True West Awards: John Moore’s final year after 25 years
• OnStage Colorado: Third annual OSCAs coming in January; new website features include Theater FAQs and Discounts page
• Lincoln Center: New Meyer Leopard sound system installed in Fort Collins
• Denver Center New Play Summit: Feb 14-15, featuring four new play readings plus full productions of Cowboys and East Indians and Godspeed

Top 10 Show Recommendations (23:00-39:00)

Coming Next Week (39:00-end)

• Interview with Lee Kaplan of Debut Players about new Fort Collins theater space in former AMC theater
• Upcoming reviews: Dracula, Job, Jerry’s Girls, Daisy Violet, Wild Oscillation

Trancript

Alex Miller (00:00)
Hey, hey, hello and welcome to another episode of the OnStage Colorado podcast. I’m Alex Miller.

Toni Tresca (00:06)
And I’m Tony Tresca

Alex Miller (00:08)
And yeah, we took last week off and they were a little late this week because Tony you’re out of town. What were you up to?

Toni Tresca (00:15)
Yeah, I was out in Chicago. I was visiting my girlfriend’s family, which lives in Chicago, visiting slash meeting them for the first time in many cases. It went very well. And I got to try a shit ton of Chicago style food.

Alex Miller (00:30)
wow, did you get stuffed with pierogies and deep-dish pizza and stuff like that?

Toni Tresca (00:36)
I had three different types of pizza, multiple Chicago dogs. It was really good, very yummy. I think my favorite is definitely, really do like the deep dish. There is something about that that is really unique in style. Although I was told by multiple people in Chicago that they’re like, I just wanna let you know that that is a tourist thing. We don’t eat deep dish every single day in Chicago. It’s like maybe.

Alex Miller (00:41)
huh.

huh.

you

Ha ha ha ha.

Toni Tresca (01:04)
Twice a year we’ll get deep dish. And after eating it, I understand why. It’s just because it’s so filling. There’s so much pizza there.

Alex Miller (01:09)
Yeah.

Have you ever seen back in the day, John Stewart used to love to like harsh on on that kind of pizza from the point of view of a New York pizza and he’s like, it’s not a pizza. It’s a fucking casserole.

Toni Tresca (01:23)
You know what?

I understand that argument after eating it. It is very, very different than what we classify as pizza. ⁓

Alex Miller (01:31)
Yeah.

Great, well, that’s cool. And it went well. didn’t throw you out on your ear or anything like that and say, what did you bring this guy home for?

Toni Tresca (01:40)
No, luckily I did get to stay in the house. Thank God.

Alex Miller (01:44)
I’m sure they were delighted to meet you. yeah, so because of that, we didn’t see a whole lot of ⁓ theater. I had my granddaughters over the weekend, so I didn’t see anything. But I did want to talk about the Elway documentary, which was the final film that wrapped up the final night of the Denver Film Festival, which was really interesting. As I wrote in my review, was like, was the weirdest scene to see all these people. mean, the Ellie was like,

with people to see this film and there were all these people wearing, you know, Elway jerseys, you know, and then of course, interspersed with people in suits and evening gowns and stuff that you would normally see in the, in the Ellie. And there we were like cheering for things that had happened 30 years ago, know, during a play that happened 30 years ago. And Elway was out there in the front, it was like, my gosh, I haven’t seen paparazzi like that in a long time. I’d never, I…

Toni Tresca (02:10)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Alex Miller (02:36)
I tried to get in and take a picture, I couldn’t even get over the heads of all the cameras and stuff like that. So he was there and he had a big VIP section. But it was a lot of fun. It really was. mean, it was just like a, it was kind of like watching, you know, I guess multiple Broncos games with a whole bunch of Broncos fans. So that was from the point of view of Broncos fans. It was a lot of fun from point of view of a film that was very kind of…

kind of standard issue sports doc, you know, it was done by a couple of guys from NFL, NFL films, and it was endorsed or supported by the Broncos. So wasn’t like, you know, anything damning was going to come out. You know, they did touch on some of the darker parts of his life, you know, with this going through his divorce and stuff like that. But overall, it was, you know, pretty, pretty regular documentary. So if you’re a Broncos fan or, you know, really a football fan because he was one of the greats and certainly a big name in Denver. So that really was a lot of fun to get out to.

Toni Tresca (03:27)
That does sound like quite an interesting scene at the Ellie Cochkens. Not often that it’s filled with sports fans. It’s usually used for opera and live theater and things.

Alex Miller (03:30)
Yeah.

I know. Yeah,

there was a guy, a guy walked past with a Sutton jersey and Andy, I’m like, my God, that guy’s dork. I don’t think you can just wear any Broncos journey to Jersey. You had to have a tug at an Ellaway one. But anyway, so so and you you want to talk about one of the one of the films that you saw, which also had a theme, heavy Colorado theme.

Toni Tresca (03:56)
Yeah,

definitely. So was this documentary called Creed USA. We’ve talked about it on the show before and it centers on this really rural former mining town ⁓ in Colorado, Creed, which is home to the Creed Repertory Theater. And the documentary kind of starts as framing this conflict in this town as being between the kind of more liberal theater artists who are more transient by nature who come in during the summer and then kind of leave the town.

And then the residents who are more rural and rustic folks who kind of embrace the mining traditions of the town. And the documentary kind of sets it up like that. And that is a really intriguing premise. But then it evolves and kind of humanizes this really interesting debate over the health plan that’s going to be going in voted on by the school board. And so it kind of becomes this really interesting microcosm of the political divides that are.

⁓ articulated, like that are being felt around the country, should say, because this health plan is about whether or not to include inclusive language about trans and non-binary youth in the education system. And so that in this kind of small town with lots of big opinions on both sides creates really intense conversations. But then unlike here in Denver, where things are so spread out, where if you have a disagreement with somebody, you never have to see them again in Creed,

Alex Miller (04:55)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (05:20)
You kind of have to learn to live with these people, even if you vehemently disagree. And so I thought it was a really interesting case study in kind of how democracy works. And it’s not through no fighting and everything being okay, but it’s just kind of through constant conversation and a commitment to continuing to work together.

Alex Miller (05:42)
huh. That’s, that’s really cool. And, I’m really looking forward to seeing that one. it street? Is it going to be on Netflix? Is it on Netflix yet or.

Toni Tresca (05:49)
So right now there has not been any streaming plan announced. I was talking with the director and she said that they’re kind of currently in the middle of their festival run at the moment. So they’re hitting all these festivals and don’t want to announce kind of where it’s going. she said that they do have plans to eventually make it available to the wider public. So as soon as I hear some more, I’ll definitely update folks here on the podcast.

Alex Miller (06:00)
Okay.

Okay, great.

Toni Tresca (06:15)
Then on November 1st, so a little while ago, I went out and attended the grand opening of Ballyhoo. This is the new space in Highlands neighborhood in Denver created by Julia Tobey, who is a friend of the podcast. And we’ve been talking a little bit about this opening for a little while now, but it was really cool to actually see the venue totally realized, very colorful and packed.

with people. It was a really cold day, so the ribbon cutting that was supposed to be outside got moved inside, but that just really kind of emphasized how many people were all there. And yeah, there were theater people, but I was sitting next to some folks who were just residents of the neighborhood who had just shown up and kind of wandered in because they were curious about what all the hubbub was about.

Alex Miller (07:03)
huh, that’s great. Yeah, I’m looking forward to getting in there. I was going to try and stop by that day, but I didn’t get a chance to. But of course, right now they’ve got the remount of Hedwig and the Angry Inch up there in their theater. So that’s one that’s ⁓ definitely worth checking out if you haven’t seen it.

Toni Tresca (07:19)
Definitely and it it sounds like they have been selling very well So that’s really good to hear exciting that a lot of people are getting to experience the space But just a quick note if you’re going over there, I would definitely Allocate some additional time for parking because there is no parking lot there It’s all street parking in a residential business district of Highland So you just need to kind of block in some time and maybe be prepared to walk a couple blocks

Alex Miller (07:49)
Uh huh. Yeah, that can really be a drag. and I were out at show at Ogden a couple of weeks ago and just the parking is just, you know, and everybody’s trying to charge you 30 bucks to park, know, in their gas station or whatever. It’s just, it’s just part of life. And when you go on, go to shows in downtown, but what are you going to do?

Toni Tresca (08:10)
Yeah, unfortunately, I don’t think there’s really any, there’s no real nice solution. I was talking with Julia and she was like, yeah, unfortunately, parking is just kind of our biggest pain point. And there really is not a lot of room to knock something down. And you don’t want to knock down some of the historic buildings that are in that neighborhood to build a parking lot.

Alex Miller (08:28)
No.

Toni Tresca (08:30)
So I’m okay with walking in this case.

Alex Miller (08:33)
Okay. And then you had something on here, Dinos Alive. What was that?

Toni Tresca (08:38)
Yeah, so this is the latest immersive experience over at the exhibition hub. This is where they’ve done stuff like the Van Gogh exhibit, as well as that Titanic immersed that ⁓ came through a couple of months ago. And so I got a chance to go check it out. This is just kind of a dino themed installation. They’ve got 35 animatronic dinosaurs that are set up in kind of immersive environments throughout the exhibition hub and

It’s an interesting concept. They definitely put a lot of research into it, but I would not recommend this to anyone who is above the age of like six or seven. It’s definitely geared towards the little ones in your life. Not a lot there for you to grab on to if you’re an adult who has maybe already been exposed to dinosaurs in a plethora of media. ⁓

Alex Miller (09:26)
Well, I

happen to know a two year old boy who would probably really enjoy that. is my son Ezra is super into dino. So where is that again?

Toni Tresca (09:37)
It’s at the exhibition hub. It’s right off the highway in North Denver. So you’re kind of on the way out of town. It’s in a more of a warehouse-y district. There’s not a lot else going on over there.

Alex Miller (09:52)
Okay. All right. Good to know. And how did you wind up going to that? you doing a story about it for someone?

Toni Tresca (09:57)
Yeah, I was doing a story about it for Westward. And so I ended up going over there, touring it early. And I would say if you do find yourself at Dino’s Alive, definitely pay the extra five bucks to do the VR experience. I’m not normally a fan of that kind of technology, but the kind of display that they have, or I guess the VR experience that they have set up.

inside the exhibition hub is really interesting. You kind of start in a museum setting and then you wander through the actual kind of Jurassic periods and get to interact with the dinosaurs. It’s really, really cool and I would say worth that additional $5.

Alex Miller (10:38)
Okay, yeah, that’s definitely something to check out for the young ones, especially those kids that just can’t get enough dinosaurs. I don’t know what it is about dinos, but. So all right, well, let’s just shift over to some news that we’ve got. to kick off things, we had a comment from Lima Haley, whoever sees marketing and public relations for the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. And we were talking about their new season, we noted that they didn’t have a original practices show.

schedule which they usually do it’s it’s you know where they do just a couple of performances of a show as it would have been in back in the days of the globe and Shakespeare’s day so so she said you know she said they’re not going to present an original practices production in 2026 because all resources are focused on reopening the Mary Rippon outdoor theater a major undertaking future plans for the original practicing things are still TBD

And also she noted that there are three previews of Twelfth Night rather than the usual one because of the complexity of getting set up in a completely renovated space. So thanks, Lime, for letting us know about that. And we’ll look to maybe see original practices back in 2027 or not. Who knows?

Toni Tresca (11:45)
Yeah, I guess the future of that is definitely up in the air. I would be shocked if they don’t return though, given the popularity of them. They only did two shows and they sold out both of them. And I hear from the actors that they really enjoy doing the original practices as part of the overall festival experience. It’s something new, engaging to get to do near the end of the run. So if I was…

Alex Miller (11:54)
It sells out. Yeah.

I like that, yeah.

Toni Tresca (12:12)
a betting man, I would definitely place bets on seeing this return in a future season.

Alex Miller (12:17)
All right, what else has caught your ear?

Toni Tresca (12:20)
Yeah, this year is going to be the final year of John Moore’s ⁓ True West Awards. This is his annual 30 days of 30 bouquets to theater artists around Colorado. And I actually caught up with John Eck, the screening of Creed USA during the Denver Film Festival over at the Mayan Theater. And he told me that this was on the horizon, as well as a few other potential changes to his job.

But as he wrote on Facebook and told me vehemently when I asked him that that does not mean he is retiring, but it is the start of a change for him because he’s.

Alex Miller (12:57)
Yeah,

it is a huge undertaking. mean, to do 30, you what he calls bouquets, which means identifying the people, you know, interviewing them, doing a story and then rolling them out one day after another. That is a lot, a lot, a lot of work. So I don’t blame him, but I think a lot of people will miss it, but I’m sure there’s, he’ll be doing other things.

Toni Tresca (13:02)
Yeah.

Definitely, yeah. And he’s been doing it for almost 25 years. And he’s a very sentimental guy, as he says. And when it was also announced this year that UMS, the underground music showcase that he helped create, was also going to be winding down at 25 years, he kind of felt like maybe it would be nice to kind of wind these down as well. He started doing these over at the Denver Post. He’s now over at the Denver Gazette. He’s kept doing these awards the entire time.

really 30 days with 30 bouquets is not accurate. It’s actually 31 because he does a Colorado theater person like of the year on that 31st day. So it’s really 31 stories that he’s cranking out over the holiday season in addition to doing a ton of other reporting. And he just said that he had been hearing some feedback that his coverage kind of skews towards theater, which makes sense. He’s a theater.

Alex Miller (13:57)
All right. Uh-huh.

Toni Tresca (14:17)
He’s a former theater critic, a theater guy by training, and that’s where his heart is. But he’s kind of been hearing that feedback, and he’s gonna be adjusting his coverage in the new year to kind of cover a wider swath of the arts and culture going on in the Denver metro area. And so with that, that kind of meant phasing out these True West Awards, which meant that there were 31 days where he was writing about pretty much just theater.

Alex Miller (14:43)
Right, right, yeah, makes sense. Well, as he said in his Facebook post, he’s got plenty, no shortage of ideas for those 30, 31 stories, but if you do have suggestions, you can shoot them an email at john.more at denvergazette.com. And also, so when he, he’ll be wrapping these up and we’ll be doing right after that in January, we’ll be doing our third annual Oscars, the Onstage Colorado Awards for theatrical excellence.

Keep your ears out. you peel your ears? You peel your eyes, keep your ears. I don’t know, how do you say that? Keep your ears sharp. your, keep an eye out. Anyway, keep an eye out for the Oscars in January. We’ve already been, Tony and I have been a little more indulgent this year about trying to figure out who we wanna nominate or give awards to as we go rather than like scrambling in January trying remember everything we saw. you were very on it, Tony. just, I recently got…

got a lot of mine done. yeah. Yeah.

Toni Tresca (15:45)
Nice. Yeah, we’ve got

a spreadsheet and everything. We’re very official now.

Alex Miller (15:50)
Yes,

we do. We have this fancy project management tool called ClickUp where we keep track of all the theaters that we have on our calendar, all of our reviews, all of our ⁓ advertising partners, as well as our Oscar awards. So yeah, we’re getting official here. Another thing I wanted to mention on the site, I’ve been doing a little bit of work. I’ve started doing some theater FAQs that are on there, which they tell me is good for…

search engine optimization, especially in this time of AI when people are looking for quick hits. So it’s probably more for people that are a little newer to theater, like how do I get tickets to this? what do I have to wear at the theater? Or what’s difference between a proscenium and a thrust stage, stuff like that. So I’ve been having fun with that. I also started a theater discounts page on the site. So…

I’ve been, as I see them, I’ve been putting them on there. I don’t have a lot yet, but I figure once theaters get the idea that they can publicize any discounts they have, just us an email, info at onstagecolorado.com. But I wanted to mention one in particular, a friend of the pod, Mark Reagan, who’s doing a really great discount this year for, they’re doing $12 general admission tickets to see Every Brilliant Thing, which is running, I think,

December 5th through the 28th at the Derry Center. So if the price of theater concerns you, this is a great chance to see a really great play with also another friend of the pod, Matt Zambrano in the role there. So that’s one and there’s some other discounts on there as well. So there was this Opera Colorado ⁓ thing where you can pay what you will to see. ⁓

I think La Traviata is over, if you want to see the opera for 25 bucks or less, that’s another thing. some good discounts out there.

Toni Tresca (17:41)
Definitely hope to see some more theaters utilizing discounts as a way to fill seats. ⁓ I know you and I are often in theaters and we’ll look around and we’ll see a lot of empty seats around us and think like, there’s gotta be something else that they can do to fill these seats. And I really do think discounts are really enticing way to maybe attract some people who are on the fence. even, mean, not everybody can do the pay what you will like Opera Colorado or-

Bunt port, offering those discounts, like the week, like week of show or whatnot is, it’s another marketing tactic. It’s just another feather in your cap.

Alex Miller (18:17)
Absolutely. People are especially in these trying times as you have to preface everything with these days. People are looking for a way to save a little money.

Toni Tresca (18:27)
Definitely. I wanted to touch on another story, this one going on up north in Fort Collins. They’ve got a new sound system over at the Lincoln Center. They said in their announcement, if the performance hall sounds a little bit more pitch perfect lately, your ears aren’t deceiving you. We’ve literally amped things up with a brand new state of the art sound system, and we can’t wait to share all these ear-resistable details. That pun was theirs.

Alex Miller (18:55)
God. Rimshot.

Toni Tresca (18:56)
not mine.

So this system, it’s featuring a Meyer Leopard speaker array and it’s this is I know it’s a this system is touted as being one of the most flexible and high performing line arrays out there. It’s they use this on Broadway tours and stand up comedy and concerts. So it’s nice that at least one theater around Colorado is getting an upgrade to their sound system.

Alex Miller (19:01)
Ooh, the Meyer Leopard, my favorite.

Cue diss on the Beale Theater, which we’ve been talking about at the Denver Center, sometimes having some issues with sound, but not always, not always, just sometimes. Speaking of the Denver Center, last week they also, they announced the 20th Colorado New Place Summit lineup, which will be this year in mid February. A of times it runs.

Toni Tresca (19:32)
Yep.

Alex Miller (19:43)
into March too, but this is February 14th to 15th. So this will feature readings of four new plays alongside world premiere productions of two works from the 2024 summit, which we’re looking forward to, Cowboys and East Indians, and then the other one. What was the other one?

Toni Tresca (19:59)
Godspeed.

Alex Miller (20:00)
Godspeed, that was kind of the Western ⁓ one. So this year, the four plays are Lemuria by Bonnie Antosh, a queer reimagining of King Lear set in the world of primatology. Wow, I didn’t see that coming. I was like, okay. I don’t even know what primatology is. Is that the study of apes or primates or something?

Toni Tresca (20:04)
That’s right.

believe that’s what that means. I’m looking it up now.

Alex Miller (20:23)
⁓ Influent by Isaac Gomez, a DCPA commission exploring influencer culture and authenticity. You Should Be So Lucky by Alyssa Haddad Chin, an intergenerational story about family and tradition in Chinatown. And finally, The Myth of Two Marcos by a familiar name, Tony Meneses, a time bending tale of friendship featuring an Aztec superhero. So yeah, Tony’s had a play before at the…

at the New Place Summit. so it’s cool to see him back. So yeah, Cowboys and East Indians. We saw a reading of this is by Nina McConnally and Matthew Spangler and directed by the DCPA’s artistic director, Chris Coleman and then Godspeed by Terence Anthony is going to be directed by Delicia Turner Sonnenberg. So which one of those two are you most excited to see in a full production, Tony?

Toni Tresca (21:14)
Definitely Cowboys and East Indians for me. That was the highlight for me of the 2024 festival. It’s such an intriguing script. I won’t spoil anything here, but I imagine even if I like touched on the plot, you would not be able to guess where this one is gonna go. Because it really doesn’t give anything away. It’s just very shocking and it goes, it’s really interesting, really well done.

Alex Miller (21:30)
I know it’s like

Yeah.

It’s gonna have like, know, Blair Witch level, don’t tell people what it’s really gonna happen, because it’ll spoil it, but yes, you’ll definitely be like, Holy shit, yeah, it’s a great story. Godspeed was like, I think we were a little bit like, huh, on that one. You know, I think that one’s definitely needed a little more work from what we saw at the reading, so I’d be curious to see what they do with that. It’s, I don’t know.

I don’t remember exactly what I just remember it was about a woman running from, it was in Texas was it?

Toni Tresca (22:15)
Yeah, it’s about this black cow person who was on the run. yeah, and I remember it being very repetitive and pretty long. And so I’m hoping that maybe they tighten it, they tighten this piece up and really focus in on the main ideas, which I thought they articulated in the first act. I didn’t realize it was going to be a two act piece.

Alex Miller (22:19)
CalPerson.

Yeah.

So, yeah, if you get a chance, this is a really fun event to get to even if you just get to one of the readings, but you can also get a pass and so far they’ve they’ve introduced 74 new plays over half of which returned to the stage as full productions from the Denver Center Theatre Company and those include The Whale from Samuel D. Hunter, The Book of Will by Lauren Gunderson and Jose Cruz Gonzalez’s American Mariachi was which was great. So yeah, it’s always exciting to see what

What new stuff is coming?

Toni Tresca (23:06)
Definitely, and these four sound very different, which I think is my favorite part of the festival every year, is kind of just bouncing around from reading to reading. And because the plays are so different, usually that means you get into arguments with people after you see them because everybody has their own rankings of them. I remember last year during one of the lunches, I got into a very spirited debate with a couple of playwrights.

Alex Miller (23:10)
Yeah.

Toni Tresca (23:30)
about the quality of the plays. And I loved that. I was like, had it my mind. I was like, this is like the, this is what I’m thinking. And then it was really fun to have those ideas challenged and kind of push back on.

Alex Miller (23:30)
Really?

Mm-hmm.

huh. Yeah. Yeah. We always have a great time going to it. So, all right. Well, that’s it for the news bag today. We’re going to take a quick break and when we return, we’ll hit our top 10 Colorado headliners. So stick around. We’ll be right back.

Alex Miller (23:55)
Onstage Colorado was brought to you by the Aurora Fox Arts Center, presenting the Farnsdale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s production of A Christmas Carol, November 28th through December 21st. The Fox will welcome some of the true grand dames of the Colorado theater community to the stage for this hilarious nonstop journey into a holiday show gone utterly and madly wrong. Tickets at aurorafoxartscenter.org. We’re also supported by Parker Arts and its production of the 25th annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,

running through November 16th at the Schoolhouse Theater. This Tony Award-winning musical follows an eclectic group of kids vying for the spelling championship of a lifetime. Tickets at parkerarts.org.

Outstage Colorado was also brought to you by the Colorado Springs Flying Arts Center at Colorado College, presenting Mary Poppins, November 20th through December 28th.

This classic tale of a struggling family brought back together by a special nanny and a spoonful of sugar will bring extra cheer to your holiday season. Tickets at fac.coloradacollege.edu. Also supporting the podcast is Curious Theater Company, whose production of Job runs November 8th through December 7th. With razor edge dialogue and an unsettling edge, Job is a taut, provocative thriller that asks urgent questions about mental health, corporate loyalty, and what we’re willing to sacrifice to keep our place in the system.

Tickets at CuriousTheatre.org. Onstage Colorado receives support from the Boulder Ensemble Theater Company whose production of Every Brilliant Thing plays December 5th through the 28th at Derry Arts Center in Boulder. This one-man show starring Matt Zambrano is a deeply funny and life-affirming play that lifts up the good in all of us. Tickets at BETC.org.

Toni Tresca (25:35)
Okay, it’s time for this week’s Headliners. These are some of the shows of interest that are coming up in the next week or so that we think you might want to check out. So Alex, what do you have us to start with this week?

Alex Miller (25:49)
Okay, well, this one’s a familiar title coming from the Viva Theater. They’re like a kind of a senior actors group that’s been around Boulder for quite a while. They’re doing Murder on the Orient Express at the Boulder Dairy Center. It’s up now and it runs through November 23rd. So this is kind of the newer, this is the Ken Ludwig version. So it’s got a little more ⁓ humor to it. And we saw a production of it earlier this year at…

my gosh, now I’m blanking. Where did we see that,

Toni Tresca (26:22)
The last one I saw of it was at Vintage Theater, and I think that was last year.

Alex Miller (26:25)
Okay.

Okay, maybe I was confusing it with Death, no not Death Trap, what’s the other one? The Mansion one? Mouse Trap, yeah. Yeah, another Agatha Christie. Yeah, so anyway, well that one will be at the Dairy Center through November 23rd if you want to see a classic.

Toni Tresca (26:32)
Mouse trap. That was at Arvada Center. Yes, that is, yeah, another mystery. That’s right.

Nice. I’ve got a newer play. It’s Job by Curious Theater in Denver. This is running through December 7th. So it actually already opened. And this centers on a public breakdown that Jane has at her high pressure big tech job. That then after she has this breakdown at work, she’s placed on a mandatory leave and sent to a corporate recommended therapist to determine her readiness to return.

Jane and Lloyd, who is her assigned evaluator, then navigate a tense series of sessions. And as their conversations grow sharper and more personal, it becomes a of a gripping game of cat and mouse. I’m actually going to see this play this evening. So I’m quite curious to see what all of that entails. I believe it’s a one act piece, two-hander, I know. ⁓ Got a good cast. So I’m curious to see what this looks like. Pun not intended.

Alex Miller (27:40)
Me too, yeah, definitely wanna hear what you have to say about jobs. My next one is kind of interesting. This is the Elixir of Love and it’s just playing this weekend, November 15th and 16th at the Boulder Dairy Center from Boulder Opera and they’re presenting, it’s a one hour family friendly show called The Elixir of Love, follows Nimmerino’s hilarious quest to live Adina’s heart with a love potion and it’s sung in Italian with English subtitles.

⁓ with a Q &A and it says it’s perfect for ages four plus. So this is a way to introduce, you know, one of the youngins to some opera. So that sounds really cool.

Toni Tresca (28:14)
That does sound really interesting. Very accessible way, yeah, for kids to get into it. My next pick is Jerry’s Girls. This was originally supposed to open last month, but due to a series of delays, it’s now going to be opening November 13th and running through the 23rd over at the Maisel Center in Denver, being produced by Veritas Productions. And this kind of features…

Alex Miller (28:17)
Yeah. Yeah.

Toni Tresca (28:39)
Iconic numbers from Hello Dolly, Mame, Mac and Mabel, and LaCaja Falls. And it says audiences will be swept away by show-stopping favorites like Just Leave Everything to Me, Where Every Ain’t, Before the Parade Passes, and If He Walked Into My Life, performed by a powerhouse trio of women, including Nancy Evans Begley, Ali Chung, and Dana, Dana Hartright.

Alex Miller (29:03)
Cool. And where is that again?

Toni Tresca (29:05)
It’s over at the Meisel Center in Denver.

Alex Miller (29:07)
That’s right, yeah, the Meisel.

And I think, yeah, Veritas is doing it in conjunction with the Meisel. So that’s kind of a cool coordination. And Veritas is one of the newer production companies, but Nancy and a crew over there have done a nice job with the stuff they’ve done so far. So if you’re into Broadway tunes, that sounds like a good one to check out.

Toni Tresca (29:25)
Definitely, yeah. I’ll be there Friday night reviewing it for the site. So I will be reporting back on this production.

Alex Miller (29:33)
All right. My next one is at Vintage Theater in Aurora. This one is Angry, Rockous, and Shamelessly Gorgeous. It’s playing, it’s up now, it’s playing through November 23rd. So this is about a woman who’s coming back to the States after a major theatrical controversy to perform one more time. So she’s rehearsing for her grand return. She meets the young actress who’s been hired to replace her. It’s a dramatic comedy that confronts aging, legacy, and honoring the past while embracing.

unknown future. So that sounds pretty interesting over at Vintage.

Toni Tresca (30:05)
That does. That’s a really intriguing premise for a play. Sounds very spicy.

Alex Miller (30:09)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yep.

Toni Tresca (30:12)
My next headliner is a world premiere. It’s Daisy Violet, The Bitch Beast King. This is being produced by Featherfall Theatre Company at the Derry Arts Center in Boulder. It’s written by Sam Kohler, who I actually went to grad school with. I met in grad school. And it’s directed by Erin Klass. And it is a dark comedy about girlhood. Up in the attic, sisters Josephine and Henrietta create a new sister for their family.

Alex Miller (30:29)
Really? huh.

Toni Tresca (30:40)
who is gleeful, monstrous, and embodies everything they’ve dreamt of, the rage of children and the fury of girls.

Alex Miller (30:49)
Okay, that sounds interesting. For sure.

Toni Tresca (30:52)
Yeah, it’s an

intriguing premise. It’s a one-act play. I’m checking this one out on Saturday. I wonder how this will be staged. I have heard the readings of this have been very effective, but a good reading does not always a good staging make.

Alex Miller (31:04)
Mm-hmm.

Okay. All right. Well, here’s another kind of theater piece about theater. Sherlock Holmes and the Greek Chorus. This is being done by Theater Company of Lafayette. It runs through November 23rd. So it’s a laugh out loud murder mystery. So they’re doing the Lysistrata and they’re preparing to open…

It’s for opening night and there’s this accident prone regal theater and ruled with an iron cane by a pompous autocrat. apparently it sounds like a very silly ⁓ show maybe along the lines of Noises Off or something like that. So that’s at the company of Lafayette.

Toni Tresca (31:47)
Yeah, it sounds like noises off with a little Agatha Christie. My next one is a fundraiser. It’s one night only. It’s being produced by local theater company at E-Town Hall, which is this nifty venue, largely used for concerts and stuff, but is also a pretty cool performance hall in of itself in Boulder. And this is a new play that centers on drag queen.

Alex Miller (31:50)
Yeah, yeah.

Toni Tresca (32:11)
Lettah Celebrate, who just wants to live her life, lip syncing Lady Gaga. But when a strange woman asks for her help after losing everything, Lettah finds herself desperate to save her or be doomed to repeat the same day over and over again. So kind of sounds like a drag Groundhog’s Day, which could be fun.

Alex Miller (32:16)
you

Yeah, yeah, I’m gonna be there Nick reached out and said hey you want to come check this out? I was like sure so I’ll see you there Because just one night no information yet of when it might have a run or more So it’s just a one night only if you want to catch it

Toni Tresca (32:45)
Nice, okay, you’re gonna be there. I won’t actually be able to be there. I already had plans that evening. So you’re gonna have to, I’ll be curious to hear what you think.

Alex Miller (32:53)
Okay, I’m sorry I thought you were gonna be there so anyway but yeah I’ll let you know. So my last one is a very familiar title, A Doll’s House, but not so much the theater that’s doing it so it’s kind of unusual for Millibow Art Theater in Colorado Springs. They’re doing this classic ⁓ you know Ipsen play November 13th through the 23rd.

You know, in Millibos, it’s such an interesting outfit. do, you know, the folks that run it are, they come out of a circus tradition. So they do a lot of stuff, like along those lines, they do stuff, lot of family-friendly things. But then every once in a while, they’ll do something that’s kind of more like a, a sort of a more of a, I don’t know, regular theater type show. So this is, I guess this is a new 90 minute adaptation of A Doll’s House.

that they’re good doing at Millibo. So if you’re in the Springs area you might want to go check that out.

Toni Tresca (33:44)
Nice. My final pick is in Johnstown being produced by Candlelight. This is the kind of the first Christmas holiday production of the season. is Million Dollar Quartet Christmas. That’s right. my God. Yeah, this is the first, it is not going to be the last. This is not going to be the last time you hear Christmas or holiday or seasonal fun on this show. This has a nice long run. It runs

Alex Miller (33:55)
They’re coming in droves. Uh-huh.

Toni Tresca (34:11)
November 20th through January 11th and in Million Dollar Quartet Christmas it’s very similar to regular Million Dollar Quartet in which this has Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Elvis Presley at Sun Records for a festive celebration. And so yeah, it’s set in this Christmas decorated studio and is a holiday edition of the Million Dollar Quartet with classic holiday hits. So I’ll be there on its opening.

I don’t know exactly what that means. I’m not sure if this is going to be literally the same show, like Million Dollar Quartet, but they just swap in Christmas songs, or if they have created a whole new plot for this kind of Christmas celebration. I’ve seen Million Dollar Quartet multiple times, so I’ll… correct.

Alex Miller (34:44)
Yeah.

Yeah, because that’s based on an actual event where the four, you know,

happened to be in the studio at the same time and had this amazing session. So I’d really curious to know what this is. It’s like suddenly Santa pops in and says, hey, let’s do some Christmas songs. And Elvis just goes right into Blue Christmas.

Toni Tresca (35:10)
Yeah, I mean, they certainly have Christmas songs that each of these artists can sing, but I will definitely be curious to see how it plays with history. I imagine this one will probably be a lot more fast and loose with the facts.

Alex Miller (35:24)
Right. All right.

Toni Tresca (35:26)
Well, that brings us to the end of the show for this week. We will be back next week with another podcast that’s going to feature Alex’s interview with Lee Kaplan, who is the founder and artistic director of Debut Players since 1991. Wow, that’s a, that is quite a run over there. Can you tease what that conversation is about?

Alex Miller (35:44)
That is,

yeah, that is a very long tenure. And this is a theater company I don’t know a lot about. We see some of their shows. I think they do a lot of stuff with kids, ⁓ but I think they do some other general audience stuff as well. So they’ve got some things going on. They’re building a new home in an old AMC movie theater in Fort Collins.

Toni Tresca (35:54)
Mm-hmm.

Alex Miller (36:05)
So it’s kind of similar to what Miner’s Alley is doing. They’re opening in stages. So the first one, they’re raising a million dollars to get in there with a black box theater with classrooms, offices, a costume shop, green room, set workshop, and that’s due to open next summer. And then the next stage is they want, they need $2 million for this. They want to complete a 300 capacity main stage with flex seating and adaptable stage. So it sounds a lot like Miner’s Alley.

And that is ideally going to open in the summer of 2028. So stick around or come back for that next week. We’ll be talking to Lee and hearing a little bit more about some of what’s going on theater-wise in Fort Fun.

Toni Tresca (36:32)
Mm-hmm.

That is cool. Yeah, I guess that’ll be then the third full-time dedicated theater space joining ⁓ the Lincoln Center and Bas Blue up there, which is, that’s definitely a positive addition for the area. And this phased approach seems smart because I imagine that you are able to really generate a lot more buzz and excitement once you actually have a deliverable to people rather than just being like, look at these blueprints, just trust me that this will be cool.

Alex Miller (37:03)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep. Get something stood up. Yep, for sure. So yeah. So that’ll be next week.

Toni Tresca (37:20)
And in the meantime, what can listeners find on the Onstage Colorado site now and upcoming?

Alex Miller (37:27)
So Judith Sears and Kyle Ross Springs just posted a review of RUR, which is this 100 plus year old play about robots, which sounds pretty interesting. I’ll be at Dracula, a Comedy of Terror at Ghana Galleria, I think on Friday night. I’ll have a review of that. We’ll have the aforementioned Dollhouse at Millibo from Judith as well. Your review, Tony, of Curious Theater’s Job, which we were just talking about, as well as Veritas Productions’ Jerry’s Girls.

and the world premiere of Daisy Violet, the bitch beast king. I just love saying that. And this one we didn’t mention you’re doing. So Hold Tight is back with Wild Ascelation. So this is the dance company that they do, you know, like one or two performances a year. So do you know anything about Wild Ascelation?

Toni Tresca (38:10)
It is a collaboration between this immersive dance troupe and a restaurant in the area in which they have devised a dinner theater experience of sorts in that it is set in an actual restaurant and you are getting food prepared by the actual chefs who run the restaurant while there is a performance happening around these food items that you’re tasting.

Alex Miller (38:34)
Interesting. Okay.

Toni Tresca (38:37)
Yeah, it sounds appropriately weird, is definitely Upholdtite’s… that’s definitely par for the course with them. They always kind of do trippy, experimental stuff. Yeah, absolutely. So I’m very much looking forward to seeing this on Monday.

Alex Miller (38:42)
Yeah.

Pretty off the wall, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, Gwen’s stuff is not always for everybody, but it’s always interesting, that’s for sure.

Toni Tresca (39:01)
Definitely. So if you want to stay up to date on what is going on in theaters across the state, subscribe to the OnStage Colorado Theater Blast newsletter, which comes out every Thursday and features a roundup of all of the reporting that we’ve been doing for the week, as well as a very extensive calendar listing of all of the different shows that are happening around the state. And then if you’ve got the time.

Rate, review, and be sure that you’re subscribed to this podcast so that you never miss an episode.

Alex Miller (39:32)
Absolutely. All right. Well, that’s all for this week. Thanks so much for listening. I’m Alex Miller.

Toni Tresca (39:38)
and I’m Tony Tresca and we’ll see you at the show.