Plus Julia Tobey on Ballyhoo, Top 10 Colorado Headliners and more spooky season stuff

In this episode of the OnStage Colorado Podcast, hosts Alex Miller and Toni Tresca look at some recent A&E news — including the Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s season announcement and a chat with Ballyhoo Table & Stage founder Julia Tobey on the new venue’s grand opening this Saturday.
Later in the podcast, Alex chats with Scot Merchant, creator of the new musical Ichabod, which has its world premiere at Denver’s Mizel Center Oct. 30.

Also in this episode, the Top 10 Colorado Headliners — upcoming shows from around Colorado that may be worth checking out. Here’s the list in no particular order:

Chapter Summary

Episode Overview

This episode features reviews of The Lion King and The Motherfucker with the Hat, Estes Park Halloween coverage, Colorado Shakespeare Festival’s 2026 season announcement, interviews with Julia Tobey (Ballyhoo Theatre grand opening) and Scott Merchant (Ichabod musical), this week’s theatre headliners, and Denver Film Festival preview.

Chapter 1: Introduction (00:01-01:19)

Alex and Toni preview the episode’s topics including Colorado Shakespeare Festival news and an interview with Scott Merchant about his world premiere musical Ichabod, opening at the Maisel Center and Meow Wolf.

Chapter 2: The Lion King Review (01:19-04:08)

Both hosts discuss the touring production at Denver Center, praising Julie Taymor’s puppetry and the show’s spectacle. Toni compares it favorably to Life of Pi and notes the large family audience.

Chapter 3: The Motherfucker with the Hat Review (04:08-06:31)

The hosts share their disappointment with Flamboyant Theater’s production at Three Leaches Theater, critiquing the static staging and missed opportunities with the intimate space.

Chapter 4: Estes Park Halloween Events (06:31-12:13)

Toni shares experiences from three ghost tours (Historic Park Theater, Stanley Hotel, Dunraven Inn) and The Shining Ball at the Stanley Hotel for his upcoming Estes Valley Voice article.

Chapter 5: A Town Called Harris (12:13-17:13)

Toni discusses the immersive theatre production at Westminster’s DeSpain Schoolhouse, praising its meta-theatrical approach and Jessica Austin’s script.

Chapter 6: Julia Tobey Interview – Ballyhoo Theatre (17:13-29:01)

Alex interviews Julia Tobey about Ballyhoo Table and Stage’s grand opening (November 1st). They discuss the coffee shop/bar/theatre concept, upcoming productions of Hedwig and the Angry Inch and Rent, and potential franchising plans.

Chapter 7: DCPA Sound Issues Discussion (29:03-30:43)

Toni shares a follow-up from a reader about sound quality issues at Denver Center touring shows and DCPA’s response.

Chapter 8: Colorado Shakespeare Festival 2026 (31:16-33:43)

The hosts announce CSF’s 2026 season marking the completion of Mary Rippon Theatre renovations: Twelfth Night and Shakespeare in Love (outdoor), Julius Caesar and Friends, Romans, Countrymen (indoor).

Chapter 9: Scot Merchant Interview – Ichabod (35:28-54:26)

Alex interviews composer Scot Merchant about his musical Ichabod. They discuss his opera background, the show’s themes (queer love, greed, institutional critique), technical elements, and the difference between performances at Mizel Center versus Meow Wolf.

Chapter 10: This Week’s Theatre Headliners (54:57-1:02:50)

Alex’s picks:

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Parker Arts), Dracula (Main Street Live, Trinidad), Dracula, a Comedy of Terrors (Garner Galleria), Misery (Open Stage, Fort Collins), Alibis and Other Lies (What If Theater)

Toni’s picks: Ghost Light (various venues), Edgar Allan Poe is Dead and So Is My Cat (Buntport), La Traviata (Opera Colorado), Hedwig and the Angry Inch (Ballyhoo)

Chapter 11: Denver Film Festival Preview (1:04:56-1:09:25)

Toni outlines his extensive film festival coverage from October 31-November 6, including Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, Oscar contenders, and Colorado-focused documentaries. Andy Miller will cover the final weekend.

Transcript

Created by AI orcs – beware!

Alex Miller (00:01)

All right, well, hello and welcome to yet another episode of the On Stage Colorado Podcast. I’m Alex Miller.

Toni Tresca (00:08)

And I’m Tony Tresca.

Alex Miller (00:10)

And today we’re gonna zip through some theater news, including a kind of biggish announcement from the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. We’ll do our top 10 Colorado headliners. And later in the pod, we have my interview with Scott Merchant, an opera singer and composer whose world premiere musical, Ichabod, will be opening Thursday at the Maisel Center in Denver with two more performances at Meow Wolf November 5th and 6th. It’s a fun conversation. This is based on, of course, the story of the headless horseman.

a very old American folk tale, an interesting story about how to bring something that sounds pretty ambitious to the stage.

Toni Tresca (00:44)

Wowee, lots of good stuff on the episode this week. We were chatting about before, a couple days ago we were like, what are we even gonna talk about? And then, lo and behold, we got some breaking news today to discuss, a really cool interview with Scott. And then we’ve also seen quite a bit of interesting theater, including, we were both over at the Lion King on Friday night at the Denver Center to catch the national tour on its sixth stop in Denver.

Alex Miller (00:48)

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (01:14)

This is it’s come here five other times and now it’s back for time sex.

Alex Miller (01:19)

Yeah, I mean, what can you say about The Lion King? It’s really, in some ways, it’s kind of in a class of its own. It’s a very familiar story. Of course, it comes from a Disney movie, but the way it’s done is so incredibly unique and impressive. And it’s just a really grand show. It’s a really, really big show. And since I last saw it in 2021, I feel like they added some more stuff. I don’t remember.

some of the some of the entrances through the audience onto the stage and especially some of the critters like they had a full-on elephant which I didn’t remember so and great performances and we’ve got your review it that you review it that I’ll get on the site here pretty soon so really fun

Toni Tresca (02:04)

Definitely agree and very much a spectacle driven show. Julie Taymor and her team have created just a visual smorgasbord of puppetry. And that doesn’t always work. earlier this year, I saw the touring production of Life of Pi, which is definitely riffing on this kind of storytelling, but to a much lesser effect. It wasn’t as well integrated into the show as it is here where it’s

Alex Miller (02:20)

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (02:32)

pretty much just every second of the show, there is some kind of new theatrical puppet trick that is being introduced in some part of the stage, even if it’s just rolling by for a few seconds before it goes right off stage. It’s, yeah, and the kids who were in the audience, which there were a lot of kids, we were chatting before the show, I the only other time we’ve seen this many kids was when Frozen came through, which is another Disney f-

Alex Miller (02:58)

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (03:00)

Disney mega musical, they were just absolutely eating up this show.

Alex Miller (03:02)

Right.

yeah. Yeah. The other thing cool about the puppets is that they’re all different kinds of them, you know, there’s, they’re, you know, they’re wearing them. They’re not holding them so much, although there’s some, you know, where they just have a simple stick with a bird on top and some of them like a, like this crazy kind of Rube Goldberg ⁓ bicycle that’s got antelopes ⁓ running on it. And, ⁓ you know, there was a woman dressed, I think she was a leopard who had, she kind of was, I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s really cool the way they did that one. So yeah, a lot, just a visual.

Toni Tresca (03:10)

Mm-hmm.

Alex Miller (03:35)

digital spectacle, as you said. So on the other end of the spectrum, you and I both saw the motherfucker with the hat. So this was a flamboyant theater production at the Three Leaches Theater in Lakewood, formerly The Edge. And this was one we were both looking forward to because it’s a fairly somewhat well-known comedy, kind of on the edge, edgy comedy that kind of.

didn’t really live up to it. was a little bit of a disappointment and your review pretty much outlines kind of where it fell short.

Toni Tresca (04:08)

Definitely. Yeah, this was, it’s a great script. It’s a funny, very funny sex farce about this guy who is coming out of jail. He’s gotten sober. He finds out his girlfriend is cheating on him. Kind of goes off and then it kind of goes off the deep end, just kind of trying to figure out what’s going on. There’s betrayals in here. However, for a play with like such high stakes, it just, it drug a lot. The staging was often just very static.

people just kind of sitting in spaces or standing in one particular spot of the stage for long periods at a time with no movement or no energy to it. A lot of the emotional moments kind of fell flat. The argument scenes were pretty well done across the board, I would say. When they were yelling, there was at least some energy in the space, but outside of those moments, it just really kind of struggled to have any kind of life or any sense of

Alex Miller (04:54)

Mm-hmm.

Toni Tresca (05:06)

just kind of dynamic kinetic energy between the cast.

Alex Miller (05:09)

Yeah. You know, it was interesting. You called out the fight scene, the choreography you didn’t think was particularly good. But I was also thinking like the fact that it took place like literally like three feet from us makes it pretty, it’s pretty hard. A fight scene, know, fake fighting relies on some slight of hands or whatever that if you’re up close, it’s kind of, you’re going to see the tricks, right?

Toni Tresca (05:33)

100%. I kind of also, in my review, I was very critical of the kind of staging of it. There’s three locations that are mentioned in the show itself, and the director, John Marc Antoni, stages it so that there are just kind of big furniture pieces occupying each of these locations that, as a result, it kind of, the stage, which is already not very big, becomes incredibly small and confined to these isolated areas.

And you almost just wish they had just, since it’s such a small stage, rather than sectioning it off like it did and pretending that they’re in a larger theater, you wish that they had just used the intimacy of the space, do the scene changes. They already did the scene changes anyway, where they went to black and played music in between and took up time as if they were changing furniture and moving things, even though there was nothing there. So I just feel like you could have done that with the show and been more effective, because, but.

Alex Miller (06:23)

You

Toni Tresca (06:28)

the staging just did not match the space.

Alex Miller (06:31)

Yeah. Yeah. So that one, you know, that didn’t didn’t blow our socks up. Is that a thing? Blow our skirt up, knock our socks off. So the other thing that you and I wanted to hear about was this ghost tour at the historic Park Theatre. What was that all about?

Toni Tresca (06:40)

knock our socks off. Yeah.

Yeah, I went on a couple of ghost tours. I’m working on a piece about the ghostly activities that take place in Estes Park for the Estes Valley Voice. And so I went on three different kind of haunted ghost tours in the area. The first one was last Wednesday at the Historic Park Theater, which is the oldest operating single screen movie theater, some geographical distinction.

Alex Miller (07:14)

Yeah, we’ve talked about that before.

Toni Tresca (07:17)

in the United States. I have talked about it before and their kind of fight to survive given this kind of the tough financial state that movie theaters are in and the fact that they’ve only got one screen to do all of their programming on. But they also have a long history in the town. They’ve been here over 100 years and they have a ton of ghosts, 12 in fact. Not all human, they said. They’ve got some ghost dogs walking around the space.

And on that tour, kind of just got to go all over the theater, including the projection room and see it was a really cool, it was a cool tour. It was led by the owner of the theater who was very forthcoming about her own personal interactions with these ghostly spirits at late night in the theater.

Alex Miller (08:03)

Wow, and then you were also up at the famous Stanley Hotel up there where The Shining was filmed. What was that ghost tour like?

Toni Tresca (08:09)

That’s right. So I was up at the Stanley for two different tours. First was the Shining tour at the Stanley to break down all of the, all of the, like Stephen King’s inspiration, how he stayed there for one night back in September in the 70s. And he got all these ghost stories from a bartender named Grady, which does appear in the Shining book. That’s like a…

Alex Miller (08:32)

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (08:33)

That is based on a real interaction he had with a bartender there. He was actually the only guest staying at the hotel because the hotel was closed for the season at that time. The only room that was available was to room 217, which is the presidential suite. It was the only one that hadn’t been turned down for the season. So he stayed in this, which is notoriously the most haunted room in the entire place. And he had a ghostly interaction, went out on the balcony, smoked a cigarette.

Alex Miller (08:43)

Uh-huh.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah

Toni Tresca (09:01)

then wrote down the entire plot of The Shining that very night while staying in the hotel. Incredible story. And then he later returned to the Stanley Hotel to shoot the mini series in the 90s in the space. The Kubrick film was shot largely on a soundstage in London, as we learned on this tour, I didn’t know that. But Stephen King’s version of it, which is available on Blu-ray. ⁓

Alex Miller (09:06)

that’s a great story. Yeah.

Toni Tresca (09:27)

but not, it’s kind of hard to find in other locations, but that was shot at the Stanley. And very informative tour, very highly theatrical, takes you all around these different locations at the Stanley. And then I went on a ghost tour at the Stanley about an hour later that takes you to different spots and tells you a bunch of different ghost stories, including about how the Estes method was made at this park to help find the spirit Lucy.

who has haunted them for a long time. This child who allegedly was squatting in the facilities got kicked out by the staff, froze to death outside, and has been haunting the grounds ever since.

Alex Miller (10:07)

Wow. Wow. So is this story live yet on the site?

Toni Tresca (10:12)

Not live yet, it’ll be going up a little bit closer to actual Halloween. But it’ll, yeah, it should be dropping on this Thursday, the 30th.

Alex Miller (10:22)

And can you remind us the URL of the website there?

Toni Tresca (10:26)

yeah, that’s it’s for the online publication, the Estes Valley Voice.

Alex Miller (10:30)

Okay, great. want to check that out.

Toni Tresca (10:34)

And for the Estes Valley Voice, I’m also writing about my experience at the Shining Ball, which was also at the Stanley Hotel that I went to that evening. I was really, I really was, Alex. It was a very Stanley day for me. It was a really interesting event. This is an annual thing that they do at the Stanley Hotel. When you walk in the exterior of the concert hall, the Stanley is lit up in red.

Alex Miller (10:42)

You steeped in it. Yeah

Toni Tresca (11:03)

blue lights as well as projections that read Redrum in capital bloody letters across the side of the building. Everybody is dressed up in these really elaborate costumes, tons of Jacks from The Shining, Jack and Wendy’s as well as the twins in the blue dresses. Lots of Pennywises were there, kind of expanding out to larger Stephen King stuff. You had ⁓ the Gunslinger.

Alex Miller (11:08)

nice.

Yeah.

Yep.

Toni Tresca (11:29)

was there. And then people who were dressed up as non-Steven King things like the Grabber from the Black Phone, Art the Clown, Disco People. Although I think my favorite one was this couple who was, there was a woman who was dressed in like pilgrim clothes on a stake with a bunch of like orange lights, Halloween lights wrapped around her as if she was burning on the stake. And then her husband was the man who had this torch burning her at the stake.

Alex Miller (11:57)

Wow, damn, that sounds pretty cool. ⁓

Toni Tresca (12:01)

It was very

cool. There was a Stephen King costume contest and a shining costume contest in the middle of the evening, but most of the night was just dedicated to tearing it up on the dance floor.

Alex Miller (12:13)

Yeah, that sounds like a lot of fun. All right, and then lastly, you got to the Catamounts new show, A Town Called Harris, which is really kind of a historic sounding thing for Westminster, yeah.

Toni Tresca (12:23)

It is,

it’s over in the historic to Spain schoolhouse, which I’d never been to before. It’s in more of the kind of the southern part of Westminster, closer to Denver area. And the interior is decorated by the actual Westminster Historical Society. So there’s all these kind of maps of the history of Westminster.

pictures of old town leaders and figures who are referenced in the show that you’re about to see. And from the second that you enter the schoolhouse, the show starts. And I didn’t realize that until like, like, I was like looking around and then an actor came up behind me and like started talking to me. And I was like, wait a second, you’re in the show. I guess we’ve already begun with people out here because you realize that the gimmick, the conceit of the show is that there’s this troop of actors who are part of the

Alex Miller (13:09)

Mm-hmm.

Toni Tresca (13:19)

Junior Westminster Historical Society as well as their adult sponsors who are helping with the show and they’re putting on this history about the time when Westminster when the town of Harris incorporated in 1911 and became the city of Westminster and this vote that the town did in order to do that and However in the middle of this play about this ghostly happenings go wrong and interrupt it

which leads into kind of this immersive, kind of open world, kind of clock, clock kind of configuration. It’s very similar to Impossible Things, where you’re going, split up into five groups, you go in kind of a clockwork motion around each of the different things, and you’re trying to solve the mystery of what’s causing the ghostly happenings inside the schoolhouse.

Alex Miller (14:10)

Okay, wow. That’s a so what was your take on it overall? Was it was it was it interesting?

Toni Tresca (14:17)

I found it to be very effective. It was really metatheatrical and kind of riffing on a lot of the, I’ll just say it, bad and tired immersive theater tropes that we’ve been seeing as of late. And so it’s very much acknowledging that and being like, yeah, we know that this can be kind of cheesy and bad sometimes, but we’re not doing that. And I think that’s really impressive is that the show starts with that conceit and then proceeds to do kind of its own immersive thing.

Alex Miller (14:29)

huh.

Toni Tresca (14:45)

But because the immersive part of it is paced so effectively, the actors are really engaging and actually make the experience feel very participatory. Even if you’re not able to change the outcome, you’re not like, you don’t have that much agency within the story, you do feel very much a part of it. The actors are super funny too. think Jessica Austin’s script is really quirky and funny. It’s not trying to be this kind of

Alex Miller (15:06)

Austin.

Toni Tresca (15:14)

serious meditation on history and everything that we’ve like that kind of it’s not that kind of play. It’s much more interested in you being like kind of establishing this fun romp and this very I would say the mystery is very easy to kind of piece together as somebody who really enjoys mysteries. The plotting was rather kind of straightforward and obvious, but I was having a lot of fun interacting with the characters as well as my fellow audience members. So

Alex Miller (15:27)

Mm-hmm.

Toni Tresca (15:43)

I just kind of got swept up in the experience and really had a blast with it. I thought I found it to be really enjoyable.

Alex Miller (15:50)

Awesome, great. All right, well let’s shift over to the news. What’s happening in Colorado Theater News or Colorado Arts News this week.

Toni Tresca (15:59)

Yeah, I wanted to start with a pretty cool announcement from Opera Colorado. They announced last week that they are switching to a pay what you wish ticket model for all performances. Pretty big announcement. We’ve seen quite a few groups around Colorado that do this. Like, for instance, Buntport Theater has been doing this for a little while now. But this is a pretty big shift for a big group like Opera Colorado to do it.

Alex Miller (16:18)

down.

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (16:27)

They’re saying their suggested ticket price is $25, but you’re welcome to choose a price that works with your financial circumstances. So that means that you can pay for the minimum that you could pay is $1 plus the sales tax from the city. So it’s not zero, not totally free, but that’s pretty good for opera tickets that normally they go for 58 to $280. So

Alex Miller (16:40)

Right. That’s free-ish. Yeah.

Toni Tresca (16:56)

That’s a massive reduction in the ticket price.

Alex Miller (17:00)

Yeah, did they get some sort of source of funding to back this up to you now or?

Toni Tresca (17:04)

That’s a really good question, Alex, because the last time we talked about Opera Colorado, we were talking about them doing a leadership transition because they were in the financial toilet, because their finances were not looking good. The press release did not note any additional kind of funding to match this. just, the newly appointed general, Ellie Cochran’s general director and CEO of Opera Colorado, Barbara Lynn Jamieson said,

Alex Miller (17:13)

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (17:32)

opera belongs to everybody by expanding pay what you wish to every performance. We’re ensuring that anyone, no matter their financial situation, can experience the beauty, drama, and connection that live opera brings to our community. But no grappling with the kind of financial implications of that decision.

Alex Miller (17:50)

⁓ Yeah, that’s really interesting. It’d be really interesting to see what kind of audience participation they get. Yeah, so right now you can get tickets to Verdi’s La Traviata on the Opera Colorado site. So we’ll see if they go fast ⁓ or if it really drives interest in the opera. So that’s cool.

Toni Tresca (18:07)

Yeah, Opera Colorado has been struggling to kind of attract audiences to the main stage shows for a little while now. So I think this could also be like a marketing move, like you just said, to just increase the general interest, remind people that this existed. Because I know this got a lot of goodwill on social media. People were talking about this on Reddit and it got a lot of news articles written about it. I think this is a…

perhaps a marketing and kind of strategic decision to show what this new leadership team is committed to and maybe the grants will follow.

Alex Miller (18:41)

Yeah. All right. Well, a story that we are going to have on the website here is about the grand opening of Ballyhoo Table and Stage in Denver’s Highlands neighborhood. So this is Julia Toby, friend of the pod, space set and feature. It’s kind of like a little bit of everything space, coffee, cocktails, singing bartenders. going to have they’ve got a small theater.

They’re to be restaging Hedwig and the Angry Inch ⁓ and all kinds of stuff. So you had an opportunity to swing by there back in June for Story of Rook for Westward, and then you dropped by again. So what’s happening there? How has it come along?

Toni Tresca (19:14)

Well, it looks totally different from when I was there in June. And it’s really funny. I walked through with Julia Tobey then in June, and she gave me a layout when it was just tape on a floor. There was nothing on the walls, just the absolute bare bone. And so then to see the espresso machine and the coffee bar to the left as you walk in, along with this cafe space to the right that she had talked about on that initial pitch.

Alex Miller (19:27)

huh.

Toni Tresca (19:42)

be fully developed along with the gallery space in the hallway that leads to the 298 seat theater in the back of the space. To see it all put together and fully realized was, it was honestly just quite impressive. And there’s no small feat to get there. It took roughly $300,000 to get to open the space and a ton of time working with the city to kind of navigate its pretty tricky permitting process and zoning complications that they had to deal with.

but now they’re about to do their grand opening on November 1st.

Alex Miller (20:15)

Wow, that’s fantastic. Well, as it happens, I was able to do a short interview with Julia after we recorded this section. So let’s toss to that and hear it from the lady herself about this big effort that they’re doing there.

Alex Miller (20:30)

Hey, so Julia, Toby, Tony and I were just talking about you and we thought, wow, we should we should talk to you. So here all about Ballyhoo Table and Stage Opener and how’s it going?

Julia Tobey (20:40)

Hi, hi, hi. Good to see you guys. Good to hear from you guys. Thank you so much for having us on. So we have been running around, like you said, with like a chicken with our head cut off for like eight months, fist fighting the city of Denver for the permits and the licenses and all the things. But we have our grand opening this Saturday, November 1st at 10 a.m. is the ribbon cutting, followed by family friendly activities until three and then adult shenanigans after 3 p.m. in the cocktail bar until midnight.

Alex Miller (21:10)

Wow, that sounds awesome. So, hey, before we talk any more about it, give me the basics. What is it, where is it, and how big is it?

Julia Tobey (21:17)

So Ballyhoo Table and Stage is at 33rd Avenue in Tejon Street in the Highlands, which is just west of downtown Denver. Not to be confused with Highlands Ranch, we’re right by downtown and we’re right up the street from Linger, Little Man Ice Cream, Route Down, like super, super hot neighborhood. We have about 9,000 square feet. We have a small stage in the cafe in the front where our singing bartenders are. You might see David Nels up there playing piano, open mic, karaoke type stuff.

And then in the back we have a 298 person capacity theater, which will be open Hedwig and the Angry Inch, November 6th, along with Rocky Horror this coming October 30th and 31st, all sorts of stuff. So we open at 7 a.m., seven days a week. Sorry, weekends are 930 a.m. Still getting used to our hours of operation. And then we close as late as 10 p.m. or midnight, seven days a week. So all day, coffee, fast Wi-Fi, food, cocktails.

Alex Miller (22:04)

Okay.

Julia Tobey (22:15)

followed by live entertainment.

Alex Miller (22:18)

That’s awesome. You know, there aren’t that many places that do coffee and booze around, so that’s cool.

Julia Tobey (22:24)

Yeah, and very few that do live entertainment. So the singing bartender thing is a huge element that we offer every day after 4 p.m. People like Randy Chalmers, Alejandro Roldan, people that people love in the theater community. They’re serving you cocktails and also serving you live music.

Alex Miller (22:42)

that is so cool. And I got to tell you, I had no idea it was like almost 300 seat theater. That’s a pretty big theater.

Julia Tobey (22:49)

Yeah, yeah, it’s nice. We have a whole garage in the back as well for our scenic and painting shop for theatrical scenic elements. So it’s, yeah, it’s a fair amount of square footage for that neighborhood for sure.

Alex Miller (23:02)

Yeah. So, so you also are the head of Give Five Productions, which has been producing shows around the Denver area, including Hedwig and the Hangar Inch that you did last year. And so you’re bringing that back. Why did you, why did you think to do this show?

Julia Tobey (23:18)

You know, it was incredibly impactful last August in Rhino when we did it. It got a huge response and we thought, and honestly, it’s very easy to produce. It’s a two person cast, four person band. It’s designed to be rudimentary as far as like corded microphones, things like that. Like it’s not supposed to be high tech. There’s not supposed to be anything that’s crazy involved. So that was an easy kind of entry for us. And a lot of my friends that worked at like Utah Shakes or Colorado Shakes over the summer.

Alex Miller (23:34)

Mm-hmm.

Julia Tobey (23:46)

missed Headway because they were out of town during that summer slot. So I was happy to bring it back in a different kind of seasonal time slot. And then we’re also producing Rent next year. We just announced this. Yeah, directed by Rodney Hicks. He’s an original cast member. He opened and closed the show off Broadway, on Broadway. And so he will be directing it. And then David Nels is our music director for that. We’re announcing that audition notice tomorrow, October 28th.

Alex Miller (23:57)

wow, okay.

David knows, I think, he must have cloned himself. He seems to be everywhere.

Julia Tobey (24:17)

I wish he could clone himself. mean St. Louis wanted him the same time slot and I was like David do this. It’s like it’s just so his wheelhouse and he was in the East Village in New York City in that 19 like mid 90s. You know, I’m like you have to speak to this story.

Alex Miller (24:23)

Hahaha

Mm hmm. That’s great. So in addition to, you know, being a coffee shop in a place where people go to have a drink and have entertainment, mean, what was your take on like where Ballyhoo fits in? there anything quite like it? I can’t think of anything.

Julia Tobey (24:47)

Somebody asked me, are you guys franchising? I was like, absolutely. So we are in talks with franchising to somewhere in the southern region of Denver, probably like Castle Rock, Parker, Inglewood, Littleton area. Yes. And then somebody wanted to do it in San Francisco or Atlanta or like other places across the US. So we are very open to that. But Ballyhoo Table and Stage in Denver, Colorado is a unique concept. Food and beverage revenue is honestly a huge part of our business model.

Alex Miller (24:50)

Mm-hmm.

well.

Julia Tobey (25:15)

So if you’re going to be producing theater and live entertainment, just having ticket sales support that as a for-profit entity is tricky. So the food and beverage revenue is going to help support all that live entertainment you’re going to see.

Alex Miller (25:28)

Mm-hmm. That’s great. Wow. Already people want to replicate it. speaking of, you’ve got like a full bar of your beers on tap. What kind of food do you have?

Julia Tobey (25:38)

So in the morning we have breakfast burritos, really delicious egg sandwiches on croissants. We transition into more charcuterie boards, paninis, elevated desserts in the afternoon and evening, full, full bar. So Piper and Dino McTaggart, who ran Cap City Tavern, Piper’s a Broadway veteran, Spamalot, Radio City Rockette, she and her husband are leading our food and beverage program and it’s a fantastic menu. So check out BallyhooDenver.com.

And we have a menu page that’ll tell you more about that. And then we partner with Queen City Collective Coffee. So really delicious espresso latte cappuccino offerings as well. David Otto is our lead barista. He’s also a performer in town. He just created a Lavender Time latte along with Emma Maxfield, our other coffee lead. These are all like performers in town who are also working in our cafe, bar, yeah, for cocktail bar, coffee service, et cetera.

Alex Miller (26:26)

Wow.

That’s amazing. So where does the name Ballyhoo come from? It’s a great name.

Julia Tobey (26:40)

I love it. So the first time I heard it, my husband was a standup comic for 30 years. And we were at some random club, probably in Los Angeles somewhere. And we were at the light board and he said to the light guy, at this point in my show, if you could just give me some Ballyhoo. And I was like, what, what, does that mean? If you think about a Hollywood premiere and the spotlights are up in the sky and the spotlights are just going crazy and it’s creating this attention to wherever that location is, that’s a Ballyhoo.

And in theatrical terms, it’s any time that lights on stage are just going crazy. So we’re trying to create this attention to this particular spot because we believe we’re going to save lives through just creating human connection and eye contact and just understanding that we’re all in this struggle together as humanity as a whole.

Alex Miller (27:27)

Wow, yeah, and there’s the play Last Night of Ballyhoo, but that doesn’t have anything to do with this. It just happens to have the same word in there. But it’s a third place. really sounds like what you’re driving at here is a place where people can go and get away from screens maybe and meet people and hear live music and entertainment.

Julia Tobey (27:45)

That’s exactly right. And that’s real word is the third place. third place, third space. So a place beyond work, beyond home, where you can just come and just be connected with other humans. Get off your phone if you can, get off Netflix, experience live theater, live music, and human connection. And just remember we’re all in this together.

Alex Miller (28:05)

Absolutely, yeah. Well, I’m excited to hear that you might have one down my way, because I live in Highlands Ranch, very different from the Highlands. But yeah, we could use something like that down here. It’s boring as hell. There’s nothing. There’s nothing. Yeah. All right. Well, I’m going to try and make it out there on Saturday, sometime for your grand opening. break legs and have a great opening. And yeah, and also if you want to check out Hedwig, it’s a great show. We saw it last year.

Julia Tobey (28:12)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Alex Miller (28:33)

Great to see and Clark Destin Jones coming back to reprise that role. It’d great.

Julia Tobey (28:37)

Yes, 10 a.m. ribbon cutting this Saturday, November 1st, and Hedwig opens November 6th and we are truly almost sold out. So, hedwigdenver.com for those tickets or check us out at ballyhoodenver.com. B-A-L-L-Y-H-O-O denver.com.

Alex Miller (28:53)

All right, Julia,

thanks so much for popping on and good luck with it all.

Julia Tobey (28:59)

Appreciate it. Thank you so much, Alex. Take care.

Alex Miller (29:01)

All right, bye bye.

Toni Tresca (29:03)

Yeah,

Finally, for our last bit of news, we’re returning to a reader comment. Garth Gersten, who was the reader who wrote to us last week about the sound issues that he had been experiencing at the DCPA during touring productions, he emailed us again. He had shared with us that he had been having those problems. And then he reached out to the DCPA to ask if, quote, anything be done about the sound mix at the touring shows.

The sound quality has been getting worse and worse over the last few years, and too much of every show is unintelligible due to the poor mix. It’s gotten so bad that we’re contemplating not renewing. Please let me know that you are one, aware of the situation, and two, what steps are being taken.” End quote. So, more or less, what he kind of shared with us.

Alex Miller (29:47)

Mm-hmm.

Right. Yeah. And so he shared their response back with him, which was very just kind of PR kind of, I don’t know, kind of just, I don’t know what kind of kind of empty language, but the part that stuck out to me was that we understand that some people have a better experience than others, which apparently is the case. And, you know, we’ve talked about, but, you know, and they said they would pass it on to the touring production and how it’s the touring production that does the sound.

they bring their own sound equipment and crew doing the best to balance the sound as best as possible. But we had heard this from other people as well, but we were just out there at the Lion King the other night, and I think you and I both kind of looked at each other afterward and said, huh, sounded fine to us, that particular show.

Toni Tresca (30:34)

Yeah, The Lion King, there were no sound issues. However, I really do wonder that with The Lion King, if it’s just such a well-oiled machine at this point, that yeah, they’re not gonna have any problems. It’s Disney, they have the money, they’re paying over 40 cast members, they can pay for a proper sound mix.

Alex Miller (30:43)

Yeah.

Yeah, imagine if they learned that there was a problem, they would have a SWAT team of sound engineers like descend from the ceiling of the Buell to fix things. Disney, damn it. Yes, right. all right, well, hopefully, I mean, we’ll see what comes of that if it improves at all or whatever, but.

Toni Tresca (31:02)

The SWAT team wearing Mickey Mouse ears.

Alex Miller (31:16)

Also, ⁓ just in hot off the digital press, the Colorado Shakespeare Festival has announced its season for next summer. So this is a big one because all of the renovation on the outdoor Mary Ripon Theater will be complete. And that means that also we back up to four shows to outside to inside.

Toni Tresca (31:23)

Mmm.

Yeah, and so the lineup includes the very popular musical comedy Twelfth Night in the Mary Rippon, followed by Julius Caesar, staged in the indoor Roe Green Theater.

Alex Miller (31:46)

Yeah, I’m really keen to see Julie Caesar. I’ve never seen it. It’s such famous, you know, play. It’s got all those quotes in it all that. And ⁓ really, really definitely look forward to that. And of course, I’ve seen Twelfth Night many times, but that’s always fun to go see.

And then the next two, one of them is a show based on the film Shakespeare Unloved. This is a musical called Shakespeare Unloved and that’s followed by, and that’ll be outside. And then the next one is a world premiere of something called Friends, Romans, Countrymen by David Davoulos. This is a show that was commissioned by the Colorado Shakespeare Festival and that’ll be inside in the real green. So it’s a long ways off, but definitely have that to look forward to.

can’t wait to see what they’ve done And of course, part of that renovation was the old Hellems building on the CU campus, which is where I spent a lot of time as a student there, because that’s where all the English and writing classes and stuff were. Even in the 80s, it was a very creaky old building with a lot of, you know, it very musty and smelly. So I’ll be curious to see, I don’t know, hopefully I can pop into Hellems and see what it looks like in there as well.

Toni Tresca (32:52)

Yeah, I’m definitely looking forward to getting back out to the Riff-On to catch the shows out in that outdoor space. And two pretty interesting ones. They’ve chosen, obviously, they’re more commercial shows for the outdoor space, Twelfth Night and Shakespeare in Love, because that’s a little bit bigger than the Roe Green. Although one thing I didn’t see in the announcement is anything about the continuation of the original Practices shows, which are their productions where it’s staged

Alex Miller (33:03)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (33:21)

like it would have been back in the day.

Alex Miller (33:23)

Yeah, yeah, we’ll have to check on that. And they only do two performances of them. They sell out. And you and I have both tried to get into one and have failed the last couple of years. But maybe that’s just, maybe that’s coming on or maybe they just had too much going on and they didn’t want to do it this year. So who knows? We’ll find out.

Toni Tresca (33:30)

Right.

Alex Miller (33:43)

So, all right, well, we’re gonna take a quick break, then listen to my interview with Scott Merchant, the creator of the new musical, Ichabod, and then we’ll come back with our top 10 Colorado headliners. So hold tight.

Alex Miller (33:53)

On Stage Colorado is brought to you by the Aurora Fox Arts Center presenting Lizzie through November 2nd. With a cast of four powerful performers and a dynamic live band, it’s a fierce and captivated experience exploring the heated days leading up to the Lizzie Borden murders and her controversial trial. Tickets at aurorafoxartscenter.org. On Stage Colorado is sponsored in part by Colorado Candlelight featuring Steele Magnolias through November 9th.

In a small Louisiana beauty salon, six women share humor, love, and strength in a play that blends heartwarming comedy with moments of poignant emotion. Tickets at coloradocandolight.com. And we’re supported by Parker Arts and its production of the 25th annual Putnam County Spelling Bee running through November 16th at the Schoolhouse Theater.

an eclectic group of six mid pubescents vying for the spelling championship of a lifetime. Tickets at ParkerArts.org.

Colorado is also brought to you by the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College presenting Raquel’s Purple Pineapple Adventure October 25th through November 2nd.

a joint production with Creed Repertory Theatre.

family-friendly show is about a girl who just wants to help her family run their campground in the Colorado mountains, but the worst has happened. Summer school. Tickets at fac.coloradocollege.edu. Also supporting the podcast is Curious Theatre 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.

Alex Miller (35:28)

All right. ⁓ We are here with Scott Merchant, the creator of Ichabod, the new musical coming up here. Welcome to the OnStage Colorado podcast. Scott, thanks for being on.

Scott (35:38)

Thank you, Alex. I really appreciate you having me on.

Alex Miller (35:40)

So is there no Ichabod musical already? It seems like something somebody would have thought of before.

Scott (35:46)

You

would think so. before I started writing it 10 years ago, I definitely did some research to see who else out there was producing such a thing. And I couldn’t find a one. So I said, OK, it’ll be my turn.

Alex Miller (35:59)

It’s such an iconic name. It’s like you just, everybody knows. I mean, I think everybody reads the story. Well, at least used to read the story when they’re in school at some point. The headless horseman story, everybody knows it. so, well,

Well, before we get into a little bit about Ichabod, I just want to ask about you and your journey to being able to write a musical. Where did you start? A lot of people say it was a very young age. What was your first experience with the stage?

Scott (36:27)

Yeah,

for sure. I was an opera singer when I was eight years old and I told my parents I was going to be an opera singer when I was eight years old. they were like, that’s nice, honey. But lo and behold, it was what I was meant to do. And if you look back on my path from the very beginning of kindergarten all the way up till the very present, I have always been outgoing. I have always been creative. I’ve always been someone who loves to create on stage. For me, the…

becoming other characters and helping other people to become characters is like my drug of choice. And opera, of course, is one of the biggest spectacles in the history of music. So that’s kind of where my background came from. I grew up in a small village called Rousses Point, New York. And we’re a tiny little village in the northeast most corner of New York state, right on the Canadian border and Vermont border. So on Lake Champlain. That’s why when you come to see Ichabod, you will hear some references, of course, to Tarrytown, which is Sleepy Hollow, but also to some of the areas where I’m from.

Alex Miller (37:08)

Wow. Okay.

Scott (37:20)

in northern New York to kind of give a little holler back Carol Burnett style, but inside the musical.

Alex Miller (37:23)

Uh huh.

Okay. And so you’re talking about your path as an opera singer. Are you currently performing in with any companies or where are you doing stuff?

Scott (37:34)

Well, I’m not performing right now, but I did make my American debut with Opera Colorado in the production of Carmen.

And ⁓ I sang at the Lamont School of Music. I was recruited by the Lamont School of Music to be their lead tenor for five years. And that’s where a majority of my training came from. And then I’ve also been taking, I first went to Italy on my own to sing in a different young artists program. And then I eventually was invited to teach over in Italy. So I’ve been bringing families over to Italy to study as well. And those are the kinds of things that influence my everyday. I’m so very lucky in my life to be around other creatives and other opportunities that allow

me to see the world in such a beautiful light, but also to bring other people along. And really that’s what Ichabod is about. It’s about this weird sense of Tarrytown, New York in my own little noggin, and you’re being invited along to that sleepy hollow.

Alex Miller (38:24)

Okay. And before you started on Ichabod, had you written anything else, any shorter works or?

Scott (38:31)

Yeah, I’ve done some small things here. Their thematic concerts is my favorite thing to do. for example, my studio, True Voice Studio, where I’ve been teaching for 20 years, we do regular recitals. And so one of my last recitals was at the Oriental Theater. I think we’re calling it the O now. And it was called Movie Magic. And ⁓ all of my students sang songs from different movies. And I pieced together the different parts of the films that would show kind of a basic storyline of the film that they were singing along to.

with like a 13 piece band. was super duper fun. We packed the house. People love that kind of music. They love if they can sing along as well. Ichabod is kind of the same. I’m intending for people to come along and have a really fun time and get a little scared sometimes, some thrills, some laughs, a little bit of 19th century smuddiness, like show a little ankle. know. Thank God I am not in the musical.

Alex Miller (39:18)

Woo, okay. And so are you in it?

Ha ha ha

ha!

Scott (39:24)

Thank God,

no, I told the cast and I told my team, said, guys, I just want to make this clear. I am not playing any role in my musical. If we have to find somebody off the street, we will pull someone in first before I have to play it. And so we did end up getting an incredible cast. I mean, I cannot tell you the people that have come out for this musical and the talent.

that we have in this show. I mean, it just blows my mind every time I hear them singing, every time I talk to them. And these are like amazing professionals from our community. One of our principal leads is Johnny Nichols Jr. He’s the artistic director of the Denver Gay Men’s Chorus. And just these incredible talents that come through that have been cast for these parts, they’ve come along the journey with me. It’s been really unique and really different for us. And the actors are crucial to what we’ve done.

Alex Miller (39:55)

huh.

Yeah.

Scott (40:13)

They’ve added to Ichabod in a major way.

Alex Miller (40:16)

Right, right. So did you write all the music and the book?

Scott (40:21)

I did, I wrote the entirety of the script and I wrote all of the music. Although I would like to say the reason why Ichabod was such a huge process, but successful process for me is because I have a very close friend of 25 years whose name is Bruce Phillips.

And we met at Crane School of Music 25 years ago, and he’s been a good friend ever since, and he plays for my studio. Well, Bruce is an incredible transcriber, and transcription means a person can listen to something and either write it down on music paper or they can listen or watch something and they can play it in. In this case, this is what Bruce did. Bruce is an amazing pianist. And we were able to use Finale, which is a music transcription application.

And I can’t even tell you, I have hundreds of videos of me recording all of the music on my piano and then sending that over to Bruce so he could transcribe it into the computer, into finale. And that’s really why we’ve been able to have all of the music along the way. Bruce has just been a crucial part of this process as one of my arrangers, as my music director, as my close friend and confidant. He and I have been really in this path since about two years ago when Ichabod kind of woke back up. I started writing the musical 10 years ago.

And a couple of years ago, it kind of woke back up. And at that moment, the characters decided it was time to finish. So we did. But Bruce has written in my musical, Bruce has written two things, which I want to make sure to give him credit for. The first thing is this beautiful, sleepy hollow waltz. And that happens at the one of the last scenes during the wedding that will get played on a Victrola.

⁓ once the wedding portion is over. So that’s really cool. You’ll get to hear that. And it’s in the style of that old-timey music. And then the other thing is, in my musical, I have a melody that I’ve written called Into the Graveyard. And the most big, the most challenging part of today is trying not to let out any spoilers. Because I have lots of them. And if you come to see the show, you’ll see why I can’t talk about a ton of them. Into the Graveyard is a very important scene in the show.

Alex Miller (42:06)

Okay.

Scott (42:14)

Ichabod falls upon a small broken down graveyard. He has some observations of some young people playing there. He doesn’t quite know what it is, but he finds out. And so that melody that I wrote for that, Bruce was able to take that melody, reverse it completely and turn it into the horseman’s theme. So every time the horseman comes on stage, the ride of the horseman theme comes along with that. And so yes, the music is mine. Yes, I’ve written all the script.

But I also have had this incredible teammate and team of people who have been, I can’t, they’re just invaluable. They’re just incredible people. It’s true, you cannot do it yourself. You have to have a village. You have to bring other people along with you. And I’m just lucky enough that I have the people around me from my life that are willing to take the journey.

Alex Miller (43:01)

So you’re referring to this as a musical, so it’s not an opera, but when I saw one of the clips from it, it sounded fairly operatic. So would you call it an operatic musical or something like that?

Scott (43:11)

Yeah, well, old school musicals like Gershwin and Rogers and Hammerstein, they do have kind of like a bit more of an operatic feel, a bit more of a classical feel versus rant and avenue cue. Those have a bit more of a belty contemporary feel. And so I would not call Ichabod an opera. And by the way, opera, it’s one of my favorite things to teach people is opera is the plural of opus. Opus means a work and opera means multiple works placed together.

Alex Miller (43:20)

Yeah.

Scott (43:37)

And so technically we could insert ourselves into that opera, but no, we have some contemporary stuff going on. And some of the music that you hear is very classic. I would say that this musical is kind of a mix between Sweeney Todd and Avenue Q. It’s very irreverent. It’s a little bit vulgar. It’s a little scary. It’s a little horrific.

Alex Miller (43:55)

Right. Well, I was going to ask you, at what point does an opera, what is the difference between an opera and a musical? mean, of course we understand that operatic singing is quite different from a typical musical, but I’ve never really thought about, like, at what point does an opera become a musical or vice versa?

Scott (44:10)

Yeah, well, they’re close cousins and they have a common page which is called operetta, Gilbert and Sullivan. But, you know, I spent my entire life being an opera singer and so the spectacle is very important to me. I would say that we could fit this musical into the operatic category because there is some very classical singing stuff like Rogers and Hammerstein, some of that old school kind of singing, but also there’s a modern part of this. And so I would say that it’s more of a musical in a sense that it has some contemporary themes, it has some contemporary singing and style.

Alex Miller (44:11)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Scott (44:38)

But I suppose at the end of the day, it could be a bit of both. And truly, at the end of the day, is that. It’s that definitely opera has influenced me, and I put myself 1,000 % into this musical. So you’ll see some really large spectacles and some operatic moments. You’ll also hear and see some really contemporary moments that I think you’ll really enjoy.

Alex Miller (44:41)

Mm-hmm.

Okay, random question. How do you feel about the song Opera Singer by Cake? Are you familiar? Yeah, it is. It’s great song. No, no. Well, yeah, John McCray couldn’t sing opera if his life depended on it. so, well, I also want to ask you how closely does the story of your musical hue to the original

Scott (45:04)

I love that song. It’s one of my favorite songs. I am an opera singer. Yes, I love that song. Even though there’s no singing of opera in it.

That’s right.

Alex Miller (45:25)

that’s story by Washington Irving, the legend of Sleepy Hollow. ⁓

Scott (45:28)

Yeah, the legend of

Sleepy Hollow, which was set in colonial times, by the way. So in this musical, I like to tell people that it’s similar in the sense like Hamilton, that it comes in, we enter into Sleepy Hollow, we recognize some of the names from Sleepy Hollow, so you’ll get some similar characters from Sleepy Hollow. But in that particular moment, after we are introduced to the characters, it takes an immediate left turn. And so the story kind of takes its own form and kind of…

Alex Miller (45:52)

Mm-hmm.

Scott (45:55)

fills itself out. And so it’s a bit of a transport for the audience. For those who, like you said earlier, we’ve all read the legend of Sleepy Hollow in school. Like I remember reading that in elementary and middle school. And so that’s been in our lives for a very long time. And so for me, this is a really fun twist on the Sleepy Hollow story. And ⁓ it’s got, I’ve put into it some really relevant in my mind topics, including, you know,

queer love story, which is in it. And that’s very apropos for right now as we read today that the Supreme Court is reconsidering nationalized queer marriage, gay marriage for us. That’s a very important thing. The musical covers different kind of controversial topics like education and losing a passion for teaching. Female sexuality is part of it as well and how that is looked down upon in the church and the kind of oppression from the church and how small towns can have like conspiracies and. ⁓

This is kind of all woven together from all of my experiences in my life. I was raised a Catholic. And so when you see Father Harmful seen in this show, that is my vision of my experience in the Catholic Church. And I have an uncle who’s a priest in the Catholic Church, and ⁓ I think you’ll enjoy it. But ⁓ it’s definitely sarcastic and ironic, and it definitely shows my true feelings about different institutions that we place ourselves in or we’re placed in. And I really hope beyond people having a good time and

Alex Miller (47:04)

Mm-hmm.

Scott (47:16)

really enjoying the music, I hope that some of these messages, like the LGBTQ message that we have of queer love, and how does that survive in a small town? And also we discuss greed, especially in this moment of time, we look around the world and greed is just…

and taking over so much of what I personally would hope would be humanitarianism. And so instead of being humans to humans, we’re humans to monetizing another human. And so greed is probably the biggest message of our show. And in fact, the lesson of Ichabod in this particular iteration is that when love is consumed by greed, there is violence.

And so we find out how that plays out in the show. And you’ll see there’s a Greek chorus that will say those things along the way. But for me, it’s very relevant to today. I mean, every day we wake up and there’s something else going on with some sort of minority. Women’s rights are being challenged. Queer rights are being challenged. People of color rights are being challenged. And all of those things we’re addressing in this musical. And we’re adding a modern flair, or at least we’re going to call a modern flair to it because it’s happening right now.

It happened during colonialism and it happens right now. And so we’re connecting that and making people understand what the relevance of it is. And I think it’ll be easy to see.

Alex Miller (48:37)

Okay, great.

So one of the things about musicals is that they tend to be kind of expensive and there can be a lot of scenic elements and other technical things that add up. How much of that do you have in this show? I do you have an actual headless horseman racing across the stage or anything like that?

Scott (48:56)

Yes, we do. have lots of fun things that will happen. And I cannot tell you what will happen with the Headless Horseman because I don’t want to ruin it for you. But there are very strong technical aspects that will be really fun for the audience to experience. both the shows are really unique. The show on the 30th.

Alex Miller (49:03)

Okay, fair enough.

Scott (49:12)

is a more traditional show set at the Maisel theater there. So it’s a more traditional show. You’ll see people entering in from left and right. You’ll understand that this is a musical. We’ve been here, we’ve done this before. And it’s great there. also have our next iteration of it is going up at Meow Wolf on November 5th and 6th. And that is a trippy, completely different situation with the show where technical parts are different and even just as great as we’re having at the Maisel. And so you’ll see all kinds of things happen with the horsemen. We definitely have…

really cool, intricate costumes. Our main principal costumes were made by a good friend of mine named Rebecca Posey. She lives in New Orleans. She and I sang together at the Lamont School of Music here in Denver, Colorado. We sang Cosi Fontute together and we went to Italy to sing together as well. And she happens to be a period costumer. So she is really great at creating these incredible costumes.

And so part of our technical process, well at the beginning, like a long time ago, was getting together with Rebecca on Zoom, because she’s in New Orleans, and talking to her about these costumes. And she has done an incredible job, incredible. And her ⁓ YouTube page is pocketful of posies, if anybody wants to look. It’s just incredible stuff. So that’s another piece of it. That’s all been shipped out. The cape of the horseman, everything has technical parts of it.

Because we’re such a big cast, we don’t have a lot of room physically backstage for other people. So as a cast, we’re helping each other. Let me help you get your costume on. Let me help you finish your makeup transition. And the other cool thing about technical part of this, besides the lights and the sound, which is super fun, you’ll see there’s some incredible lights and sound stuff that’s gonna happen, but also some transformations. We have some actors in our cast that are playing three characters. And so they are transforming themselves in between.

Alex Miller (50:39)

and

Scott (50:58)

the scenes into these other characters. And I won’t tell you who it is, but keep an eye out. You’ll recognize them.

Alex Miller (51:04)

Okay.

Great. You were talking about costumes. What about wigs? Do you have a wigger?

Scott (51:09)

We don’t

have a wigger, although we did this time. The most interesting part of this whole process is we got to make some heads. And so we had our actors go over to a good friend of mine, Greg Sonnenberg, and he’s an artist out of ⁓ Station Six Over Nine here in Arvada. And he does prosthetic art. And so I said, can you make us some heads? He said, absolutely. So our actors went over and the ones who are dying and ⁓

He was able to make the prosthetic. They had to sit there for 20 minutes with all this stuff all over except for two nostril holes. And he has this really chill jazz music playing in the back. My actors told me that they felt like he was an ASMR. He was like, very calm. You’re doing very neat. And know, chill music in the background. So he ended up doing that and we got these incredible plaster casts of the actors. So our heads look like the actors who will be dying in this production. And that’s been one of the most fun things to do.

Alex Miller (51:51)

Right.

Nice.

Scott (52:05)

collecting all the furniture and trying to get Sleepy Hollow to be, I want Sleepy Hollow to feel sad. hmm, right? And so we wanna feel that. And so all the things that we’ve collected for the show cumulatively have created this really sad, dark area, not super time relevant, I would call it time period irrelevant, but definitely an understanding that there’s something happening in Terrytown, something has not been discussed and they gotta get to the tail end of it and figure it out, which we do at the end of the musical.

Alex Miller (52:12)

Mm-hmm.

All right. Well, I know you’ve just got a few shows here in Denver. Are you going to kind of see how they do and then hopefully go further?

Scott (52:44)

Yes, I mean, we’re so thankful that we’re performing at two major houses in our community. The Mizel Center at the JCC, the Jewish Community Center has been incredible. And Tim Campbell and his team have just been incredible to build us into there. Some of the things that we’re bringing with us are a little bit technical in terms of lighting and sound. so having ⁓ these incredible teams that are like, yeah, we can do that. We’ve done that before.

is really helpful to us. then, you know, over at Meow Wolf, which I never thought in my mind that I would ever have a production, a musical at Meow Wolf. They do shows, but they’ve never done a musical at this Meow Wolf. And so…

Alex Miller (53:19)

Yeah, they have

that perplexiplex space, is fantastic. It’s a really cool space. Yeah.

Scott (53:22)

Yeah, it’s fully immersive and it’s projection technology and we’ve

designed it just for the show. So there’ll be areas that you can touch and it will change the light. You’ll get to see lots of really fun spectacle in that show.

Alex Miller (53:35)

All right, well, Scott Merchant, the creator of Ichabod, the musical, ⁓ is going to be performing, as we said, at the Maisel Center on October 30th, and then it will be at the Meow Wolf Perplexiplex on November 5th and 6th. Break lots of legs. ⁓ It’s exciting project, and

Alex Miller (53:52)

we are going to take us out here with a little bit of music from Iqbaad.

Scott (53:56)

Thank you, Alex. Thanks for taking the time today. I hope everyone has a good time and comes to see Ichabod. Thank you.

Toni Tresca (54:26)

Well, that was a great conversation with Scott about Ichabod. What an interesting musical.

Alex Miller (54:32)

Yeah, yeah, it’s, it’s under really, it sounds real interesting. And then, you know, his, he’s got such an interesting background too, as an opera singer. And, and, you know, it sounds like he had a lot of buy-in, I think he’s, you know, with his brother helping out and all this. the talking about the, you know, where, where opera starts and musical theater ends or vice versa was, was interesting too. I’d never really thought about it.

Toni Tresca (54:57)

Yeah, was definitely interesting to hear from him on that. I can’t say it’s a subject I’ve thought a ton about either. It’s just, I mean, they do seem surface level very similar, but there’s a lot of nuance.

Alex Miller (55:08)

Yeah, and I really would try and get out to the Perplexeplex at Meow Wolf because I don’t know that they’ve done anything like that in that theater, like an actual theatrical production. They’ve got comedy in there and some bands and have…

Toni Tresca (55:22)

They did that

one Cthulhu puppet show staging in there that I’m blanking on the exact name of it, but it was more comic in nature. But it was a musical theatrical production. But yeah, it’s not what they normally do in that space, like you’re saying. It’s a lot more used for comedy and live music.

Alex Miller (55:26)

Okay.

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (55:45)

But all right, well now it is time to switch over to this week’s headliners. These are some of the shows of interest coming up in the next week or so that we think you might want to check out. Alex, what do you have to start us off with this week?

Alex Miller (55:59)

Well, this one’s down south, closer to me and Parker, the pace Parker Arts is doing the 25th annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. This will be at their smaller Schoolhouse Theater, which is right on the main drag there in Parker, which is a neat little space. And of course, everybody knows this show. It’s about kids in a spelling bee and it’s a lot of fun. If you haven’t seen it, definitely recommend checking it out. This one’s going through November 16.

Toni Tresca (56:23)

Are you gonna hit that one since it’s in your backyard?

Alex Miller (56:26)

Yeah, I’m going to try. I’m trying to squeeze in as much as I can, but we’ll see.

Toni Tresca (56:32)

Cool. Mine, pick is happening at various venues all across the Denver metro area. It’s called Ghost Light and it’s six spine tingling tales from behind the curtain around Colorado. From these writers student days in Laredo Heights to at the Bonfies with Henry Lowenstein or up in the mountains. Each story is told by a stage manager, director, professor, costumer, scenic artist and actor.

and reveals the chilling mysteries that linger long after the lights go out in Colorado. And it’s produced by the local troupe Everyman Theater, and it’s gonna be at the People’s Building in Aurora, October 29th, then at the John Hand Theater in Denver, October 31st, so on Halloween, then over at the Lone Tree Rec Center, November 1st, and finally at Vintage Theater in Aurora on November 12th.

Alex Miller (57:26)

Okay, well that sounds like a lot of fun and definitely a couple of opportunities to check that out.

Toni Tresca (57:31)

Yeah, definitely an interesting kind of local twist on the spooky season. It’s something kind of in line with a town called Harris.

Alex Miller (57:41)

All right, well my next, I have a kind of pair of Dracula’s here. One of them is straight Dracula. It’s just Dracula at Main Street Live in Trinidad. So way down south, it’s playing through November 2nd. If you want to get, ⁓ you know, if you’re in the area, you want to check out just like your standard Dracula tale that’s happening down there. And then the other one is, this is going to be opening at the Garner Gallery at the Denver Center. It’s called Dracula, a Combity of Terrors.

And I think we’ve talked about this before. runs November 8th all the way to May 10th and has some really a couple of great local comic actors in it. Leslie O’Carroll being one of them. Do you remember who else was Sean? Scretchens in it?

Toni Tresca (58:20)

Sean Scroggins is in it.

We’ve got Marco Alberto Robinson and Adrian Lee Robinson, the husband and wife dynamic duo who have been taking over Colorado stages together are in that show. And then another local person as well whose name I am blanking on. I don’t have it in front of me right now, but yeah, it is a Colorado drenched cast. It’s a really incredible thing.

Alex Miller (58:25)

yeah. Yes. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, and typically those Grona Galleria shows often have local cast, and it’s a great, it can be an awful lot of fun. They’ve had a couple of, you know, misses there over the years, but this one, I bet this one will be.

Toni Tresca (59:00)

You know, the misses that they have in this space are more often than not touring stuff, though, I would say. Just a little note. Yeah, absolutely. My next pick is a Colorado-made product. It is by Buntport Theatre in Denver. This is a remount of their show. Edgar Allan Poe is dead, and so is my cat. They say that this is a comedy that’s unlikely to be spooky.

Alex Miller (59:04)

That’s right.

Yeah, bye Colorado.

Hmm?

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (59:26)

unless you think podcasts and Boston market are spooky. obviously no listeners of this podcast think that the podcast are spooky. So this will be more of a comedy for you then, but it’s about a guy who lives in his sister’s basement, who is recording podcast episodes dedicated to his hero, the Gothic writer, Edgar Allan Poe. And much to his sister’s dismay, he takes very little interest in anything else, but they say change is on the way.

coming in the unlikely form of a thrift store suit.

Alex Miller (1:00:00)

Wow. Okay. Yeah. Definitely looking forward to that. I’ll be going to it pretty soon. I can’t remember what night. ⁓ Okay.

Toni Tresca (1:00:07)

I’m gonna check that one out on Saturday, November 1st, in the middle of

my Denver film happenings.

Alex Miller (1:00:13)

wow. Yeah,

I think I’ll be there that night too. So we can we can and Andy as well so we can have some fun at that. I wanted to just mention really quick, Edgar Allan Poe is one of those, you know, famous writer names that you hear and you know the stories. if if you ever if there’s ever a good it’s always a good time this time of spooky season is take a minute to read something like The Telltale Heart or The Fall of the House of Usher. Man, that guy was a good writer. I mean, not just the

Toni Tresca (1:00:19)

Excellent.

Alex Miller (1:00:40)

the images that he conjured, but his prose is just beautiful. And it’s really fun to read aloud, know, so if you have like a Halloween party and you want to stop it for 20 minutes and read an old short story, that would be the one I’d pick. shout out to Edgar Allan Poe and that poor dead cat.

Speaking of Stephen King, ⁓ open stage theater up at Fort Collins. And Fort Collins is at the Lincoln Center, they’re doing Misery. So this is running Halloween through November 29th. This is of course the tale of a famous writer who has a car crash and he’s nursed back to health by his most ardent fan who is horrified to learn that he’s killed off her favorite character and she has some…

Awful things she does to him to try and get him to change his ways with the plot. it’s been a show that’s been done a number of times in the last couple of years, but Open Stage is mounting it up there. So it should be great one for the folks in NoCo.

Toni Tresca (1:01:37)

Mm-hmm. My next one we talked about a little bit earlier in the show during our news segment. It’s La Triviata being done by Opera Colorado over at the Ellie Cochran Cochran’s Opera House in Denver. This is their season opener and it’s kicking off their pay what you will ticket model. So if you want to see this show that is set against the backdrop of glamorous 1850s Paris,

There’s never been a more affordable chance to do that than right now.

Alex Miller (1:02:07)

That’s right, Genrelle are hot. All right, my last headliner is Alibis and Other Lies at What If Theater in Lakewood. This is playing just through this weekend through November 1st. This is an improvised Agatha Christie. it’s, you know, these folks do some improv stuff and things like that. by the end of the first scene, someone will be dead. A detective will arrive to figure out who done it. Lies will be told, chaos will ensue, and you’ll be surprised at how funny a murder can be, is what it says. So. ⁓

That’s a, I’d like to get out to what if theater at some point of, know, they’re always doing interesting stuff out there and I just haven’t been.

Toni Tresca (1:02:40)

Yeah, I love the titles that they have and the ideas behind them. It seems like they’re really doing interesting stuff out in the Lakewood area. Yeah, I haven’t checked them out either.

Alex Miller (1:02:48)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (1:02:50)

I’ve got two more to round us out. We touched on this one a little bit earlier in the show too, so I’ll keep this one brief. It’s the remount of Hedwig and the Angry Inch over at Ballyhoo in Denver, November 6th through 23rd. This is the show that was staged by Get By production, stars Clark Destiny Jones, Emma Maxfield, and it’s a rock opera.

Alex Miller (1:02:59)

Mm-hmm.

Toni Tresca (1:03:14)

It’s kind of weird out there, extreme in your face, but if you, if there are people who love this show, they’re dedicated to this show specifically, and so this is a great chance to see it in the new space.

Alex Miller (1:03:30)

Yeah, and this was directed by Kelly Van Osbray. did they get Annatares or Schwartz back for it, or do they have someone else?

Toni Tresca (1:03:36)

So,

Anne, we saw Anne tears the sports Emma Maxfield was the person who came in on the back half of the show and she is re reprising the role this time around. Anne is currently in rehearsal for frozen. So I think she is too busy. Yeah.

Alex Miller (1:03:50)

She’s a little busy. Wow.

Yep. She’ll kill it. She’ll kill it. Looking forward to taking my granddaughters to Frozen at the Arbeta Center coming up in November. all right.

Toni Tresca (1:04:00)

And then my

final pick is Down South in the Springs by the Springs Ensemble Theater. It is a classic play, R.U.R. And this is a play about a young woman who arrives at this factory island where human beings are manufactured. And while investigating the origins of the new artificial working class, unexpected proposition lands in the middle of a rising revolution.

It’s a Czech melodrama that inspired a century of science fiction, and they say predicted some of our most contemporary science facts. It’s definitely an interesting time to be doing this in the age of artificial intelligence. Yeah, I’m not sure if, do we have somebody who’s gonna be covering this one, Alex?

Alex Miller (1:04:48)

Yes, I think Judith is going to be at that one, so we’ll have a review of that when the time comes.

Toni Tresca (1:04:55)

incredible. I look forward to reading that and you know if she has good things to say maybe I make the drive out to down to the springs.

Alex Miller (1:04:56)

Yeah.

Yeah, that sounds like sounds like a really interesting show for sure. So, all right, well, ⁓ that’s it for that stuff on this website upcoming reviews to look out for including yours review of the Lion King and a town called Harris. One of us will write a review about Edgar Allan Poe is dead and so is my cat. And then we have your feature about the grand opening of Ballyhoo. And then coming up.

You’re going to be on stage Colorado is going to be hitting the Denver Film Festival pretty hard this year, more coverage than any other site I wager to guess. And you’re going to be kind of leading the charge. So what are some of the shows the films that you’re going to get out to see and write about?

Toni Tresca (1:05:40)

Yeah, so these are subject to slight change, because these are not the only films I’m seeing. So if I feel strongly about something else, I may do some swapping and add some more in. Like, I’m seeing some documentaries, but unless they’re, like, incredible, I probably won’t write something about them. But these are the ones that are sure things to expect. So on Halloween, I’m going to be…

Alex Miller (1:05:53)

huh.

Toni Tresca (1:06:06)

F.E.L.E. Cocken’s opera house to experience a wake-up dead man, a knifed-out mystery. So this is the third entry in the Rian Johnson mystery film series. Really enjoy the first two. Very, very curious to see where this one goes.

Then on November 1st, I’m gonna be doing either Rental Family or J. Kelly. These are both Oscar-y kind of films, and I’ll probably do the one that I have more to say about. And then I’m trying to get to this film called Fucktoys that evening. But that one is time-dependent because I’m also gonna be over at Buntport that night to see their show. So just trying to fit as many things in as possible. But.

Alex Miller (1:06:29)

Mm-hmm.

All right. Dizzy man.

Mm-hmm.

Toni Tresca (1:06:50)

Then on the second, I’m going to be hitting Netflix’s Train Dreams, which is about the kind of how the railroads were put together. It’s and then Sentimental Value, which is a foreign language film that is a front runner for the Best Picture as well as the Best Foreign Feature award this year. Then on November 3rd, I’m hitting the Bradley Cooper film Is This Thing On? It’s about a guy who is going through a divorce and finds standup comedy.

Then on the November 4th, I’m going to be doing hitting the documentary Creed USA about the Colorado town. Definitely of interest for Colorado folks. And then that evening I’ll be at a Dead Man’s Wire, which includes a live conversation with the filmmaker afterwards. Then on the 5th, I’m at Park Chan Woo’s new film, No Other Choice at the Botanic Gardens. And then rounding out my time at the festival because I have a

Alex Miller (1:07:28)

Yeah.

Toni Tresca (1:07:46)

I have some travel that I had scheduled already before these dates came out that I was not able to move. So I’m only able to be there through the six, but I’ll be hitting the documentaries, short films made by Colorado artists, and a new film called Eternity.

Alex Miller (1:08:01)

Great. Yeah, and think we’re gonna have my son Andy Miller picking up some reviews on that final weekend while you be out. So we’ll cover as much as we can of the Denver Film Festival this year.

Toni Tresca (1:08:12)

It’s really incredible festival. And so I would encourage folks who are out there, there’s still tickets available. Pick up some, even if you just have time for like one, just like whatever fits into your schedule. That’s kind of the fun of it all is pretty much from 10 a.m. till about 10 p.m. at night throughout this 10 day stretch. There is something interesting scheduled for you to go check out.

Alex Miller (1:08:35)

Yeah. And of course you can buy a whole festival pass, but what’s an individual film? Are they similar to a regular movie theater price?

Toni Tresca (1:08:45)

Yeah, for like, for like, some of the smaller stuff, you’re talking like around like 10 to $20. For some of the bigger films, you’re looking maybe like a little bit closer to 30 or $40, but nothing super outrageous. It’s still a lot cheaper than most theater tickets are.

Alex Miller (1:09:03)

Mm-hmm. Great.

Toni Tresca (1:09:05)

And so if you want to stay up to date on all that’s going on in theaters, as well as our coverage of the Denver Film Festival, you’re going to want to make sure that you subscribe to the OnStage Colorado Theater Blast newsletter that comes out every Thursday. And then go ahead and rate, review, and subscribe to this podcast to make sure that you don’t miss an episode.

Alex Miller (1:09:25)

No, because it’s all gold. Gold, I tell you! yeah. All right, well, that’s all for this week. We’ll be back next week with some stuff, who knows what. Thanks so much for listening. I’m Alex Miller.

Toni Tresca (1:09:28)

That’s right, Alex.

and I’m Tony Tresca and we’ll see you at the show.

Editor & Publisher at  |  + posts

Alex Miller is editor and publisher of OnStage Colorado. He has a long background in journalism, including stints as the top editor at the Vail Daily, Summit Daily News, Summit County Journal, Vail Trail and others. He’s also been an actor, director, playwright, artistic director and theatre board member and has been covering theatre in Colorado since 1995.

+ posts

A Colorado-based arts reporter originally from Mineola, Texas, who writes about the evolving world of theater and culture—with a focus on the financial realities of making art, emerging forms and leadership in the arts. He’s the Managing Editor of Bucket List Community Cafe, a contributor to Boulder Weekly, Denver Westword and co-host of the OnStage Colorado Podcast. He holds an MBA and an MA in Theatre & Performance Studies from CU Boulder, and his reporting and reviews combine business and artistic expertise.