Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Denver

It's a telling comment on the shortage of roles for women that almost no local actress has worked in more than one or two productions this year, but Erica Sarzin-Borrillo made her two appearances - in at the Mizel Center and at Germinal Stage Denver - count for a lot. Her Agnes in was all haughty, enameled elegance, the head of a crazed household, fighting to keep things in balance through meticulous attention to routine. In , she played Alice B. Toklas, the woman who dedicated her life to Gertrude Stein and became the narcissistic poet's maid, secretary, wife, muse and even writing paper. Borrillo made the character self-consciously affected - as was fitting for the hostess of Parisian salons - but also a vulnerable and conflicted woman.Sometimes Ed Baierlein makes it look almost too easy. Along with his wife, Sallie Diamond, he is the soul and driving force behind Germinal Stage Denver, the city's oldest serious theater company, directing plays he selects and starring in many of them. Baierlein's performing style is so low-key and relaxed that it's easy to miss the skill and authority that shape it. In , he played Wicksteed, a doctor disgusted with sex because he's examined so many genitalia. Disgusted, that is, until the nubile, young Felicity swans into his orbit. Baierlein also brought ferocious but carefully repressed depths to the upper-middle-class Tobias of Edward Albee's . But it was in that he showed the passion that animates his work, particularly in the magical scene in which the female protagonist, Ellie, realized her love for him, and he advised her with soul-penetrating sincerity not to marry for money: "You are going to let the fear of poverty govern your life, and your reward will be that you will eat, but you will not live." It was one of those moments that stay with you long after a play's over.Two of the season's most memorable productions were the work of Israel Hicks. , an update of Giraudoux's , focuses on the grandly near-destitute Countess Aurelia, who saves New York from greedy contractors. Hicks's production was brilliantly cast: Kathleen M. Brady was an inspiring Aurelia, and Rachel Duvall a gentle joy as the waitress, Irma. But there was also strength, joy and vitality throughout the ensemble, with exciting performances filling every niche and corner of the stage. When actors work with this much exuberance, you know there's inspiration coming from the director. Hicks assembled another extraordinary cast to give August Wilson's - a work of oceanic power and depth - its full due.Bug was a study of psychosis - an involving thriller without a lot of psychological complexity. The protagonist, Peter, moved in with a drug- and booze-addled woman and infected her with his phobia about bugs. Pretty soon the cheap motel room was filled with bug repellants and he was mutilating himself, even tearing out one of his own teeth, in the belief that his body was infested. It takes a lot of generosity and guts for an actor to give himself body, soul and spirit to a role - especially one this taxing - but that's exactly what Reid did. He was terrifying and understated at the same time, and you could feel him searching desperately for a footing through the descending darkness of his madness.What is there to say about Charles Weldon, other than that he's brilliant? In , he played Solly Two-Kings, a man of great depth and courage, an escaped slave who risked his life and his freedom working on the underground railroad. Two-Kings could transmute dog shit into something pure and valuable, and while he was unable to rest or to set down the staff that represented his struggle while injustice existed, he did not want to shed blood. Weldon knows how to play the complex music of an August Wilson script. He explored every facet of this heroic, almost-biblical character, and made Two-Kings as human and affable as he was strong.Though not a perfect play, George Bernard Shaw's is a brilliant and thought-provoking one. The study of English upper-class culture in decline revealed itself as sexy as well as funny under the guiding hand of Ed Baierlein. The main characters - Captain Shotover, a retired seafarer, and Ellie Dunn, the smart and spunky young woman who realizes she loves him - were beautifully played, and there was strong work from the rest of the cast, which included a pair of terrifying sisters and some rather weak-kneed men. It's a talky play, but everyone spoke their lines with enough confidence and wit to make this an enjoyable rendition of a fascinating play.It doesn't matter how much you praise Jamie Horton, you're never being hyperbolic. He's a deeply talented actor, at home in classics and contemporary work, comedy and tragedy - well, perhaps with a slight tilt toward comedy. In , Horton was in his element, playing two very different characters: the humorless, upper-class Victor and his physical double, the alcoholic hotel porter Poche. Horton didn't need gimmicks to help us differentiate between the two characters; he gave each of them slightly different characteristics but an entirely different soul. And, naturally, he handled the split-second timing demanded by farce with absolute aplomb.Mark Rubald is always a pleasure to watch, and he gave perhaps the most delightful performance of his career as the Sewer Man who helped Countess Aurelia save New York in . A true gentleman, though possessed of a jaunty workingman's swagger, this Sewer Man knew all the secrets of the city from his study of its garbage. Rubald can be one of the most playful actors around, and the pleasure he took in the role was infectious.Somehow the Colorado Shakespeare Festival managed to transform this warmhearted, poetic comedy into a drearily uninspiring evening. The production had one saving grace: Sean Tarrant's Malvolio. Malvolio is a vain, mean-spirited buffoon who's convinced by a trick letter that the mistress of the household he serves loves him. Tarrant took us through every twist and turn of the character's thinking with inspiring clarity and precision. His reading of the letter was hilarious, but he also made us pity this Malvolio for the humiliation he suffered toward the play's end. Tall and thin, Tarrant seemed a bit too elegant for the role until he revealed a lithe, uninhibited zaniness worthy of John Cleese.