In choosing our favorite theater productions from the past year, we didn’t have to look very far from our own backyard. Aurora theater companies dominated this year with a mix of powerful drama, insightful biography and gut-busting comedy. Folks from the Aurora Fox redefined what’s possible with set design, while the Vintage troupe finally proved that their move to the former Shadow Theatre space on Dayton Street could be a critical and commercial success.
Along with strong showings by Aurora-based theater company Phamaly at the Denver Center and a hilarious production of “Sylvia” a bit farther south at the Lone Tree Arts Center, we learned that great metro theater isn’t bound by geography. There’s plenty of drama, comedy and insight to be found outside of Colorado’s capital city, and Aurora is far from the cultural boonies. What follows are just a few of the highlights from a year filled with impressive achievements.
“RFK,” Vintage Theatre
The Vintage Theatre found a new level of commercial and critical success with its production of “RFK” early in 2013. The one-man biography detailing the life and legacy of Robert F. Kennedy was a long-running hit for the theater, the first viable smash since it made its move to its new Aurora home on Dayton Street in 2012. Immediacy was one of the most intriguing parts of the one-man show directed by Terry Dodd and featuring James O’Hagan Murphy in a powerhouse performance as Kennedy. The success of the production also had a lot to do with the material — the drama by Jack Holmes is a visceral political portrait. Through a combination of imagined dialogue and actual excerpts from stump speeches and statements to the press, the show paints a vivid picture of Robert Kennedy in myriad roles. Dodd and O’Hagan Murphy combined public moments with a rich, troubled and nuanced personal portrait. The struggles of the 1960s felt immediate, and the legacy of Kennedy’s battles were easy to see in modern headlines and current woes.
“Metamorphoses,” Aurora Fox
Director Geoffrey Kent and designers Charles Packard and Brandon Case showed once again why the Aurora Fox is a local leader in taking creative risks with the production of “Metamorphoses.” The show, written by Mary Zimmerman and based on ancient Greek myths, compiles some of the most interesting stories from ancient tradition. The stories of King Midas, Zeus and Hermes are plenty compelling on their own, but this show added a 3,500-gallon swimming pool to the mix to make the production more interesting. And it worked. The actors’ movement in and out of the water was fluid; the blocking was seamless despite the formidable challenge of a swimming pool, a wet deck and two levels on the stage. The fight scene in the water during the story of King Ceyx was tense and compelling. It all made the Fox’s small studio theater feel bigger and more epic than its 75 seats.
“Fiddler on the Roof,” Phamaly Theater Company
The Aurora-based Phamaly Theatre Company made the history of the Jewish people feel like the history of all underdogs in their production of “Fiddler on the Roof” in July. The troupe pulled out all of the stops for this show, and that makes sense, considering that the theater company earned $10,000 in federal arts grants for the show at the Denver Center for the Performing arts. The Aurora-based theater company drilled down to the essence of what made “Fiddler” such a historic success on Broadway and beyond. As Tevye, Gateway High School graduate Mark Dissette was earnest, funny and heartbreaking. The music led by Donna Debreceni was spot-on, and the violin work by Leslie Wilburn and California import Sophia Hummell was a delight. And as always, the company invested the action with a deeper message, one that comes in part from the very mission of Phamaly. In this show, the Jews who are threatened, beaten and chased out of their homes are also members of the disabled community. They’re in wheelchairs, they’re blind, they’ve got cerebral palsy and Parkinson’s disease. All of these touches made an old show feel completely new.
“Sylvia,” Lone Tree Arts Center
The central gag in A.R. Gurney’s comedy “Sylvia” is simplistic enough to run out of steam pretty quickly. A middle-aged man finds a dog named Sylvia in the park, and the pooch becomes a stand-in for all of his unrequited dreams and desires. This dog speaks in English, she sings Cole Porter songs and she argues with her owners like a bratty 7-year-old. It’s a trope that could get old fast. Happily, the fusion of dog and person never felt tired or hackneyed in the Lone Tree Arts Center’s dynamic and endearing production of “Sylvia.” Director Randal Myler and a stellar cast helmed by Jamie Ann Romero as Sylvia kept the central device fresh and funny through the whole show. That success had just as much to do with the human drama here as it does the gags about chewed shoes and doggy treats. The show was a regional stand-out in a year that featured plenty of heavy hitters, showing just how far Lone Tree has come since it opened its doors less than three years ago.
“Avenue Q,” Aurora Fox/Ignite Theatre Company
Who says an old classic can’t offer new laughs? The Ignite Theatre company’s October production of the smash Broadway musical “Avenue Q” may have felt familiar to dedicated fans of local theater. That’s because the show that ran in the Aurora Fox studio theater was an almost complete remount of the Vintage Theatre’s critically acclaimed 2011 production, one of the last shows to run in the theater’s former digs on 17th Avenue in Denver. The Ignite production faithfully recreated every detail of the original show, reuniting the vast majority of the cast and crew and taking design, sound and production cues straight from the Vintage performance. It worked. Director Bernie Cardell and the reassembled cast and crew don’t screw it up. Just as it did in 2011, this show offered the feel of a big-scale Broadway show on a small stage. Along with Ignite’s 2012 production of “Next to Normal,” the show proved that the young upstart company is capable of some impressive things.