In a workshop on playwriting some years ago, Michael Shayan was instructed by the leader, noted dramatist Luis Alfaro, to put a hand over his heart, to feel the heartbeat of a character – and to “just listen.” The voice he heard was one Shayan had known all his life. It was that of his […]
We humans are very fond of our tender bodies and our clever brains, which explains a lot about our fears of Death and Madness. And that statement doesn’t apply only to modern humans, coddled by our sanitized lives and our careful culture. We’ve had those fears since always. Shakespeare’s King Richard II exclaims this, in […]
When immersed in a live performance it’s easy to get swept away in the story and characters, forgetting sometimes you’re watching actors on a stage at all. It’s okay to be transported, but on the casting side, it took a lot of work to get there. Every single show produced at the Denver Center for […]
Without the benefit of SparkNotes during a Shakespearean play, audience members can understandably struggle to engage with forgotten language. More than 400 years stand between Hamlet’s soliloquies and our modern hearing. Interestingly, in Hamlet, much of the language is very similar to what we use today with the odd exception. Those exceptions are usually solved […]
Honor and vengeance take center stage in the final act of Shakespeare’s Hamlet — and there’s no shortage of swashbuckling in the play’s thrilling conclusion. Get a look inside the rehearsal room with these sneak peek photos as Ty Fanning (Hamlet), Ðavid Lee Huýnh (Laertes), and Seth Andrew Bridges (Horatio) learn the fight choreography of Rick […]
The name William Shakespeare is nearly synonymous with that of his greatest play, Hamlet. But did you ever stop to consider that the essence of the story wasn’t really his? Instead, according to the Folger Shakespeare Library, ol’ Will, along with many predecessors, borrowed it from ancient Norse legend. The tale of a son avenging […]
The Denver Center Theatre Company is excited to announce the Tony and Emmy Award-winning cast and creative team for the Olney Theatre Center’s production of Avaaz, written and performed by Emmy Award-nominee Michael Shayan. Directed by Tony Award-nominee Moritz von Stuelpngael, Avaaz will run Oct 4 – Nov 17, 2024, in the Singleton Theatre. Critics […]
Chris Coleman never aspired to direct Hamlet. The artistic director of the DCPA never saw himself in that role. He had played the title character onstage twice — senior year in college at Baylor University and again at Actor’s Express, a theater company he founded in Atlanta — and “literally never wanted to direct it […]
Ahead of I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter running from September 27 to November 3 in the Kilstrom Theatre, take the opportunity to familiarize yourself with the source material. A National Book Award Finalist and New York Times Bestseller, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika Sánchez tells the story of Júlia, […]
William Shakespeare lived in Elizabethan England over 400 years ago. He was well-known at the time of his death with several plays circulating throughout Europe. However, Shakespeare’s popularity has proved to be ever-changing, growing and adapting with modern times – even four centuries later. His play The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, usually shortened […]