Actor Natalie Jensen had commuted from Colorado Springs to Greenwood Village five times a week because her husband, Jared, had what he considered his dream job as a Colorado Springs police officer.
“Natalie loves the theater,” Country Dinner Playhouse producer Paul Dwyer said, “but she loved her husband more.”
Jared Jensen was shot and killed Wednesday morning as he waited to apprehend a man wanted in the stabbing of his own sister. Jensen was 30.
Natalie had appeared in the chorus of “Beauty and the Beast” at CDP since November. She was the understudy to the lead character of Belle. She has appeared in four CDP musicals since 2004 and has also worked as a Barnstormer – the preshow performers who also serve patrons drinks and desserts.
Natalie recently decided not to audition for “Man of La Mancha,” opening next week, “because they had just bought their first house together, and Natalie had decided that what she wanted to do more than anything else right now was to spend more time with Jared and to be a wife,” Dwyer said.
There was some talk that Wednesday’s performance might be canceled, but the company decided the best way to honor the couple was for the show to go on without Natalie. In the program, she dedicates her “Belle and the Beast” performance “to my husband Jared, who is truly an officer and a gentleman.” The couple were married in 2001.
“Magnets” is ending
Buntport’s wildly popular biweekly live sitcom “Magnets on the Fridge” will end with its May 10 season finale, the company announced last week.
The boundary-pushing cult phenom, centered on a fictional book-club gang of 20-somethings, was created as midweek fill-in programming but quickly became the company’s economic sustenance. Each original episode (60 and counting) is based on a book suggestion by the previous audience.
Fans needn’t worry. In November, instead of “Magnets” Season 6, Buntport introduces a new show. The replacement is tentatively titled “Starship Troy.” But in inimitable Buntport style, “Starship Troy” was a title made up strictly for last week’s news release, which announced: “At this point none of us have any idea what it will be like, other than loads of fun.”
This week’s episode, based on the Yellow Pages (oh, those evil audiences), marks Hannah Duggan’s exit from the show before moving to New York. Her beloved boozy pregnant television anchor L.P. Lymberop-
olous signs off with episodes at 8 and 10 p.m. Tuesday, and 8 p.m. Wednesday, at 717 Lipan St. The company promises a “thrilling excuse to get rid of a staple character” and a witty explanation for the enormous baby she is carrying (720-946-1388).
“Chorus” bloodlines
The cast of Town Hall Arts Center’s production of “A Chorus Line,” which opened Friday in Littleton, got a visit Tuesday from three Colorado-based actors who performed in the Broadway cast in the 1980s – Michael Gorman, Mercedes Perez and Brian Kelly. Not that Gorman was a special guest. He’s director and choreographer of the THAC staging, and will be spending most of 2006 as associate choreographer to the legendary Baayork Lee in advance of the Broadway revival opening Sept. 21.
Gorman played Bobby, Perez (Denver Civic’s “Menopause the Musical”) played Diana, and Kelly (Arvada Center’s “The Full Monty”) played Mike. Tuesday they confabbed with their impossibly young counterparts, Robert Riney, Malorie Stroud and Phil Martin, respectively.
“Boy Friend” break
University of Northern Colorado graduate Jenny Fellner isn’t starring in this week’s national touring production of “The Boy Friend” in Denver, but that’s the show that gave Fellner her big break in 2003. Fellner starred in the Bay Street Theatre’s production of “The Boy Friend,” directed, like this tour, by Julie Andrews. That mounting never made it to Broadway, but Fellner did. She was hired away for a year-long stint in the leading role of Sophie in “Mamma Mia!”
“Jenny was lovely, an adorable young lady,” Andrews told The Denver Post. “She was just lovely in the piece, and exactly right for her particular character. She just brought so much of herself into it all. She’s just delicious.”
Fellner is preparing to star in “Princesses” on Broadway, opening in November.
Theater critic John Moore can be reached at 303-820-1056 or jmoore@denverpost.com.
This week’s theater opening
FRI | Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art’s “Ami Dayan’s ‘The Man Himself”‘ | BOULDER
This week’s theater closings
TODAY | Arvada Center’s “The Heiress” | ARVADA
TODAY | Modern Muse’s “The Raft” (at the Bug Theatre)
FRI | Upstart Crow’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” | BOULDER
MARCH 5 | Denver Center Attractions’ “The Boy Friend” (at the Buell)
MARCH 5 | Country Dinner Playhouse’s “Beauty and the Beast” | GREENWOOD VILLAGE
MARCH 5 | Union Colony Dinner Theatre’s “Once Upon A Mattress” | GREELEY
MARCH 5|Germinal Stage Denver’s “A Delicate Balance”
MARCH 5|Fine Arts Center’s “La Cage Aux Folles”|COLORADO SPRINGS
MARCH 5|Coal Creek Community Theatre’s “Barefoot in the Park”|LAFAYETTE
MARCH 5|Alliance Stage’s “Dead Man Walking” (at the Victorian Theatre)
MARCH 5|Coal Creek Community Theatre’s “Barefoot in the Park”|LOUISVILLE
