Something different and exciting happened March 31 at the Newman Center for the Performing Arts: Denver’s arts scene grew up a little.
The Mile High City joined dozens of other communities in the United States and abroad in experiencing “Blind Date,” a daring, multimedia work presented by the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company.
In other words, Denver got to be part of the international arts dialogue in a way it rarely does because this production is among the most talked-about and important creations of the past year anywhere.
Being able to see such a work might not sound so unusual, but consider that the 24-year-old company, which regularly tours internationally and has received numerous honors, had never been to Denver.
The reason is relatively simple. Before the University of Denver launched Newman Center Presents in fall 2003, there was no multifaceted performing-arts series in Denver, hard as that is to believe.
Even though residents of far smaller cities, such as Iowa City or Lincoln, Neb., have regularly had the opportunity to enjoy everything from the Philadelphia Orchestra to vocal innovator Meredith Monk, the Mile High City had been largely shut out.
Even now, the city is still way behind. While the steadily expanding Newman Center Presents is set to stage 14 events in 2006-07, that is half or even one-third the number of annual events that many major university performing-art series offer.
Beyond missing out on the array of events other cities routinely experience, what “Blind Date” drove home was the disturbing paucity of anything that could be called avant garde in Denver.
The general lack of visiting performing arts groups means Denver has had almost no link to vanguard events created elsewhere.
A notable exception came in 2004 when, through the efforts of Asian Performing Arts of Colorado, Denver became just the third U.S. city to land a performance of Tan Dun’s innovative, semistaged oratorio, “Water Passion After St. Matthew.”
In the theater scene, the situation has been brighter when it comes to locally conceived new productions. Under former artistic director Donovan Marley, for example, the Denver Center Theatre Company mounted 75 world premieres in 21 seasons.
And “The War Anthology,” playing at the Curious Theatre through April 29, is avant garde by any definition, featuring 10 short works, including contributions from Pulitzer Prize winners Tony Kushner, Suzan-Lori Parks and Paula Vogel.
But few of these works deal with timely sociopolitical themes in as provocative or visceral a fashion as “Blind Date,” which wrestles with such hot-button issues as patriotism, freedom, religion, tolerance, bravery and security.
Denver arts organizations are still squeamish about wading into such potentially shark-filled waters. None of the city’s major troupes dared to tackle Stephen Sondheim’s controversial “Assassins,” so the upstart Next Stage Theatre stepped boldly into the breech last year.
Aside from a hesitancy to confront difficult subject matter, what might be even more detrimental is an almost total absence of works that defy categorization and explode the neat, largely artificial boundaries erected between arts genres.
If Denver’s arts scene is to continue to mature, it must be willing to sometimes venture to the precipice and jump off. If existing organizations are unwilling or unable to do it, then perhaps ones devoted to that purpose should be established.
As the sold-out performances of “Water Passion,” “Assassins” and, most recently, “Blind Date” make clear, a small yet significant portion of Denver audiences are ready and even hungry for the new.
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-820-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com.
