Local actor Christopher Boeckx has played many choice roles over the past three decades. He’s been Harold Hill in “The Music Man” – three times. The Michael Caine scoundrel in “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.” The “Cat in the Hat” in “Seussical.” 

But he landed his dream role last month, when he was appointed to serve as a magistrate in Colorado’s 18th Judicial District by the Chief Justice of Arapahoe County. His job is now to help divorced and separated families come to fair and manageable child custody arrangements.       

“This has been my professional ambition for the past 15 years,” said Boeckx, 39. “This is what I always hoped to do with my training and experience. It’s a career-defining opportunity.”

That opportunity is a chance to combine his considerable legal acumen with a lifetime of service, along with the wealth of compassion it requires to be a compelling actor. He is second among the Denver Gazette’s 2024 class of True West Award winners, acknowledging 30 great stories from the Colorado theater year.

“There are a lot of similarities between being an artist and being a magistrate,” said Boeckx. “In both cases, it’s all about people and their stories. Being involved in theater has always been an exercise in empathy  and being a good judge is about being present and listening and being able to appreciate people’s stories so that you are in the best position to help resolve conflicts.”

Kelly Van Oosbree, who first cast Boeckx 11 years ago to play Harold Hill, the charming trombone grifter in “The Music Man,” brought him back last summer for her latest staging at Performance Now in Lakewood. Only this time, she cast Boeckx against type as Charlie Cowell. He’s what she calls “the necessary bad guy” – even though he’s 100% correct to mistrust the phony music teacher’s intentions with poor Marian the Librarian.

“Chris made a meal out of Charlie Cowell,” Van Oosbree said. “He stole the show the minute he stepped onto the stage.”

In October, Boeckx took part in local theater history when he played brooding uncle Archibald Craven in a one-day-only performance of The Wesley Players’ “Secret Garden” at the somehow still standing Historic Elitch Theatre in northwest Denver. That constituted the first full performance of a musical with (some) production values on the 133-year-old stage since 1991.

What has made 2024 all the more special to Boeckx has been getting to appear in both productions alongside his 9-year-old daughter, Fern.

“It meant the world to me to play Charlie in ‘The Music Man’ because, after playing Harold Hill three times, it let me be backstage and really enjoy the process with my daughter, without having to worry about 10,000 lines,” he said. “Plus, Charlie is a fun role. It was a chance to just be silly – and you have to enjoy those moments.”

Van Oosbree smiles at the memory of Fern’s audition for “The Music Man.”

“Fern came into the room and sang ‘Do You Want to Build a Snowman?’ and it was clear it was something Chris had worked on with her. He was more nervous than she was.”

Boeckx, who first appeared on the Littleton Town Hall Arts Center stage as a 16-year-old in “Oliver?” and later played “all the non-diving roles” at the pre-Parker Casa Bonita, has long been known as an easygoing and naturally gifted comic actor. But his path from one stage to the next has been ever circuitous because of the many significant twists and turns in his adult life.

Boeckx is a graduate of Columbine High School, Metro State University Denver and the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law, where he graduated with honors as a member of the Order of St. Ives. But his first act as a practicing attorney was to join the Peace Corps. (He spent two years training teachers and building a modest library in a quaint village in eastern Thailand. The experience, he says, taught him a great deal about humility, hard work, selflessness, presence – and the art of war.)

“Taking time away from his career and his family and the comforts of a first-world country to be in service to others – that’s huge to walk away from,” Van Oosbree said. “But that’s who Chris is.” 

Upon his return, the tall funnyman with the big brain and a bigger heart co-founded (with me) the Denver Actors Fund to help local stage artists pay down their medical bills. He launched his own family law practice but was soon snatched up by the Colorado Attorney General’s Office to serve as an Assistant Attorney General. He then joined Springer & Steinberg P.C. before the call came from Arapahoe County to become a magistrate. 

Van Oosbree, for one, thinks those families who are called into Boeckx’s courtroom will have no idea how lucky they are to be matched with him – until they are.

“Being an actor is all about walking in other people’s shoes and embodying another person’s life while you are onstage,” she said. “I can think of no better way to put all that training into real-world practice than what Chris is doing as a judge.”

Oddly – or perhaps fittingly – Boeckx is not alone on his thespian jurisprudence journey. Award-winning actor Cajardo Lindsey served just a few doors down from Boeckx as a Colorado District Court judge for two years before his recent return to private practice – and to the stage. Lindsey will appear waaaaay against type in Curious Theatre’s “Downstate” (March 15-April 20). He will most certainly be exploring the other end of the gavel in that story about four men convicted of sex crimes who now share a group home.

While Boeckx’s new duties will keep him from acting for the foreseeable future, his return to the stage these past few years has meant everything to him. “In a word, it’s community,” he said. “It’s home. This is where I grew up. Being back on the stage has given me a sense of self that I didn’t realize I had lost.

“I found my voice.”

Note: The True West Awards, now in their 24th year, began as the Denver Post Ovation Awards in 2001. Denver Gazette Senior Arts Journalist John Moore celebrates the Colorado theater community by revisiting 30 good stories from the past year without categories or nominations.

Unsung Hero of the Day

AJ Watson of Aurora is in his first season as Production Accessibility Manager for Denver’s disability-affirmative Phamaly Theatre Company. Serendipity delivered Watson after newly arriving in Denver from Connecticut and deciding to attend a performance of “Alice in Wonderland.” That led to backstage volunteering and now, much more. 

“AJ is literally the backbone of so many Phamaly productions, and he doesn’t ever want anything in return but people having their best time,” said Phamaly performer River Hetzel. “He always puts other people first, and I can’t imagine doing a Phamaly show without him.”

Colorado Theatre Guild President Betty Hart concurs. “AJ is an extraordinary human,” she said.