2025 DENVER GAZETTE TRUE WEST AWARDS: DAY 1

Here’s every brilliant thing busy and beloved actor and director did this year

Matt Zambrano is such a nice guy, he will give you the shirt off his back – and the words off his page.

True story. I was unsteadily attempting to write my first real play back in 2013. It was about suicide, and I was trying to come up with something for a lost boy to say about self-doubt and loneliness, but I was blocked. The only words echoing through my brain were Zambrano’s from a glorious poem called “Starfish, Citrus,” and they were drowning out all others. In it, the narrator wonders “if there is something like arthritis for flowers? And can their petals get that from reaching too hard, for too long?”

You could spot me 30 years, and I will never come up with anything that good. So I did what any journalist would do – I called Zambrano and explained my predicament, asking for advice. “Oh, you can have them,” he said of his word seeds, as if gently blowing them free like a puffy dandelion in bloom. (So I quoted him, with a footnote.)

He’s just that nice. He’s also a pretty great actor, director and teacher, as he showed at every turn in 2025, a glorious trip around the creative sun that culminates Dec. 5 with the opening of his solo starring role in the Boulder Ensemble Theatre Company’s “Every Brilliant Thing” (through Dec. 28 at the Dairy Arts Center).

“Every Brilliant Thing” is just about my favorite play of the past 25 years, and I’m not going to lie: It’s also about suicide – and it is maybe the most life-affirming play I have ever seen. It can be played by any actor of any gender or any age, and the live experience depends entirely on the narrator’s interaction and connection with the audience.

Zambrano will be in his garden.

Here’s some of what else he has done in 2025:

• He performed in the company of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival for the first time in 20 years, playing the jester Trinculo in “The Tempest” and three varied roles in “Richard II.” He also appeared in the Boulder Ensemble Theatre Company’s comedy “Hope and Gravity,” which was staged in both Denver and Boulder.

• He directed “Baskerville,” a heady (Sherlock) Holmes’ whodunnit for the Lone Tree Arts Center. And the gigantic Gloria Estefan musical “On Your Feet” for the Littleton Town Hall Arts Center. And a trippy little play called “Mr. Burns: A Post Electric Play” for Red Rocks Community College staged in and around the Historic Elitch Theatre.

• He is the 2023 co-founder (along with wife Libby Zambrano) of “The King Penny Radio Hour,” a “95%” improvised ensemble comedy throwback to old-timey variety shows. No two shows are remotely the same. In August, the “Radio Hour” began a monthly “Third Thursday” residency at the Clocktower Cabaret. (Next show: Dec. 18 at 1601 Arapahoe St.) 

• He went to Korea and taught miming workshops to artists with disabilities with New York’s Broken Box Mime Theater.

• And, hold on to your butts: He co-created and performed in a one-off stage show called “Hold On to Your Butts” at the Clocktower Cabaret. That’s two actors and a foley artist performing a live, shot-by-shot parody of the film “Jurassic Park.” (Coming in May, the next iteration: “Fly, You Fools,” a puppet parody based on the first installment of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy. “That one is phenomenally funny,” his wife says.

• And he already has a huge jump start on 2026, with gigs to direct the children’s musical “Junie B. Jones” for the Arvada Center (Jan. 23-May 8); “Pete the Cat” for the Denver Children’s Theater at the Mizel Arts and Culture Center (March 1-22); “Twelfth Night” for Metropolitan State University (April 16-26); “Fully Committed” for the Creede Repertory Theatre (May 23-Sept. 19); and “The Book Club Play” for the Utah Shakespeare Festival (July 14-Oct. 3).  

Zambrano has come up last in the alphabet his entire life. But after the year he’s just had, there’s no question the very first recipient of a 2025 Denver Gazette True West Award is  Zambrano.

These annual awards honor the best people and stories of the Colorado theater year.

Zambrano graduated from Wheat Ridge High School and the University of Colorado Boulder, and was among the final class of the Denver Center’s vaunted National Theatre Conservatory master’s program in 2012. There’s just something special about him as a performer and a person – just ask anyone.

I did, specifically the question: What is the Matt Zambrano secret sauce? His colleagues talk of his sense of play, his work ethic and the way he supports the people he works with. 

“I would say his secret sauce is a commitment to excellence in a broth of compassion,” said his wife, clearly taking that sauce prompt literally. “He puts so much compassion and empathy into all of his work, and I think he really tries to put the needs of other people first.

“But then, when it comes to his own work, his commitment to excellence is unrelenting.”

Jessica Austgen, playwright and “King Penny” performer: “Matt leads with kindness and positivity in every situation. As an actor in the cast, I feel like Matt is just very likable and magnetic, and you feel very safe and supported in his presence – which leads to a great experience for both the actors in his ensemble and the audience.”

Jessica Robblee, Boulder Ensemble Theatre Company Producing Artistic Director: “I know Matt to be a clown meets poet meets workhorse meets mad scribbler meets giggler. He is so smart, and therefore so quick and free on stage. He’s someone you want in the creative trenches with you because he can do so many things well.”

This endeavor to nail down the Zambrano recipe is all theory, though, Robblee stipulates:

“It may be impossible to capture someone who is Batman meets DeNiro meets Rizzo the Rat.”  

Zambrano: A poetry excerpt

“Sometimes I wonder … Do flowers feel lonely? … When they see the big fuzzy bees giving love to all the other flowers around them? … I wonder if there is something like arthritis for flowers. And can their petals get that from reaching too hard, for too long? …” – Matt Zambrano, National Poetry Slam semifinalist

Note: The Denver Gazette True West Awards, now in their 25th and final year, began as the Denver Post Ovation Awards in 2001. Denver Gazette Senior Arts Journalist John Moore celebrates the Colorado theater community throughout December by revisiting 30 good stories from the past year without categories or nominations.

‘Every Brilliant Thing’

• What: A play by Duncan MacMillan and Jonny Donahoe

• Presented by: Boulder Ensemble Theatre Company

• When: Dec. 5-28

• Where: Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut St., Boulder

• Starring: Matt Zambrano

• Directed by: Jessica Robblee

• Times: 7 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays; 2 p.m. Sundays

 • Tickets: $48 (select $12 onstage seats)

• Info: betc.org

More True West Awards coverage:

• Matt Zambrano: On Your (Aching) Feet!

• Mark Ragan and Jessica Robblee: The 2024 Colorado Theatre People of the Year