Denver School of the Arts student Blake Channing Taylor, his dad and uncle ‘are going to make this work’

When I met young Blake Channing Taylor (not Tatum!) in August 2024, he was dressed as Snoopy, complete with an attached doghouse built over his tiny legs. I am not even going to attempt to adequately describe how awesome he looked. Just check out the accompanying photo.  

He was participating in the Denver School of the Arts’ Drama Dash, an annual bonding experience that helps younger students like Blake connect with older students at the start of the  new school year. A year later, there he was again, giving his all with a pal in a three-legged race – this time dressed as a tiger from “Encanto.”

I was there snapping photos at Drama Dash because the school encourages its students to collect pledges that are then donated to my nonprofit, the Denver Actors Fund. Those past two Dashes raised a combined $22,000.

You won’t find Blake at DSA right at the moment, however. He’s on Broadway playing young Marlon Jackson – and understudying Michael himself – in “MJ the Musical.”

He’s 12.

“Blake is an awesome ball of energy,” said Shawn Hann, DSA’s Director of Theatre. ”He got cast in the national touring production of ‘MJ,’ and before he even started rehearsal, they moved him right to the Broadway production.”

Edd Taylor, a STEM professor at the University of Colorado Boulder and a self-described solo dad since Blake was three weeks old, had a plan for all of this. Edd and his two brothers, Dennis in Texas and Bobby in California, were going to team up like a football team to get the parenting job done because, as Edd said when I asked him how exciting all of this is for the family, he said, well, it’s about as exciting as it can be.

“I mean, this is the biggest kind of dream,” he said. “My brother, Bobby, puts it like this: ‘If you have an athlete, this is them going to the Super Bowl.’”

Blake has already dedicated his debut Broadway performance to the memory of his uncle Dennis. I asked Edd if that means something as sad as it sounds – and it does. 

When the Taylor brothers were first told that Blake would be heading out on tour all over the country, Dennis, recently retired from the Waco Police Department, was in the perfect position to be the primary road-trip caregiver. Dennis was both a police officer and a musician. “In fact, he was the person we called when we couldn’t get the music right for the auditions,” said Edd.

But around the same time Blake started trying out for the “MJ” creative team in November, Dennis was diagnosed with a virulent recurrence of pancreatic cancer, a disease that was supposed to take him three years earlier, before it remarkably relented. “He ended up being cancer-free for the last three years,” Edd said. “So we are appreciative of what I started calling his ‘angel years’ – those years we didn’t expect to be able to have.

“But it was literally the day before the funeral that I got the call that Blake was being moved up to Broadway. We were in Houston in a shoe store trying to find shoes for the funeral.”

Now, brothers Edd and Bobby – also a college professor – will tag-team with Blake through the end of the school year. “When I’m having to fly back to teach my class, my brother will fly in and take over while I’m here. It’s not the cheapest arrangement, but there’s no way we’re not going to make this work.”

If you have followed local theater at all the past few years, there is a good chance you have seen Blake somewhere: He stole the show in Town Hall’s “Raisin” and “Matilda,” while also appearing in the Arvada Center’s “Kinky Boots” and “Beauty and the Beast.” He was in “Kinky Boots” (again) for the Rocky Mountain Repertory Theater in Grand Lake. In November, he was one of five DSA middle school students picked to play with the big kids in “Big Fish.” He’s also performed with Cleo Parker Robinson.

Locally, he’s trained at the Denver Center, the Rocky Mountain Conservatory Theatre, the former Cherry Creek Dance and the Children’s Music Academy. So much success in such a short span of time.

“As a solo dad, you’re always trying to make sure that they don’t feel like they’re getting less than other people, you know what I mean?” said Edd. “So I started off by putting him in everything. I was like, ‘We’ll try football. We’ll try baseball. Gymnastics. Tennis. We’ll see what he likes.’

“But I lucked out because the things that he ended up liking a lot were things that I was always interested in, too. It all feels so good. I’m still in touch with his birth family, and they are just so happy for him, too. They’re going to come out to New York and see the show as well.”

Brasch opens off-Broadway

It’s been a big week for Denver School of the Arts, and not just for Taylor.

It’s now been just more than three years since the Denver Center Theatre Company announced it had selected young Jake Brasch’s Denver-born play “The Reservoir” for development. That sounds like a long time, but it’s actually been an uncommonly short journey from rough draft to the play’s off-Broadway premiere on Feb. 5 via The Atlantic Theatre in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan.

The play, which had its world-premiere staging in Denver in early 2025 under the direction of Shelley Butler and subsequently transferred to the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta and Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles, is a gentle comedy about memory, family and an alcoholic college student who comes home to Denver (specifically the Cherry Creek Reservoir and the Tattered Cover Book Store) to heal.

But the true joy of Brasch’s play is his creation of the four grandparent characters (based on his own) who become his recovery allies. “The Reservoir,” its marketers say, “symbolizes that it is possible to turn the darkest parts of our lives into lightness, humor and joy.”

“The Reservoir” runs (at least) through March 15 with Noah Galvin joined by veterans Caroline Aaron, Peter Maloney, Mary Beth Peil, Chip Zien, Heidi Armbruster and Matthew Saldívar.

Brasch is a 2010 graduate of Denver School of the Arts. “The play is a love letter to my family, to Denver itself, and to the community that has held me up through the good, the bad and the ugly,” he said all the way back in 2022.

Boulder DA teams with Motus

Boulder’s award-winning Motus Theater presented a special performance of “Youth Behind & Beyond Bars: Stories from the Frontlines of the Juvenile Justice System” on Wednesday morning at the Colorado Capitol Conference.

The program features guest readers – in this case, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty – reading autobiographical accounts written by adults who were incarcerated as children. Their stories show how early involvement with “the system” shaped their lives, families and communities.

Dougherty read a selected monologue before legislators and advocates as part of Motus’ ongoing program addressing the long-term impact of youth incarceration and the importance of more restorative and cost-effective community-based programs.

By hosting this performance at the Capitol, Motus Theater and their legislative hosts aimed to create space for lawmakers to engage directly with lived experience as they consider policy and budget decisions affecting youth, families and justice-involved communities across Colorado.

According to Motus, it costs more than $177,000 to incarcerate each youth in the juvenile system.

The Ellie turns 20 with new stage

The Ellie Caulkins Opera House, home to the Colorado Ballet, Opera Colorado and hundreds of other local and touring performances each year, is turning 20 this month.

The city is marking the anniversary in part by unveiling a brand-new stage floor that is years in the making. “And while the stage might not look any different to our audiences, its impact will be profound for our partners,” the city said in a statement.

Meet the new Harlequin Liberty Switch Stage — a revolutionary floor system that transforms between a solid stage floor and a sprung dance floor in just seconds. Simply put: Dance companies need a stage with some give, while most others need a hard surface.

“I’ve never experienced such an incredible difference between a sprung and unsprung floor until feeling it first-hand on the new stage at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House — it feels amazing, and truly is a game-changer for our company,” said Alexandra Gilliom, Colorado Ballet Corps de Ballet Dancer.

On Feb. 27, Opera Colorado hosts a special anniversary concert featuring Grammy-winning baritone Will Liverman with pianist Elizabeth G. Hill.

“We’re thrilled to mark this milestone with such an accomplished artist and dynamic performer,” said General Director & CEO Barbara Lynne Jamison.  Concert tickets begin at $29, while high-rollers can choose a fancy gala option complete with an afterparty.

The concert begins at 8 p.m. with a one-woman opera called “At the Statue of Venus,” performed by soprano Hallie Schmidt and pianist John Morefield. This short, one-act comedy by Jake Heggie and Terrence McNally, was specifically commissioned to mark the opening of The Ellie 20 years ago.

Briefly …

If you read here on Sunday about “Soul Power,” the new Prime Video documentary series dropping Thursday that takes a nostalgic look back at how the rebel American Basketball Association changed the NBA, check out the party coming to the Sie Film Center on Wednesday (Feb. 18). Among those attending will be former Nuggets Coach George Karl and players Ralph Simpson and Chuck Williams. Sportscaster Vic Lombardi will host a post-screening Q&A….

Want to meet new MCA Denver Director Anthony Kiendl? Just show up at 1485 Delgany St. between noon and 3 p.m. any day through Friday and buy an admission. He’ll be there in the galleries hosting informal public conversations with all comers.

And finally…

Did you catch that weird and wild spot on “Late Night With Seth Meyers” with James Acaster where the English comedian and podcast repeated, over and over, that if you really wanted to hear answers to Meyers’ questions, you would have to come to a live interview at 1:30 p.m. Feb. 8 at Wax Trax (the day after appearing in concert at the Paramount)? The stunt was a wildly successful ploy to get Denverites to come out to hear Acaster discuss his musical project “Temps” with one of his collaborators, Denver legend Kalyn Heffernan of Wheelchair Sports Camp. Wax Trax posted that the store was swarmed by the “hundreds.”