Review: The Wild Party

Review: The Wild Party | Bright Heart Stages & Shifted Lens Theatre Company | Aurora, CO | Curtain Up! | Eric Fitzgerald

Theatrical magic is unfolding at the newly opened Storyteller Theater on E. Colfax in Aurora: The Wild Party. Bright Heart Stages and Shifted Lens Theatre Company have teamed up to deliver a roaring, intoxicating plunge into the Jazz Age guided by the mind‑bending, pulse‑quickening direction of Lexie Lazear. This Wild Party doesn’t just unfold—it detonates, spilling over with smoky glamour, dangerous desire, and the kind of high‑voltage ensemble work that makes the walls feel like they’re vibrating. Lazear shapes the evening with a fearless, choreographic command of chaos, pulling the audience straight into Queenie and Burrs’ apartment and refusing to let go until the final, devastating note.

Based on Joseph Moncure March’s scandalous 1928 narrative poem of the same name, Andrew Lippa’s The Wild Party arrived Off‑Broadway in the 1999–2000 season with a swagger that instantly set it apart. Uniquely, the entire show — music, lyrics, and book — comes from Lippa himself, giving it a unified pulse and a deliberately anachronistic pop‑rock sound threaded with jazz and gospel influences.

At the center of the story is Queenie (Mo Bailey), the dazzling blonde who’s grown dangerously bored with her volatile lover, Burrs (Alexander Watson)  — a vaudeville clown whose appetite for chaos once thrilled her and now terrifies her. Their attempt to reignite the spark erupts into a night of booze and bad decisions, launched by the brash, seductive pulse of “Queenie Was a Blonde.” What follows is a gathering that quickly swells with misfits, dreamers, and opportunists who crowd the apartment and push the evening toward its breaking point. The energy shifts sharply when Kate (ThurZday) bursts in, announcing herself with the swaggering confidence of “Life of the Party,” accompanied by the enigmatic Mr. Black (Lloyd Harvey), whose presence ignites the triangle that drives the show’s emotional core and exposes every fault line in Queenie’s world. What begins as revelry spirals into jealousy, violence, and the tragedy that leaves Queenie wondering how it all came to this.

Director Lexie Lazear uses the acting space with an inventive precision that never feels like a workaround. With the audience seated on three sides and a playing area that’s far from generous, she shapes the action so it feels both intimate and volatile — close enough to catch every flicker of emotion yet charged with the restless momentum the story demands. She also treats the lighting as a kind of silent partner in the storytelling, shaping mood, tension, and focus with such clarity that it feels like an active presence in the room. Shadows, color shifts, and sudden bursts of brightness become part of the choreography, guiding the eye and tightening the emotional screws in ways that deepen every moment. Lazear doesn’t simply stage the chaos of The Wild Party; she orchestrates it, ensuring that every entrance, confrontation, and collapse lands with purpose.

Mo Bailey’s Queenie is a magnetic center of gravity, commanding the room with a poised, combustible intensity that sharpens every moment with her presence. Her voice has a luminous clarity that threads effortlessly through the score, carrying both the glamour and the bruised vulnerability at the character’s heart. Her work has a riveting focus —a sense that the entire party orbits her, drawn in by the force she exerts even when she’s standing still. It’s a true tour de force, the kind of performance that anchors the chaos and gives the night its emotional pulse.

Mo Bailey as Queenie | Photography credit: Cohagen Wilkinson

Alexander Watson brings a raw, unsettling charge to Burrs, grounding the character’s volatility in a performance that feels both dangerously unpredictable and painfully human. Lloyd Harvey’s Mr. Black radiates calm, magnetic confidence, his warm, melodic voice filling the space with an ease that immediately shifts the room’s energy. Each actor offers a distinct gravitational pull, and together they create a compelling tension that sharpens the stakes of Queenie’s unraveling. Both deliver strong, fully realized performances that deepen the production’s emotional architecture.

ThurZday is an absolute force of nature as Kate, tearing through the role with a ferocity that’s as entertaining as it is unsettling. Her coke‑fueled swagger is executed with flawless control, turning every entrance into a jolt of chaotic electricity. Vocally, she’s operating at a level that feels almost unfair; her numbers blaze with power, wit, and a gleaming confidence that lifts the entire production. Whenever she’s onstage, the temperature spikes; she’s riveting, unpredictable, and unforgettable. It’s a standout performance in a night full of exceptional work.

ThurZday as Kate | Photography credit: Cohagen Wilkinson

The ensemble delivers extraordinary work throughout the night, driving the production with a unified force that feels razor‑sharp and wildly alive. Danielle Morris’s choreography amplifies that energy, giving the cast movement that’s as purposeful as it is explosive, shaping the party’s chaos into something thrillingly precise. Their vocal strength and dynamic physicality rank among the most impressive I’ve seen in recent memory, giving the evening its relentless momentum and glittering edge. Among them, Brekken Baker as Madelaine stands out, the unapologetically predatory lesbian who prowls the room in her hilarious, yearning solo “An Old‑Fashioned Love Story,” searching for the perfect woman. — a sly, sparkling burst of comic timing and vocal finesse that instantly becomes one of the night’s brightest highlights.

The ensemble of The Wild Party | Photography credit: Cohagen Wilkinson

Onstage and fully visible, the band is an essential engine of the night, led with assured musical command by Paul Falk. The six musicians deliver a sound that feels immediate and alive, giving The Wild Party its pulse and sharpening every emotional turn. Their presence adds a vibrant, tactile charge to the storytelling, reminding the audience that this world is being built right in front of them, note by note.

Angela Lazear’s costumes are a knockout achievement, capturing the 1920s’ decadent swagger with a level of detail that borders on obsessive — right down to the footwear that quietly completes each character’s silhouette. The period is unmistakable, not because the design announces itself, but because it breathes authenticity into every corner of the room. Matt Rogers’s sound design adds another layer of richness, balancing the band and vocals with a clarity that keeps the night’s chaos sharply defined without ever overwhelming the performers. And as noted earlier, lighting is an essential force in the production’s overall impact. Andrew Russell’s lighting design works pure magic from start to finish, sculpting the space with color, shadow, and intensity to heighten every emotional turn. It’s lighting that doesn’t just illuminate the show — it ignites it.

The Wild Party is a must-see theatrical event. Lazear’s direction is among the most assured and imaginative to hit the area in recent years, and the cast delivers work that feels uniformly charged, committed, and thrillingly alive. It’s as close to perfection as a production can get — a night of theatre that detonates with craft, talent, and sheer electricity.

For Information and Tickets: https://events.humanitix.com/the-wild-party