Local comedy scene faces allegations
Denver’s nationally renowned comedy scene has been roiled in recent weeks by a growing number of female performers alleging incidents of sexual harassment and discrimination at some of the city’s best- known venues.
But many improv performers and stand- ups are reluctant to go into specifics, worried they will alienate potential audiences or bookers, according to more than two dozen interviews conducted by The Denver Post.
And as the stand- up and improv scenes confront their demons— a complicated task, given the frequently raunchy onstage material that pushes the limits of propriety — performers and activists are finding it difficult to even discuss the issue without conflict.
Most recently, two women have accused Voodoo Comedy Playhouse founder Stephen Wilder, as well as current and former staff and performers, of sexual misconduct dating back several years.
In an interview with The Denver Post, Wilder denied any incidents of assault by himself or his staff. He said he is unaware of pending legal action or charg--
es based on the recent complaints, but he did acknowledge past misconduct by some performers.
The most serious allegations first appeared in a Nov. 4 Facebook post by Denver resident Colleen Weaver, who formerly performed at the Voodoo.
Weaver and others have alleged intimidation and harassment that occurred during rehearsals or after shows, including performers being “handsy and flirty” off stage, cornering women and pantomiming lewd and violent acts, and then being metwith a dismissive attitude after airing their concerns toWilder.
“In the process of everything coming to the surface, I had to admit to myself that I was sexually assaulted ( by an employee of the Voodoo),” Weaver wrote in an email to The Post. She declined to name the employee she says assaulted her, or the circumstances of the event.
“My reason for focusing on Steve is because he is a person of power who has been abusing that power for some time now,” said Weaver, who declined to be interviewed except via email.
Weaver also described an incident in July 2016 inwhich she and Wilder were sitting in the darkened theater after a performance. She said she was alarmed when Wilder pressured her multiple times to audition for a showcalled “Live Nude Improv,” despite her repeatedly turning him down.
“He left, and I told the bartender what was going on and as per usual, it was brushed off as Steve just being an idiot,” she said. “Instead of his peers convincing him to resign, it felt like theywere trying to clean up the mess for him.”
Wilder said that he inquired “with many other talented improvisers at the same time, both men and women” for the show, which he said contains little actual nudity.
EM Starnes, a female customer of the club, said a male performer harassed and intimidated her at theVoodoo. Shewas datingWilder at the time, she said.
“( He) backed me into a corner of the theater between shows when no one was around. He stroked himself while staring at me menacingly, then made a slicing motion across his throat before he walked away,” Starnes wrote in a Nov. 4 Facebook response toWeaver’s allegations. “It was immediately reported to the owner of the Voodoo, who laughed and said, ‘ Let it go. You know how he is.’ ”
Wilder said his team has been “working feverishly” to address many instances of misconduct— on- stage and off. “And as the owner, I’ve dealt with these things as they come to us and taken appropriate action,” he said, adding that the performer who harassed Starnes has been banned from the theater for some time.
Noreports of assault at theVoodoo, or byWilder, have been filed in the past three years, according to the Denver Police Department.
Wilder admits to “lapses in judgment” in 2012 and 2013, when he asked subordinates out on dates, and acknowledges making “bad choices for conversation topics with members of the improv community.”
The Voodoo has taken steps to improve the culture and accountability at the venue in recent weeks, Wilder said, but “that does not discount the seriousness of the allegations.”
Weaver, who performed at the Voodoo as recently as September, has said more than a dozen other performers and friends are boycotting the venue at 1260 22nd St., which has served as an important hub of local improv and stand- up since it opened in the Ballpark neighborhood in 2011.
Voodoo typically hosts up to 50 regular shows each month, about 30 percent ofwhich are produced by women, Wilder said.
“I would guess that there’s a lot that has yet to come to the surface, and more that never will,” Natasha Gleichmann, a New York- based performer from Denver, wrote in an email to The Post. “This is about the abuse of power by a theater owner ( and) in that industry.”
As a former member of the popular “Hit and Run: Musical Improv” show at the Voodoo, Gleichmann said she wrote one of the first business plans for the venue in 2011.
“I’ve had male friends at the theater direct- message me recently and tell me that they want to stop performing there, but that they don’t want to lose the venue and the sense of community,” she said. “It’s a Catch- 22 for most people.”
Division in stand- up
The soul- searching and debates — encouraged in part by the national # MeToo campaign and waged largely on social media — also have led severalwomen with connections to Denver’s comedy scene to speak up at a pair of live forums.
Those include an Oct. 18 roundtable meeting at theVoodoo about sexual misconduct claims, and an Oct. 19 “comedy debate show” at El Charrito’s Comedy RoomRoom, which was intended to address gender representation in Denver comedy.
The El Charrito event was planned as an entertaining forum, host Zeke Herrera said. But some attendees, dressed in witch costumes, disrupted the show by shouting over Herrera as he took the stage.
“I think ( the activists) wanted more of a fight than to be entertained,” Herrera said. “There’s definitely some factions forming. … It’s absolutely harming the scene.”
The discord between activists with connections to the scene, led in part by comic and artist Emily Zeek, andotherworking comics began this year on Facebook but has increasingly spilled onto the stage, stand- up John Papaioannou said.
“My advice for comicswould be to distance themselves from social media engagement,” he wrote in an email to The Post. “It’s a self- perpetuating outrage machine, and for every hourwasted in fruitless arguing, youwould be far better served working on your material.”
That ignores the root of the issue, Zeek said.
“As I became more vocal about the sexism in the scene … I was met with overt hostility, anger and retribution,” she said, alleging she was pushed to the bottom of, or ignored entirely, for shows on which comics with less experience were subsequently booked.
However, Papaioannou said a “sacrosanct line” was crossedwhen activists complained to another venue, Diebolt Brewing, about his behavior at the El Charrito event, resulting in the cancellation of his Diebolt set the next night.
A widespread concern
The conversation around sexual harassment has grown louder since the HarveyWeinstein story broke in The NewYork Times on Oct. 5. Closer to home, The Times’ Nov. 9 bombshell on mega- comic Louis C. K. opened with a purported incident at Aspen’s U. S. Comedy Arts Festival in 2002. And then on Thursday, comic- turned- U. S. Senator Al Franken was called out for forcibly kissing a radio anchor during a 2006 USO tour and posing for a photo with his hands on her breasts as she slept.
“For comedians, the professional environment is informal: Profanity and raunch that would be far out of line in mostworkplaces are common, and personal foibles — the weirder the better — are routinely mined for material,” The Times story on Louis C. K. said, describing comedy as “fiercely insular.”
The problem, some comics say, is confining this issue to a single venue, or even city.
“This is an issue that is blanketed across the industry,” Denver comic Lauren Dufault said. “I am friends with many women who have performed at Voodoo and have had negative interactions there.”
Comedy Works owner Wende Curtis said that “as both a feminist and business owner,” she is troubled by the allegations of harassment and discrimination in the scene. But she defends her performers and staff against accusations of sexist booking practices, which Zeek has alleged.
“I do not discount anyone else’s experiences, because I absolutely know this exists,” Curtis said. “But make sure that it’s accurate. There have been some people who have really been affected and damaged out there, and it’s because their ( critics) are just getting on the bandwagon.”
Curtis is worried that when activists accuse certain stand- ups of sexism, it hurts everyone’s chances of being judged by their performance prowess, and not their gender.
“I hear that some open mics are going to guy- girl, guy- girl,” she said. “How does that help the scene? That’s discrimination in the other direction.”