The Denver Public Library recommends these library resources to enhance your theater experience of The Outsiders from DCPA, showing this fall in September 2026.
The winner of four 2024 Tony Awards®, including Best Musical, is The Outsiders. This classic coming-of-age story takes you to Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1967, where Ponyboy Curtis, his best friend Johnny Cade, and their family of Greaser “outsiders” dream about who they want to become in a world that will never accept them. The Outsiders features Danya Taymor’s Tony Award winning direction that’s “refreshing, gritty, and endlessly effective.” (The New York Times). With “high-octane choreography” (New York Magazine), The Outsiders has been described as “more pulse-pounding than anything else on Broadway!” (Time Out New York).
What to Read
Our reading recommendation: Diego faces deadly consequences when his friend starts using him for transportation to sell weed, then harder drugs. This gritty novel-in-verse uses sparse, tense language to explore themes like the price of loyalty and the far-reaching impacts of violence on teens.
About the book: Diego works hard. His single mother encourages him to stay focused on school, on getting into college, on getting out of their crumbling neighborhood. That's why she gave him her car. Diego's best friend Lawson needs a ride--because Lawson is dealing. As long as Diego's not carrying, not selling, it's cool. It's just weed. But when Lawson starts carrying powder and pills and worse, their friendship is tested and their lives are threatened. As the lines between dealer and driver blur, everything Diego has worked for is jeopardized, and he faces a deadly reckoning with the choices he and his best friend have made.
What to Watch
Our watching recommendation: Though Dìdi is a more lighthearted and humorous coming-of-age story, Chris faces a lot of the same struggles as Ponyboy. If you enjoyed the tensions of expectations vs. reality, friends vs. family, and class divides in The Outsiders, be sure to check out this movie!
About the movie: In 2008, during the last month of summer before high school begins, an impressionable 13-year-old Taiwanese-American boy learns what his family can't teach him: how to skate, how to flirt, and how to love your mom.
What to Listen
Our listening recommendation: Jamestown Revival members Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance are also the composers responsible for the folk rock sounds of The Outsiders musical. For similar Americana vibes, check out this compilation album of indie folk artists covering each others’ songs. Listen to The Lone Bellow for energetic, emotional vocal harmonies or Shovels & Rope for raw country blues.
BONUS: For more places to listen, stream songs from Jamestown Revival, The Lone Bellow, and Shovels & Rope on Freegal Music+ using your library card.
About the album: Features a slew of Dualtone artists and alumni including The Lumineers, Brett Dennen, Gregory Alan Isakov, Mt. Joy, Shovels and Rope, and Langhorne Slim all covering each other's songs in celebration of the label's landmark birthday.
What to Download
Our download recommendation: Like Ponyboy, being in the wrong place at the wrong time completely changed Jasmine’s life. This heartfelt, reflective novel explores struggling with the consequences of past choices and the traumas of surviving a youth detention center.
About the book: After spending fourteen months in a juvenile detention center, sixteen-year-old Jasmine Cole navigates her second chance as she tries to keep her past a secret, but when a friend from the center reaches out to reconnect, she must decide whether to keep pretending or risk everything to be honest about who she is.