On Pointe

CP Dance Reviews: BodyVox, Pennsylvania Ballet


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Published: Oct 28, 2009

Bill Hebert

BodyVox

Swim Fan

Part of getting older means losing our childish impulses. We gain wisdom and adopt more serious ways of dealing with whatever comes our way. So it is with BodyVox, a youthful dance company known for its abundant tomfoolery. But if Water Bodies is any indication, BodyVox is maturing, both choreographically and conceptually.

Sure, there are high jinks. "Metamorfishes" features a fantastical underwater duet where a man and woman portray courting Siamese fighting fish. "Fishers Are Men" is a quirky vignette about two guys befuddled by an unusual catch. "Kaleidoscope," a contemporary Busby Berkeley-inspired number, presents a colorful scene where dancers, both live and on film, perform synchronized stunts.

Yet certain works in the program are serious to the point of being somber. With the elegiac "S.O.S.," performers engage in stately dance that devolves into a turbulent sinking scenario (it's a haunting ode to passengers of the Titanic). "Serein" opens with abstract film and movement elements and gradually develops into more concrete representations, to enact a stirring contemplation on the visceral sensations of rain.

Whatever the mood — merry, dark or in-between — these scenes epitomize a visual cleverness that never lets up. BodyVox loves offbeat shapes, busy patterns and beautiful configurations.

But it's never just variety for the sake of it. It's obvious that co-artistic directors Jamey Hampton and Ashley Roland are infinitely intrigued by monkeying around with juxtaposed limbs and bodies while simultaneously exploring the physics of movement — momentum, push-pull and the effects of gravity.

BodyVox inflects another layer by diving into the cerebral — even in the funny parts, which often verge on black comedy. There's plenty of deep thinking going on. Oct. 22, Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts.

—Deni Kasrel

Triple Threat

Take a solid heap of Tchaikovsky, sprinkle in some tap dancing, mix thoroughly with a new work that celebrates the powers of creative invention and you've got the Pennsylvania Ballet's 46th season opening program. When George Balanchine created Theme and Variations in 1947, it was considered the very leading edge of dance innovation. Balanchine stripped ballet of its cozy relationship with fairy tales. He took grand Tchaikovsky music (Suite No. 3 for Orchestra in G major) and choreographed complicated corps work and a difficult pas de deux. He wanted no story, no friendly peasants, no dying heroine — just complex dance patterns. This wonderful neoclassic work got an outstanding rendering by the PAB corps, who kept their body lines moving flawlessly in ever-changing intersecting patterns. In the pas de deux, Amy Aldridge and Sergio Torrado were outstanding — especially Torrado, who brought physical presence and command to this abstract piece.

Agnes de Mille's Rodeo was first performed in 1942. It's a miniature musical comedy with a great Aaron Copland score created for ballet. Set in the old West of ranch hands and rodeos, Rodeo revolves around a spunky tomboy heroine who's more anxious to ride horses and round up cattle than flirt with men — until the Champion Roper dances his way into her heart. Corps member Laura Bowman was a good tomboy; her suitor, Jonathan Stiles, was an fantastic roper, using tap to announce his intentions. Ian Hussey did double duty, shouting out calls while performing flawlessly in a hootin' hollerin' square dance.

Matthew Neenan's world première, At the Border, stole the show, managing to be totally new and wildly experimental, yet beautiful and subtle. For music, Neenan turned to John Adams' Hallelujah Junction — a difficult, percussive, off-key, off-beat, repetitive piano duet. Fourteen dancers surged across the blue-lit stage only to suddenly freeze. Ballet jetés and tours crumbled to the floor, rigid arms sliced air, angles were sharp and at any moment the whole stage exploded with odd moves. From Tchaikovsky to Adams, there's no border this performance didn't cross. Oct. 22, Academy of Music.

—Janet Anderson