Thursday, January 19, 2006

home movies


everett dance theater
home movies
zero arrow theater
cambridge ma
presented by crasharts/worldmusic
1.13.06


there is something very low-tech and honest about this work despite being multimedia, which i appreciated. at first, seeing a couple of screens jerk up and down on which scratchy homemovies were displayed, turned me off. admittedly, i've become accustomed to glossy flashy techy stuff that offers little more than a cool factor. but, maybe that's the point...homemovies are that way. what makes them wonderful are the imperfections. i am tired of seeing bland all girl dance department dance, and this was not that. all of the dancers were unique in personality, appearance, movement style, and, as we came to understand, their histories.
i wish there had been a little more optimism to the work. (yes, this is me saying that). yes, life is hard. of course it is. we all have our stories of things that have affected us negatively. and, particularly in a performance setting, those stories more easily draw out an emotional response. it is harder to talk about life being good and draw the audience in. i don't think everett was up to that challenge. that is not say that there weren't funny moments. there were several that i even laughed at. the movement at times was witty, but sometimes silly or overly simple. the partnering and group exchanges were some of the best i've seen in awhile.

some other people's thoughts
marcia siegel
ted bale

1 Comments:

Blogger fwc said...

i agree w/ what you say about needing more optimism in general. artists take themselves too seriously. but i'm always up for "witty" dancing. ;)

8:06 AM  

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