Tuesday March 16, 2010 - The wonderfully fresh and enticing choreography of Larry Keigwin delighted his audience at The Joyce this evening where his Company are dancing thru March 21st. This was one of the most purely enjoyable dance evenings of recent seasons, climaxing with RUNAWAY - a brilliant tour de force that I first saw performed at Juilliard. It's been re-worked for The Joyce and it's a knockout.
Photo at the top: Larry Keigwin by Steven Schreiber.
The evening started with a jolt: CAFFEINATED opened with a procession of latte-guzzling dancers in gym-wear zig-zagging across the stage. Ballet fans will recognize the Philip Glass music from AKHNATEN as the same score used by Jerome Robbins in the third movement of his GLASS PIECES. The dancers on this perpetual coffee break may slow down momentarily but the don't stand still: fueled by The Bean, they remain happily and sometimes maniacally in motion. Raising their cups in a celebratory toast, they fill the stage with glitter. Then: a refill and joyfully onward. Their day is just getting started.
Click on the images below to enhance.
After the caffeine-induced high to grab our interest, MATTRESS SUITE opens with the voice of Cecilia Bartoli singing Scarlatti as Nicole Wolcott portrays an anticipating bride: in gown and veil she signals both her timidity and her quiet lust. Larry Keigwin in a tuxedo is her groom; his solo to the gorgeous "Caro mio ben" echoes that of his bride. The mattress arrives and is plopped on the floor where it becomes the setting for the couple's mating ritual, set to Vivaldi. Passion and antagonism alternate, and perhaps Viagra is needed as it ends with Nicole striding off, unfulfilled. Larry is then left in a lonely dance with the mattress set to "Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone". But he soon finds consolation with two boys (cuties Aaron Carr and Matthew Baker) and the three of them romp in their tighty-whities; but when Aaron and Matthew cuddle up more seriously together, Larry gets dressed and leaves them, his destination unknown. Meanwhile Nicole seems to have settled for sleeping alone and she makes love to the mattress on which she is finally borne aloft by the three men. Photo above of the menage a trois by David Bazemore; this male trio is set to Dietrich Fisher-Dieskau's recording of "Di provenza" from TRAVIATA. MATTRESS SUITE is a six-movement mini-masterpiece on the art of bedding.
In its world premiere, BIRD WATCHING is set to Haydn's Symphony #6. Photo above by Christopher Duggan. Between the music and the crystal chandelier overhead and the black satiny tutus and flashy rhinestones worn by both sexes, the work has an oddly formal feeling. With delicate and charming gestures, these birds flutter and preen, both self-aware and well-aware of one another. References to Swans and Firebirds may be detected and the glittering refractions from the diamond rings they all wear flash onto the backdrop. Both beautiful and intriguing to watch, the piece needs just a bit of pruning here and there; da capos can easily be edited out in this digital age. As Balanchine so often proved, scissors can be a choreographer's best friend.
RUNAWAY on the other hand seemed almost too short. The curtain has been left up after BIRD WATCHING and we see the chandelier lowered and wheeled off and the backdrop furled and whisked aloft; lighting is set and smoke begins to drift in. Charlotte Bydwell (above in a Rosalie O'Connor photo) prepares for her close-up as assistants flutter around her; meanwhile the male fashionistos gather and chat across the stage. Then the pulsating score by Jonathan Melville Pratt begins to surge and we are swept into the runway-club scene where vanity, hauteur and provocation meld in the endless march of the models. The women wear shocking-hot pink-lemon-lime-orange dresses; the men start off in black suits but soon begin shedding articles of clothing, some stripping to black briefs while others are shirtless or pant-less.
Striding with imperturbable attitude, the dancers cross and re-cross the stage; sometimes a woman will fling herself onto a man's back but nothing can break their stride. Relentlessly, they march up and down the aisles of The Joyce, enticing the audience into their world as we gape at the sculpted torsos and mega-teased hair.
Every so often one of the dancers will burst into a brief solo and here Kile Hotchkiss stood out for the sheer sweep of his body in motion. A favorite of ours from his appearances with TAKE Dance, it was fun seeing Kile in a new context. He's one of Gotham's finest dancers with an arresting face and form. Kile is seen in Christopher Duggan's photo above.
RUNAWAY surged onward, ending with all the women glaring at us as the curtain fell. The dancers and Larry Keigwin then basked in a well-deserved flood of applause and screams from the full house.
My thanks to Christopher Duggan for his kind permission to use his photographs - his website makes me wish I was getting married! - and also to Michelle Brandon Tabnick.
Agree totally with your writeup, Oberon. The Duggan photos are super.
Posted by: GD'Or | March 18, 2010 at 10:45 AM
I was wondering who that blond guy was dancing with K & C. Kile ought to be in the movies. Talk about giving good face.
Posted by: JRP | March 18, 2010 at 10:54 AM