From Grounded to Dreamlike, Pilobolus Dances the Whole of Human Experience
One of the oldest American contemporary dance companies returns to Seattle with five exciting and varied works. Pilobolus performs re:CREATION at Meany Center for the Performing Arts, through 10/19.
Contemporary dance scares the hell out of some people. “But what does it mean?” they ask, wondering how to enjoy live concert dance without a sequin-studded script and a princess after her happily ever after. But there’s a reason Pilobolus (also the name of a fungus) has graced stages and screens since 1971: they dance about the human experience in all its glory, fear, ridiculousness, and sometimes in the nude (but not in this show, sorry).
re:CREATION is a nearly two-hour production featuring five pieces by current and past collaborators. Tales From the Underworld, created by Co-Artistic Directors Renee Jaworski and Matt Kent with composer Stuart Bogie, is very Halloween-appropriate. Combining elements of mythical journeys to the afterlife and clad in deep reds and blacks, dancers Connor Chapparro, Hannah Klinkman, Sean Langford, Derion Loman, Darren Robinson, and Jessica Robling hoist each other around the stage, muscles rippling in the dark shadows of eerie stage lights. Bogie’s score, featuring a single clarinet and an effects pedal, completes the mood of impending death and letting go. It is a somber piece but not hopeless, even as the dancers’ bodies twist and writhe together in images that evoke Heironymus Bosch’s naked hellscapes. A spider web-thin prop of sheer white gossamer floats just above the dancers’ heads, chased by a dancer wielding a paper fan. Pilobolus is a master of props, using simple objects to make grand statements onstage.
Walklyndon is a short-ish piece with human sounds instead of music, including the slaps of dancers’ hands against each other’s rear ends, the resulting exclamations, and stomps. It is all human, all conceivable, and my 8-year-old friend’s favorite piece of the rep.
Bloodlines, from the creative brains of Jaworski and Kent with Marlon Feliz and company dancer Hannah Klinkman, and inspired in part by a Joy Harjo poem, illustrates the emotional journey of caretaking children and elderly parents. Klinkman is a versatile, mesmerizing dancer with uniquely expressive arms and back muscles, commanding attention with her stamina and artistry in all five pieces of the current rep. Klinkman is equally stunning in the fourth piece of Act I, Thresh/Hold, a complicated dream sequence featuring all six company dancers and a simple silver door on wheels.
The last piece of the evening comprises the whole of Act II. Rushes is part vaudevillian slapstick, short film, and stunts with wooden chairs that your children will definitely attempt to emulate at home. (Blame the inspiration on Pilobolus, for they are truly unforgettable, but please don’t sue them.)
Pilobolus re:CREATION runs through 10/19 at Meany Center for the Performing Arts (on the UW main campus). Tickets ($80-$125) here. Accessibility notes: theatre and some common areas are wheelchair accessible. Restrooms in the basement are accessible by elevator, and are gendered and multi-stall. (See accessibility info here.)
Melody Datz Hansen is a freelance dance writer in Seattle. Her work is published in The Seattle Times, The Stranger, City Arts, and on her blog at melodydatz.com.