October 19, 2007
Catching up: I reviewed LEVYdance for Tuesday's Chronicle:
"LEVYdance has the appeal of youth: fresh-faced, chiseled dancers with the urban cool of club kids, sexiness infused with smarts and a young choreographer, Benjamin Levy, worth getting excited about.
His style makes a drama out of anatomical chain reactions, energy zipping from joint to joint like an electrical current. And he knows how to create an emotional arc. In his 2002 duet, "Falling After Too," two men manipulate each other's knees, shoulders and hips with relentlessly deflective intimacy. When at last they knock chests but their arms flail past each other, unable to hug, you feel the oomph of that tragedy like a statement of the human condition.
Small wonder, then, that Bay Area dance watchers have been waiting for Levy to break out in a big way. His company's fifth annual home performances on Friday and Saturday seemed designed to do it. The crowning premiere "Bone Lines" had all the trappings of the next big step: a bigger-than-usual venue at the Jewish Community Center's Kanbar Hall, costumes by haute couture designer Colleen Quen, set by sculptor Rick Lee and a commissioned score by Keeril Makan recorded by the Kronos Quartet.
But this proved a case of getting too much too fast. Levy's solemn dance for four looked overwhelmed by all these elements, with movement serving merely as glue to keep it all together."
Click here for the full review.
Posted by Rachel at October 19, 2007 09:53 AM
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