This is contemporary ballet company Rambert's latest production which is on tour until the end of May 2019. I have seen this company, formerly known as Ballet Rambert, several times before, and they have always produced exciting and ground-breaking shows, and they have always left me breathless and wanting more. Their latest piece, Life Is A Dream, left me cold. I found it boring and unfulfilling, and I was disengaged from the performance in a way I have not been in a very long time.
I am therefore now trying to analyse why, and see if there is a reason for this other than maybe my getting up from the wrong side of the bed that morning.
I think there are several reasons why this piece failed to engage and enthral. The two most important reasons I think are one, the story was almost impossible to follow. Even after reading the synposis in the programme, it still was very difficult to understand; and two, the piece was all very much performed at the same pace with very little change of dynamic at all, and the dancers were not ever used in this piece to their full potentials, making the piece seem rather pedestrian and slow-moving.
The story is based, we are told, on a Calderon play (c1635) about a Polish Prince who is given one day of freedom from his imprisonment. He goes on a 24 hour rampage of violence and cruelty before being locked up again. When he is finally released he enters the world as if it would break any second and is very cautious in his life henceforward. Choreographer Kim Brandstrup has re-imagined this story, and made it into a dance company rehearsal and the director of the company having a dream.
The set, during the first act was the interior of a Medieval castle, or at least that was how it appeared, and upon these grey and dank walls scenes projected of trees in a storm, and crosses. It was all very atmospheric and nightmarish. In the second act, the scenery had been turned around and we see that the walls were just theatre flats and we could see all the pulleys and stage weights holding them up. One of the principal dancers was given the task of wheeling a large theatre light around the stage for the majority of this act lighting up his alter ego.
With costumes that blended in to the set, and very moody lighting throughout, there was little variation and little visual stimulation. The dancing was all very 'samey' with little again to change the monotony of the piece. Dance tempos were all very much of a muchness and until the first pas-de-deux in the second act, there was really nothing faster and more furious than a Sunday stroll in the park.. That is not to say that the dancers were poor - far from it. All the dancers were incredible and their timing and precision superb. Rambert dancers perform with an ease and a grace that is second to none and their skills and talents undeniable. Sadly however, this piece did not showcase these talents to their full, and the whole was a long and incomprehensible sequence of uninspiring and tangled narrative.
The choice of music suited this style quite well. The music was all chosen from the same composer's oeuvres, Polish contemporary classical composer, Witold Lutoslawski, which was disjointed, dissonant and very reminiscent of the music style of the very early shadow-play cinemas which was an idea mirrored quite nicely in the second act when large shadows were cast over the stage flat from the onstage light. [an idea left under-developed]
Rambert company still are very much at the forefront of cutting edge contemporary dance-theatre, but sadly this, their latest creation, did little to inspire and entertain.
Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 10/10/18
No comments:
Post a Comment