Review by Bess J.M. Hochstein, Berkshires editor
Every once in a while, if you’re lucky, you see a work of art so stunning in conception and execution that it takes your breath away. Such is the case for Flyland, choreographed by Dutch dance-maker David Middendorp and performed by L.A.-based dance company BODYTRAFFIC last week at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival. The first piece on a diverse, dense program of exceptional dance, it’s a brief blast into a surreal skyscape that conveys a story of love, longing, and heartbreak with no literal narrative.
Flyland begins with a beautiful couple — dancers Katie Garcia and Joan Rodrguez — intertwined in a spare room drained of color. He waves his arms and a fire alights in the stylish hearth; they lithely embrace and spin apart as faint, virtual furnishings appear: a large red table and chairs on an oriental carpet; large windows filled with greenery, and bookshelves with a ladder, which he appears to climb like spider to pull a curtain shut, though in reality, he never leaves the floor. He lands back in the chair across from her, slams the table, and sends a glass of red wine flying in slo-mo. From there, their room opens up to a cloudscape, and the dancers (with the audience) embark on a fast-paced, surreal journey made possible by drone videography, clean, enchanting animation, quick, supple movement, precision timing, and heartfelt music.
This mind-bending combination of floor dancing and projection has the viewer wondering what is real and what is virtual as well as which way is up or down. We see the dancers flying, spinning in freefall, carried off by a giant crow, caught, lifted up, and helped along their way by giant shadow-like hands. They eventually tumble back home and land in their chairs, facing each other across the expanse of the table, and the subtle visuals, the heartrending musical accompaniment (To Build a Home, by The Cinematic Orchestra), plus the distance between them make clear that their relationship is ending. Flyland lasts less than 10 minutes, but I felt as if I had been carried away on a dreamlike journey. I wanted to watch it again and again.
BODYTRAFFIC had presented its first performance of Flyland at the Pillow’s gala on June 21, and the dancing was so masterful, the technical execution so flawless, and the piece so affecting, gorgeous, and mind-blowing that I’m sure no one minded seeing it again during the company’s Ted Shawn Theatre debut. (The troupe had previously performed twice in the original Doris Duke Theatre and had a sold out run in 2022 at the outdoor Leir Stage.) One might have assumed this work had been created for the enchanting duo of Garcia and Rodriguez. In fact, the piece has a surprising past; in 2016, Middendorp and two European dancers auditioned an earlier version of Flyland, with different music, on the television show Britain’s Got Talent, where it justifiably wowed the judges. This nearly ten-year-old dance retains the shock of something new; despite a decade of technological advances, it still feels cutting-edge, leaving viewers in a state of wonder, awe, and disorientation.
From this lofty beginning, the program continued with Blue Until June, a piece from 2000 by Trey McIntyre, a familiar fixture at the Pillow, both with his own (now-dissolved) troupe and his always-exceptional dances made for myriad companies. Dance watchers have long described Mark Morris as the most musical of choreographers, but in my opinion, McIntrye has displaced him; his dances are informed and shaped by the music but never cross the line of aping it. Last year, McIntyre joined BODYTRAFFIC as Creative Partner, and from the performance of Blue Until June, it’s clear this is an ideal match; the company’s dancers — strong, precise ,flexible, and graceful, all with winning and unique personalities — perfectly execute his intricate, fast-paced, challenging choreography with little sign of exertion. And, like McIntrye, BODYTRAFFIC founding artistic director Tina Finkelman Berkett clearly has an affinity for evocative music as an integral part of dance.
Blue Until June is built on nine songs that portray various shades of romantic relationships, all performed by the legendary soul singer Etta James. It spools out with seven dancers in a multitude pairings and groupings masterfully executing McIntrye’s characteristic quicksilver, sweeping ebb and flow of movement, replete with bravado lifts, spins, leaps, and breathtaking catches, with multiple layers of action in the foreground and upstage. Blousy costumes (think girls in their summer dresses) perfectly complement the choreography, with dancers breezing on, across, and off the stage.
It’s nigh impossible for me to see any dance set to One for My Baby (and One More for the Road) without thinking of Twyla Tharp’s rendition for Mikahil Baryshnikov, sung by Sinatra, but McIntyre and these charismatic, versatile dancers owned Etta James’s rendition. They expertly captured the mood shifts of the songs throughout the piece, from upbeat and humorous (kudos to the perky, perfectly cast Jordyn Santiago joyously twisting and twirling to Seven Day Fool) to slow and bluesy (Fool that I Am), ending almost too predictably with a pas de deux to At Last. This work is delightful yet so dense that it could have been an entire program on its own. McIntyre’s ever-inventive and complex choreography brought to mind Emperor Joseph ll’s comment about Mozart’s music: “Too many notes.” But for McIntyre as for Mozart, too much is glorious.
The second half of the program consisted of two full-company commissions debuted last year. I Forgot the Start, choreographed by Matthew Neenan, takes its name from a line in a prototypically morose song by Suphian Stevens, Flint. This is another dance of love, but love that’s enmeshed with loss and grief. The opening song sets the tone: to the voice of Sinead O’Connor’s In this Heart, the dancers, draped in gauzy, translucent costumes designed by Márion Talán del la Rosa, begin center stage, lined up behind each other, rhythmically swinging their arms in a manner somewhere between carefree, mechanized, and dutiful. It’s a touchstone movement they come back to as this dance unfurls with a blend of pedestrian and dramatic moves, languorous coupling, sensual bodyweight shifts, moments of uplift and groundedness, passion and despair. It’s all in a softer mode than the tone of the previous works, though just as emotionally impactful, abetted by subtle, evocative video projections by designer Christopher Ash.
The evening ended with Incense Burning on a Saturday Morning: The Maestro, by Juel D. Lane, whom Pillow audiences might have seen performing with Camille A. Brown & Dancers in years past. The most literal of the program’s four works, this dance brings us into the mind of a painter, as indicated when the curtain opens on a sheer scrim with a portion of words spoken by a man’s voice appearing in handwriting: ”I’m not trying to look for any magic. I’m just trying to do what I do and enjoy.” The words are wiped away by animated swashes of paint. We see dancer Chandler Davidson, perched on a low stool, make a flicking move with his wrist as we hear a tinny percussive noise, which together convey someone tapping excess paint off a brush. It’s a movement and sound combination that recurs throughout this work of whirling movement and visuals.
The dance is Lane’s tribute to painter (and professional football player) Ernie Barnes, and it brings new life to his iconic painting “The Sugar Shack” — a vivid juke joint scene made famous by its appearance in the credits of the ‘70s television show Good Times and, in an altered version, on the cover of Marvin Gaye’s 1976 hit album I Want You. In this piece, we see Chandler as the artist, attired in white, waving his arms with intention, like a painter making bold brush strokes, which are echoed in projections on the scrim. The artist observes, assesses, poses, and dances with and among figures in skin-skimming, jewel-toned attire (by costume designer Jarrod Barnes), including Alana Jones in a bright yellow slinky dress, bringing to life a woman who grooves with abandon in several of Barnes paintings. There are sequences of fast-paced stylized social dancing, calling to mind Barnes’s depictions of people dancing, and an extended sequence of African dance, with the dancers stomping, bent legged, flat-footed, and grounded, driven by a transition in the score (by Munir Sakee) to propulsive drumming. Faint projections, including of Barnes’s work (kudos to video designer Yee Eun Nam), further place the artist in his swirling universe of paint and bodies in motion.
BODYTRAFFIC was the second performance I took in at the Pillow on July 2. Earlier that evening, Philadelphia-based Almanac Dance Circus Theater returned to the Leir Stage, where a table, two chairs, and an apparatus for suspension, highlighted on the outdoor platform, raised anticipation before the dancers appeared. First came Egg Project, a duet in which Jo Kramer and Nicole Burgio, wearing monochromatic slit skirts and tube tops, variously and precariously balanced on the furniture, magically and humorously materialized hard-boiled eggs — most often in their mouths — and put the suspension apparatus to good use, floating off the ground for segments of aerial dance and, in the case of Burgio, being hoisted up by her top knot in the ancient art of hair hanging. Then, a second duet — Helpful Hints for Strength & Health for Busy People — had Ben Grinberg and Rhonda Moore, in loose-fitting jumpsuits, engage in daring interactions that called on coordinated strength and balance, as she walked on him as he lay on the floor, or walked up his body as he stood, ending up standing on his shoulders, with both of them upright, all as they recited lines from a 1901 illustrated handbook of fitness exercises.
Both of these works, plus a brief snippet at the end that brought all four dancers together, were works in progress and clearly in need of a bit more time and polish. But that’s another aspect of the magic of Jacob’s Pillow: the Festival provides the space to present excellent dance with choreographers and performers in peak form, and also to show audiences what’s yet to come.
Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival 2025, in Becket, Massachusetts, continues through August 24.
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