Dance department shows variety, slips between ‘Here and There’

Through an eclectic mix of dances and clever use of dialogue, the Department of Dance at Cal State Long Beach kicked off its season with "Slipping Between Here and There" last weekend.

The show featured choreography by graduate dance students Summer Brown, Jay Carlon, Heather Glabe, Jeremy Hahn, Jessica Kondrath, Brian Moe and Johnna Wickstrom.

All seven pieces in the show were done in a more modern and interpretive style, but there was a nice range of themes and tones that were explored throughout the show.

Modern dance pioneer Doris Humphrey once said, "All dances are too long," and usually it is true. However, two pieces in the MFA show, "Chinvat Bridge" by Moe and "Snowflakes and Gumdrops" by Brown did not drag on, but instead left the audience wanting more.

In "Chinvat Bridge," Moe explored the concept of hell through the Zoroastrian religion, where all souls must cross the Chinvat Bridge before ascending to heaven or descending to hell. Moe's piece depicted three unfortunate souls whose misdeeds sent them to the latter. This piece was wonderfully dark and creepy. The audience seemed uncomfortable the moment the piece began with the sounds of tortured moaning in the music, which Moe composed himself. The lighting was appropriately dark with splashes of red light across the chains hanging from the ceiling. The dancers individually writhed and twisted in pain, and as a group they grappled with each other on the floor in a mound of flesh. The piece ended with the last standing dancer leering at the audience with a creepy smile while beckoning them to hell. The only disappointment in this piece was that the chains weren't utilized as props or as an apparatus.

Brown's "Snowflakes and Gumdrops" was a delightfully soothing and aesthetically pleasing piece. Performed by Bethany Feil, who is reminiscent of "The Nutcracker's" sugar plum fairy, In this piece, she showed the grace of a ballerina combined with the movement vocabulary of a modern dancer. The stage was sprinkled with heaps of snow and Feil was costumed in a lovely red-orange ball gown. There was a touching moment at the end where the snow fell on a perfectly-still Feil right before the curtain closed.

Sometimes a choreographer will choose to employ dialogue in their piece. Usually this doesn't go very well because most dancers aren't blessed with vocal acting skills. But every once in a while, the use of dialogue will be instrumental to the success of a piece. Both outcomes were shown in the MFA dance concert.

In Wickstrom's "The Stories We Tell" the audience was taken through the family history of Athena, the goddess of wisdom and strength, and other characters from Mount Olympus. There was way too much dialogue in this piece and the dancers didn't really pull it off well. The mixture of contemporary references to pumpkin pie and Nebraska didn't really jive with the story of how Zeus tried to kill his unborn child who grew up to be Athena. At one point the dancer with the most lines exclaimed, "Hey, I'm the narrator!" which only added to the unpleasantly hokey vibe the piece gave off.

On the other hand, the dancers in "Hansel and Gretel's Survival Guide to the Wilderness" by Glabe pulled off the use of dialogue exceedingly well. In fact the piece probably wouldn't have been as good without it. Glabe's piece imagined the future of Hansel and Gretel after they pushed the witch into the oven. Hansel and Gretel were depicted as self-appointed scout leaders who taught others how to survive in the woods. A video backdrop was used, which whimsically portrayed the storybook pages and the lush, green forest background.

Summer Brown, as Gretel, and Kyle Hadenfeldt, as Hansel, had a believable relationship as quarrelling, yet loving siblings. There was just the right mix of dance and dialogue, and Brown and Hadenfeldt had enough acting talent to make the performance very enjoyable. A favorite moment was when Hansel self-narrated as he unleashed the contents of Pandora's box. It was a little cheesy, but combined with the storybook theme, the effect was charming.

Overall, the show was a success because each choreographer chose to go with their own theme and tone while tying their piece into the collective theme of the show. This resulted in a pleasing array of very different pieces for the audience.

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