Brenda Way hit the bull’s eye when she said ODC’s dancers, newly returned from a month-long tour of Southeast Asia, are “in absolutely top form.” They are, and they proved it with ease and grace this past Friday, the opening night of their current performance series at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.
The centerpiece of the evening was the world premiere of “Waving Not Drowning: A Guide to Elegance”—an exquisitely tongue-in-cheek homage to fashion and female foibles. Choreographer Brenda Way used a 1950s etiquette book for women as the inspiration for piece, as did composer Pamela Z, who used extensive passages from the book as the text for the libretto. From the distance of 60 years, the text gives us a sly and witty perspective on fashion, gender and what it means to be a woman.
The piece opens with a dancer dressed in a gorgeous ultramarine gown; as she circles the stage at a run, the dress billows and floats, radiating an attraction that is both electric and sensuous. She disappears into the wings, never to return, and is replaced by the company dressed in black and gray underwear with black ankle socks, standing under a grid of circular spots. Honestly, what could be clunkier than black ankle socks shortening the line of the leg? Ditto the gray cotton athletic underwear. But with this company of lithe and energetic dancers, they hardly seem to matter.
“What is elegance?” asks a warm female voice, enticing the audience to join in “a game of Pygmalion.” The voice echoes itself: seductively overlaying lists of clothing, phrases of French haute couture, lessons of being well-dressed: “A really elegant woman never wears black in the morning.” The voice maps out the day of the fashion-conscious woman, the paragon of femininity and desirability: “9 a.m., a tailored tweed suit…”
Similarly, the dancers layer movement, from individual contortions to manipulations of each other’s bodies to the men’s swinging the women like pendulums in clocks to the five couples dancing a fragmented tango. Even in its multiple drolleries, the choreography is inventive, precise and as thoroughly elegant as a Chanel wool suit in one color with matching accessories. The dancers perform the piece’s eccentricities with acrobatic élan and a playful deadpan seriousness.
“Waving Not Drowning” ends with a tip of the wide-brimmed hat to Project Runway. The men appear on stage in even less underwear than can be imagined and the women follow them on with rolls of paper and tape. While the disembodied voice of elegant authority lists fashion items from Accessories to Zipper, the women dress the men in feral paper constructions that suggest cocktail dresses and fantasy outfits—one man sports a pair of wings. Their fashion designs complete, the women drop to the floor to marvel at their creations, and the men dance, whirling papery skirts—grace and strength in their mannerisms and movements.
The program included KT Nelson’s “Grassland,” an absolutely wonderful piece of choreography. Before a green and gold-striped screen, the dancers, dressed in light green and aqua costumes that resemble bathing suits, inhabit the stage like fish in an underwater haven. Organized into three couples and a trio, the dancers shake and wind into the small spaces their bodies and limbs create. Are they doing the sidestroke or waving through the air like long stalks of grass? Daniel Santos and Yayoi Kambara are breathtaking in their slithering and entwining duet that is both athletic and surprising; Jeremy Smith has two short solos before the elusive Elizabeth Farotte weaves in and out of his arms. Corey Brady and Anne Zivolich are simply lovely.
KT Nelson’s “River” pits two couples—guys in jeans (Daniel Santos and Corey Brady) come to fish in the early hours of the morning and two fish (Yayoi Kambara and Elizabeth Farotte) dressed in short shimmering dresses—against each other in struggles that resemble both love and the desire for independence.
—Jaime Robles
ODC’s program 1 continues through March 28. Program 2, which includes the world premier of KT Nelson’s “Labor of Love” and Way’s “Something About a Nightingale” and “In the Memory of the Forest,” begins March 19. For tickets and information, visit www.odcdance.org or call 415-978-2787.