Wanda Puvogel, the artistic director of TanzLuzern, has the knack of putting complementary double bills together, even when it seems that the two pieces are poles apart. The secret to that success probably lies in her professional background as a dramaturge, a role that she fulfilled for both these new works, thus providing the glue that knitted them together.
The two pieces are conjoined in concept by the animal of their respective titles, although this was a programme with antlers but no floppy ears since Mthuthuzeli November’s deer in Oh Deer was physically embodied by Tanaka Roki, while Phoebe Jewitt’s White Rabbit was a non-literal dip into a psychological fantasy ambiguously inspired by Lewis Carroll.
Oh Deer further enhances November’s fast-rising status as one of the world’s pre-eminent young choreographers with an ascendency that takes a quantum leap with every new work. This latest opens, in darkness, with the sound of birds squawking and goats bleating. The curtain rose on the deer standing by a pool, an enclosed circle of blue light enveloped in a haze, an effect accentuated by green vegetation poking out of a blurred backdrop as if trees barely seen through the mist (excellent minimal set design by Laura Peloso). The deer’s head worn by Roki was eerily realistic: his face only became visible when the head was removed for the curtain call.
As dawn began to break, Roki performed a strong opening solo with tight muscular control, locking to switch from fast steps into slow motion and sliding rhythmically across the pool. Eventually, out of the downstage gloom came a close-knit group of ten dancers, led by Grazia Scarpato, wearing Bregje van Balen’s pale blue costumes, tightly fitted like a second skin. A cylindrical red light lowered to suggest the heat of the day. The juxtaposition of the deer resting by a pool and the emergence of Scarpato put me momentarily in mind of the similar encounter in L’apres-midi d’un faune.
White Rabbit also started with a strong design statement. Returning from the interval the audience saw a giant green eye peering through a porthole at the rear of the stage, gazing straight ahead or looking to the sides where several easy chairs were piled haphazardly. As the house lights dimmed, Rebecca Stofer’s video design narrowed through the darkness of the pupil, as if taking us down the rabbit hole, and the porthole opened to show Scarpato slithering down onto the stage to perform a dislocated solo, like a stringless puppet or a newborn calf trying to find its feet.
Music was a great boon to both works. As usual, November composed his own score (excepting the closing song by Aretha Franklin), which ranged from a disco beat to a heavy rave with electric guitar highlights. Jewitt utilised classic late twentieth century songs, such as Nancy Sinatra’s My Baby Shot Me Down and The Beatles’ Day Tripper, all superbly integrated by Minouche Briot, sensitively linking the recordings with her own composition to create a holistic soundtrack.
Both choreographers moved their ensembles in varying permutations, liberally employing canon, repetition and unified movement, often pulling dancers into immediate harmony from a spread of independent motifs, creating impressive patterns that were invariably performed with pinpoint precision.
The choreography in both works was crowned by outstanding duets. In Oh Deer the initial powerful pairing of Roki and Scarpato was followed by a mid-section dance in the “pool” by Kany Michel Obenga and Mia Bardot; and Obenga performed a challenging all-male duet with Ching Heng Huang in White Rabbit, which also included a commanding partnership of Bardot and Mathew Prichard to Nina Simone’s Ne Me Quitte Pas; so highly physical in its lifts with Prichard holding his partner while performing multiple turns. The dancers had to be prised apart at the end of this exhausting duet. The theme of being observed (that eye through the porthole) was continued with Roki seated silently in the background watching them dance.
Both pieces ended strongly, although in contrasting ways. The closing section of Oh Deer saw another poignant solo by Roki to Franklin singing You’ll Lose a Good Thing, his head lowering to peer underneath the falling curtain. Jewitt ended with a coruscating finale to the accelerating beat of The Rolling Stones’ Paint it, Black with an initial quartet being augmented by additional pairs up to the full dozen in a succession of seamless transitions, culminating with the ensemble leaping to the front of stage with an abrupt blackout coming just as Scarpato reappeared at the porthole into this fantastic world.
This pair of thirty-minute works amounted to an outstanding programme, which I can easily imagine gracing a company like NDT or Rambert although I would find it hard to imagine any better performance than by this dynamic ensemble in Luzern. It was further evidence of November’s burgeoning talent and an eye-opening introduction to Jewitt’s choreography. I look for entertainment, excitement, innovation or challenge in any new work and White Rabbit ticked all these boxes with aplomb.
Graham's trip was sponsored by TanzLuzern
