Here Comes the BOOM!

Well, well, well. Week two of DanceBOOM! is under way, and Phillyist is even more excited after this week's show than we were after last week's. Ann Marie Mulgrew & Dancers weren't exactly what I was expecting, and I lied to you (not on purpose) about their start time -- but I'm going to blame both of those facts on the promise of the rain that never came, as the performance was supposed to be outdoors. Even if it had rained, there really wasn't any need to cancel or change the pre-show: all the ladies were carrying open umbrellas with them (bad luck indoors!). Nevermind if they were wearing all white. (Incidentially, the all-white gave me a scary sorority flashback. From those two days I was a Greek and had to find all-white clothing. Before I quit.) Mulgrew's piece was at least visually interesting, I just would have liked to see it on its full scale.

The first act of the show (Mulgrew & Dancers were pre-show) was "Living Room(s)," choreographed by Kate Watson-Wallace and performed by local dancers Bethany Formica (who Phillyist saw last week with her own company, Reactionaries), David Konyk, and Megan Mazzarick, with a cameo performance by an awesome red velvet couch. You think I'm kidding, but I'm not. Konyk and Formica performed one of the most interesting pas de deux on said couch that I've ever seen. Eyes closed, the two mimiced the problems of sleeping with a partner on a small area. The two tossed, turned, tumbled, kicked, spooned, and rolled on the narrow sofa, touching almost the entire time. It was incredibly human, even though it was choreographed: I had the feeling, watching it, that I'd done the same thing, just not to music. Soon after the dance came to a resolution, the couch tilted up on one arm and Mazzarick approached it. She proceeded to sit, stand, and lie on the vertical sofa, a feat that showed not just her talent as a performer but also her very impressive upper body strength (to "sit," she often hung from the top arm of the sofa). Even though she was the only one who was sideways, watching her made me think that maybe I was the one facing the wrong direction. By the end of Watson-Wallace's piece, the sofa had completely inverted and Mazzarick was hanging from it, still looking like she was lounging on it and we were all the ones with the wrong way for "up."

Following the performance that I will henceforth refer to as the "Red Couch Collective," a hamburger was suspended from the ceilng and Hijack took the stage. Hijack is composed of Kristin Van Loon and Arwen Wilder, and their music selections ranged from "Schubert" to "Manilow." Unfortunately, the hamburger (and a few other items suspended from above) and the ever-changing musical selection were the things I found most intersting during this third of the show. Van Loon and Wilder were intentionally awkward in their movements -- so awkward that I began to feel uncomfortable watching them. There was certainly humor in their performance, but that's what it was: a performance. I'd say that Hijack falls more into the category of performance art than dance, and the insertion of their piece, "Fetish," into the middle of the evening, was rather jarring. Of course, had the evening ended with Hijack, I would have walked out of the Wilma shaking my head in confusion.