A Little More Action

Smuin Contemporary Ballet is a different company than when it last came to New York in 2012, five years after the sudden death of its popular founder. Michael Smuin was known for his highly accessible works full of musical theater splash. While his San Francisco based company continues to perform his repertory, it has commissioned a broad range of new work under succeeding director, Celia Fushille. The program they brought to the Joyce Theater this week had a bit of the old Smuin light touch about it, while also pointing to the company’s future. Nestled between a Val Caniparoli piece from 2014, and Annabelle Lopez Ochoa’s “Tupelo Tornado” (2024), incoming artistic director Amy Seiwert’s “Renaissance (2019) was the most engaging work of the evening. All three productions are New York premieres.

Performance

Smuin Contemporary Ballet: choreography by Val Caniparoli, Amy Seiwert, and Annabelle Lopez Ochoa

Place

The Joyce Theater New York, New York, July 13, 2024

Words

Karen Hildebrand

Smuin in Amy Seiwert's “Renaissance.” Photograph by Steven Pisano

Caniparoli’s “Tutto Eccetto Il Lavandino” (everything but the kitchen sink) opens mid action, with spry unison work to match the buoyant Vivaldi score. His women are in pointe shoes and kicky tennis dresses designed by Sandra Woodall in a charcoal tweed more common to business attire. Woodall dresses the men in pleasing shades of lime. There’s plenty of energy as the ensemble delivers cheerful heel taps, elbow flaps, high steps. The ballerinas spend considerable time flat footed so that when they suddenly rise up to pointe, it has the effect of an exclamation mark. “Tutto” has its charms, particularly when it opens up to four different pas de deux spotlights, but eventually the pace wears thin and the constantly shifting variations seem as scattered as the title suggests. It could easily have been half as long.

In contrast, Seiwert’s “Renaissance” delivers a sense of gravity. The set features three towering columns of twisting vines and the stage is cast in golden light (both by Brian Jones). Wearing ballet slippers, the dancers are a unified corps in tunics of filmy ivory chiffon by Kaori Higashiyama. Traditional Eastern European songs sung mostly a capella by Kitka Women’s Vocal Ensemble have a hypnotic effect. When Tess Lane enters dressed in dark tights and halter, all eyes move to her. Five men supplicate themselves, cradling her feet so they never touch the ground as she walks; then raise her overhead like a mermaid carved into the prow of a ship. The men form a stairway with their bodies and she climbs, shoulder by shoulder to dive from the top and be caught in waiting arms.

Smuin in Val Caniparoli’s “Tutto Eccetto Il Lavandino.” Photograph by Steven Pisano

Seiwert’s movement is fluid and sensual, while also precise. It holds its shape. She sows the occasional quirky gesture or odd angle with care, such as when Tessa Barbour places her arms parallel to her face, then shifts her head side to side as if her view is blocked. Terez Dean Orr is a riveting presence throughout “Renaissance,” and Al Abraham grabs my attention whenever he’s featured. Early on, Abraham is joined by three women for a fascinating quartet where the dancers are physically connected throughout. Barbour has a beautiful solo here too. This work, like others I’ve seen from Seiwert, is well-constructed, a pleasure to watch, and falls short of showstopping.

Seiwert, who danced with Smuin’s company for 17 years, was mentored by the choreographer himself. After he died in 2007, Fushille appointed Seiwert choreographer in residence, and the Bay Area dance community claimed her as its “most original dance thinker.” Though she’s accomplished much, including an evening length work commissioned by the Joyce in 2017, she hasn’t yet pierced through to wider acclaim. It makes me think about the nature of creative risk. Could it be that Seiwert, whose workshop project, Sketch, was designed to give dance artists a safe place to fail, herself plays it too safe?

Smuin in Annabelle Lopez Ochoa’s “Tupelo Tornado.” Photograph by Steven Pisano

Ochoa’s “Tupelo Tornado,” about the life and legacy of Elvis Presley, disappoints as a potential bravura finale. I saw Ochoa’s imaginative “Broken Wings” about the life of Frida Kahlo for San Francisco Ballet this spring, and somehow hoped the earlier reviews of this new work were overly critical. Alas, no. Ochoa’s take on Elvis came across as parody when it seems she was trying for a genuine tribute. Much of it—for instance a procession of dancers, each carrying a cardboard crown perched on a pillow—seems right out of a movie by Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar. But she was quoted in the program as saying, “‘Tupelo Tornado’ is a mosaic portrait of the artist and king of rock & roll, Elvis Presley, who slowly and gradually succumbs to the weight of fame.” As Elvis, Brandon Alexander performs the entire piece with a television set on his head that distorts his facial features with flashing colored light. (“Max Headroom,” anyone?) No amount of suede jacket fringe or flared pants can capture the essence of Elvis’ signature moves. But wow, do I admire the spark that didn’t quite ignite in this work. To risk the success of “Broken Wings” is to suffer the failure of “Tupelo Tornado.”

Karen Hildebrand

Karen Hildebrand is former editorial director for Dance Magazine and served as editor in chief for Dance Teacher for a decade. An advocate for dance education, she was honored with the Dance Teacher Award in 2020. She follows in the tradition of dance writers who are also poets (Edwin Denby, Jack Anderson), with poetry published in many literary journals and in her book, Crossing Pleasure Avenue (Indolent Books). She holds an MFA from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. Originally from Colorado, she lives in Brooklyn.

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