There's no time for rest or recuperation. Suddenly, a voice booms from above announcing the anticipated performance of a big star. “Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Ms —” a name perpetually cut off. Finally, Kancey rises and summons the strength to perform. She wrestles with a vanity that is lit on stage, rolling it around, then giving into it. She sits down in front of the mirror and puts on her jewelry. A trio of black mannequins covered in fuchsia feather boas rotates opposite her in a spotlight (lighting design, which added tremendously to the performance, was by Connor Sale). 

In Kancey's last act, she is transformed into a fabulous diva dame chanteuse. She reemerges on a raised platform in an evening gown, framed between two dark blue drapes, radiating in the spotlight. After lip-syncing about masking heartbreak with a smile, she accepts applause—a standing ovation on the night I was there. The glory doesn’t last very long: the ghost (Lakeria Robinson) reemerges to deposit a single rose on the stage and Kancey collapses a second time. For a few breathless minutes, the audience, too, is uncertain about what is real and what isn't.  

And then, even more striking than before, Kancey reappears as the head of the rotating mannequins, draping herself in pink feather boas as she triumphs in an encore. Finishing center stage, she is inundated with red roses that fall from the sky. 

The full audience—who had trekked to the theater amidst pummeling wind and a flash flood warning in New York City, I might add—erupted into thunderous applause. In a dance which positions fact and fiction as sometimes indistinguishable, there was one thing in which the audience could place their full and fervent faith: Kancey's remarkable performance.