Maymester Day 10
Tonight I saw one of the most moving performances I have ever seen. Originally, I was going to write about our day visiting the “Institut du Monde Arabe” as well as our class discussion, which were both of which were fantastic! However, after seeing Kid Pivot and the Electric Company Theatre’s performance of Crystal Pite and Jonathon Young’s “Betroffenheit” I feel like I need to use today’s blog to help dissect and digest such an incredible work of art.
Funny enough, I was not able to really see the first minute of the performance. A woman had gotten caught in the aisle right in front of me when the entire Théatre de la Ville went pitch black for the start of the show. She then proceeds to cry out in the complete silence, which triggers the hisses from the perturbed audience around her. Then, the lady in my hand takes her hand and starts guiding her down the row to the right, where there is one open seat. However, the woman is disoriented, and tries to sit down on every one as she moves down the row. With the help of the whole row taking her hand and guiding her, she alas arrives at the empty seat at the end of the row. Phew! Now, back to the incredible performance.
The intro is immediately both gripping and terrifying. It is set in an industrial looking dark room that looks like it could be some type of prison. There are wires, which are writhing around like snakes as the lights weave wildly across the stage. At this point it’s unclear if I am watching some sort of live horror movie, or a dance performance.
Jonathon Young then enters and begins a haunting scene of him talking to one of the voices in his head about some sort of addiction. He is making the voice go through a script pledging that it will follow certain steps and not be drawn back into the addiction. Then, we meet Young’s alter ego, dancer Jermaine Spivey. I have never seen someone dance to a conversational voice in the way that Spivey did. Every syllable of this conversation Young is having with himself is met with a dance move. I am blown away by how mathematically precise the dance moves are lined up with the conversation. I felt like it also showed how conversation is actually in itself very rhythmic. It has its own phrases and cadences that can be paired with dance in the same way we put music to dance.
Young and his alter ego proceed to dance out an incredible duet where they are fighting each other over this mysterious addiction. It eventually becomes clear that there has been a terrible accident that has happened to Young (which is based off of his having lost his daughter and two nieces in a fire). While I did feel like there was a clear drug addiction that that Young is dealing with throughout his grieving process, I feel like the main addiction that he is trying to cope with is that of his reliving the accident. He wants to keep going back to it in his mind, because this is where the dead live, but he also wishes to move on from it. We are left with no clear answers, only the incredible Jermaine Spivey’s ending solo which is as heartbreaking as it is hopeful.
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Arabic writing at the Institut du Monde Arabe
Political artwork at the Institut du Monde
A beautiful oud at the Institut du Monde Arabe