Invertigo in Busy Girl
I stepped out of the shower on Sunday evening, slipped on my “Busy Girl” dress from Speedy Girl, a pair of BCBG peep-toe pumps, put my hair in a messy French twist ornate with my delicate flower hairpin gifted by Speedy Girl. The delightful "Busy Girl" dress is carefree both in material as well as look. It is lightweight yet elegant, and masters the "oh this old thing I threw on 30 seconds ago" look. A buy I do not regret at all and matched the look I wanted for our evening perfectly. Alex, being the guy he is, quickly threw on a pair of jeans, an Oakley long-sleeve, and was ready to go. Somewhere in the primping process I lost track of time (ahem ahem), and suddenly panicked that we wouldn’t make it Downtown in time for the performance. I will omit the various traffic laws I broke to arrive on time…
Still buzzing with the frenzy of Los Angeles Traffic, the downtown grime, the parking search hysteria, and olfactory overload we stepped into the Los Angeles Theatre Center performance space unaware of the fact that we would be transported to a completely different world. Two female dancers and one male dancer stood onstage while forest-like noises were played overhead. A narration on bird behavior began to play and for a moment I recognized the excitement of my eight year old self as if I were on a school fieldtrip to the zoo or nature center—However, my eight year old self never experienced this type of learning and wonder. In a comedic yet apt manner, the dancers began to execute choreography that depicted a Bird’s courting ritual. The movements were an odd yet delightful myriad of ronde-du-jambes, attitude turns, pencil turns, jetes, swan-like undulations, and rapid humming-bird like hand gestures. Soon another “male bird” appeared onstage and executed an aggressive pas de deux with the first; depicting a male standoff in competition for the female’s attention. However, this male bird dance consisted of a series of handstands, flips, lifts, and almost capoeira-like partner work between both dancers. Once the dominant male established itself he danced victoriously with each of his female ‘lovebirds’ in a sweet, high-spirited, and perky pas de quatre.
The second piece of the evening, Fun in Limbo, however, had a completely different feel. The choreography explored the place “where heartbreak is suspended,” as Artistic Director Laura Karlin so eloquently put it. The first image featured dancer SaraAnne Fahey dancing with an air of nostalgia to an old record. Just as her movement began to pick up momentum and in intensify, Fahey would stop the record and replay the same chunk, over and over again as if trying to recapture a particular moment in time or a particular emotion evoked by a certain piece of the song. She moved melancholically from swift floor work to infinitely long extensions and melodic, floating, pirouettes. As the piece evolved, other characters began to arrive at this “heartbreak limbo” that choreographer, Karlin, had laid created for us. Between the pounding drum, the beautifully longing cello and the electrifying guitar, coupled with the strong, dynamic, effortless, and whistful choreography the world created onstage by Karlin was both poetic as it was familiar. It was a feeling that we’ve all experienced; a wish to preserve something lost; something we weren’t quite ready to loose and want to cling to…For some it’s a lover, for others a dream, it might be an era, or a stage in your life; regardless of what it is it’s an old friend we’ve all encountered before.
