On the subject of renewed classics: if you live in the New York area, go see Sarah Michelson’s tour de force “Dogs,” at the BAM Harvey Theater through Saturday only.
It’s as if Michelson, with key help from visual designer and principle dancer Parker Lutz, scooped up all the women-birds and women sphinxes–the Firebirds and Cleopatras– in history and ballet and found a way to reimagine them so they didn’t seem hokey or threadbare, as they often do when choreographers return to them, but renewed in their mysteries.
I don’t want to give the experience away–the whirl and swirl and statuesque glow of the dancing, the way the stunning design (which just keeps stunning, moment to moment) makes the Harvey stage seem both enormous and thoroughly sealed. This gift is best surprised by. In mood the closest approximation I can think of is Balanchine’s “Divertimento from ‘La Baiser de La Fee’ “: that eerie sadness.
Also, if you go, let me know what you make of the odd coda. It feels allegorical to me. I won’t post responses until “Dogs'” run is up.
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