Species: Yes, It's Dance at the Fringe!
There is much to admire in this piece and I fully applaud Sapience Dance Collective for bringing us dance at the Fringe, however I can’t help but wish the piece felt more finished and fully rehearsed.
On the positive side each of the five female dancers finds moments to shine, one astonishingly athletic woman that I thought of as the “earth mother” in brown (there were no programs opening night) is perhaps the most consistently successful both in her execution and the realization of her part.
The others flit in and out of the piece, there are two interesting “birds” locked in a sexless “mating-dance”, and a scarf dancing “wind spirit”, all are initially interesting but go on too long (oddly in a reprise they start to work). The catching of a creature by the “earth mother” was interesting but cried out for more violence.
Sometimes however the dancers seemed slightly out of sync in parts where precision was demanded. Lifts felt weak, half-hearted, or just plain clumsy. I couldn’t shake the impression in the first half of children running around imitating dancers -“Look Mommy, I’m a bird!” (“Controversy Time” - In a piece called Species, I can’t help feeling that some real sexual energy and violence might have been called for. Without a man in sight a little tentative play didn’t cut it. Get aggressive ladies, or change the title. There are differences in the sexes, if you are without one sex then rubber masks – see below - will not make up the difference.)
The costumes, with the exception of the enormous patchy “earth mother” skirt never quite work, feeling like rehearsal clothes, the idea of a costume, not the thing itself. Additionally some sketchy lighting marred the strongest segment in the first half, a birth sequence that starts routinely but becomes marvelously insect-like.
The piece itself begins with an ill-conceived “prologue” featuring a dancer in a old man Halloween rubber mask that adds nothing but confusion to what seems in some ways to be a creation story. The masks are picked up by all five midway through - now Princess Diana and James Brown with others distract us from, and stand in for, what might have been an opportunity for some interesting character work. When the masks are pulled off in front of the audience (something normally verboten in mask work) the effect is relief, they then lie discarded on the ground looking sadly like forgotten props.
Later the piece comes into its own, really sizzling, as the five pull at their faces as if they too were masks. Suddenly the horrifying visuals created connect and the piece zips to an end somewhat reminiscent of “Fantasia’s - Night on Bald Mountain.”
As a work in progress, perhaps using the Fringe to find a workshop audience, it’s worth a view by those interested in dance/movement pieces. It won’t convert the uninitiated, but will spark interest in others. I will look for Sapience Dance Collective again hoping to find the polished piece that I know lies within them.