RATED R

 
 
RATED R
 
Toronto Fringe Festival
July 1-20 2016
Choreographer: Aria Evans
RElaps Dancers: Jesse Dell and Irvin Chow
Ranked Dancers: Jasmyn Fyffe, Peter Kelly, Pulga Muchochoma, Kassi Scott, Mateo Galindo Torres and Kathia Wittenborn
 
REVIEWED BY TED FOX


This double bill features two new works from Choreographer Aria Evans.
 
RElaps,the first piece, explores an abusive relationship. Takes place in an apartment. The set design consists of semi-abstract white blocks representing the furniture. Gives a feeling of glacial emptiness, of not being lived in. Reflects the couple's state of mind.
 
The dancers flirt with each other, waltz together and fall backwards trusting the other to catch them. Moments of tenderness and closeness like these are jarringly broken. Suddenly they are brutally shoving, hitting, throttling or torturing each other mentally and physically. Hand-held lights become torture instruments. We can feel the heat of a light on a face.
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This cyclic behaviour of tenderness relapsing into violence continues throughout. Dancers Jesse Dell and Irvin Chow eloquently express their pain and suffering in both body language and facial expressions. A few times one supports the other in a way suggestive of a soldier wounded in combat.
 
This couple is a product of the society they live in. This multicultural society is vividly depicted in Ranked, the second piece. Here, lonely outsiders clash for dominance, control and human connections. There is speed prevalent in this piece for six dancers. Dancers rush madly in and out, oblivious to each other; and when they connect, it is brief and violent.
 
Ranked convincingly and metaphorically depicts race and gender interactions in today's multicultural melting pot society. As in RElaps, all seem unable to get out of behavioural patterns ingrained in their bodies and minds.
 
A powerful show.