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Flash Review, 6-1: Short
'n Sexy at the Flea
Lisa LeAnn & Terry Dean put on a (really swell) Dance Show!
By Maura Nguyen Donohue
Copyright 2000 Maura Nguyen Donohue
So I dragged myself away
from a recently immunized and reluctant sister (not to mention yelling
at Marky Mark to take his shirt off again in "Three Kings") to attend
what I feared might be yet another struggle through another dance
showcase, Lisa LeAnn and Terry Dean Put on a Dance Show. I did figure
with choreographers like Mark Dendy and David Neumann on the roster
at the Flea that I could expect at least a few moments of enjoyment.
What I got were fast and fresh slices of modern dance pie and, to
the chagrin of said sickly sibling, a fair share of yummy topless
boys dancing.
Katie Workum opened the
program with spurts of dance and conversation in "Stay. Stuck."
Workum delightfully stutters and twitches with lighthearted adroitness,
facing rejection with her face flat on the ground. Brooke Davila
engages the audience with a skilled performance in Clare A. Thesing's
brief "Verbal." The solo makes good use of the wall in the small
but elegant Flea Theater. Brian Brooks is a modern dance android
whose popping mechanisms are sticking in his articulate performance
of "Just This Much." Lisa LeAnn Dalton hiccups her way through a
horrific parody of country music in the opening of "If I'm a Fool"
and follows with lots of weeble wobble rolls in the lotus position
and then an astounding amount of monkey jumps and rolls. David Neumann
slips and slides his way through another terrific deconstruction
of gesture in "Dose." He performs in suit and hat to Tom Waits,
adeptly shifting in and out of a Tim Roth kind of slick charm. Watching
Neumann in this oozy woozy solo is like smoking a smooth Cuban cigar
while drinking the spiked punch from your kid's prom. Terry Dean
Bartlett's "Tricycle" is mesmerizing. Though the lighting design
is not credited, it's very effective, especially in this trio with
Dalton and Davila. The performers are revealed dangling from their
hands off of red spikes. The image, thanks in part to the saturated
red light, is of meat hanging off the butcher's hook. The dancers
drop, jump back up, switch places, swing and twirl in this simple
and seductive dance. I could have watched this longer than I would
have thought. It's simple, gorgeous and performed with skill by
all three.
The excerpts of Mark
Dendy's "Rock and Soul," created collaboratively with the dancers,
are both exquisitely crafted and performed by Alexander Gish, Nicole
Berger and Timothy Bish. The Thai-styled sarong pants allow the
performers' legs freedom and constant revelation while their bare
torsos allow the audience views of beautiful articulating backs.
Berger captures the audience and the end of the first of two duets
with an ecstatic arch back into the ground. Now, two nights ago
I dreamt that Keanu Reeves was a fantastic modern dancer and he
was showing me a wonderful duet he was working on with Eddie Taketa.
I'm still guessing the dream means 'go back to Hawaii for a while'
but regardless the duet included some highly impossible partnering
work. Or at least that's what I thought 'til I saw Tim and Alexander
dance together in the second of Dendy's two duets. It's as rambunctious
as the Rufus song it's danced to and was a nice infusion of bouncing
babe boy energy. They matched each other in luscious dancing, managed
their way through intricate partnering with ease and provided even
more entertainment than watching "Trick" when your boyfriend's not
home. That's for fags and hags alike.
Lisa LeAnn and Terry
Dean Put on a Dance Show runs again next Wednesday, June 7 at 8pm
($15) and 10pm ($10) at the Flea Theater, 41 White St. in Tribeca.
Info: 212-226-2407.
(Editor's Note: For more
info on dancer, choreographer, and writer Maura Nguyen Donohue,
go to www.inmixedcompany.com.
To get on the e-mail list to be updated on Lisa LeAnn and Terry
Dean's shows in Manhattan and Brooklyn, e-mail
tdeanpear@hotmail.com.)
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