Life Could Be A Dream

[rhythmaning]

On the last evening of the Edinburgh Festival – so that is quite a while ago (but I didn’t tell you about it back then, so what the heck) – we went to see Nederlands Dans Theater.

NDT are frequent and welcome visitors to Edinburgh; we tend to see them each time they come across. They have three companies – the main company; a youth company, NDT2; and a group for more experienced – let’s face it, older dancers, NDT3. I think I have only seen NDT3 once – but it was brilliant – and the idea of using experienced dancers who would otherwise not be able to perform is excellent.

It was the main company who played in the festival. It was a mixture of piece we had seen before, and new works (at least, new to me).

They opened with a long piece, Silent Screen. Set to music by Philip Glass – rather beautiful, simple piano pieces – the dancers moved to a backdrop of projected films. It opened with gloomy lighting, three characters moving in the dark; it was only later that it became apparent that one of the characters was on the screen with two dancers on stage. The dancer on the screen moved into the distance, along a pier into the sea.

I have seen other companies work with film; and it rarely works – either the film distracts and detracts from what is happening on the stage, or it adds little. Here, though, it worked well, adding to the narrative.

One beautiful scene showed light shining through a window moving across a wall, throwing shadows on the screen, whilst dancers danced on stage as if in the space of the room. A giant shadow passed in front of the window, dwarfing the dancers.

Another scene had a dancer emerge from the orchestra pit, and slowly walk to the back of the stage, pulling her dress with her: the dress covered the stage, the material spread across the width of the theatre. It looked wonderful.

This was a lovely work, energetic, emotional and contemplative.


Nederlands Dans Theater (picture: Edinburgh International Festival)

The second piece was Sh-Boom, danced to a variety of songs from the 1940s. More energetic and humorous, this was fun: quite manic at times, the dancers careering around the stage. At the end of the dance, a hail of paper rained down from the ceiling and over the audience, like confetti or snow; each piece had a line from the song Sh-Boom – “life could be a dream”. It was beautiful. (Being sentimental, and believing the sentiment, I kept my piece of confetti.)

This was followed by a short duet, Shutters Shut, set to a poem by Gertrude Stein, If I Told Him. The dancers actions mimicked the words; it was tightly focused – the two dancers tiny on the large stage, their movements occupying little space. Again, this was energetic and fun.

The final piece, Signing Off, was more melancholy. Again set to the music of Philip Glass, it was a piece of duets, solos, and a trio of dancers. Beautifully lit, it was low key and romantic.

All these dances were choreographed by Paul Lightfoot and Sol Leon, the resident choreographers for NDT. The company seem to have a standard vocabulary of dance – there is a definite house style – angular, emotional, and energetic. I find it very engaging – but then, I am a fan.

---

Last weekend, we went to see Zurich Ballet at the Festival Theatre. I’ve probably said before what a wonderful building this is. It was originally the Empire, a music hall, and it became a bingo hall. In 1994, it opened as the site of the main theatre in the Edinburgh Festival. (For years, a new theatre had been mooted; there was space behind the castle where it was to be built – this was known, aptly, as “the hole in the ground”. No theatre was built there.)

The Festival Theatre has kept the original interior – ornate Edwardian gilt, big chandeliers – but with a completely redesigned, glass-fronted front of house. The wide curve of glass opens onto Nicolson St (opposite the site of the café Nicolsons, where J.K. Rowling sat and wrote Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone). When the theatre first opened, I didn’t like the glass: looking in from the outside – you look in on one of the bars – on wet Edinburgh nights, it felt rather exclusive: all those people having fun as you scurry by outside.

Once inside, though, it is wonderful: the views out are stunning; and you can stand by the glass and watch the world go by outside. Although my first impressions were that it wasn’t inviting, it is now one of my favourite buildings.

It also makes a stunning theatre. It has the widest stage of any UK theatre (at least, it did when it opened in 1994) – which means that the sightlines are superb from just about anywhere in the house. (It also means that during the festival, it is co-opted for large scale opera productions – rather than dance, which is relegated to the Playhouse.)

Zurich Ballet hadn’t played Edinburgh before, and on a damp Friday night they got a very poor house – about a third of capacity. Perhaps everyone was all danced out after the festival.

They danced one ballet, In den Winden im Nichts (Winds in the Void). A long piece – eighty minutes – danced to Bach’s cello suites (II, III, and IV). The music was beautiful – very ethereal – and filled the space well. But the ballet was too samey: though modern rather than classical, a single piece for that time was wearing. It seemed very clinical – it looked great, but it wasn’t engaging.

There were some excellent set pieces – the corps de ballets moving across the stage; the full company dancing in synchronization – but it didn’t grab me.