THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, October 15, 1996 TAG: 9610150028
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TERESA ANNAS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 122 lines
WEST OF WATERBURY, out amongst the cattle and cabbage patches of rural Connecticut, a once-seedling dance troupe has flourished.
Now a quarter-century old, Pilobolus Dance Theater - which performs in Norfolk on Saturday - took its name from a fast-growing fungus that moves toward the light.
True to form, this small, collective dance group - six dancers, four artistic directors - has been spotted in lights of all types, stage to video. They are an annual fixture at the American Dance Festival, and at the Joyce Theater, New York's dance mecca. They have been seen on PBS' ``Dance in America'' and ``Great Performances'' series.
From their megaswift rise, they have continued to evolve. And, a very Pilobolian evolution it has been.
``Pilobolus is a little creature that explodes. When it shoots its spores, that's the second fastest thing in nature,'' said Michael Tracy, an artistic director who joined the group in 1974.
Likewise, they got their start in May 1971 as Dartmouth students dabbling in dance; by December, The New York Times raved over their first public gig.
A fascination with natural processes and other influences have nourished their choreography. ``We're as much interested in the visual effects of organic properties as we are in the psychological event of human interaction,'' said Tracy, sounding briefly stuffy in a recent phone conversation from Connecticut.
Lightheartedness, and a boisterous, lighter-than-air physicality, have marked the group since its inception.
``The ways the members of this troupe tie themselves up in knots and defy the laws of gravity can be whimsical or weird, astounding or perplexing,'' The New York Times has written.
Tidewater Performing Arts Society is presenting Pilobolus, an encore event celebrating TPAS' 10th anniversary season. The nonprofit group last brought Pilobolus here in 1987 as its premiere presentation. Since then, TPAS has produced annual seasons featuring some of the nation's most adventurous performing arts groups, from ISO and The Bobs to monologuist Spalding Gray.
Pilobolus had its own anniversary in 1996. For its 25th season, the troupe choreographed a full company piece that celebrated the rambunctious wit that first buoyed the troupe.
The 20-minute piece, called ``Aeros,'' is scheduled to open the program at Harrison Opera House.
``It's kind of a humorous story of an intrepid rocketeer who lands on some other planet where people move and fly in odd and unexpected ways. And he has to try and figure out how to deal with these creatures.''
For ``Aeros,'' the costumes - designed by Lawrence Casey, a costumer for Metropolitan Opera - are ``exotic and otherworldly, with bright colors that are derived from the colors in the rain forest,'' Tracy said.
The Paul Sullivan score, commissioned for the piece, also is funny and exotic, he said. ``Because we have the luxury of affording a composer to write to our choreography - instead of vice versa, the way it's usually done - the music is very well suited to the movement.''
Like so many of their dances, the suggested narrative in ``Aeros'' concerns an outsider's attempts to meld with a foreign group.
It's a recurring theme, acknowledged Tracy, and may pertain to the group's sense of itself, and its process of collaboration.
In the wide world of dance, ``not only are we seen as upstarts, outsiders in our own field, but we sort of invented our own style.''
The Pilobolus look was boisterous and athletic in the beginning, melding acrobatics and modern dance. They are famous for creating eye-popping, somewhat astounding structures with bodies that connect, then disconnect, in strange and compelling ways - like kinetic sculpture, or cells observed under a microscope.
Over time, the troupe has developed a wildly diverse, 70-work repertoire that mixes the sublime, the somber and the slaphappy.
As they have from the start, Pilobolus still creates by consensus.
They began as college buddies at Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., just four students enrolled in a dance class with an assignment to co-choreograph. The end result, an 11-minute piece they called ``Pilobolus,'' blew away their peers. The guys got so excited by this, they went professional within months, and ended up as the founders of Pilobolus.
Keeping up the momentum, and the collaborative goodwill, over 25 years hasn't all been ``wild berries and roses,'' as Tracy put it.
``We have stayed together, against all odds. I'll be embarrassingly frank: We duke it out in the studio. It sounds silly. But, in fact, that's the most accurate description of what collaboration can be,'' he said.
``You can say we're a harmonious bunch of pals. But we've come to the stage where we don't expect that.
``When you're young, you do. You expect that collaboration means a euphonious coming together, something akin to a harmonious convergence.''
Collaboration is a mysterious process, he said. ``Most people aren't cut out for it. Even some of our old cronies found themselves on the edge of compromise, and felt that anything less than a final say was not enough.''
It's not a matter of ego. ``We have enough ego left to sink a ship, within the confines. We also have enough respect for each other's eye. So, we're willing to put up with the difficulties of collaborating, for the benefits of the broader view.''
The other major piece on the program - ``Sweet Purgatory,'' written in 1991 to music by Dmitri Shostakovich - is a polar opposite to ``Aeros.''
The 30-minute, full company piece conveys a somber mood, makes a social comment, and was choreographed to existent music.
The Russian composer, who lived from 1906 to 1975, ``grew up in a terribly repressive time, and wrote some wonderful music about it.''
Pilobolus' choreography to his Chamber Symphony, Opus 110a, does not contain a narrative. Instead, it suggests ``universal issues that all societies have to deal with.''
Tracy stopped short of describing the dance. ``It's one of those pieces where the work, as it stands, communicates what we want it to communicate. And it can't be translated into a sentence.''
But it's clear enough on stage, he said. ``The audience will see and feel the imagery that is the subject of the piece.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]
PILOBOLUS DANCE THEATER
Pilobolus has developed a wildly diverse repetoire that mixes the
sublime, the somber and the slaphappy.
PILOBOLUS DANCE THEATER
Pilobolus creates structures with bodies that connect, then
disconnect, in strange ways.
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GRAPHIC
[For a copy of the graphic, see microfilm for this date.] by CNB