“Tesseract”
Charles Atlas, Rashaun Mitchell, Silas Riener
BAM Harvey Theater
Brooklyn, NY
December 13, 2017

It opened with a starry sky, viewed through 3-D glasses. In their mixed media dance and film extravaganza, dancer/choreographers Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener partnered with videographer/director Charles Atlas for a two-act performance, the first half: a rollicking 3-D dance video, the second half: a live dance performance with simultaneous video shadowing. Not surprisingly, the dancers – some schooled, as Mitchell

"Nutcracker"
San Francisco Ballet
War Memorial Opera House
San Francisco, CA
December 13, 2017

Maybe a break from writing clears the mind and opens it to fresh perspectives even on familiar material. At least, it seems so after more than a dozen yearly viewings of Helgi Tomasson’s 2004 “Nutcracker" set at the time of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. He set it to a grand event that somewhat ironically celebrated the country’s hegemony while Europe was already

"An American in Paris"
Elephant Eye, Pittsburgh CLO, Theatre du Chatelet et al.
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
December 14, 2017

What is it about Paris that Americans who go there want to find? Some seek a sense of freedom, whereas others hope to discover their true home. This stage musical is supposed to be about the adventure of leading an expatriate life. The idea has a complicated history. It started as

"Darkness Odyssey Part 2: I or Hallucination" 
Kota Yamazaki/Fluid hug-hug
Baryshnikov Arts Center
New York December 14, 2017

Five dancers take part in Kota Yamazaki’s “Darkness Odyssey Part 2: I or Hallucination,” but for the most part each dances on his or her own, on a shiny floor, with a diaphanous rectangle of silver fabric hanging overhead. The overall feeling is one of slow, liquid movement – but with fits and starts troubling the surface calm.

"I Am Vertical"
Dana Tai Soon Burgess Dance Company
Kogod Courtyard
The National Portrait Gallery
Washington, DC
December 10, 2017

The poet Sylvia Plath receives attention because she wrote about herself as a passionate woman, because she committed suicide and because she was in love with another writer - Ted Hughes, the man who led their time together. Now, more than half a century after her death at the age of only 30, Plath's poems are still in print, she

The Suzanne Farrell BalletOpera HouseThe John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing ArtsWashington, DCDecember 7 & 8, 2017 by George Jackson

First things first! Last night, December 8, the company danced the greatest "Serenade" of the countless ones I've seen. It had utterly remarkable accelerations with the fastest allegros plus the richest retards. These things were independent of any particular dancers, and yet all were part of it. The phrasing changed my idea of "romantic" and "classical" in

Helanius Wilkins's "Triggered"
Terrace Theater
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
December 3, 2017

Was it bold of Wilkins to start with three male solos in a row and continue with a male duet? A sign at the theater's entrance had alerted the audience to strong language and mature topics. Yet, what met the eye possessed a harmony that was totally unsensationalistic. Different bodies, so it seemed, moved as a matter of course

"The Nutcracker"
Kansas City Ballet from Missouri
Opera House
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Washington, DC
November 22, 2017

This time, DC's visiting version of "The Nutcracker" comes from Missouri's metropolis - Kansas City, located on the state's western border with Kansas. Like such guests in previous years, the company is wanted back home for Christmas so that its seven performances here are scheduled as a Thanksgiving  treat.  Credited as choreographer is

"The Sarasota Ballet: Classical and New Voices"
Works & Process
Peter B. Lewis Theater
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
New York, New York
November 19, 2017, matinee

Works & Process, the imaginative discussion program sponsored by the Guggenheim Museum, offered a double dose of ABT's revered principal Marcelo Gomes, showing him both as a dancer and as a choreographer in a program featuring dancers from the Sarasota Ballet, led by its director Iain Webb and hosted by Wendy Perron. Webb