This American Dance: Monica Bill Barnes & Company at Skirball

This is sort of a follow-up to Yeah. What Ira Said. So, read that first. Then hurry back....

Okay, welcome back!

So, as I left NYU's Skirball Center last night, Ira Glass had just retaken the stage after the concert and was asking the audience how many of them had been dance fans before tonight, how many dance shows they had attended in the last year, and the like. I'd wondered about that, too, since it looked more like an NPR audience--his NPR audience--and it probably was.

In any case, it's well known that Glass and his audience now love Monica Bill Barnes & Company since Glass welcomed Barnes and troupe into a This American Life event shown in "more than 600 movie theatres across the US, Canada and Australia." Barnes & Co. did so well with that audience, that what was originally planned as a one-shot appearance--and a kind of victory lap-- at Skirball has been extended: If you can still get a ticket (try here), you can see MBB & Co. with Ira Glass today at 3pm.

If you do get to go, I hope you like glitter, because you'll see lots of it glinting from Kelly Hanson's costumes and gusts of it flying through the air. So much that Glass--unexpectedly, because he'd missed a crucial email--had to get on stage and vamp for four minutes--with a nifty balloon trick and one awkward story--while stage hands cleaned up half the stage.

I happen to love glitter and soul music and perfectly calibrated physical comedy. So, when it comes to Barnes, all good. Give up your leisurely Sunday if you agree.

Anna Bass and Monica Bill Barnes dance Luster (photo by Christopher Duggan)

There's something about Anna Bass, Barnes's partner in crime, that reminds me of Carol Burnett; both have genius. Barnes, I can't quite describe. She is a performer unto herself. Barnes and Bass often dance side by side, at great length, in related though not identical movement. I just realized last night that I must choose. I can just go ahhhh and settle into enjoying the talented Bass or I can stay on high alert for all the rapidfire, formidable changes Barnes goes through and try to figure her out. I can switch, but I can't watch both.

The nearly two-hour program includes two lively Barnes/Bass duets--Luster (a New York City premiere) and I Feel Like--you know, the one with the James Brown sex machine song? It also features Mostly Fanfare (a 2010 trio with Christina Robson and chairs gorgeously held aloft in the dancers' jaws) and Everything Is Getting Better All The Time (a 2011 quartet including Robson and an adorable Giulia Carotenuto). Because, for Barnes, the glamor of the stage and its performers is clearly something to be celebrated even while she's poking affectionate fun at it all, lighting designer Jane Cox makes a fantastic team player. 

NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts
566 LaGuardia Place, Manhattan
(between Washington Square South and West 3rd Street)
(map/directions)

Yeah. What Ira said.

Monica Bill Barnes & Company in Thank You and Good Night (photo by Steven Schreiber)

The utterly charming Monica Bill Barnes & Company will be at NYU's Skirball Center for the Performing Arts with This American Life host Ira Glass tomorrow and Sunday (but this is not an announcement--because you already know that, right? And, if not, you can find out more here.)

I'm bringing this up because Glass said something about his experience of seeing Barnes' troupe for the first time that I'd like to share. I'll explain why later. Here's his quote:

NPR's Ira Glass

I was inspired to make our recent cinema event after seeing MBB & CO. in June 2011. I'll be honest, I don't go to a lot of dance, but her show was the most charmingly alive dance performance I've ever seen. Literally, while it was going on, all I could think was, ‘I want to see this again. How do I see this again? How do I bring everyone I've ever met to this?’ So I created that cinema event in May 2012 where we performed an episode of our show onstage at Skirball and beamed it into movie theaters, with dances by MBB & CO. Afterwards, the most common question I was asked was 'Who were those dancers?' People kept coming up to me saying 'I don't like dance. I don't go to dance. I want to see them again.' Which, yes, is a weird thing to say about an entire art form, but the point is, they won a lot of fans that night and I think when people see a full MBB & CO. show, they'll be even more wowed.

As it turns out, I feel this way about a lot of the dance and movement-based performance I see--I want to "bring everyone I've ever met to this." I want a lot of what I see to not fade away so fast--like after a night or a few nights or, if the artists are lucky, a couple of weekends. I want it to be seen by more than the usual suspects. And I want it to be pondered and processed and taken to heart and argued about and remembered. I want it to influence things beyond dance, beyond the arts. I want it on the American breakfast table and at the water cooler and on the supermarket queue and in the neighborhood bar and in the board room and in the war room.

Good going to Barnes for getting Glass's attention and his joyful response. Her efforts are good for her, of course, and possibly good for us all. What do you think, maybe in 2013 and going forward more of us can step up our magic(k) creativity and raise the outside world's awareness about what's doing in these excellent, essential little villages we call the dance communit(ies)? Let's work on ways to bring everyone we meet to this.

This *dancing* American Life!

Guess who's coming to This American Life on Thursday, May 10? Monica Bill Barnes & Company!

Yeah, that's right: A dance troupe. No, not on the radio. It's a live show from New York's Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, screened in select movie theaters, and here are all the details.

I saw this amazing dance performance by Monica Bill Barnes' company, and I thought - that is totally in the style of our radio show. But obviously you can't have dance on the radio. Then I realized, we have to do another cinema event! We've built this lineup of stories mixed with super visual things, including the dancers I saw, so it's going to feel like the radio show but also totally unlike anything we've done before. I really can't wait to see how it turns out.”

-- Ira Glass, Executive Producer and host, This American Life

My latest Dance Magazine reviews

The October issue of Dance Magazine includes my review of the companies of Camille A. Brown, Andrea Miller, Kate Weare and Monica Bill Barnes at The Joyce Theater (August 9-14). Pick up a copy!

Women in charge at The Joyce

Leslie Kraus and Douglas Gillespie

Kate Weare Company in Bright Land (Photo: Christopher Duggan)

Old-time music band The Crooked Jades 

in live performance for Bright Land (Photo: Christopher Duggan)

I can't give you a review. That's promised for Dance Magazine, and I'll certainly let you know when you can find it there. But I do want you to know that four female choreographers have been royally ripping it up in two different, shared programs at The Joyce Theater this week:

Gallim Dance (choreography by Andrea Miller)

Camille A. Brown

Kate Weare Company

Monica Bill Barnes

They've brought some of the most vibrant dancemaking and dancing I've ever  seen at the Joyce, and you really ought to get there if you can get a ticket.

Remaining shows:

Tonight at 7:30, Friday at 8pm: Camille A. Brown and Andrea Miller

Thursday at 8pm; Saturday at 8pm: Kate Weare and Monica Bill Barnes

Family-friendly program on Saturday at 2pm

More information here and tickets at Joyce Charge: 212-242-0800

These four women have got it goin' on!

Coming up in August at the Joyce Theater: two shared programs with lots of new choreography I'm really looking forward to checking out!

Camille A. Brown and Andrea Miller: Monday, August 9 at 7:30pm; Wednesday, August 11 at 8pm; Friday, August 13 at 8pm
Information, video clips and tickets

Kate Weare and Monica Bill Barnes: Tuesday, August 10 at 7:30pm; Thursday, August 12 at 8pm; Saturday, August 14 at 8pm
Information, video clips and tickets

Plus a "family-friendly" show, featuring all four choreographers, on Saturday, August 14 at 2pm

Bridge of Sighs, choreography by Kate Weare (photo: Keria Heu-Jwyn Chang)

choreography by Camille A. Brown (photo: Matt Karas)

The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Avenue (between 18th and 19th Streets), Manhattan
JoyceCharge: 212-242-0800

Jacob's Pillow names dance residency awardees

I'm delighted to learn that three of New York City's most intriguing contemporary dancemakers--Monica Bill Barnes, Kyle Abraham and Camille A. Brown--will show new work at the Summer 2010 Jacob's Pillow Dance fest developed through its prestigious fall-into-spring Creative Development Residency program. Wit, provocation and pizzazz--each of these choreographers are capable of all three!

See clips from Jacob's Pillow Dance 2009. For more information, click here.

MBB dancers put on their "Game Face"

Slideshow from Game Face by Monica Bill Barnes
All photos by Eva Yaa Asantewaa, (c)2008


(Click an image to see it larger.)

Free performances of Game Face (about 20 minutes) run now through August 7 and again from August 11-14 at noon and 1pm, Robert Wagner Jr. Park, at the southern end of Battery Park City's Hudson esplanade (4 or 5 train to Bowling Green) as part of the Sitelines08 festival of site-specific dance.

Monica Bill Barnes’ Game Face uses everyday people who have passed through the Robert Wagner Jr. Park as inspiration, with the performers cast as sightseers, sunbathers and Park Rangers. This oddly matched group slowly begins to perform a show, using the entire area as their stage. Made entirely on site, the cast of die-hard dancers perform their hearts out in the midst of tour buses, passing summertime crowds and the heat.

Curated by Nolini Barretto, Sitelines is a presentation of the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and is part of the River to River Festival. For more information on Game Face and other Sitelines presentations, click here.

What made me cry...

...shamelessly...big, fat tears...a knockout performance by Monica Bill Barnes and Anna Bass in Barnes's Suddenly Summer Somewhere, premiered this past week at Dancespace Project. From their first appearance at the karaoke mics--barefoot and dressed nearly alike in old-style springtime coats--these two gifted performers had me firmly in their grip and never turned me loose. This piece was, by turns, frightening and desperately sad and finally beautifully poignant. Cleverly set to standards performed by Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and others, this duet is an unusual journey through the underworld of a long-running relationship. And nothing about it--from Barnes's extraordinary and insightful movement choices to the dramatic arc of the relationship--was expected or stale. Both performers are strong actors as well as dancers; in fact, Barnes may be one of the finest, most versatile actors I've seen in dance, and she has a solid partner in Bass. Hard work, hard work, hard work... Dancers work hard, but these two especially. If you missed this one, look for your next opportunity to see it, and let your heart open to it.