Dance Review: Ron Brown’s Work is Evidence of Brilliance

Ron Brown’s Program B is a brilliance sandwich. All three parts are made up of the stuff of brilliance, but the real meat of it is in the middle (appropriately so). That meat is called Walking Out the Dark I, and it is the kind that is fully seasoned and tenderized. The surrounding pieces (the bread) are not nearly as excitingly seasoned, but a necessary and essential part of a Ron Brown balanced meal.

Opening the show, Ebony Magazine asks the onlooker, “Do you see what I see?” in the midst of beautiful patterns and movement exploding on the stage, kaleidoscopic at times. The black and white garb including long, black satin gloves, cocktail dresses and suits for the men scream elegance.

After this explosion of elegance, the four men of the company dance and breath as one to a poem, which includes lines such as “Your god does not have long, blonde hair”…”Come down my brother…don’t walk around like you are on tv…”. They dance to the tempo of each others breath, which they listen hard to as they go from slow ronde de jambs with the body undulating down to a “hit the wall” abrupt stance with bodies as rigid as stone.

When Arcell Cabuag (who is also the Associate Artistic Director) enters the stage in long, flowing white material to the sound of seagulls, a climax is reached. Arcell takes flight as he dances with an ethereal quality. He dances the dance of a ghost and a bird in the way he floats in his attitude pitch falls and into the ground African praises. He foreshadows his own death with his ghostliness. This solo ends in his death as he lays peacefully on his back downstage as his friends walk up to him, acknowledge that he has passed on and exit the stage without grievance.

The dancers return to the stage to dance the beauty and joy that is oozing out of the words “Do you see what I see”. These words are spoken over and over again live by the spoken word artist, Wunmi. Sometimes the simplest moments in life are so beautiful to one person, but remain unnoticed by another. The dancers simply walk across the stage in brightly colored outfits before letting the joy of the music make them groove with African steps and jumps, which is contagious as they force the others to see the beauty that they see and that they feel-that we see and that we feel.

The second piece, A Walk in the Dark I, is the meat of the brilliance this evening. A mother and a daughter and a father and a son stand diagonally across from one another at all four corners of the stage. As they bare their souls to each other in bare, flesh colored outfits, the eternal “bickering” of a parent and child comes alive. The first section in this piece portrays the daughter and the son throwing horrible temper tantrums as they angrily thrust their ribcage and pelvis, flail their bodies through the air and slam on the ground face first. In the second section, the mother and the father retaliate with the ever so ominous guilt trip. This is poignantly portrayed by the mother as she grand pleás in second while scooping up the hurt heart and the pool of tears off of the ground to present to the child.

There is no relation between this mother and father, and, in fact, they don’t exist to each other. The same goes for the children. These are two separate families who happen to be going through turbulence at the same time on the same planet (or, on the same stage). The fact that they never see each other is astonishing as they execute complex patterns. The two pairs intertwine between one another as they fight with their respective parent without even a glance in the direction of the other dueling pair as they come within a hair’s breadth. At one point, the daughter figure-eights around the father while she continues her argument with her mom, and the father focuses his angst on his son.

The absolute climax of this piece is the period when all four dancers exist in their own heads for a moment as they dance angry solos. The flailing and abrupt movement that has been prevalent throughout the piece is used in each of their solos. This is the first time in the piece when all of them are directing their angst inward and not relating to the parent or child. Immediately following this, all of them lie down on the ground in a straight horizontal line (after the mother is the last one standing as she has the last word). Dirt falls in the same straight horizontal line that the families are lying in from the catwalk. The dirt falls four times. They are now buried in the ground. We have an everlasting struggle with our parents that starts at the beginning and ends at the end.

The last piece of the evening, Exotica, shows not only a wide range of style (from stunning classic technique to dirty stank), but also a range of music and atmosphere. Exotica takes us straight from the night club where everyone is shaking their booty to pumping bass to the church scene where people bow their head in prayer as His Eye is on the Sparrow plays.

Throughout the nightclub scenes and church scenes (they continue to interchange and the music quite often overlaps), their movement evokes praise not only toward the sky praising the Lord but also inward praising oneself and down to the ground praising elders. There is one movement that becomes a motif, quickly praising those three things by placing the hand to the ground, to one’s heart and then toward the sky as they simply walk across the stage.

The message that this sends is clear: whether in church, at a club or at home, you can make any place a church by praising life. The costumes add to the celebration with various shades of brightly colored velvet dresses and pant suits on the men and women. My personal favorite part of this celebration aside from the beautiful praise is how “in the pocket” all of the dancers are. At one point, all of the dancers are in two lines, and they pause for a moment before grooving-a groove that almost appears to be internal as they get deeper and deeper in the pocket.

Ron Brown and his dancers continue to bring us unique contemporary dance that is deep seated in African movement. The work takes an honest look at life and death with a readiness at all moments to celebrate all ups and downs. Ron Brown’s choreography and the dancers’ passion work together to permanently brand the concept of each piece on each person walking away from the theater.

Studio Photography by: Daniel Hedden.

iDANZ Critix Corner
Official Dance Review by

Adrienne Jean Fisher
Performance: Ronald K. Brown’s Evidence
Choreographer: Ron Brown
Venue: Joyce Theatre
Date: February 12, 2009
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