Gestures of Music Theater by Symonds Dominic;Taylor Millie;

Author:Symonds, Dominic;Taylor, Millie;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press, Incorporated
Published: 2014-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Figure 10 Josh Baker as Billy in “Angry Dance” from Billy Elliot. Photo by Alastair Muir.

Figure 11 Kaine Ward as Billy in Billy Elliot. Photo by Alastair Muir.

Gendered equality in dance vocabularies is a common technique to subvert traditionally masculine characteristics in not only The Book of Mormon but also Spring Awakening (2007). Bill T. Jones, as mentioned above, has embraced the erasure of gender differences before in his choreography, and Spring Awakening is no exception. In order to counter the rigid strictures and traditions of Victorian life in Spring Awakening, Bill T. Jones brilliantly infused the choreography with his own brand of postmodernism, as the teenagers explore the limits of their sexual and intellectual freedom in late-nineteenth-century Germany. Early in the musical, Jones suggests an adherence to traditional masculine ideals in “Bitch of Living”; sung and danced by all the young men in the cast, the number expresses their frustration—not unlike in “Turn It Off”—at repression, particularly sexual. The dance vocabulary is reminiscent of that in “Angry Dance”: percussive, pulsating, and aggressive, with lyric implications of masturbation expressed through gesture, hands gripping and pumping phallic microphones in the air above the lap and feet beating and stamping to that rhythm. As the number climaxes, the teenagers leap about, jumping on chairs and around the space. But much of the choreography for both girls and boys is less reflective of lyrical meaning. Instead, Jones lays evocative but abstract choreography on top of the dancers’ bodies; it might outline a body part or pulsate a rhythm but does not necessarily tell a story or directly correlate to a character trait. “Mama Who Bore Me” is a litany of everyday gestures traced around the girls’ body parts and through the air; they appear almost as semiotic signs. In “Totally Fucked,” the arms of the dancers flail in violent, urgent movements around their own bodies, and at times the entire company bursts into chaotic jumps reminiscent of a mosh pit.

Equality of choreographic expression runs throughout the show in a variety of repetitive techniques, such as the incorporation of chairs into the dancing, the laying on of hands, and the use of technology. Both male (“Bitch of Living”) and female (“Mama Who Bore Me”) performers stand, jump, or dance on chairs, a move that can indicate power, sensuality, or both. In the latter number, girls straddle the chairs; in “My Junk,” they dance around Hänschen as he masturbates, jumping up and down, arms flailing in full-body extension of Hänschen’s freedom in sexual release, jumping again on the chair after he stands up. The ritualistic, sensual laying of hands on one’s own body occurs throughout, as mentioned above; one particularly effective example is in “Touch Me,” in which all of the principal performers march in a circle around the stage, their hands moving in a litany of symbolic gestures across their head, torso, and pelvic region, climaxing in the same gestures performed as they stand in a straight line downstage. In “The Mirror-Blue Night,” as

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