REVIEW: PPY22 Revealed: SDC Pre-Professional Year

Bay 20, Carriageworks
Reviewed December 5.

"PPY22 Revealed" was a large-scale graduation performance that gave its 49 graduates ample space to collectively shine across five different works. Now in its ninth year of operation, SDC’s Pre-Professional Year has a growing number of graduates who are making their marks across the dance scene.

The first work, arrival in s.a.r.s.h, choreographed by Sam Coren was a darkly humorous yet vibrant and engaging work. Set in the year 3045, the cast took us through several scenes in an imagined artificial recreation sector that allowed these unfortunate people of the future to escape from whatever real-life horrors one might imagine to be taking place 1000+ years from today. The electronic voiceovers that guided the dancers (and the audience) through changes in the program gave this work a coherent narrative and Alice Joel’s costume designs were believably futuristic. The dancers allowed the underlying humour of the work to come through by playing their roles straight, and showed their ability to move cohesively as an ensemble. I admired the way Coren flipped the fears and assumptions about what a dystopian future might look like, by focussing solely on how people might seek to escape it, if only temporarily, and how this could be monetized in a capitalist system.

The program notes for IVY, choreographed by Melanie Lane, described this piece as, “a re-imagined folk dance for the future”. It starts off at a cracking pace, requiring a level of speed and precision from its performers that must surely have tested their stamina. The cast rose to the challenge and maintained the technical precision required by this piece until the tempo slowed and they were able to physically slow down and breathe with softer, slower movements.  As a work, IVY feels quite dense and compact – you can sense how much thought Lane has put into this piece, and I suspect further viewings would reveal much more. Costumed solely in black, but all in different variations of type, at times Bronte Hilder’s costume designs saw the dancers blend into their shadowy surrounds rather than stand out against it.

The last work before interval was an excerpt from Rafael Bonachela’s Variation 10. This technically demanding piece requires the lines and shapes of a fully developed classical technique, as well as a high level of musical precision and an ability to physically embody a range of dynamic possibilities. Overall, the cast of dancers performed this challenging piece well, while in the closing duet Ronan Armstrong and Carmelita Buay shone in a delightfully lyrical portrayal. Toni Maticevski’s costumes emphasised each cast members athletic physique, adding an occasional flounce or frill only where it would not obstruct the audiences view of their lines.

Returning to the theatre after interval, it appeared that Cloe Fournier’s piece, Tout ce [-‘sa] All of this [That] had already begun to take shape. One dancer laid out several pairs of chorus shoes downstage while another who had stood, barefoot, wearing a long gold dress in the foyer during interval eventually returned to the stage with a microphone. At several points in this work, this same dancer proffered the microphone, asking another cast member to speak – but they never did. There were some interesting sections of choreography where smaller groups stepped out from the ensemble before merging back into the group, and Bel Campbell’s costume design showed the dancers as individuals in a range of everyday outfits which wouldn’t be out of place on the street. Perhaps in keeping with this, it remained very much an ensemble work and a team effort without any undue emphasis on one dancer over another.

The final work, James O’Hara’s We have been here before but never like this emphasised the companionship and teamwork between the cast by framing the beginning and the end with a semicircle of every cast member holding hands. Bronte Hilder’s costumes were brighter and bolder in colour, giving this piece a cheerful and uplifting aesthetic that nonetheless, continued to emphasise the dancers as the diverse individuals they are. It was a very appropriate piece to finish the show with.

Lighting designer Alexander Berlage lit every work in this program to great effect. Congratulations to this years’ graduates of PPY22 and to the choreographers whose work they performed in this program. 

– GERALDINE HIGGINSON

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