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A Nightmare Turns Fifty

March 22, 2013 by 6 Comments
Paul Taylor's Scudorama. Laura Halzak (prone), Michelle Fleet (in air), Jamie Rae Walker (L), Julie Tice (in an earlier cast). Photo: Paul B. Goode

Wishing Happy 50th birthday to a dance like Paul Taylor’s Scudorama mightn’t be a good idea. The cake could blow up in your face. You have to be a bit crazy to love this dance. Made the year after Aureole, which lives on in an indestructible springtime, Scudorama cringes and crawls and hides from view. The current revival dates from 2009. Scudorama’s 1963 premiere at the American Dance Festival in New London, Connecticut, was, by all accounts, disastrous.  The score by Clarence Jackson didn’t arrive in time. Neither did the set by … [Read more...]

03/22/13 4:54 PM | filed under: classic modern dance |

Taylor Made

March 13, 2013 by 2 Comments
Sean Mahoney and Amy Young in Paul Taylor's Perpetual Dawn. Photo: Paul B. Goode

Can one refer to someone as a perpetual dark horse, or is that a contradiction?  If not, I’d like to apply it to Paul Taylor.  You can never predict what he’ll come up with, or what thumbscrews he’ll apply to his essentially buoyant vocabulary of steps. Among the 21 works on view during the Paul Taylor Dance Company’s three-week season at Lincoln Center, some, such as Speaking in Tongues, are big and tormented; others are nightmarish, e.g. Last Look. Some are ineffably tender and mellow like Eventide; others are tart and joke-filled … [Read more...]

03/13/13 11:00 PM | filed under: classic modern dance |

Taylor: Then, Now, and Forever

March 24, 2012 by 2 Comments
Eran Bugge, Robert Kleinendorst, and Aileen Roehl in The Uncommitted. Photo: Rick McCullough

Happy 50th birthday, Aureole!  Sorry I missed the celebration. You certainly don’t look your age. When I think of all the ideas you spawned for your boss, Paul Taylor, I’m amazed at your daisy-freshness. This is some season for the Taylor company: three weeks at the capacious, formerly named New York State Theater, instead of the usual two at the smaller New York City Center. Twenty-two works and repetitions of each stuffed into 21 performances that began March 13 and end April 1. Is Taylor trying to kill his dancers? Probably not. But … [Read more...]

03/24/12 7:44 PM | filed under: contemporary dance |

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