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<\/a>I thought writing about this retrospective, \u201cStreb: From Ringside to Extreme Action,\u201d would be timely. In this pandemic we need heroes. Her eight dancers are adroit, beautiful. Their toes point, their legs stretch, their bodies arch. But they don\u2019t spend time being lyrical. I think back to Filippo Taglioni preparing his daughter Marie to debut in his 1832 La Sylphide. <\/em>In order for her to waft about on the tips of her toes looking insubstantial, he put her through two two-hour ballet classes every day until he deemed her tough enough totake on the role. She fainted often. Streb\u2019s dancers are strong<\/em>, and her choreography foregrounds that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\u2019re a Streb dancer, timing is crucial. You don\u2019t want to fly off a piece of equipment and land on a fellow performer. Or have someone knock you out of place. Against the green trees that rise behind the Henry J. Leir outdoor stage at Jacob\u2019s Pillow, the performers in their identical sky-blue unitards by Andrea Lauer call out warnings to each other and announce their intentions tersely and loudly, backed up by technical director\/emcee\/dj Zaire Baptiste. We spectators are advised to take out our phones and, perhaps, capture crucial moments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The show offers a retrospective look at pieces Streb made before her equipment became immense and complex. Several date from the 1980s and 1970s. The most recent were made in 2002. We hear her voice commenting on their history, while the dancers and a costumed crew place, tape together, disconnect, and reposition the four big red padded platforms onto which the performers fall and from which they rebound. But their equipment includes more structures and objects, such as a trampoline and a twelve-foot long pole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the 2006 Tip <\/em>that opens the show, a half circle twelve feet in diameter, set on its rounded edge, rocks from side to side, controlled in part by a dancer inside it. The six others run up and down its flat side, lie prone and cling to it like limpets to a rock as it becomes nearly vertical. One by one, they swan-dive off onto the red cushioning<\/p>\n\n\n\n .Watching the twelve short dances, you notice that everything that happens takes the time it takes. And sometimes that\u2019s a split second. The equipment begins to seem like a live thing. In the 1978 Pole Vaults<\/em>, Jackie Carlson mates with a long stick\u2014holding it, spinning with it, cradling it, jumping over it, tossing and catching it, balancing it on her forehead. All this to an original music compilation produced by Voodoo F\u00e9.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/a>