Theatre
Theatre review: Dance Nation
John Nathan enjoys a play which captures the tyranny of girlhood
September 6, 2018 11:31
John Nathan enjoys a play which captures the tyranny of girlhood
September 6, 2018 11:31Adults playing children isn’t a new idea. Dennis Potter’s 1979 television play, Blue Remembered Hills, was an achingly poignant portrayal of life as a seven-year-old. Much of its impact was rooted in the way children attempt to be as grown up as they can.
It was set in the idyllic Forest of Dean in 1943 but the sense of impending crash was like watching Bambi attempt to fly an airliner.
But, as memorable as Potter’s work is, this American play by Clare Barron in which the children belong to a high achieving Ohio dance club, is a much more nuanced affair, not only because all but one of them are girls and therefore much more mature than most of their male counterparts, but because all are in their early teens.
Take almost any of the girls’ conversations out of this context and there is barely an exchange between them that would not serve as convincing dialogue between grown-ups. Granted, they are candid, sometimes sexually explicit, and disarmingly honest — but then, to British ears, Americans often are.
Yet what emerges through the children’s individual monologues here is something much more raw than that — a mixture of terrible vulnerability and world-conquering confidence that could threaten nations and continents were this power put in the hands of tyrants. (Perhaps, then, tyrants are simply partially under-developed adults who suffer from — and make others suffer from — their own under-development). Add to this the anxieties of being a girl coming to terms with emerging sexuality, and add to that the extra burden of expectation that adults place on them, and you get an idea of the torment that it is to be a teen.
Barron frames the action within the high-pressure environment of a dance club that competes at events nationwide. Every performance gets them closer to the final, known as the Nationals, in Florida. The most present adult in the children’s lives here is Dance Teacher Pat (a superb Brendan Cowell), a kind of podgy drill sergeant who trains his charges with an intensity and ambition that would not be out of place in the rehearsal rooms run by Bob Fosse or Jerome Robbins. Except the range of dancing talent he has in his class spans a much wider spectrum — from lots to none.
The performances throughout are terrific. Kayle Meikle’s dancer Ashlee reveals the conflicts raging within these young bodies.
Her rambling yet powerful monologue simultaneously rebels and succumbs to the pressures of being young and female.
Just one gripe. Beijan Sheibani’s production — which suffered from one or two technical glitches on the press night — is admirably subtle but it lacks the sense of an uncontrolled life-force that characterises Barron’s writing.