 Renowned
for its galvanizing dancing and electrifying choreography, Twyla
Tharp Dance, which played to sold out houses when it made its Joyce
Theater debut in 2001, returns to the Chelsea-based theater for
a two week engagement, July 28--–August 9. Among the season
highlights will be the New York premiere of "Westerly Round"
and the revival of Tharp’s 1970 ground-breaking classic, "The
Fugue." The 2003 Tony Award-winning choreographer’s singular
dramatic range will be further seen in "Surfer at the River
Styx," whose stormy darkness contrasts the wit and easy charm
of "Known by Heart Duet."
Heralded as a new direction in Tharp’s
career when it premiered 33 years ago, "The Fugue," a
trio set to the music of the performers’ own dancing feet,
was critically acclaimed as transcending tap. Definitively Tharpian,
the dance, 14 minutes of pure movement, brims with surprise in its
unique spirals, lunges, shifts in tempo and shuffles through space.
Set to music by Mark O’Connor,
"Westerly Round," which premiered in 2001, glows with
Tharp’s wit, which playfully fuses the elegance of the classical
ballet vocabulary with the steps and spirit of American folk dance.
Its flirtatious pleasure expressed through an abstracted square
dance form suggests a 21st century cowboy romance.
"Surfer at the River Styx"
reveals yet another dimension of Tharp’s renowned imagination.
In this sextet, premiered in 2000 and set to an original percussive
score by Donald Knaack, Tharp takes her audience on a riveting and
transforming voyage whose darkly ominous passages resolve in a beatific
apotheosis.
Comic, romantic, and fiery by turns,
"Known by Heart Duet" applies the formal structure of
the classical ballet pas de deux (an adagio, two solos and a coda)
to explore a witty, fierce and at times combative, contemporary
partnership. The dance, set to Donald Knaack’s "Junk
Music," is an excerpt of a suite of dances originally commissioned
by American Ballet Theatre in 1998.
Tharp received a 2003 Tony Award for
her work on the current Broadway hit, "Movin’ Out,"
which she conceived, directed and choreographed. In addition, her
choreography for the show was recognized with every honor available
to a Broadway show including the Astaire Award; Outer Critics Circle
Award; Drama League; and Drama Desk Awards. As the show’s
creator, Tharp was also a finalist for a 2003 Pulitzer Prize. Her
previous work on Broadway includes several seasons by Twyla Tharp
Dance at the Winter Garden and "Singin’ in the Rain,"
which she directed and choreographed.
Tharp has created more than 125 dances,
choreographed five Hollywood films and received two Emmy’s
for her television work. In addition to her work with her own dance
troupe, she created commissioned ballets for numerous companies
including Paris Opera Ballet, The Royal Ballet, New York City Ballet,
Boston Ballet, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, the Martha Graham Dance
Company, and American Ballet Theatre, for which she created 12 ballets.
Her many awards include 18 honorary
doctorates, the 1990 Samuel H. Scripps/American Dance Festival Award,
as well as a MacArthur Fellowship. Her autobiography, "Push
Comes to Shove," was published by Bantam Books in 1992, and
her newest book, "The Creative Habit," will be released
by Simon and Schuster this fall.
Twyla Tharp Dance is comprised of
Emily Coates, Whitney Simler, Lynda Sing, Stuart Capps, Matthew
Dibble, Jason McDole, Charlie Neshyba-Hodges and Dario Vaccaro.
The company, which has performed in 24 cities across the United
States
since January, was most recently seen at the 2003 Jacobs’
Pillow Festival in Lee, MA and at the American Dance Festival in
Durham, NC. Internationally, the company will be seen at Sadler’s
Wells in London and at the prestigious Spoleto Festival in Italy
just prior to its Joyce season.
On September 9, Twyla Tharp Dance
will appear in New York as part of the Lower Manhattan Cultural
Council’s Evening Stars series, followed by performances at
the McCarter Theater in Princeton, NJ (September 25); the Kuss Auditorium,
Springfield, OH (September 30); the Indiana University Auditorium,
Bloomington, IN (October 2); the Brown Theater, Louisville, KY (October
4). Travelling to the West Coast, Twyla Tharp Dance will perform
at Schnitzer Hall, Portland, OR (October 8); Campbell Hall, Santa
Barbara, CA (October 10); University Theater, Riverside, CA (October
11) and at the Mandeville Auditorium in San Diego, CA.
At The Joyce Theater, evening curtain
times for Twyla Tharp Dance are at 8pm, Monday through Saturday.
There is also a matinee performance on Saturday at 2pm. The program
will remain the same for all performances. Tickets are $40 and are
available at The Joyce Theater box office, by calling JoyceCharge
at 212-242-0800, or by visiting www.joyce.org. The Joyce Theater
is located at 175 Eighth Avenue at 19th Street.
###
Leadership support for The
Joyce Theater's 2002-2003 season has been received from the LuEsther
T. Mertz Charitable Trust.
This Joyce presentation is made possible, in part, with public funds
from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York State
Council on the Arts, a state agency, and with private funds from
the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation to encourage the performances
of New York City-based companies at The Joyce Theater.
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