The (fill in the blank) Between Us at The Edge Theater

Artistic Director Mariah Eastman premieres two complementary works  “Take a Chance” and “A Choreographic Mad Lib”. “Take a Chance” builds off Merce Cunningham’s (a modern dance pioneer from the 1950s) chance practice where he or another staff member would literally roll dice to determine what costumes the dancers wore, what lighting and what music for their performance that night. For “Take a Chance”, audience members will be given the choice of two pieces of music and two sets of costumes to choose from. Generally, Darvin Dances will pick one audience member to pick the music and another to pick the costumes but for smaller audiences, we will approach it democratically with raised hands. For any spaces with theater lighting, the lighting designer will be able choose the lighting as the piece moves along. “Take a Chance” gives an opportunity for audience members to participate in the creation of the piece and will do so knowing it will never be the same again.

“A Choreographic Mad Lib” takes a different approach entirely. Using a mad lib format , audience members will be asked for verbs, adverbs, noises and even choosing what movement phrases they want to see or dancers upon entry into the space. The piece itself is a structured improvisation using the filled in mad lib as the guiding structure of the piece. After each section, the audience gets to hear what the mad lib was and will be able to see how their choices impacted the dance.

In addition to “Take a Chance” and “A Choreographic Mad Lib”, Darvin Dances is premiering “comply(DEFY)”. This work explores themes of hopelessness, perseverance, and resistance, questioning what it means to resist when resistance itself feels futile. Pondering this existential question, dancers reach upward while falling into lunges, plank rolls, attitude turns and even giving into gravity to fall to the floor. In the end, the audience is left with a message of hope – any form of resistance whether small or large, will lead us to a brighter future.