Paul Taylor’s fascination with—and affection for—insects is well-known, and has manifested itself in his choreography. His 1988 Counterswarm set two fiercely combative hordes of insect-like creatures against each other to thrilling effect, and in 1961 he created Insects and Heroes, in which the dancers moved in and out of stylized cages. Both of these were set to dense contemporary scores.
Photo by Joseph Schembri
For his newest dance, Gossamer Gallants, which had its premiere at Purchase College’s Performing Arts Center on Saturday evening, he turns 11 dancers into bugs of a more whimsical type. And he’s working with infectiously melodic music: the robust, rhythmic and consistently fast-paced music from Smetana’s opera The Bartered Bride. This premiere is one of Taylor’s lighter efforts, a sweetly cartoonish display of mayhem and goofiness. It’s also a heck of a workout, with the dancers—especially the men—bounding with vigorous energy, engaged in nearly nonstop aerobic activity.
Taylor, as he often does, has provided a literary quote in the program—by none other than Herman Melville: “The nocturnal radiance of the firefly is purposely intended as an attraction to the opposite sex…some insect Hero may show a touch to her gossamer gallant.” The six men are clearly costumed by Taylor regular Santo Loquasto as fireflies, with midnight-blue unitards and snug caps with shiny lighter-blue patterning, and expansive—and very gossamer—wings. They caper and bumble, and get all silly when any of the five women happen to pass through. For the women, Loquasto has given over to sheer silliness: their snug chartreuse leotards emphasize their curves, and from their matching bathing-cap headpieces sprout two bouncy antennae.
The choreography is busy, antic and funny in an intentionally heavy-handed way; the Purchase audience gave in to frequent laughter. Taylor seems to be connecting with his inner child, and allowing the dancers to do the same. At one point the men line up and do a bit of folk-flavored movement that alludes to the music’s earthy middle-European flavor, and Loquasto’s backdrop evokes a Czech town square. But mostly Taylor is tapping into the music’s uncomplicated brio, while sending up the male-female dynamic with unapologetic goofiness. The women strut and sashay, the men topple and flip over in reaction to their presence.
The early portions of Gossamer Gallants suggest a kinship with the final section of Jerome Robbins’ The Concert, in which mundane concertgoers caught up in Chopin sprout wings and turn into butterflies, capering gleefully through mock-dramas. Towards the end, though, Gossamer Gallants veers closer to the territory of Robbins’ The Cage, in which a voracious female insect society destroys any male who dares to enter its realm. Things don’t get quite as deadly in Taylor’s piece; his buggy battle of the sexes is all in good fun. The piece is short, undemanding and an impressive display of the many ways in which the Taylor dancers can jump and leap through surprising shapes.
Two of Taylor’s finest works framed the premiere. Both Roses (1985) and Piazzolla Caldera (1997) also focus on the male-female encounters, albeit in extremely different, yet equally riveting, ways. The quietly sensuous Roses features five deeply romantic couples gamboling and intertwining in ever-surprising ways, exploring the delights of one another’s bodies. For the final section, a couple in gleaming white (Eran Bugge and Michael Trusnovec) strolls on to embody the ultimate in calmly rapturous harmony. Piazzolla, one of Taylor’s most masterful works, is all lust and heat. A taut, inventive synthesis of tango moves and moods with his own grounded, fluent style that explores raw, earthy sexuality as it seethes and pulsates right up to its devastating final moment.
These three works, and 18 more, will be performed during the Paul Taylor Dance Company’s spring season (March 14–April 1) at Lincoln Center’s David H. Koch Theater.
