Reviews & features: Dance

The List Festival Awards: 2009

From chicken sex to naked puppets

Our annual awards for the most interesting and unique shows out there.

One Up One Down

Single consumerist satire, GSOH, seeks breathing space

Natasha Gilmore’s latest work continues her crusade to create accessible, comic-tinged dance-theatre that engages with contemporary issues. This is a satire on the pressures of consumer culture on women, with three impossibly lovely, pink-clad dancers…

Zeitgeist

Breathtaking Butoh bento box

This is the first time Australian company, Zen Zen Zo has come to the Fringe, but they’re no blushing debutants. Zeitgeist is a retrospective of their shorter works inspired by the untamed Japanese art form of Butoh. But it’s also a pulse check, a look…

Still Breathing

Impressive but joyless contemporary dance

There’s plenty to admire in this new show by all-male company 2FaCeD DaNcE, not least the virtuosity of UK breakdancing champion, Robby Graham. Plus some incredibly tight ensemble routines, which fuse street dance with contemporary to explore the…

Manolibera

Clever cartoons for all ages

Although not strictly speaking a children’s show (it’s in the Dance & Physical Theatre section of the Fringe programme), this is a wonderful example of how a piece of theatre can cross the generational divide. Italian company, Scarlattine Teatro has…

Circa

Bodies balancing, beautifully, breathtakingly

Circa is just about human bodies. About what they can do, how much they can take, how they can be funny and sensual and cruel. About their possibilities. The six-strong cast of charismatic young Australian performers need nothing more than their bodies…

Flhip Flhop: Everything Happens on the Break

Comic theatre gives hip hop the brush off

Given how the Fringe aspires to be a place for artistic cross-pollination and experimentation, should we be surprised when worlds collide? Well, what about the pairing of hip hop culture and painting and decorating? The white dungarees and paint soaked…

Gelabert Azzopardi Companyia De Dansa

Double-bill from acclaimed Catalan choreographer

To say Cesc Gelabert is in a class of his own isn’t strictly true – but it’s fair to say there are very few pupils sharing the room with him. His unique and incredibly cerebral movement style has been enjoyed across the world, both as a soloist and with…

RAW

Aerial spectacular that never quite takes off

Sometimes, aerial dance doesn’t need a narrative. Some pieces, like 2007’s Fuerzabruta, present unconnected images, building a sense of wonder in the audience that grabbing for narrative meaning would puncture. Although it’s on a smaller scale…

Lola: The Life of Lola Montez

Biographical drama flamenco-style

The life of Lola Montez is ideal for the stage: an Irish woman who re-invented herself as a Spanish dancer, her fame in the 19th century makes her the natural ancestor of the modern celebrity. Yet this complex story is confused by the rapid pace, and…

Tap Kids

Tapping the light fantastic

Anyone who pitches up at Tap Kids with a cynical attitude and a sense of impending dread will quickly find themselves struggling to contain smiles of unfettered delight. While the show – a hybrid of Tap Dogs and High School Musical – is rooted firmly…

Ousia

Atmospheric illusion

All those who dared to board Darren Johnston’s Ren-Sa bus back in 2005, will know what a master of disorientation he is. It was a journey into the unknown, with blacked-out windows making it impossible to know where you would end up, or what would…

Royal Ballet of Flanders

The last time this dynamic company was in Edinburgh, they were performing William Forsythe’s off-kilter, Impressing The Czar. Two years later, the Royal Ballet of Flanders is back with another impressively unconventional work, The Return of Ulysses.

The List Festival Party

Video and photo gallery

Mercifully the sun shone for us this year at The List Festival Party. Japanese drummers enthralled the crowd as a stilted dancer busted his moves, while air guitarists strummed along to any and all of the music. The Body Tights Men provoked giggles in…

Tom Tom Crew

Hip hop acrobatics and human beatboxing

Australia’s Tom Tom Crew make a welcome return to the Edinburgh Fringe with their high-energy hip hop inspired show. Having been described as a 21st century circus, this show is in an incredible spectacle of young talent and infectious enthusiasm. Break…

New Art Club

Balletic musings on the meaning of ‘now’

Tom Roden was 13 when the compilation Now That’s What I Call Music was released back in 1983. He and his girlfriend broke the law by taping it on cassette from the vinyl. That year, Tom was a goth. He was also a New Romantic, a breakdancer, a mod, and a…

Mercy Madonna of Malawi

African adoption musical

Like all the shows at The World this year, getting the Malawians to Edinburgh has been a huge undertaking. Joining a myriad of other performers, hailing from Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, Cuba and Brazil, the Africans inject a lively dose of their native culture…

Myriad

Dancing inside the mind

Following last year’s successful debut, Interrupt, Collisions Dance is back with its new production, Myriad. Quirky and contemplative, it explores notions of selfhood in relation to modern day alienation, and the internalised worlds we so often find…

Spectrum

Late-night telly turns hip hop fantasia

The old BBC 2 test card – yes, that one, with the little girl and the clown – is a bit of a strange premise to build a whole hip hop show around, but London’s Avant Garde Dance has managed to make it work. One dancer plays the girl, the others just…

Four Quarters

Contemporary dance in shooter form

Tired after days of mediocre Fringe shows? Proceed directly to Zoo and ingest these four sharp little shots of contemporary dance performance. The magnetic Isobel Cohen, who curated the show and appears in three of the works, starts things off by…

Elvis Still My Heart

No, Elvis has definitely left the building

Louise Barrett is a fantastically talented physical performer. You can’t take your eyes off her. In spindly ‘spinster’ Agnes, subliminating repressed sexuality into an obsession with the King, his eroticised pelvic flicks translated into nervous…

A Lot of Nerve

Cabaret in a world of its own

Picture the scene – you and your friends have had a bit too much to drink, you shimmy over to the stereo, pick out a choice tune and turn your living room into a bespoke cabaret joint. Great fun, but when morning comes, you’re well aware that nobody…

Something About Others

Thoughtful moves delivered on a big ideas soundtrack

For a mere fiver, Something About Others delivers four brave modern ballet pieces in 45 minutes, through an entertaining soundscape that moves from classical to club anthem by way of a medieval haunt. You might not derive all the nuances of the stories…

Big Red Door Festival

Okay, this is where the fun starts, folks. Never mind the host of comedians and burlesque clubs exported up from London – the best cabaret spot in town is distinctly home-grown. Behind The Big Red Door is a very special venue indeed, hand-built from…