Footloose Dance - Honycomb Zone
| Category: Dance | 2012-10-02 Mary Alice Fry |
| Project: Footloose Dance presents - Honeycomb Zone | |
 | Directed/written by Mary Alice Fry; composer Bob Marsh with live music by the Free Reed Vibrating Society; sculpture/set design by Cindi Valverde; choreography and performance by Carolé Acuña; Brandon Kazen-Maddox, James Arthur; contributing writer Elizabeth Costello; creative consultant Zack.
"Footloose Artistic Director Mary Alice Fry has done the conventional theater thing before, where you "sit there and wait for people to come in and be polite." But she "just gets really tired of it!" Her new show, Honeycomb Zone, which she's presenting with Theatecture as part of the 24 Days of Central Market Arts Festival, is geared toward audiences who feel the same way. The free show, staged in UN Plaza, is meant to attract everyone around: Twitterers, City Hall employees, the food truck crowd, the homeless, public transit users. Its initial draw, according to Fry, is the hexagonal honeycomb-like set pieces, designed by Cindi Valverde, which audiences use to build hives. "Every time," says Fry, "it's completely different, the way people shape them. There's something about the way they fit together and surprise you and play with your imagination." While the giant, collective K'NEX-like building is going on, performers from martial arts, acrobatics, modern jazz, and flamenco "tell the story of two brothers who are seeking shelter," says Fry, all to live, original music composed by Bob Marsh and the Free Reed Vibrating Society. According to Fry, we live in an era when "people are taking it outdoors." Theater, she believes, should follow suit, especially if it's not a protest but "a celebration." --By Lily Janiak Mary Alice Fry uses the current bee colony collapse crisis as a jumping off point for the story of two homeless, teenage brothers searching for safe refuge after being separated from their family. They are unofficially welcomed to life on the streets of San Francisco by The Magician played by dancer/actress Carolé Acuña. In a round of poetic and kinetic dance theater motifs, The Magician trains the boys in self-defense and safety. Brandon Kazen-Maddox and James Arthur use their professional theater, circus, acrobatic and hip hop skills to portray in a highly dynamic fashion their transformation from fear to compassion. The Free Reed Vibrating Society adds musical support and acts as a Greek chorus. The centerpiece of the show is the building of the mobile, cardboard sets which are taken apart, re-formed and repositioned to form hives. Cindi Valverde's sculptures of the family along with the prefabricated, interlocking hexagonal pieces are eye catching, clean and simple. The performance flows in and around the honeycomb modules including ones that will be interconnected some up to 6'x10' in scale! |
View video on host site | |
| Performer: Performer: Footloose dance | |
| Location: Venue: United Nations Plaza |