Corpus/SIGNA
”The Fever Harbor”
Sal A
May 5, 2015
With “The Fever Harbor” Corpus and the performance group SIGNA taken the Royal Danish Ballet, where they have never ventured before. However the big question remains. Is it really a journey worth taking?
Corpus has recently been nominated for a Reumert Award for the production “I Føling”, a ballet about the War in Afghanistan and the wounded veterans. In the ballet the RDB dancers performs with war veterans, who even takes part in the actual dancing. “I Føling” shows that ballet can be a medium for current affairs issues.
“The “Fever Harbor” takes the company where it has never been before. And yet. The whole concept has several touching points with Flemming Flindt’s Ionesco based “The Triumph of Death” from 1971. Both works takes their inspiration in the consequences of an end of civilization following the outbreak of fatal disease.
As in “The Triumph of Death”, democracy is the first victim and a totalitarian ruler takes over. But at least in Flindt’s work, we got plenty of dancing, although not very refined choreography. Both works also offer a significant amount of nudity.
“The Fever Harbor” places the 18 dancers, who has survived the consequences of an environmental disaster, at the court of the self-appointed king. Of course, the king is mad as a hatter. Each night the dancers compete to win the favor of the king. The losers are punished. The dancers perform for the survivors who every night makes their way through the deserted city to see the competition and pay homage to their beloved dancers.
Audience Participation
The audience (approx. 60 people) are placed in the dressing rooms of the dancers (build on the A Sal stage). The audience is served by the guards/servants of the dancers, form a sounding board for the dancers and their complaints about - and intrigues - with each other. It presents the small audience with an up-close view and access to the dancers, or rather the personas each of them are playing.
Not two audience members will get the same performance. That is an interesting point from an academic view, but in reality, it has little value.
The performance runs for more than 3, 5 hours. Of that the dancing is probably little more than half an hours and consist of the group of dancers trying to overshadow each other in works like “Giselle”, “Napoli”, “Swan Lake, “The Dying Swan” and as in other Corpus works, John Neumeier’s “Romeo & Juliet”, the favorite ballet of all RDB dancers.
The SIGMA performance group performs the power team of King, Queen, Co- Queen and servants/soldiers. Character Dancer Morten Eggert is the master of ceremony. However, there is no surprises from their contribution. The King is mad. The Queen is screaming. The Master of Ceremony is a pleaser. Therefore, there is never any real surprises or real danger.
The dancers are bitches, darlings, bullies etc. They are very good in playing the characters and intriguing against each other. At least for this evening the competition were won by the underdogs, Dan and Dolly, danced by the lovely Viktoria Falck-Schmidt and Christian Hammeken as her much put upon partner.
And then we go home.
Form over Choreography
In a way I feel – and certainly hope – that this production has given some real value for the participating dancers. I also hope that some of the audience have gained something from watching the dancers up close. On every other component, I feel that the production has failed. Neither as a dance performance nor as a drama does it moves beyond well-known clichés. It does not really manage to mix the art forms into new and exiting territories.
In many ways, Corpus has been a benefit to the Royal Danish Ballet. They have developed and produced several interesting and relevant initiatives. In a recent interview with “Teater 1”, a Danish cultural magazine”, Corpus leaders Esther Lee Wilkinson and Tim Matiakis states that Corpus should interpret the present.
“And it is true what some people says, Corpus is more interested in form than in choreography”, states Esther Lee Wilkinson in the interview.
“The Fever Harbor” certainly demonstrate that point. Nevertheless, it remains a point, I have difficulty agreeing with. I also find that the chosen key strategy is the main reason why productions like “The Fever Harbor” fails to become an interesting work.
A dance performance which does not want to include choreography – and there was practically no new choreography of any sort in “the Fever Harbor” - is a hard sell. Moreover, when the added component from the performance group also fails to deliver any novelty, all that is left is the cliché.
The Royal Danish Ballet and their audience deserves better.
Read more about SIGNA here:
Photo: Viktoria Falck-Schmidt by Authur Kostler (Copyright(c) Corpus/Royal Danish Ballet)
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