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<< backChicago Sun Times | hweiss@suntimes.com Dance Critic | Hedy Weiss | Chicago Sun Times | March 14, 2006 RECOMMENDED Breakbone overcomes obstacles, if not stereotypes With its tiny square footage, large structural columns and imperfect sight lines -- along with the aroma of Mexican food wafting up from a restaurant downstairs -- Strawdog Theatre might be the last place you'd expect to find "Heroine: A Woman's Tale," a no-holds-barred "experimental dance opera" about women and violence. On the other hand, the existence of all these potential obstacles doesn't appear to have phased the members of Breakbone DancCo. in the least. They are very much in a world of their own devising and control. Of course, you don't have to flip past the front pages these days to encounter tales of horribly abused women -- whether a university student who is bound, slashed and raped after a night out on the town in a big American city, or, half a world away, a woman officially sentenced to death for her refusal to enter into an arranged marriage. But it is a more or less generic story that is told in "Heroine," the 75-minute work conceived and directed by Atalee Judy that features a relentless electronic sound score by young Canadian composer Stephen Seto of s:cage, a narrative and often hypnotic vocals and lyrics by Judy and Berianne Bramman, provocative film footage by Carl Wiedemann and skillful lighting by A. Cameron Zetty. As for the choreography, it is the work of Judy, in collaboration with Tabitha Faes and Jyl Fehrenkamp -- the two tall women in matching coppery red hair and satin slips who dance the piece with fearless abandon, and who serve as victim-survivor doppelgangers. The story, told obliquely but clearly, is about an innocent young girl who initially is seen playing happily with her doll, or on a swing, or skipping along railroad tracks. She is ultimately raped and remains emotionally devastated well into womanhood. In fact, something dies in her after the rape, and in one of the more stunning moments of the piece her bed, in the form of a heavy wooden enclosure, becomes a closet of fear, a coffin and a boat set adrift. For a long time it appears that she will not make it back to "life." But through the most difficult and grueling process of spiritual death and rebirth, a survivor emerges. "Heroine" can be a grueling voyage, but every time the piece begins to verge on melodrama it catches itself with a dramatic or choreographic gesture that is either starkly realistic or surreal, and this saves the day. In addition, Faes and Fehrencamp are strong, deeply expressive dancers capable of suggesting great vulnerability as well as grit, and of making their movement seem almost improvised. As for Judy, her integration of all the various media is invariably artful and imaginative, and she possesses an impressive sense of theatricality. Yet it would be interesting to see her move beyond those polar female stereotypes of victim and Amazon warrior.
(Copyright 2006 by the Chicago Sun Times)
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