Dance Review: 'Collapse' a feast for your senses

By Jim Carnes - jcarnes@sacbee.com

Published 12:00 am PDT Monday, October 29, 2007
Story appeared in SCENE section, Page E1

It's safe to say that you've never seen anything quite like "Collapse (suddenly falling down)," the Sideshow Physical Theatre company's multimedia program at the Mondavi Center.

Theater, dance, audio and video (including 3-D projections) combine in a sensory experience that is as confounding as it is enlightening.

The script, written by Ed Gaible (who also directs the acting) was suggested by Jared Diamond's book, "Collapse," which, in reference to the long-gone inhabitants of the desolate Easter Island, said, "Can we say that their end was the inhabitants' own fault, or that they were tragic victims of insoluble problems? ... What were the Easter Islanders saying as they cut down the last tree on their island?"

Approximately 15 people collaborated on the project, including geologists, geophysicists, physicists and computer specialists.

Choreographed by Della Davidson, in collaboration with dancers Jane Schnorrenberg, Kegan Marling, Kerry Mehling, Victoria Terrell-Carazo and Christine Chen, and actors Sara Zimmerman, Victor Toman and David Orzechowicz, the program considers the many forms that collapse can take. Societies fall apart, the earth rattles and shakes, relationships dissolve, and patterns of action and reaction recur.

A wall of boxes – building blocks – stands pretty much floor to ceiling initially but begins to fall, a block or two at a time, revealing in one section a large screen on which the nifty 3-D images are periodically projected. The open stage is dressed with a nearly bare tree, suspended in the air and slowly twisting, and an oblong patch of grass, which will separate into "islands," much as the continents once broke off from a single land mass.

The dancers act in concert and in opposition to each other, repeating patterns that usually end in someone falling down.

The script includes a humorous encounter between two islanders and an anthropologist, as well as references to natural disasters and genocide.

In the end, it suggests that our world is one tree away from becoming Easter Island.

Collapse (suddenly falling down)

WHEN: Continues at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and 7 p.m. Sunday
br> WHERE: Studio Theatre, Mondavi Center, UC Davis
br> TIME: Approximately 80 minutes, performed without intermission
br> TICKETS: $29 general, $14.50 students and children
br> INFORMATION: (530) 754-2787

About the writer:

Call The Bee's Jim Carnes, (916) 321-1130.

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