Few dance companies of any size, let alone a small-budget local company, have the ambition or vision to produce a 70-minute multimedia work exploring the incursion of technology into contemporary life.
Yet that’s exactly what the too-little-known 3rd Law Dance/Theater has done, presenting two perfor mances of “The CleanRoom” (2008) this past weekend at the Lakewood Cultural Center.
While the overall concept and accompanying choreography could have been further honed and tightened, it was hard not to be impressed by the intelligence, audacity and sheer scope of this expansive, highly theatrical piece.
Rather than try and put across some simplistic, cliched message, company co-directors Katie Elliott and Jim LaVita wisely chose to ask an overlapping series of stated and unstated questions, such as “Why is a clay tablet better than a hard drive?”
What resulted was a layered, thought-provoking work that probed a wide range of technology and Internet-related themes, including information versus wisdom, real versus virtual, individuality versus collectivity and free will versus group think.
Craig Bushman’s dark, disorienting lighting design and the inventive costumes and props, including eyeglasses with tiny lights on each side and dissociative light boxes, helped generate the work’s intoxicatingly futuristic, sometimes alien feel.
Further contributing to the overall sensibility was LaVita’s video projections, mostly computer language, symbols and grids, and Elliott’s alternately contemplative and ear-blasting aural track, with its evocative mix of electronica and early music, sound effects and sci-fi movie clips.
The two collaborators manage to skillfully integrate these elements with Elliott’s often evocative choreography, which was well-realized by the nine dancers, especially standouts Eliza Kuelthau, Michael Richman and Kelly Dugan.
There were times when it was easy to wish that the movement was more closely, or at least more obviously, attuned to the thematic structure.
But there were many strong moments, such as Jennifer Golonka’s achingly vulnerable solo in which she cannot bear to be without her rubber gloves, symbols of society’s technological accoutrements, and a humorous section in which tutu-clad dancers simulate computer breakdowns by clumping to the floor.
Kyle MacMillan: 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com
