Good Enough? dance review: Humane interrogation
Reflecting on alienation, individuality and the pressures of performing, this show is a raw celebration of community
.jpeg)
What does it take to become a performer? It’s a question that has been posed in grit-and-jazz-hands terms by musicals such as Fame and Chicago. But you have probably never seen it answered quite like this before. Andreas Constantinou and his Denmark-based company Himherandit delve into the messy, beautiful, heartsore, turbulent and generous psyches of creative people (both individually and as a collective) and present an unvarnished portrait of what it means to be a person with a drive to create something and serve it to the world. It’s hilarious one minute and cuts to the bone the next, absurdity stirred together with crystalline honesty.
The three performers (Aris Papadopoulos, Paola Drera and Theo Marion) open by lip-syncing to an interview with Constantinou, talking about his anxieties over presenting work. They each exaggerate their gestures differently, bringing their own personalities to meet his: performance is one part material, one part individual. They dance joyously to RuPaul while brandishing pictures of themselves from babyhood to adulthood, stripping each other’s clothing while narrating stories of their births. The piece skates the line between raw and polished, teasing us with its rehearsed, improvisation-style skits and its recorded, mimed anecdotes, blurring the line all performers tackle between artifice and truth.
In one heartbreaking moment, Constantinou reveals in voiceover that he stopped inviting his biological family to his pieces after they were constantly critical of the works’ weirdnesses. Each performer has a similar story of isolation and alienation, and of the freedom their community has brought them: as performers, as queer-identifying people, as close friends. We’re invited into this beautiful space at the end. The contract between audience and performer is tenderly broken and we are given the chance to see what they see from the stage, to understand what they feel. It’s still a developing work, and there is something slightly unfinished in the finale; the performers only dance together as one unit briefly. But as a forensic and humane interrogation of the drive to perform and create, it’s more than good enough; it’s brilliant.
Good Enough?, Summerhall, until 30 August, 1.30pm; picture: Himherandit.