On the Dance Stage, Missteps Were Made

Fringe festivals are, by nature, unselective; frequently the offerings turn out to be ho-hum, or worse. Once in a while you chance upon a gem. Always, attending involves risk.

No surprise, then, that the three dance programs Saturday at the Atlas Performing Arts Center were underwhelming. "Cabaret Extraordinaire" was a cabaret in name only and extraordinary in the sense of being extraordinarily incomprehensible. Nancy Havlik's Dance Performance Group turned out four works of wannabe performance art.

"Is Dave Dead?" began with a guy (Joseph Perna) in a plaid sports coat and a mohawk yelling about the Grim Reaper, and it continued with lines like "I think this is starting to make sense" interspersed with long blats on the saxophone. The work was met with polite applause. Perna's solo "Bestial Acts," based on the phrase "the world is too much with us," wavered between the literal (lots of fake money) and the ridiculous (a conelike fake nose). Three dancer-actors in chartreuse Lycra expounded on a snake and slithered about in "Pure Elixir," and "Nonstop" delivered several minutes of continuous shaking.

Dissonance Dance Theater presented an ambitious program of four lengthy modern works by its artistic director, Shawn Short. All were imbued with angst, and one ended with a scream. "S," "Rubber," "W.T.F." and "7" were driven by mood and unfolded in long phrases that ebbed and flowed till they reached their own natural conclusion. Short pulled together such an odd assortment of mediocre, well-trained and non-dancers that it was difficult to discern the merit of his choreography through the flapping feet and the pall of a program that was underrehearsed.

The doozy of the day was "On Your Soapbox Slipping . . . ," in which dance graduates from Virginia Commonwealth University and some friends put together a program on the level of a sophomore choreography class. Good for them that they were ambitious and disciplined enough to mount six lengthy works. Kudos to them for grasping the opportunity to perform in a festival.

Unfortunately for the audience, the works were little more than extended noodling. There were lots of sideways lunges, one painfully slow opening that began on the floor and stayed there too long, and plenty of entrances and exits. In the last work, the dancers wore black business suits, to which were attached flounces of green organza hung with fake flowers. The work was aptly called "When I Opened My Eyes I Was in the Strangest Predicament."