'Knights' to Remember: An Eye-Popping Pageant

Blood lust and threats of beheadings never looked so good as they did in Caracalla Dance Theatre's "Knights of the Moon," which played to standing-room-only crowds over the weekend at the Kennedy Center. Inflamed emotions may be bad for peacekeeping but they're a boon for theater, and this evening-length production was surely the most entertaining offering yet of the center's Arabesque: Arts of the Arab World festival.

In fact, if any local stage has ever sparkled and throbbed as the Opera House did at Saturday's performance by this entrancing Lebanese troupe, it's been a long, long while.

Clearly it's good to be king of the musical theater world in the Middle East, as Caracalla, founded 40 years ago, claims to be. (And who's to argue?) The company's production values alone eclipse what the Kennedy Center regularly showcases. But it wasn't just the stunning filmic backdrops of dunes and moonrises, or the jewel colors of the thick velvets and shimmering silks in its ocean of costumes, that made "Knights of the Moon" such a delectable sight. It was also the tremendous energy of the dancers -- they bounded onto the stage like racehorses out of the starting gate, and their enthusiasm never let up. Add to that the sheer beauty of the dancing, a visual luxury arising from Eastern folk dance blended with the stretch and fluidity of ballet and the theatricality of Western modern dance. (Martha Graham is cited as an early influence on founder Abdel-Halim Caracalla. )

Name a legend style -- Arthurian, Homeric, Shakespearean -- the plot of "Knights of the Moon" has elements of many, whipped together: A Gypsy woman causes one of a king's two baby sons to fall ill; the king has her burned at the stake, while the Gypsy's daughter steals the sickened infant prince in revenge, intending to kill him. But when she mistakenly slays her own child instead, she raises the king's son as her own. It's not until years later that he and his brother meet, not knowing each other's identity, when they are rivals for the same woman. Only a last-minute revelation keeps the one from raising the other's head on his spear.

We're told all this through songs sung in Arabic by the main characters (who don't dance, though Simon Obeid, as the kidnapped Prince Bandar, often underscored his meaning with mesmerizing shoulder action). The lyrics were charmingly translated in supertitles: "I smelt the essence of her welcoming coffee," sings one of the princes about Lady Nour, his eye twinkling with a glow that must have shone into the upper balconies. Was this Arabic sexy talk?

Sweetness and testosterone were a combustible mix here. But if the fundamentals of manhood in the "Knights of the Moon" story felt a bit prehistoric to a Western consciousness, the tale nevertheless rested firmly on universal values -- family bonds, forgiveness, love overwhelming anger. The story is heavy with drummed-up sentiment and the dancing -- sensuous, undulating, full-body -- reflects that with lots of bounce in the joints and a sinuous use of torso and hips. It's a heart-stealing style that makes the dancing of most musical theater seem hopelessly square.

Jerome Robbins he's not, but director Ivan Caracalla -- son of Abdel-Halim -- keeps the pace brisk with busy, well-organized stagecraft. One scene depicting a competition of the cavaliers centered on a galloping dance of the horsemen bearing gold-tipped lances, arcing into high leaps with capes swirling, against a video backdrop of camels trotting across a desert, so clear and well proportioned that the space seemed to have expanded several acres. Ululating women in billowing, jewel-encrusted silks crisscrossed the stage to the churning beat of the music. A marvelous tent was revealed upstage like a giant baba au rhum, flanked by palace towers. The women bounced on their knees as the horsemen stabbed and jousted with their lances, all with the heavy accent of a folk dance.

How much of this can we credit to uniquely Arab efforts? The set designers and "virtual scenographers" are Italian; many of the dancers have Russian-sounding names. But the music, the choreography, the heated passions of the whole enterprise have a distinctly Arabic feel. Predicting the need for more escapist eye candy, might we next see Caracalla's much-talked-about "Two Thousand and One Nights"?