The fall dance season arrives laden with promise, as highly anticipated productions by leading companies from near and far hit Bay Area stages.
While the performing arts scene continues to suffer from a pandemic hangover, a malaise that’s turned into an existential challenge to many theater companies, the dance world seems to be fairing better — there have been no major casualties akin to the closure of California Shakespeare Theater, 42nd Street Moon and the dismaying end of Berkeley’s Aurora Theater.
But under the surface, smaller dance companies are cutting back on performances. And an array of dance institutions, including Dance Mission Theater, the Embodiment Project, ODC and Flyaway Productions, continue scrambling to replace funds from cancelled National Endowment For the Arts grants. More than ever, the dance scene depends upon audiences interested in experiencing what’s revealed when human bodies are set in coordinated motion.
Here are some highlights of the fall season.
Smuin Contemporary Ballet
Under the artistic direction of choreographer Amy Seiwert, Smuin Ballet’s third act is shaping up as an exhilarating new era as the company’s Season 32 kicks off with three Bay Area premieres. Set to Caroline Shaw’s Pulitzer Prize-winning score for eight voices, “Partita,” by triple-Tony-Award-winner Justin Peck. makes its first appearance outside of New York City Ballet. The program also includes Alejandro Cerrudo’s “Extremely Close” and Seiwert’s “A Long Night,” which is set to a medley of songs by Patsy Cline, Pink Martini, and Tom Waits. The season kicks off with a three -day run at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts (Sept. 12-14), moves to the Lesher Center for the Arts for two days (Sept. 19-20), then settles into Yerba Buena Center for the Arts for eight performances (Sept. 26-Oct. 5).
Details: For tickets ($25-$95) or more information visit smuinballet.org.
Paris Opera Ballet
In one of only two U.S. engagements, Paris Opera Ballet’s North American premiere of “Red Carpet” by Israeli-born choreographer Hofesh Shechter, a leading force on the U.K. dance scene, comes to UC Berkeley. The lush evening-length production bridges the 17th century opulence of Sun King Louis XIV’s court, when the company was founded, with our contemporary obsession with celebrity. Blending ecstatic free jazz, Mediterranean influences, and techno beats, the pulsing score, performed live, was written by Shechter and his longtime collaborator Yaron Engler.
Details: Presented by Cal Performances; Oct. 2-4, Zellerbach Hall, UC Berkeley; $50-$175; calperformances.org.
Fly Away Productions
Directed by Flyaway Artistic Director Jo Kreiter in partnership with the TurkxTaylor Initiative, the new work “Down on the Corner” features a cast of queer, transgender and female performers, a commissioned score by singer and songwriter Melanie DeMore, and a film by Leila Weefur. Presented near the site of the 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria Riot, a pre-Stonewall manifestation of queer resistance in San Francisco’s Tenderloin, the run includes 10 free performances with no reservations required. Each show lasts 35 minutes, with the first performance each evening preceded by a historical introduction at 7:15 p.m.
Details: Oct. 3-11, Southeast corner of Turk and Taylor Streets, San Francisco; free; flyawayproductions.com.
PUSHfest
PUSH Dance celebrates its 20th year with a reboot of PUSHFfest, a showcase for an impressive cross-section of new and recent works by a dozen choreographers, including premieres by PUSH Artistic Director Raissa Simpson and Associate Artistic Director Ashley Gayle. The dancemakers include KAMBARA+’s Yayoi Kambara, Xochipilli Dance Company’s Héctor Jaime, Modern Natya Company’s Swetha Prabakaran, PUSHLab participants Ting Alvarez-Maquinta, Kevin Wong, Ting Alvarez-Maquint, and several others.
Details: Oct. 4-5, Black Box Theater and 5M Park, San Francisco; $20-$55; www.pushdance.org.
Circa
Australia’s answer to Cirque du Soleil, Circa has created an expansive body of works that combine acrobatic feats with thoughtful dramaturgy and brilliant staging. “Humans 2.0,” commissioned by the Mondavi Center at UC Davis and created by Circa Artistic Director Yaron Lifschitz, toggles between intimate tableaux and primal feats, raising questions about whether balance is possible, or even desirable.
Details: Oct. 25 at Green Music Center, Sonoma State; $31-$91; gmc.sonoma.edu/circa; Nov. 1-2, Bing Concert Hall, Stanford University; $59.40-$113.40; live.stanford.edu.
MOMIX
As a company known for its masterly deployment of dizzying juxtapositions, size changes, and shape shifting, MOMIX seems destined to engage with Lewis Carol’s beloved and perpetually prescient tale “Alice In Wonderland” (first published 160 years ago). With a narrative tailor-made for the illusionist dancers, company founder Moses Pendleton takes his crew down the rabbit hole for series of absurd, surreal and whimsical vignettes.
Details: Nov. 29-30 at Zellerbach Hall, UC Berkeley; $35-$92; calperformances.org; Dec. 3 at Mondavi Center, UC Davis; $39.50-$89.50; www.mondaviarts.org.
Contact Andrew Gilbert at jazzscribe@aol.com.