• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About
  • Donate

The Arts Fuse

Boston's Online Arts Magazine: Dance, Film, Literature, Music, Theater, and more

  • Coming Attractions
  • Reviews
  • Interviews
  • Commentary
  • The Arts
    • Performing Arts
      • Dance
      • Music
      • Theater
    • Other
      • Books
      • Film
      • Food
      • Television
      • Visual Arts
You are here: Home / Review / Dance Review: “Significant Others: Dances for Family, Friends and Lovers” — Through the Lens of History

Dance Review: “Significant Others: Dances for Family, Friends and Lovers” — Through the Lens of History

June 5, 2019 1 Comment

By Jessica Lockhart

In this piece, Peter DiMuro asks a vital question: how has history informed the ways we look at queerness today?

Significant Others: Dances for Family, Friends and Lovers, Peter DiMuro/Public Displays of Motion in the Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts, Martin Hall, Boston, MA (closed)

(l to r) Peter DiMuro and J Michael Winward in a scene from “Significant Others.” Photo: Timothy Avery.

Boston-based artist Peter DiMuro has put together a dance performance that explores his decades of studying gay lives and identities through movement and storytelling. For over 30 years, his work has examined family dynamics, and in Significant Others taps into this history to assist him in dramatizing the depths of love and loss. In this piece, he asks a vital question: how has history informed the ways we look at queerness today?

Significant Others is a collaboration among DiMuro’s Public Displays of Motion, The Bang Group, and J. Michael Winward. Each group is very different in terms of their styles, but it was this very discord that made the evening’s premise work. The stories are similar, but they are told through radically different approaches. This diversity results in an experience that ping ponged ironically: abstract gestures were used to signify loss, family letters were read aloud, skilled dancers presented an exhilarating variety of distinctive visions of  love.

DiMuro walked on stage carrying a chair and a cocktail. The lighting created a square room. He took sips from the drink as he outlined the boundaries of his space using arm gestures to indicate a corner, and then repeated that for each corner. He began to read “Dad’s Letter” from 1989. DiMuro moved gently when he read the man’s mundane opening, “the weather is cool and I’m busy boiling potatoes.”  But he stopped when his body twitched. As his father’s letter moves into discordant comments about his job and wife, DiMuro’s increasingly repetitive motion becomes frenzied, reflecting the anguish he feels on recounting this unhinged personal account. Another excerpt comes from 1990’s Light Reading, which featured a number of DiMuro’s personal letters. Five women present “Donna.” They sit in a row of chairs listening to each other as each takes turns reading a letter from the DiMuro’s sister. As one performer read, another danced an abstract response to the words.  These family letters were anything but light: they reminded us of how complex family relationships can be.

Then, via a change of dynamics, J. Michael Winward’s Hail Mary, Cha cha cha! presented a funny and poignant look at being a queer Catholic teenager. His engaging dialogue featured stories about nuns before some welcome comic relief: he recited traditional Catholic prayers while doing ballroom dance. Winward is a strong performer with terrific timing and considerable presence.

Kara Filli in a scene from “Significant Others.” Photo: Timothy Avery.

The evening’s highlight were three dances performed by The Bang Group. The rhythm-driven company is based in N.Y.C. and it has a long history of teaming-up with DiMuro. First up was a solo, “Octandre,” originally choreographed in 1958 by James Waring. It was performed by Nic Petry: it was an unsettling look at a man being driven to move by dissonant sounds. He struggles to perform traditional ballet jumps and turns, but he is ‘weighed down’ by dark, unseen forces. Watching the performance of this piece, now sixty years old, clearly showed why Waring has been described as “one of dance’s great eccentrics,” an artist who was a pivotal part of experimental movement in the ’50s and ’60s.

Next, “Enough,” which featured a quartet that burst onto the stage with such vibrancy that it almost took my breath away. First the dancers generated a whirlwind, their bodies soaring though the space. Then the mood subtly changed, the mood becoming quiet, a scene of partnering and embracing. Eventually, the dancers kissed — first her, then him, and then all the performers kissing each other. Bright red jackets and skirts were worn by both female and male dancers. The company’s technical virtuosity, marked by movements surprising and bold, was a joy to watch. The performers were Louise Benkelman, Jeffrey Kazin, Tommy Seibold, and Amber Sloan. The next dance was a playful duet, “Tender Traps,” performed to a campy collection of songs sung by Doris Day, Debbie Reynolds, and Frank Sinatra. The unexpected partnering in this dance was a delight.

DiMuro has been present through a considerable amount of history: from the AIDS crisis to the battles for gay marriage and transgender rights.  Significant Others suggests that he isn’t showing any signs of slowing down, and that’s reassuring. In an increasingly fragmenting culture, we need artists who shed light on what makes us all human, different, and yet very much alike.


Jessica Lockhart is a National Endowment for the Arts Fellow in Dance Criticism and has a BA in Communication from the University of Southern Maine. Lockhart is a Maine Association of Broadcasters award winning independent journalist. Currently, she also works as program director at WMPG Community radio.

Share
Tweet
Pin
Share

By: Jessica Lockhart Filed Under: Dance, Featured, Review Tagged: Friends and Lovers, Jessica Lockhart, Peter, Peter DiMuro, Peter DiMuro/Public Displays of Motion, Significant Others: Dances for Family

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Jan says

    September 3, 2019 at 12:04 pm

    So glad to read this review! Tho a gay man involved in dance for many years, I don’t know much about “gay dance.” Peter and Michael inspired me to go to the Queerly Dance Festival. They, that event, and this article inspire me even further to see if I can set up a residency between what they’re doing in the Boston-Cambridge area and Mexico City’s Queer Dance Festival at my Tlacopac Artist Residency there. This is a rare dance review that captures not only what happened, but how it felt to be there.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search

Popular Posts

  • Music Feature: The Tedeschi Trucks Band -- Home for the Holidays The Tedeschi Trucks Band is capping another remarkable... posted on December 1, 2019
  • Concert Review: "The Last Waltz 40 Tour" -- The Best Approximation Possible To hear a 13-piece ensemble of this caliber, doing just... posted on November 12, 2019
  • Concert Review: Tool -- Defying Convention Tool is going to remain relevant as long as the band ca... posted on November 15, 2019
  • Rock Concert Review: Bob Dylan at the Tsongas Center -- Nothing if Not Chameleonic But really, what is a Bob Dylan concert these days if n... posted on November 21, 2019
  • Theater Review: "Come From Away" -- A Heartening Tale of Human Connection Come From Away is more than just a rousing and heart-wa... posted on November 11, 2019

Social

Follow us:

Follow the Conversation

  • Dick Horwich December 6, 2019 at 11:02 pm on Film Review: “Marriage Story” — A Divorce From HellFinished watching this movie an hour ago, and — though we didn’t find its sympathies as unbalanced as you did...
  • Ollie Hallowell December 5, 2019 at 5:51 pm on Critical Commentary: A Few Thoughts about John SimonA critic critiques a critic, so eloquently. Such a pleasure to read such informed and intelligent commentary.
  • William Marx December 5, 2019 at 3:07 pm on Opera Review: Antonio Salieri’s “Tarare” — A Startling Opera of Social CommentarySo Salieri shouldn't have been so jealous of Mozart ...
  • Bill Marx November 29, 2019 at 9:21 am on Book Feature: Terry Tempest Williams on the Agonies of “Erosion”I have been reading through this fine collection. Besides the essay that Bob suggests, I would recommend the Q &...
  • Notimportant November 25, 2019 at 1:43 am on Film Review: “The Nightingale” — Song of the PowerlessWhat in this movie says white privilege? An Irish family living in slavery is privilege. My family immigrated to the...

Donate

Like what you see? Donate to The Arts Fuse today!

Footer

  • About Us
  • Advertising/Underwriting
  • Syndication
  • Media Resources
  • Editors and Contributors

We Are

Boston’s online arts magazine since 2007. Powered by 70+ experts and writers.

Follow Us

Monthly Archives

Categories

"Use the point of your pen, not the feather." - Jonathan Swift

Copyright © 2019 · The Arts Fuse - All Rights Reserved · Website by Stephanie Franz