SynopsisOne of my project lines for the Astra Dance Company is the re-creation of some of the most absorbing films of the Silent Era as dance-dramas. Nosferatu, Metropolis, The Cabionet of Dr. Caligari While and come at once to mind in this connection, seemed to me clearly to deserve to be first in line and when I proposed it to the Astra creative team, Caligari proved a favorite!
With its fourth production of story-dance theater, the Astra Dance Company moves from its former sources in the short story (Astra von Berlifitzing,Eleonora) and in poetry (I Dreamed I Spoke in Another’s Language) to the classic silent film: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari!
The film Caligari, made in 1920 Germany, is reckoned to be the foundation of the genre of the horror film. When a traveling carnival hypnotist, Dr. Caligari and his encoffined somnambulist Cesare visit a fair in a small German town, frightful events begin to occur. Investigations discover a strange and dangerous trail which leads at last to an insane asylum—but who is it that is mad? Perhaps the investigator himself….
Caligari tis a festival of the menacing and the macabre. The figures of authority are weird or sinister. The external world broods threateningly. Apparent exits from danger lead only to new entrapments.
The style of Caligari is remarkable. The actors move in dance-like ways, not always smoothly, sometimes in an abrupt fashion that anticipates dance modalities of decades later. The sets are painted backdrops, walls, floors and flats. Where we expect right angles, squares, rectangles, we find weirdly misshapen figures. The dress, makeup and expressions of the key figures Caligari and Cesare strongly express their eerie, uncanny characters.
The film Caligari resonates pervasively in the work of Tim Burton: The Penguin has been compared to Dr. Caligari himself, Edward Scissorhands to Cesare, and the “look” of Beetlejuice and The Nightmare Before Christmas to that developed in the unorthodox geometry of Caligari.
In general, the Astra Dance Company production of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari hews closely to the original.The film is “expressionist” in visual style, in that objects are far from naturalistic and serve to embody the unstated emotions of the persons and the moment, and this principle has also guided our dance-drama.
The acting style of the film is also expressionistic rather than naturalistic, in that the actors show themselves as embodiments of emotions or ideas (Authority, Conformity, Order—and their opposites): this style too we have maintained.
One change worth noting: the film examines the borderlands of madness, ending with a twist that reverses its apparent verdict on sanity/insanity. Our show ends with a reversal of the reversal that puts the ultimate escape from enveloping horror once more into question.
Caligari remains an active presence in the arts, remade as film, stage drama , radio drama and even Bunraku! Scores for Caligari have been written nearly a dozen times. To our knowledge, Astra Dance Company is the first to pay homage to this enthralling and consuming film by way of dance-theater. We hope that we shall be judged to have done it justice.
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Caligari Cafe
Location
The El Portal Theatre,
5269 Lankershim Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 91601
Schedule
May 11, 2012 @ 8:00pm
May 12, 2012 @ 8:00pmMay 18, 2012 @ 8:00pmMay 19, 2012 @ 8:00pmInformation and Tickets: (818) 508-4200
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