Review of Message in a Bottle | A not entirely convincing mix

Take Sting’s songs, add a story of a war-torn family, then sprinkle it all with lyrical and contemporary dance, with a touch of hip-hop and breakdancing, you get Message in a Bottlean entertaining, but not always convincing, proposition for the general public, which comes to us from the United Kingdom at the invitation of Danse Danse.

The great Sting himself would have given his enthusiastic approval to this project, the choreography and direction of which are by Katie Price, a great admirer of the artist, presented as a leading figure in urban dance in England. It is true that the singer’s fans – who constitute, one imagines, the vast majority of spectators – should be charmed by this fairly well put together production which knows no downtime. It highlights the artist’s greatest hits (Fields of Gold, Every Breath You Take, Roxanne and of course, Message in a Bottleamong others), with arrangements revisited by Alex Lacamoire, sometimes with guest performers, with a soul, oriental or rock flavor.

It can be perilous to combine the corpus of great song artists with dance – we think in particular of the BJM proposal around Leonard Cohen which never convinced the author of these lines. Very often, designers cannot resist the temptation to attach a narrative framework by wanting to create a coherent whole, a guideline between the paintings… But it is easy to fall into the conventional and the literal, and to lose in depth.

That said, the songs of Sting, a great humanist, are evocative and we can understand the desire to create a narrative piece danced around his work.

Refugee story

The proposal put forward, as clear as rock (we are not being subtle here), is that of a united and happy family – two parents and their three teenagers – who will find themselves torn and bereaved. by the civil war, expelled, imprisoned, refugee, then a slow reconstruction towards a new life. A subject that finds resonance in current affairs and echoes in certain pieces by Sting, a politically engaged artist.

The first scenes are agreed, the dance, smooth, just like the smiles on the faces of the dancers. We understand, they are happy, everything is fine. All the codes of classical narrative ballet Giselle are respected here, with the large stage where the dancers, grouped on stage, perform ensemble numbers punctuated by solos or duets, supported by pantomimes. With the difference that we are presented with a mixture of acrobatics, contemporary and urban dance, a marriage that we found a bit forced, just like the amalgamation between certain songs and their scenes.

Thus, one of the characters falls in love and gets married to the sound ofEvery Little Thing She Does Is Magic ; Don’t Stand So Close to Me becomes the scene of an attack by soldiers on a group of women (why?); Message in a Bottle and his SOS obviously, is camped in a prison; Englishman in New Yorkquite touching and a rare more calm moment, well represents the arrival in a new society, the loss of bearings, and finally, a new love which blossoms.

It is when the choreographer moves away from very smooth lyrical work or frees herself from the floor figures characteristic of breakdancing that she shines the most, when the gestures become more inventive, truly hybrid. We think in particular of a magnificent painting with cannon-like movements, under showers of light.

The scenography deploys a lot of technical prowess in the service of the story, in particular projections on a transparent screen, at the front of the stage, and another at the back, which make it possible to create different universes –, the rain falling, a shipwreck at sea. The use of long sticks, in a scene where the three brothers are imprisoned, is clever and visually creates a convincing effect.

But it’s really in the second part that the mayonnaise sets – finally. The paintings, more dynamic and gripping, use a moving square structure to modulate the space, from a prison to a customs house to a bad street, a perfect scene for the song Roxannereally well shot, but which filters dangerously with cliché.

The dancers of the choreographer’s troupe, ZooNation: The Kate Prince Company, are very athletic and know how to capture attention with their play and their enthusiasm; we let ourselves be taken in by their story, all the same. But we are left unsatisfied with the urban dance on offer, which remains commercial after all.

An entertaining show, which should appeal to a wide audience – and particularly Sting fans – but perhaps not to those looking for a more inventive proposition.

Message in a Bottle

co-production of Sadler’s Well+Universal Music UK

Wilfrid-Pelletier RoomUntil March 16

6/10

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