"Etymology of a Person": A Challenging New Dance Theatre Piece

Following up their first full-length narrative "Aspiration: Housewife" (reviewed exclusively for Associated Content-click here), the Odonata Dance Project's "Etymology of a Person" turns from satirizing the dull, deadening non-life of the perfect, idyllic, suburban existence to searching for life and spirit in the depths of the underworld. The plot, such as it is, follows a group of souls competing in a series of reality-television-style challenges for the right to re-ascend to Earth; she who collects the most pomegranates wins. While facing an uphill climb in terms of sifting through its murky abstractions, "Etymology of a Person" ultimately emerges as a work of affecting if confused beauty.

The audience is greeted with the image of an intriguing glowing red fingerprint, foreshadowing the theme of identity, and a couple of boxes and compartments and retro bits-and-pieces; the glint of a piece of chrome is enough to instantly recall the world of appliances, and all things 1950s consumerism, of "Aspiration: Housewife". The savvy theatergoer is advised to sit toward the back of the house: director-choreographer Jessica Bonenfant stages the show as a cinematographer might frame for widescreen, with the whole cast onstage and all doing different things more often than not; this reviewer chose a front-row seat, granting the desired intimacy of a cabaret but too often resulting in the loss of visual information. Mirroring a television theme that crops up, by presenting an overwhelming choice of characters to watch all neatly lined up, Bonenfant forces the viewer to pick one or two performers to attend to at once, resulting in either picking a program and sticking with it, or channel surfing-except, to torture the metaphor, that most of the cast never gets a 'commercial break'.