Review: ODC/Dance presents “Dance Downtown” April 10 - 13, 2025 Blue Shield of California Theater at YBCA, San Francisco, CA

The social safety net is being torn asunder.  The courts, the schools, the labs, the libraries, and the centers for art are being disregarded, or sold to the highest bidder. In this time of great urgency, complacency can play no role.  How does ODC/Dance, a contemporary company based in the West Coast’s most progressive city, meet the moment? With inventive high-octane dancing, smart storytelling, and a dash of humor.

ODC Dance Downtown returns to the Blue Shield Theater of California at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts April 10 – 13, 2025 with a trio of no-holds-barred works.  Taking advantage of the advanced production capabilities of this dance-centric venue, video projections seamlessly summon novel worlds, live musicians play in the orchestra pit, and set pieces lower from the flies to augment the world-class dancing of the eleven member ODC company.

ODC/Dance performing Kimi Okada's Inkwell. Photo by Natalia Roberts

Leading us off, Kimi Okada’s Inkwell (2024), explores the manipulative powers of an ill-intentioned city-slicker over a hayseed, the wide-eye and affable Christian Squires, newly arrived in the big city.  Brandon “Private” Freeman’s slithering demagogue gleefully cajoles and controls his minions, the eight townies. A wave of his hand sends them tumbling across the stage, while a crooked finger summons them.  

Brandon Private Freeman as the Demagogue, left, and Christian Squires as the Human in Kimi Okada's Inkwell. Photo by Natalia Roberts

Inspired by the menacing 1920’s & 30’s caricature world of Max Fleisher, the marvelous projected backgrounds of designer Yuki Izumihara bring this black and white cartoon to life, where swirling tunnels burrow and clouds pop in time with a sound effect and onstage scuffle. Okada’s choreography, with heads bobbing and knees pulsing, captures the subtle stuttering quality of an old-time animated film flickering across a screen. One feels the wind, as line drawings of leaves blow across the sky, and Rachel Furst windmills across the stage, her schoolgirl dress flaring.

I consider how so many in our country have chosen to follow a dark path toward authoritarianism rather than risk being ostracized from the dominant culture, as we watch Squires succumb to the group disfunction.

The program-note for Brenda Way’s Unintended Consequences (A Meditation) (2008) states, “the work considers the effects of America’s fetish of individualism.”  Preshow, I marveled at how well this theme meets the moment, as a handful of billionaires harvest ever-greater wealth at the expense of the many who cling to the myth of the self-made man as their destiny.

A vaulting column of fluorescent tube lights, perhaps suggesting a skyscraper, dwarfs an isolated human form. Jenna Marie flexes and folds her body. A newcomer arrives, and catching Marie mid-kick, he tilts her backward and drags her across the stage as if on a furniture dolly.

As more dancers enter, I try to find signs of an “every man for himself” mentality. Three women appear, their clothing while universally a neutral grey-green, varies in style, from flirty to athletic. Duos form and dissolve, reforming with new pairings. Some pound their hands insistently into their palms, demanding or declaring something of importance, but discord is largely absent, as the performers mold their forms around or melt into their partners. 

Rachel Furst performs a body slide in Unintended Consequences. Photo by Natalia Roberts

One of the pleasures of abstract, non-narrative dance is the freedom to follow the movement wherever it takes you.   Charmed and transported by the music, a compilation of Laurie Anderson songs, most from the “Big Science” album (1982) (which I played on repeat throughout my college years), I abandon my search for Way’s stated intention and relax, letting the sounds and the shapes speak for themselves. Soon I find quirky synergies between the beguiling world conjured by Anderson and the gestural ethos onstage.  In response to “Hi, I'm not home right now, But if you wanna leave a message, just start talking at the sound of the tone,” a trio mimics the greeting with huge flapping lips they create with bended arms across their mouths.  A pair of crouching dancers coordinate the slant of their backs so another may slide down them with arms extended as Anderson sings “Here come the planes.”  The joy of this ride for me is experiencing Way’s ingenious translation of the enigmatic folksy lyrics into movement.

Jeremy Bannon-Neches holds Rachel Furst and Colton Wall, left, while Ryan Rouland Smith captures Katie Lake. Photo by Natalia Robert

After intermission, the world premiere of the epic Areas of Relief awaits, a three-part work created by renowned New York-based choreographer Sidra Bell, in collaboration with composer, Mary Halvorson, a recent “MacArthur Genius” known for her inventive guitar jazz stylings, and architect Cass Calder Smith. In the pit, The Eclecta Quartet are joined by guitarist Liberty Ellman, whose plucked accents craft a contemplative mood over the longer low chords of the strings.

Joanne Kim, left, Jeremy Bannon-Neches and Addison Norman in part I of Sidra Bell's Areas of Relief. Photo by Natalia Roberts

Circles and arcs abound in part I. The possibility of presence. A genderless figure, in form-fitting electric-blue bodysuit, dashes confidently backwards, following the outer edge of a cone of white light. The looping path of a comet carves through the night sky.  Ideas of aliens, astronauts, futuristic friends trying to turn back time, rise for me. As the stage fills with lunging, squatting, spinning, flipping caerulean dancer-shapes, Bell’s cosmic tapestry expands.  The forces of gravity are felt in the fall and recovery of swinging arms, and fanning kicks.  Danger intrudes as a dancer hugging the stiff upside-down body of another struts purposefully away.  Joanne Kim careens through space, her bent knees jutting forward, as her arms, and long loose hair, are lifted by the centrifugal force of her rapid rotations.

II. where do we stand introduces a wealth of possibility. A shimmering grid of prismatic rectangles implies a fathomless depth. Costume Designer Kyo Yohena transforms the dancers from anonymous  functionaries, into a Greek-inspired contemporary tribe. Their hand-painted leggings and dresses are each uniquely embellished, with diaphanous ruffles for some, and drapey red accents for others.  Dancers work in synchronous systems, scribbling over the stage unnaturally, as recorded electronic jazz supplants the string music.  Breaking into pairs, they bear each other’s weight in strange ways. One is carried atop a crawler’s back, while another is conveyed legs spread atop a shoulder.  The artifice falls away and a roughness intrudes as several dancers reappear nude but for flesh-toned undergarments. Manipulating each other’s bodies, pushing and pulling, playing dead in one’s arms or swimming with churning limbs atop an ensemble, the chaos of escape or capture defines this nightmarish sequence.

Joanne Kim, left, and Rachel Furst tussle. Colton Wall and Addison Norman at right in part III of Sidra Bell's Areas of Relief

With the reintroduction of the live string quartet, a more recognizable order is restored for iii. folks dance, the final section. The stage is alive with complex athletic dance sequences. The intricacy and layering of movement and visual designs feel overstimulating at this point, and yet as the curtain falls with kinetic motion still unspooling, I want nothing more than to see Bell’s piece again. 

Review by Jen Norris, published April 12, 2025

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Production Credits:

DANCE DOWNTOWN April 10, 12 & 13, 2025

Inkwell (2024)

Choreographed by KIMI OKADA

Projection Design YUKI IZUMIHARA

Costume Design MAYA OKADA ERICKSON

Lighting Design THOMAS BOWERSOX

Sound Design MILES LASSI

Music RAYMOND SCOTT, CARAVAN PALACE, DJANGO REINHARDT, LIZZY & THE TRIGGERMEN

Additional Costume Construction KYO YOHENA

CAST

The Human CHRISTIAN SQUIRES

The Demagogue BRANDON “PRIVATE” FREEMAN

Townies JEREMY BANNON-NECHES, RACHEL FURST, JAMIE GARCIA CASTILLA, RYAN ROULAND SMITH JENNA MARIE, KATIE LAKE, COLTON WALL, ADDISON NORMAN

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Unintended Consequences (A Meditation) (2008)

Choreography BRENDA WAY

Music* LAURIE ANDERSON

Lighting & Scenic Design ALEXANDER V. NICHOLS

Dancers JEREMY BANNON-NECHES, RACHEL FURST, JAIME GARCIA CASTILLA, RYAN ROULAND SMITH, JENNA MARIE, COLTON WALL, KATIE LAKE

Areas of Relief (World Premiere)

I. the possibility of presence II. where do we stand III. folks dance

Directed by SIDRA BELL

Rehearsal Director MIA J. CHONG

Composer MARY HALVORSON

Scenic Design CASS CALDER SMITH

Lighting Design ALEXANDER V. NICHOLS

Projection Design YUKI IZUMIHARA

Costume Design KYO YOHENA

Dancers JEREMY BANNON-NECHES, RACHEL FURST, CHRISTIAN SQUIRES, RYAN ROULAND SMITH, COLTON WALL, KATIE LAKE, JOANNE KIM, ADDISON NORMAN

Music THE ECLECTA QUARTET featuring LIBERTY ELLMAN (guitar) SHAINA EVONIUK (violin) RACHEL NOYES (violin) CHLO RACHEL NOYES (violin) CHLOÉ MENDOLA (cello) MICHI ACERET (viola)