Choreographer: Anthony Missen
Anthony Missen’s new show is a dystopian dance where shadows stalk a group of young friends as they grow up. Acrobatic and physical, The Shadow begins with some clear storytelling, but it loses its way in the second half.
It starts with the five friends as young children playing games such as Peek Behind the Curtain. They waddle in fun and smirk in their competitive displays of silliness. But as the days pass, and as dancers dressed all in black pass between them, darker times beckon. Four of the five friends pair off in heterosexual couples leaving one boy isolated. Try as he can to be noticed, his old playmates ignore him.
Another man, mostly an onlooker, moves in to take care of the lonely boy. He acts older than the rest of the cast, giving the suggestion that he could be the boy’s father, or the boy’s older self, looking back into his past. Lee Clayden, as the older man, and Reece Marshall, as the boy, dance beautifully together as they climb over each other and perform trust games as each falls to the ground ready to be caught.
After this pas de deux, The Shadow’s story becomes more violent and opaque. Gustavo Oliveira and David Colley square up to each other to peacock and fight while Alice Bonazzi appears to become a dominatrix. In comparison, Alice Marriott is given little to do. The story of the lonely boy is almost forgotten. The six shadows, who must have been roasting in their outfits in the overheated Place, march on and off stage so many times that it eventually becomes distracting.
Missen suggests that the shadows represent our dark unconscious, but only once do we see a character battle with their demon. The rest of the time, the shadows seem unlinked to the friends, and instead seem like a militia or a dark version of the avatars on TV’s The Cube that show the contestants how the challenge is done.
Of course, dance doesn’t need to faithfully follow a narrative like a play, but The Shadow seems uneven with such strong storytelling at its start and more imagistic work at the end. Missen’s choreography is gruelling at time, with dancers slamming into each other across the stage, but it is always exciting to watch. He even throws in a little vogue in an oddly placed nightclub scene. What could be an uplifting segment is made strange by the silent screams that Clayden is making into Marshall’s ear. The Shadow is unsettling, but frustrating.
Reviewed on 10 February 2022 and continues to tour
