Director and Choreographer: German Cornejo
The Argentine Tango is the most sensual of the Latin dances, a passionate story of conflict and reconciliation in which two perfectly matched combatants go head-to-head. German Cornejo’s new show Wild Tango restores the original experience of the dance in which men performed together and creates a combination of group and duet numbers for unisex pairings. But over two hours of performance, it loses any sense of connection between the individuals or the important storytelling that makes this dance so explosive to watch.
Staged at the Peacock Theatre, this version of the Argentine Tango is constantly fast paced with high-speed flicks and shapes that are impressive but surprisingly empty as number after number offers a competent but rather soulless performance with little to connect the dancers to one another or to join the 20 choreographed pieces together. A seductive look or two may pass between them at times, but this feels like a technical exercise with very little passion or sense of drama between the people in the dance.
Instead, each performance has the look and feel of a pop video, all posed and designed but without the grit that anchors the Argentine Tango. Cornejo’s choreography mixes tango with a lot of Paso Doble and some contemporary and street dance to create a fusion of styles that has visual impact but never feels fully coherent or explanatory. There is no attempt to break down the tango and rebuild it for modern audiences across the show or tell a single narrative within Wild Tango; it is a series of disconnected numbers.
Some of that sits with the semi-staged set designed by Marius Arnold-Clarke comprising two scaffold rigs which the dancers occasionally clamber up and gyrate. Elsewhere the visual appeal of the show is determined by some rather unexpected costume choices that impede the audience’s view of leg and foot placement or seem out of step with the reworked vocal performed by Luciano Bassi whose centrality to Wild Tango makes this also a kind of pop concert with dance accompaniment.
Designed by Cornejo and Gerardo Cass most of Act One takes place in fetish wear, the female dancers in skimpy fitted leathers and the men in similar trousers, corsets and, in the opening number, Assassin’s Creed style monk outfits with harem pants that entirely disguise their legs. Act Two is even stranger, taking its inspiration from Duran Duran’s neon and fluorescent highlights in the title sequence from A View to Kill and possibly the Stingray uniforms, followed by some 80s sparkly disco body suits.
And Cornejo throws in a few props including swirling ropes, some cloth and a few uses of bungy rope harnesses (creating some very ungainly aerial leaps) and gymnastic hand straps that do result in some impressive stunt. But in this first night performance there are some slips, missed hand connections and heavy landings that need some tidying up. There’s a Cirque du Soleil feel at times with talented performers in a show that may have many different elements, not all of them remotely related to tango, becoming less than the sum of its parts.
The dancers work hard and there is a lot of performance across the two hours, not least from former world champions Gisela Galeassi and German himself but Wild Tango is overcomplicated and so fast moving, often to the detriment of finishing shapes, that it doesn’t allow the connection and conflict between two people to fully take centre stage.
Runs until 21 May 2022
2 Comments
Judging by the audience reception we clearly approached it from a very different angle. Coming out of the theatre and walking back to the tube the audience were buzzing. The dancing may not have been full on Tango, but there were many elements of it, yes it was in many cases pumped up to be more urban..but it was received very well by the public, and a real feel good uplifting evening!
Yes it was spectacular but perhaps too much circus aerial dancing on elasticated ropes, with dancers bouncing high above the sky, more like acrobats than dancers. Unex pected and no where near as good Argentinan Latin Tango dancing as previous “Tango Fire” by the same company at the Peacock Theatre a few years ago…and where did all the females go? Only three females to 8 or 9 men; resulting in lots of men dressed in pink dancing together, a must see for Gay men, but not for heterosexual men; we like to see equality in the sexes and sexuality, with at least as many females as men please.
This is one for the LGBT folk perhaps? For me it was disappointing: Let’s hope
raw and passionate Argentinan Latin Male / Female dancing with a story line is resumed when the company returns to The Peacock in October 2022: Tango After Dark; with thr hope of usual passion story telling and passion Argentinan Tango Dancing returns for the benefit of broader audience appreciation; rather than just LGBT tastes.