The phrase “the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice” has taken on different meanings since the first recorded use in the late 19th century. At once a term of affection, more recently the phrase has become a metaphor for how slavery in the United States has affected Black communities, the metaphorical fruit that grew from numerous African ethnicities being forced together through inequality, discrimination and oppression.

John Neumeier’s surrealist psychological take on Hans Christian Andersen’s classic tale, “The Little Mermaid,” written in 1836, pays close attention to the 19th-century author’s cosmology. “Be careful what you wish for” could easily be the subtitle for both cautionary tales.

It has been one hundred years since the debut of the surreal Triadic Ballet (Triadisches Ballett) that premiered in Stuttgard in 1922. A work in the Bauhaus style, its colorful automatons, built of oblong shapes, dance nimbly around a colorful void. Hedwig Dances and Bauhaus Dessau have co-produced an official sequel that is every bit as imaginative and “out there” as the original.

American Ballet Theater continues to dazzle Chicago audiences with high-octane dancers, precision execution and, sometimes, dramatic intensity that transcends their beautiful bodies and phenomenal technique. ABT, how we have missed you!
The highlight of the evening for me was Christopher Rudd’s duet, Touché (2021), danced by Calvin Royal III and Joaaô Menegussi. The clever title clues us into the double-entendre of touch, and the exclamation, touché, of a fencing match that has been fought and won, here perhaps by both sides.

Grounded, erky-jerky movements with cave-like crawling are not the typical description you would use when describing a ballet performance. And yet, this is precisely the goal. Ballet 5:8 is not your average or typical dance company.  Rooted in faith, led by a Latina woman and intentionally collaborating with women designers who prioritize sustainability, Ballet 5:8 is unwavering in their eleventh season with their unique vision to ensure ballet is fresh, functional and accessible to everyone. 

From April 27-30, Chicago Repertory Ballet begins their 2023 season with “Vibrant Variations” at the Studebaker Theatre with four new world premieres. The performance features a “mixed-red” show, a stylistically diverse program of multiple shorter works–generally 3 or 4 pieces, each around 15-30 minutes in length, which would ordinarily contain work by different choreographers. What is different about this mixed rep show is that each work is choreographed and directed by the company’s founder and Artistic Director, Wade Schaaf!

A life can be measured in epochs, periods of time where events and influences converge to form an era. We experiment with our minds and bodies during our “college years” and plan for retirement in our “Golden Years,” a first crush, first romantic relationship, marriage, divorce. That is how I would describe “Touch of RED,” as an intense, emotional epoch between two Black men squeezed into one-hundred and one minutes.