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Summerworks: 5 reasons why NO FUN should be lots of fun

If you’re after the raw power of punk rock, Helen Simard’s Iggy Pop-inspired dance show has you covered. Featuring a live four-piece band riffing on Stooges hits and three dancers channelling Pop’s unique onstage energy and physicality, NO FUN (named for one of Pop’s best-loved songs) actually sounds like lots of fun. Here’s why.

1. It’s inspired by Iggy Pop’s dance moves

Anyone who’s seen Pop perform live over his decades-long career can picture his unique aesthetic: shirtless, sweaty, writhing to buzz-saw guitars, one moment appearing bored, the next releasing a wide-eyed, unapologetic explosion of energy.

“When you watch Iggy, you see him going crazy and wild, but it’s also super-precise,” says Simard. “So much of his performance is the way he moves. I see him not just as a musician, but as a performer whose body and movement are fascinating. I wanted not only to examine his movements as by-products of music-making, but to explore what stories they’re telling. Could I take his signature movements and put them in a context where we look at them as dance?”

2. It’s well researched but not over-intellectualized

Using the wealth of live Iggy videos online, Simard traced his performance style from the late 60s through the 2010s, hunting for signature moves he’s used again and again over the years. That said, she’s careful not to over-think it – that wouldn’t jibe with Pop’s punk rock ethos that values spontaneity, improvisation and fuck-ups. “It’s really easy to fall into making something precious that was never meant to be precious,” says Simard. “We don’t want to miss the spirit. We don’t want to be playing a character, we want to be playing with a character.”

3. It’s not a tribute act

The four-piece band won’t be doing Iggy Pop or Stooges covers. Simard is pushing her performers to use Iggy as a base for further exploration. “It’s music inspired by the sound,” she explains. “We tried to make the music in the same way we made the dance. Instead of saying, ‘Play Lust For Life,’ I’d say, ‘What does your imagination of that song lead you to play?'”

4. Dance conventions get smashed

Channelling Iggy allows the company to shed a lot of dance conventions, says Simard. “As a dance artist you spend so long formatting your body to fit into a technical precision that’s been handed down from classical to modern to contemporary dance, so it’s hard for dancers to abandon aesthetic judgment and to release this formatted, trained body. But for us, tapping into Iggy is about getting in people’s faces and provoking reactions, whether they’re good or bad. It allows us to let go of these ideas about beauty and of doing something people will like, and lets us move in ways that challenge people to rethink their assumptions about ‘beauty’ and ‘good,’ and why they need to like things.”

5. It’s okay not to “get” it

Simard admits some people might find the show confusing and unsettling. “The most fun you have with the show is when you accept that you don’t know what’s going on, and that’s okay. It’s a space where you’re allowed to not understand what’s going on. The show is loaded with rock nerd in-jokes, and if you’re someone who knows Iggy and his work, you’re going to be able to recognize sources and where things come from.”

Get more SummerWorks 2016 here.

stage@nowtoronto.com | @JordanBimm

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