FEEL HEAR SEECRET created and performed by Katherine Duncanson, Susanna Hood, Nilan Perera and Jim Ruxton. Presented by hum dansoundart and twitchLIMBic at the Theatre Centre (1087 Queen West). Runs to October 20, Thursday-Sunday 8 pm, matinees Saturday and Sunday 2:30 pm. $20, Saturday matinee $10, Sunday matinee pwyc, some discounts. 416-538-0988. Rating: NN
Rating: NN
The collective piece feel hear SEEcret is all dressed up and goes almost nowhere.That’s not a criticism of Nina Okens’s clever costumes, which include dresses of detachable swaths of pink crepe for Katherine Duncanson and Susanna Hood and wire piping on the body suits worn by them, Nilan Perera and Jim Ruxton.
No, it’s that the interdisciplinary work — dance, film, text, music — experiments with bodies wired to create sound and light, with extended vocal technique and a soundscape built partly by playing on found objects, but does little with them beyond saying, “Hey, here’s this effect.”
Two segments, though, connect with viewers in a striking fashion. In one, a blindfolded Hood dances in an increasingly nervous, frantic manner to Perera’s score played on bike wheels, a huge metal disc, bowls, wrapping paper and the miked floor itself.
In the second, the two women, ghostly against a film of the four performers naked in the woods, run their hands over the massive figures projected on the back wall while Duncanson sings Cole Porter’s haunting I’ve Got You Under My Skin.
There’s something eerie and sensual in both scenes, something that touches an emotional chord as well. The rest is a series of sights and sounds yet to be plugged into a theatrical plan.
