“Savion Glover’s SoLE PoWER” is a technically brilliant train wreck. The show, which opened this week at the Joyce, spotlights both the 36-year-old’s incredible tapping virtuosity — and his rambling, borderline-hostile persona.
The show is in two parts: the first, mostly solo. Glover’s premise is that “tap dancing has gone from sight to sound.” In other words, it’s what you hear, not what you see, that counts. And boy, does he push it.
Not only does he turn his back to us much of the time, but he performs for a few minutes in darkness. OK, but we’re sitting there trying to look at him.
The second part is more entertaining. It helps that Glover has a whole crew of tappers, all of them less aloof than he is. There’s also a flimsy sci-fi premise, but Glover’s declaiming about his artistic lineage is long-winded and self-important, even when he’s trying to be humble.
The tappers pair off into couples and have fun flirting in one extended tap jam. That’s what this show needs — less lecturing and more fun.
It needs editing, too. Glover tapped while miming shadowboxing or skipping rope for so long that it seemed as if he were just killing time.
At least the costumes are amusing. At one point, he donned two (yes, two) pairs of sunglasses, leather shorts and a T-shirt emblazoned with a Post cover photo of the Son of Sam.
The sounds Glover can make are amazing — he can fire out taps like rattling gunfire while drifting across the stage — and so are his moves, when you can see them. Would it hurt him to perform a little?