Much like the program as a whole, Tuesday’s performance by Hubbard Street Dance Chicago was a mixed bag, with top-notch performers let down by half-baked choreography. (
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Tuesday was out-of-town night at Fall for Dance, a sampler of far-flung companies New Yorkers don’t often get to see.
The Australian Ballet crossed the Pacific to perform Glen Tetley’s “Gemini,” a piece made for two couples, who shadowed each another in a marathon of leggy solo and partnering work.
“Gemini” was made back in ’73 and looks it, particularly the retro, jet-age sleekness of the costumes — shiny, mottled yellow unitards with the women’s pointe shoes dyed to match. The piece is supposed to be a hybrid of classical and modern movement, but the dancers did straight ballet. Even as Hans Werner Henze’s music built to a frenzy, the dancing stayed the same.
Each Fall for Dance program has a crowd-pleaser, and this program’s was “Something Different.” Here, Steven McRae, a virtuoso principal dancer from Britain’s Royal Ballet, proved he could do most anything — including a four-minute tap solo to Benny Goodman’s “Sing, Sing, Sing.”
From Sweden came choreographer Pontus Lidberg, who performed along with New York City dancers in his take on “Faune,” set to Debussy’s classic. Four dancers surround a fifth who’s nearly naked, save for flesh-toned briefs. Just who was “it” shifted as the dancers undressed and covered up again.
“Faune” is well-made, with flowing moves that had the cast members cradled and bracing one another, but the awkward mechanics of disrobing and dressing while dancing made it seem as if this faun’s afternoon was spent at Plato’s Retreat.
The program closed with Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, whose crackerjack dancers performed Ohad Naharin’s “Three to Max.” It’s a remix of pieces he’s done over a decade, but it felt as if it were duct-taped together out of spare parts. A section to Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” was sutured to one involving counting in an imaginary language. Show us one idea, please. Even better — finish it.