Paul White in The Oracle. Photo by Regis Lansac.
Presented by: Adelaide Festival Centre
Reviewed 20 August 2014
If the pre-show bells heralding the beginning of The Rite of Spring don’t forewarn the audience of a unique experience about to occur, the smell of burning myrrh throughout the Dunstan Playhouse certainly will. The Oracle is laced with symbols of paganism but before it even starts, these sounds and smells (that for some are more closely associated with Christian tradition), seem to create unease. The ploy, one of many, is subtle and speaks to the brilliance of Director and Choreographer, Meryl Tankard.
The Oracle is Tankard’s incarnation ofThe Rite. The 1913 ballet was created for Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes, and theParisian premiere resulted in frenzied debate over the music of Igor Stravinsky and choreography of Vaslav Nijinsky.
A century later, and with a lot less controversy, The Oracle, Paul White does not appear at first. Eddi Goodfellow manages the sound of nature at precisely the right height to cause some seat shuffles, and clever set and video designer Régis Lansac extends the anticipation of seeing one of Australia’s best dancers, to almost maddening length. Disquieting visuals are projected; human form-turned-kaleidoscopic images suggest crosses and gothic art, in a form analogous to grotesque stained glass windows.
Eventually, as expert ground level lighting by Ben Hughes turns contour into form, White reveals his shape-shifting abilities using only his remarkable skill and a velvet cape. Androgynous at times, and with a sacrosanct authority; when we see his face, pain and torturous emotion runneth over, contrasting profoundly with movements of faun-like joy.
White and the dramatic pre-recorded music are compellingly entwined. With only a cap, undies and a fur (not all at once), White, the only dancer in the show, tells the nature-versus-man tales with such clout. He is everywhere and everyone. Dancing with his shadow and then with a duplicate self (projected) his strength and presence is palpable even from the back rows. Finally, expelled, naked and vulnerable, White shows us shame, mortality, desolation and sacrifice; drawn by Tankard from the unsettling works of Scandinavian painter Odd Nerdrum.
The Oracle is an interpreter of signs we cannot afford to miss… not unlike this show. Tankard, White, et al expertly capture the exquisite beauty and abject cruelty of nature and man. Evocative, provocative, measured and extremely powerful, Meryl Tankard and Paul White’s storm in a theatre is absolutely magnificent.
Give up any attempts to get your body in shape for summer; it’ll seem utterly futile when you see White’s (although if he doesn’t inspire you to revisit the yoga plank, no-one will). Instead, find out why spring has well and truly sprung! Last shows!
Reviewed by Gordon Forester
Twitter: @GordonForester
Venue: Dunstan Playhouse
Season: 20 – 23 August 2014
Duration: 55 minutes
Tickets: $45 – $60
Bookings: Book online through the Adelaide Festival Centre or phone BASS on 131 246
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