I went to a dress rehearsal of Chosen being presented by Marshall Ellis of ME Dance Inc. This production is incredibly urban, hip and edgy. This is an original new show created by Marshall. His fusion of
contemporary, ballet, hip hop and jazz dance will give audiences a new
fresh perspective to live performance art.
The entire back wall of the stage was used as a movie screen to open the show. A camera zoomed back through skyscrapers before settling in on a lone man in a hoodie walking in a parking lot. The rap music lyrics were about a life in which everything seems to go wrong.
A light spray of stage smoke caused the lights to showcase their cones of influence. The entire show was set largely in darkness. The dancers would become slivers of warm and cool highlights with their bodies blending into the darkness. The cast was mostly women with just two male dancers dressed in hoodies. I wondered if this was in some way a tribute to Trayvon Martin who was shot up in Sanford for walking through a white neighborhood with a hoodie on.
There was sensual dance along with spiritual yearning and the dancers stoically faced the future. The music echoed regrets of a relationship that didn’t last and the singers rise in a music industry which is blood thirsty. Sketching so much, I probably missed some of the more subtle story elements in the show. In general the theme involved the cast aspiring for greatness and always finding an endless struggle in the pursuit.
Performances of Chosen are on March 9th – 11th, 2018 at ME Theatre (1300 La Quinta Drive Orlando FL 3209.) Tickets are $20.