[This article was originally published October 4, 2019, for the show's initial run at the Hudson Theatre]
In David Byrne鈥檚 American Utopia, choreographer Annie-B Parson makes sure that even the band members dance.
That鈥檚 accomplished by some special harnesses that make movement possible for even those toting heavy instruments, but Parson鈥檚 work isn鈥檛 typical of what you might immediately associate with a choreographer working on Broadway.
After working with Byrne on Off-Broadway鈥檚 Here Lies Love and the tour of his album Everything That Happens Will Happen Today, Parson makes her Broadway debut choreographing and staging American Utopia ( at the St. James Theatre, with an opening set for October 17) in a singularly uncluttered way. In fact, she wonders if the staging for the uncategorizable concert evening may be unlike anything attempted before on the Great White Way.
鈥淭he movement, the vocabulary is not derived from musical theatre,鈥� she says. 鈥淭he dance material has a pedestrian quality, but it also comes from the absurd, of abstraction, of disassociation.鈥�
But don鈥檛 mistake pedestrian for average. 鈥淧edestrian鈥� is a technical term in dance that means everyday movement. So rather than jumps and twirls, the 11 performers walk across the stage without any characterization.
鈥淚 hope that the show can influence the way people can look at theatre and movement in theatre as larger than the way we typically think of choreography,鈥� Parson says. 鈥淣ormally we think of choreography as steps, but it really is an organization of bodies in space.鈥�
It鈥檚 a beautiful problem that David Byrne charged her with鈥攊ncorporating every person on stage into the choreography鈥攕he says, adding that she prefers limitations, rather than starting with a blank canvas.
She calls David Byrne鈥檚 American Utopia a feel-awake experience, not just a feel-good one. 鈥淭hrough that statement of people singing and dancing together and David speaking a little bit about where he lives as an artist and how he views what鈥檚 going on, you get this larger statement of where we are as a community and where we need to go,鈥� Parson explains. And Parson鈥檚 path is one that continues to push the boundaries of dance on Broadway.
