East Bay Express - OverThere Section

Vol. 21 • No. 19 • February 12, 1999

dance

Last year a gaggle of dance watchers were in a clump chatting and gossiping when one exclaimed, "Did you see Topiary?" I thought he was talking about those cute trees manicured like the pom-poms at the ends of poodle tails. "Not the plants," someone said. "The choreographer. She made one of the most original dances I've seen around here in years." It was a retelling of a Greek myth performed with offbeat imagination, they said, and while the opinions of others are as reliable as a greased rope, the consensus was too strong to be ignored. Fortunately for those of us who missed her last year, Samuael Topiary is back again. Her upcoming piece is a dance film with live music of the Greek tale of ATALANTA, the daughter of cruel King Iasus who tossed her out of the kingdom as an infant for not being a boy. Brought up under the aegis of the goddess Diana and parented by the bear Crona, she can run as fast as the wind, and no man is swift enough to beat her. The film was shot in forty locations around San Francisco in Super 8 Kodachrome, with stunning juxtapositions of open land and shimmering city, giving Atalanta the look and feel of an early modern dance film that grafts chance and joy onto a clear design. With arrowlike Jessica Lutes as Atalanta and comic Remy Charlip as the cruel king, the choreographer has imagined the myth through "queer, contemporary eyes" and composed a magical, modern fairy tale that opens tonight and runs through February 20 at ODC Theater, 3153 17th St. 415-522-8793.

- Ann Murphy

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