THÉÂTRE DU CORPS PIETRAGALLA - DEROUAULT

After staging works by Louis Aragon, William Shakespeare, Alfred de Musset, and Eugène Ionesco, the two choreographers have continued their exploration of the theatricality of movement through the hybrid language of dance and theatre that lies at the heart of the pieces created by Théâtre du Corps. Two people meet one night on a strange, deserted street, a non-place devoid of any logic of daylight. The Client and the Dealer engage in an astoundingly beautiful verbal joust, a parade in which each person sizes the other one up, brushes against them, provokes them, and ultimately lays themselves bare. Pierre-Claver Belleka, aka Dexter, and Julien Derouault embody this ambiguous duo of unclear intentions. We never know whether they want to express violence or intense desire. The text is recited as a voiceover as they fashion a dialogue between contemporary dance and krump that looks like a stylised boxing match. The passing rounds yield a profound, astonishing interplay between what we hear and what we see, as if the text summoned the gesture and the gesture inhabited the text, the whole giving form to the unconscious, to the inexpressible nature of these very musical words. The actor-dancers slowly fall under the spell of the words, and beneath this encounter with otherness, emerging from the void, lies death itself.

The show contains lighting effects that may cause visual discomfort for some audience members.