Continuous replay

Originally choreographed by Arnie Zane, Continuous Replay traces its roots to his interest in photography and film. The piece, performed naker, is based on 45 gestures accumulated in space and time.

Continuous Replay looked as though it came from another world, and in a way it had: it was made in 1991, but was based on a solo that Zane made for himself in 1977. (Zane died in 1988.) Erick Montes Chavero, the Zane figure here, entered first, naked, and began moving frenetically to the score that Jerome Begin had composed, “Music for Octet,” from two Beethoven string quartets (Op. 18, No. 1, and Op. 135). Gradually, he built an accumulated phrase, which incorporated a teapot’s handle and spout (and pouring) and added a deep lunge and arms that scissored by the face. One by one, other dancers, all naked, joined Chavero, and a group began travelling across the stage, picking up his accumulation and altering it or falling into unison. More dancers ran far upstage, from one side to the other, behind the main action. There was Seán Curran. Then Arthur Aviles appeared. And Larry Goldhuber. You could hear the delight in the audience as people recognized these former Bill T. Jones dancers, who had come home. (Other company alumni were scheduled to appear in the work throughout the run.)

The Beethoven was only occasionally audible; at times there were bits that sounded as though they were played in reverse, but there was plenty of competition from other elements that Begin had woven into his score: a crowing rooster, a man in distress, part of the “Honey Badger” voice-over, telenovela-style dialogue, mission control-ish transmissions. In time, dancers began entering wearing bits of black clothing, then white, as the group (the entire company plus the guests) made its way around the edge of the stage. A solo occasionally sprang up at a distance from the group—I-Ling Liu, spotlit, in an attenuated adagio, followed by Jennifer Nugent, in a rectangle of light, in a more high-energy undertaking. The chaotic organism continued to churn on, until, finally, giving a big shout, the dancers lunged, and stopped. Chavero was the only one still naked—here, a source not of vulnerability but of supreme freedom.