Nightmarish noir and audacious spectacle at Holland Dance festival

In Marcos Morau’s Horses, suited dancers swing around a streetlight but the scene feels far from Singin’ in the Rain. Lamps multiply across a squalid stage with wings exposed, a suspicious figure prowls with a torch and a long-necked light snakes down from above, deepening the chiaroscuro until the action seems like a film noir caught on fire.

Nederlands Dans Theater’s piece opens with house lights up and a solo of flinches and hoof-like hands, then a second dancer arrives nose-first; the mood shifts from animal alertness to an acutely urban nightmare before the auditorium doors slam and darkness falls.

Max Glaenzel’s set, lit by Tom Visser and scored with Andrzej Panufnik’s unsettling strings, stages vaudeville vignettes that mix clowning with heavy breathing, canned laughter and other sound effects, while two figures resemble wildlife photographers documenting the mayhem.

Netherlands, Holland

marcos morau, horses, ndt, max glaenzel, tom visser, andrzej panufnik, film noir, chiaroscuro, vaudeville, holland dance