You will have to listen really close to hear my subtle sound design elements. This production runs thurs – sat at 8:30 each night, this week and next. Best of all…it’s free!
Odd Man Loves Hooker
Bartok’s self-described “grotesque pantomime,” repeatedly banned throughout his lifetime, is remodeled by choreographer Donald Byrd as theatrical pulp fiction. The line between eroticism and savagery is blurred in this twisted fable of an outsider’s tragic fate at the hands of a band of drug addicted thugs and their seductive moll. The Miraculous Mandarin was Bartok’s post-World War I commentary on European society and its fear of “Oriental” otherness.
First presented in 2006 at the Moore Theater, this version of Mandarin continues Byrd’s interest in pushing the edge of how dance theater is presented and changing the audience viewing relationship. With casting, Byrd turns expectations on its head with no visibly Asian performer in the role of the Mandarin. Through support from Storefronts Seattle, this dance performance will take place in the first floor windows of the historic Bush Hotel overlooking Hing Hay Park. This mirroring of the setting of The Miraculous Mandarin, an Amsterdam-style red light district, puts the audience, viewing the performance from the park and located just below the windows, in the complicit role of voyeur.
This rare and unprecedented series of FREE performance was initiated by SDT to broaden the reach of the organization and to make dance performance of this caliber available to the general public. As one of the premiere contemporary dance companies in the country, SDT will bring its signature precision, athleticism, and sexiness to the performance, its first free season performance since artistic director Donald Byrd took the company’s helm in 2002. This opportunity to see world-class contemporary dance is not to be missed.