Robert and the Dance
5 March

By Tuesday morning, I knew that I was starting with another cold and assumed that it had been passed on to me by one of my Quaker brethren over the weekend.

However, I was not going to let it diminish the pleasure of the next 48 hours as I was due to meet up with son, Robert, who was in Liverpool for workshops and performances with Barebones Dance Company.

It's last August since I last saw him and last May since I last saw him perform, on that occasion with bgroup at The Place in London. However, that's actually a good hit rate given that his work takes him over mainland Europe and North America. I was to discover that he'll be spending a goodly part of the next twelve months working for a company based in Belgium so I'll have to cross the channel to see his next body of work.

I was at work all day and he was with the company delivering a series of workshops around the region so we met up at The Quarter on Falkner Street for a cup of coffee before coming back to Crosby. Relax, wash, chat with Ross and then we went out to a new-ish restaurant near to us called The Fat Italian. Ross and I have heard various recommendations about the place, including one fulsome one from Roland who is a fair judge of a restaurant.

And it was an exceedingly good meal.

Wednesday was a lazy morning and I took the man into town to meet up with the company at noon. Then it was a rest until the evening when I drove down to the Contemporary Urban Centre, a converted warehouse up river from the Albert Dock.

There were four pieces in the show, each by a different choreographer, of which the third piece was a solo given by Robert, himself. Robert hadn't shown great enthusiasm for the programme and, to be honest, I don't much disagree with him. It was honest, workmanlike stuff without necessarily being exceptional.

I can't say I liked the first piece, Container by Rui Horta. Even as an academic exercise in spacial manipulation I didn't really feel that it had anything to say let alone anything new to say. The second piece, Magnification by Garry Stewart, at least had an idea - the idea being to ask the three performers to move to vastly amplified sounds produced by bodies. Some of the results were (intentionally) excruciating. The real problem with this piece was that, after five minutes, it had made its point and just kept on making it again and again. And then I started fixating on Zombie movies in which gross bodily functions are usually accompanied by soundtrack horrors. This didn't help me.

However, I could have looked at Josef Perou's buttocks on their own for twenty minutes or more. They were a thing of beauty. Then, from looking at the company's website, the impression I get from the press photographs and the videos is that he was a very late addition to the team. Praise be, I say.

After the interval came Robert's solo followed by Hinterland by David Massingham, the company Director. Well, call me old fashioned but this did have what I would call choreography - bodies in motion creating interesting shapes and participating in interesting relationships. It may not have been the most cutting edge part of the evening but it was fine for me.

So, what about Charlotte Wilson's piece Straight Talking with Robert. Well, I think that it dared a lot and succeeded. But I couldn't imagine any of the other five members of the company being able to perform it. Not because of the difficulties of the dance but because of the difficulties of the presentation.

The first five minutes were more about Robert's abilities as a actor, talking directly to the audience, basically doing a softening up, warm up routine, getting us all on his side. He's very good at charm and the "Robert" character on stage drew us all in. The body language was deferential, little bobbing nods of the head, shrugs of the shoulder, all guaranteed to engage us and make us feel empathy. All the time talking about breaking through the conventions of "The Dance".

And then began a sustained piece of physical theatre cum dance in which Robert expressed (and by that I mean squeezed out of himself) emotional hurt. It was very raw and very real.

I've no idea if he was exorcising personal demons. Some of it felt like that. If so, I certainly hope that he's protecting himself. I know that there is strength in vulnerability but still.

I don't readily cry in live theatres. I cried then. I was witnessing something of the internalised frustration and agony of my own depressions. I was fairly shattered by the end.

And not a little proud of my son's undoubted expertise as a dancer, performer, physical actor and manipulator of emotions on a mass scale. And though that may not sound like it, I do mean that statement as a massive compliment.

And then he finished off by returning to the "Robert" persona and begging our forgiveness if he'd upset anyone. Very naughty. Less than two minutes later he was back out on the dance floor performing the final piece.

I'd say that the bulk of the programme was reasonable but Robert's piece was very good .

It was only on the way home that I remembered that he'd been suffering with a bad back for the previous 24 hours. I'd not given it a moment's thought during the performance. I must find out if it was really bad for him.