I was not exactly expecting Puck and the other fairies when I sat down to watch the new production by the Joffrey Ballet. This Midsummer Night's Dream is Sweden's celebration of the Solstice and a joyous goodbye to darkness. It's more overtly carnal and deliciously trippy than Shaikespeare's version. To my delight, this was not anything like 16th-century England. Choreographer Alexander Ekman brings pre-Christianity Pagan Sweden magically to life on a spring night in Chicago. The Joffrey Ballet imbues Ekman's choreography with the energy and elan of a world-class dance ensemble.
Some traditions of midsummer in Sweden include collecting the morning dew and washing your face, which promises lasting youth and beauty. There is also a game of jumping over a fire for luck. Ekman replaces the fire with a raucous opening dance as a visual metaphor for a roll in the hay. Of course, the Joffrey dancers can synchronize hay tossing and dancing with meticulously choreographed abandon. The Sleeper is played by dancer Julian Gutierrez who is led to the festival by dancer Jeraldine Mendoza.
After the hay roll, things look like a Chicago street festival in Andersonville. The chef wears a suit and sunglasses and emits smoke from the grill and his cigarette. A photographer wanders about taking photos, and a young woman preens and poses even though the camera is not always directed at her. All have wine, food, and general merriment. There was a moment when the Joffrey ensemble stood en masse on the edge of the stage smiling and toasting the audience. It was a show of normalcy that was deliberately too normal, like a catalog photoshoot.
Mikael Karlsson writes the music for Midsummer Night's Dream with songs performed by the ethereal and haunting voice of indie-rock artist Anna Von Hausswolff. She is the narrator of this tale with her voice bending and reaching high notes perfectly. The Lyric Opera Orchestra played the score filled with touches of steel drum, strings, piano, and an array of timpani. This was a performance taking the entirety of the stage filling and overflowing it with sound and movement.
After the intermission, everything is on a slant, discombobulated. The bed now hangs in the air, the banquet table is tilted and littered with passed-out revelers. The Sleeper is in the midst of an altered universe. The dancers wear flesh-tone attire in appropriate hues and the Sleeper finds himself nude as a bacchanalia unfolds before him. Bodies are tossed from the tilted banquet table, and a man (Zachary Manzke) plummets in slow motion to the ground. Giant fish float down from the sky and the ensemble flops about rhythmically like fish out of water. A giant fish head floats past the Sleeper and yes, I heard the "Fish Heads" ditty in my head at that moment.
The ensemble forms a tight line and the visual of their bodies appears fused with the legs becoming like a centipede's. Midsummer Night's Dream features the dancers using their voices in surreal vocalization. The overt carnality is tempered with some surreal absurdities. A pair of headless dancers (Edson Barbosa and Davide Oldano) appear at the banquet table drinking and moving about the stage. They are reminiscent of the Green Apple illustrated by Ron Campbell in The Yellow Submarine (1968). The chef is now naked wearing only an apron. He is en pointe appearing as a twisted glockenspiel-type figure in and out. The orgiastic dancing is amazing in technique and calls upon the acting chops of the ensemble.
The amazing set was designed by the choreographer Karlsson. The rolled bales of hay, the sun, and the banquet all took on a persona populating the mind of the Sleeper and the watchers, aka the audience. A Midsummer Night's Dream was originally staged in Sweden in 2015. I cannot think of a more talented company than the Joffrey to bring such a feast of dance and music to Chicago audiences. I highly recommend that you go see it. This is dance and performance at its most vibrant and avant-garde.
Midsummer Night's Dream performed by the Joffrey Ballet of Chicago runs through May 5 at the Lyric Opera House, 20 N Wacker Drive. Running time is two hours wit a 25-minute intermission. Tickets start at $36. Get your crew together and go!
For more information on this and other plays, see theatreinchicago.com.
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