Live Arts review: 'This Town Is a Mystery'
At the Live Arts/Philly Fringe festival, Headlong Dance Theater's THIS TOWN IS A MYSTERY builds instant communitites, for a night at a time. Inquirer theater critic Howard Shapiro reviews.
By Howard Shapiro
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER
Headlong Dance Theater's This Town Is a Mystery is as much — and maybe more — an experiment in communmity building as it is an artistic pursuit. It's a Live Arts part of the Live Arts/Philly Fringe, running every night during the festival, and each night is different.
That's partly because the Headlong piece is really four pieces in four separate places, plus dinner, and includes the audience in a basic way: We bring the food. Since spring, Headlong has been making dance/theater pieces with four Philadelphia families, each a separate work of about a half hour. Families perform each night perform in their homes. Each ticketholder is assigned a family's performance, and must bring a covered dish of food for a potluck after-performance dinner.
As an unusual evening of community building, it works – at least the performance I saw did. I went to the Aryadarei home deep in South Philadelphia, where Zahed and Shannon and their three children — Sulaimon, 12; Sydney, 10, and Shaheen, 7 — performed little dances interspersed with family tales.
In one story, Shannon, a native Philadelphian, tells about her her sons and daughter and their births. In another, Zahed, a native of Iran, tells about an cultural imbroglio in London and his unwarranted detainment with others for months at an immigration jail in York. The judge who eventually freed him apologized on behalf of the nation and said he knew Zahed Aryadarei would be fine citizen. "I have honored what he said to this day," Aryadarei asserts.
It was a sweet evening. The dancing, rehearsed for months, was simple and heartfelt, especially between mom and dad; the kids were cute when they took to the rowhome's living-room which was strewn with bare bulbs for a stage effect. The Aryadareis had put their furniture in storage for the performances.
After the show, the Live Arts crew brought a long table into the living room, the 14 audience members (each audience is limited to a small number) arranged their folding chairs all around and out came the food — a diverse spread.
Gloria Ranieri, a neighbor ("I loved it. I was so impressed") brought her trademark meatballs. Sara Narva, a teacher dancer whoc ame with her partner, dancer an theater artists Billy Yalowitz, brought a French dish she'd made called socca, a pancake made of chickpea flour that she'd cut into triangles. There were baked chicken legs, mac and cheese, potato latkes, eggplant parm, large bruscettaslices and many dishes.
People introduced themselves to one another immediately and brisk conversations filled the room with happy cacaphony. "I'm just a fan of the Fringe," said one ticketholder, lawyer Maria Sawczuk. "I love being out of my normal box." Tim Evans, a festival employee who was the show's house manager, surveyed the table and the enthusiastic diners. "It's Thanksgiving every night," he said.
Contact Howard Shapiro at 215-854-5727, hshapiro@phillynews.com, or #philastage on Twitter. Read his recent work at www.philly.com/howardshapiro. Hear his reviews at the Classical Network, www.wwfm.org.
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This Town is a Mystery: $28-$35. 7 p.m. Sunday through Saturday. Information: www.livearts-fringe.org or 215-413-1318.