Theatre Royal Drury Lane
An exposing, emotion filled and vulnerable dance telling the personal struggles of Maria Caruso.
Review:
For two nights and two nights only Maria Caruso took centre stage at the stunning 'Theatre Royal Drury Lane' performing her own choreographed personal story. The dance embodies "Humanity's power to find light and love in the face of adversity". It is an addition grown from her previous performance in 2022 at the Lyric Theatre 'Metamorphosis', which is another emotion filled dance piece. Caruso shows raw, real and deep emotion through her movement, this journey shows her awakening to her own struggles and exploring her mind to find peace within and love herself.
The piece opens with a projection of snippets of 'Metamorphosis', which sets the tone for the depth and serious nature of the dance. Whilst the snippets play, Maria
Caruso's voice plays as she tells the audience about Metamorphosis, a fraction of her experience on her dance journey and what the piece will be about. A prologue style.
As a dancer, Caruso's ability to embody emotion and present a story is mesmerising. She is clearly no stranger to taking the stage by herself and making the show her own. This is admirable. Her dance style is Martha Graham based, with a mixture of contemporary, ballet and a fraction of lyrical. She moves with purpose and fully commits to the character and story she portrays. When she first takes the stage, she starts with high emotion, she is tied to a chair and is desperately trying to free herself. This moment was tense and beautiful. It shows her inner, negative struggle, how it hurts, breaks her down and is engraved in the centre of her mind. Introducing a side character, which is not a physical person, but more an idea and a feeling. This side character is at the side of the stage throughout the whole piece and how Caruso interacts with the area throughout the show is interesting to say the least, something very authentic.
However, Caruso states at the start that this story will be presented to the audience without words. But, inbetween each section she sits to stylistically write a letter to herself and her voiceover plays. This gave an autobiographical style to the piece, but it explains where she is at in the section she has just performed and explains her feelings. Which taints the idea of giving the story through movement and robs the audience of the opportunity to make their own perspective of what she is portraying. Watching dance is a personal experience and the beauty of it is having your own idea of what is going on and not a universal storyline. It makes you find something new. The transition from section to her writing the letter also decreases the level of emotion from what has been performed and creates a wall between the audience and her.
Each section of the piece is shown through Caruso changing into another outfit on stage. This is exposing and empowering. Because, this shows Caruso's energy of confidence and finding a love for each part of yourself. The costumes were designed by Caruso herself and this makes the piece more interesting, because the costumes were made from her emotions, feelings and story. Embellishing the dance. In one section, where she shows herself moving into light and dancing into it. Ignoring the darkness and negativity. She wears this beautiful white chiffon dress, the first layers are plain white, and the inside has glitter. Which makes the dress sparkle from within. Very clever Maria Caruso, chefs kiss to this! The dress gives a light and flowing element to the section, the way she moved with the dress was very comforting to watch. It added to her movements and complimented them.
The score and music composed by Ryan Onestak was perfect for her piece, it matched the style of her dance and helped tell the story. The music was an extension to the piece. It did not direct your attention away from her and it also gave Caruso the ability to match her dance dynamic along to the music. The attention to detail is marvellous.
Overall, this piece was an enlightening and empowering piece of dance. It celebrates the contemporary Graham style and how Maria moves is free, emotion filled and embodies the story. A true contemporary queen. It makes you walk away and remember to stop holding yourself back with negativity and judgment, because when life is all over the most important and enjoyable aspects of your life are the ones where you stepped out of your comfort zone, been true to yourself and let your spirit free. I'm sure I am not alone in feeling excitement for Maria Caruso's next move, what is coming next? However, also appreciating her power to tell her own story and not leaving a snippet of detail. She didn't glorify it, she showed her story for what it was. That is a true art.
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