Philly Fringe 2018: NextMove Dance presents Circa's 'Humans'

Leaps of faith

As the audience took their seats and waited for the show to begin, performers entered the stage one by one, removing layers of clothing. What was left behind looked like a pile of laundry, until an arm shot out from beneath the heap.

Caroline Baillon emerged from the pile, writhing and contorting her body as she shimmied out of her layers like a snake shedding its skin. This image was both funny and poignant, setting the tone for the performance.

Humans tested the strength and skill of its performers with static backflips, gravity-defying balances, and human pyramids, which in turn tested viewers’ ability to believe what they saw. Two performers launched themselves off another acrobat's chest into spinning leaps. A male acrobat stood on the back of another on all fours, who then lifted both legs, holding the weight of two bodies with just one hand. Performers mounted trapezes and straps to form elegant airborne shapes.

Groups of performers mounted one another’s shoulders, sometimes three high, sometimes upside down, and once holding between them the ankles of a woman doing a split. Dismounts from these formations were part of the act; they often resembled showy basket tosses and barrel rolls of cheerleading, complete with a few near-misses.

Yet everyone landed safely, as these were carefully choreographed visual tricks designed to astonish the audience. Indeed, Circa made what seemed incredible or impossible look fluid, graceful, and effortless.

Flying high, going deep

The best parts of Humans created meaningful moments drawing upon Circa’s combination of circus with dance and theater. Two duets performed to James Brown’s “Please, Please, Please” physically suggested the proximity of desire and animosity in romantic relationships, where partners may vie for control.

In this section, a man lay prone, face down, while Bridie Hooper danced on his back. Later, Hooper took the more vulnerable position, forming a horizontal circle around his upright body by clasping her feet with her hands.

Other sequences also used acrobatics to consider the human experience, as when Hooper and Kimberley O’Brien shared a partnered tumble. During this dance, O’Brien held tight to Hooper’s braided hair. Were they rivals, warring siblings, or something else?

Later, a female acrobat collapsed into a split from which she could not seem to rise. This sequence played lightly, but it also raised questions about ability, disability, and the limitations of the body. Dangerous-looking dismounts alternated with fliers coming down from trapezes, straps, or the bodies of other performers into a hold that resembled the way a parent carries a child.

My favorite part blended together all these themes with Circa’s physical prowess into a memorable duet in which a male performer became a puppeteer pretending to control his female partner’s body. He gripped her hair with one hand as if her puppet head could not stand upright on its own. He moved her like a doll, posing lifeless limbs that flopped when his controlling hands moved away.

While Humans was full of astonishing physical feats and fun to watch, its use of movement to explore theme elevated this performance beyond a series of tricks into an evening to remember. Without the trained animals, pageantry, and noisy kitsch of the traditional circus, Circa can focus on human acrobatic strength and grace.

The company gives thoughtful consideration to the body-as-canvas for studying human nature and the self.