Layers of Meaning
An Interview with Andrew Merrell
BY GARTH GRIMBALL; PHOTOS BY STEPHEN TEXEIRA
Andrew Merrell is a dance artist based in the Bay Area whose project-based company Slack Dance will be premiering Flowery Language, dance works of existential ennui, moribund malaise, histrionic hors-d’oeuvres, and bourgeois babes, at Dance Mission Theater in San Francisco from October 4-6. Here, Andrew reflects on how the pandemic shaped their dance-making, the sense of nostalgia in their upcoming work, and the layers of meaning within Flowery Language.
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How did Flowery Language develop into the upcoming performances at Dance Mission Theater?
This is my first full evening show since before the pandemic. There are five pieces and they are separate works and I am weaving them together for an evening, but they are all stand-alone works. Three out of the five had seed origins since before the pandemic. In the process of developing those three works, two others showed up. Going through the pandemic, with that stop, I thought, “Do I let go of these things and venture into new things?” But I didn’t want to let them go. I felt that they were valid experiences that I wanted to put forth.
Since the pandemic forced a different relationship to time, and the amount of time given to developing ideas, has that changed the way you make work at all since there’s been more time to think about the ideas?
Yes and no. I started Slack Dance, making my work and putting it out there, in 2016, and I was getting into a groove, had people I was working with, had momentum. And then the pandemic hit, it all stopped and everyone moved away. It was really hard for me to get back to it. I tried to be like everyone… I made a couple of solos in my door frame, and those kinds of things. But ultimately that’s not what I wanted. I wanted to get back to group numbers with people that I love. That’s why I do this work.
Those ideas have formed and have been informed by the time that has passed. Not to say I’ve been working on these pieces since 2020. It’s been a long time of ruminating on them, but actually getting into a studio and working has only been happening the past year. Time has shifted me and therefore shifted what is coming out of the work.
The evening is called Flowery Language; does that speak to the verbose titles or the work, the movement vocabulary, all possible meanings?
It’s all of the above. The titles play with the idea of flowery language. The movement you could call flowery. The reason I call the company Slack Dance is there’s a sort of lush quality to my movement. But there’s an undercut in the language, too. When we say, “Oh, that person is using flowery language,” often it can have a negative meaning – they’re saying a bunch of words but they’re not actually saying anything. It speaks to artifice and camp, and there’s a lot of that going on in the show too. Which isn’t to say I don’t think my works have meanings. I think they do. Dance to me is everything, like my religion. I can get really dramatic about it. I’ve given my life to it and I love it and at the same time I always find it kind of completely ridiculous. I have this need to do it but that’s where sometimes it ends.
One aspect of the show that excites me is the idea of making period specific dance. “Diane, Tamara, Suzanne and Joyce meet for coffee and get shit done” is set in the 1990s. “Genteel characters who suffer from disillusionment and tragic entanglements” is inspired by Merchant Ivory films based on E.M. Forster novels, which offers several layers of temporality. How are you thinking about representing time periods in dance?
I don’t know if I’m trying to do literal representations, more just taking the ideas of time and space from them and making the work now. The whole show has a certain level of nostalgia to it, looking into my personal past and history and people in my life. “Diane…” is about my mom and her girlfriends who raised me in the 80s and 90s. I did get some vintage 80s dresses for the cast and some of the music will be referential.
Sima Belmar and Randee Paufve are doing a duet called “Newts and Hoptoads,” which is one big dance to the dialogue from the film The Turning Point, the famous fight scene between Anne Bancroft and Shirley MacLaine. And that’s set in the 70s and filled with all the dance references in it.
And the E.M. Forster one is an homage to the Merchant Ivory films. Forster was writing the novels in turn-of-the-century Britain, taking a hard look at British society and imperialism and class structures, and those ideas haven’t really shifted in the Western world.
How do you balance making work purely as a choreographer and as a choreographer-dancer?
That’s been tough because I hate doing that. With “Genteel characters,” that piece I finished to completion before the pandemic with a different dancer. I got to craft it from the outside and now I am having to put myself in as a dancer. The other piece I’m in is a duet with Rogelio Lopez, and he is my life partner so there is a level of ease to it. Randee and other people I love and trust have come in and given feedback.
There’s a solo that I made on a whim. I gave myself the experiment of using the material created in my dance classes, which has been my only choreographic outlet for the past four years, and I loved a lot of it, so I made a solo out of that material.
So they all have separate entries into the parts that I’m dancing in. To be honest I’m still nervous that I put myself in three pieces in an evening and I don’t know if I have the stamina for it. We’ll see!
How are you feeling two weeks out from the show? What’s it been like making the works with your cast and collaborators?
I’m super excited about it. It’s been a long time coming. It makes me nervous and stressed to do it, and I’m really close to it. I am in love with my dancers. These are people who started Slack Dance with me. There’s only one person in the show who I’ve never worked with before, but they are also part of our community. A lot of them are moms, the majority are, and have had kids in the past five to six years. So their whole dance lives have shifted because of parenthood, and we’re talking about parenthood. They are still phenomenal dancers but don’t have the space and time that they used to. It’s been a selfish joy to bring this ensemble together and I’m feeling incredibly lucky and fortunate to do so.
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To learn more about Andrew’s work, visit www.andrew-merrell-dance.com.
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