This Episode Made Cat So Sleepy
And while we’re on the subject of the lovely lady, did that dress last night look familiar to anyone? Clearly, it’s one of Cat’s faves. She is the grand Empress of the “Ain’t No Accounting for Taste” club and yet, I love her still.
I considered not blogging about this snorific episode at all then this morning I was IMing with the always entertaining Matt Murphy and realized I have a bone or two to pick and I wanna do it all public like.
Just yesterday, NeYo’s “Sexy Love” popped up on my iPod and I was thinking wistfully of Allison, Ivan and the Shane of old.
It’s clearer than Christmas cookies at a bat mitzvah that none of the ladies on this show (with the possible exception of Karla) have any business dancing hip hop. More so than in any other season, the contemporary dancers seem FAR out of their depth in the form. Caitlin was an unmitigated disaster last night. Honestly, she looked like me in my beginner hip hop class. I made the same cringe-y face watching her as I do in the mirror every monday night. There was no snap, no edge, no flow, no groove. Everything was tentative and awkward. There was a time Shane would have inhabited the landscape Nap/Tabs have taken over and given us a number that contemporary dancers could execute with a degree of integrity but lately, it seems like his only solution for chicks who can’t hit is to make them dance like strippers. (See: last week’s floor fucking in the group number and Caitlin’s breakdown last night.) It’s maddening. It’s not cute. It’s not hot. It’s just embarrassing. Kupono and Ashley were far less galling, mainly due to the fact that Ashley’s more comfy with the form than Caitlin (and possibly because Shane doesn’t want to have sex with her. Judging by Caitlin’s lack of skill in this arena and her featured role in last week’s Sparks group routine, methinks the dude’s got a yen).
All right. Bone, the first, picked. Moving on…
Memo to all SYTYCDDR contemporary choreographers. PLEASE STOP PUTTING THE SAME FUCKING ROUTINE ON STAGE. Just because you use different music and the dancers wear different costumes does not mean it’s not the same 10 – 15 moves tossed in a bag, shaken up and dumped on stage. It all works just fine when we’re dealing with dancers with whom we’re connected, who have a story that’s being told, who we know and care about. The rote choreography becomes a vehicle for an emotional journey and I’m all for that. It’s like a well executed romantic comedy. You know exactly what’s going to happen and roughly how many turns it’s going to take to get there but when you care about the characters, it doesn’t matter. If they’re unlikeable people and/or poorly drawn, it’s like shoving every orifice full of cotton candy. I’m talking My Best Friends Wedding vs The Wedding Date (Dreamiest of dreamies, Dermot Mulroney shone in the former and couldn’t save the latter).
These treacly, sap-tastic lyrical routines are great when we’re invested in the dancers’ journeys: Ivan was technically weak, Danny was emotionally stunted. Both used one of these routines to show they could over come. But it doesn’t matter how strong the dancer if we have no context of pathos or struggle. At best, these numbers are a fucking snooze-fest and at worst, they give you cavities.
Not clear on what I’m talking about? Let’s go to the video tape:
(Let it load and skip to 2:15)
(Yeah, they called this “jazz”. Whatever, they’ve never had their vernacular straight. Pop Jazz? Huh?)
Big, open armed attitude turn?
Look at my crotch developpe and/or battement?
Carry the girl like a baby?
Big, impressive split leap from the lady, likely caught in mid air by the dude?
Seemingly precarious lift, usually with another entreaty to look at the lady’s crotch?
Role on the floor, legs intertwined?
Gentle face touch?
Walk away apart/together in sadness/comfort OR hold eachother lovingly while sinking to the floor?
Check, check, check, checkity mother fucking check.
Now, as a counter point, Mia often offers work that’s similar in terms of the technical steps but the quality of the movement she requires from her dancers and her sense of rhythm and flow takes her work out of the realm of lyrical dance competition and stamps a clear and original artistic signature on it.
The only reason I can tell the difference between a Mandy Moore number and a DiSnorio one is most every Mandy lyrical routine has some lil hitch where one dancer pulls another with a flick of their foot. Oh, and, Tyce uses music written post 1989. Otherwise, I might as well be in a public school gym somewhere in Texas with a number pinned to the back of my sparkly leotard.
I’m sure there are plenty of folks who dug Jonathan and Karla in Stacey Tookey’s piece last night. I get it. They danced it beautifully but I so didn’t care. I have zero sense of who either of them are as people and we’re not far enough into the season to get a handle on if/how they’re growing as dancers and performers. Stacey seems like a lovely lady but when they bring in a brand, spankin’ new choreographer, it would be nice if their work felt brand spankin’ new. I’m certainly interested in seeing more of her. Mandy has had moments of inspiration and excitement on the SYTYCDDR stage and I hope Stacey, too, will bring something original and fresh. But lasts night’s introduction to her work was terribly cliche and after five seasons, it’s getting harder and harder to forgive this kind of milquetoast.
So I know this was a whole lot of grousing but I wouldn’t get so worked up did I not love this show with all my heart and soul. Since I went all negative nancy on your ass I’ll do my best to balance it with an admission I can’t believe I’m making. While I tend to find his work rather uninteresting, I was deeply entertained by the choreography of He Who Dresses from the Closet of Our Lady of the Plunging Neckline. Much like Cat Deeley, Brian Friedman did not disappoint with his wardrobe choice. More importantly, he did not disappoint with his choreography. Kayla danced the fuck out of it. Girl was built to be a dancer, those legs go on for football fields. Max was no slouch either. It was the only piece of the evening that blew my skirt up.
Now, we’re only two episodes in so I’m not going to sound any alarms yet, but what I’ve lauded about this season, that there isn’t one person I don’t like, is revealing itself to be the inverse of a real problem: there is no one I love. (Well, ok, Phillip, but my affection for him is based on past seasons and not on a step he’s danced this year.) So, I have to ask, next week? Mia Michaels? Can you deliver these children? Please?
13 Comments
June 18, 2009 at 2:55 pm
You’ve put your finger on something that has been bothering me. On the one hand, the limited repertoire of steps and movements in the ballroom and social dances don’t spoil my enjoyment of them, because the mastery of technique can be enjoyable in and of itself, and the performance qualities can also sell a routine that is not as well executed. That’s why Randi and Evan did a better job of their jive than Phillip and Jeanine did with their tango: neither couple could do more than fake the ballroom technique, but Evan and Randi were relaxed and committed while Phillip was visibly anxious. Since I’m less able to identify the specific moves and techniques of lyrical/contemprary/is-it-jazz-yet? I have to grok it more from an intuitive place. I was a lot more interested in the male-female power struggle between Max and Kayla than the sentimental heterosexual couplings that are the default setting for so many of the routines, and it was because of the vocabulary of movements as well as the performance. So all the Mia haters will screech about how mean she is,but her dances are never boring.
June 18, 2009 at 3:25 pm
You are awesome, this is such a satisfying review. Thanks ^_^
June 18, 2009 at 3:40 pm
I think my biggest complaint of last night, besides how boring it was, was how much the judges seem to love Jonathon. I have no idea how he made it on the show. He doesn’t seem spectacular in any sense, and while he did better last night, I can’t see him staying around for long.
June 18, 2009 at 3:52 pm
Really? I think he’s a lovely dancer. He’s got way better follow through than Vittolio, who I also enjoy but who’s energy never extends past the tips of his limbs (I thought Nigel was blind to have complimented his lines last night which were less than stellar). Jonathan, on the other hand, knows how to take up space. He’s far from the technically strongest dancer on the show (aka Brandon) but I certainly see why he was cast.
June 18, 2009 at 5:19 pm
And the camera LOVES Jonathan.
June 18, 2009 at 5:44 pm
The routine that drove me nuts was Ade/Melissa. What in the world was Sonya thinking?! That was nearly a carbon copy of Mark/Courtney’s “The Garden” from last season.
June 18, 2009 at 5:56 pm
Yeah. It was shit. So shitty in fact, I didn’t want to put in the thought it would have taken to write coherently about it. Figured ignoring it was dismissive enough.
June 18, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Well, I’ll see if I like Jonathon next week, I’m just not seeing it yet.
June 19, 2009 at 1:23 am
It’s sad that Stacey came down to the US to teach her weakest choreo yet. She was so great in SYTYCD Canada.
June 20, 2009 at 3:34 pm
They danced it beautifully but I so didn’t care. I have zero sense of who either of them are as people and we’re not far enough into the season to get a handle on if/how they’re growing as dancers and performers.
I think we’re sort of on opposite sides of the narrative coin re: this show, but I’d like to know if, when you go to a real dance performance, these same issues of individual growth and artistic identity are likewise in play to an extent similar to the way they are on the show? And, if the typical live, non-SYTYCD dance performance doesn’t carry the same narrative weight, then why do you view SYTYCD as a bildungsroman? Is it because the narrative is there on the show, and you might as well grab onto it?
June 20, 2009 at 4:38 pm
Well, first of all, thanks for teaching me a fancy word for “coming of age story.” That is basically what bildunsgroman means, right? I’m basing that on a quick glance at wikipedia. Satisfying word, for sure.
Secondly, the answer to your question is, sort of, though I’m more interested in the journey of a choreographer than of individual dancers. It’s not a requirement in order for me to enjoy the work but it certainly heightens the experience. If I’m seeing new work from a choreographer I know nothing about and it’s compelling and well danced, I don’t need any more than that. But if I return to see the work of that same choreographer again and again, I hope for growth. It’s the same as following the work of a musician. I’m sure some people are interested in bands that churn out the same record over and over but I don’t care so much. I’m interested in growth and change from one to the next. It’s a large part of why Radiohead’s so fucking great. Why The Beatles were out of control. Why Bob Dylan’s still selling records. Growth over time.
To be clear, in the context of this show, I only need a handle on the dancers as people and their growth as humans if the choreography’s as bland and generic as Stacey Tookey’s was. If the piece is exciting and fresh (pretty much anything by Mia or Wade), I don’t so much care. But it is true that my deep love of this lil’ reality show is rooted in watching young dancers grow over time. I wouldn’t find the show nearly as compelling if I wasn’t taken on that journey.
Does that answer your question?
What’s on the other side of said narrative coin, from your perspective?
June 20, 2009 at 5:19 pm
Thanks, and yeah, you answered beautifully. (All the satisfying words are German, I notice.) (I am not a Radiohead fan, though, so I had a spastic lol at your expense, but then, Cat is a Radiohead fan too, so who am I to judge?)
Artistic growth is a weird story, IMO, because I think “growth” is part of a vernacular (hee) intent on mythologizing a certain artist, which is entirely apropos when we’re talking about a self-consciously ROCK STAR artist (e.g. Dylan), even if there are obvious stylistic changes throughout a career — it’s as much about the image and myth as it is the actual (differences in) music. So, I kind of think that there’s a lot of artistic overreaching when “growth” gets invoked, especially since it straddles the edge of cliche. Maybe I’m being picky and double-standardy. I hope what I’m saying there is clear, it’s kind of tangled in my own head.
(Caveat: going through my mental list of my favorite bands, a LOT of them have a very specific style that they rarely change from record to record. I could listen to a random Stereolab, Cocteau Twins or Bardo Pond song, and I probably would have trouble telling you from what point in their careers (each spanning almost 20 years) that song was released/recorded, and wouldn’t much care to, either. I’ve also become that moaner who’s complaining that a band’s new tunes don’t come close to their classics, so yeah, Music Curmudgeon here.)
The other side of the narrative coin is spectacle, i.e. something that’s purely, aesthetically arresting and which isn’t principally invested in driving a story. The classic example of spectacle is a song & dance number in a musical — the narrative suspends itself so that, say, Marlene Dietrich can show us how sexy she is.
Even though reality tv heavily relies on narrative, I watch it as much for spectacle as for story, I think because I find reality narratives to be really simplistic and often heavy-handed enough that I can’t buy into their authenticity, and if something might detract me from enjoying a piece of art (yes, I just called reality tv art), then I’m going to ignore it; I think art should be enjoyed since there’s enough failure and dejection in real life that I don’t want it creeping into my escape.
Anyway, I’m glad there’s an outlet for grown-up discussion beyond complaining about, as momo put it, the Meanness! of the MEAN judges!
June 24, 2009 at 11:58 am
loved your points re: spectacle Leee. While I think that seeing the “growth” narrative is what makes watching a show like SYTYCD fun, it’s the beautiful performances (whether or not there are growth/story arcs being told) that really make it worth watching week to week.