Sokolow Theatre/Dance Ensemble
Premieres
A Virtual Performance of
Anna Sokolow’s

ROOMS2020

Music by KENYON HOPKINS

Dance Directed by SAMANTHA GERACHT, ELEANOR BUNKER, & LAUREN NASLUND

Video Directed & Edited by LAUREN NASLUND

Dancers
ILANA RUTH COHEN, ERIN GOTTWALD, SAMUEL HUMPHREYS, ERIKA LANGMEYER,
BRAD OREGO, SIERRA POWELL, MARGHERITA TISATO, & LUIS GABRIEL ZARAGOZA

https://sokolowtheatredance.org/rooms-2020/
Available for view until July 25, 2020

ROOMS2020 is an amazing adaptation of Sokolow’s ROOMS, which premiered in 1955. It portrayed the loneliness of city apartment dwellers post-World War II, in the era of polio and the threat of Communism and atomic annihilation. What irony that the year 2020 has time-warped us back to a parallel life. Once again we are all living in ROOMS.

The company originally planned a live performance of ROOMS, when COVID intervened. The result is this marvelous video production, perfectly suited to the theme of isolation and its effects on the mind.

The names of the movements tell the tale: “Alone”, “Dream”, “Escape”, “Going”, “Desire”, “Panic”, “Daydream”, “Street”, and “The End?”, followed by the entire company in “Coda”. To the often-atonal edgy jazz accompaniment, each dancer takes a star turn in one or more movements. Each is excellent, evocative, beautiful, real. They stand, stretch, whirl, crawl, claw, hop, seduce, reach elegant arms toward the sky pleading for release, for freedom. The viewer can relate to their desires and frustrations. We are there with them. We understand.

Every aspect of this production is beyond stellar. The music, the video editing, and the fact that each dancer did the video recording of his or her performance. This is a classic.

-Karen D’Onofrio-