THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

Sinuous Undulation
Two Thousand and One Nights

Sweetness and celebratory good humour - not to mention eye-wateringly magnificent costumes - are precious thin on the ground in contemporary dance. In fact, I doubt the London stage has seen such textile beauty, such opulent headdresses, such marvellous clashes of brocade and braid, of indigo velvets and jewelled chiffons, since the last time the Caracalla Dance Theatre from Lebanon were here.

As the only contemporary dance company in the Arab world - not entirely surprising - Caracalla Dance Theatre have made their own bridge between East and West, with a style blending Arabic folklore exuberance and the sinuous Martha Graham technique studied by their artistic director Abdel-Halim Caracalla.

The 30 dancers are young, handsome and full of modern eagerness, but what is so refreshing is how Arabian they look to our eyes, There is naturally a great deal of sinuous undulation, but it comes clothes with an appealing decorum and unselfconsciousness.

The story is that of Sheherazade, but closer to its original form than the version given in Fokine’s famous Russian ballet. There is a King Lear-like opening in which the old kings (splendidly crowned and bearded) divides his realm, from Persia to Samarkand, between his sons, who both turn our to have regrettably misjudged their choice of brides.

The first adulterous queen is dispatched after a rather shocking pas de deux as her slave turns her upside-down in his shoulders and revels her to have bare legs under her heavenly black gold, turquoise and magenta negligée.

The second queen’s adultery is more of a sensual indulgence, veils endlessly fluttering, backs hingeing impossibly, lithe, tanned bellies offered skywards by both sexes, and the very beautiful Alissar Caracalla vying for attention with her equally queenly eunuch, and epicene young man with an extensive range of glittery lipsticks.

There is a certain assistance on the narrative front from a picturesque old actor, who gives the show a Shakespearean air, linking episodes narratively for us in cracked English, telling us the punchlines before we see the scene so as to spare us the trauma of suspense. This is very jolly, So are the two kings, men of mighty firth, stomping about with squads of scimitared soldiers (who have the very best outfits of all, which is saying something).

In the second half, we have Sheherazade telling the story of the marketplace, where an evil wizard (our epicene young friend) fools bargain-hunters into buying an ugly old woman because of the way she is packaged, This is set ebulliently to Ravel’s Bolero, which sounds vastly better than usual when played on Arabian instruments. The folkloric finale is an irresistible good time.

Of course the show is not dramatic, in our style, nor is its choreography a revelation of Western modernism; but it is something genuinely different, offered wholeheartedly to entertain, and, thinking of what the Peacock was hosting last week, better 2001 Caracallas than one Béjart.

Ismene Brown
15 February 2003