The 7 Fingers pull into PAC NYC to take audiences on an unforgettable journey (photo by Matthew Murphy)
PASSENGERS
Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC)
251 Fulton St.
Tuesday – Saturday through June 29, $43-$117
pacnyc.org
7fingers.com
“There’s something about a train that’s magic,” Richie Havens sang in a series of 1980s Amtrak commercials. The 7 Fingers troupe captures that magic and more in the breathtaking Passengers, continuing at PAC NYC through June 29.
For ninety minutes, the Montreal-based company combines circus acrobatics, gymnastics, song, dance, physical theater, and prose to take audiences on an exhilarating and affecting ride on the rails, By the end, the performers feel like characters in a play more than mere strangers on a train.
Written, directed, and spectacularly choreographed by Tony nominee Shana Carroll, Passengers begins with Kaisha Dessalines-Wright, Marie-Christine Fournier, Eduardo De Azevedo Grillo, Marco Ingaramo, Anna Kichtchenko, Maude Parent, Michael Patterson, Pablo Pramparo, Méliejade Tremblay-Bouchard, Santiago Rivera Laugerud, Sereno Aguilar Izzo, and Will Underwood bringing out chairs and aligning them as if on a train, destination unknown. Over the course of approximately twenty scenes, each one highlighted by a different discipline, they make their way through tunnels and over bridges as they run, jump, tumble, leap, twirl, and throw one another high in the air, incorporating such props as suitcases, luggage racks, clothing, and the chairs.
Kichtchenko spins multiple hula hoops, holding them out for several of the men to dive through. Contortionist Parent claps her hands to stop and restart time, altering reality in between. Fournier and Grillo perform a romantic hand-to-trap pas de deux in midair on duo trapeze to a rousing version of “Saint Louis Blues.” Dessalines-Wright sings “Train Is Coming” with Grillo on ukulele, advising, “Train is coming, and not that slow / You catch it up or you let it go / Round and round the tracks they go / When you’re back you let me know.” Dessalines-Wright discusses Einstein’s theory of relativity as it applies to speeding trains and time. Grillo pulls himself up on aerial straps, then is joined by Dessalines-Wright on duo straps. Izzo juggles a growing number of white styrofoam balls, some from inside his shirt. Kichtchenko flies with aerial silks. Ingaramo impossibly rises, balances, and slides down a Chinese pole. Three performers build vertical human chains to the song “Call,” which promises, “We will no longer / We will no longer / break apart / We will no further / We will no further / Fall.” Friends and lovers come together and say goodbye.
Suitcases, luggage racks, playing cards, and other props are used alongside hula hoops, aerial straps and silks, duo trapeze, and a Chinese pole in dazzling 7 Fingers show (Renee Choi Photography)
Passengers evokes Cirque du Soleil, Pina Bausch, The Music Man’s opening number, Company XIV, and STREB but is clearly its own phenomenon. Ana Cappelluto’s ever-changing set is supplemented with Johnny Ranger’s videos of passing landscapes and tunnels, some projected on a horizontal bar at the top back of the stage, along with Éric Champoux’s lighting, which creates dazzling shadows and glowing effects. Colin Gagné composed the wide-ranging original music and designed the sound with Jérôme Guilleaume.
The performers, in naturalistic costumes by Camille Thibault-Bédard, are nothing short of spectacular, celebrating remarkable feats that push the limits of what the human body can do. But Carroll (Water for Elephants) manages to make it all relatable, as train travel is still mostly an egalitarian way to get from one place to another.
In “La hora de la hora,” the song accompanying the juggling, lyricist Boogát admits, “Soy un loco más en la locomotora (I’m just another crazy person on the locomotive).”
You’d be crazy not to get on board this magic train.
[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]