bobrauschenbergamerica returns to New York City for an extended run at DTW (photo by Richard Termine)
Dance Theater Workshop
219 West 19th St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves.
April 23 – May 16, $25
212-924-0077
www.dtw.org
www.siti.org
In October 2003, New York City-based SITI Company presented bobrauschenbergamerica at BAM’s Harvey Theater. The production is now back for an extended run at Dance Theater Workshop as part of the Guest Artist Series, with cast and crew Talk Backs following the April 27, May 4, and May 11 performances. Here’s our original review; please note that we have not seen the current show, so some aspects, of course, might have changed: Playwright Charles L. Mee and director Anne Bogart’s Americana romp is set on a perpendicular American flag with openings a la LAUGH-IN, wherein characters will suddenly appear, sometimes in the midst of showering. The multitalented cast features a biker, a homeless man, a bikini babe, a prom queen, a roller-skating cheerleader, a gay man, a white professional man, a black man in love, and artist Bob Rauschenberg’s mother. Making art out of everyday objects, the show is an avant-garde collage of American apple pie, featuring such songs as “Love Will Keep Us Together,” a picnic with fried chicken, a human martini, Ping-Pong balls, a swinging tire, and text from Rauschenberg, Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Walt Whitman and Merce Cunningham. “Art was not a part of our lives,” Bob’s mother says to the audience several times. But it is surely a part of her son’s vision of America, making for a wacky, wild, and fun night.