WHAT:
In Plain Sight is a full evening movement theater piece where 4 performers divulge their real life obsessive tendencies that have turned into compulsive actions, as a way to cope with their overwhelming lives.
Created by choreographers Ally Voye and Carmela Hermann Dietrich, the group uses movement and true life storytelling to create a series of serio-comedic choreographic autobiographical portraits that expose their invisible, even when it's in plain sight.”
WHEN:
May 12 - 14, 20...
WHAT:
In Plain Sight is a full evening movement theater piece where 4 performers divulge their real life obsessive tendencies that have turned into compulsive actions, as a way to cope with their overwhelming lives.
Created by choreographers Ally Voye and Carmela Hermann Dietrich, the group uses movement and true life storytelling to create a series of serio-comedic choreographic autobiographical portraits that expose their invisible, even when it's in plain sight.”
WHEN:
May 12 - 14, 2016, 7:30pm
WHERE:
Bootleg Theater
2220 Beverly Blvd.,
Los Angeles, CA 90057
213-389-3856
WHO:
• Ally Voye • Co-Creator, Choreographer, Performer
• Carmela Hermann • Co-Creator, Choreographer, Performer
• Leah Rothman • Performer
• Bill Ratner • Performer
• Pablo Santiago • Lighting Designer
• Tom Moose • Composer
HOW MUCH:
Tickets cost $25, $20 for Students/DRC Members and are available online soon on the Bootleg website
TICKETS
www.inplainsightshow.com
ARTIST STATEMENT:
“In Plain Sight, a new deeply personal work that choreographer Ally Voye and I are developing, finds us choreographing the details of people’s real lives in poignant and humorous ways,” shares Co-creator Carmela Hermann Dietrich. “The project stars four real-life people, all of whom have volunteered to bare themselves for this project, who divulge their secret obsessive-compulsive tendencies along with their psychological roots – compulsive actions developed to cope with overwhelming life events. We look at the underlying causes, and question why someone can, can't, or doesn't want to stop the behavior. The “dances” expose what isn't visible even when they are in plain sight.”
SYNOPSIS:
In Plain Sight is a series of serio-comedic choreographic portraits, featuring four people, who each grapple with a compulsive behavior. The four – Carmela, Ally, Bill and Leah – have volunteered to bare themselves for this project and divulge quirky compulsions and their psychological roots. These people, who would never have met without this project, find connection with each other through performing together. The work offers a window into wrestling with humanness, while exposing what is invisible, even when people are “in plain sight.” In Plain Sight was developed through in-depth videotaped interviews with each performer. The transcripts and videos of these interviews provided material for the choreography and text.
THE FOUR PORTRAITS:
• Carmela
The piece begins with the complexities of food obsession and body consciousness, which became magnified for Carmela when her son was born with developmental delays. In her terror and confusion, she could find comfort only in ice cream, donuts, and other sugary items. Thus, the dance film, “Orange Thursday," is a duet between a herself and 5 dozen donuts.
• Ally
Sharing the food theme, Ally hurls herself repeatedly against the floor in the ongoing losing battling choosing Kale Salad over Gooey Cheese Pizza.
• Leah
Then Leah, a Brentwood mom of 3, responds to her son's crippling social anxiety diagnosis by making sure that every element of her outfit matches - from her underwear, nails and handbag, to the water bottle and chewing gum for that day.
• Bill
Bill, one of America’s premier voiceover performers, experienced the deaths of three family members by the time he was 13 years old. In an attempt to stave off any future tragedy, he developed superstitious systems of counting during daily tasks.
ABOUT:
Ally Voye (Co-Creator, Choreographer, Performer) –
Ally Voye is a dancer, choreographer, educator and dance filmmaker who began her dance training in Salt Lake City at the Life Arts Center. A graduate of the department of World Arts and Cultures at UCLA, she studied extensively with Victoria Marks and Maria Gillespie, among others. In 2014, Voye was awarded a year-long grant by San Francisco’s Margaret Jenkins Dance Company to develop her choreography and dance film work with her mentor, Cari Ann Shim Sham*. Ally's choreography and dance films have been presented at a variety of venues throughout Los Angeles and the United States including the Pasadena Dance Festival, Ford Amphitheater, UCLA’s Fowler Museum, Highways Performance Space, Jacob’s Pillow, and the American Dance Festival. She is co-artistic director of IN/EX Dance Project, a Los Angeles-based collaborative dance company dedicated to unconventional performances. In addition to producing, performing and choreographing locally, Voye is a dance-teaching artist at The Growing Place preschool in Santa Monica.
Carmela Hermann Dietrich (Co-Creator, Choreographer, Performer) –
Carmela Hermann Dietrich, MFA, is a choreographer whose work is informed by personal history, politics, and the things people don’t discuss in public. Hermann Dietrich received her MFA in Choreography from UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures and was a longtime collaborator with Simone Forti. She has been presented at The Getty Center, The Bootleg Theater, REDCAT, Highways Performance Space, and Los Angeles Central Library. Hermann Dietrich creates duets with longtime collaborator Terrence Luke Johnson, which comedically take on issues of sex, death, and intimacy. She has taught throughout Southern California and founded The Making Dances Workshop for choreographers to receive constructive feedback while developing new work. (If Carmela wants to put together a 150-word bio, that would be great. If not, this will suffice.)
Leah Rothman (Performer) –
Leah Rothman, a non-practicing attorney, is currently working as a full-time mom to her three young children. Originally from Marin County, she has spent the majority of her adult life in Los Angeles with her wonderful husband Jacob. In Marin, she was principal flautist in the Marin Symphony Youth Orchestra. As an undergraduate, she majored in philosophy at UCLA before attending Law School at Columbia University. As an attorney, she loved not only the work, but also the heels and the suits. She practiced corporate litigation at Stroock, Stroock & Lavan, before starting a family. In her role as mom, her jobs include conflict resolution, creating scheduling spreadsheets, carpooling, cooking meals, being on the green committee, and staying calm without pharmaceuticals (SoulCycle and hot yoga help). She is inspired and passionate about color; in the wake of the whirlwind surrounding her special-needs children, she finds comfort in the therapeutic nature of fashion.
Bill Ratner (Performer) –
Bill Ratner is one of America’s premier voiceover performers on movie trailers, documentaries, computer games, and cartoons. Ratner’s spoken-word performances are featured on National Public Radio’s “Good Food,” “The Business,” and KCRW’s “Strangers.” He is a nine-time winner of The Moth StorySLAMs. His personal essays and short stories are published in The Missouri Review, The Baltimore Review, Hobo Pancakes, FeminineCollective.com, Blue Lake Review, Spork Press, Niteblade, Papier Maché Press, and Wolfsinger Publications. He is the author of the book Parenting for the Digital Age: The Truth behind Media's Effect on Children and What To Do About It from Familius Press. He holds a Masters in Fine Arts in Creative Writing from University of California Riverside/Palm Desert. http://www.billratner.com
Bootleg Theater –
Bootleg Theater is a year-round inclusive art space for original, boundary-defying live theater, music, and dance performances born from the diverse cultural and artistic landscape of Los Angeles. Bootleg supports and collaborates with the best of established and emerging music, theater, and dance artists to create daring multi-disciplinary live experiences that are striking, contemporary and non-traditional.