Joe Goode Performance Group: 2005 Home Season
June 13, 2004
 
From Voice of Dance by Heidi Landgraf
 

The Joe Goode Performance Group returned to the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts this past weekend to complete the third piece in a triptych begun in 2003. The third piece, Hometown, is an absolute work of polish and professionalism, summing up the best of the previous two works, and leaving behind the worst. The use of set (designed by Goode and Dan Sweeney) lives up to the gorgeous promotional materials, and punctuates the dialogue to great comedic effect. Hometown hits a homerun. There was a palpable sensation of excitement at the conclusion of the opening night—one had the sense of deep satisfaction at a complete statement so clearly and poignantly made, and also a sense of real connectedness to the universal theme of homelessness, a sense which, many in the Bay Area faced with the ever increasing cost of living, are familiar with. Not owning a house became a thing to be championed in this piece. The knowledge that the true home lies within the body, which is an attainable and more realistic goal, became a relief for us all. One we sensed was closer to the truth anyhow.

Hometown keeps the idea of the everyman already established in Folk and grace, but leaves behind the longer and more specific characterization dialogue, in favor of a more archetypal quality. Yet Hometown's characters are rich and real, don't be mistaken. Goode has refined his formula by this third time around and the result is a more adept dialogue, apt and to the point, with greater room for movement expansion to fill in the rest.

Opening with an electric blue backdrop, there are a few telephone poles in the corner of the stage. "Two little birds looking for a nest" are dancers Elizabeth Burritt and Felipe Barrueto-Cabello, she dressed in a red patterned dress, and he in khakis. Ah, we've seen this duet before. Burritt's character is reminiscent of the disgruntled housewife from grace, the second piece in Goode's triptych, preceding Hometown in this program. But this is the other side of the housewife, whiny and saccharine, she embodies every housewife looking for a home across the nation, every woman looking for satisfaction in material things, demanding it from her husband and garnering laughs when she says among other things, "You need a potential swing set." As the duet unfolds in the beginning, there is a fear that even the beautiful video projections created by local high school teens from TILT (Teaching Intermedia Literary Tools) won't be able to save us from the tedium of it. Hometown begins with that search for the ever elusive comfort, the typical grass is greener concept with which we are all familiar. Ho hum. Intentionally created, Goode lets the point linger just long enough before he changes the scene entirely. Two street people enter, the music (the work of the award winning Beth Custer and played seamlessly by her ensemble—Custer on clarinet and vocals, David James on guitar/voice, Jan Jackson on drums, Graham Connah on keyboards and Craig Broussard on bass) cuts in and makes a complete departure from dreamland, and we are transported to the city.

Enter Marit Brook-Kothlow, who offers a stand out performance as a disembodied hooker (is there any other kind?), her home a small plastic bag filled with whatever accoutrements du jour are to her satisfaction. Her frazzled hair reflects her mental state. Her hollow voice both sings and becomes the wind blowing through townÑthrough her. She sings/moans to us under the streetlight, and the result is both mesmerizing and haunting.

As the street dancers enter, they give Brook-Kothlow the once over, and comment disdainfully, "Damn." Thus begins what I am calling the Shit/Damn dance, my personal favorite. Dressed in costumes by Wendy Sparks that are pared down and specific, dancers Rachael Lincoln and Melecio Estrella are edgy street types. The piece begins to layer and contrast between the street people and the hometown couple, punctuated at points by Neubauer's gorgeously miniaturized sets that slide onstage at the exactly right moment. The real shift occurs when the male street character, played so well by Estrella that one wonders if he wasn't playing himself, steps on to the astroturfed and miniaturized park scene, and begins to crack. He opens up and says, "Look at this ribcage; it's like an armor." As he begins to disclose more and more he travels downstage and down the steps of the pit singing to us that inside he is soft—"baby's butt soft," and that inside his ribcage "is the only hometown he cares about." This is the pivotal statement of the entire piece and the message resonates deeply.

From here there is another poignant confessional solo from the hooker finished off with a group rescue where she is swept into the air by the two couples. All five move with a larger brushstroke vocabulary now as the piece reaches its climax, the melancholic refrain of Custer's score seeping into our skin. Goode's movement is awash and provides the meat to the bones of the succinct and heartrending dialogue which serves up a twist now as Burritt trades dialogue with Estrella, telling us of her armored ribcage, and confessing of her desire for the home surrounded by the white picket fence, perhaps enslaving her spouse in the absolute need of it. The movement becomes silhouetted in Elliot's efficient and poetic lighting as the piece winds down for the finish.

Hometown ends with a striking visual statement that knocks the ball out of the park. I don't want to spoil it for you, you'll have to come out and see this one for yourself.

As Goode prepares to tour to small hometowns all through the Midwest (and will be sure to receive a standing ovation in Minnesota), San Francisco will be proud to claim him as our own.