Somnambules and the 7 Deadly Sins

If you've ever been to see a Derevo piece—a company with whom award-winning dancer/performers Yael Karavan and Tanya Khabarova have both worked—you'll have some idea of what to take away from this gleefully disturbing journey into an altered sleep state. If not: good luck.

Both Karavan and Khabarova are beautiful movers, but it's their eye for a striking image—something that scratches just beneath the surface of recognition—that glints through this piece and ultimately stops it from being self-indulgent.

They tease and prickle us with a grim and a beautiful series of vignettes that recall grand gothic archetypes and silent movie fiends. Khabarova is the demonic doctor, malfunctioning and out of control, making her subject sign a Faustian pact, before she is whisked away to dance with death under a pumpkin-gold moon. Roses and bridal white emerge as themes. The pair duet exquisitely behind a shadow screen like conjoined twin-lovers, then emerge as posturing showmen in black hats. Suddenly, a turd falls from the sky onto a cloth map of the world, and they fling it up and down with abandon. Tightrope walking the line between horrific and charming, the result is really quite enjoyable.

But while the ending hints at an overarching theme of destruction, it doesn't feel like the result of what has come before. A tighter driving force would give this piece the power it seeks to convey. That said, it's well worth it if you're looking for something at the twilight hour with a few more fangs than cabaret.