DANCE REVIEW : KUDELKA’S SPIRITUAL ‘PASSAGE’

There are the brash nose-thumbers among choreographers--say, Twyla Tharp or William Forsythe. And there are the solemn mystics such as Glen Tetley or Jiri Kylian. Happily, the Joffrey Ballet has invited both kinds to its stage in the past.

And now comes James Kudelka. Count him with the latter.

Also count him as an engaging theatrical mind, one who knows how to wring a provocative situation from the barest metaphorical context, one who applies the Tudor-esque language of modern ballet to his dramatic scenas with inordinate skill.

If Kudelka’s “Passage,” seen Tuesday in its local premiere at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, is an indicator of his talent, the Canadian dance-maker has important work to do. He may not be as bold or harrowing as Kylian, but his frame of reference is infinitely more challenging than the oiled, push-pull physicality of Tetley. You could say he combines the best of both.

The quasi-narrative of “Passage” focuses on an unearthly creature, David Palmer, his muscular body bathed in white powder and captured under a shadowy spotlight. While he spins, twists and stretches with fluid urgency, others--dressed in street wear--are magnetized to him.

In their brief healing contact with this saviour, whose self-energizing motion is beneficently Christ-like, these penitent souls lean, cling, collapse and supplicate. Finally, he falls and they lift his pale, limp body as though from the cross. The images sear. They are reinforced by the taped a cappella choirs of Thomas Tallis’ “Spem in alium,” its thick overlapping sounds reinforcing the constancy of motion, its long lines directing the eye along the choreographic paths.

The Joffrey dancers gave “Passage” their most passionate effort and it was inspirational--especially that of the gifted Palmer. But they just as easily transformed themselves into genial punsters for Paul Taylor’s “Arden Court.”

Like angels, they caught the humanity and gentle glee of this neo-classic work. So did they show sensitivity to Taylor’s overall enlightenment, his pristine sense of design, his superior musicality--aided by conductor Jonathan McPhee’s buoyant, vigorous way with the William Boyce potpourri.

True, some of the humor of role-reversal got lost in the Joffrey translation. There are no men here big and burly enough to define the delightful ridiculousness of their doing delicate balletic feats and promenades arabesques. But the whole cast reveled in the gracious little floor-skimming leaps and scissored sprints--and double-time footwork in counterpoint to adagio movements.

With Taylor, there’s always a squiggly joke lurking about and “Arden Court” had several. Who in the audience did not laugh out loud as a line of men with spread arms and legs revealed among them one who was upside down?

By comparison, Gerald Arpino’s “Confetti,” a tutu and tambourine extravaganza, looked decidedly innocuous with its en face flourishes and skitterings. But the company never lets on that it is doing anything less than significant. The evening ended with the same choreographer’s ever-familiar “Light Rain.”