Dance and Music Reviews : ‘Mind’s Eye,’ a New Sci-fi Ballet, at Pepperdine

“The Mind’s Eye--Year 2031,” a new multimedia sci-fi ballet by Bethune Theatredanse and E.Z.T.V., offered an interplanetary journey that never really got off the ground Saturday at Smothers Theatre, Pepperdine University.

Based on the celebrated C. S. Lewis novel “Perelandra,” it featured script and choreography by Zina Bethune, video by Michael J. Masucci, a variety of music styles, voice-overs, and elaborate decor and costumes--everything but insight and poetic imagination.

This full-length narrative work presented a succession of events, but neither explored nor developed them. Two projection screens positioned upstage like a pair of eyes provided nearly constant video accompaniment that rarely illuminated or amplified the dancing.

Did we really need close-ups of the protagonists emoting? (Or, for that matter, sententious voice-overs of their telepathic communication?) Special effects cliches included violet seas, asteroids hurtling through space, and dancers “flying” like the old TV Superman.

“The Mind’s Eye” invited comparison to L.A. Chamber Ballet’s “The Little Prince,” a recent full-length dance adaptation about interplanetary adventure, done with relative economy of means and much greater poetic effect. Dancers aimlessly tossing around phosphorescent spheres in “Mind,” for example, recalled the more memorable buoyant globes in “Prince.”

A scene devoted to Apollo and three muses (beauty, music, and reason) invited even less favorable comparison to Balanchine’s inimitable masterwork “Apollo.”

Only James Dunne (Ransom) created a coherent character with sustained professional-level dancing. Pallas Sluyter made a physically and dramatically ponderous Green Lady (Perelandra). The rest of the cast was well-drilled but uneven, and overall performance energy and focus often flagged.