DANCE REVIEW : Batsheva Co. at Royce Hall

Batsheva Dance Company of Israel brought great physical daring and deep intelligence to a four-part program Saturday in Royce Hall, UCLA: a program that brought into focus many shared assumptions and priorities of modern dance in the late ‘80s.

Recent (1985-88) works by Doug Varone, Nir Ben-Gal, Mark Morris and Daniel Ezralow explored similar concepts of sequenc

ing, of formal structure, of incorporating non-dance movement forms--especially gesture--and of making action, not acting, the key to expressive content.

With its cruciform lifts and the Lutheran world view of its Bach accompaniment, Varone’s “Cantata 78/Every Waking Hour” must have startled those spectators lured to the performance by ads promising a Hanukkah event.

No matter: The work’s moral view of human relationships and social responsibility--initially defined through depictions of isolation-within-a-group and developed through passages of increasing personal contact and shared weight--made a powerful universal statement.

Like Varone’s piece, Ben-Gal’s “Misleading Moments” (music by Wim Martins) reveled in counterpoint: a seated couple executing an intense, synchronous motion-cycle that the other cast members reiterated in surging corps passages.

Later on, women raised their skirts and men dropped their pants--with their partners hurrying to cover them up--but Ben-Gal never developed or resolved this intriguing contrast between the constrictions of patterned group behavior and the impulse toward anarchic self-expression.

A witty celebration of the contemporary dance world, Morris’ familiar “Canonic 3/4 Studies” (to piano arrangements of many different scores) had jokes and in-crowd references aplenty. However, even audience members unable to decode his parodies could enjoy Morris’ inventive gambits with balance and spectacular rhythmic acuity--not to mention the ebullient dancing.

Displays of punishing athleticism set to the music of Philip Glass have nearly become an ‘80s subgenre. But Ezralow’s “Eight Heads” set a new standard for risk and stamina with its careening gymnastics (dancers racing to hurl themselves through the air at other running dancers) and intricate, high-speed group sorties over, around and between two mobile staircases. Metrical precision and muscle-power, selflessness and finely honed individual skill: This showpiece needed just about everything and the Batsheva dancers responded magnificently.