DANCE REVIEW : Graceful Tandy Beal & Company Perform at OCC

As members of the audience began to file into the theater at Orange Coast College on Friday, trying to match ticket stubs to seat numbers, they noticed a barefoot woman in a black dress tumbling in slow motion over the rows of seats.

A glance toward the front of the auditorium and they saw a barefoot gent in a black cutaway coat beckoning to the mysterious woman, while, in the other aisle, another couple was moving in similarly graceful sync.

No, these elegant interlopers weren’t patrons. They were the dancers of Tandy Beal & Company, in a captivating pre-show tableau that set the mood for the fanciful bill of dance to follow.

In a variety of familiar yet freshly performed group and solo works, Beal justified her reputation as a richly talented choreographer-dancer.

An astute sense of social gesture marked the group dances, especially the charming “Creation du Monde,” which traced the adventures of several chic couples as they found themselves in a Garden of Eden.

“Dust to Dust,” to music by Jon Scoville, also followed a journey, this time of a group of dancers who changed from mere humans into jewel-like golden statues and then back to humans again.

Beal’s solos included “Everything Is True but Desire,” a tale of a woman’s encounters with various adversities, and “Mysterious Barricades or the Plot Without Thickener,” a sardonic glimpse at a woman in a long red dress.

“Figure of Speech,” Beal’s self-conscious and fourth-wall-breaking monologue about the creative process, featured little dance and would have been best left off the otherwise sophisticated program.