L.A.’s World of Dance : Ethnic Troupes Try to Stay True to Roots, Please Audiences

A virtual United Nations of dance explodes on Southern California stages this month as nearly a dozen touring companies--from Moscow, Sumatra, Spain, Guinea and India, even from New Mexico and Los Angeles--are scheduled to show their wares.

But for all the glitter on display--replete with native costumes and music--each visiting company will be dancing as fast as it can along a narrow precipice. Despite two performances recently canceled--by the admired Flamenco artist, Maria Benitez, at Wilshire Ebell Theatre (attributed to “poor promotion”)--the principal problem facing touring companies, according to their spokespeople and to some observers, is the longstanding confrontation between showmanship and authenticity.

“When we started, back in the 1950s,” said Spanish dancer Jose Molina, on the phone from a tour stop in Pittsburgh, “the idea Americans had was that Spanish dance was something that happened on top of a table. You know, the MGM version of Spanish dance.

“In those days, we had to be commercial, we had to more or less give the public what it expected.

“Now, after a long period in which Americans have traveled often to other parts of the world, being authentic is something our audiences expect of us. They want to see the true thing. Now that they are more sophisticated, we can be more authentic.”

Gema Sandoval, founder and artistic director of the 17-year-old Los Angeles ensemble, Floricanto/USA, which just wound up an engagement in San Gabriel, said: “In terms of commerce, one must put together a show that sells. But, naturally, it must be first of all true to its sources.”

Rikki Stein, Les Ballets Africains company manager, said that it is impossible to present dance to Western audiences as originally performed. “When you are in a village, it is all terribly exciting. The dust is flying, everybody is jumping, but there’s no way you can represent that on the Western stage. To make that transition, (the late founder Keita Fodeba) employed certain forms of blocking, choreography, entrances and exits, judicious use of lighting and, of course, many costume changes.

“So there is deformation. But the dance steps haven’t been messed with. The costumes, for the most part, haven’t been messed with. . . . The music is utterly as it should be.”

Stein, speaking on the phone from London, said his company’s dancers are recruited from among the best performers in Guinea and some are given special training to enhance their skills.

Stein also argued against a Western “preconception” about African culture. Westerners, he said, consider African culture “as some sort of time capsule which people step out of to entertain or amuse modern man.”

The use of words like raw, fierce and exotic are not appropriate in describing Les Ballets Africains, Stein insisted. These words, which have been used recently in reviews of the company, tend to rile him.

He is frustrated by critics who emphasize the kinetic style of the troupe and is equally opposed to characterizations of the company’s work as a kind of “ethnic cabaret” that, after decades of success in the West, has lost its former “innocence” and “authenticity.”

“I’m trying to legitimize the art form, to get away from all these images of exoticism and primitivism and be able to say this is an art form that should be able to stand proudly . . . with classical ballet and dance or opera or any art form you can mention,” he said.

Igor Moiseyev, who founded the granddaddy of all touring folk dance companies when he formed the Soviet State Folk Dance Ensemble in 1937--which eventually became the internationally beloved Moiseyev Company--emphasized that artistic evolution is a necessary part of presenting dance in America.

“Our company has always evolved. Our history is one of expansion and the widening of horizons,” the 85-year-old choreographer said in a phone interview from backstage in Houston. Speaking through an interpreter, Moiseyev said: “During the life of our ensemble, of course, we have in essence gone from folklore to pure artistic interpretation.”

Even more recently, the company has added dance of other nations to its repertory.

Even what to call the the art form is in question.

“Please don’t call it ethnic,” said Judy Mitoma, acting chair of the dance department at UCLA and also chair of the university’s World Arts and Cultures Program. “As in ethnic dance. I’m trying to persuade people not to use it. My solution, which creates problems too, I admit, is to refer to world dance. “

Mitoma claims that authenticity is not an issue in judging touring performance troupes, “because authenticity can only exist in its own cultural context. Put it on the stage and it is immediately no longer authentic. The issue isn’t there.

“We spend a lot of time trying to understand dance in its culture, where it is. But when work starts to travel, everything changes.”

Sandoval summed up the built-in problems with putting folk dance on the stage:

“Getting on the stage, you have to take chances. The change of medium makes a difference. That’s because you have to make choices--between sad or happy dances, between historical periods, between different aspects of a region, both of which are true, but one of which you won’t show.

“When I have to make discretionary choices, it is not commercialism I think about, but balance: balancing the work, and balancing the programs.”

Mitoma has a ready answer when asked how one can tell the difference between genuine folk expression and the phony.

“I look at whoever is delivering the message--performing the dance--and I do not assume that the one delivering it is the ultimate carrier.”

Times Staff Writer Chris Pasles contributed to this article.

DANCE TROUPES DUE

The Moiseyev Dance Company from Moscow, 54 years old and 150 members strong, is scheduled for a two-week engagement at the Pantages Theater in Hollywood. Les Ballets Africains, the 39-year-old, 33-performer company from Guinea, is due for five performances around Southern California in the coming week, including Pasadena Civic Auditorium on Sunday. Among others soon to arrive: “Ranganiketan,” a troupe from Manipur, India, due at Frost Auditorium in Culver City on Saturday; the Tonantzin Aztec Dancers (part of the Artes de Mexico festival) at San Gabriel Civic Auditorium, Tuesday; the touring Jose Molina Bailes Espanoles company, scheduled at Ambassador Auditorium, Nov. 23 and 24; the veteran, Los Angeles-based ensemble, Lola Montes & Her Spanish Dancers, performing at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa Nov. 23.