Warrin’ Piece : Donald Byrd’s ‘Bristle’ Fuels Raging Power Plays Between Dancers--and Has Parallels to His Past

Off to a hostile start, unsmiling men and women in Donald Byrd’s newest dance stand erect in separate camps like opposing troops ready for battle. It’s a war the choreographer knows firsthand.

“I have a relationship now that for 10 years was like one big battle,” before things changed, said Byrd, whose New York troupe will perform “Bristle,” an evening-length work, at Irvine Barclay Theatre on Thursday. The presentation concludes the theater’s 1993-94 Feet First Contemporary Dance Series.

Premiered in Baltimore in the fall and danced earlier this week in Santa Barbara, “Bristle” seethes with energy that fuels violent power plays--both sides fight to dominate--and explores other issues, including intimacy, or the fear of it, seduction and trust.

Deploying a mix of sharp-edged, postmodern dance, ballet and pedestrian movement, the acclaimed dance-maker’s alienated charges fling themselves together like co-dependents, repel one another like commitment-phobic loners, and make love that looks at times like rape, at others like unfeeling aerobics.

At one point, dancers strip down to their underwear. That, Byrd said recently, represents the point in a love relationship, amid all the conflict and violence, “when there’s nothing left to do but expose the true self; the clothing is like a shield.”

“You also have the (characters) at their most seductive,” he said. “And, from a strictly theatrical point of view, it heightens the tension of the piece.”

Byrd, 44, is considered one of his generation’s top choreographers. He founded his eight-member company, Donald Byrd/The Group, in 1976 and has since crafted works for major troupes in the United States and Europe.

Among his critically praised creations are “The Minstrel Show: Acts for Coons, Jigaboos and Jungle Bunnies” (1991), which addresses racism and stereotypes, and “Drastic Cuts” (1992), a suite of virtuosic, abstract dances.

In a phone interview before the Santa Barbara performance, he said that “Bristle” was inspired in part by Jean Baudrillard’s writings. One of the French intellectual’s theories suggested to Byrd that bigger-than-life, lace- and red-velvet-trimmed notions of love must die in order for relationships to survive.

Brainwashed by the movies and romance novels, Byrd said, “most of us think that our partner has to give us a lot of attention for us to believe they love us, that they have to demonstrate their desire and love” in an epic way, a la “Gone With the Wind.”

Such overblown fantasies “really get in the way of our actually being with the person; we’re not really dealing with the person in the room or the bed with us.” A successful relationship requires the ability to “just be with another human being” and accept his or her flaws, he said.

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Byrd’s longtime musical collaborator, Mio Morales, wrote “Bristle’s” propulsive, synthesized score. Its midsection, however, contains some of Ravel’s “La Valse,” a waltz that builds to an over-the-top frenzy, musically reinforcing the “ludicrousness” of dressed-up romanticism over genuine love, Byrd said.

“I used the Ravel,” he said, “because it’s European music, and for most people that means romanticism.”

Harmony is the theme of the work’s final third act. Tenderness prevails as the men sweetly kiss and caress their mates; pas de deux partnering becomes give-and-take, men and women supporting each other’s weight. This resolution mirrors the progression of his own, formerly war-torn relationship, today a dozen years old, Byrd said.

“One day, I noticed that the fighting had stopped. There was much more harmony, and I realized I was more accepting of (my mate), and they were more accepting of me, including my limitations.”

Still, while dancers embrace at the end, a subtle sense of discord remains.

“When you enter into an arena of intimacy,” Byrd said, “there’s always going to be a certain amount of conflict. The proportions of it change, but it’s always there.

Similarly, there is no expression of joy in “Bristle,” performed by dancers in austere, black or gray garb.

“No, the joy would come after the third act,” Byrd said. “If you can get to a place where you can accept the person, be with them, whoever they are, there’s a tremendous amount of joy, but getting there is dark. Also, basically, I don’t think I’m an optimistic person. I have moments of great optimism, but . . . .”