4 New Works, Little Progress

Cheers and jeers for Ballet Pacifica’s 10th annual summer choreographers’ workshop seen Saturday at South Coast Repertory.

The good news is that the Irvine-based company looked better than ever. It can now boast several strong, young dancers, including--but not limited to--Erin Holmes, Tye Gillespie, Spencer Gavin Hering and veteran Eloisa Enerio.

But as a whole, the company still lacked a unified look, consistency and, especially, a carry-through of dance impulse and momentum.

Three of the four new works, all created by choreographers from previous workshops and all presented as works-in-progress, were hugely derivative. The one that wasn’t was trivial in the extreme.

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Stephen Mills’ “Handel Concerto Grosso” matched sculptural forms to the baroque score much in the manner of a Paul Taylor, but without the great New York choreographer’s imaginative musicality.

Unfortunately, ensemble values were messy, and in the central pas de deux, Viktor Uygan handled Holmes roughly. But Gillespie had partnered Katherina Von Schonfeldt quite strongly in the opening movement.

Paul Vasterling’s “Ballet: Tango,” set to music by Astor Piazzolla, added little to what we’ve already seen much better in years of popular touring shows from Argentina.

The four men (Uygan, Hering, Paul Michael Bloodgood and Christopher Molloy) looked a bit strained in the choreographer’s would-be sensuality, but at least Melissa Ehrmann maintained her dignity as a used and abused brainless vamp.

Rick McCullough’s “Nova” was the most ambitious and substantial of the new works, vaguely articulating a post-nuclear holocaust and rebirth vision on the order of a Jiri Kylian work. (McCullough danced in Kylian’s Netherlands Dance Theater.)

But it was Britten’s “Sinfonia da requiem” and the minimal but effective scenic and light design by Liz Stillwell that carried the emotional weight, not McCullough’s loosely connected steps.

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Still, McCullough had found inspiration in Britten’s score. Colin Connor used Mozart’s little G-minor Symphony (No. 25) merely as wallpaper music for his airhead beach ballet called “Leisure Time.”

Here, a languid, static figure (Michel Gervais) reclined in a lawn chair in contrast to a group of six hyperactive dancers enacting various sports and games. Gervais’ lassitude turned infectious for the others, but Hering still managed to end the first movement in a blazing solo before collapsing in his chair.

In the slow movement, choreographer Connor seemed to want to get serious. Heather Winters appeared to suffer from loneliness, isolation, introspection or terminal ennui. It was hard to tell which. Gervais repeatedly tried to return her to life, without success. Eventually she becomes the odd girl out at the party. Lucky her.

At a post-performance discussion with the audience, Connor said he wasn’t a fan of Mozart’s music. That had been painfully obvious.