Floor work, with Brit finesse

Just as director Mike Leigh deftly created a drab, postwar 1950s England in his latest film, “Vera Drake,” so too has dancer-choreographer Yolande Yorke-Edgell managed to capture the yearnings, hopes and sly whimsies of her homeland.

“Now Then,” a program of old and new works performed by the eight-member Yorke Dance Project, brought the soul of the U.K. to the Wilshire Ebell Theatre on Saturday with ingenuity and finesse.

Indeed, the locally based company, which plans to establish a London foothold, bloomed like an English rose in Yorke-Edgell’s 20-minute premiere, “Divisions on a Ground.”

Set to Renaissance music, the five-suite dance portrays a young woman growing up in 1940s Britain, with Yorke-Edgell, a former Bella Lewitzky dancer, crafting a complex, keenly etched picture.

In the first dance, “Taking a View,” Kristen Wilkinson, Kristin Brown, Jennifer Flanagan and Yorke-Edgell, all clad in Diana MacNeil’s exemplary costumes -- florals, plaids and requisitely prim cardigans -- are gathered around a table before taking turns executing fanciful jumps, courtly jigs and unison skipping.

Childhood continued in “Don’t Speak,” with Flanagan and Wilkinson discovering the art of keeping and revealing secrets. Brown’s solo, “Queensway,” proved a study in angst, the dancer slicing the air with filigreed arm work. For “The Chelsea Potter,” the quartet donned caps and scarves, their loose limbs ceding to group stamping. “Dawes Road,” punctuated with Dickensian sorrow, showcased erect bodies, stealth-walking and the choreographer skittering backward, her flexed feet perfectly articulated.

Yorke-Edgell’s other premiere, “Now,” had the company -- including Yvette Wulff, Shelby William, Samantha Robinson and Yui Kirihara -- riffing on a subway motif in “Underground.” Against the background of Steve Reich’s pulsating score, the dancers brandished newspapers, executed karate-like kicks and kept brisk pace with ebullient leaps and hops. Jazzy moves permeated “Soho,” and the finale, “High Tea,” revealed Bryony Shearmur’s underwear adorned with the British flag.