Deepe Darknesse opened to dead silence — except for faint crinkles and pops. Two performers cautiously stepped forward when introducing themselves, rolling out bubble wrap onstage. In one moment, graceful, intentional moves mimicked ballerinas. In another, they’d freeze, eyes locking onto audience members as their bodies convulsed in place.
Experimentation and the surreal provide the groundwork for Deepe Darknesse — a theater-dance hybrid rebelling against contemporary norms. The show premiered in June 2023 in New York City and had its third-ever run at The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center last Thursday and Friday.
According to Lisa Fagan, co-creator of Deepe Darknesse, the dancers intentionally leave the audience in the dark during the opening moments, an idea she finds engaging.
“It’s really fun for us as performers because the audience has to learn a game,” Fagan said. “They have to figure out what’s happening, and so some people do, some people don’t.”
Deepe Darknesse forgoes many traditional story elements throughout its runtime. Fagan and fellow creator and performer Lena Engelstein mostly rely on movement to tell the performance’s narrative, save for some dialogue towards the end.
Fagan attributes much of Deepe Darknesse’s esoteric nature to her disillusionment with contemporary dance. She said she sought more after “being bored” with aspects of dance and became invested in experimental theater.
“I used to say I’m like a choreographer who hates dance [because] it feels limiting, but it’s also incredibly expansive,” Fagan said. “What is the point at which it transforms into something worth seeing and isn’t just decorative?”
This longing similarly seeps into the performance. In the first half, Fagan and Engelstein jolt between dance styles with a similar transience as their environment. Cartoonish, excessive dancing snaps to traditional tango as unseen radio music plays. The stage’s lights occasionally lost power, sending the two dancers numb as guest performer Hannah Mitchell applied garish makeup.
Fagan and Engelstein zig-zag between three moods for an extended period. The story only marches forward when they plunge into darkness.
Greenbelt resident Vanessa Zanin interpreted these moments as both a commentary on how women are pressured to present themselves to the world and a metaphor for depressive episodes.
“It was like they were robots, and I could feel how they had to go through the motions,” Zanin said. “And then when the [tango] music came on, it was like being a woman … you have to look, be awesome, but otherwise just keep going through the motions.”
Fagan and Engelstein drew inspiration from the ancient Roman novel The Golden Ass while creating Deepe Darknesse, which centers on a man who turns into a donkey after attempting to become a bird. According to Engelstein, the dancers portrayed themes of transformation through interpretive movement.
“There were a lot of really vivid imagery and states that were evoked in reading [The Golden Ass] that we were using the body to try and achieve …” Engelstein said. “We were attempting to bring the language of that world … to have it bubble up against the surface and just barely poke through.”
Transformation permeates nearly every aspect of Deepe Darknesse. Towards the end of the performance, the movements turn primal, reflecting Fagan and Engelstein’s evolution into animals. Engelstein kicks like a donkey as Fagan perches on a ledge, cawing like a bird.
Even in its final moments, Deepe Darknesse refuses to fully reveal its hand. Its narrative begs for audience engagement, rife with symbolism and open-ended questions.
Audience member Drew Fields thought that Deepe Darknesse “intentionally defies being interpreted,” and seeks to evoke a feeling of rebellion.
“I think it was meant to evoke a feeling and sense of frustration and wanting to be different and all the things that we deal with in our daily life,” Fields said.
Fagan finds the most excitement in peeling back the many layers of Deepe Darknesse, even as she’s performing. She wonders if audiences will find a similar thrill when watching.
“There is a [feeling] through the course of the show that is like stripping away and peeling the onion of a person and landing it in a kind of raw state,” Fagan said. “That feels for us, as performers, incredibly real, and so I wonder if people will sort of feel that a little bit too.”
