The Tempest Replica

In her new dance piece, based on motifs from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Crystal Pite stages a game of revenge and forgiveness, reality and imagination. Pite explores these motifs in two contexts: a maquette of Shakespeare’s island as a metaphor for isolation, captivity and desire, and a nostalgic cityscape that evokes longing. Chalk-white replicas deliver the essential plot points of the story, but the emotion and tension of the narrative are fleshed out by real characters. To explore and demonstrate this duplication of character and copy, the story and the body, requires something incomparably precious: the mastery and articulation of the dancer.