Weare's 2007 "Sinnerman" opens the program, and like the sinnermen in Alvin Ailey's "Revelations," Weare keeps Adrian Clark on the run, though spasmodically, as he jogs and darts forward and backward in fits and starts. When he finally collapses/dives next to one of three women who've been lying immobile during his solo, the reverberation sends all three into tiny whole-body convulsions that become big flicks of their legs off the floor. They scissor their legs, roll, and crawl back. In the end - the women having slunk their way upstage - all four are standing, Clark tentatively, with the possibility of redemption hovering.
The four compelling dancers in Weare's world premiere "Bridge of Sighs" - Weare, Clark, Douglas Gillespie, and Leslie Kraus - depict the magnetism, healthy or not, that can draw and hold people together. The opening duet for Gillespie and Kraus sets the tone for the piece, somewhere between anxiety and menace. Yet there's a hint of playfulness as Kraus holds her comparatively tiny frame up to Gillespie's lankiness as they spar with the split-second timing of a theatrical swordfight. She punches his chest, he slaps/grasps her arm; she stomps forward, her legs twining between his, just missing his toes; he throws his arm around her upper torso, capturing her just as she backs into him, flinging her leg to wrap around him.
The arrival of Clark and Weare stanches the overt violence, but even as Gillespie and Kraus melt into the background, slow-dancing across the stage, their clutching, slippery embrace is unmistakably awash in abuse. The other couple has its own power issues - Clark dives his head into Weare's stomach, driving her back, though later his head traces down her torso, bowing contritely - but their neurotically charged physicality feels safer. Interestingly, the only glimpses of tenderness occur when the sexes are paired up, inviting the possibility that these four are not only in the wrong relationships; they're playing for the wrong team.
