Get a Move On

Richard Move first
incarnated Martha Graham—as dance icon, grande dame and dispenser of eloquent
oracular truths—in 1996, and those Martha@
Mother performances (now legendary in their own right) launched a career
path that is still thriving 15 years later. What began in a Meatpacking
District nightclub has taken him to Town Hall, Berlin, London and Italy (where
he declaimed La Graham’s words in Italian), and even a guest appearance at the
Graham company’s 80th-anniversary gala.

The cascading gown, the
almost-scary make-up, the ultra-tightly-pulled back hair, the distinctive vocal
patterns: Move as Martha has achieved his own iconic status. Now he and his
ongoing performance enterprise MoveOpolis come to Dance Theater Workshop with a
new twist on his Martha@… series. He
will recreate a 1963 public interview Graham did with Walter Terry at the 92nd
Street Y. Playwright/actress Lisa Kron (In
the Wake, Well) takes on the role
of Terry, a notable, influential dance critic, author and lecturer who died in
1982.

An audio recording of the
interview was discovered recently by an archivist, and was soon brought to
Move’s attention. “1963 was a very interesting moment in her life,” Move says.
“She’s almost 69, and about to experience what she called her ‘first death,’
when she could no longer dance. She would soon be crippled with rheumatoid
arthritis. Her drinking was about to become very public and almost kill her
within a few years. So this is right before that downward spiral. In this
interview, she’s still really in grand form, in terms of her eloquence. There
are great moments of levity, and of real darkness. She speaks in detail about
some of her great roles: Clytemnestra, Jocasta, Ariadne, the Bride in Appalachian Spring.”

In developing the Martha@… series, Move has read
everything he could about Graham, and accumulated an oral history from
conversations with Graham dancers. “I’m pretty deep into my research, but
there’s a lot in this interview that I haven’t heard her say, or seen
published, anywhere. For me to hear things for the first time on this audio
recording, that was a big deal.”

Move chose Kron, a founding
member of the Obie-winning troupe The Five Lesbian Brothers, to portray Terry
for a number of reasons. The two are friends and have collaborated on a
play—and he greatly admires her work. “It seemed important to me that the role
be played by a writer/actor/raconteur, and Lisa is all three. She is well read
on Graham. I thought it would be interesting to push the gender envelope, take
it to another level. And something really fascinating happened. The gender play
of it, I think, creates that immediate sense of irony. I think people listen
more intently; it breaks down a barrier immediately and lets people in sooner,
and in a more intense way.

“We know so much about
Graham, but it’s been really fun trying to learn about Walter Terry,” he notes.
In addition to reviewing dance for the Herald
Tribune and Saturday Review and
writing numerous books, Terry was an ebullient booster of dance and friend to
many in the field. “We can access tons of his writing, but there’s not a lot
about him. We’ve found a Warhol
drawing of him with a pinky ring and an ascot and cigarette holder. So in the
early ’60s, he was a bit of a dandy. He has an amazing speech pattern; these
are two people with their own manner of speaking, completely—in terms of word
choices, cadence, grammar, you name it!”

Sharing the stage and
adding another layer will be two elegant dancers who often work with Move:
Katherine Crockett, a current principal with the Graham company, and Catherine
Cabeen, who danced with that company and Bill T. Jones. “There are moments
where they appear as Martha at her peak,” Move says. “The interview content is
real dense. And we’re really sticking as closely as possible, as performers, to
the way they did it. There are moments where Graham gets up, and where I’m
going to do that. But the majority of it is their discussion about her roles,
the development of the technique, et cetera. So I have these two women
animating it, bringing it to life in a certain way. So you both hear the text
and you see some moments of it.”

Move timed these DTW performances
to the 20th anniversary of Graham’s death on April 1. In his inimitable way, he
has been keeping her alive for much of those two decades. “At first I was
concerned that only dance people would ‘get it.’ The reality is, people relate
to her as the quintessential icon, as the diva, as one of the great first
pioneering women in her arena, like Coco Chanel, Diana Vreeland, Bette Davis. I
soon realized I was on to something special, because it was resonating with
people both inside and outside of dance.”

Richard Move and MoveOpolis

March 30–April 2, Dance Theater Workshop, 219 W. 29th St.
(betw. 7th & 8th Aves.), 212-924-0077;
7:30, $20.