{"id":120,"date":"2022-11-04T19:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-04T20:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/?p=120"},"modified":"2023-09-24T11:58:02","modified_gmt":"2023-09-24T11:58:02","slug":"jennifer-archibalds-guess-whos-coming-to-dinner-premieres-at-richmond-ballet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/2022\/11\/04\/jennifer-archibalds-guess-whos-coming-to-dinner-premieres-at-richmond-ballet\/","title":{"rendered":"Jennifer Archibald\u2019s \u201cGuess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner\u201d Premieres at Richmond Ballet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recent ballets by choreographer Jennifer Archibald<\/a> explore how dancing creates a distinct kind of remembrance, homage and hopefulness. This week, her unique combination of choreography and documentary brings together political history, a cinematic classic and Richmond Ballet<\/a>. Entitled Guess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner,<\/em> her new ballet <\/a>was inspired by the 1967 film<\/a> of the same title that starred Sidney Poitier. The film plot features a white woman bringing Poitier, her fianc\u00e9, home to meet her supposedly liberal white parents.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until June 12, 1967, six months before the film was released, that interracial marriage was legalized. That court case, Loving v. Virginia<\/a>, took place in the state where Archibald was commissioned to make a ballet.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt started with Guess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner<\/em>,\u201d says Archibald. \u201cI wanted to pay homage to this historic film through a ballet, as a step toward changing the narratives seen on stages. The spine of the story is about love, and the music for the ballet binds together themes of compassion, love and civil rights history. Singers\u2019 voices inspire dancers to respond physically and to explore vulnerability as part of loving relationships. The ballet\u2019s duets reflect the highs and lows that are part of unconventional relationships, historically and today.\u201d<\/p>\n

The score includes music by Sam Cooke<\/a>, a central figure in the civil rights movement, who imbues the ballet with a soulful and poignant acoustic landscape.<\/p>\n

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Eri Nishihara and Zacchaeus Page in Jennifer Archibald’s Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner<\/em> Photo by Sarah Ferguson, courtesy Richmond Ballet.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Archibald has distinguished herself as a courageous choreographer who can uncover difficult histories and make strides towards greater understanding and connections among people. In 2021, her commission for Tulsa Ballet, called Breakin\u2019 Bricks<\/a><\/em>, examined the city\u2019s past and future, acknowledging the horrific massacre of 1921 while making space for a city that can \u201cbuild together, and create a community that can listen to and support one another,\u201d says Archibald in a video<\/a> about the process of making Breakin\u2019 Bricks<\/em> that is subtitled \u201cFinding Spirit Through Ashes.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ballet was selected as one of the best events of 2021, with Tulsa World<\/em> critic James D. Watts Jr. writing, \u201cJennifer Archibald\u2019s Breakin\u2019 Bricks<\/em> \u2026 is a work that left the audience with an unspoken but inescapable question: Now that you\u2019ve seen how racism both subtle and gross has permeated our past and present, what will you do to remove it from our collective future?\u201d<\/p>\n

In Richmond, a city that was the capital of the Confederacy from 1861 to 1865, and, in 2020, home to protests about Confederate monuments, Archibald was inspired by the dancers. \u201cRichmond Ballet is made up of a group of artists who are diverse, thoughtful, and reflective,” she says. “While making this ballet, we had many conversations about the city\u2019s history, and its future. I talked about my own parents and what life was like for them as an interracial couple who got married in 1969 in Canada. I am hopeful that it\u2019s the current generation of dancers and choreographers who are making ballet a place to share stories that are relevant to everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Richmond Ballet dancers in Jennifer Archibald\u2019s Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner<\/em>. Photo by Sarah Ferguson., courtesy Richmond Ballet.
 <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Guess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner<\/em> premieres on November 1 and will be performed in Richmond until November 6, as part of the company\u2019s Studio 2 program. The ballet will also be included in Richmond Ballet\u2019s January 27 performance at the Virginia Wesleyan University Susan S. Goode Fine and Performing Arts Center in Virginia Beach, Virginia.<\/p>\n

The post Jennifer Archibald’s “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” Premieres at Richmond Ballet<\/a> appeared first on Dance Magazine<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recent ballets by choreographer Jennifer Archibald explore how dancing creates a distinct kind of remembrance, homage and hopefulness. This week, her unique combination of choreography and documentary brings together political history, a cinematic classic and Richmond Ballet. Entitled Guess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner, her new ballet was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":122,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":125,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120\/revisions\/125"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.leigh-annemccaguecouture.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}