[ssba]
Moon River
Reviewed by Jessica Salans
No Hay Banda at Son of Semele Creation Festival 2015
Through Feb. 5
RECOMMENDED:
Enchantingly, disarmingly bizarre.
I’m not sure what I witnessed Friday night, but it held attention.
A few of the oddities that occurred in this performance piece originally devised by Maria Garcia and Catarina Morena in London, include:
-A ten minute recording of Arizona’s SB 1070, one of the strictest anti-immigration measures passed in 2010.
-A beautiful, German aria sung through a suspended, stretched out, red velvet, lit-up- like-a-Christmas-ornament petticoat.
-Wall projections of a coyote, accompanied by Garcia in an 80’s wedding dress decked in dollar bills, enacting a sun salutation-esq ritual to the titular song.
-Garcia portraying a Tea Party Representative, relenting to be more likeable.
-Elocution lessons with the audience, a practice to entice aforementioned representative’s wife to sleep with him.
-“America the Beautiful” and original, haunting music on piano from the charming Sasha Evans.
-Garcia in an astronaut-alien costume suited with mushroom-topped scepters .
The overall performance is a reactionary creation from Ms. Garcia about the American Dream, student migrant and visa politics. Arizona’s SB 1070 promoted racial profiling, requiring state officers to determine the immigration status of someone arrested or detained under “reasonable suspicion”. A Supreme Court ruling in 2012 gutted most of the discriminatory legislation, with significant limits on local immigration enforcement. There have been other positive movements on immigration reform. At the start of this year, California enacted bill AB60, allowing any eligible California resident, regardless of immigration status, to attain a driver’s license. According to The Wall Street Journal, within the first three days, 46,200 people applied.
Garcia writes that she is dedicated to passing comprehensive immigration reform. I hope Garcia also remains committed to expressing her downplayed, curious eccentricities with audiences in Los Angeles, which gently encourage participation, freedom of thought, and laughter.
No Hay Banda/Son of Semele Company Creation Festival 2015, 3301 Bevelryu Blvd., Westlake; Saturday, January 31, 8 p.m. Sun., Feb. 1, 5 p.m., https://sonofsemele.org
