Photos - Ralf BrinkhoffWhat does Australia succeed in? Cricket? Not lately, apparently. Not that I'd really know. Philanthropy? Not according to the electronic Dick. Manufacturing? What manufacturing? Microsurgery? Yeah, I think that used to be touted as one of our specialties. Tap dancing? Well, gay (in the colloquial sense) as that sounds, aha. Thanks to Dein Perry's Tap Dogs, the world knows us for something more than chundering, or throwing another, er, shrimp, on the barbie.
15 years ago Tap Dogs made a cacophonous entrance at Sydney's ubiquitous annual festival, so their return to the Capitol for a five-week anniversary season is an auspicious one, which brings with it much anticipation, our breath bated by a growing worldwide reputation: 11 million people, in 330 cities and 37 countries, have seen them.
One of Australia's most visionary directors and designers (born in Hobart, incongruously), Nigel Triffitt, takes on both those roles for these engagements, with Dein Perry, as ever, at the choreographic helm. Triffitt has long appealed as being his own man, provocatively downplaying his training at NIDA and London's Drama Theatre in deference to experience. Rampant and diverse success (from rock to opera, puppetry to 'visual' theatre) has doubtless proved the best revenge against any detractors along the way.
Perry was the inventor, if you will, of Tap Dogs, and has been a constant key to its trail of critical and popular triumph; the former including no less than 11 major awards, among them a NY Obie. (An Obie, when it's at home, is an off-Broadway gong given by The Village Voice to NYC performers; so, for Aussies to earn one, breaking through East Coast continental US parochialism, is news.)
But, of course, reputation can only take us so far: the proof is in the proverbial pudding, 'specially just after Chrissy, when artists clamour for attention in the run-up to festival fever.
The very idea of sustaining an 80-minute show, without interval, on the strength of tap, alone, is an ambitious, if not downright preposterous one: the fact the Doggies pull it off, managing to keep our heart-rates in their working zones for much, if not most, if not all of the time, goes to their inventiveness, proficiency, polish and professionalism, which is not just this side but, probably the other side of staggering: the duration and intensity of input to achieve this output is truly unimaginable.
It's grouse, too, that working-class, blokey references remain: if they're taking the piss, it's done with great humour and affection for the upside of Aussie maleness (yes, I think there is one). Consequently, VB (product placement?), scaffolding, welding tools and a generalised hard-labouring vibe permeates Triffitt's set and filters all the way down to the dancers' streetwise apparel.
Two pneumatic female percussionists stationed high above the floor steal some of the limelight but, by-and-large, it's hard to divert one's attention from the imaginative routines beaten out below, at a skill-level probably unknown in the whole history of tap, with a half-dozen hunky Bojangles (with film star Adam Garcia leading the pack) having what seems like a genuinely rollicking good time, which makes for a contagious energy that inspires the audience to a very enthusiastic ovation. For mine (and my companion's, if I intuited his reaction correctly), it took a short while to settle in and there were momentary lapses recorded on my thrillometer but, all-in-all, Tap Dogs reminds us that quality family entertainment isn't necessarily a dirty word and not entirely endangered by pasteurised, homogenised, adulterated Disneyfication and there's some intrinsic, attractive value left in innocence and simplicity (not that the steps involved here are anything mortals are in any danger of apprehending). That might make me sound like an old fart, but I am.
Sure, it's as much about big light, sound and fx as dance, but 21st-century expectations almost certainly demand more than the rustic charm of vaudeville.
Real blokes can, and do, dance. And real dancers can be, and are, real blokes.
Dein Perry's
Tap Dogs
Directed by Nigel Triffitt
Venue: Capitol Theatre, 13 Campbell Street, Haymarket
Dates: Wednesday 5 January – 6 February 2011
Times*: Tuesday – Saturday @ 8pm, Sunday @ 5pm
Matinees*: Saturday & Sunday @ 2pm
Tickets: $75 to $109.90 | Family Ticket $249
Bookings: Ticketmaster 1300 723 038 | www.ticketmaster.com.au
Visit: www.tapdogs.com.au
* Performance times remains subject to change
