The American Dance Festival Presents THE AGE OF ANXIETY

The American Dance Festival presents dendy/donovan projects' Mark Dendy (Obie and "Bessie" award winning choreographer) and British producer/director Stephen Donovan as they make the jump from stage to screen with their debut film tHe aGe oF aNXieTy (The ADF Exclusive Cut).

This acclaimed duo has been making and producing experimental dance-theater-visual art in and around New York for over a decade. The film will make its world premiere at ADF in Durham, NC, at an in-person event at Mystic Farm & Distillery on June 15 & 16 (more info and tickets at https://bit.ly/3cbyM5q) and will be available for online viewing June 20 through June 26 (tickets available at http://tickets.duke.edu/online/article/adfanxiety21.

Drawing upon their own personal mental health challenges, this formidable team leaps full force into the world of the moving image and a journey of displacement, sadness and rage, and real life. Illuminated through dance and a landscape of disparity, racial and social injustice, political chaos, and dysfunction, their story is told through the eyes of the central character, Monsieur Le Clown.

Monsieur Le Clown, sad and lonely, is catapulted into internal isolation when he perceives the world outside is collapsing because of Covid-19. Self-isolated in mind and body, he fantasizes about life beyond his pandemic prison, a 6th floor NYC walk up, while his faithful companion "Depression" dreams of a different type of final exit in Trump-era America.

tHe aGe oF aNXieTy is a reaction, a document of its time, a call to action. It is a visual feast that is "a twisted love letter to New York City." The film investigates the self and the collective. tHe aGe oF aNXieTy explores how our minds are held hostage by a fractured society and the actions of others, and where fragments of reality and fiction blur the boundaries of public and private and collide where history and the personal live together.

Dendy's daring physicality and wit, combined with Donovan's pointed social commentary and "grit and guerrilla" visual style, along with a poignant and surreal non-linear narrative, chronicles the vibrancy, color, and kinetic life-force of the New York City streets during the 2020 lockdown.

A dynamic score, sixteen incredible performers, and many iconic New York locations such as Central Park, The World Trade Center, The Hudson River Piers, The Public Library, and East Village rooftops connect together to heighten the raw visual energy as we witness this unique moment in history told through the eyes of Monsieur Le Clown. This is his personal and life affirming journey.