Celebrating its 25th year, Deborah Slater Dance Theater (DSDT) announces the world premiere of PRIVATE LIFE. Three years in the making, PRIVATE LIFE is a series of interconnecting stories about a group of American soldiers and their families. With text by poet Deborah Crooks, original music by composer Bruno Louchouarn, and choreography and direction by Deborah Slater, PRIVATE LIFE plumbs the emotional depths of military life and the fundamental nature of what it means to survive.PRIVATE LIFE opens Thursday, December 11, 2014 and runs through Sunday, December 14 at ODC Theater.
Slater conceived the idea for PRIVATE LIFE through a series of conversations with former ODC dancer Private Freeman, who joined the military at age 17, one year before he started to dance. PRIVATE LIFE grapples with the seemingly opposite worlds of art and war, using Sun Tzu's 6th c. BCE military treatise The Art of War as a primary structuring tool. "What interests me in the book is Sun Tzu's psychological analysis of power -- how you get it and hold on to it. Many of his chapters serve as blueprints for relationships, the domestic just as much as the military kind," says Slater.
PRIVATE LIFE interweaves Private Freeman's story in the form of filmic dreams and memories which punctuate the live performance. Ben Estabrook, Lindsay Gauthier, Loren Robertson andIan Winters collaborated on the videography. Performing the various roles of soldier, husband, wife and girlfriend are
Anna Greenberg and Andrew Merrell, making their DSDT debut. They join returning company members Derek Harris, Kerry Mehling and Kelly Kemp. Beth Harris and actor
Paul Finocchiaro round out the cast.
"Military life offers a lens for considering questions which I would not have otherwise," continues Slater. "When you have a near-death experience, what do you hold on to? What does it mean to have an experience that no one else close to you has had? Why do some people suffer PTSD, and others not? Why does there always have to be a winner and a loser?"
Slater last collaborated with Louchouarn on Night Falls, a work about a woman on her 60th birthday, which premiered at ODC Theater in 2011. PRIVATE LIFE marks Slater's fourth collaboration with Izzie Award-winning lighting designer Allen Willner (Men Think They Are Better Than Grass, The Desire Line and Night Falls) and her second with Crooks (Survival of the Fit Enough).
Sean Riley serves as set designer.
A post-performance reception in honor of DSDT's 25th anniversary is scheduled for PRIVATE LIFE's opening on December 11. Tickets go on sale November 1, and range between $15 and $30. To purchase online, visit
odcdance.org/buytickets.php or call 415-863-9834, Monday through Friday from 12 - 3pm.
For information about all of DSDT's performances and programs this fall, including a monthly broadcast of past works on 2nd Line TV, visit deborahslater.org.
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