MOVEMENT
OVERVIEW
The heart of the movement training at UCI is Annie Loui’s approach to partnering work through contact improvisation; a dance improvisatory form based on weight and energy exchange between two people. This work is supported by technique including basic tumbling and dance lifts, and leads to integration of movement and text. Annie’s book The Physical Actor details the approach.
HOW
Grounded in the mime, modern dance and dance/theater explorations of Paris in the late 1970’s, and expanded through 30 years of studio training with actors, Loui movement technique releases the physical/emotional honesty of actors. This is a training of energy and weight exchange in which the ultimate goal is kinetic and intimate responsiveness to a partner. The playful, dynamic and exhilarating shifts of counter-balance that characterize this work are reached through the practice of contact improvisation. Basic tumbling, energy exchange exercises and partnering dance lifts are its fundamental building blocks. A good contact session taken into text allows the spontaneous physical language of the actors’ bodies to parallel the spoken dialogue. Without consciously imposing objectives actors inter-relate spontaneously, dynamically and elegantly; and the outcome is an imprinted ability to deliver emotional and physical honesty in a scene.
WHY
A good contact session taken into text allows the spontaneous physical language of the actors’ bodies to parallel the spoken dialogue. Without consciously imposing objectives actors inter-relate spontaneously, dynamically and elegantly; and the outcome is an imprinted ability to deliver emotional and physical honesty in a scene.