Shadowbox Live brings true crime to stage in story of Bonnie and Clyde
Shadowbox Live explores the romantic legend and harsh reality of outlaws Bonnie and Clyde in its new dance-theater piece.
“No Return: The Deadly Dance of Bonnie and Clyde,” originally planned to debut in 2020, will open Sept. 15 for a two-month run at 503 S. Front St.
“Bonnie and Clyde’s story is... so dramatic, like a true-crime TV show,” company leader Katy Psenicka said.
Psenicka conceived, choreographed and directed the piece, beginning in 2019, based on her research of the short-lived lives of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. One of America’s most famous criminal couples from a widely covered manhunt, they were shot to death by officers in a 1934 ambush.
“What Clyde and Bonnie endured during the Dust Bowl era was incredible... It’s a wild story of survival with many moments of no return. Telling the story through dance shows their path to self-destruction,” Psenicka said.
“We put this cautionary tale together to highlight their humanity,” she said.
Double-casting emphasizes characters
Of the 32-member cast of actors, dancers, singers and onstage band members, Psenicka double-cast the four roles of Bonnie, Clyde, Clyde’s brother Buck and his wife Blanche. To fulfill Psenicka’s dance-driven vision for “No Return,” one performer dances and another performer sings and speaks each key role.
“Between the eight of us, you’ve got the full Barrow Gang,” Leah Haviland said.
Haviland delivers brief dialogue and sings as Bonnie, often in scene-setting moments that lead into Amy Lay dancing the role.
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“I love the challenge ... You have to be able to distill down the emotion into the moment to convey it succinctly to the audience,” Haviland said.
“Bonnie was a dreamer who wanted to be a famous poet, singer and movie star ... In a time of heartache and hardship, the news locked onto Bonnie and Clyde ... With so many fans, they were like today’s TikTok stars,” she said.
Modern songs add contemporary feel
Brimming with a pop-rock score drawn from Top 40 hits, the two-act dance-theater piece dramatizes the star-crossed lovers’ two-year crime spree, with flashbacks from their first meeting in the 1930s through Clyde’s 1932 release from prison.
Among Haviland’s songs are alternate versions of The Cowboy Junkies’ “Misguided Angel” and Katy Perry’s “Dark Horse.”
Other songs in the score come from Fiona Apple, David Bowie, Kate Bush, The Doors, Peter Gabriel, Billy Joel, John Legend, Led Zeppelin, Styx, U2 and other pop/rock songwriters.
“The numbers start within the scene, and morph into the dancing with the actors moving into the background,” Haviland said.
“Each scene of dialogue helps ground the audience back into the grim reality of the Depression era from the beauty, abstraction and heightened emotions of the dance movements,” she said.
Challenging roles evoke characters' struggles
JT Walker dances as Clyde while Jamie Barrow sings and speaks the role.
“Bonnie and Clyde have tragic, self-destructive flaws in the classic sense of tragedy,” Walker said.
“I don’t think these two ever had a shot... or any real chance at happiness,” he said.
In one key dance to Gabriel’s “Don’t Give Up,” Walker aims to evoke Clyde’s struggle in prison. “Alone in a prison cell, Clyde feels despair and longing. He’s having a difficult time, constantly being beaten and abused on a whim by the guards,” Walker said.
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“Buoyed by a letter from Bonnie, he decides to hold out and keep surviving,” Walker said.
Although Walker hasn’t shared a role like this before, the veteran performer danced the role of Heathcliff in "Madness and Lust,” the troupe’s 2014 dance-theater piece adapted from “Wuthering Heights.”
“For me, the main draw of working at Shadowbox is the ability to do so many different kinds of things. I know of no other place in the world that offers so much variety and opportunity to learn to do so much,” he said.
Video enhancements help tell the story
A signature element in “No Return” is its multimedia blending of movement and voice with video.
“More than most of our shows, video helps move the story along,” said David Whitehouse, Shadowbox Live’s director of digital content and design.
“Since the story isn’t told chronologically, the video helps to clarify the narrative with flashbacks showing how Bonnie and Clyde first met,” he said.
More video, mostly shot in 2021, was added to flesh out the story with several large-scale scenes, including one elaborate sequence filmed on an estate with a 1936 Ford Model A.
Working with digital designer Zach Tarantelli, Whitehouse developed video based on Psenicka’s vision and suggestions for historical footage.
“To make it feel authentic, we edited our performers into old black-and-white newsreels ... In one colorful dream sequence, the Barrow gang imagines what life will be like when they’re rich and famous,” Whitehouse said.
Narrative choreography enhances the production
Overall, though, the dancing and music primarily define “No Return.”
“The choreography is pretty complex,” Psenicka said.
“Most people who come to Shadowbox Live might never see a traditional dance show, but are thoroughly entertained by our dance-theater pieces. They’re not strictly dance because the choreography is storytelling that makes it more accessible, she said.
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The pandemic ended up giving Psenicka and others on the troupe’s creative team more time to develop and polish the piece.
“My imagination was working to my advantage during the shutdown,” she said. “It was a blessing in disguise that allowed me to expand the show and push beyond where I normally would have gone.
@mgrossberg1
At a glance
Shadowbox Live will present “No Return: The Deadly Dance of Bonnie and Clyde” at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 15, 2 p.m. Sept. 18 and 7:30 p.m. Thursdays and 2 p.m. Sundays through Nov. 13 at 503 S. Front St. The production, initially scheduled to open Sept. 8, was postponed a week as a precautionary measure after two actors and a musician tested positive for COVID-19. Tickets cost $40 to $240. (614-416-7625, www.shadowboxlive.org)
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Shadowbox to perform 'No Return: The Deadly Dance of Bonnie and Clyde'
