Dance work at Harbourfront holds a mirror to our need to be loved

Norwegian choreographer and all-round theatre artist Alan Lucien Øyen and his company Winter Guests return to Toronto this week with a work about the things we do for love.

Titled “Story, story, die,” the 90-minute kaleidoscopic whirlwind of fiercely visceral dance and enigmatic spoken text examines the ultimately futile way we stage our lives in order to win approval. Although an examination of the role of social media in this process of self-validation was not the work’s original intent, “Story, story, die” ultimately delivers a sobering indictment of its toxic impact.

The title is taken from an improvisational game, sometimes played before a live audience or used in theatre training. There can be any number of players. One acts as a director who initiates the game by pointing to a player who must then improvise on a given story idea. Without warning, even mid-sentence, the director will point to a different player who must pick up the narrative thread without missing a beat. If you fail, you’re eliminated. The last one standing wins the game.

“The working title of the piece was actually ‘Love me,’” said Øyen. “It’s basically about our desire to be recognized. It’s such a drive and source of both ambition and disappointment. There are all these things we do to tell the world that we’re here. If the world acknowledges us, then we are in fact here. And if they don’t, then we’re somehow not. That was the starting point.”

Traditionally, dance as an art has been expected to speak for itself, even when the goal is to tell a story. Not surprisingly, the results are often problematic. More and more, today’s choreographers — Canada’s Crystal Pite and Øyen are prominent examples — explore ways to integrate movement and speech so they become a distinct, richly evocative and seamless form of expression.

Bergen-born Øyen, 44, has been resident choreographer at the Norwegian National Ballet for almost a decade but is much more than a maker of movement. He is a distinguished stage director and writer/dramatist. His work consistently pushes the boundaries of live performance and he has an extraordinary eye for the kind of stage artists who can help him achieve his vision.

Øyen likes to begin a new work with a process of collaborative investigation. In the case of “Story, story, die,” given its premiere in Oslo in May 2019, he gathered his seven-member international cast, explained the idea he hoped to explore, and then asked each of them to relate their own experiences or thoughts on the subject.

“It’s very much based on exchange,” said Øyen. “I do this because I know what I’m thinking, but I don’t know what you’re thinking. And I’m curious and I want to make a work that speaks universally to a lot of people. So you want as many viewpoints on the topic as possible.”

Sometimes Øyen encourages the dancers to write down their thoughts. He sifts through the results for ideas or images that resonate strongly and, from there, begins to create the text they will ultimately speak.

“Perhaps one sentence will stick home and I might write my own text based on that,” Øyen explained. “But then, when I give the text back to the dancers, there’s a certain degree of ownership. Yes, it’s a completely new monologue and it’s fiction, but it comes from sort of a seed, and the dancer knows it’s something they said and can feel it’s still somehow theirs.”

Øyen’s work often explores the nature of what we choose to call “reality.” It’s central to “Story, story, die,” which shifts from what we take to be real into the realm of the surreal. The lies we tell to present the world with what we think is a lovable image are in fact lies we tell ourselves to our own detriment. Just how real is a curated version of oneself? Øyen offers an example.

“There’s a line where someone says, like, ‘I don’t recognize you anymore, You’ve changed,’ and then she answers, ‘You’re so stupid. Don’t you get it? It is you who’s changed. I’m just a mirror.’”

Øyen is grateful to be old enough to recall what it was like to live in a pre-Facebook world.

“If I had had this in my childhood I can’t imagine how life would have been. Social media causes such stress and anxiety. I wouldn’t want to be young today. The piece deals with the concept of acceleration, because I think we’re at a point where information flows so fast that it’s like a runaway train.”

Øyen hopes “Story, story, die” will prompt audiences to think about what is true and authentic about themselves.

“Theatre helps us learn something about ourselves and the lives we live. It’s why I go to the theatre myself. I want both to forget about myself, and be lost in something else and be moved. When the lights come back up, I want to feel as if I’ve understood something about myself through other stories and other people. So that’s the ambition with this work.”

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