Sara Hook Dances and David Parker and the Bang Group present Time Will Tell

Sara Hook Dances and David Parker and the Bang Group present

Time Will Tell

Chicago, Ill. (February 24, 2025) – Longtime collaborators, Sara Hook, Head of the Department of Dance at the University of Illinois and New York City based, David Parker and The Bang Group, present Time Will Tell, with special guest, Roxane D’Orleans Juste, legendary José Limón principal company dancer, Friday and Saturday, March 14-15, 7:00pm at Links Hall, Chicago, 3111 N. Western Ave, Chicago. Tickets available online at https://www.linkshall.org/

Time Will Tellis a program of 7 works made up of vigorous, purposeful dancing leavened by these veteran dance artists’ characteristic gimlet-eyed wit and verve. Expect velcro suits, queer romance, the collision of Cecchetti ballet and 60’s social dancing, kinetic quips, postmodernist remnants, dangerous rhythms, and soulful revelations.

Re-Accounting (2022) premiered after three years of development between longtime friends and collaborators, Sara Hook and David Parker. The work places personal and historical training tropes within the Cecchetti ballet and modern dance canons in high contrast with the surprising and rhythmic choreographic voices of its progenitors.

In Parker’s Schlemiezel(2024), a couple of vaudeville hoofers dance through a certain sticky intimacy while clad in plaid Velcro suits. Noises of Velcro slamming together and ripping apart enhance and complicate their already syncopated tap dancing, while serving as a rugged musical score for their increasing conjoinment.

Yegg (2012) is a solo developed collaboratively by Sara Hook and Racy Brand. The title Yegg is slang for “safe cracker or burglar.” It refers to the performer’s relentless attempts to conquer (or unlock) their physical/ technical prowess in a ridiculous demonstration of obsession and the need to raise the stakes. Originally inspired by Hook and Parker’s memories of the idiosyncratic behavior of some of their older relatives,

Housebroken (1995) is a duet that uses an elaborate, gestural language to reveal the complex negotiations of long-term love.

L’Equivoque (2019) is a solo created and performed by Bessie award winning dancer, Roxane D’Orleans Juste, who portrays a tragicomedy in disguise, playfully exposing the unmistakable double-edged nature of assumptions, biases, and prejudice. Made in collaboration with performers Elliot Emadian and Jacob Henss, Sara Hook’s Dicks (premiere) references the iconic American early reader series. Set to recorded improvised guitar duets by Sean Walsh and Nick Didkovsky (www.didkovsky.com), the work is the third part of a trilogy of dances exploring gender expression (and repression) in the classical Ballet and Modern Dance training cultures and traditions.

Friends of Dorothy (2003) is a pas de deux by Parker for two men who move from seemingly innocent antics to mature romance while dancing to overripe recordings from classic Hollywood musicals sung by Jane Powell and Debbie Reynolds, which connect both ironically and sincerely to their revels.

Please contact Anna Sapozhnikov sapozhni@illinois.edu with any questions.