Forklift

Image by Jeff Busby

‘Forklifts must not be used in the workplace for acts performed during this show. The performers are highly trained artists’.

It’s an opening disclaimer that promises fun, and then delivers fun in palletloads.

It’s sort of surprising that circus and contemporary dance have managed to stay apart for so long; like those two friends who you just know will get along like a house on fire, but who never quite seemed to make it to the same parties. While circus was tipping a bucket of sequins over its own head and smearing on the red lipstick, contemporary dance was busy rolling about in a tub of mud in nude skivvies.

In KAGE’s new production, Forklift, nude skivvies, sequins, red lipstick, circus and contemporary dance finally come together, as they were always meant to: on top of a 4-tonne Toyota forklift.

Australian circus’ tiniest giant, Nicci Wilks, kicks off proceedings in the courtyard of the Arts Centre with a high-vis jacket, Cup-a-Soup, vending machine chips and a couple of Playgirl centrefolds, hooning about on her forklift with one-handed aplomb. Her cargo: Henna Kaikula and Amy Macpherson, limbs akimbo in ragged brown fishnets and tanks the exact colour of a cardboard box. Kaikula and Macpherson perform a variety of contortions and dance moves at dizzying heights, before being neatly stored away in some shelving.

At this point, our two human cardboard boxes suddenly acquire agency – Kaikula assumes a benevolent smile and Macpherson a laserbeam stare – and they recruit Wilks away from her magazine for some feats of impressive acrobatic ability. Add a few high-vis leotards, drop the framing narrative like it never was there, and it’s time to answer the question we all came for: exactly what magic can three trained acrobats do with a forklift?

Directed by Kate Denborough and devised with the help of the performers, Forklift is smashing good fun. This is a work that’s impossible not to like; for any shortcoming it has, it’s got two extra moments of brilliance.

Forklift is set to the apparently compulsory semi-melodic industrial fclang-gzzzt-bweee soundtrack that must accompany all modern dance pieces, composed in this case by Jethro Woodward, although the presence of actual heavy work machinery does give the music a stamp of authenticity missing from most modern dance.

Some of the dancing isn’t as crisp as one might have hoped for from a contemporary piece, and the choreography could be more innovative. The work also jolts from dance to acrobatic poses without quite enough blending to make them seem like part of a whole. The loss of the thoroughly endearing framing narrative after one third of the performance (and Wilks’ character with it) also gives the piece a scrappy, slightly unfinished feel.

All that said, this is a bit of unashamed performance fun, and a great event to which to take anyone. As long as they don’t drive a forklift. Best not to give them ideas.

Rating: Four stars out of five

Arts Centre, Melbourne
www.artscentremelbourne.com.au
12 – 16 February