DANCE THEATRE OF HARLEM
The audiences that filled the Civic Center for Performing Arts’ four recent performances welcomed the company back to Chicago, after a seven-year absence, with cheers. The sleek, confident, handsome corps–living proof of Mitchell’s 20-year commitment–showed off its very considerable talents in an interesting, eclectic program of three stylistically diverse works: George Balanchine’s neoclassic The Four Temperaments, Mitchell’s John Henry, and John Taras’s version of Firebird, the 1910 classic based on a Russian fairy tale.
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Eddie J. Shellman was a superb John Henry. His spectacular high-flying leaps, which seemed suspended in air, his swift spins, and his characterization of the workingman who struggles against dehumanization were all wonderfully earthy. Carl Michel’s stylized railroad-engine set offered a dramatic opening backdrop, and his street costumes suited the work. John Henry was a strong crowd pleaser.
