Inspired by cheap champagne, faux luxury, and the destruction of our natural world, choreographer Jessie McCall brings four dancers to the stage for the joyful yet confronting dance-theatre work DAYBREAK ESTATE, playing in Wellington, Christchurch, and Auckland from March 8 – April 9, 2022.
Daybreak Estate pours you a glass of cheap champagne in mourning for the outright violence that we inflict upon our planet. Trapped in a decaying wellness retreat, the ritualistic nature of both our self-healing and self-destruction is examined. Our protagonists are equal parts social elite and primal pack, disconnected from the earth, yet face down in the mud.
Daybreak Estate was created in 2020 and premiered in Experimental Dance Week Aotearoa in the same year. Described by viewers as “haunting and charming”, “wildly clever” and “hilarious in a somewhat devastating way”, the enthusiastic response from audiences inspired this remount and tour in 2022. The work has evolved since its first outing to reflect changes in the teams’ own lives and perspectives.
“Daybreak Estate is the name of a cheap cask-wine brand. I love the contrast and contradiction of this affordable, bulk, low brow product with the grand and rather elitist sounding name. I feel that it speaks to the inevitable and utterly human contradictions, underbellies, and facades that we all play within life and that this work explores.” – Jessie McCall
As in all of McCall’s work Daybreak Estate will offer bold physicality, intimacy, and a chance to laugh out loud. Her work refuses to tell the viewer what to take away, but she aims to provoke with a series of images and notions around luxury, glamour, community, environmental destruction, social sabotage, and the natural world.
McCall has assembled an incredible group of dancers to bring this work to life who all bring their vast experience in the field of contemporary dance to the stage. Dancers include Liana Yew, Sharvon Mortimer, Olivia McGregor, and Terry Morrison.
Daybreak Estate is refreshingly indefinable. The work pulls its audience into an intimate dance with their own vulnerability, destructiveness, and sheer delight.
Note – copy for this article provided by Elephant Publicity.
Wellington
8-12 March 2022
Te Auaha (part of the NZ Fringe)
Te Auaha – Tapere Nui
Level 1, 65 Dixon Street, Te Aro
Tickets available here
Christchurch
17-19 March 2022
Little Andromeda
Level 1/134 Oxford Terrace, Christchurch Central City
Tickets available here
Auckland:
7–9 April 2022
Herald Theatre, Aotea Centre
50 Mayoral Drive, Auckland Central
Tickets available here
