Themester Activity: Did Shakespeare choreograph Ballet Hispanico??

Probably not. But it wouldn't be that far off!

The themester activity I attended was Ballet Hispanico. The ballet was separated into four different dances: Umbral, Sombrerisimo, Sortijas, and Mad'moiselle. What does Ballet Hispanico have to do with Shakespeare, you might ask? Well, I asked myself that when I started watching the ballet too. However, I came to realize many similarities among the two. There's the first obvious similarity; the stage and the actors. Although these were dancers, they were still playing a part and telling a story. In that sense, there was a Shakespeare behind the scenes writing this play too. However, more than one person worked to choreograph these dances and create these stories. Then again, it is often believed that Shakespeare didn't write all of his plays by himself. Other than the tangible similarities of attending a ballet at IU in 2013 and a commoner going to see a shakespeare play in the late 1500's-early 1600's, the themes of the dances and Shakespeare's plays were also very similar.

The dance Sortijas, was a dance to portray "the unavoidable pull of fate in our lives" (Ballet Hispanico Program). We see the idea of fate in more places than one in Shakespeare's plays. We see fate in Hamlet, King Lear, All's Well That Ends Well, Cymbeline, and many other texts. When watching the ballet, knowing it was going to be about fate, I misinterpreted the dance at first. This dance starred only one male and one female dancer, so originally I thought the two were in love, and there was no way they were ever going to be apart. As the dance went on, however, I began to think that the male dancer was not playing a man, but fate itself. The female dancer kept trying to ignore the male dancer, and run away from him, but in the end was unsuccessful. The male dancer ended up controlling her every move.

Another dance that paralleled Shakespeare's work was Mad'moiselle. This dance highlighted gender roles through varying imaged of gender identity. The dance started off with two groups; the male dancers and the female dancers. However, the dance ended with all the dancers wearing the same thing. They were all wearing wigs, the men were shirtless and the women were wearing nude body suit's from the waist up, appearing shirtless, and everyone was wearing black pants. The dance suggested that many gender identities are false and/or irrelevant, because in the end we could all appear to be the same man. In shakespeare we see many instances of gender switches, as seen in Twelfth Night or Cymbeline, for example. Ballet Hispanico made me learn how we can see Shakespeare in every day life, even if the matter seems to be totally distant.