They say what you yearn for, yearns for you too: as I generated the work, what surprised me most is how much this story about comic-book-like villains really became a story about how we can choose to repeat the sins of the past or how we can embrace forgiveness and release vengeful anger and work to heal.
down and outlined the production to provide a structure to work from—it would be a play in two acts. The first act would function as a “who done it” murder mystery, introducing all major characters and setting the stage for act two, which would showcase all par- ties banding together to defeat a “big bad” enemy. All movement would be based in a sense of magical realism, and would be utilized to not only fur- ther the plot and tell the story, but also to showcase the extraordinary abilities of the super-villains themselves. Dance to me has always been somewhat mag- ical and mysterious, so why not have these characters’ otherworldly powers be experienced through the medium? A voice told me to think big and unen- cumbered and as I began writing I knew I needed to build a world in which to properly tell the story—that the setting itself was its own character, and that in addition to the piece’s lead- ing figures I would need a Greek-like chorus, an ensemble that would shape- shift repeatedly to tell the stories of the people living within a troubled city. WHEN I CREATE, I often think of play- wright Suzan-Lori Parks who once shared, “Why do I write? Sometimes I feel like I’m a haunted house. And writing helps me deal with the spirits that reside in the house.” Our culture places so much importance on the sole “leaders,” the CEO geniuses of the world who have such great ideas that often do not come from them at all. I don’t really function like that, but like Parks, and many great com- panies in the Bay Area that value col- lective leadership, I feel like a vessel. The only time I feel like I am at a loss or am fighting my creative pro- cess is when I do not write/dance.
heartbreaking at moments. As I began to finish the work at the end of sum- mer 2023 my father became deadly ill. As I helped him recover through- out the fall, I needed to save my tears for a different kind of work with him (much to the voices’ discontent). At the time of writing this article I have three scenes left to complete… I look forward to welcoming the Bay Area’s dance community into a staged reading of “Villains” in spring 2024. I find… people love villains. Not only since they are often fabulous and unapologetically outwardly- delight in their lives and purpose (which is a joy to witness), but because at the end of the day, we are all painted as the villain at some point (or many points) in our lives. That it is in the villain, not the hero, that we truly see ourselves. That the inter- nal conflict which so many struggle with is central to our humanity. As so many know but easily forget when push-comes-to-shove, the complex- ity of the world cannot be affixed to the binary of black and white, good or evil, right and wrong–that some- times… the wrong is right, the bad guy is good, and that when we label someone as the villain, we become one too. I look forward to sharing this work with you. Until then, please be kind with yourselves and with others. And give the voices space to speak. ZACKARY FORCUM (they/he) leads OOMPH Dance Theater where they create work at the cross-roads of movement/narrative. Their work has been presented in WESTWAVE, SPF, NQAF Festivals, are a past Lead Artist for SAFE- house and Artist Adaptability Circles, and their performance femmes refusal was nominated for a 2020 Isadora Duncan Award. Forcum holds their MFA in Choreography & Performance from Mills College & BA in Theatre Arts from UC Santa Cruz.
Because when I sit down and hold space for the voices that want to speak, they flow out of me. And it is these moments where I feel most powerful and alive. So logical are their responses, shaping their form with characters, situations, lives that have been lived in and have a depth of meaning/experience. Of course it is not only inspiration that shapes my work, but also my years working in the craft. I often think of Jim Berman from UC Santa Cruz who encouraged his playwriting stu- dents that everytime a character spoke there was a reason for it and that real- ism on stage was never 100% real, that it was either 90% or 110%--we are manufacturing the moment being witnessed onstage, and that because of this, we can make these moments prog- ress better than they are experienced in everyday reality. The influence of my great dance mentor Jacqueline Burgess is always with me–who encouraged me to utilize movement in the process of abstraction, to tell deeper narratives through dance when words are inade- quate/take too long/fail all together. The results that have come through in this process have been… surpris- ing. They say what you yearn for, yearns for you too: as I generated the work, what surprised me most is how much this story about com- ic-book-like villains really became a story about how we can choose to repeat the sins of the past or how we can embrace forgiveness and release vengeful anger and work to heal. IN THIS PROCESS, I’ve often cried when I write. The voices and scenes that flash through my mind do not demand much, but space to be heard and I find the stories they tell a bit
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In Dance | May 2014 | dancersgroup.org
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