ALL-MALE Japanese group Condors blend physical theatre, dance, video and pop culture in their dance theatre production, Grandslam.
Cape Town dancer Jacki Job first encountered the 13-piece ensemble when she lived in Tokyo and met their director, Ryohei Kondo.
She knows Grandslam is a combination of various skits from their previous performances, many of which she has seen.
“So it’s like the best of Condors that they’ve created for this show,” she said in an interview in Cape Town.
“They have a combination of skills; dancing, singing, they all play a musical instrument and they incorporate that into the production.
“They have a bit of a roadshow feel to the show so they film various things wherever they are, and integrate it into the performance, so there’s also that aspect,” said Job.
Even when living in Tokyo for eight years until 2011 as dancer, choreographer and teacher, she considered it important to create ways for artists to exchange their views and performances between South Africa and Japan and she continues to look for ways to facilitate exchanges.
Two As One was the first Japanese/South African dance and music collaboration Job organised in 2011, albeit on a much smaller scale, with a Japanese musician and a dancer, plus a South African dancer and a musician.
Job is directing the choreography for the opera African Angels (at Artscape from Feb 19 to 22), while working on her PhD research proposal and producing the Grandslam performances in South Africa.
Her aim with the exchange is “that people become aware of a non-Western aesthetic.
“We are very focused on Broadway and America, on the West End. It’s very Euro-centric, our aesthetic, and there’s a whole other world people have to become aware of. They’ve travelled the world with this piece.
“It’s also to whet people’s appetities to Japan because there are many more artists that I’m associated with who are interested in coming here.”
Job describes Condors as “very accessible and entertaining. So, it’s a nice way to introduce people to contemporary Japan.”
• Grandslam, Catalina Theatre, Wilson Wharf, Durban. Feb 10 and 11. R80 and R100 at Computicket or call 031 837 5999.