LOS ANGELES-- Do run, not walk to the Geffen Playhouse to catch DO
JUMP!, the "actorbatic" show put on by a team of multi-talented performers down from Portland, Oregon. Led by director/choreographer Robin Lane, these high-fliers combine gymnastics, trapeze-work, singing and mime with dazzling speed and precision. They also collaborate on comic routines that would make a circus clown proud.
Backed up by a 4-piece band that plays original, klezmerlike riffs, the Do Jump! company defies categorization. As one critic said, "They talk, dance, leap, run, fly. Are they dancers? Actors? Acrobats? Vaudevillians? Who cares? They are Liberators."
The liberation comes in the way they break down the walls between
audience and performers, children's and adult theatre, athletics and
aesthetics. At times they bring the audience into their routines, at other times they lose themselves in elaborate, carefully choreographed routines, only to suddenly shift gears and take to the air on swings or strut around on elongated stilts with wicked looks of glee on their faces.
They go from the sublime to the ridiculous with such ease and joy that it makes the heart quicken with delight. Do Jump! is an ideal family show for the holidays. (Geffen Playhouse, 10886 Le Conte Ave., Westwood. (310) 208-5454).