Content Warning: Sexual Assault
A letter to the choreographer of "Titicut Follies"
Hello Mr. Sewell,
I am a current Senior at the University of Minnesota studying dance. My professor and I went to Titicut Follies on Friday evening as part of my senior project. For this project I am writing reviews of shows in the Twin Cities on my website.
I must say I’m shocked that a ballet such as Titicut Follies is in production. This is a different kind of shock than that which you hoped to glean from the audience. It is a shock that’s followed by outrage and embarrassment. I’m struggling to see how you utilized allyship with people with mental disabilities in any part of your process, and as a member of the dance community I’d like to have a conversation. I am aware that the tone of this letter may seem accusatory but I must stress that it is a result of what I perceived at the performance of Titicut Follies and feel I am meeting the performance at its own level in this critique of concept/content. This performance affected me personally and felt I needed to respond honestly.
Are you interested in having a conversation? I’m hoping to engage in a back and forth where you can tell me your reasoning and ask me questions.
I feel there are two schools of thought on presenting problematic or “I-can’t-hardly-even-look-at-that” work. One being that it is enough to show the truth of events as they were, expecting the audience’s horrified reaction is adequate. The other thought being that structures of oppression must be undone and not merely exposed, for to showcase a phenomenon without a placed opinion is to perpetuate.
Based on these schools of thought, I feel you circulated around the former in the performance of Titicut Follies, therefore perpetuating violence and stereotypes.
If you value the former, can I infer that you value shock? It seems, to me, in this show you aimed to use ballet in new and disturbing ways to freshen or modernize the ballet technique. In this case, I feel, it was at the cost of a community of human beings. In the article in the New York Times about the show it mentions your intentions: “Mr. Sewell said that he had asked people with experience in the mental health field whether his choreography looked right. ‘The last thing we want to do is be making fun of people,”’ he said.
As if accurately impersonating a person with a mental challenge makes it any less offensive. Whether it was well intended or not, the production is what matters. It’s in the production where I witnessed oppressive stereotypes of people who are mentally challenged being reinforced.
I am sure the documentary you based this ballet on exposed some very real problems and obscenities. It is one thing for that movie to be published and viewed without the direct consent of the bodies involved but another thing entirely for you to re-interpret it. You are twice removed from the actual experience. This diluted form of the stereotypical “crazy person”, however “accurate”, is not your story to exploit. I think it could be a story you choose to tell and unearth but not exploit. I just wonder about the benefit of depicting a body being force-fed so dramatically for shock value. Especially seeing that same body being paraded around stage, lifted and swooped through the air with no remorse sympathy or consequences.
Maybe we could have a conversation about the audience’s role as sympathizers though they are removed from the performance?
I would be remiss if I did not also mention the sexual assault on stage. The particular occurrence of sexual assault happened as some dancers walked on stage in nude underwear, one at a time, some wearing masks. Duets ensued and first, one woman was apparently stabbed in the stomach and dragged offstage. Then, upstage center, in red lighting, a woman was stabbed in the stomach and raped from behind very obviously: her limp body flailing. This was presented with no sympathy for the victim and no consequences for the perpetrator. Are your thoughts that sexual violence on stage is okay? Because it’s not actually real on stage? Do you believe rape makes for good art? Do you think you should have had a trigger warning for those suffering trauma from sexual abuse?
I feel that the piece focused on the mistreatment of the patients while infantilizing them. Having some of your dancers appear as toddlers. The most common modes of transportation for the dancers was to waddle with an uncoordinated gait or a walk (still the balletic “toe, ball, heel”) with an inward gaze and twitch.
You seemed to champion the guard instead of the patients. Giving him a personality. Having him perform solos while engaging the audience and receiving applause. If the evil in the real life situation lies with the guards and their mistreatment of the patients, why are we the audience left with a connection only to the guard, while other characters are exposed like animals in a circus or nature documentary? Here are these animals (humans) in their natural habitat. See how peculiar? See how strange? Are you not entertained? I felt you exploited the actual humans from the documentary as spectacle. The audience is left feeling that people with a mental challenge are dangerous, violent, and stupid.
Although I have strong opinions about the show, I really do want to engage in conversation. And though I am writing to hold you accountable, I don’t want to call you out without also offering a dialogue.
Abigail Whitmore
I have since talked on the phone to James Sewell to discuss the performance. I will share some notes from our conversation.
James admitted to needing a program note. The performance, as it was, started with the dancers “in the world” on stage, and he didn’t want to break that for the audience by having a person talk about the content before the show, like I suggested.
We agreed that each traumatic experience on stage deserved a full length performance in order to give context at the beginning and resolution at the end, but James explained to me that he wanted to keep with a certain rhythm of the piece. Cutting from one scene to the next to give the appearance of “tableaus” in a “Follies” performance. I asked, “Do you think you could have sacrificed the rhythm of the show in order to give each horrific instance its own weight? Did you ever think of trying to shift the power structure?” We seemed to disagree.
James said that whenever he strayed from exactly what happened in the documentary his collaborator, Frederick Weisman, would say it was too didactic, therefore forbidding him to add depth to his characters. James felt he was at the service of Weisman’s artistic vision. I asked James why it was important to work with Weisman on this topic. James said it would be great if it was a catalyst for conversation.
We talked about how people would react to this piece. James said, “If it’s not upsetting it’s an insult to the people who suffered it. It’s supposed to upset you.” He made it clear that he believes people will make endless assumptions about the work and that it is out of his control because everyone has different experiences. I tried to make it clear that I believe he absolutely does have control over how audiences view his work because as a choreographer he has control over what they see.
James will continue having his company perform this piece with Weisman as his collaborator. He hopes the piece can keep growing to be more authentic. Me: “I don’t think you should use the movements of people with mental disabilities as choreographic motif.” James: “Why not?”
I thanked him for taking the time to talk. He said he especially wanted to talk because I said I was a student. I offered to help him write a program note or signs in the lobby for future shows.
Photo from Cowles Center publicity for James Sewell Ballet
