‘Pang!’ premiere underscores the connectedness of all of us
World Arts and Cultures/Dance Professor Dan Froot is a producer, performance artist, writer, composer, dancer, and saxophonist. His new work, Pang! is an evening of three short plays based on the oral histories of families facing food insecurity in Los Angeles, Miami, and Cedar Rapids. The plays are performed as a live broadcast, amidst a forest of microphones, sound effects props and musical instruments. Pang! aims to raise awareness, decrease stigma, and promote cross-class dialogue around circumstances faced by families living below the poverty line.
"Pang! had its world premiere last night at CSPS Hall in the New Bohemia district of Cedar Rapids, and I cannot imagine that one person left this remarkable show unaffected.
As the audience entered the hall, we were greeted by the performers and director who chatted with audience members before beginning their captivating performance. The show is presented as three radio plays based on interviews with families in Los Angeles, Cedar Rapids and Miami. The stated commonality is that all of these families face food insecurity, but the layered storytelling performance offers the audience so much more. The stories are also lessons of vulnerability and community.
Everything about this performance is remarkable. From the very first moment, the audience is drawn into each story, which is accompanied by outstanding music and sound effects. The lighting design intensified each story through varied use of backlighting, as well as front lighting. Truly, as Dan Froot noted after the performance, this is an ensemble piece. As such, the composer, Robert Een brilliantly scores the emotions of characters. Froot and Een collaborate to bring the music to life on a variety of instruments.
The layers of human needs for food security, safety and community underscore the connectedness of all of us. The world in which we live is more complex than we realize, and Pang! brings these complexities from real life to stage and then asks us to think about these issues when the show concludes."— Laura Johnson, Oct. 21, 2017
Read the full article at the Little Village Magazine website.