7 years and holding
Celebrating 7 years of anything. Now that in itself is a huge feat in my life! To honour that time with slaDE~, now that is something I truly treasure.
In honour of our 7 years together, I wanted to celebrate this momentous occasion with the fullest and most entertaining experience possible (for a Wednesday night that is). Something truly special for my beloved. In this case, using the tickets that I won to the Theatre Calgary play ‘Skydive’ seemed appropo and enthusiastically fun! Racing home on my bike (yes, I’m still cycling every day to work, despite the minus temperatures in the morning), I arrived breathlerss and in desparate need of a shower, however quick that might be. In true fashion, I was ready and raring to go in 10 minutes; remarkably on time for our 5:15 reservation at the fine dining restaurant ‘Cilantro’. We’ve been wanting to go here for ages, but being as spendy as it is, we wanted to hold out for a special occasion, such as tonight. The dining extravaganza didn’t let us down. The seafood was divine and cooked to perfection. After luxuriously savouring our meal, we strolled down to the theatre hand in hand and, upon arriving, settled in to our seats, with full bellies and satisfied smiles.
The play was outstanding (and involved no standing!). Many corny references to the 80s era and 80s music were made. Two actors managed to fill the stage and 90 minutes with high flying acrobatic-like maneuvers. How they did this was incredible …. it involved a cantilever see saw of sort that had the actor attached by a harness around the pelvis to a hoist that was maneuvered by 4 men on the other weighted end. I wish that I had taken a photo of this remarkably simple but efficient ballast system that had a steering wheel on one end to twist and turn the actor on the other. What truly was remarkable is that one of the actors was a paraplegic! The system had molded legs that helped the actor stand and fly and rotate in every possible direction. What an incredible gift. Needless to say, we were enthralled by the whole experience, loving every moment of this incredibly engaging and witty story.
As Morgan tells his brother Daniel in the play “When you free-fall, you don’t feel the fall, only the free”.
The Globe and Mail desrcibes the system as such
Technically, Skydive is a fascinating and unique show. Frazer and Sanders are each strapped to an ES Dance Instrument, a device invented by the show’s “aerial choreographer” (and former Arctic explorer) Sven Johansson in the 1980s. The actors are attached to long steel poles and manoeuvred like puppets up and down, side to side and in spiralling circles by black-clad operators.
Sven also pioneered dance for the disabled in 1994. “The ES Dance Instrument compensates for lack of balance, blindness and muscular inability,” he says, “giving freedom of movement to persons who would not otherwise be able to dance for enjoyment or artistic expression.”
A wonderful anniversary to say the least!
