♪

That exchange of energy between

artists and audience member is,

is something that can't be

replaced. And so we were really,

really lucky that we have this

beautiful space here at Kaatsbaan

to share with artists and

and art lovers alike.

♪

We are getting it

quite done.

Quite done, it is getting.

We are summoning all

the beatboxers.

♪

This residency means a lot

for me, and I know

the crew as well,

because there isn't a long form

version of any of this anywhere.

Zero.

And if it, if there is, it's

very much like, look at this

beatboxing.

Whic to me is kind of lame

because it's like,

you're, this is just the tool.

This is just a tool that

you're going to be using to

communicate. Right? But it's not

about that. It's just, those are

just the skills that we're going

to use in order to like talk,

♪

We need this right now.

Like, we need this,

like just to get us

even that, that sense of hope

because that's what artists do.

We have a responsibility to

start that conversation.

Look, the world's burning

in a lot of ways, but we're

still going to do everything

that we can to like, give

something to you. We're going to

give ourselves and share this

energy with you. Hopefully that

it'll like lift your spirit in

some sort of way. And that will

be a win.

You know?

Cause that's what it is. Art is

transformative. And like you can

really shift people's lives in a

different direction by sharing

your own experience. And that's

what we want to be doing through

this time.

♪

Game over.

It was the first live

performance I'd seen since

February 2020. It was also the

first live performance that most

of the audience had seen since

February 2020. Not only was

the whole audience ecstatic, to be

able to see people perform and

to once more engage and cheer

and clap and respond.

But the performers themselves

finally heard a live audience and they

could, they could react to it.

It was, it was wonderful.

I just, what I get from them is

this sense of just wistful,

ecstatic, euphoria, the few of us

staff members just sat in the

audience, watching these dancers

dance after so many months of

not knowing when that was ever

going to happen again. And it's

really hard to articulate why it

was so moving. That's why people

love art so much.

Because it's,

something you can't articulate.

It's something you can only feel

in your heart, in your gut.

Hey everyone!

Welcome!

Oh my god it's so many people!

Hey hey!

How are you?

Long time no see, how's everything?

I see we're wearing the same colors.

Welcome everyone to the

Kaatsbaan Mock Ball.

My name is the Legendary

Omari Oricci

The Founding Father of the

House of Nina Oricci

and I'm so happy that you're here

at our first annual

Kaatsbaan Mock Ball. So!

My work has to represent growth.

My work has to represent a

questioning of identity and

self, but then at the same time,

a realization, an awakening of

community and what that

really means

DJ. Let's get another beat

because they're about to battle.

Are you ready judges? You got to pick

who you want. The Old Way. It's a battle.

Battle battle battle

of The Old Way.

Talk about lines, talk about precision,

talk about grace, talk about attitude,

talk about Old Way.

to The Old Way to The Old Way to

The Old Way

Which one of em is not like the other one

which one of em just doesn't belong?

Which one of em is not like the other one

Old Way elements in strong.

Which one, which one?

Let's go, let's go. Let's go.

Don't make me get loud.

...but I don't have to tell you

because you know you're ugly.

Everyone laughs, and kikis.

And everyone laughs, and kikis.

♪

The artists need, we need these

opportunities to, especially,

I mean right now with COVID, you

know yeah. An opportunity to

bubble ourselves, you know,

I mean we're already bubbling ourselves up.

But just the opportunity to get out,

and, and, and, really do

something in that time, we need that,

you know, and it makes us

feel worth something like we're

still worth something. You know

what I'm saying? Like, Oh, this

world still needs us. Oh the

world's shut down. Oh, artists,

artists are just out every man for themself.

No there are

artists coming together. You know,

there are artists coming

together to help fund other

artists, you know? And maybe

that's another thing. Like we

need more institutions,

institutions to allow us to

create these connections with

other artists and bring us

together with other artists.

From other forms of art

Ladies and gentlemen,

Les Ballet Afrik

We need to give Stella a LSS.

Yeah!

Ms. Stella, Ms. Stella,

Ms. Stella, Ms. Stella,

I love you guys.

We don't need a mic. Say what?

We want you to get some sleep!

Ms. V! Ms. V! We want you to get some sleep!

This project never to me was

going to be a project that just

involved a performance. It

involved collecting oral

histories that are going to live

at the performing arts library.

It also involves connecting with

communities. You know, in my

mind, we would go to a city to

perform and we would have an

evening of doing the

performance, but then another

evening where we would connect

with the community of dancers in

whatever city and they would

share their story. And it's

about what this community has

done for so many people

changed our lives.

♪

Baby,

it's good to be young.

You better believe it.

Work, mama.

♪

To be honest, it's a friendship.

It's so strong, and then you can see,

you can tell, on stage,

we're such good friends, like best friends,

we talk about everything.

You can see when you watch us,

how fun, and how like

we are connected.

♪

Okay. So yesterday got me

thinking. It was when Greg and I

were having this meeting and we

were talking about all the

qualities that all the performers,

uh, in our company have.

And Greg went on and on and talking

about everyone. Me, Noé, José, Gisele,

And obviously he didn't talk

about him, and I didn't hop on him.

On saying,

expressing his qualities

that I admire on him, not as a musician

as a performer on the stage.

♪

I, I know his voice. I know his

language music wise. If I hear

composition from him, I can

tell this to music somehow, you know

and I can't point exactly on

what is this special thing that

he brings, but there is, uh,

it's his signature, but as a

performer, he is always trying

to connect with everyone on his stage

and like is always make

eye contact and really to

connect and like to understand

what's going on on your mind

when you are performing and like

having a communication, you can

always go through his eyes and

like find support.

Um, and he's always

like gauging eyes to

support himself too as well. And

I think that's, that's that,

that, that shows a lot when

you're performing, because

it shines.

♪

♪

I, I feel supreme trust that

our, our relationship will

always work out because at the

end of the day, I'm just usually

excited for Leo's ideas.

And it's not just choreography, you

know, like we have, we have

songs where he wrote the melody,

you know, or he is really coming

up with ideas that aren't just

tap, he's coming up with

melodic and making them work. So

it's really exciting for me to

encourage him as a composer and

be like, yo, no, that's dope.

Like it's like a relationship,

you know, things are going

great, but it's still good

every Sunday night to sit down

and be like, Hey, how was your

week? You know, you can't just

assume that people always know

what, what you're feeling or

what you're thinking.

♪

Ooh,

I like that. Keep working that back

don't know how to act

Slow motion for me slow motion for me.

♪

Limes

♪

Tequilla

♪

Jose Cuervo

It's time to celebrate.

The most exciting thing about

this type of residency coming

from quarantine for me personally,

is, well, one of the

most important things is just

human contact. Just like the

worry-free guilt-free ability to

share a meal with someone, to

give someone a hug really meant

a lot to me.

Hello.

Goodbye.

♪

Ah, that's how we used to do.

This is the Chef V. We are so

honored to have her love of food

amongst us.

I am making four chicken breasts

stretch for nine people.

Michelle's here now. Skill.

You just cut it thin and put a bunch of

vegetables on top of it.

Boo-yah.

What ya got, Patterack?

So how was rehearsal today Jamar?

Rehearsal was, um,

very good, actually

good rehearsals actually don't

they don't for me, they don't

always mean when things go

smoothly. It was good because, um,

I presented an idea and I've

fought to the max to stay

committed to the idea.

Can we go back to that?

♪

You just, gotta feel yourself.

I thought I knew what I needed,

but I think this residency has

sort of allowed me, um, it's

sort of peeled back the covers

on a whole nother level of

necessity and it's more and it's

deeper and that is daunting

because I'm like, really, I

really felt like in the past,

like I was digging as deep as I

possibly can, but I think

there's something about this

moment that makes me feel like

there is more, which means going

deeper into myself.

And I can't even imagine what the work would

look like in ten years from now.

I mean,

I hope dance would be able to

handle it.

♪

When, Duke offered this residency,

um, I grabbed at it

because it was an opportunity

for us to move from Zoom

meetings to actually be in a

studio with part of our cast.

And it, it's still going to be

early to have Vivian involved

because we're literally going to

go there and just, you know,

with Josh and Jeffrey and

a couple of dancers start the

bare bones of what this is.

How was it to work

on something and n ot

know when it's going to be premiered?

Great. I think it's great

because it, it keeps me honest.

I think it keeps me honest and

it keeps me, um, yeah. Yeah.

That's kinda like the main thing.

♪

Ah!

All right. We're going to dance

with some trees at Lincoln Center

so we're practicing,

although these trees are

different, um, we're doing the

best we can so that we can be on

point when we go and film.

How close are the trees?

They're as close as

they are on the photo. Yeah.

Cause if it's like this? It's kind of

like this, look, check this out.

Like that. So yeah, you have

room. Totally.

There's a magic window on

these Bubbles, where on the very

last day of the Bubble, before

these artists exit the Bubble

and go home, there is a window

that these performers can all

perform together. And our hope

was to shuttle these dancers

into the rotunda of the

Guggenheim. One of the most

social distance conducive spaces

in New York City. We were a

little bit naive. It was June.

We thought the museum would be

open by August. That's not the

case. Um, but when we realized

the museum, wasn't going to be

open to receive these dancers

and that governor, the governor

was still not permitting indoor

performances to happen. We

thought, how do we sequence

these Bubbles and create more

opportunity for these dancers?

And so we reached out to

multiple presenters to see if

they would work with us. And

Lincoln Center, uh, jumped right

in. They realized this window of

opportunity to have double,

rapid tested 14 day isolated

dance projects. In essence,

their passport is stamped.

And so Lincoln Center welcomed four

different Works & Process

Bubbles onto the Lincoln Center

campus, which was closed off to

the public. Performances,

outdoors happened that were

filmed, really serves as a model

for how these Bubble residencies

can be generative, uh, rather

than existing in isolation.

♪

Hello, hello, we are at Lincoln Center

and, we're doing our filming.

at Lincoln Center, with Works & Process.

Um, it's been a wonderful

experience in the two week Bubble, from

Isolation to Creation.

COVID-19 free woop woop!

Negative!

This feels weird, a mask feels strange,

I know we were, like,

I was just at Lincoln Center

just like, you know, 13 days ago

doing a site visit

before we left. And yet I feel

like I haven't been here in years.

I think back. Perfect. Crazy thing.

I'm motivated. I'm a

little scared, because it's like going back

into isolation, it's like, blah.

I wish it was longer.

But hopefully we'll be back.

♪

We spent the whole day there with them.

It was utterly exciting.

But the absolute joy

that happened because they

could all work together was, was, astounding.

♪

So an eight change,

One two three four five six seven eight change,

So give that, but we don't see them.

Um, and then again

whenever we're done with the taping,

it's too hot,

come right back over here.

Work Shay, work Shay.

♪

Yes. It's nothing! It's nothin!

♪

♪

Ok, great, let's do it

Full energy

Mark

Ready?

Yep

OK, going going going

Rolling

♪

♪

♪

It's okay it's okay.

slowly you pull it out.

You wiggle it out. Pull pull

Good

Yay! That was suction.

[Cheering] You got stories!

Michelle and Archie! Yay!

Woo! Aw.

♪

What is truly exciting about

these Bubble residencies and the

model that we've created is that

we know with scientific data

that this works. How do we know

that it works? We double rapid

test the artists on the way in.

And just two weeks ago, we

tested all 19 artists on the

very last day of their Bubble

residency and all 19 tested

negative. So they're negative on

the way in they're negative on

the way out. And this is a

working model for artists to

safely gather and create again.

♪

To feel a part of a community

that is the power of the arts

to build community. It provides a

place for people to belong

In the wake of this

time, where we have all had to

remain so isolated,

we will foster

this building of community again.

♪