The late Martha Graham trod the finest line between genius and excess, sublimity and self-parody. It was a line of which she was grandly unaware, but that Richard Move, her impersonator and "reincarnated spirit", treads with reverential glee. This is the second time that Move has presented his Martha-dedicated cabaret in London, and it's even better than last time around.
Familiarity doesn't lessen the pleasure of Move's wickedly accurate re-creation of Graham's egregious style. Though he is over a foot taller than his model, and male, he captures some genuine spark of the late choreographer's essence in his loving imitations of her diva make-up, her overweening stage charisma and the spooky, solipsistic tropes of her speaking voice. As he reads from her notebooks (sometimes rewriting her lines) and introduces extracts from her dances, reminders of Graham's giant transforming vision can move us to respectful silence. But in a split second Move can reduce his audience to hysterics, pinpointing the moment when her greatness slips into the ludicrous: "I stand before you in sweet terror, divine turbulence . . . "
In his reconstructions of the Graham dances, historical accuracy fights with high camp. Graham's male dancers functioned, at worst, as artistically emasculated hunks; in Move's company, their toyboy status is wantonly advertised through a wardrobe of outrageous jock straps and painfully phallic moves. The women - intense acolytes - are comically just the right side of self-abasement. Move himself is a towering heroine, like Graham herself, always firmly centre stage.
Move is on fine form, but it's the guests in this year's cabaret who ultimately make it an improvement on his previous show. British dancer Sheron Wray performs the gritty, heartfelt solo Harmonica Breakdown, which was created by one of Graham's dancers and finest teachers, Jane Dudley. Matthew Bourne (director of Adventures in Motion Pictures) manfully allows himself to be interviewed and condescended to by "Martha". As Bourne prattles heedlessly about his plans for musicals, a Nutcracker rewrite and film options from Disney, Move's queenly indifference modulates, exquisitely, into glacial contempt. Finally, Mark Morris (a huge fan of Move) dances a little Spanish number in which he flaunts a mean castanet technique, a blissfully flirty bottom and a fine gift for comic timing. Dance history has never been this much fun.
