As doomsday draws near, this impossibly beautiful duet sees ramshackle dance duo Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutsas, known as Bert and Nasi, imagine a future without each other. As soon as it’s over, I want to go back to the start.
The end of the world is told in two parts at the same time. The first is shown on a screen, where a hastily put together slideshow squares up to the future and details how everything will crumble – their relationship, their lives, their world, their words. The second is through dance as Bert and Nasi try out movements like a tasting menu, making the most of the time they have left.
The space is filled with the sound of toe scuffs as they grapple and bob like bored children, knots falling out of their bodies as they shake. Their steps are soft and their touch easy. With a slow, jagged elegance, they roll, slap, wobble and chase, like they’re marking each other on court. A hug turns into a headlock, a leap into a lift. Nasi is more straight-faced, while every so often Bert lets slip a smile. They reach for each other’s movements, sometimes falling in sync, and sometimes slipping past into something new. They don’t rush; they have all the time in the world.
Both insistently silly and unreservedly heart-rending, The End is about the time we waste and the people we enjoy wasting it with. The slideshow reaches the last day they spend together, and time moves forwards without them. When we have seen it all laid out – this imagined future, these imagined endings – it is no wonder they cling to each other so tightly.
At Summerhall, Edinburgh, until 25 August.
