DOGGIE HAMLET

Doggie Hamlet

Doggie Hamlet (currently on tour) is a full-length outdoor performance spectacle, conceived and directed by Ann Carlson, that weaves dance, music, visual and theatrical elements with aspects from competitive sheep herding trials. The work is performed by four dancers, one boy, one American Sign Language interpreter, two herding dogs and a flock of sheep in a 30 x 50 foot fenced field. Doggie Hamlet recalls the bucolic impression of a landscape painting or a 3D pastoral poem. The sheep, the dogs, the human performers, and the earth’s surface are at once performing as themselves and as living symbols in this work. Through story, motion, site and stillness Doggie Hamlet explores instinct, sentience, attachment, and loss, and is a beautiful and dreamlike spectacle weaving instinct, mystery, and movement into an unusual performance event.

Choreographer: Ann Carlson

Performers: 35 Sheep, 3 Dogs (Wull, Lala, Munk), Ryan Tacata, Diane Frank, Diane Cox, Peter Schmitz

Presenting Partners: Alfred University (NY), The Center for the Art of Performance UCLA (LA), Vermont Performance Lab (VT), Center for the Arts (WY), Dartmouth Hopkins Center for the Arts (NH), International Festival of the Arts (CT)

Recipient of the National Dance Project Award 2015 - 2017