Los Angeles Times
Saturday July 15, 2000
An Exciting Night of Ballet, Piano Improv
Dance Review (excerpts)
By Lewis Segal
Times Dance Critic

Swirling across a small carpeted stage at the Skirball Cultural Center on Thursday, Marla Bingham danced with such a powerful expressive focus, and such unerring technical surety, that it became hard to believe that this locally based choreographer and teacher was making up her solo moment by moment.

However, this exciting 'Dance of Life' benefit program for the Vital Options cancer support network coupled Bingham's improvisational dancing with equally impromptu pianism by film and television composer William Goldstein. As Vital Options founder Selma R. Schimmel explained in her opening remarks: "We don't know what we will see and hear tonight, and neither do they."

Maybe not, but liquid imagery unified the first half of Bingham 10-minute performance, from her metaphoric use of a gleaming aqua cape to her surging, eddying paths. Improvising classical ballet can be risky even on an ideal floor, so it was understandable that Bingham wore soft slippers rather than pointe shoes. But her hyperextended classical line gave an extra sheen even to the passages later in the solo where she explored a quick, sharp, darting image of motion punctuated by moments of smiling stillness�.

Contact Bruno Artero: