Shape shifters

>> Moses Pendleton's Momix is hard to pin down

By SIOBHAN O'CONNOR

 Moses Pendleton is very particular about what his upcoming show, Momix in Orbit, is not. The renowned choreographer insists that it's not really a dance show ("We try not to push the 'D' word") any more than it is straight theatre, comedy or circus. "Of course," explains Pendleton, "we do use all of those elements. We perform in a Vaudeville style, with skits and props and tricks with shadows." Right, like a cabaret? "Well, no. Not exactly."

 Combining wild acrobatics, physical comedy and dance, Pendleton's 20-year-old performance troupe, Momix, may be hard to pin down, but the range of human contortion and the elaborateness of the skits are both dazzling and confusing.

 Think back to Prince's ueber-campy "Batdance" video, which Pendleton helped choreograph--with multiple Batmans, Jokers and Vicki Vales coiling around each other in sexy, second-skin costumes--and you start to get the picture. Now add optical illusions, a massive hula-hoop being worked by a slinky, narrow-hipped woman, and a physical-comedy jailbird skit a la Laurel and Hardy set to a score by Vivaldi. "My idea is to get humans to act like cartoons," he explains. "To have such exact movements that they can be watched as though they're on a screen, in a movie."

 The kind of guy with a bio that could put anyone to shame, Pendleton is also an award-winning skiier, choreographer of the closing ceremony of the Lake Placid Olympics, has an IMAX movie under his belt, several operas and much more. With little formal training in dance ("I used to put a penny in my loafers and get down to impress the ladies, but that's about it"), Pendleton is first and foremost athlete and country boy. And while he left the farm he grew up on long ago, he's proof that you can take the boy out of the dairy farm but you can't take the dairy farm out of the boy. Pendleton continues to harvest sunflowers as a pastime, something he says is a main source of inspiration. "I see the plant world as very energetically charged, with an infectious kind of energy that I try to use." :

 

Momix perform July 10-15, 17-22, at the Monument-National, $30. Info: 845-3155