By: Staff Writer
September 28, 2021
Renowned poet and playwright Derek Walcott’s “Dream on Monkey Mountain” is still being celebrated some 50 plus years after it was first broadcast on US television because still resonates with the Negro experience through ritualistic dance to this day.
Sonja Dumas, Director of the Continuum Dance Project, speaking on a panel on Sunday evening that was examining the late Caribbean poet and playwright, Derek Walcott’s work “Dream on Monkey Mountain,” told the participants that the play should not be thought of as anything other than a Negro spiritual of sorts and that in her own dance theatre she uses the “motif” of the Negro spirituals in a lot of her dance productions so she is comfortable with spotting it in all Caribbean works she comes across.
Walcott’s award winning Dream on Monkey Mountain centres on the black Makak, who despises himself for being black. After being imprisoned for destroying things in a local market, he has a vision in jail of a white goddess, who pushes him to return to Africa. In his dream, Makak dreams of becoming a great warrior in Africa, convincing others to join him, and receiving support from the Ku Klux Klan.
The play incorporated a lot of humour, African themed behaviour and Afro-Caribbean choreographed dancing.
Carol La Chapelle, Artistic Director of the La Chapelle Dance Company & former dance director and choreographer of Derek Walcott’s renowned Trinidad Theatre Workshop, said about the choreography, “Today I revisited the excitement of choreographing an original piece that utilized our Caribbean culture in mainstream theatre.
“Derek Walcott’s dream offers possibilities for the dance as a syncretic fusion of styles in a work that draws strength from folk roots, and really defies traditions yet it is distinct and articulates a different reality.”
There were a lot of ritualistic dance segments in the play to which the costumes were an integral part of bringing the characters and the theme of the play to life, to which Ms La Chapelle added: “The ritual is used to evoke spirits and spirits isn’t linked to empowerment and healing.”
She added: “We know that one element of dance and dance performance in presentation is improvisation, when it comes to folk dance it is quite essential and I notice this quite often.”
She also said: So I thought it was right for that production and it’s a kind of raw power that is included, injected into the performance which adds excitement with vigorous, sensuous ritualistic moves and intricacies in music. The style of African in character and the choreography aims to evoke a sense of credibility of awareness, so the artist can spiritually own and transpose it to something new.”
Dream on Monkey Mountain has a “pique” vibe- which Ms Dumas characterises as the Spanish word for “spicy”- and flare to the dance to it, where she added the women dancing in the play is indicative of women trying to get the attention of the men.
“I’m using this as the kind of conduit towards the man and to show other women. That is quite ingrained in all of the dances that forms a suite of what we call the Bele in Trinidad,” said Ms Dumas