Barefoot Boy with Cheek

When Paul Taylor quit Syracuse University and hotfooted it to Manhattan 14 years ago, he was not sure of anything except that he had this terrible itch to dance. Faced with an audition before Martha Graham, he was uncertain as to whether he should leave his shoes on or go barefoot. So he compromised and danced in his socks. But once he got his feet off the ground, he quickly became the barefoot boy with cheek, choreographing numbers in which dancers simply walked across the stage like pedestrians, stood rigidly still for minutes on end, or cavorted and slithered to the sound of raindrops or the recorded voice of a telephone operator giving the time check.

Last week the Paul Taylor Dance Company opened a one-week stand in Manhattan with Orbs, Taylor's newest and most ambitious work. It, too, was way out--in the solar system, to be exact.

Yet unlike the experimental dabblings of his early years, it displayed a fresh and distinctive style that is the mark of a maturing artist. Choreographed to three of Beethoven's last quartets, Orbs is a kind of astronaughty tour of love and life on the planets. In the Venusian Spring segment, the Sun God (Taylor) conducts a primer course in lovemaking, repeatedly stroking his loins until two couples get the idea and engage in a "micro-orgy." This leads to Martian Summer, in which the Sun God, wearing a mask on the back of his head, is by sudden twists and turns a scowling accuser and a smiling protector. Most ludicrous are the earthlings, who in Terrestrial Autumn romp through a slapstick wedding scene that teeters on the brink of banality. After some sober reflections on descending night and death in Plutonian Winter, all elements conspire in a bright aurora borealis of a finale.

Quirky, Perky. The only disturbing aspect of the Paul Taylor Dance Company is 36-year-old Paul Taylor. At 6 ft. 1 in. and 185 lbs., he looms as a galumphing Gulliver among the light and lithe Lilliputians in his eight-member company (six women, two men). The imbalance is noticeable enough so that, contrasted with the troupe's whippet-quick movements, his flicks seem like flays, his leaps like lurches. And, for obscure reasons, he assumes a curious Howdy Doody grin that often lends a wry twist where obviously none is intended.

More important, however, is that Taylor is a giant among modern dance choreographers. In embracing such epic themes as God, man and nature in one work, he is treading a perilous course, yet he manages to sustain a unifying rhythm and pace. The choreography, with its wit and quirky, perky turns, its swirling patterns and exultant leaps, is boldly original.

Though Taylor's troupe is one of the most successful in modern dance, it will not clear enough from its Manhattan performances to cover expenses. The lukewarm support for modern dance at home makes it impossible for it to afford anything but the scantiest scenery; the dancers even make their own costumes. To make ends meet, Taylor & Co. will depart this month on their twelfth tour abroad, where they draw six times as many people a year as they do in the U.S.

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