A Mime, Dance and Multimedia Feast

Dulcinea Langfelder’s Pillow Talk at the Centaur

By Byron Toben

Dulcinea Langfelder’s latest production, Pillow Talk, has no relation to the 1959 Doris Day movie of the same name. Nor the fact that she bears the rare name Dulcinea, imaginary noblewoman of Cervantes’s 1605 Don Quixote relate, despite the popularity of the 1964 musical’s hit song, The Impossible Dream.

Rather, as she herself describes it, it is “an essay on dreaming” which perhaps owes more to Freud’s 1900 book.

Most of all, its 31 scenes are based on her own remembered dreams, as immediately recorded by her on a Dictaphone she kept under her pillow over several years. Five of these involve Barak Obama, which may make this talented lady a future Trump target.

… its 31 scenes are based on her own
remembered dreams, as immediately recorded
by her on a Dictaphone she kept under
her pillow over several years.

Ms. Langfelder previously appeared in Victoria at the Centaur in 2000, as a wheel chair bound patient who zips around as a sedentary dancer. She also invoked her own Cervantes name sake in Dulcinea’s Lament at the Segal Centre in 2013.

Dreams of course, are not new to theatre. I thought immediately of Shakespeare, Strindberg and Calderon, which I note are also the examples quoted by Centaur head Roy Surette in his program notes.

This show relies heavily on the technical team Ms. Langfelder has assembled. It consists of Vincent Santes (lighting, projection design) Benjamin Broche (video animation), Patrice Daigneault (projection animation and programming ) and Danys Lavasseur (sound design). Anne Sabourin, who has succeeded Ms. Langfelder in the world touring of Victoria, here collaborates on staging and choreography.

The result of all this ranges from the dreamer lithely dancing through a Van Gogh field to being bopped on the head by a digital coconut. Lots of running in circles, split second reactions and bodily contortions, all contributing to a poetical and whimsical experience.

As Kipling suggested, she can dream, but not make dreams her master. No Ifs about it.

For a less metaphorical Hollywood song on Pillow talk, see the aforesaid Doris sing so here.

Pillow Talk continues at the Centaur theatre until April 24.
Tickets: 514 288-3161 or Centaurtheatre.com