Article by Toni Taylor
Bolger portrait by David Judelson

David Bolger sits on a rock at Jacob's Pillow (the historic dance site near Boston) after the American debut of his company's latest work, "Ballads," a beautifully stunning, respectful, and honest look at the human consequences of the Irish potato famine featu-ring dancers Anne Gilpin, Robert Jackson, Murine Bloomer and Simone Litchfield. Diane O'Keefe doubled on cello and Martin Niaowland played Uillean pipes and whistles. The 30-something Bolger is the founder and artistic director of Cois Ceim (pronounced "kush came"), whose work is spurring interest in an Irish dance other than traditional step dancing. "Ballads" represents the next stage in Bolger's inadvertent attempt to create a new Irish dance vocabulary. His work is praised for its simplicity, honesty and approachability. "Ballads" is no exception.

As Bolger and Cois Ceim ("footstep" in Gaelic) come of age, his work to modernize Irish dance reflects the way that the economic renaissance continues to modernize Dublin. College-aged Irish are returning from abroad in droves to take advantage of the booming economy. This generation is also returning with the economic clout to sustain markets for the creative arts beyond traditional Irish folk culture.

These economic resources go far in stabilizing the Irish dance community across the board, allowing it to focus on creating new works. Their expanded global tastes and a desire to extend the cultural amenities of the global village to Dublin, Belfast and Cork have spurred the growth of Cois Ceim.

With pieces such as "Real Look," a work made in direct response to Eamon de Valera's (Ireland's Taioseach back in the '50s) vision of Ireland as "a land of cozy homesteads with comely maidens dancing at the crossroads." Bolger compared that vision to what was really happening in Ireland with all the returnees and decided that there was vast opportunity to puncture the puffy rhetoric. Audiences have been thrilled. Bolger says "The typical audience reaction is something like 'What is this dance thing...being cheeky and commenting on things..?"'

Bolger followed his sister into dance via the tap school in hometown Dublin. Finding that movement came easy to him, Bolger loved tap "because of the noise and rhythm." He staged theatrical events in the family's back garden, lighting them with the glow from the refrigerator. "While not aware it would be dance, I always knew my destiny involved theatre in some capacity," says Bolger.

The idea of serious dance training began with a Sunday afternoon father-son chat in the car. After a typical question of "what do you want to do with your life?" David blurted out, "actually I want to be a dancer." "I was kind of joking, I thought this was a ridiculous answer, so I then wanted to do it."

To Bolger's surprise, his father replied, "well, if you want to be a dancer, you've got to do classical ballet because that is the core. You have got to have the technique." A terrified Bolger promptly found himself enrolled in the Dublin City Ballet's National College of Dance in Black Rock, County Dublin. While alternately hating and loving the training, he was intrigued because he had found something that didn't come naturally. "I was the only boy in the class along with 10 girls. They put me straight through into a master class. It was so alien to me, the barre and all." A Gilbert & Sullivan operetta tour produced by Dublin's Drama Society brought him to London. After settling there, he immersed himself in ballet, jazz, and modern training and began to recognize the possibilities for modern dance expression. "I started to feel creative in a way that it would be nice one day to be a choreographer. I liked the word 'choreographer.' It's a nice word." While in London he focused his training with Michael Clark (from the Royal Ballet) and Matthew Hawkins, who taught classes, did workshops, staged happenings, created works, and (most importantly) built companies. Rather than pushing to the front, trying to land a spot in one of those companies, Bolger watched how ensembles and companies were put together. He also soaked up the ideas of American moderns such as Merce Cunningham, Trisha Brown, and others touring through London at the time. He returned to Dublin and began dancing with some companies but soon grew tired of it. "I realized that I didn't like some of the work I was doing because I felt it was kind of alienating to an audience. I didn't feel I was connecting."

His first work, "The Silent Screen," about Charlie Chaplin's life, was a comedy for four dancers and musicians created for Dublin's New Music/New Dance Festival. People laughed as never before at a dance show, requesting more. Adds Bolger, "are you kidding, it's hard, expensive, and you have to ask people to work for nothing." But every year a local dance festival would come up with enough money to lure him and some dancers back into the studio. This allowed him to be a "friendly" choreographer with ongoing, enthusiastic audiences, good reviews, and slow but steady requests (paid, no less) for new work. There were enough rumblings about his success in Dublin that he went North with a video under his arm to propose that Belfast's Old Museum Arts Centre present Cois Ceim's debut in the North.

In truth, he was not quite prepared. "I lied to them and told them that I had a full evening's program. I said it had garnered praises in Dublin and we would love our Northern Ireland debut in Belfast to happen here."

The museum did the institutional act of hemming and hawing while Bolger feared he had blown it by getting caught in a lie. Yet a call came a few weeks later; they were thrilled to offer Cois Ceim a spot in the next festival. With just two months to spare, the company quickly pulled an earlier work into shape and created two new pieces with live music. Young Belfast welcomed them as a breath of fresh air from the usual grand opera-house fare.

Cois Ceim's success has also led to other opportunities for Bolger. He choreographed the 1998 UK Tour and the '99 US tour of Martin Guerre, the latest musical from Les Miserables creators Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schiinberg. Scottish musical theater impresario Cameron Mackintosh found Bolger by way of Abbey Theatre Associate Conall Morrison, who had worked with Bolger on a previous project. Bolger also created dances for the film Dancing at Lughnasa (starring Meryl Streep).

For now, Bolger and company have become the reluctant leaders of an embryonic Irish modern dance movement. It seems possible he will create an indigenous Irish modern dance vocabulary, a la such progenitors as Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham or George Balanchine. Says the 30-something Bolger, "I'm proud that The Irish Arts Council has passed a new arts plan concentrating on dance. It identifies us as an area that has been neglected for years.

They have released many different grants for dance companies and individual artists." From a Sunday-afternoon father-son chat to an American debut at Jacob's Pillow, this company continues the joyous job of expanding the definition of the Irish dance. In the process, it is proving that times are indeed changing for the best of the arts in Ireland.