~~ Blossom Festival kicks off The Cherry Jam downtown featured many artists and performers By RENEE SUTTON nceouverites celebrated spring under a light pink canopy of pet- als at Cherry Jam, the kick-off concert for the Vancouver Cher- ry Blossom Festival yesterday. Unsuspecting transit passengers were drawn into the party at the Bur- rard SkyTrain station by various per- formances, including Japanese drum- ming, a Bollywood dance lesson and a Haiku poetry reading. The month-long celebration of Vancouver’s 40,000 cher- ry trees began April 3 and will continue through to April 28 with a variety of community events. Pedestrians were craning their necks to catch a glimpse of the beating drums and colourful dance perfor- mances that brightened up the cloudy day. Audience members of all ages waved their arms and clapped their 66 hands to the Bollywood dance lesson by Shiamak Vancouver Performance Team. Almost 30 years ago, Peter Kreuk planted the cherry blossoms at Bur- rard SkyTrain Station as a landscape The beauty architect. Today he is the chairman of and the the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festi- . val and said he uses any excuse he can history of to walk by the area if he’s downtown. [the cherry He said he enjoys the smiles flowers bl bring to people’s faces. ossoms] “Tt’s nice to have in the downtown and esthet- core; you don’t often have spaces like . this in an urban environment,” Kreuk ic qual- said. ity of them Linda Poole, executive director of the ° ° Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival, Is quite said the Cherry Jam has become a tra- unique dition and is a way to say goodbye to winter and hello to spring. ANDREA STANLEY “We continually open people’s eyes to the beauty around... because it’s so easy to take things for granted,” she said. Andrea Stanley had never been to a cherry blossom festival before, but said she came to check out the Japanese dance performances. Stanley said the blossoms represent the passage of sea- sons to her. “The beauty and the history of [the cherry blossoms] and esthetic quality of them is quite unique,” she said. Rosa Catacora, visiting from Peru, said she heard about the festival on the Internet and was impressed by the mix of culture in Vancouver. Continuing with the Cherry Blossom Festival this weekend, there will be a Sakura Days Japan Fair at VanDusen Botanical Garden. It will celebrate Japanese culture with performances, Japanese food and a Japanese tea ceremony among other demonstrations. Harper featured in satire A comedy takes a twist on reality of national politics By LUKASZ JONCA play about Prime Minister Ste- Ai Harper that was dropped in Toronto over lawsuit fears is com- ing to Vancouver. The play, Proud, opens tomorrow at the Firehall Arts Centre. It takes place in an alternate history after the 2011 Canadian elections. The main charac- ter of the play is a political figure re- sembling Harper. The story follows a female MP named Jisbella, played by Emmelia Gordon, as the prime minister’s right hand, but she has her own agenda. The play is politically driven and deals with Canadian political issues of today. It uses humour to get the audi- ence thinking. The original production company dropped the play in Toronto due to fears of a libel lawsuit. Gordon, who has worked in shows such as the Progressive Polygamist and the one-woman show Dissolve, said she is really proud of her latest work in Mi- chael Healey’s political comedy. “We are so detached from politics... I think our government is hoping for that, is playing on that. They’re chang- ing so many laws and bylaws right now that it’s actually really scary,” Gordon said. “The things people have put into place that have made Canada so great and so amazing, lots of those things are being thrown out the window.” The play features UBC theatre grad- uate Scott Button who plays the son of an MP. According to Scott, this is an important play because it gets people conversing and excited about politics. “There’s a consumer-oriented soci- ety that’s in place. It’s been easy to be- come distracted with basically every- thing, rampant materialism, the pursuit of status, things that we are made to feel are really important when they really aren’t,” Button said. Tickets for the play range from $25 to $40, but will be half price from April 5 until April 9. Matinee shows on Wednesdays will be by donation. Dancing and boxing come together as one choreographed performance A new show portrays a unique relationship By MIKE HODDER udience members will get to sit [pinssic at anew show document- ing the world of boxing through contemporary dance in Vancouver. The performance takes place today and tomorrow at the Vancouver Play- house. The International Choreographic Arts Centre is an Amsterdam-based dance company that is bringing their show, Rocco, to Vancouver. Rocco’s set casts the audience as the crowd at a live boxing match by seating them around a ring elevated on the stage. The show is a beautiful, violent mar- riage of two unlikely genres, said Jim Smith, the show’s producer, adding that it is a relationship that works. “The performative aspects of both [boxing and dance] live well with one another,” Smith said. “The show ex- plores the art of boxing and how it forms relationships.” Choreographer Emio Greco, whose father was a boxer, and Peter C. Schol- ten co-created Rocco and were inspired by the tenacity and physical and men- tal preparation both boxers and danc- ers undertake. During the show’s development, its dancers worked directly with an Italian boxing trainer to adopt the nuances of the sport’s movement. The 1960 Italian film, Rocco and His Brothers, directed by Luchino Visconti, inspired the show. Visconti’s film revolves around two brothers, Rocco and Simone, vying for the love of a prostitute named Nadia. However, Rocco is not a direct adap- tion of the film, and concerns itself pri- marily with the relationship and com- petition between brothers. “The complexity of what it means to be male is the social underpinning of the show,” Smith said. “What is broth- erhood? What is competition? What does it mean to throw your fist at some- one?” Rocco starts at 8 p.m. today and to- morrow, and there will be a question- and-answer period at 7:15 p.m. before each show. Tickets are $35 to $70 and can be pur- chased at dancehouse.ca/tickets or by phone at 604-801-6225. SUBMITTED photo Rocco examines boxing through contemporary dance