I've met the epitome of different and special – Twyla Tharpe.
In the early seventies, Twyla's boyfriend-manager, Bill, was my husband, Jeff's lawyer. We had a few dinners, and small gatherings. Around the spring of 1974 all of that ended. She wanted something.
One Sunday afternoon she came to our home. Jeff sits on the sofa; she sits on the matching puffy chair. I'm in the middle, on a straight-back chair. There's an uncomfortable silence. Then Twyla asks if I would narrate her work, “The Bix Pieces”.
I look to the left. Jeff's proud and expectant. I look to the right: Twyla's poker-faced. I take the inevitable deep breath. “Okay….”
For a brief while, I enter the world of THARP. This means strong and supple bony feet, with knobs on the toes, and bunions on the sides. It means layers of leggings, and smelly tops. Time and space are measured by stretching, pulling, bending, jumping, kicking, turning, and slipping, and sliding. The loft on Franklin Street is up two long and steep flights of rickety stairs. At the top is the magic movement nursery. Twyla's the mother. One feels loved working there. It's an elliptical love. Twyla always looks to where the movement's going. She rarely looks directly at you. She holds her head a bit forward from her body – ideas are coming fast and the rest runs to keep up. She and her dancers work their bodies from morning to night. I sit and watch and wait. I'm to be the character of Twyla speaking about herself and why the Bix had been made. My cues are music and dance instead of dialogue. We go over it a couple of times. When leaving Twyla's studio, I down the rickety stairs on my tush. My personal private choreography. I'm afraid of heights.
In the world of THARP, one never thinks of anything but dance or the costumes or the make-up or the music. On our break, we watch the playback video of rehearsal. Nothing but the THARP vision exists.
“I hated to tap dance when I was a kid……….” “It's funny! The audience laughed with the BIX! Why didn't you tell me Twyla?”
Who is this person? She never answers. Or she engages in intense dialogue with Bill about the velocity of dropping eggs on the kitchen floor. Or at times, she is zonked and drinks Scotch and talks money. I feel she is brutally honest and sees things X-ray clear. It's kind of scary being with someone who cuts through to the “truth” so to speak. Once, she commented on my performance. “You did good.” Now, forty years later I know how rare and valuable those words were.
One evening during BIX rehearsals, Twyla wanted to show another new work to a few friends. Afterwards, everyone goes to the back of the loft to have a drink and chat. In doing so, they pass by her bedroom where the book, Open Marriage , lays open on the bed. Twyla remains in the studio. She isn't aware that I'm still there also. She accidentally had cut her finger and I watch her squeezing it to bleed more. Then she flicks her wounded finger again and again; harder and harder; as if keeping time to some unrelenting march that only she hears. Splattered blood drops dance on the white wall in front of her.
Most people would have gotten a Band-Aid. Not Twyla. She isn't most people. There's a fierceness within her that runs deep inside. She's fiercely creative, fiercely determined, and fiercely discontent. I don't know what to do. I take a few steps closer and…..stand. I'm just…. there.
Twyla – Twist – Twirl – Twang - Genius !