JEZEBEL is a dance production inspired by the Video Vixens: provocative female models who appeared in hip-hop videos on MTV in the late 1990s. The Vixens danced scantily clad in music dominated by men. However their influence was great: it was often the Vixens who determined the aesthetic of the videos and the popularity of the artist. They were hypersensual, strong and independent.
concept, choreography and performance
Cherish Menzo
light design and technical support
Niels Runderkamp
music
Michael Nunes
costumes
Daniel Smedeman
stage directions
Renée Copraij
advice
Berthe Spoelstra, Christian de Yav & Nicole Geertruida
singing coach
Shari Kok-Sey-Tjong
co-producer
Frascati Producties
sales
GRIP
campagne image
Tatchatrin Choeychom
with support from
Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst
with thanks to
Nicole Beutler Projects, Bau Dance & Performance Amsterdam and Centre Chorégraphic Le Château
“The composer Michael Nunes has created a brilliant soundscape, threatening and impressive. And Menzo’s entire performance is exactly that: on the border between threat and seduction, alienation and seductiveness.”
Theaterkrant
The dancer Cherish Menzo – who performed alongside Natalia Pieczuro and Giada Castioni in Voetvolk’s The Sea Within – refuses to be defined by others in JEZEBEL. She navigates the landscape of hip-hop culture, searching for ways to claim her image for herself. Can Jezebel deconstruct the controversial stereotype associated with the black “hip-hop honey”?
The jury’s of the BNG Bank Theaterprijs 2020 report says: “In JEZEBEL, Cherish Menzo moves somewhere between dance and performance. With minimal means, she is able to powerfully depict the iconography of this oversexualised woman. [...] In Jezebel, Menzo finds an original way to put the icon of the black woman in hip-hop culture into a new perspective.”
Location
online (live @ nona)
Begijnenstraat 19/27
2800 Mechelen
België
