Isadora Duncan never systematically filmed her dances, though she had the opportunity to do so well before her death in 1927, at age 50. (She was famously killed while riding in a car, when her long scarf got caught in one of the wheels.) Apparently, only a five-second snippet of her performing survives, hardly enough to convey the unique intensity that made her an iconic figure of the early 20th century, as notorious for her revolutionary politics and freewheeling life as for her radical art. As a result, her once-dazzling personal presence has faded from popular culture. Her legacy rests on the subjective responses and selective, highly personal memories of her admirers and disciples.
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Martin Sherman’s 1990 play When She Danced addresses that delicate legacy. Set in 1923, it finds the middle-aged American expat in decline, facing not only a struggle to survive but to keep her artistic mission alive for future generations. Living in Paris with her husband, Sergei Esenin, a Russian poet 17 years her junior, the dancer scrounges for financial support to start a dance school in Italy. On the night the play takes place, she’s hosting a dinner for a man she believes to be an Italian diplomat who can help her finance her dream.
I have no idea whether Jennifer Engstrom, who plays Duncan, can dance. She doesn’t try here. The closest she comes to re-creating her character’s artistry is a scene in which Duncan “rehearses” a new piece by closing her eyes and gently swaying while Alexandros plays a Chopin etude. What Engstrom does capture is Duncan’s bawdy sense of humor, her restless energy, and her enduring grief over the drowning deaths of her children a decade earlier.
