Grit

Steppenwolf Theater LookOut Series

Premier March 6th - 8th 2025

Grit  is an experimental dance work that interrogates the underbelly of achievement by exploring the isolating cost of competitive natures amongst four performers. By blurring the lines between exhaustive pleasure and exhaustive pressure, the four bodies move through tension-filled repetition, playful provocation, and amorphous structures to suggest an emergent collective.

The dancers work with embodiment that is up to their own thresholds of choice and necessary adaptation within themselves and the group's energy. The work incorporates tactical use of tape, platforms, and towels that build barriers and divisions within the space and between the performer’s bodies—they constantly dismantle the previous unsustainable structures to try again. The performer's relationship to fluids, both bodily and from external sources, texturizes the performer's progression from charged, confrontational barriers toward softening into one another's flesh and fluidity. Cycling through, the sections expand and contract time, forcing each performer to slowly decay their initial rigor and brashness to reveal a greater reliance on each other's care to continue.

NEW CITY STAGE - DANCE PREVIEW: “Grit” at Steppenwolf 1700

Concept/Direction- Maggie Vannucci

Performance + Movement Creation Collaborators- Laura Baumeister, Rahila Coats, Kate Laughlin, Hannah Marcus

Dramaturgy + Thought Partner- Courtney Mackedanz

Sound Design + Mixing- Michael Cunningham

Presenters- Steppenwolf Lookout Series

Lookout Series Co-Producers- Lauren Steinberg + Patrick Zakem

Steppenwolf Lookout Production Supervisor- Matthew Chapman

Performance photos: Ricardo E Adame