Red Wine and Frivolous Things
June 26th-28th
Friday and Saturday 7:15pm open for Wine Tasting, 8:00pm Show
Sunday 1:15pm Wine Tasting, 2:00pm Show
$18-$25 Sliding Scale
Purchase Tickets

“Come quickly, I am drinking stars” – Fra Dom Perignon circa 1200 A.D.

Humorous and beautiful, aerial and land dances, choreographed by Lisa Christensen and dancers, bring an emotional and kinesthetic sense of the richness and sensations inherent in wine and winemaking throughout the ages.

When you sip wine, you sip history, art, and mysticism.  In an age when champagne and wine barrels are mass-produced and taken for granted, we consume wine without thinking about its power to turn events in world history and economics.  “Red Wine and Frivolous Things” takes wine, a familiar, every-day item and weaves a story following the adventures and exploits of wines gods and goddesses;the fierce and violent Shezmu from Egypt, Geshtinana, the Sumerian goddess of vines and taverns, the mischievous Dionysus with his Bachantes, and the intoxicated Soma from India. 

Imagine Dionysus sending “The Wild Yeast’ off to work fermenting grapes into wine, or Geshtinana enchanting her workers into a trance dance with her harp to help them with harvesting grapes, or Soma, finally humbled and finding solace amongst migrant farm workers in the twenty first century.

These ancient deities transcend time while dealing with their dilemma of immortality - they can’t die. They travel through centuries and continents disguised as contemporary mortals.  They become the catalyst of events and turns of human history as they impart knowledge and technology of wine making.

Geshtinana, reincarnated as an Contessa in Champagne, France in 1200 A.D.  Shezmu, disguised as Father Benedict, scolds her for neglecting her work tending the church’s vineyards.  Ensconced in the attire, rules and rigidity of medieval abbey life, neither of them recognizes each other as an ancient God or Goddess.  In fact, in an era of witch hunts, they are fearful of revealing their true identities until Dionysus, gallivanting as Dom Perignon rushes up crying “Come quickly, I am drinking stars!”  He had invented champagne.  In his enthusiasm and a slip of the tongue, Dionysus blows his cover.

Immigration in the United States effects day to day lives of newcomers and established members of a community.  “Red Wine and Frivolous Things” through the eyes of Geshtinana, Dionysus, Shezmu and Soma, explores the joys and travesties of immigrants of today as they suppress their old roots in order fit into the expectations of new societies. Experiences of aging such as watching friends and family members die, becoming obsolete in the work force, having difficulties performing previously simple tasks, “Red Wine and Frivolous Things” tells a story of aging

The Inspiration

Imagine you are at an acupuncture appointment and your acupuncturist, who is really Dionysus, the ancient Greek god of wine advises you that that “You are under entirely too much stress and should be drinking red wine and doing frivolous things with your girl friends.”  Imagine two girl friends consoling each other and drinking wine.  They get so drunk that their table (a dancing “contraption”) tips, spins, flings them around and generally causes enough confusion that they can’t discern whether it’s the table or the wine that makes their world topsy-turvy. 

Such was the inspiration for “Red Wine And Frivolous Things”, a musical comedy about the history and mysticism of wine.   With local aerialist flying high, this full evening work will take place  June 26, 27, 28th 2009 at the Veteran’s Memorial Building in Downtown Santa Cruz. Each performance begins with a visual feast of Art, by painter Breda Voss’s paintings filling the space.  Wine tastings will be a precursor to a night of dance and comedy. This multi-sensorial experience will deepen your appreciation of wine, increasing the joy when you take that next sip.

About Lisa Christensen

Lisa Christensen is a dancer, choreographer, writer and “contraptionist”.  She designs and builds structures that can be danced on, in and with.  Her productions alter the audience’s sense of reality, temporarily.  Her mission is to create works that cause a gut felt reaction or recognition of something familiar and bring about a questioning of attitudes or beliefs.  She has collaborated with Mir and a Company contributing contraptions and choreography.  Her one act play, “Densiflora and the Deconstructo Vixens”, a play about a mythological tree caught up in a wave of deforestation, development and poor urban planning received a grant as part of First Night Santa Cruz.  She produced “Ipade Aladun”, funded in part by the Santa Cruz Arts Council, was a festival of West African dance and music with performances by local and West African musicians and school children.

Individual scenes and dance excerpts from “Red Wine and Frivolous Things” have been performed in multiple venues including The Monterey Dance Festival, The 2006 …and Still Dancing annual concert, National Dance Week in Santa Cruz and Mountain View.  “Table Whine” in a review was dubbed “The high light of the evening” for a performance at the gala opening of The Attic.

The audiences' journey through this world of wine is enhanced by the costumes (which evolved from my historical research), by live music, recorded music, the collaborative choreography, with wine tasting by local vintners.

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