Deepstaria review: Wayne McGregor explores the dark depths of ocean life

For his latest work, choreographer Wayne McGregor starts in the depths: of the ocean, of space, of darkness. What he finds there ranges from earnest isolation to playful jellyfish. Across 70 minutes, the nine dancers of Company Wayne McGregor bend and flicker through shifting moods: sometimes overlong, but with dashes of invention and exploration.

Characteristically for McGregor, lots of technology is involved. The score by Nicolas Becker and LEXX is generated by AI in performance – a changing performance of a recorded sound. For his blacker-than-black stage, McGregor turned to Vantablack Vision, a light-absorbing coating used on space instruments.

From the audience, it looks pretty much like any other black box theatre, but it’s shaped and framed by Theresa Baumgartner’s lighting. Spotlights slice through the black, while plush shimmers of purple and green suggest the depths of the ocean. Baumgartner adds some self-indulgent (and headache-prompting) lights in the audience’s eyes, but she creates gorgeous suggestions of falling water or shafts of undersea sunlight.

It starts out stark. Dressed in ultra-black underwear by Ilaria Martello, dancers bend and shift in isolation. Even when they jump into each other’s arms, there’s a sense of distance – collision rather than collaboration. They change into gauzy pyjamas for longer duets. Two men wind around each other, cool but connected.

At its driest, Deepstaria can get stuck in a groove, pursuing a dance process until it loses momentum. But McGregor’s dancers are always bold, sleek and nervy, responding to the twitches and high leg extensions of his choreography.

Becker and LEXX’s soundscape hums and clicks alongside the dancers. Both the sound collage and the unpredictable performance suggest Merce Cunningham’s chance experiments. As with McGregor’s Untitled, 2023 there’s a touch of Cunningham in the steps, too, particularly when he sets the whole cast in motion with plunging dips and fast, skippy footwork.

Deepstaria takes its name from a form of jellyfish, which also provides the work’s most memorable scene. Now dressed in floaty, translucent organza, dancers reach their hands into the spotlight. Fingers fluttering, they suggest the ebb and flow of a creature moving on or against the current of water. From the shadows, the cast watch each other with close attention. Coming together, they create larger, multihanded sea creatures.

Whether observing or collaborating, there’s an endearing sense of communication and connection, of making something together in the void. Do you speak jellyfish?

Deepstaria is at Sadler’s Wells until 2 March