:zooming sound bursts forward :bright, cheerful synthesized :music bounces over a peppy beat :energetic electronic :pulses and bubbles :marimba chimes echo chords :synthesized electronic :chords build Kate: :distorted and distant Devon will get some exterior shots just to locate where the project takes place.

Alice: One of the things that's interesting about this whole rehearsal process is that we're not revealing where we are.

Echo: ...not revealing where we are.

Alice: Like, Devon captured the beginning, and like, it's this kind of roadway that's so surrounded in mist and, you know, there's a cyclist who shoots through the space.

:whir of bicycle wheels Alice: It's every film trope of how the trees arc up over the road.

How the mist works.

Echo: ...and then how the... Alice: I keep saying it's filmic... Echo: ...but of course it's filmic!

Alice: ...in the way that it's so surreal, but actually... Echo: ...it's so specific... Alice: ...coded in filmic language -- and it's real.

Echo: ...and it's real.

:high piano notes alternate :hollow wooden marimba :notes resonate :plucked notes fall like rain Alice: It's this incredible embodiment of the tree, suddenly filled with dancers.

Echo: ...uh, suddenly the tree is alive...

Uh, what kind of tree is, like... :intentional upward :music progressions :soft synthesizer melody Alice: It is...November, 2020. :soft metallic boom Alice: It is in the middle of the COVID pandemic.

:metallic crank clangs :lift whirs upward Alice: The world has broken apart.

Echo: ...broken apart... Alice: We're in a bubble.

We're following COVID protocols.

:metallic clang Echo: We are following COVID protocols... :metal rattles Alice: We're watching the COVID numbers go up.

But we're here in a bubble making art.

:laughs :alternating marimba chimes Alice: I am seeing Laurel and Jerron for the first time since March.

We haven't done this since March.

Echo: ...we haven't done this... Alice: Um, and even if you're doing your, your best to maintain a minimum, you can't maintain six hours of tough dance work on your own every day.

We're working with aerial equipment, you can't rig that necessarily and be on it for six hours a day.

Echo: ...and be on it for six hours a day.

Echo: :voices overlap :rubber bungees squeak :droning synthesizer intensifies :slap against thigh :metallic chimes build Alice: So we're here.

It's November 2020... :metal carabiner clicks Alice: ...and we have this kind of glorious month of being together making work.

Echo: ...of being together making work.

Alice: Mm.

Unreal.

Man.

2020. :electronic tones alternating :rubber bungee stretching :metallic equipment :against cloth Kate: :electronically distorted I have so many more questions for you, but I think it's good that we just chip away at it every night, instead of, you know... Alice: :overlapping voice Yeah, yeah.

Kate: ...all at once.

Alice: Yeah, yeah.

That sounds good.

That sounds good.

:offscreen voice: Marker.

:plastic snaps twice :calming marimba chimes :resound and overlap :low marimba chimes resume :alongside intensifying drone :marimba chime harmony :vinyl and velcro brush and crunch :sandbag thuds Alice: So, here's a question, like, how does a, a piece of, how does a work come into being?

Some choreography is top-down.

Some choreography, every motion of every finger and every position and every look is crafted by the choreographer, but, in the course of -- Man, no, I've been doing this since...2005?

-- um, most of the pieces I've been in since then have not been that way.

And so, the dancers themselves, particularly in modern dance, and contemporary, like post-modern dance, um, the invitation is for dancers to be creators in the process.

Echo: ...the structure, and... Jerron: I had always really wanted to be an artist, um, and it's curious because I do think that an artist has to have a certain amount of, um, oh gosh, confidence... :nervous laugh ...and, like, assurance in who they are and what they can bring to the table.

For me, artistry was really just the ability to make, just to put things into the world, um, from my perspective.

But I recognize that what's, what's true for me is true for a lot of people.

Echo: ...and even if what's not explicit... :indistinct overlapping voices Alice: What you see here in our process is that Wired is being made, it's being made in a kind of cauldron of process where... :metal clicks Alice: ...the dancers are contributing and I'm contributing and the composers are contributing and it's not me saying you do this, do this, you do this, you do this, you do this.

It's this kind of mish-mash of raw commitment.

You know, we have, we've passed this kind of 19th century genius solo creator model.

:flutters of marimba notes :overlap Laurel: I enjoy partnering.

I am not a huge fan of solo work.

It's not my key artistic interest.

I enjoy partnering and ensemble.

I love the way that one person plus one person can make something truly new that is not quite the product of either... :rubber squeals against metal Laurel: ...or you could sum as one and one make three.

:whirl of voice and breath :voice yells: Ah!

:fluttering marimba notes :continue, stronger :bass backbeat like a heartbeat :metal gear clanks :against the ground :rubber-soled footsteps :on marley floor :marimba chimes overlap :rubber wheels :pivot against vinyl Kate: :electronically distorted What do we need to know about disability and access?

:sticky fingers squeak :against marley flooring Alice: The first thing I think the nondisabled world is going to think about is that the wheelchair becomes a choreographic object when actually it is not.

It is my body, and it is not a prop, it is not a tool, it is not a device, it is not an extension of my body.

It is my body.

:airplane sound flying overhead :droning synthesizer tones :distantly: ooh, :the camera's coming out!

:heavy breathing :metallic clicks of descending rigging equipment :rubber wheels thunk Alice: But my choreographic thinking, which is shared by Laurel and Jerron, is how do we fully live into impairment, into disability, and how do we choreograph the maximum expression of impairment and disability?

Echo: :voices overlap ...two, three, okay.

Laurel: Dance as the expression... Echo: ...dance as... ...dance as... Laurel: ...the artistic cultivation and expression of the body is in many ways ideal for the disabled body, because we inherently have something different to say.

Now.

I cannot compare, having never been nondisabled, uh, what it might be like to dance in a nondisabled body.

:droning synthesizer hum :deep synthesizer tones :alternate :distorted splashing water Alice: The goal here is not to sort of set in opposition, but to see how the field of dance for disabled artists is expanding; how it can grow, to really live out a perspective where disability is not incidental, but it is a part of a culture and aesthetic in itself.

:overlapping marimba chimes :distorted airplane :flying overhead :marimba chimes become stronger :distorted airplane :flying overhead :feet land on marley floor Jerron: I think that my weapon is to be a, an artist because I'm creating things that aren't there.

Echo: ...and so, you know, it frees the self... Jerron: Like when I get into the studio I feel very secure, um, I feel very keyed in to my role and to my value.

:footsteps running on :sprung marley floor Jerron: I look deep inside of me and ask, What are they interested in?

What do they, what do they want?

Why are they inviting me?

Like, that question circulates, and that's how I bring out what I bring out.

Echo: ...and that's how I bring out what I bring out.

:sharp intake of breath Jerron: And actually I'm just really interested in assigning legibility, assigning a, a, a scholarship and a legacy of movement to the things that have been called excess and been called too much.

You know they, they land in history, y'know.

:metallic chimes :alternate and flutter :metallic booms alternating :distorted sand pours over metal :cavernous, echoing :pops and clicks :marimba notes :flutter and overlap :metal equipment clinks Laurel: Wired is an experiment.

Wired is an experiment in, and for, disabled dancers.

So, in its very naming, Wired is meant to invoke a sense of danger.

This idea -- that you could be harmed.

All dance requires emotional vulnerability on the part of the performers.

The ability on the part of the choreographer to cultivate and elicit vulnerability in the piece and the ability on the part of the performers to offer and portray it.

:metal, rubber and skin :squeak in concert :a voice: Steady.

Laurel: We are well trained; we are physically conditioned for exactly this work.

The moments that look risky?

We craft those for you so carefully.

The moments that truly are risky -- that's often where we're hiding that vulnerability.

:overlapping marimba chimes :overlapping marimba chimes :wooden hollow rhythmic clicking :marimba chimes :continue overlapping :metallic barbed wire :cracks against marley :metallic crunches :against marley and fabric Alice: The story of Wired is actually pretty simple.

Um.

Wired came about because I was in the Whitney, and I saw Melvin Edwards' "Pyramid Up and Down Pyramid," which, if you don't know the work of Melvin Edwards, you absolutely have to go and find out about him.

And this is a barbed wire sculpture.

And it, I like, I turned the corner and I saw this and I was like, "Oh my god."

My world just stopped.

And then, months passed while I read everything I could about barbed wire.

And I understood that barbed wire as a technology, is a border-enforcing technology, and that it divides the ground, and it, you know it divides us and them and, I wanted to be able to take this into the notion of territory, and terrain, and surface, and the air and, those things meshed in, you know, those ways that kind of wei-- kind of wild stuff happens that's not really rational.

:metallic echoes :synthesizer chords :rhythmically build and descend Alice: A-And then finally, we got to the studio; and we're like okay...

Here's the structure, here's the story, how do we begin to create?

:barbed wire wrapping :and resounding :synthesizer chords continue :building and descending :thud of hands on knees :barbed wire crackles against :marley floor :hollow, rhythmic croak Alice: Ready when you are.

:offstage voice: I'm ready.

:deep, rich marimba chimes :alternating :hollow croaking, like a frog Alice: I think the thing that's emerging that is maybe not clear is that this is the present.

:metallic clang of wheels Alice: And that a new future is being born out of this present.

:hands slide :against marley floor Alice: To say that this has been a lost year is actually not right.

I mean, it's been a reassess, reevaluate year.

Um.

It's been a year of incredible personal growth.

:rubber wheels skid :across marley floor Alice: Um, and personal failure.

Necessary part of growth.

Echo: So, I'm doing this... Well, just a sec-- I'm not doing this... We are doing this... :hands sliding along marley :muted boom Alice: We are doing this, because we have faith and trust and love for each other.

:deep marimba chimes :metal clicks of :equipment and wheelchair :palms squeak across marley Alice: Maybe it's a love for the body, it's a love for the wheelchair, it's a love for disability, it's... a love for movement, it's...

It's I-I, uh, I -- I don't know.

It's all of those things, ehn.

:deep marimba notes chime :palms squeal :rhythmic croak :sharp exhale through the mouth Alice: So, it's really unclear where we are in the process, because different things are in different places of development... Echo: Some things are stabilized... :mark clicks twice :rope whines Alice: It still feels rich and ripe with possibility; um, it's not finished.

Echo: ...um, it's not finished... :metallic rumble :rope rubs quickly against metal :distorted metal :school bell rings Kate: :electronic voice So, wrapping up.

Last question.

:deep hollow, metallic boom :rubber squeaks :ocean roars :calming synthesizer :notes resound Kate: :electronic voice Why make dances?

Alice: I've always had stuff to say, um, I've always wanted to be able to say it in movement.

So, I make dances, because they seem to me now to be the most meaningful way that I can understand the world that I live in, my relationships to people, my -- It is the most powerful way that I know to work through certain ideas.

Like, certain ideas I want to work through in writing, but certain ideas can only be most fully realized in movement.

And those are very often questions that are just critical, I think, to making a better world.

:alternating synthesizer tones :deep marimba chimes