Review: 100 tapaa nauraa

Laughter is contagious from the dancer to the viewer

The title of choreographer Jyrki Karttunen’s new work, 100 Ways to Laugh, already tells us what the new dance company of the Helsinki City Theatre is all about. And yes, there is laughter during the performance, both on stage and in the audience. But despite the topic, the mood is wistful in many places, sometimes even melancholy.

The dance group of the City of Helsinki fills the Elsa stage with Karttunen’s light and airy dance. The dancers move in the sunny yellow space, overlapping and overlapping. The group’s fast-paced dances are punctuated by solo scenes that test laughter in the body.

Karttunen will start as the director of the Helsinki City Theatre’s dance company at the beginning of next year. This autumn, she has been able to get to know the group while working on this work. The eight dancers dancing in the work have adopted Karttunen’s loose movement language wonderfully, the entire yellow stage sounds to the rhythm of their dance.


The light movement brings to mind scenes from old films. The group could be, for example, the young radicals from the Inspector Palmu films. Full of relaxed, mockery where the rules are not bowed to. Still, men wear jackets, collared shirts and ties, women wear skinny pants from the 1960s or cute dresses. Karoliina Koiso-Kanttila’s costumes from the past add a subtle touch to the atmosphere.

The music is also nostalgic and sets the mood for longing. Composer Tuomas Fränti has designed a soundscape that includes songs from Tchaikovsky and Charlie Chaplin . Fränti’s own compositions complete the world seamlessly.

Laughter may start with fake laughter, but when someone giggles long enough, soon others will laugh too. The laughter is contagious from the stage to the audience. Laughter can start from the leg or hand or in the middle of the dancer’s body. The young Aksinja Lommi , who is visiting the group, carries laughter from one limb to another and back again in a frantic vibration solo. The laughter swirls in your body until it bursts out of your mouth.

The dancers transform into funny and endearing romps when they put on yellow, hooded overalls. There is a black cloth on the face, so the creatures could be from Mars, for example. The möntis seem to be an evolution of Karttunen’s solo My imaginary friend is with me, in which Karttunen performed together with human-sized, white soft toys. They may also be related to the Teletaps, both wonder at the strangeness of the world and often walk a little clumsily. You can laugh at the bugs without inhibition. But they are also skillful, their circus-like slapstick scene is one of the gems of the work.

It is interesting to see in which direction Karttunen will take this skilled group as its leader. The versatile choreographer is skilled in creating works based purely on movement as well as theatrical performances. His predecessors Kenneth Kvarnström and Nigel Charnock , who passed away in August, represented almost the extremes of contemporary dance, but one can expect Karttunen to open up in many directions.