Nancy Ellis (Portland, OR) – Nancy’s NANCY
WEEKEND 1: Nancy Ellis, a longtime Portland favorite, has been working on her first self-created and choreographed solo performance, Nancy’s NANCY. We are so thrilled to share it with Portland audiences, this story tinged with “sadness, stubbornness and infectiously bright charisma” (Willamette Week).
BIO
Nancy Ellis began dancing professionally in 1994, when she joined the musical theater chorus of the St. Louis Muny Opera and became a member of Gash Voigt Dance Theater of St. Louis. In New York City in 1995, Nancy became a founding member of both Yanira Castro + Company and Maura Nguyen Donohue/inmixedcompany. With these and other artists, including Annie-B Parson and Paul Lazar/Big Dance Theater, Nancy has performed throughout the U.S. and in Russia, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Switzerland, Puerto Rico, Costa Rica and South Korea. Since moving to Portland in 2006, she has worked with Jennifer Monson (TBA 2006), Hand2Mouth Theatre, Tahni Holt, Linda Austin, Katherine Longstreth, and Dawn Stopiello. Nancy began making her own work in 2014, with generous support from the N.E.W. Residency program at Studio 2@Zoomtopia. She presented Nancy’s NANCY in sold-out shared evenings there in September 2014, to positive audience and critical response.
PERFORMANCE SYNOPSIS
Nancy’s NANCY is a self-portrait inspired by Yanira Castro’s NANCY, a performer portrait based on Nancy Ellis which premiered in New York in September 2013. Life events and documentary dance-theater solos by artists including Miguel Gutierrez, Jérôme Bel, and Faustin Linyekula also inspired this performed memoir.