BANG BANG
Bang Bang is a contemporary dance solo created in 2017. The piece was awarded the Prix du CALQ for Best Choreographic Work in 2017 and the Prix de la Danse de Montréal (Best Performer category).
The desire to pass the piece on to a young performer, Nils Levazeux, evolved into a version for two dancers.
The peace is an ordeal. Built on a relentless repetition of jumps and athletic motifs counted in 11, it demands exceptional focus and physical commitment from its performers.
Gradually, this demand reveals their combativeness, their resilience, but also the flaws of the human performer.
This duo version adds the idea of moving through the ordeal together, combining each other's strengths and weaknesses.
Precision meets exhaustion. Over the course of 50 minutes, the performers’ identities dissolve.
Continuing to jump becomes at once absurd, poetic, and political.
"A physically demanding work of such intensity that it provokes direct physical reactions from the audience. With The Wind Rises and Bang Bang, Quebec’s Manuel Roque has demonstrated that the Montreal dance scene remains among the most stimulating today"
Tanznetz – Leipzig , festival Euro-scene. Nov. 2025
Choreography: Manuel Roque
Performance: Nils Levazeux et Manuel Roque
Costumes : Marilène Bastien
Soundtrack: Manuel Roque
Artistic advice and rehearsal direction: Lucie Vigneault
Lighting Design and LX Consultation: Karine Gauthier and Olivier Chopinet
Duration: 50 minutes
Premiere: 2017 - Les Subsistances (Lyon, France)
Photos: Julie Artacho and Juraj Zilincar
Production: Cie Manuel Roque
Co-production (solo version): Festival TransAmériques (FTA)
Development: Marie-Andrée Gougeon and Marta Oliveres (for DLD)
This project (2017 Solo Version) received support from the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Conseil des arts de Montréal.