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NEW YORK -- This is a tale of two icons. The first is choreographer and director Twyla Tharp, who several years ago used Billy Joel's song catalog to develop the Tony Award-winning stage hit Movin' Out, which enjoyed more than 1,300 performances on Broadway and a successful national tour.
The second is Bob Dylan, whose music and lyrics inspired and are showcased in Tharp's new outing, The Times They Are A-Changin', which opens tonight at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre.
During a rehearsal break, Tharp, 65, says there should be "no comparisons" between her latest troubadour tribute and the one that preceded it. "They're like apples and oranges," says the dance maverick, whose no-nonsense manner can be engaging and intimidating.
"In Movin' Out, the band was upstairs and the vocal was carried by the piano player," Tharp explains. "Billy's material was handled in a way that was very Billy, in terms of the orchestration, and the piano players had voices that gave some sense of Billy Joel."
In Times, "there are characters who carry the songs, so movement is part and parcel of the action. We've transposed a number of Dylan songs for the female voice, and there are duets."
The numbers include Blowin' in the Wind, Just Like a Woman, Like a Rolling Stone and other popular and critical favorites.
"Some songs are taken in a totally different direction from that folk-concert world Dylan was in," Tharp says. "The progression had to do with establishing this dream world or circus world, and finding metaphors that could be embedded in the movement."
Asked what drew her to Dylan, Tharp, who has also drawn on repertoires ranging from Beethoven to Jelly Roll Morton, says simply, "It has to do with looking at the work of someone else and figuring out if it's appropriate for me at this point. Dylan has obviously had a career for decades, and each one has its own validity."
Tharp is reluctant to discuss Dylan's reaction to Times, stating flatly, "There's nothing to be said."
But in a separate interview, Dylan, who caught Times during its world premiere at San Diego's Old Globe Theatre, begs to differ. "It hit me like a lightning bolt," he says. "It went through me on a celestial level, and not because I had anything to do with it. Dance is not my expertise, but I felt like I was flying when I left the theater. A couple of the duets knocked me flat. It was pretty steamy. These songs were coming across in a way I couldn't get them across. I understand now she's made it 1,000% better."
Tharp says the Broadway production is "very different from the one in San Diego. The song list is quite similar, and the character list is essentially as it was. But some scenic transformations are different, and the ensemble list is totally different, because my dancers were still on contract to Movin' Out until the spring."
Whether New York critics prove as effusive as Dylan remains to be seen. Tharp isn't taking it as a given that the show will prove to be as popular as Movin' Out did, either.
"There will be people who have deep connections to the Dylan canon on its own terms," Tharp says. "That canon is always going to be there. But this is something different. It's a translation into another world, and that's the adventure."
Contributing: Edna Gundersen
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