{"id":102965,"date":"2025-12-20T20:49:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-20T20:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/102965\/"},"modified":"2025-12-20T20:49:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-20T20:49:07","slug":"jacob-jonas-sara-mearns-the-emperor-has-no-clothes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/102965\/","title":{"rendered":"Jacob Jonas & Sara Mearns: The Emperor Has No Clothes"},"content":{"rendered":"

There was much to admire at the intimate Charlie Chaplin Studios<\/a> in Hollywood on the chilly evening of December 12, 2025. Jacob Jonas The Company<\/a>, joined by the exquisite Sara Mearns<\/a> of New York City Ballet, drew a devoted crowd of followers and curiosity seekers. The atmosphere was warm and welcoming\u2014food scents in the air, manicured outdoor spaces glowing softly, and a prominently displayed table of Jonas\u2019s memoir, Cemented Beauty, presented as a \u201cmeditation on the human experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jonas, whose artistic roots include hip hop and whose collaborations span dance, film, music, and the written word, has built a notable presence in contemporary dance. With appearances at Jacob\u2019s Pillow, The Wallis, and other respected venues, his ambition and drive are undeniable. His personal journey\u2014most publicly his survival of stage-four non-Hodgkin\u2019s lymphoma\u2014has become central to both his artistic identity and public narrative.<\/p>\n

\"Jacob<\/a><\/p>\n

Jacob Jonas The Company in COYOTE FOX WOLF DRAGONFLY BUTTERFLY BEE EAGLE RAVEN HAWK, choreography by Jacob Jonas \u2013 Photo by Josh Rose.<\/p>\n

As the audience gathered at the soundstage entrance, smoke billowed theatrically, heightening anticipation. The crowd\u2014young dancers, seasoned professionals, mentors, retirees\u2014buzzed with excitement about entering a space shared by Jonas and Mearns. Jonas appeared briefly, thanking the audience with a disarming humility and offering a loose outline of the evening\u2019s events. Without a program, the timeline remained intentionally vague, adding to the sense of mystery.<\/p>\n

Inside the cavernous soundstage, a football field-sized, slightly raised, mylar platform dominated the room. In dim, diffused light, dancers in nude bodysuits rolled, rocked, slammed, and fell in a continuous physical drone. As the audience scrambled for limited seating or floor space imitating the art before them, their bodies also collided with the ground in relentless repetition.<\/p>\n

\"Jacob<\/a><\/p>\n

Jacob Jonas The Company \u2013 Sara Mearns in Zebra, choreography by Jacob Jonas \u2013 Photo by Josh Rose.<\/p>\n

The introduction was abruptly interrupted by a tall, blond dancer in a white, astronaut-like costume who ran the perimeter of the space, stringing yellow \u201ccaution\u201d tape around the massive stage. It evoked a crime scene or wrestling ring\u2014an unspoken warning not to cross, not to interfere, not to escape. The audience sat alert, adrenaline engaged, yet immobilized.<\/p>\n

What followed was a prolonged continuum\u2014nearly an hour\u2014of bodily collapse and recovery, repeated again and again. The experience recalled the Milgram obedience experiments of the 1960s, in which participants were tested on how far they would go under the authority of instruction. Here, the authority was artistic. The experiment asked: how long would the dancers endure? How long would the audience watch? And why would no one intervene?<\/p>\n

\"Jacob<\/a><\/p>\n

Jacob Jonas The Company in COYOTE FOX WOLF DRAGONFLY BUTTERFLY BEE EAGLE RAVEN HAWK, choreography by Jacob Jonas \u2013 Photo by Josh Rose.<\/p>\n

The work relied almost entirely on physical abuse as its expressive vocabulary. Falling, slamming, and exhaustion accumulated without transformation or relief. In a world already saturated with images of violence, disease, and suffering, this performance offered no context beyond endurance itself. Light occasionally suggested escape, but the choreography never followed through.<\/p>\n

Jonas\u2019s personal suffering hovered over the evening as an unspoken justification. Yet the work assumed that his experience eclipsed all others. There was little empathy for the dancers\u2014young artists whose bodies are their livelihoods\u2014or for an audience carrying its own private burdens. Five minutes of this intensity might have communicated the point. Nearly two hours felt punitive.<\/p>\n

Most troubling was the cost to the dancers themselves. This level of sustained physical abuse risks long-term injury and shortened careers. The body is the instrument, and here it was treated as expendable in service of spectacle. Martha Graham described dance as \u201cthe hidden language of the soul,\u201d where the body reveals inner truths beyond words. On this night, the bodies spoke loudly\u2014but only of unrelenting torment.<\/p>\n

\"Jacob<\/a><\/p>\n

Jacob Jonas The Company \u2013 Jill Wilson (center) in COYOTE FOX WOLF DRAGONFLY BUTTERFLY BEE EAGLE RAVEN HAWK, choreography by Jacob Jonas \u2013 Photo by Josh Rose.<\/p>\n

And yet, the evening concluded with a standing ovation.<\/p>\n

Why? Why did mentors, benefactors, peers, and leaders say nothing? Why does the dance world so often equate suffering with significance, intensity with insight? Why does branding and personal mythology silence critical thinking?<\/p>\n

This was not a meditation on the human condition so much as a prolonged demand for attention: Feel what I feel. Know my pain. Redemption, healing, and release\u2014so essential to Jonas\u2019s own survival story\u2014were conspicuously absent. What remained was trauma without transcendence.<\/p>\n

The concern is not that Jacob Jonas lacks talent\u2014he clearly possesses it. The concern is whether this fixation on suffering becomes a cul-de-sac rather than a passage forward. Impact alone is not meaning. Abuse is not depth. And applause does not confer truth.<\/p>\n

In this case, the emperor\u2014celebrated, applauded, unquestioned\u2014stands exposed.<\/p>\n

For more information about Jacob Jonas The Company, please visit their website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Written by Joanne DiVito for LA Dance Chronicle.<\/p>\n

Featured image: Jacob Jonas The Company \u2013 Nic Walton (In air) in COYOTE FOX WOLF DRAGONFLY BUTTERFLY BEE EAGLE RAVEN HAWK, choreography by Jacob Jonas \u2013 Photo by Josh Rose.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There was much to admire at the intimate Charlie Chaplin Studios in Hollywood on the chilly evening of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-102965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}