“Camille A. Brown and her company Camille A. Brown & Dancers began their Celebrity Series of Boston debut at the Boch Center Shubert Theatre Saturday night by summoning the gifts, legacy and complicated history of black performers.
Unfolding like a family album, images were projected behind the dancers that varied from grainy archival footage of minstrel shows and cakewalk pageants to vintage photos of cinema maids and butlers and video clips of TV comedians of the 1950s and ’60s. Meanwhile, an eight-member ensemble performed a torrent of complex and supple movements in unison, pairs and solos, white sneakers highlighting fast feet, to rhapsodic, propulsive live piano music.”