Early in the first act of Shorter and spalding's …(Iphigenia) the carousing band of Argive soldiers cum frat boys dumps the body of a deer stage left, close to the audience. A spotlight is trained onto the carcass, and there it remains: as the bodies of Iphigenias pile up alongside it through Act I; as the Iphigenias are revivified and we enter a new conceptual plane in Act II; as the mythic plot reconvenes in Act III; and during the curtain call, when the cast, musicians, and crew come onto the stage to take their bows. At one point, I half expected the ensemble to smile wide and extend their arms towards the rigid body of the deer, inviting audience applause for their fellow performer, still, even now, fixed motionless under a spotlight.