Anything but a silent night with Philadanco

Choreographer Daniel Ezralow has spent the past several years devising moves for Spider-Man and his comic book adversaries’ now-infamous $65 million Broadway debut, “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” This may be the most high-profile gig of Ezralow’s career, but it’s not the first time he’s created a dance inspired by a red-suited fantasy icon.

That would be his work with Santa Claus on Philadanco’s holiday perennial, “Xmas Philes.” That piece will be the focus of the local dance company’s latest show, “Celebrating Danny,” an evening-length celebration of Ezralow’s work.

“They’re little ditties if you take them separately, but if you put them all together they become a potpourri of Christmas spirit and a bit of a jaunt,” Ezralow says of the nine segments that make up “Xmas Philes.”

Ezralow — whose Christmas resume also includes the Ron Howard/Jim Carrey adaptation of “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” — hopes to continue building “Xmas Philes” into a full evening. For now, the program will be supplemented by “Pulse,” a modern ballet of sliding movements set to a piece by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang; and “Compassion & Revenge,” inspired by September 11.

“It was very clear that we were in a desperate state as a country and very angry,” he says of creating the latter dance. “I felt like we needed to take a breath.”