5/23 New York Times Article on Wheeldon

[bobbi]

I haven't posted in a while and here I'm back with one of my "rants." My nose is out of joint because of the following quote from Christopher Wheeldon:

"I find myself longing for the richness of the ballets, I grew up with, especially MacMillan's."

I had to read this a couple of times for the implications to sink in: The current resident choreographer of the New York City Ballet does not find Balancchine ballets "rich" enough for him. Excuse me, but in the pantheon of Twentieth Century choreographers, MacMillan is not in the top five of my list. (Perhaps I would have been less outraged if Wheelon longed for the "richness" of Ashton.)

Did anyone else have any reaction to this quote?

[Leigh Witchel]

Here's the link to this article, for convenience: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/23/arts/dan...nce/23WHEE.html

I'm not mad for MacMillan either, but I think the key words here are "I grew up with". Alexandra and I often talk about something we call "the Baby Duckling syndrome". When something is the first thing you know, it has a special pride of place. MacMillan encouraged Wheeldon when he was young and is what he grew up on. I think Wheeldon's affection for his work is very understandable in that context.

[Alexandra]

Good to see you again, Bobbi!

I agree with Leigh's assessment, but it does worry me, as one who does not find MacMillan's ballets rich, and I take your point. There is a real difference in orientation and viewpoint between someone who primarily loves Ashton or Balanchine -- and I know they're very different -- and MacMillan, I think, and the "richness" here is the supposedly "deep" psychological underpinnings.

[brokenwing]

but upon considering things that Leigh and Alexandra have mentioned already, realized he meant no harm by it. I don't think he meant to say Balanchine's ballets lacked richness but rather there are other choreographers, like MacMillan, who could serve him that as well that he was missing out on.

[Dale]

I completely understand where Wheeldon is coming from. But what worries me is that whatever one thinks of McMillian or Balanchine - they are, to me, complete opposites. That is worrying for me. If Wheeldon were going to be doing MacMillian-esque works for NYCB, that probably would by opposed to what the company stands for. On the other hand, we've seen the work of those who are supposedly Balanchinites. Personally, I find many Balanchine works more emotional than MacMillian's, despite all the rolling around on the stage and wailing that is done in the later's work.

[bobbi]

Dale, I think you articulated what got me so upset. Balanchine's whole aesthetic was in the opposite direction from the story ballet. His ballets were based on the musical impulse. Now, we have someone in charge of the New York City Ballet rep who is turning back the clock to an era where the story mattered more than the music.

I know that Balanchine is gone and there will never be another one like him (as the aristocratic world that produced him and other titans of Western culture (e.g. Mozart) is history. But it seems that only twenty years after Balanchine's death we have NYCB turning into NYCB Theater. What a slap in the face to everything he stood for -- and in the House That Balanchine Built too. I find it so very, very sad.

[Mel Johnson]

Originally posted by Bobbi

I know that Balanchine is gone and there will never be another one like him (as the aristocratic world that produced him and other titans of Western culture (e.g. Mozart) is history

Would it be so awful if Wheeldon, say, turns out to be Schubert?

[brokenwing]

Things have obviously changed a lot since Balanchine died, but I don't think things are so fargone yet that we should resort to calling the company NYCB Theater. I feel that there are still choreographers that make ballets on the impulse of music, as you've said, and Wheeldon is one of them. Have any of you seen 'Morphoses' or 'Mercurial Manouvers'? Those ballets are about as musical and genius as one can get, and I don't think there is a storyline in either that overrides the musicality.

Perhaps we've simply analyzed too much and Wheeldon really didn't mean anything by the comment. Even if he did, I do believe there are other choreographers out there who can fit the bill of choreographing ballets that follow the legacy of Balanchine, even if they pale in comparison.

Having said that, NYCB has changed a lot, which is pretty obvious. I personally feel that much of this is due to outside pressure and criticisms about a lack of classical technique or sense of classicism. I've even heard *very* important figures in the NYCB world discussing this.

That is simply something I found intolerable. Why must such criticisms be taken to an extreme need to be proven wrong? There are thousands who adore the company for what it is or was or whatever, so why should it have to change just to prove a few naysayers wrong?

[Alexandra]

I can't remember reading, in the last 30 years, a complaint that NYCB was not classical enough, at least not from an American critic. I think this may be a misunderstanding -- there have been constant, often loud, criticisms about the way Balanchine's ballets are danced, but not an urging that the company become more classical. More neoclassical, more back to Balanchine, but not more Petipa. I have no reason to disbelieve the official reasons given for this year's novel workshop selections, namely, that in preparation for the upcoming Balanchine Celebration, the School wanted to explore/examine/introduce the students to, Balanchine's roots, and to do it through works from the past staged for the company during his lifetime.

Mel, I think your comment, "Would it be so bad if Wheeldon turned out to be Schubert" is very apt. I would be happy if there were a dozen Schuberts. Even a Glazunov would do right about now, and a couple of Copelands.

[brokenwing]

Perhaps then, the criticism of a lack of classical technique has been misinterpreted as a criticism of a lack of classical pieces in the company? I think that's more of what I meant.

[Alexandra]

Brokenwing, I just emailed you with a longer explanation, and while writing it, I think I may have figured out what this issue is. There HAS been criticism of SAB that the teachers are now teaching "Balanchine technique" while during Balanchine's day he used classical teachers, because he wanted the students to have a solid grounding in classical technique (Danilova, Stanley Williams). When dancers got into the company, Balanchine would use/change this technique, but that was something reserved for fully formed, fully grown dancers. But this would be a school issue, not a company one.

I don't have any idea whether any of this went into the thinking for the current SAB workshop, and I think it's inappropriate to discuss that, unless someone can point to an article or interview. As I wrote above, the official reason for the workshop rep is that it's to acquaint the students with older ballets from which Balanchine's work descended. IMO, it's a terrific idea, and it should be useful. There's a lot of Petipa in Balanchine, and a smattering of Bournonville, too. And Fokine is a near-contemporary, and Balanchine staged his Les Sylphides. (I'm very interested to see how people will regard this piece now. When Balanchine staged it, the ballet was still in repertory. It was a signature piece by ABT, the Royal did it, and people were very used to seeing it in costume and felt that the costumes and sets, the atmosphere, were necessary. I'll bet that the general take today will be "Steps! It's got steps! What a work of genius!" )

Back to the original topic on Wheeldon, it would be interesting to see the reaction if he does make a MacMillanesque-piece He said he wanted to make a blend of dramatic and abstract (one might argue that MacMillan's "Song of the Earth" is like that). I don't think doing dramatic ballets would be a step back, or a step back in time. I know there are many people who think that abstract ballet is, in itself, superior to dramatic ballet, and that dropping the story improved ballet, is a progression in the development of ballet, but I'm not one of them. So I'd argue that doing a dramatic ballet itself wouldn't be a frightening development. But this is definitely an IMO -- there could be healthy debate on any of these issues. The jury's still out. IMO

[Petra]

The strangest and saddest thing IMO in this article were Wheeldon's comments on the NYCB dancers regearding how they have to be told precisely what to do and how they don't meet him halfway creatively.

Strange because this is his home company - if you don't like your collaborative process... Well, that's like Michaelangelo saying "God, this Carrera marble - it just doesn't meet me halfway" - If you don't like marble, go off and paint a ceiling or something. If Wheeldon is happy to (presumably) be drawing a permanent salary from NYCB while having carte blanche to chorograph for other companies, I personally don't think he should be complaining about the material he has at his disposal there.

These comments were also very sad, because this certainly isn't the company or school that created Kirkland, Kent and Farrell (I've never seen NYCB, so I'm just naming the dancers whose autobiographies I've read or seen.) Thinking back, this illuminates a lot of comments on the NYCB thread but Wheeldon said it with such authority and obviousness (that's not a word) that it was quite shocking - to me, at any rate. Perhaps no one else has mentioned this point, because to the NYCB-goer this point is indeed self-evident??

[Michael]

I like his frankness in the interview. A basic problem for me in relating to his work has been the "Who is He?" question I've felt lingering after watching several things and especially after being inundated by skillful PR of the Vanity Fair genus. The more he answers that question, implicitly in his work and explicitly in his speech, the more I find the creative honesty which I think helps contribute to good art.

His anecdote on working with the City Ballet dancers on Carousel is provocative. He said something similar to what he said in the Kisselgoff interview, only in a more nuanced way, in his recent interview with Francis Mason in Ballet Review.

One thing that I have always liked about Wheeldon is that he gets something very personal out of his dancers. What he saw and brought out about Alexandra Ansanelli in Polyphonia, for instance, or the role made on Muriel Maffre in the SFB Ligeti work. If while making Carousel he had to fight with some of them to draw some of that out it would not be the first time that happened with a choreographer. Observing Wheeldon, I don't think that being generally overbearing or nasty in the Jerome Robbins mode is at all a risk in his character.

[Alexandra]

GWTW, I just reread the interview and didn't find a complaint about City Ballet dancers, just a comment that they were used to being used as tools, and a comparison to Hamburg Ballet dancers. I really think it was simply a comment on different approaches rather than a complaint. (Whatever one thinks of Neumeier's choreography, dancers adore working with him, and his approach may work better for Neumeier's "Nijinsky"--a theater piece-- than for abstract ballet.)

Michael, I think the "Who is He?" question is possibly one that could be asked of any good, young choreographer? They have to try out things -- I think it's a strength that he's taken so many chances and has worked in so many styles.

I think, too, that he (and this goes for any choreographer that doesn't have his own company and reasonable resources) may not be ablle to do exactly what he wants, so we don't really know who he is yet. I did an interview with him about three years ago for Interview magazine (they gave me 300 words, which was ridiculous, and cut it to 150 words, which was beyond ridiculous. They gave it a full page, but it was a full-page photo, with the "interview" as the picture caption). One of the things he said that I thought was especially interesting was that he wanted very much to do a ballet that was a real collaboration with designer and composer. He alluded to that in the NYTimes interview, too -- I also think it's a strength, and a rare one, that he's open to collaboration.

I thought it was a good interview.

[Ari]

Originally posted by Bobbi

Balanchine's whole aesthetic was in the opposite direction from the story ballet.  His ballets were based on the musical impulse.  Now, we have someone in charge of the New York City Ballet rep who is turning back the clock to an era where the story mattered more than the music. . . . But it seems that only twenty years after Balanchine's death we have NYCB turning into NYCB Theater.  What a slap in the face to everything he stood for -- and in the House That Balanchine Built too.  I find it so very, very sad.

Bobbi, I don't think Balanchine was hostile to story ballets at all. He made a number of big ones himself (Nutcracker, Midsummer, Don Q, Coppelia, Harlequinade); it's just that he preferred to work in the non-narrative mode. And, in the fifties at least, he encouraged other choreographers to create the kinds of ballets they felt comfortable with. While he didn't believe in a "something for everyone" repertory of the ABT variety, he did want a repertory with some balance.

Personally, I'm grateful for the chance to see something — ANYTHING — other than the numbingly hip slick ultramodern ear- and eye-hurting fiascos that NYCB churns out so regularly.

[Alexandra]

Ari makes a good point -- and also, we tend to forget that the 1950s City Ballet repertory contained dramatic ballets like Cullberg's "Medea".

[bobbi]

Ari, you do make very good points, and I agree with your assessment about the story classics. But as a mature artist, Balanchine did tend to trim the story, i.e., Ballet Imperial lost its mime, Square Dance lost its caller and Apollo lost its birth scene. I'm not against a good story ballet, but it's the direction NYCB is taking that disturbs me. However, the one Wheelon ballet that I like -- and still like after subsequent viewings (the prime test for me) -- is Scenes de Ballet. I find it charming and elegant (Ashton like).

[Calliope]

When I first read it I thought he was also complaining about the NYCB dancers, referring to them as tools, and then with "Carousel" not meeting him halfway and his "lashing out at them".

It could just be that the comments came at the very beginning of the article and the end of the article.

[Ari]

Originally posted by Bobbi

I'm not against a good story ballet, but it's the direction NYCB is taking that disturbs me.

Which direction is that, Bobbi?

[Dale]

Wasn't it Kirstein who wanted a more varied rep.? I had read that once Balanchine become a true part of the establishment (at the time of the opening of Lincoln Center and the Ford Foundation grants) he exerted more control over the rep. and some of the varied ballets Kirstein liked were gone.

[Michael]

I found the Wheeldon-Ballet-Review quote on the subject of dancers participating in the choreographic process. It adds some context (almost reverses some of the NYCB meaning, in fact) and a good deal of nuance to what he says in the Kisselgoff interview and it's worth quoting here (fair use), I think, in view of the extensive comment which that portion of the Kisselgoff review has provoked:

Mason: "The dancers, you were saying, are different in Europe than here in the way they attack a new role."

Wheeldon: "They're not always as technically capable but they're more willing to go deeper into something, they're more willling to throw themselves. And there are dancers here with whom I work at City Ballet who are very much like this and that's why I like to work with them. They strike up a kind of creative relationship with me rather than expecting me to come in and make them do all the work. I think the most interesting work comes from getting to know a dancer and working a little bit below the surface; European dancers tend to be a little bit more open to that ..."

Spring '03 Ballet Review p. 56.

[Mel Johnson]

I found the "elicited collaboration of the dancers" idea highly reminiscent of Ashton. The article itself did nothing to disturb my impression of Wheeldon so far - that is, a very talented, pleasant young man of great potential. Long may that potential develop, say I.

[Petra]

Michael, thanks for the quote from Ballet Review. Perhaps the NY Times article suffered from an excess of editing?

[KayDenmark]

I think we should just let Wheeldon be Wheeldon. I'm no fan of story ballets and I simply hate him when he's trying to be cute, but I'd much rather see him follow his muse wherever it takes him than see anyone forced into pale Xeroxes of the Balanchine style. Isn't ham-handed Balanchine imitation part of the problem with Peter Martins?

I think NYCB is pretty lucky to have a young, innovative in-house choreographer - it keeps the company vital and alive. What other major company has that opportunity right now?

Furthermore, it's good for the dancers, who have the chance to have parts created on them, parts tuned to their own personality and skills.

Balanchine works are inimitable, but how many times can you try to re-intepret something really styled for Violette Verdy, or be told that whatever you're doing was done better 30 years ago by Suzanne Farrell?

[Alexandra]

Originally posted by KayDenmark

Balanchine works are inimitable, but how many times can you try to re-intepret something really styled for Violette Verdy, or be told that whatever you're doing was done better 30 years ago by Suzanne Farrell?

An infinite number, I would hope. Why is this such a problem in dance? Do opera singers regularly rant that they can't stand doing one more Norma? Performers are always compared, and there are standards to be met in any art form.