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Misty Copeland, Part Deux


Helene

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3 hours ago, vipa said:

I agree Abatt, and that clearly is her perspective. If there were more black dancers and one of them was chosen over her, she would have to think differently. 

 

There weren't even other black dancers eligible for those roles. Every single dancer she was competing against was non-black, isn't that right? She was outnumbered, but she still sees the outcome as racial. Pity the other dancers who didn't get the role Copeland wanted either, who lacked her convenient scapegoat. 

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Is she obliquely or directly accusing her AD of racism?  Because Kevin McKenzie also had Carlos Acosta as a guest principal.  Based on interviews McKenzie has given, getting tickets sold is a huge motivation for bringing in guest stars. 

 

The Russian immigres will buy tickets to see Diana Vishneva, etc.  Thry already have international reputations and fans will pay top dollar. 

 

I think Misty saw that and decided she would have to raise her own profile to get the same box office bonanza.  And raising that profile included telling her story in the "nutshell" version that invites clicks for news articles, magazine sales, tv ratings etc.  It has worked.  But she has injuries, so 32 reliable foettes are not possible.  Well executed alternative steps would be better. IMHO.   

 

Had she joined a different company (Royal Danish as an example that does not have so much star importing) perhaps she would have been promoted sooner.  

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I recall having several of these discussions when Copeland was first promoted, and the situation has not magically improved.  There is, in the ballet world as well as most of the rest of American culture, implicit racial bias.  To be fair, most people work hard to eliminate the examples that they know, but that is only a fraction of the problem.  I've only seen Copeland dance on video, so I won't make any claims about her skills in the classical repertory here, but I applaud her willingness to speak up about these biases. 

 

The fact that we keep hashing this out, over and over again, says a great deal about the presence of bias in the culture, here and at large.

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3 hours ago, sandik said:

I recall having several of these discussions when Copeland was first promoted, and the situation has not magically improved.  There is, in the ballet world as well as most of the rest of American culture, implicit racial bias.  To be fair, most people work hard to eliminate the examples that they know, but that is only a fraction of the problem.  I've only seen Copeland dance on video, so I won't make any claims about her skills in the classical repertory here, but I applaud her willingness to speak up about these biases. 

 

The fact that we keep hashing this out, over and over again, says a great deal about the presence of bias in the culture, here and at large.

 

Agreed. Italy may be ahead of the USA in this regard. The first and ONLY commercial DVD of Misty Copeland in a full-evening-length classical ballet is her La Scala Romeo & Juliet, opposite Roberto Bolle. It's a beauty.

 

For all the yak-yak and smug self congratulations for being PC, American public TV (PBS) has yet to program a live or taped full-length ballet starring Misty. We don't need more documentaries or 1-minute spots on TV. 

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7 hours ago, sandik said:

The fact that we keep hashing this out, over and over again, says a great deal about the presence of bias in the culture, here and at large.

 

As a point of logic, what it shows is that people disagree about that bias, and whether there was or might have been bias in this case in particular - not who is correct about it. 

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Hee Seo's italian fouetté weakness as Queen of the Dryads was discussed a few years ago without bringing her race, birth country, trajectory of promotion, or schools (Universal Ballet and Kirov Academy in her case).

 

At some point the performance on stage, at that place and time, is what we comment upon.  Or at least, I think our contributors are commenting upon.  It is up to the AD to remove a dancer from a role if his/her body is not up for it.  

 

Swan Lake is somewhat an exception because there are so many versions over 125+ years, so I am sanguine about substitutions for the fouettés.....but they must be spectacular steps.  I expect beautiful execution con brio! 

 

Now, other masterworks, such as Balanchine's T&V are made to display specific technical brilliance.  And frankly if you are not on Madame Alonso's technical level, you have no business being on the stage in that lead role.   

 

 

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4 minutes ago, Jayne said:

Now, other masterworks, such as Balanchine's T&V are made to display specific technical brilliance.  And frankly if you are not on Madame Alonso's technical level, you have no business being on the stage in that lead role.   

Balanchine might have disagreed with you:  he cast non-bravura dancers in non-bravura roles on occasion, and bravura dancers in Romantic-style roles, and that made many a critic and audience member scratch his or her head.  (His answer was that they were his ballets.)  For example Arlene Croce called Stephanie Saland's "Square Dance" a failed experiment, and Balanchine was in charge at the time.

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8 hours ago, Natalia said:

 

Agreed. Italy may be ahead of the USA in this regard. The first and ONLY commercial DVD of Misty Copeland in a full-evening-length classical ballet is her La Scala Romeo & Juliet, opposite Roberto Bolle. It's a beauty.

 

That may be more because of the recently commented upon lack of DVDs of ballet being made in the US of late (someone said when the last ABT was--I think the SL?) than racial politics. There have been a lot of ugly incidents in Italian soccer this year. Though probably it is less bad than in Russia.

 

 

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37 minutes ago, Jayne said:

Now, other masterworks, such as Balanchine's T&V are made to display specific technical brilliance.  And frankly if you are not on Madame Alonso's technical level, you have no business being on the stage in that lead role.   

 

 

 

Which is why we were all so impressed when Carrie Imler and Bakthurel Bold performed the first section as a part of their retirement show a couple weeks ago -- setting the bar very high.

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Out of curiosity.

Aside from her racial driven controversy. Has it been a precedent in the history of ABT where a Principal dancer has been singled out as so technically weak as Copeland..?

I know it has happened at City Ballet...but the category I see Copeland in public discussions I only remember having it seen with Skorik before...not even Somova or Seo. 

Any such precedent in ABT history....?

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18 minutes ago, Helene said:

You missed the many, many posts about Seo's deficiencies, as well as her lack of positives, unlike the positive you found and posted about during intermission of Copeland's White Act.

 

So then Seo would be the one precedent. I clesrly remember Somova's when she was promoted...then Skorik and then Copeland as the most controversial appointed Principals. For some reason I don't remember Seo as the center of such lenghty, controversial threads...

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Somova and Skorik are from Russian companies, whose dancers are still expected to reflect the virtues of style of their schooling, along with a certain standard of technique, and they were considered epic failures by some in meeting these standards.

 

ABT does not have the same expectation for schooling, and, frankly, I don't think people cared as much.  New Yorkers could buy tickets to other performances over a long season, as opposed to being "stuck" with whoever was being cast on tours that lasted a week, for the most part.

 

There are other precedents for ABT dancers not meeting the expectations of the group before them, particularly in the Baryshnikov years, where the dancing did not meet standards set by Makarova, Bruhn, Fracci, d'Antuono, etc. in the years before Baryshnikov defected and took over the company.  

 

This is cyclical and didn't suddenly emerge when Copeland or Seo came on the scene.

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4 minutes ago, Helene said:

Somova and Skorik are from Russian companies, whose dancers are still expected to reflect the virtues of style and their schooling. 

 

ABT does not have the same expectation for schooling, and, frankly, I don't think people cared as much.

 

There are other precedents for dancers not meeting the expectations of the group before them, particularly in the Baryshnikov years, where the dancing did not meet standards set by Makarova, Bruhn, Fracci, d'Antuono, etc. in the years before Baryshnikov defected and took over the company.  

 

 

Would that be the Kirkland, Harvey, Gregory, Van Hammel years...?

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9 minutes ago, cubanmiamiboy said:

 

Would that be the Kirkland, Harvey, Gregory, Van Hammel years...?

Kirkland's last years were after Baryshnikov took over ABT, but she was a mess by then.  Her years dancing with Baryshnikov started in the Chase years.  Cynthia Gregory joined ABT a decade before Baryshnikov did, and she was an established dancer long before he took over ABT.  Martine van Hamel was a Principal Dancer before Baryshnikov defected.

 

Harvey joined ABT in 1974, the year Baryshnikov defected, but he made her his prima when he took over ABT.  I remember performances from the Baryshnikov decade well, and I remember a lot of dullness.  While I wouldn't fault Harvey's technique, once for me was enough.  

 

It's hard to imagine and remember now, but it took a major mind shift to accept Cynthia Gregory as an actual, bona fide ballerina who was worthy to set foot on the same stage as Russian and European dancers.  A bit like accepting Kappell as a bona-fide pianist and Bernstein as a "real" conductor.

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3 hours ago, Helene said:

Balanchine might have disagreed with you:  he cast non-bravura dancers in non-bravura roles on occasion, and bravura dancers in Romantic-style roles, and that made many a critic and audience member scratch his or her head.  (His answer was that they were his ballets.)  For example Arlene Croce called Stephanie Saland's "Square Dance" a failed experiment, and Balanchine was in charge at the time.

Not all experiments succees, but you don't know until you try.  Still, an AD's obligation is to cast the best performance on the stage.  

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14 minutes ago, Jayne said:

Not all experiments succees, but you don't know until you try.  Still, an AD's obligation is to cast the best performance on the stage.  

If you don't know until you try, then you can't ensure that you've cast the best performance on the stage.

 

I think the AD's obligation is to know when to call the experiment quits.

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Ten, twenty, thirty years ago when fans were upset about a dancers' technical weaknesses, it didn't end up all over the internet being discussed over and over etc. I suspect that this has created a very distorted sense of history. 

 

I will say that, as a critic, Croce was brutally (and in my opinion unjustifiably) harsh about what she considered Fracci's technical weaknesses -- and  in her specialized romantic repertory, not virtuouso roles.

 

Other major ABT ballerinas have had substantial technical weaknesses in some areas--sometimes, as with Part, people feel her other qualities more than compensate. Some people....not everyone. 

 

(Baryshnikov had ballerinas, like Yeager, who rarely figure in people's (articulated) memories of the past--I only saw her in one principal role, Sylphide, but if I had seen her do 1000 fouettes it wouldn't have convinced me she was a major ballerina. I enjoyed her Sylph well enough, and dislike bringing her up just to knock her--others may have better memories--but any sense that ABT's line up has never had ballerinas who got mixed reactions seems dubious to me. I am afraid I mostly agree with Helene about Harvey too.)

 

Edited to add: from everything I have read and seen, I would like to see Copeland's Giselle--certainly more than I would like to see Boylston's; I don't expect Copeland to fly through the air...but there are other qualities to Giselle. And nothing I read about her debut suggested she had major technical problems.

 

 

 

 

Edited by Drew
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28 minutes ago, cubanmiamiboy said:

 

Would that be the case of Copeland's present situation with the warhorses..? ( Giselle...DQ...SL..)

I've read quite nice things about Copeland's performances in all of them, even from you about Copeland's White Act, although I've not heard them described as perfect, and I suspect that so has McKenzie.  So, to answer your question, no.

 

I much prefer Balanchine's version of "Swan Lake" given how much of a circus I think the Odile act has become.  Although I am partial to Kent Stowell's Act IV choreography and the amazing music.

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5 hours ago, cubanmiamiboy said:

Out of curiosity.

Aside from her racial driven controversy. Has it been a precedent in the history of ABT where a Principal dancer has been singled out as so technically weak as Copeland..?

I know it has happened at City Ballet...but the category I see Copeland in public discussions I only remember having it seen with Skorik before...not even Somova or Seo. 

Any such precedent in ABT history....?

 

Absolutely. In the late 70s and through the 80s, many ABT aficionados complained about Leslie Browne's prominence despite relative tech weaknesses, just because she was a star of the hit film THE TURNING POINT early during her career. In the end, she built a nice specialized rep for herself in dramatic ballets, esp. the Tudors.

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Browne was lovely in the Tudor ballets.  

 

She seemed to be cast in everything originally because of the film, after Kirkland had to drop out of it.  On the other side of the plaza, Antonia Franceschi  was not after "Fame."

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I don't know. It might be that I had, honestly, never seen an Odile the way I saw Leo's and Copeland's before in my entire life, with the exception of Skorik's, but that was in a gala many years ago....and I would had never guessed that I was witnessing a Principal to be. I thought that she was perhaps some corps de ballet-(and a very bad one)- who had ventured to dance in this unknown Miami gala. And then...many years after the unfortunate performance, I started seeing her name, Skorik, all around this board. Anyhow, Copeland is here...right now. She's not going anywhere and the MET store is full of merchandise capitalized on her name-(even Barbie and Mme. Alexander dolls)...and she will stay until retirement, so I wish McKenzie goes smarter and starts producing his future seasons with many running Juliettes-type characteres ballets for her, now that she's so bankable in NYC. And no more fouettes for her, please...( you know...for those of us who still count).

Edited by cubanmiamiboy
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I couldn't remember Yeager's name off hand, but yeah.  

 

And it was the same set-up: bringing up a home-grown generation.  Most of the non-import Principals and Soloists started in ABT I/Studio Company and have made it up the ranks.

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