nanushka

Intermissions have been running about 20 min, and it looks like there are two for that program.

20 minutes ago, ABT Fan said:

Is it a NYCB retirement thing to only give the dancer a single rose? Or is that a pandemic thing? A flower shortage thing (which is a real thing right now)? I’m so used to ABT retirements where each person coming out gives a bouquet. I suppose that is wasteful but this looks so skimpy to me, especially for a dancer of Reichlen’s caliber.

It was Reichlen's request, per the recent article in the NYTimes:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/17/arts/dance/teresa-reichlen-retiring-from-new-york-city-ballet.html

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It will be “typical Tess fashion: low key,” Stafford said. “During the bows, she doesn’t want bouquets. She just wants single roses, and she doesn’t want it to be a parade of all the principal dancers who feel like they have to do it. She just wants anyone who wants to give her a rose to give her a rose. And she’ll gladly accept it.”

He added, “She’s pretty popular. I imagine a bunch of dancers are going to want to do it.”

Clearly, this stresses Reichlen out. “I just really enjoy dancing,” she said. “The recognition and the pouring on of praise just makes me feel very uncomfortable. And in retirements in the past, when I’m at them, the whole time I’m thinking, this is my worst nightmare.” Well, maybe not her worst nightmare — she paused, clearly agonized.

“It’s not me,” she said. “I’m the dancer who stands in the back corner of the studio. I enjoy being onstage, obviously, but it’s funny: I would be happy if the curtain came down and we didn’t have to bow.”

I loved reading that part of the article.

6 minutes ago, Helene said:

I don't think they need actual threats, particularly at Tutberidze's rink: they already have 14-year-olds with triple axels and multiple quads to take over.  Which skater has never been the point.

Why do ballet students and dancers hide injuries and eating disorders/disordered eating, from their parents and companies?  They know there is someone to take their place.  That is true of elite athletes as well, amplified in sports like skating and gymnastics and many of the "X" sports where many of the athletes are so young.

That's quite possibly true, though I think the world saw (pre-scandal) that Valieva was not just one of the pack of strong Russian skaters. Sometimes, with a remarkable enough talent, which skater can become the point. I imagine she was recognized as one they wanted to push as far as she could possibly go. I could certainly be wrong about threats, it's just a possibility that seems quite plausible to me. You're certainly right, though, that even without that there'd have been plenty of other pressures.

3 minutes ago, Helene said:

The threat is that you follow the protocol and get elite training plus stipend paid by governments, the opportunity to compete, adoration of the public, lucrative sponsorships, opportunities to skate for decades in a thriving and ice show environment and skating/skating and dancing TV competition series after your competitive career, and if you win the Olympics, a car, an apartment in Moscow, and a stipend for life.  Or you don't, and it all goes away.

Those are incentives — or their absence. I'm thinking genuine threats. I would not be at all surprised. (And if so, then moral censure of her as an individual becomes even more difficult.)

1 hour ago, dirac said:

Should she have been allowed to skate? No. Should she face consequences? Yes. But focusing on her as an individual makes little sense in this context.

Yes, I think this gets it quite right.

15 hours ago, On Pointe said:

I don't feel sorry for her in the least,  as I have no doubt she knew she was taking a banned substance.

Quite possibly — though if she did, I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that she was made to feel she didn't have a choice. I can easily imagine quite convincing threats made against herself, her loved ones, etc. Tutberidze and her skaters are part of a much larger, corrupt system.

If there’s ever a time to retire the (IMO) outmoded phrase “ladies’ figure skating,” this Olympics must be it.

A mess, indeed. It's like a scene from Spinning Out or something.

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“Why did you let it go?” Tutberidze asked in Russian in a scene broadcast on live television. “Why did you stop fighting? Explain it to me, why? You let it go after that axel.”

Valieva did not reply.

7 hours ago, Drew said:

I completely agree, but the way it has played out in this particular case also foregrounds problems with having minors compete.

Only if you buy into the logic that her age should be considered as a factor in whether she be allowed to complete after having tested positive for a banned substance — which doesn't seem at all logical to me. I don't understand what the one has to do with the other. Her age should impact who is held responsible, not whether she skates in competition. Her presence on the ice, after a positive test, renders the whole competition a bizarre exercise in overlooking the obviously relevant. It calls into question the significance of the entire event. I don't think it should matter whether she is 18 or 15, or whether the substance got into her by force, in ignorance, or with her willing consent. Once it's there, she should be out. Yes, it may be sad that she as a (possibly innocent) minor should have to pay that price for the mistakes of her elders — but the competition makes no sense if she skates, IMO.

That's interesting, I don't think of Scotch Symphony and La Sylphide as being connected in at all the same way.

Certainly, the creator of one has seen and is responding to (among many other things) the other; but I think of SS as depicting (to the extent that it depicts anything) something from the same world as LS, but not in the same idiom, and not with the same basic narrative.

Which I guess is just to say that I don't find that SS suffers by comparison. (Though I really only like the first two movements — love them, in fact — and don't much care for the third.)

(That may be partly Mendelssohn's fault, though, as it's the same with the music.)

It’s great he’s coming back! Maybe bodes well for the prospect of future NYC ABT engagements?

I was pretty disappointed by Reichlen in Slaughter on Saturday. She was my main reason for staying for the piece. Her legs were of course gorgeous but I was not particularly drawn in by any other part of her performance. I saw her in it once before (a few years ago) and thought she was ok, not great, in terms of overall performance. This time, not so much. Too bad, as it was my last time seeing her and I have really loved her in numerous other things.

Ugh yes that costume. I didn’t much like his program either. Loved  Jason Brown though. Gorgeous skating.

Oh no. With her farewell coming up, I really hope she has no serious injury.

Oh, I'm very surprised to hear that the outdoor terrace hasn't been open. Duh, isn't outdoor public space what it's all about now? That makes no sense. Unlock the doors!

I think intermissions promote possible viral transmission a lot less than having a bunch of people eating and drinking while mingling unmasked. At least the current protocols make a bit more sense.

(That said, I’m hoping we may be getting closer to a time when the eating and drinking can again be allowed, too, now that we’re past the worst of the omicron variant and perhaps nearing an endemic stage of the virus.)

I’ve been watching her performances on YT in the months leading up to the Olympics and I agree, @Drew—it’s hard not to love her!

I was there too, @MarzipanShepherdess, and agree with many of your observations. Mearns was fantastic. She looks in marvelous shape, and she is so perfect in this role. She has gorgeous, powerful legs — almost a match for Reiclen's in Slaughter! I enjoyed Pereira's dancing more than I ever had before. (I do just wish she'd tone down the lipstick.) Janzen was a good partner, which is nearly all this role requires — but yes, then he botched two of the three double tours, stepping out of the landings.

I completely missed the hard fall! Must have been absorbed in watching another part of the stage.

I agree about Unanswered Question. I'd have been perfectly happy with just Walpurgisnacht as a first act, but they don't seem to program it that way. Moves would have made a bigger initial impact without UQ in between. There are indeed too many repetitions of the same thing, but I did enjoy seeing Laracey hold that gorgeous arabesque, supported only by the four men from below. I'd be interested to see the piece in the complete Ivesiana, where it perhaps works better.

I really enjoyed Moves, which I'd never seen, and I thought all four leads (Gerrity, Grant, Hod, Walker) looked great. Got the sense this piece was an influence on Peck.

I've decided never to stay for Slaughter again, unless there's someone in it I really want to see. (I wanted to see Reichlen for one last time.) It's not a strong enough closer to round out a really satisfying program (which this wasn't, alas — didn't all add up to quite enough).

9 minutes ago, volcanohunter said:

But surely they have to expect the issue to come up. Artists are constantly asked questions about how they square performing the works of misogynists, anti-Semites or sexual predators, or what it's like to portray controversial figures, or how they judge the actions of artists who lived under totalitarianism or occupation.

I imagine they did expect the issue to come up and instructed the artists not to engage.

That's probably what was meant by "weren't prepared to answer": they deliberately chose not to prepare them.

Arlene Croce wrote at some length about the heights and body types in Mozartiana:

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Farrell and Andersen don't appear mated, the way Farrell and Peter Martins do, or Farrell and Jacques d'Amboise. Andersen has a stripling, asexual quality; he doesn't mate easily with anybody. Even the very young Darci Kistler looks better with Sean Lavery or Christopher d'Amboise than she does with Andersen. In Apollo, Andersen looks fine as the boy-god, but later, when he comes into his maturity and has to dominate the Muses, he's unconvincing, especially with Farrell as Terpsichore. Balanchine in Mozartiana uses Andersen's slightness in relation to Farrell as part of a scheme. It is, first, a way of accentuating the mild force of the music and its spiritual temper. ... The ballerina's dancers in Mozartiana are lighter, airier, more restricted in their sensuous range than they are in Chaconne, which Farrell performs opposite Martins or Adam Lüders. She hurls no thunderbolts here; instead, one sees a fiery glow of pinpoints clustered in the sky. And then the feathery fall through space. Andersen's dances are also concentrated and aerial, but if he's light, she's lighter. Balanchine in his casting and use of Andersen has removed much of the gravity from the male end of the male-female partnership, but he hasn't upset the balance. The result lifts the whole ballet into an upper atmosphere; we breathe new air—the ether of Mozartiana.

...

Balanchine has avoided setting up the obvious correspondences and turnabouts. Although we sense the connection between the big and the small girls and between them and Farrell (for one thing, they're all dressed alike), it's an elusive and mysterious connection. And who is the second man? You might think that Balanchine would cast this lone male dancer in contrast to Andersen, but in fact it's Victor Castelli, another lightweight.     (Going to the Dance pp. 404-405)

ETA: Castelli is remarkably fleet in his gigue (in the video posted above). Ulbricht didn't have nearly that same speed when I saw him on Sunday (the tempo was significantly slower), but he had good precision and elevation.

The whole idea of a Michael Jackson musical that is "essentially an authorized biography" (as the above-linked NYT piece calls it) seems kind of ridiculous. I'm a little surprised artists of Wheeldon's stature got onboard. (That said, I've never much liked Wheeldon's work.)

30 minutes ago, Sal said:

My only quibble was that she smiled throughout...

I have repeatedly noticed and been bothered by this about LaFreniere. A little of that can be fine, in the right places. But she grinned all the way through Chaconne last fall, and through most of the Mozartiana menuet.

It reminds me of how Veronika Part for awhile often held her mouth open while dancing. I think she worked on it, though, and it was not a problem in the latter part of her ABT career, as I recall. Hopefully LaFreniere can do the same. (She perhaps has a bit of an overbite, and so it may be difficult for her to sustain a relaxed look with closed lips. From years of braces in childhood, I can sympathize.)

I agree about those particular qualities but for me the role calls for more.

@cobweb I agree with you on basically every point. Hyltin was not particularly  memorable in this. Huxley had fantastic precision and height on his jumps. The 4 new soloists looked superb (though I wish LaFreniere grinned less). Fairchild was more thoroughly satisfying than I’ve ever seen her. Garcia was enjoyable too (in a role and ballet I generally don’t care for). Kikta gorgeous throughout. Sanz and Laracey and Kikta great in La Valse. Furlan almost stole the show, and his jetés were phenomenal. But once Furlan froze for the long encounter with Death, Mearns and Ramasar more than capably took over. I was not looking forward to seeing the last two pieces again but with these casts it was worth it.

Yes, very exciting and well deserved by all. Great news!