Mel Johnson

Going by the Dumas retelling of the story, which is what Vsevolozhsky was working with, it was Silberhaus (Silverhouse). I also didn't like the sound of the perhaps more Hoffmanesque Stahlbaum (Steeltree). Given the propensities of modern producers to change everybody's name to something "relevant", I predict a time not too far off when the kids are named Leni Riefenstahl and Heinrich Himmler Stahlhelm.

Back in them Good Ole Days, Otto Kahn produced an Aïda at the New York Hippodrome with elephants onstage. They seemed to get along well with the rest of the cast, but one showed an annoying tendency to Sing Along with Ramfis. Remember, Kahn was the producer who introduced Swan Lake to America (starring Yekaterina Geltzer). I don't know if he used any animals in that.

This is a lovely synopsis. I really chuckled over the explanation of how the nutcracker broke. What a subtle distinction! Thanks, I worked really hard at it, and now see, twelve years down the pike, that I deleted my own reference to the Nutcracker still wearing his jaw bandage, which explains the "previous wound" reference.

Well, it sure beats the AUTHORITARIAN version, where the Sylph and her Secret Police break down your door at midnight, pillage your house and beat you with rubber hoses.

I think that those are ballet slippers. Remember, one of them has to come off.

And the pose is a connoisseur's choice. Even by today's standards, her position of effacé looks good. It's difficult to use that in any form of photography; all the dancer's faults are revealed. A fun period detail is the photographer's stand/brace immediately behind her.

I don't know more about Alexander Krein than you probably do, having only a passing familiarity with the Laurencia pas de six and experience playing one of his klezmer-based chamber quintets, but I think it's useful to consider how musique dansant was treated in Russia, even during the Soviet era. As in the "Paquita Grand Pas", music could freely be extracted from other works, and be interpolated into another of similar sound. The male variation cited may even be by Deldevez, dating from the earliest version of Paquita or even Corsaire, the evidence is arguable. I get this picture of ballet scores being a lot like loose-leaf binders, with numbers circulating through the repertoire, so it would not be out of the ordinary for some Minkus or Drigo to show up in ballets by other composers. Whether Krein did it or not, I don't know. I don't know enough about his working methods. Chabukiani could have just thrown something into something else on his own authority. Le Corsaire is a good example of this practice, with its 5-7 composers, depending on whom you ask.

Add to that, that the paper was probably using a halftone printing process using a screen which would be considered unacceptably coarse, even in places which still use that technology today. We forget that the offset image we see in most newspapers now is considerably smoother and of higher definition than the halftone prints of the 20th century.

We're coming in hot! as they say in the Air Force, and hope to be finished with this year's fund drive by next Wednesday. Of course, we're happy to take contributions anytime, and want to encourage shopping through Amazon.com via the banner link all year long. These finder's fees sustain us, so that we don't have to bother you during the busy season, when all the shows are up. This drive has been one of the shortest ever, so good for all the contributors who make and support these boards.

I agree that it's Lucia, and the photo was worked on. I had thought initially that the fuzzy area around her head was a result of "dodging" to make her face stand out, but then I saw that the "nimbus" extended into the border of the print area of the picture, meaning that it was brushwork on the surface either with white watercolor or photo bleach, removing background. There are also markings for cropping the image down just to the face. I don't know if her nasolabial fold has been retouched, but if you look at her eyebrows, you'll see that they are extraordinarily black and not lined up well with her actual browline. She would never have permitted herself to appear like that in real life, so I have to conclude that that area has been retouched as well.

Yes, and even after. There was even a school of thought that male dancers needed to GLUE the shoes on using old-fashioned hide glue that had partially dried. Ecch!

It used to be done all the time, socks or tights. Now it's a sort of Old School practice.

It is further interesting to see David Blair. It was about this time that he transitioned from the Touring Company to the Main Stage, and he looks ever so much more mature (at 21) than many other photos I've seen of him from that era of RB.

The "elderly, ugly" is a riff on Gilbert and Sullivan's "Trial by Jury", where the Learned Judge ascribes part of his success to having wooed a rich attorney's "elderly, ugly daughter", then tossing her aside, thus making him the ideal jurist to try a breach of promise suit! At any rate, the ugly sisters in Ashton's Cinderella are lineal descendants of Carabosse in the Royal Ballet tradition.

Further consider that Ashton was creating his Cinderella for an English audience, where the "pantomime dame" is an established tradition. Few castings make for better elderly, ugly women than men!

Victoria tells me that we're over halfway there! To those who have already contributed, thank you! For those who mean to, but haven't got 'round to it yet, why wait? Contribute now and avoid the last minute rush! Maybe, just maybe, we can wrap this up by next week, and not have to worry about it for another year.

Perhaps, if one holds to the idea of the transmigration of souls, a case could be made metaphorically, but Petipa was neither yet clinically dead, nor was Balanchine formed from the brow of Terpsichore fully blown, and already choreographing "Prodigal Son".

AND there is a part of the Chicago area audience who will be intrigued, as they will remember Ruth Page's version.

At the opening of ABT's David Blair production of Swan Lake, Siegfried entered in Act I accompanied by two Great Danes, which belonged to Regisseur Dimitri Romanoff.

I've got it! Let's turn this production over to Oliver Stone! That way, we'll learn things about ballet that we never dreamed existed, and in fact, don't, but Oliver will present them that way anyway!

From the waist up, she looks all right (well, ok, the makeup is weird, like the Apprentice in "The Cage", but that's bugs and not birds; and what's with the hands being blacked?), but the lack of rotation of the thighs spells nondancer in ALL CAPS! Better had they cropped the photo at the bottom of the tutu.

Many thanks to those who have already contributed, and we're looking forward to this being one of the briefest fundraisers we've ever had. So don't lose a chance! If you've thought about it, but haven't quite got around to it, now is a good time to take care of it! Let's go over the top, and return to our regular programming as soon as we make our goal, as they say on the classical radio stations!

There's certainly nothing that says Apollo must be fair-haired or -skinned. Those things are controlled by an artistic director's preferences for appearance. While the company was still back at City Center, the main Apollo settled on Jacques d'Amboise. When they got to Lincoln Center, a "short cast" headed by Edward Villella was added.There's footage around of André Eglevsky, dressed in gold lamé and a gold laurel wreath, dancing a rather intense reading of the choreography. He definitely wasn't street, but could have been hanging around backstage at the theater, which is a pretty tough neigborhood!

Yes, he certainly is a stock character, sort of based on Pantalon, and Rouben was very well-versed in historic costume, so even if this weren't Léandre, it surely represents the kind of foolish old fashion plate who fancies himself dangerous around the ladies!

Yes, it certainly resembles the Ter-Arutunian design for Léandre. The Elderly Fop model is very clear, as also seen in Camacho in Don Quixote. I like especially the red heels on the shoes, which in several monarchic European societies denoted that the wearer had been received at court. Léandre obviously wants to let everyone know that he's High Society.