Helene

And the discussion has continued in response to your response to that penultimate post in the old thread,

The idea that people holding prestigious positions or in selective schools simply due to meritocracy is belied in so many ways. We can look at two examples of affirmative action for white, Protestant men in education. At the beginning of the 20th century, Harvard University based admissions on test scores, which were, at the time, the accepted measure for meritocracy, and, in their eyes, there were too many Jews from New York. Suddenly, they expanded the definition of meritocracy to include "well-rounded" criteria that resulted in a student population of "people like us." Or to take my alma mater, Wesleyan University, which accepted women 41 years after it was founded, in 1872, to be in step with newer Methodist universities that had been established as co-ed schools. and http://www.wesleyan.edu/fgss/firstwomen.html This affirmative action for almost entirely white men lasted until most of the elite East Coast schools went co-ed in the late 1960's and expanded their student bodies with early boomer females.

That's very exciting news, and with Shklyarov, too. Wish I were going to be in NYC.

Being a lauded Principal at a neoclassical company with a wide range of rep should mean that the dancer is a fit for another comparable company. The same thing is true for most Principal Dancers and Soloists at SFB, PNB, MCB, Pennsylvania Ballet, Boston Ballet, Ballet West, Ballet Arizona, Joffrey Ballet, Cincinnati Ballet, and Kansas City Ballet, just to name some. Houston Ballet may be the only stylistic exception, although the times I've seen the company live and on film, I didn't get the impression that Welch's rep had that many stylistic anomalies. Every time Cuban dancers defect, they are absorbed into US companies, most of them immediately. Stylistically, they are trained in ABT's rep, not Balanchine rep and not neoclassical rep, but that hasn't stopped AD's from hiring them and casting them. Angel Corella, for example, just hired three Cuban dancers who are stylistic anomalies to the rep the company dances. Promotions and/or Principal casting have been quick in many cases, and blending into the corps isn't an issue.

PNB's 50% off tickets -- aside from student and senior rush -- tend to be sold on Goldstar. The four people I know who've used Goldstar have been happy with their tickets. Seattle Opera had a great offer: if a subscriber bought tickets to another performance, they could get one at the standard subscriber discount (10%) or two for the price of one. A variation I've seen on the "bring a friend" offer is one at the subscriber discount and other(s) at 50% off. Speight Jenkins always said that ticket sales for Seattle Opera were dependent on word-of-mouth -- their runs are spread over 15 days instead of PNB's 10 -- and he always encouraged people to spread the word at his post-performance Q&A's. Occasionally Peter Boal does the same, as word-of-mouth is critical to second weekend sales, and often discounts generally are available weekend one and only on weaker-selling weekend two days (usually Thursday and sometimes Friday) and the occasional non-subscription performances. I don't know how many subscribers would scalp their tickets, but I suspect plenty would buy two discounted tickets and give them to non-subscribers. I read a report of a survey that said that many first-time ticket buyers (aside from Nutcracker) went on the recommendation of someone they know, and it's hard to imagine that this isn't a win-win situation for the company, with the price of testing the waters much lower than deciding to pay at least $150 for two tickets. I don't see why it should be a problem for ABT if those tickets were scalped: if they have a bunch of empty seats, especially for mixed rep, that's incremental revenue and audience. No one's saying to do this for Vishneva's "Beauty" or Osipova's "Don Q."

Men often have that luxury. Unless they dance for the Trocks or Matthew Bourne, they're not white swans, wilis, sylphides, etc.

Or to quote Figure Skating Universe's description of the "Politically Incorrect" forum,

Seeing the way the ballet community vilified Gelsey Kirkland, to the point that only Edward Villella was the only major dance figure to come to her defense, and that was to ask the greater community for tolerance, you seriously propose that black dancers take on the ballet establishment with a discrimination suit, when the Supreme Court rejected a sex discrimination suit based on statistical analysis of Walmart hiring and promotion practices, where the numbers were much greater, but were someone unconvincing? Copeland, DePrince, and Adams have described discrimination they faced, and Johnson has addressed the inadequacies of training in elite academies. The only encouraging sign I see may be -- "may be" because I don't have the previous rosters of the companies to which to compare the current -- that there are at least a dozen mid-sized to largish companies that have one black ballerina on their rosters, most of whom have been hired in this decade. As far as change never coming from management, we've discussed Jackie Robinson on the Copeland thread. It was a deliberate effort by Branch Rickey, not only to expand the audience, but to expand the talent pool. Were the Brooklyn Dodgers a ballet company, he likely would have raided Dance Theatre of Harlem after the company closed. Maybe even before the company closed.

So the dancers who are on the record for having described what they were told to their faces or what they heard their teachers say to others weren't "real" witnesses? The racism that Michaela DePrince's mother described doesn't count? Virginia Johnson's descriptions of racism in ballet are nothing? The female Principal Dancers that I'd seen at DTH should have been welcome at any company in North America, and the soloists and many of the corps members at any mid-sized American company. When AD's are quoted to say that "they're just aren't any," the DTH example belies that. They are also as at least nominal heads of their company affiliated school in the position to encourage spreading the widest net possible in their children's programs, to make it possible for the most talented, rather than the self-selected, have the opportunity to study and are encouraged to continue, like they do boys.

The early reports speculated that the attacker was mentally ill. There was no hint of that in this most recent article.

Amazing how white bodies that are not considered "ideal" are afforded consideration. Boys have always been given greater latitude outside the periods where competition at three or four imperial academies has been fierce. You've already argued that NYCB's policy of taking in children based on body type does not work once they hit puberty. That can be easily shown by the miniscule number of local students -- your number was 1500 -- who make it into the Professional Division, the even fewer who stay, and the microscopic number who become members of the company. Percentage-wise, PNB had has a better batting average with local students, once the school program became established and the company transitioned from hiring most of its Principals and Soloists from the outside to most of them having worked their way through the corps, after a blip of Boal's NYCB hires. If it's such a crap shoot, choosing to spread attention to minority students at young ages, or making it feasible for economically disadvantaged students to train in ballet, shouldn't make a difference to them in the long-run, despite the fiction of selectivity leading to post-pubescent success. Given critical acclaim for Dance Theatre of Harlem and the exceptional training they received, hiring those dancers when they became unemployed at once could be called "pushing companies to take minority dancers regardless of skill." The odds are low in general. The odds are non-existent when they are applied to zero. Also, if you read the bios of many Asian dancers in North American companies, you will see that they were born in Japan or China and trained there. You will also see plenty of Asian American dancers in schools in San Francisco and Seattle, the 3rd and 8th largest Asian American population centers in the US, both in company-affiliated and stand-alone programs.

Black ballerinas have been excluded from "integrated" companies. Taking the official reasons that dancers have been told and have witnessed, "They just get fat." Not this ballerina got fat (or "fat") or that dancer got fat, but "They" all get fat, so why bother. Also, "They break up the uniformity of the corps," which has no recourse, when it is an "aesthetic" decision. If companies were truly committed to hiring the best, the selection pool would be as inclusive as possible. Companies don't have to, because they're content with the self-selection that comes to them eagerly.

That is hardly news. It takes many, many students starting ballet to end up with the very low numbers of dancers who have professional careers. So the former Dance Chance student overcame 83:1417 odds to get a professional contract. If there are so black students who make it to the elite training ranks, then the very top-ranked companies should be able to have their pick of the ambitious top black students, as most ambitious top students want to go into the companies with the best contracts and most prestige, and this would be reflected in their company rosters. But it isn't.

That is certainly true. I was addressing the idea that he'd have to succumb to the pressure to promote Copeland because he'd be defenseless against the barrage of support due to her media presence, and if he really didn't want to promote her, and the reviews weren't strong, they'd be back-up for if he decided she wasn't ready, but he was accused of holding her back because of race.

When Dance Theatre of Harlem disbanded, there were a number of beautifully trained experienced dancers on the market all at once. Very few were hired by established ballet companies. The school continued to train dancers, mostly minority dancers, even when the company was on hiatus. How many of the advanced students were hired? For a number of years PNB has had a program for economically disadvantaged students for years called Dance Chance, which includes clothes and transport. One of its graduates is a member of the company. His brother was a PD who's been studying elsewhere and was exceptional in the student performance last year or the year before. There are two current PD's who are Dance Chance graduates. Not all members of minorities are economically disadvantaged, and it isn't a program that targets minorities specifically. However, it addresses the economic issues, and, of course, there's always been affirmative action for boys in terms of scholarships at higher levels of training. If it is a priority to train and hire minority dancers, company schools and companies would do it. For the most part, they have not, and then complain that there just aren't any.

Discuss the critics in "Writings on Ballet" or individual dancer threads. Not in the performance threads.

I think the idea that Copeland is someone that a company "has to take on" is what's sad. Every dancer who goes on stage has the opportunity to hang him or her-self. Some dancers die many of those deaths on this site. I think Mackenzie is doing the smart thing by casting Copeland. If critical response, a measure of skill and artistic merit, is good, then he's justified in promoting her on those bases, and there's confirmation by outside experts that he wasn't pressured by press coverage. If critical reaction is not good, than he's justified in saying that he's given her the opportunities, and she's shown she's not up to them. Box office has been a driver at ABT for all but the Baryshnikov years. Stars have been considered the ticket to that, and If casting didn't drive box office, ABT wouldn't announce casting long in advance. ABT has taken every bit of free publicity it can, whether that be the big defector stories and real life drama or the tie-ins to movies -- Leslie Browne was promoted to Principal after "The Turning Point" and was later back to Soloist -- and Copeland's visibility and popularity are another box office wave to ride. You can see the results of policy on the stage; it's mixed bag. If dancer development, coaching, and choreography were more important to the mix, the product would be different.

Nothing much of importance will happen if she isn't promoted, in my opinion. It's not like concours, where there's a test and the dancer either "passes" or doesn't by a deadline. McKenzie has all the time in the world -- if anything, by casting her more prominently this year, he's giving her rope with which to hang herself, while raking in the box office -- and Washington ballet cried all the way to the bank for "taking this on." The likelihood of Copeland going anywhere else permanently is slim, and to go somewhere else as lower than Principal is virtually non-existent. I would love to see Copeland and other soloists and through-the-ranks Principals get guest opportunities elsewhere, since one or two performances of a ballet annually, especially without steady, detailed coaching, is not conducive to growth. As far as the Bader Ginsburg and di Caprio arguments go, there are other accomplished jurors on the Supreme Court who do not get the publicity or a biopic starring Natalie Portman, and actors and actresses are often contractually obligated to do publicity on films. Wikipedia lists 10 biographies of Tara Lipinski and two of her own books, I see two for the last US Ladies Olympic Champion,Sarah Hughes, on amazon, including those offered by third-party sellers. The stories are told because people making business decisions believe they will sell in the proportion in which an audience is predicted. A more analogous, but no less illuminating example would be Michaela DePrince, a dancer far younger and less accomplished than Copeland, whose story was documented in "First Position," and numerous press articles, who described racism she encountered -- and, no, she did not name every name -- who wrote a book and who spent enough time speaking to the press that her AD at HNB called a press moratorium. Their stories were considered compelling enough to sell books and advertising, and there was enough public interest that the stories have legs. If McKenzie was placed in any corner, it was that he could hardly call a press moratorium when she was writing and speaking about her experiences at ABT under his leadership. As far as "60 Minutes" being pressured by a PR agent who can't make Copeland part of a package deal like "You take Copeland or you don't get Hillary Clinton" is highly improbable. Their job is to air compelling segments that will bring in ratings numbers. Dick Button, in one of his more egregious lapses of professionalism, once described a skater as a "fridge break." Very few people are forced to read or watch segments on Copeland.

Subscribers have already purchased their tickets before the beginning of the season; if a dancer is injured at the beginning of a season, it should have no impact on subscription sales. In addition subscribers can exchange their tickets, and from what I've read here, there isn't a problem exchanging tickets more than a day before the performance. The harm/foul should apply to single ticket buyers, and, of course, the advertised dancers should be replaced by a TBA or another dancer as soon as the dancer or someone in the medical profession has confirmed that there's no hope that the dancer can perform. If a dancer posts on Twitter that he or she is out for the season, his or her name shouldn't continue to be advertised. A broken foot sounds to me like something from which a dancer wouldn't recover in time, but I'm not a doctor and have no idea of what an exception might be. As far as surgery is concerned, it depends on the surgery. It also depends on what injury and/or treatments have been confirmed. A dancer may intend to have surgery but then find an alternative treatment and come back sooner than expected, as we also had out here recently.

I have closed this thread, because at 53 pages, it's passed its natural life span. The new thread is here: http://balletalert.invisionzone.com/index.php?/topic/40130-misty-copeland-part-deux/ The quote function isn't an option on closed threads. If you want to quote someone from this thread, please copy and paste the text into the new thread with the original poster's name and the post number. Just a few reminders: 1. No one is forcing anyone to read any thread. 2. No one is forcing anyone to respond to any thread. 3. No one is forcing anyone to repeat the same opinion or make the same point that they've made in this or any other thread. Participation is voluntary. If the subject doesn't interest you, you have the option to ignore it.

For those who are interested in the topic, continue.

On the other hand, you don't know how serious an injury is or what the estimates for recovery are. It's not fraud, in my opinion, if there's a realistic chance that a dancer will recover in time. We have a dancer at PNB who was cast in two major roles as her return role, one in the Forsythe rep, and then later as Odette/Odile. As it turned out, she wasn't ready to come back for either. Casting isn't out for the final program of the season, and I wouldn't be surprised to find her in the casting, which is only posted two weeks out the earliest, not months ahead of time like at ABT. If she is, I hope she will dance, but would understand if she's still not ready.

Unfortunately, the most time-consuming and indirect way is the way to do it.

Discussing posting patterns is discussing the discussion.

I've never been able to find information about the algorithm they use to determine new content. The hints that I've found suggest it has to do with when it cycles through to see if you have new content. I would have guessed that clicking "View New Content" would force it to check and look for anything between the last check and this, but that has not been my experience.