Helene

The way the show is shot, all five women and the four men with whom four are paired, appeared to be auditioning for the roles of Cinderella and Prince. We should know next week whether either of the two dancers who weren't cast continued to rehearse the roles. We should also know whether one cast member is the equivalent of the guy in the red shirt in the first scene of "Star Trek."

PNB published a two-minute video tour led by James Moore. You can see how cold it was, and it was daytime. Towards the end, there are a few seconds of Tiler Peck and Robert Fairchild rehearsing the Pas de Deux from "Stars and Stripes."

From tonight's episode, it was clear that Sklute was pushing for Sisk, even if she was partner-less. From what was shown, though, it seemed like Somes was: http://mckaylaisnotimpressed.tumblr.com/image/35914202850 with anyone.

If success is defined as getting the role and performing it, no, she was not given the resources, but being singled out by Somes is a success, because companies usually don't get a known and esteemed production like this hoping to do it once, and Sisk is very much in BW's future. It puts her at least temporarily in the lead for a chance in the next run. To assume that with five couples each had equal opportunity is isn't realistic, since Sklute said casting was a negotiation and not entirely up to Somes, whose concerns would be the ballet, not the internal hierarchy of the company, which Sklute has to consider. (He could dismiss it after consideration, but he would consider it.) If Somes wanted to give extra consideration to Sisk, she might have asked to have one of the other men to partner her - and we don't know what happened off-camera -- but she also could have been a distant fifth even if Underwood had been healthy. The timing is confusing because it looks like Sklute and Somes were using post-Nutcracker class to get a list of contenders, by which point Underwood's injury would be known, but Sklute may have meant that he had pre-cast them together in his head before Somes came. It didn't sound like he was planning for Sisk to be, literally, a fifth wheel. The dancer who was actually in jeopardy was Bennett, since her partner (Rex Tilton) had an injured foot, and if it hadn't held up or had become re-injured, her partner would have been on the sidelines like Underwood. Not every dancer gets to get a new partner because the partner is injured, especially with this kind of specific and careful coaching. At PNB, for example, Korbes gets almost all of the top roles in the post prestigious slots and is featured in all of the tours for which she is healthy. That still didn't get her a new partner for "Diamonds" when hers was injured.

In Merrill Ashley's book she described how, as a younger dancer, she was called to a rehearsal, but wasn't used right away and sat on the side reading a book. She then realized that she was missing the opportunity to watch Balanchine at work. I don't see how it is a set-up for failure to be in the studio with Wendy Ellis Somes as she rehearsed and auditioned the couples. There are plenty of situations where it is a long-shot for a dancer to be used. Looking at the actual casting, three of the four female Principals were cast as Cinderella. Sisk and Ohtaki, the other two shown to be in contention, are Soloists, with the rank of First Soloist between them and Principal. It would have been quite a negotiation to bump a Principal as the female lead in a full-length story ballet with limited casts, regardless of how talented a young dancer is, since there aren't two other ballets in which the Principals can lead. The fourth female Principal was not one of the five shown to be vying for Cinderella: she danced Winter Fairy, Beryl Grey's role. (So did demi-Soloist Allison diBona and First Soloist Elizabeth McGrath.) Because the camera is on Sisk, we get a disproportionate sense of her importance to the company in relation to other leading dancers of whom we get the occasional glance. As far as getting a taste of what it is to be at the top, whether it was deliberate or not, being in those rehearsals knowing she didn't have a partner was a test of character and resilience, and very few dancers rise rapidly through the ranks without any setbacks.

The defectors were expunged from the history; Balanchine as choreographer wasn't a significant part of their history and would have had to be added, which they had little incentive to do until he was useful to them. Imagine wanting to expand the rep and finding a treasure trove of ready-made masterpieces from a choreographer that they could claim as a cousin of their inheritance, especially when he made entire ballets based on that heritage, like "Theme and Variations," "Ballet Imperial," and "Diamonds," all of which are set to the scores of their iconic ballet composer, Tchaikovsky? His choreography is an excellent classical conduit into the 20th century, and photographs are easy to put (back) up after the fact. As far as Balanchine wanting ballets only in the present, for the majority of his time in Lincoln Center, at least, the largest part of his rep, aside from the Festivals (three and a half), consisted of revivals of his own works. He also took original choreography from his childhood into his "Nutcracker," recreated the first two acts of "Coppelia" with Alexandra Danilova, and wanted to create a "Sleeping Beauty" for Darci Kistler. His "Swan Lake" Act II is after Petipa/Ivanov. He wanted the dancing to be in the present, and often used the racehorse analogy for dancers: that they needed to be pushed constantly. He recognized that without him there to push and clarify, the ballets wouldn't look the same. In all of the videos and descriptions of the stagers who've worked with him is one constant: the wish to convey the spirit of the creation process and what Balanchine emphasized when creating and teaching the ballets himself. For those who worked with him briefly but learned the roles from people who worked with them extensively, this is what they try to pass down. Ballet is an oral tradition, passed down from generation to generation personally, not from scores. The people who stage Balanchine aren't doing anything radical, and at least Balanchine didn't live to see the (perceived and actual) substantial changes that Petipa saw made to his own work and die discontented with them.

Balanchine used different versions of "Firebird" and I think one other piece so that Stravinsky would receive royalties on the newer versions after they expired on the older versions. Stravinsky died eight years before Balanchine took the scalpel to "Apollo," but Vera Stravinsky was alive until 1982, and perhaps she received royalties on the shorter version?

Balanchine did cut and re-arrange the movements of other composers' music, notably Tchaikovsky -- Orchestral Suite No. 4 for "Mozartiana", Tchaikovsky Suite No. 3 for "Theme and Variations", Serenade for Strings for "Serenade", first dropping the last movement and then reinstating it as the penultimate movement of the ballet, and adding a violin solo from "The Sleeping Beauty" to "Nutcracker," dropping the male solo, and and moving the Sugarplum Fairy variation to the beginning of Act II -- and Mendelssohn -- dropping a movement of Symphony No. 3 for "Scotch Symphony" and dropping the development section of the Symphony No. 9 for the adagio in the "A Midsummer Night's Dream" Act II Divertissement. However, as you note with Farrell's example, changing Stravinsky had been another story for him. If there was an aesthetic reason, I think he was rejecting the dance style he used for Leto and the birth scene. It's interesting that he did the opposite of Wagner in the Ring, which was meant to be one opera, "Siegfried's Tod," but after Wagner completed the libretto, he decided we needed to know Siegfried's origins, and then about his parents, and then about the gods. Balanchine decided that New Yorkers, anyway, didn't need to know from where Apollo came.

I'm guessing the shooting time is pretty tight, and that's what he was wearing that day. I was hoping that he really did dress like that all the time, because he looks so good in a suit. It helped the narrative in the beginning, because no one was going to confuse him with anyone else.

He didn't need any reason: he had control over his ballets. He was in declining health, and impatient: Baryshnikov had joined NYCB and his health issues curtailed their collaboration. He also allowed the full-length version to be staged throughout the US and Europe concurrently with the truncated version.

I agree with sandik, and I love Apollo's first solo, which is chopped from the shortened version.

You didn't. Alison deBona also occasionally uses "I" after a preposition.

Sklute had a board meeting before or after one of those full-suit appearances.

Sounds like the Big Apple Circus. I used to go each year to see Marie-Pierre Benac.

I watched this when I got back to Vancouver, and never again will I knit and watch this show: from now on, I'm not letting go of the fast forward button. The parts with Wendy Ellis Somes in class and in the studio were great. If I see another minute of the Ballet West II guys or of Beckanne's relationship dramas, though, I will be tempted to poke my eyes out with Addi Sock Rockets.

NYCB's first tour coincided with the Cuban Missile Crisis as well.

I'm so glad for you yudi, and I hope you'll tell us all about these performances!

I just read on Lorena Feijoo's Facebook Page that Fernando Alonso died. Here is a link to the short, preliminary report from AP: http://www.cbc.ca/news/arts/story/2013/07/27/arts-cuba-fernando-alonso-dead.html Alonso was the co-founder with his then-wife Alicia Alonso of Cuban National Ballet. Rest in peace, Mr. Alonso.

Many thanks for the ID's, and welcome to Ballet Alert! I look forward to reading your biography when it is published. Please let us know when it's ready for publication.

William Weslow (1925-January 29, 2013) Roland Vasquez (March 30, 1927-April 6, 2013) Maria Tallchief (January 24, 1925-April 11, 2013) Merrill Brockway (February 28, 1923-May 2, 2013) Frederic Franklin (June 13, 1914-May 4, 2013) Robert Lindgren (December 9, 1923-May 10, 2013) (Peter) Franklin-White (February 1, 1923-May 19, 2013) David Blackburn (1936/7-June 15, 2013) David Wall (March 15, 1946-June 18, 2013) Richard Thomas (December 3, 1925-July 27, 2013) Fernando Alonso (December 17, 1914-July 2013)

I had read about him as one of the great American ballet teachers for as long as I've been reading about ballet. My condolences to his family. Rest in peace, Mr. Thomas.

I don't find it surprising that the dancers didn't know about Balanchine, since perestroika and glasnost were only several years before her visit, and there was no YouTube or legitimate outlet in Russia for the Dance in America tapes at that time, but Russell understood the importance of teaching them and used the rehearsal time to explain, which must have taken a lot of patience since it had to be translated. I doubt this would be the emphasis of stagers who had never or barely worked in the studio with Balanchine.

Seattle NPR station KUOW's Marcie Sillman interviewed Francia Russell about staging Balanchine, and her piece was aired on "Morning Edition" today. There are also quotes from PNB soloist Lindsi Dec and PNB AD Peter Boal. The transcript and link to the segment can be found here: http://www.npr.org/2013/07/27/1580782/preserving-balanchines-ballet-legacy-30-years-later The fascinating part for me was how when she went to St. Petersburg in 1989, and the Mariinsky dancers knew little about Balanchine, she took a rehearsal to talk about him to the dancers.

This is a video of "Jardin Anime" with Somova and Ivannikova:Jardin Anime Does the complete Mariinsky "Corsaire" have set pieces on the floor like the Bolshoi's does? The stage patterns suggest not, but I don't want to compare it unfairly to the Bolsoi's version, which I much prefer, if this is different than the full version.

According to the video poster, the Basil is Kim, flanked by Ivankova and Lavrinenko (I'm not sure which is which.) The Kitri is Evseeva. (Yevseeva?)