Helene

The film is 35K away from happening unless they figure out a way to raise the money. If they don't, there will be no $15-20 showing in cinemas that a limited number of people have access to. Not everyone can arrange to be at a live showing or limited run. Ballet in Cinema isn't shown everywhere, and even where it is shown, we don't always get all of them. Having a digital download as a benefit might give people incentive to pledge more than the approximately 9K the project has with 8 days to go, especially a project that's seen as an ongoing commercial venture. If it happens, and a DVD is released, I'd likely buy it, but I'm not tempted to donate without a digital download as a benefit. Digital downloads have enticed me to up a category in the past.

I wish Ihad, but I'm going to aim for an encore performance. I love "Ballo" and have listened to a couple of performances on Sirius. I'm really interested in seeing this production.

Gioachino Rossini retired at 37 and lived another 39 years. I'd call that successful

According to this article in the "New York Post," the producers of "Dancing with the Stars" are considering presenting the show once a year starting this spring, 2013, and some of the long-time pros are planning to go onto other things. The author questions whether judges Len Goodman and Bruno Toglioni will continue to want to commute weekly back and forth to London. and

There's been a lot of discussion about how much input coach Maria Zoueva had on the program, or if it was mostly Swan, and whether Alonso's version for Plisetskaia or Ek's version were influences. (Swan isn't listed as one of their choreographers on their ISU biography, although their work with Swan has been discussed in print.) In a separate interview, Igor Spilband, Zoueva's coaching partner until this year, said that he was influenced by the ballet for Plisetskaia in his version (also using the Shchedrin score) for Anna Cappellini and Luca Lanotte, but I don't see it. There are many clips of the Grand Prix series on YouTube, mostly from Russian Eurosport and Italian RAI, and just about every competitor in each event has at least one video.

Many thanks for the link, Natalia, and the clues to find more. Here's the scarf dance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVnlmj78PUM&feature=plcp and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ALB1riVf74&feature=plcp

Didn't they do the cartoon-based-on-humans blue people movie in 3D? For the life of me, I can't remember its name, but it was very popular. "Pina" was also done in 3D. I saw the Mariinsky "Giselle" movie in 3D, and it made me dizzy. I've only seen "Pina" on DVD, but it's the only movie so far that would inspire me to see another in 3D.

Casting is up for the first two weekend of "Nutcracker": http://www.pnb.org/Season/12-13/Nutcracker/#Casting First weekend, Uko Gorter, Seth Orza and Jeffrey Stanton share Drosselmeier, and second weekend, Drosselmeier is played by William Lin-Yee and Olivier Wevers, Gorter and Stanton. Clara/Prince pairings first weekend are: Kaori Nakamura/Jonathan Porretta, Carla Korbes/Batkhurel Bold, and Leslie Rausch/Jerome Tisserand. Second weekend: all three first weekend couples and Kylee Kitchens/Andrew Bartee and Leta Biasucci/James Moore.

Oh, definitely see Doug's presentations before the show -- they're a real highlight. They start one hour before the show and last 30 minutes. They are held in the Nesholm Family Lecture Hall. I don't think you can go directly into the lecture hall from the outside entrance; I think you have to go into McCaw Hall, have your ticket scanned, and then walk straight under the balcony and take an immediate left down the stairs and then take the left or right doors into the lecture hall. There are also tons of affordable restaurants within three or four blocks of McCall Hall. There are good Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese vegetarian (with soy-based "pork," "chicken," "shelfish," etc. food, and a pub with solid pub food, McMennamin's. Any where from five to ten minutes farther and you can have your pick of more Thai, more pub (TS McHugh's), Indian, Greek, Mexican, small plates, good and really good (but pricy) sushi, pizza, etc. The PNB ticket envelope has a discount offer for entrees at Ten Mercer, which is the fanciest place around with excellent food.

There's lots of it: a big garage across from McCaw Hall, one across the street from that, a lot in Metropolitan Market a few blocks away, and many surface lots within a 15-minute walk. If there's an event at Key Arena, parking fees can be in the $20 range, while it's usually closer to $12 if there isn't one. At least some of the machines at the surface lots with no attendants charge tax (~10%). The surface lots usually have two time slots a day that don't overlap, from early morning to 5pm and from 5pm to early morning. (I often parked at a cheaper surface lot on Republican, just past Roy Street. Republican is the southern border of Seattle Center at that corner of the campus, intersecting with Mercer, and Roy is one block North/parallel to Mercer, but there was no getting there at 3 and staying until 10. The parking building across McCaw Hall lets you stay there for 10 or 12 hours, but I've never had a problem staying a few hours longer.) A lot of the surface streets are restricted to residents at night. (This is on all of the signs.) There is mixed resident/non-resident parking north of Roy, but as On the Boards once put it, "In Lower Queen Anne, parking is a competitive sport." There aren't any physical meters: there are machines that take credit and debit cards and coins and spit out stickers to put on your car window, but besides being counter-intuitive and slow, they're not all programmed the same way. In many places parking is free on Sundays, but if you're in a paid zone with a machine, check the machine to be sure of the hours, and that you're not in a Sunday paid area. The paid zones use to be only until 6pm, but the city has hiked the hourly rates and extended hours to 10pm, and with two-hour limits, it's not very practical to run back and forth at intermission to feed the meters. If you rent a car or take a taxi, you can attend the post-performance Q&A's, and if you do, you can arrange for a taxi pick-up, and there won't be many people around to steal them out from under you, since usually, at most 100 people show up for them. Most will have driven, since it's a great strategy to stay to avoid sitting in a parking lot for at least half the length of a Q&A. Parking isn't as tight as it is in NYC, but the problem is, people here are philosophically opposed to paying for parking. When I first moved to Seattle from NYC, where the lot around the block from my office was $15-$25, and I offered to pay the $3 for the parking lot that was right there, my friends would refuse on principle, and I would shake my head.

Stinger, missing links should be PMed to dirac or sent to us via "Contact Us," and dirac will add them. We usually remove all links that should be in Links from other BA forums. We have over a thousand members who only read Links, and the reviews will get visibility on Links that they'll never get here.

I've never had those experiences with the Monorail or around Westlake station, but it's not about the money in any case: it's the difficulty of getting a taxi after the performance. Some taxi drivers will say "no" to everyone but the designated passenger, but I once was within shouting distance of my taxi -- I knew from the number on the taxi -- when two people opened the door and got in (like you would in NYC), and he drove away with them. The problem is that they ask, "Are you [name]?" rather than "What is your name?," and people who want cabs will say "yes" no matter what. If there's an event a Key Arena, then that's a lot more competitive. The best taxi strategy is to arrange a pickup at a restaurant or the Post Office a few blocks away, and then the taxi won't make it down Mercer Street.

June is the beginning of the worst time, because there are graduations and the weather is getting to be nice (or so the myth goes.) For example, for the first weekend in June (Friday 31 May-Sunday 2 June, 2 nights), Expedia shows (all before taxes) the Mediterranean Inn at $149/night, the Four Points at $139/night, the Maxwell at $159, the Best Western at $194, the MarQueen at $174. The cheapest is the Inn at Queen Anne @ $109. There's also the Hampton Inn, which I had forgotten, at $144 -- it get's very good ratings among Expedia reviewers. Downtown prices aren't any better that weekend, so there's no advantage to staying there, unless you plan to shop, drop your stuff off at the hotel, and then head to Seattle Center. VRBO prices tend to be lower where the commute is more difficult -- Seattle does a horrific job of linking major neighborhoods by public transport, especially on the weekends -- and the prices in Belltown, a relatively easy commute and a longer walk to Seattle Center, depending on how far north the property is -- tend to be higher or comparable/night to the hotels above. For much cheaper, you have to head out to the airport hotels or hotels north of Seattle, like in Everett, but for the northern hotels, you'd need a car. It is possible to commute to an airport hotel if they have a shuttle from the airport and save $$$, but it's a longish (1-hour, mimimum) commute and bit cumbersome: you'd take a bus or the Monorail downtown -- cheaper to take a bus, since you can transfer, where the Monorail is a separate charge -- and switch at Westlake Center for Light Rail, which would take you to the airport. Then you'd walk through the airport to the hotel shuttles, unless you were at one of the hotels within walking distance, and those tend to be in the same price range as the downtown and Seattle Center hotels. On Expedia just now I found an $79/night non-refundable offer at the highly rated (Expedia and Trip Advisor) Courtyard by Marriott that is, according to Google Maps, a .4 mi walk from the Tukwila Station (light rail), which is one stop before the airport and a largish transit center (for Seattle). (The same price is available on the hotel website, for refundable, it's $99/night, and only a small savings compared to Inn at Queen Anne, when you include commuting costs.) The hotels in the $50-$61/range tend to be in the 2's and low 3's on a 1-5 scale in ratings. The shuttle listed is a by-request service from the airport, but we found during Skate America that many of the hotel shuttle services were pretty flexible, or you could go one more stop to the airport, and then take the shuttle from there.

The Ratmansky excised most of the Kitty/Levin story -- the contrast would have been a very good ballet subject -- and muddled the Karenins' relationship. It did provide a lot of drama for Anna K., but it missed the domestication of her relationship with Vronsky. Philosophy is more out of place in narrative ballet than mothers-in-law. I wish I had been able to stay in NYC for the Kondaurova Anna K, even though I didn't like the ballet much -- I saw it with Vishneva -- as well as the Somova "Little Humpbacked Horse," but, alas, I had to return mid-week.

Gounod danced Basilio to Valdes' Kitri in one of the Vancouver, BC "Don Q" tour casts.

Do you have a general price range? When are you thinking of coming? There are six hotels I know of within a 5-10 minute walk of Seattle Center, where McCaw Hall is located: Mediterranean Inn, which is about four blocks away an on Queen Anne Avenue, which has a lot of inexpensive restaurants and a few nice ones within walking distance. I stay here if I can. The staff is great, and there are microwaves and small fridges in the rooms. Most of the rooms have ceiling fans, although a few have heater/air-conditioning units, and the windows open. Inn at Queen Anne. This is usually the least expensive, and a block closer than the Mediterranean Inn. I've never stayed here. Maxwell Hotel. One or two blocks away, on the other side of the parking garage across the street. If you get on their email list, they send out specials, like three nights for the price of two, or good discounts. I haven't stayed here yet. MarQueen Hotel. I've stayed here and got upgraded, since it was a slow November weekend, and my room was like a movie set. About two blocks away. Sheraton Four Points. I've stayed her once. I thought the staff was very nice and the room comfortable. Best Western Executive Inn. I only know this hotel because one of the bus services between Seattle and Vancouver stops here. It's a slightly farther walk. There are a lot of hotels downtown, and any of them within an easy walk to the Seattle Monorail will get you from downtown Westlake Center (4th or 5th and Pine) to the Seattle Center campus. Downtown hotels tend to be more expensive than the ones around Seattle Center anyway, because that's a more touristy and business-oriented place, unless you're trying to see the Seattle Ring. The Monorail runs until 11pm all week -- most PNB evening performances start at 7:30 and are over by 10:30 -- and it's about a 5-minute ride, with just the two end stops. There are also city buses that go downtown. Anything beyond the downtown core, though, especially on the weekends, is tricky, especially given the service cuts that happened in September. Taxis are easy enough to arrange to get there, because the hotel will call, but getting back is a real pain. It's not like San Francisco where you can sign up for one at War Memorial and the taxis show up in droves, or like NYC where they're always there. There's no rank nearby -- there are only a handful in Seattle anywhere -- and while sometimes an occasional cab will drive by after a performance, you can't count on it. My car was stolen before the 2005 Seattle Ring, and I had my pre-arranged taxi take the first person who flagged it down several times, especially since it's not an easy place to connect to one. It's not worth it, in my opinion.

Men leave for North America and Europe, and Alonso and the school keep producing more to take their places. I can imagine Gounod in that Youskevitch role.

Oh, that can't be a good sign. I had a hard enough time taking Vronsky seriously in the book.

Here is PNB's press release announcing a $40,000 NEA grant for it's year end "Director's Choice" program, which includes "Agon," "Diamonds," and a world premiere by Christopher Wheeldon: Pacific Northwest Ballet receives NEA grant to support DIRECTOR’S CHOICE Grant one of 832 Art Works grants totaling $23.3 million in funding nationwide SEATTLE, WA — National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Chairman Rocco Landesman announced today that Pacific Northwest Ballet is one of 832 non-profit organizations nationwide to receive an NEA Art Works grant. PNB is recommended for a $40,000 grant to support the presentation of DIRECTOR’S CHOICE, the closing program of PNB’s 40th Anniversary Season. It will feature a world premiere by Christopher Wheeldon and two works by George Balanchine. The production will be presented in seven performances from May 31 through June 9, 2013 in Marion Oliver McCaw Hall at Seattle Center. "I'm proud to announce these 832 grants to the American public including Pacific Northwest Ballet," said Chairman Landesman. "These projects offer extraordinary examples of creativity in our country, including the creation of new work, innovative ways of engaging audiences, and exemplary education programs." In March 2012, the NEA received 1,509 eligible applications for Art Works requesting more than $74 million in funding. The 832 recommended NEA grants total $22.3 million, span 13 artistic disciplines and fields, and focus primarily on the creation of work and presentation of both new and existing works for the benefit of American audiences. Applications were reviewed by panels of outside experts convened by NEA staff, and each project was judged on its artistic excellence and artistic merit. (For a complete listing of projects recommended for Art Works grant support, please visit the NEA website at arts.gov.) PNB’s 40th Anniversary Season comes to a close with DIRECTOR’S CHOICE (May 31 – June 9, 2013), a tribute to George Balanchine, whose works have been vital to the Company’s history. This triple-bill also features a world premiere from Christopher Wheeldon, frequently cited as today’s best contemporary ballet choreographer and often compared to “Mr. B” for his prolific versatility and capacity to update tradition. Agon returns, expertly staged by Francia Russell (an original New York City Ballet cast member) and as startlingly avant-garde as at its 1957 premiere. The program’s dazzling grand finale is Diamonds, the crowning gemstone of Balanchine’s three-part Jewels, added to PNB’s repertory by Artistic Director Peter Boal in 2006. (For more information about DIRECTOR’S CHOICE, please call the PNB Box Office at 206.441.2424 or visit pnb.org.)

Just a general reminder that posts on other discussion boards, including YouTube except where summarized by Foreign Correspondents for non-English boards, aren't for discussion here. We get enough hyperbole here. As far as how two knowledgeable people can disagree, you can go back to your opera example and how polarizing the Tebaldi-Callas-Milanov wars are, or the love-her-or-hate-her discussions about Bartoli. It's like comparing the approaches of Sutherland to Rysanek, who were completely different artists. Sutherland routinely hit the vocal equivalent of the fish dives, the 32-fouettes, and the balances in the Rose Adagio, and she mostly bored me. Rysanek could go from sublime to disastrous in the same performance, but I'll watch her fall off point listen to her sing anything at least once. People look for different things in ballet and in dancers, and have very different ideas about the evolution of ballet and how the classics should be danced physically and stylistically and about what progress should look like. Especially about what progress should look like and not look like, and how it should be applied to classical ballet vs. neo-classical ballet. For some it's a matter of taste and for some, as Balanchine put it, when asked by a mother whether her daughter would become a great ballerina, "C'est une question morale." If you read Pawlick's book on Vaganova, Vaganova wasn't a stickler who didn't move forward and didn't accept change -- she, in her stagings, pretty much single-handled swept mime out of the picture -- and as a pedagogue watched then-contemporary trends in ballet and updated her methodology and teaching to support those efforts. She did have a limit, though, and rejected then-contemporary ballet choreography when it crossed her line between progressive and circus. I think people would go into the book thinking that this line for her would be much farther to the right than it was, but it wasn't "anything goes" either.

I'm planning to see it because the setting in the theater sounds interesting.

?????? Barry Kerollis tweeted that he performed in 12 performances of "Nutcracker."

Barry Kerollis has been dancing a lot of Nutcrackers recently: Also, just finished 12 shows of # Nutcracker in 10 days (in two states w/ planes and trains inbetween). 9 cavaliers & 3 chinese. Phew!

Could resist this tweet with a photo of Tiler Peck and Robert Fairchild:

I can't find anything explicit about online streaming on the cbs.com site. Sara Mearns was in the audience, and she's been tweeting up a storm. My favorite is this: And then the moment happened. Makarova came over to me and put her hands on my face like I was one of her own. pic.twitter.com/ZzqUN8Zj The photo is great. (In an earlier Tweet, she said Makarova told her not to get up, because Mearns would be too tall for her.)