dirac

Sad news, indeed. Doing the Links over the years has made her byline very familiar to me. I always enjoyed reading her reviews.

If it was a cult, it was a pretty big one. Another, longer article. quote]Mr. Vonnegut wrote plays, essays and short fiction. But it was his novels that became classics of the American counterculture, making him a literary idol, particularly to students in the 1960s and ’70s. Dog-eared paperback copies of his books could be found in the back pockets of blue jeans and in dorm rooms on campuses throughout the United States. Like Mark Twain, Mr. Vonnegut used humor to tackle the basic questions of human existence: Why are we in this world? Is there a presiding figure to make sense of all this, a god who in the end, despite making people suffer, wishes them well?

Kurt Vonnegut has died at age 84.

Hmmmm......she is complaining, Paul, or let us say she is making criticisms, yes? Perfectly all right to do, either way, and I don’t think kfw was suggesting that it isn't okay. (I haven't read the book yet, but some of these remarks do seem to teeter dangerously on the edge of cliche.) kfw writes: An echo of Melissa Hayden’s remark to Robert Tracy that when you dance Balanchine ‘your body changes, you become a filly. You’re flying.’ She meant it in a positive way, of course. And I have the impression that Hayden herself was very much a woman onstage.

Just a friendly reminder that we are, indeed, wandering afield from our topic. By all means share your Latinate experiences, but let's stick to our muttons as well. If you’re having trouble thinking of R&J related comments, just remember that Rem tene, verba sequentur.

I agree. Say what you will, he's a man of the theatre - he holds the stage and has many of the old fashioned show business virtues, things that don't go out of style. I confess that I just love 'Le jeune homme et la mort.'

papeetepatrick writes: But Western art music presumably has to compete with the same elements in China, as well. I wonder if part of the difference isn't support from the public sector, however misguided in some respects, in the form of education and exposure?

Treefrog, I guess I'd have to take such a question on a case by case basis, really. I can think of times when it might be desirable, even necessary for various reasons, to pluck someone from the school for a big role, but systematic casting of this kind, assuming that this indeed how it works out, looks very odd, to say the least. Rank shouldn’t be everything, but. As drb pointed out early in this thread As the Alastair Macaulay piece in last Sunday's Times emphasized, this is a star-driven piece. Not that you have to cast established stars, but you need two dancers who can carry an evening's drama. A tallish order.

Ray, I agree with you for the most part, but I admit to being one of the suburbanites who sprints out for the train (not the car). I wait until after the curtain is down, and I don't do it unless I'm on the aisle, but if I've just witnessed something I don't feel much like applauding and the train is due, the train wins hands down, especially on those days when I'll have to wait a half hour for the next one. As for the clapping bit, it's happening in some sports, too. I think it’s intended as an acknowledgment of the applause, a kind of ‘thank you, I think you’re great too,’ but it just looks odd.

Matthew Bourne considered, by Brian Seibert in Slate. http://www.slate.com/id/2163505

Gina Pazcoguin as the nurse? Hot, sexy Gina in a part usually played (in every Shakespearean production I've seen) by a heavy, out of breath older woman? The play makes it clear the Nurse had a daughter (now dead) who was born on the same day as Juliet. So the nurse has to be old enough to be Juliet's mother. Well, if you can believe the Capulet parents Darci Kistler and Jock Soto in the clip, they are to think of themselves as 28. This is certainly shaping up to be a very young person's R+J. There has been a trend to cast Romeo and Juliet younger and younger. The casting of teenagers and thirtysomethings as children and parents is not inappropriate, but it may not always succeed. There was once a saying in the theatre that no actress could do the role properly till forty. While I wouldn’t go along with that, it’s possible for actors/dancers to be too immature to handle the larger emotions of the roles. Juliet may begin as a frisky teenager, but by the time she reaches the potion speech she is a woman who has learned the meaning of passion, and not every very young person can make that transition. (Of course, the base of the ballet is not Shakespeare but Prokofiev, so that makes a difference.) You could also argue that some of today’s audiences may not understand that back then a married woman pushing thirty was a very settled matron (who might not make it to fifty, given life expectancies) and casting R&J somewhat older than their ages on paper could better sense in contemporary terms. I like to see a youngerR&J myself, but it's possible to take the whole youth business too far, IMO.

Very interesting article, and thank you for posting it. About the only thing that can be said for a regime like China’s is that for good and ill, they take the arts very seriously indeed. As the article notes, the situation could turn into a bit of a rat race, with an emphasis on empty virtuosity, but we’ll see. I’d also add that there is a lot more competition for attention now. I do know young people who aren’t listening to the obvious forms of pop, but rather to international music – it wasn’t so long ago that if you wanted to hear Balinese music, for example, you had to go to Bali. The internet has made access to world music even easier.

Thank you for reminding me of that fine passage, kfw.

Pardon me, and it's off topic, but I have to speak up for a book in which I found much to appreciate. For me, that was part of the value of the book. Garis’ subject is Balanchine, but he comes to his conclusions from a continuous process of examining his own reactions and trying to account for them. I thought him particularly interesting on the Balanchine-Stravinsky relationship and he writes most thoughtfully about the style of Violette Verdy and on Farrell. I can understand seeing his approach as “me-me-me” but this preoccupation doesn’t necessarily detract from his critical acumen and in addition I think it made him exceptionally honest in his reporting of his reactions, not always the case. It led him in some odd directions (he’ll say of a ballet, “I hadn’t worked on it with Balanchine” and things like that) and I wouldn’t want to hear this stuff from every critic, no, but from Garis I don’t mind. I haven’t picked up the book in awhile, but as I recall, the context of that quote is Garis discussing the cuts that Balanchine made to the ballet, which Garis regretted, and he is suggesting that eliminating the original ending also eliminates the tragic note present in the uncut ballet and the score.

That’s true. You could argue with what Rockwell had to say, but his willingness to get on a plane and report back was not in doubt.

drb writes: Very much so. I thought it a trifle gushy, in fact, and would have preferred more dispassionate discussion of choreography and score. Still, it's his debut, and maybe he got a little overexcited. It's the dawn of a new era, no question!

I cut my teeth on Seton, Stone, and Michener too, and studied 'Gone with the Wind' with an intensity usually ascribed to Talmudic scholars. It is a funny thread, but some time ago BT began wandering afield in topics unrelated to ballet, and it's nice when the thread is as rewarding to read as this one has been.

What is special about Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice that makes so many choreographers (Isadora Duncan, Mr. B four times!, Mark Morris also often, ...) want to tackle it? Regarding Balanchine, the story obviously has attracted him, via Stravinsky as well. And in the pure dance Chaconne, centered on the opera's Dance of the Blessed Spirits too. But I suppose it must have a lot to do with the music (but exactly what?), with Mr. Morris (as well) being regarded as a very musical choreographer. Other operas are more popular and must have as good music, but I don't know of any other that contains such a choroegrapher magnet. Not an opera buff, but I have "bit", and plan to see the Morris version at the Met. Maybe it's because the music has a delicacy and grace you don't always find, at least I don't always find, in ballet music composed for opera. It really is lovely music to listen to, and my old LP recording conducted by Pierre Monteux is a cherished favorite.

Light in the Piazza made it to television on PBS and it may turn up again. I found the score dullish, as you note, every song sounded the same, and although Guettel writes a competent lyric he should maybe think about a collaborator down the line. Thank you for the "Anne of Green Gables" report. I loved the books back when and it's nice to hear that this is a good show.

You're not being a curmudgeon. And as you note, it's hard to say anything without being publicly branded as a child-loathing monster.

Sounds about right. My late uncle reported a similar experience in the Southern California defense industry.

It's refreshing to read this. The fifties are conventionally portrayed as a time of stultifying conformity and Father Knows Best, waiting to be "liberated" by the "let it all hang out" sixties, but the truth was quite different. Very true, Farrell Fan, but I do have the impression that there were many good solid reasons why the Fifties gained that unhappy reputation in the first place.

Very interesting review of the book by Joel Lobenthal in today’s New York Sun.

Has anyone else seen this production, BTW, in New York or London? Would be curious to hear more from BTers.

papeetepatrick writes: With Luders as the ballet's protagonist and Martins occupied elsewhere, it made sense to match Farrell with d'Amboise, I suppose, and the fact that he is older and can't do much more than partner her makes her dancing seem even more fleetly elusive and the pairing more poignant. (I'm going only by the video, never saw it live.) Her head is a little larger than many dancers’, which adds to its distinction and the nobility you mention (along with those fabulous cheekbones). I liked her in the ‘Emeralds’ video. The longer tutu suits her longer than average torso and she has a face the camera likes – she looks glamourous and striking- some dancers with very small heads look like bland little mouse faces on the screen, their faces don’t register. I also liked her and Lavery together.