FauxPas

I saw the Wednesday and Thursday night performances (29th and 30th) which both included "Jardin aux Lilas" (both casts) and "Company B" (both casts). The other pieces included "Brief Fling", "Romeo and Juliet PDD" (Tudor) and "Ballo della Regina". "Jardin aux Lilas" I had only seen before on the huge Met stage. This is a piece that really blooms in a space like City Center. The smaller stage and closer proximity to the audience helps get across the dramatic nuances but also the sense of being trapped in a beautiful but constricting public place. On the Met stage it looks flat and flimsy. First night had Julie Kent as Caroline with Corey Stearns as her lover and Roman Zhurbin and Kristi Boone as the Husband and Other Woman. Kent was lovely but I found her too emotionally restrained and calculated - a sense of desperation was missing. Julie pitched everything very small and contained. Kent seemed already resigned to her fate so tension was lost. On the next night, Melissa Thomas was much softer, younger and emotionally vulnerable. Corey Stearns was excellent as Kent's partner in her lost romance - very romantic presence (his curls were slicked down, looked gorgeous in the costume and white tights) and the dance demands were fully under his belt. He is better matched with slighter medium-sized ballerinas like Gillian and Julie rather than with amazons like Michele. Roman Zhurbin was nicely nuanced as the Man She Must Marry while Kristi Boone looked well but lacked a certain je ne sais quoi as the Other Woman. On Wednesday, newcomer from the corps Thomas Forster had a very anguished, tremulous quality as the lover partnering Melissa Thomas. Vitali Krauchenka looked impressive but lacked the acting nuances that Zhurbin had. Veronika Part had the European quality that Boone lacked and had lots of passion, hauteur, glamour and mystery. Superb new assumption challenging my memories of Martine Van Hamel in the role. On the Thursday evening - Part and Thomas got a rousing ovation from a very impressed and moved audience - including a mid-performance ovation at the moment where time stops and Caroline steps outside herself during her faint. The whole thing played better with greater warmth and propulsion on Thursday night. "Company B" had some interesting assumptions in the second cast. Mikhail Ilyin had a more jerky jazzy body articulation than the lighter, jumpier Arron Scott in "Tico, Tico". Carlos Lopez was delightfully Harold Lloyd in "Oh, Johnny, oh Johnny, oh" and Nicola Curry had a lovely creamy dreamy phrasing in "I Can Dream Can't I?". Joseph Phillips was a technical dynamo in "Boogie-Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B". Nice work in bits by Roddy Doble and others. The Wednesday cast included Murphy, Cornejo, Salstein et al. Misty Copeland owns "Rum and Coca Cola". A cute little vignette in the row in front of me. There was a white-haired older lady with her teenaged granddaughter who was loving the Andrews Sisters songs. They obviously took her right back to her youth and happy times. She was quietly singing along with them and bopping her head to the rhythm as the granddaughter looked on wide-eyed. Finally the granddaughter laid her head on her grandmothers shoulder by the end of the ballet. Wednesday night closed with Marcelo Gomes and Paloma Herrera in "Brief Fling" in the roles created by Julio Bocca and Cheryl Yeager back in the now distant year of 1990 during the last century of the last millenium. I found I only remembered the costumes from this ballet which I might have seen with a second cast in 1991. It also looks better on the City Center stage. The score is a fusion of modern score with electronic instruments with Percy Grainger. The dancing is also a fusion of classical ballet and funky modern dance colliding in the usual playful Tharp fashion. I found I liked it a lot. Gomes was virtuosic in a jumpy, turn intensive role created for a smaller dancer. He also was as playful and witty as Bocca could be. Paloma looked like she was having fun and had lots of speed and style. The combinations in their pas de deux seem to be a riff on the "Sleeping Beauty" pas de deux and rose adagio. Leading the stomping highland flingers were Craig Salstein and Luciana Paris in the funky modern dance roles. Thursday night opened with "Ballo della Regina" which seemed to have better energy than opening night. One problem with Michele Wiles vs. Merrill Ashley (who I spotted in the lobby during intermission) is that Michele is like a head taller than Ashley is/was. Those intricate and difficult petite allegro jumping and turning moves will look clunky or sloppy on a bigger body with longer legs and feet. Michele who was coltish back in her soloist days is also filling out and looks womanly onstage. The whole body type and physicality are different. Michele however was incredibly strong and had lots of brio and attack but lacked subtlety and delicacy. David Hallberg was a classical dynamo in the male role despite some slightly wild pirouettes - he looked happy up there too. Very noteworthy were the four soloist women - Leann Underwood, Isabella Boylston, Kristi Boone and especially Simone Messmer - they were stunning. The "Romeo and Juliet" pas de deux ("Romeo's Farewell") was very tantalizing since I have long wondered what this ballet looks like. ABT better get working on restoring the whole thing (the Nureyev and Doris Duke Foundations have the money for a worthwhile preservation project like this) since in a decade or two no one will remember the choreography. Xiomara Reyes and Gennadi Saveliev were the lovers. I keep forgetting what a powerful emotional actress Reyes can be in a dramatic ballet and she was incredibly moving here. Saveliev was an ardent, attentive partner for her. Lets have the whole thing now Kevin, we're ready.

Some casting suggestions for the TBA slots in the calendar: Veronika Part as the Siren in "Prodigal Son" - not much allegro as I remember, I think this could work for her. The other suggestion: Maria Bystrova as Myrtha in "Giselle".

I saw the Sunday evening performance. It started out with a repeat of "Baker's Dozen" with good work by Blaine Hoven, Maria Riccetto and a chipper Arron Scott in the role Craig Salstein performed on opening night. Scott was more Bobby Van perky vs. Salstein's Donald O'Connor. The "Citizen" was only distinguished by an interesting second cast. Everyone was either a soloist or a corps dancer and seemed to work as a collection of equals. Neither Sarah Lane or Corey Stearns reached the star turn level of Paloma Herrera or David Hallberg but they seemed more part of the ensemble. Sean Stewart in the role previously danced by Blaine Hoven was more forceful and dominating with his typical sure command of style. Nice to see him in a major assignment. Devon Teuscher and especially Melissa Thomas shone in the two other female roles. The piece still has problems but it is short. "Pillar of Fire" got a surprisingly authoritative performance from Michele Wiles as Hager from whom I expected little. I usually see Wiles as being wholesome and sunny and outgoing - the polar opposite of this character. She beautifully brought out the sense of isolation the character has - belonging and fitting in nowhere with no one. The only small things missing were a stronger feeling of repressed sexual frustration and a touch of neuroticism. Otherwise she really brought a lot of emotional depth and detail to the role. Marcelo Gomes and David Hallberg lived up to the high expections I always have for them with almost definitive portrayals. Particularly Hallberg really shone in a low-key, unflashy but essential role. Marian Butler was good but could have been more teasing and girlish as the Younger Sister but Maria Bystrova ruled as the Elder Sister. "Company B" had a very "A" team cast with Gillian Murphy and Herman Cornejo ("Bugle Boy of Company B") in key roles. I was particularly taken with Misty Copeland ("Rum and Coca-Cola") and Arron Scott ("Tico, Tico") as well as Craig Salstein again in full Donald O'Connor mode ("Oh Johnny!"). I agree with whoever mentioned that ABT has failed to sufficiently point up the darker contrast of the silhouetted men in combat or marching poses in the background suggesting the warfare and loss underlying these cheerful pop tunes. Everything seemed on one happy level but this is a much darker piece than "Baker's Dozen". The Paul Taylor Dancers are much more grounded and have a different sense of weight on stage than the ballet dancers of ABT who are more aerial and jumpy. That does make a difference.

Alexandre Hammoudi looked great in "Leaves are Fading" - so yes, I second Classic_Ballet's endorsement. Vitali Krauchenka looks like he could partner Michele as well and is a fine classical dancer but seems wasted in the Ethan Brown/Brian Reeder "he is big and can play the father" character/mime track. Also Kevin needs to throw some goodies towards Maria Bystrova - not just character/mime assignments but classical soloist roles. Another reason for grooming these men is that David Hallberg (who has been getting shoulder and upper back trauma injuries of late) and the seemingly tireless Marcelo Gomes have been carrying more than their fair share of the burden of partnering everyone including the ABT basketball team of Michele and Veronika. Now Roberto Bolle is on his way to lift their burden during the Spring/Summer Met season and he is a fully finished dancer and experienced partner. The real glory of the City Center is seeing corps dancers step forward while the stars are away.

I just wanted to mention that Matthew Murphy seems to have taken his blogging to a new level and has started a new career as an arts journalist. He has been a contributing feature writer and commentator for Playbill for both theater and dance. There is an article about Christopher Wheeldon's "Morphoses" company by Matthew Murphy in the current October 2008 playbill that is being distributed for San Francisco Ballet and ABT at City Center.

Regarding Stearns, the heavy hitters aren't getting any younger (Carreno, Stiefel - even Angel is into his thirties - gasp! I remember him as a teenager who couldn't speak English!) and they all need an understudy. I remember having feelings similar to that eight years ago when Marcelo Gomes starting getting bigger roles (they have Julio, Vladimir, Angel, José Manuel, Ethan - why do they need to put him on?). Well, I have been eating my words for the last seven years. Now Marcelo was more mature then and stronger as a partner than Corey is now but still the development of Stearns, Matthews and Hoven is a very good thing - for company morale now and for audiences further down the line.

I saw the first night of the regular season (Wednesday the 22nd) which included the premiere of the new Lauri Stallings ballet "Citizen". The evening started off with Twyla Tharp's "Baker's Dozen" which was in the words of the lady to my left "happy-making". One of the happy-making aspects was the presence of so many corps dancers getting a nice opportunity to show their stuff (including Sean Stewart) . However, the two real standouts were soloists: Craig Salstein in his best Donald O'Connor mode and a wild and funky Misty Copeland who threw herself all over him like a rag doll. These two really got it. The new Lauri Stallings ballet "Citizen" to a score by Max Richter is a head scratcher. A long-time ballet fanatic friend saw derivative elements of Forsythe - slightly contorted modern choreography with off-center pirouettes etc. mixed in with performance arty effects. Richter's music is restless and moody without really giving enough structure for coherent dance-making - it seemed like a film score, a good one but something essential was missing. The stage is bare with the brick back wall exposed and a shadowy half-lit stage. Stallings choreography becomes repetitive after a while but then random and arbitrary theatrical effects come in and shake things up - glitter coming down on Paloma Herrera from the flies, stagehands and dancers from other ballets walking on as observers briefly and then leaving, etc. The dancers were the best thing here: Paloma looks sensational in modern choreography and should do Forsythe somewhere, sometime. David Hallberg done up in a Madonna bustier like a fugitive from her "Girlie Show" tour was an androgynous powerhouse. Blaine Hoven showed that he is very much a dancer to be watched and Nicola Curry and Isabella Boylston were fine. The word for this one was "interesting" and I will leave it at that. I don't think it will remain in the repertoire. "The Leaves are Fading" was the first time I saw the complete ballet - it is gorgeous and got a lovely performance. Julie Kent has a role that suits her lyricism and delicacy and where her maturity is a positive element. I always have noted a very "English" quality in Kent - she is kind of ABT's Antoinette Sibley in a way. It is a shame that ABT hasn't done more Ashton - she would have shone in his "Cinderella" a decade ago. Tudor also has a very English, understated quality in this piece and she was in sync with that. I never saw Gelsey Kirkland thirty-three years ago, so I have no point of comparison. Marcelo was her selfless but engrossing partner - the partnering demands are heavy for the male role but he also had nice folk accents in his solos. The other ladies in the pas de deux were Maria Riccetto, Veronika Part and Hee Seo - all lovely in different ways. The Dvorak music is exquisite by itself even without the dancing. There is a mood of age looking upon youth and love from a distanced but mellow and warm perspective. A work I want to see again. "Theme and Variations" got a fast but not careless performance. The big news was the debut of Corey Stearns in the male lead. He did very well though he was physically mismatched with Michele Wiles who is too big for him - he will have to work out at the gym and bulk up to work with her. Wiles was having a strong turning night with dazzling multiple pirouettes - she went off the music in one solo section but otherwise really carried the star role with strength and panache. Stearns showed excellent form in the jumps with the leg beats and the multiple turns in the air (though I suspect that if he had to do one more set he would have started to tire). Stearns defiinitely showed some fulfillment of promise. The technique is clean and articulate and he is showing nice instincts in using his upper body and arms in a musical elegant way. He just needs a little more strength in his partnering and a touch more stamina which experience in bigger roles can and will give him. He is also a little tentative in his projection which also will be remedied with experience. All in all a satisfying and varied programme.

One of the big recurring themes in almost all MacMillan ballets is prostitutes of various stripes from the streetwalker to the brothel girl to the elegant courtesan. Almost every one has a grand pas for the corps du whore in one act at least. For example, in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" there is no real indication or mention that Romeo, Mercutio, Benvolio et al. are carousing with whores in the street. Romeo has a childish unrequited romantic crush on Rosaline but that is the only indication of previous involvement with women. However, those frizzy-haired harlots are ubiquitous in almost every act of MacMillan's "Romeo and Juliet" (and blessedly absent from the Cranko). Their role in the group dances is really way more prominent than their importance to the story would warrant. Meanwhile "Mayerling" has that Mitzi character and a big dance in the brothel which has some historical significance since Prince Rudolf was a fast-living sybarite. I think that the prima ballerina/courtesan Matilda Kschessinskaya has been shoehorned into the full-length "Anastasia". MacMillan's really conflicted feelings about women's sexuality is fully exposed in "The Judas Tree" where the woman basically provokes the men to gang-rape her. I think either Jennifer Dunning or Anna Kisselgoff said in the NY Times that it would be a terrible thing to have a ballet like that on your conscience when you went to meet your maker. BTW: the Royal Ballet did bring over "The Prince of the Pagodas" one summer for the Lincoln Center Festival. I saw it with the first cast of Darcey Bussell, Deborah Bull and Jonathan Cope. The original fairy tale has a convoluted story that doesn't lend itself effectively to exposition in dance. The score by Britten is not immediately appealing - rather dank and difficult in places. Bussell was enchanting but I had no desire to see the work again. As for the dislike of MacMillan - Boris Eifman has come across the same disdain. The critical fraternity in the United States is brought up on the Balanchine "there are no mothers-in-law in ballet" dictum. Story ballets are looked at with distinct suspicion as being artistically retrograde and kitschy. I remember one critic saying that MacMillan wanted to choreograph all the ballets they that didn't get around to (or didn't dare) choreograph in the nineteenth century. Essentially that group has the opinion that MacMillan's taste was old-fashioned with derivative choreography including showy overhead lifts stolen from Cranko decorated with an overlay of cheap psychology and melodramatic mime. BTW: a friend of mine said that she felt that while the Cranko "Romeo and Juliet" is better overall in the group scenes, the MacMillan version has the better pas de deux. She felt the best solution would be to interpolate the balcony pas de deux, the farewell pas de deux and the tomb scene into the Cranko overall structure. "Manon" is one of the great stories of a prostitute - the bible of courtesans like Marguerite Gautier in "La Dame aux Camellias" who keeps it by her side always. Somehow MacMillan and the Prevost novel seem fated to meet. I don't know about the popularity with audiences but major ballerinas have coveted the part of Manon. Natalia Makarova found it her best and favorite contemporary ballet role and this was backed up by many astute observers. Diana Vishneva has also made it a specialty role as did Alessandra Ferri. Sylvie Guillem was a major intepreter in London and in Paris as well - one of her best dramatic ballet roles as well. I saw Nina Ananiashvili in it with ABT and found her less than revelatory - she is really not a MacMillan dancer at all. Alessandra Ferri, MacMillan ballerina nonpareil was also dancing it with a young Bocca that season and that was the standard by which others were judged. Anyway, no matter what audiences or critics think, major dancers want to dance the main roles and get the ballet produced. Wasn't Vishneva a major force in getting the full-length "Manon" into the Mariinsky repertory? Certainly Ferri and Bocca were major factors in getting the ballet done at ABT.

All this is very nice but why isn't his name and photo listed under "soloists" on the ABT website? There is no information whatsoever about him.

For those that are interested: "Harriet Craig" is scheduled to be shown on TCM on Sunday morning September 7th at 6:30 a.m.

The "Brigadoon" was screened during a TV musicals festival at the Museum of Television and Broadcasting. Edward Villella plays Harry Beaton - the doomed townsman who is rejected by Bonnie Jean and dies trying to escape from Brigadoon. Its a dancing role created by James Mitchell originally. He has a very James Dean/Marlon Brando presence onscreen - lots of Method brooding. Not a lot of dialogue. He isn't very convincing as a Scotsman. The rest of the cast includes the very lovely, really definitive Sally Ann Howes and Robert Goulet. It was produced for TV by Armstrong, the paint and floor tile company. During one break Goulet walks into one of the mock-up Brigadoon cottages and it just happens to be a little Armstrong showroom! Goulet then does a little spiel for Armstrong home products right there in Brigadoon village. I wanted to buy some of the vintage sixties products but the problem is...they're only open once in a hundred years. Oh well, maybe in my next lifetime...

The big problem with "Chicago" wasn't the stars (Zellweger was a competent singer and dancer and Zeta-Jones started out as a dancer/musical comedy performer on the West End stage) - it was the MTV-style direction. You couldn't see that the dancers could dance because of the hyperactive editing. They would start a movement and then-cut!-another shot!-cut!-reaction shot-cut!-etc. Dancers create dances by linking movements together but I only remember just seeing an isolated kick here or a swivel there from Zeta-Jones. No idea if she can actually still do an entire dance sequence and look credible. Now "Nine" mostly takes place in Guido's head so that kind of wild editing could work to suggest a train of thought careening around. But I hope Marshall tones it down for this one.

The sad thing about all of this and makes me wonder how much Maury Yeston is really involved is that almost all the roles in "Nine" are very vocally demanding. Guido and Carla in particular really require seriously trained voices with large ranges. On paper Daniel Day-Lewis and Penelope Cruz are good choices for a remake of "8 1/2" but for the musical show? You need a real voice for both parts. Kidman has enough vocal chops for her part but the other people... As for casting Fergie... the whole idea is to pitch to the executives that you are reaching the teenage MTV crowd, not middle-aged women, homosexuals and aging Broadway fans. Tiny market shares and zero demographics. You also have to write some rock beat new song and have it on MTV and then compete for the "Best Original New Song" at the Oscars. It is just pathetic. Rob Marshall should have more respect for the material. Lots of good, talented people are in the cast here but so did "Lost Horizon".

American Ballet Theater definitely started out with resident choreographers and a cutting edge vision for that period in time: early 1940's. Lucia Chase and Oliver Smith brought in Antony Tudor and Agnes de Mille and Mikhail Fokine restaged many of his Diaghilev ballets for them. I personally feel that it is a good thing to have a national company that does the Russian full-length classics especially since many regional ballet companies do them as well. Do we really want to wait for Bolshoi or Kirov tours to see "La Bayadere" or "The Sleeping Beauty" let alone to see Diana Vishneva or Nina Ananiashvili? Also I think that the very eclecticism of the company is what contrasts it with NYCB and makes it crucially necessary to the ballet scene in this country. The NYCB has programming that when you see it season after season can become stale. The Balanchine and Robbins ballets are classics but their successors as choreographers aren't on the same level. Mr. Gottlieb meet Peter Martins. You had people like Richard Tanner doing a xerox of a xerox of a Balanchine ballet. People coming in for one new Diamond Project work feeling their way and not being invited back. Wheeldon was a great addition for the time he was there. I mean you have the neoclassic tutu work to Tchaikovsky or Mozart, the leotard ballet to Stravinsky or Ligeti and the jazzy Robbins work, etc. The few fun razzle dazzle Balanchine romps like "Stars and Stripes", "Union Jack" or "Western Symphony". Then lesser lights do riffs on that. After a while it can get stale when the real masterpieces have been seen multiple times. (I will admit I am really enjoying NYCB a lot these days due to Bouder, Reichlen, Mearns and old vets like Whelan and Woetzel). As far as I know, they never had a school in those days and the main victim was the corps which always was very inferior to the New York City Ballet corps de ballet. I believe that Arlene Croce believed that Makarova's work with the corps when she staged "The Kingdom of the Shades" from "Bayadere" in the 1970's transformed the corps and Elena Chernichova under Baryshnikov worked on them too. The corps is nothing to be ashamed of now. However, ABT currently is in a state of being an international dance boutique displaying international wares without any kind of central dance aesthetic or personal vision. Kevin McKenzie started out with the Joffrey in the seventies and they were famous for curating and restoring old lost ballets by Bronislava Nijinska and Massine and then doing modern stuff by Arpino and others. Plus doing Ashton and Cranko when other U.S. companies weren't. Kevin seems to be following something of a Robert Joffrey template especially during the City Center season with things like "The Green Table". Kevin has borrowed all sorts of classic Cranko, MacMillan and Ashton ballets from the National Ballet of Canada and Royal Ballet. However, there are several things missing here and he has revived as many of the 20th century classics as he can. When it really comes to going out on a limb and doing let's say a Massine, Nijinska, a lost early Balanchine, a lost Ashton, Leo Staats or other such work, he isn't doing much to rescue these pieces. With the death of lots of those Ballets Russes era dancers many of these almost vanished ballets will become unrevivable. A genius choreographer is another desiderata but almost every company is looking for one nowadays. Also Kevin McKenzie as a stager of the 19th century classics is decidedly a mixed blessing. He was absolutely the wrong person to do "Sleeping Beauty" because he had no sympathy for Petipa's courtly formal style and leisurely abstract dramaturgy. Anna Marie Holmes would have put something presentable up there, especially with a different design team.

Robert La Fosse's autobiography "Nothing to Hide" shows the partner's view of working with the using Gelsey Kirkland. They were rehearsing "Giselle" together. He describes her looking unattractive - disheveled with a puffy face. She seemed sullen and withdrawn as I remember, having difficulty communicating her ideas. Evidently they had trouble establishing any kind of rapport which Gelsey alludes to as well in her book describing him as immature (also missing the sexual chemistry that Misha brought to the table). The rehearsal process was difficult - La Fosse describes Kirkland as being a dead weight when he had to do the Act II lifts but onstage they looked lovely with her body draped in a long line but not so lovely on his shoulders and back. Anyway, La Fosse didn't have fun partnering Gelsey at the period in her life when she was on drugs.

Gelsey just mentions that she regrets hurting people with her comments in her book specifically Martins and Baryshnikov. She doesn't mention which comments but they would have to be the personal information about her relationships with them. It has been a while since I read "Dancing on My Grave" and I don't have the article handy. However, her comments were likely in response to the emotional hurt she caused these men, not for the repercussions to her career. However, I drew the inference that after publishing the book, Gelsey would not have been welcome at Misha's ABT or Martin's NYCB. I don't know if either gentleman directly or indirectly expressed their indignation or dismay about her published revelations. However, if they were upset then it is highly unlikely that she would have been taken back into the fold at either of her former artistic homes. Especially if Gelsey was as universally reviled personally by the dance world as she seems to have been at that time according to a previous poster's comments re: Villella's plea for mercy.

However, I remember a passage in the book where she is sleeping with Martins in his apartment and wakes up in the middle of the night to discover Heather Watts in the bedroom watching them together in bed. Evidently Peter didn't ask Heather to return her spare key. Just another note: though Bissell and Kirkland are the most frequently singled out examples of drug abuse casualties of the eighties they were not alone. Probably the most prominent and the most tragic but cocaine was big back then and lots of people in the dance world were using. However, it was made to seem that Patrick and Gelsey were the unfortunate exceptions to the rule and not part of a larger trend. Susan Jaffe has admitted in interviews that she had a brush with drug addiction very early in her career but the Gelsey example likely forced her to clean up her act sooner rather than later.

I have spoken of this before but Gelsey's follow-up book to "Dancing on My Grave" which was co-written with her ex-husband Greg Lawrence was published in 1986 and entitled "The Shape of Love". It has a very different tone from "Dancing on My Grave" which was written at a time when Gelsey was still in a painful place having been driven from her dance career and only just in the first stages of recovery from drug addiction. The first book does point the finger at various individuals such as her alcoholic father (she doesn't link her substance abuse issues with his), Lucia Chase (didn't give her enough emotional support or care as though that were part of her job) and Balanchine and others. Gelsey in the second book which deals with her return to the stage is willing to place more blame on herself and is more generous to others. BTW: in recent interviews in Dance Magazine, Gelsey admitted that she regretted spilling personal information about Peter Martins and Mikhail Baryshnikov including taking us inside the bedroom with sexual details (unflattering to both gentlemen). Both men are powerful and well-connected, then and now and probably made their displeasure felt. Both were running NYCB and ABT at the time that Gelsey was trying to return to the stage in the mid-1980's.

Just a final little response: while I find critics who hand out artificial flowers and love everything useless and unhelpful, equally worthless are those who lob sweeping dismissals, snide jibes, withering comments, been-there-done-that superiority and backhanded praise to show how just how superior their attitude and opinions are. No critic has to love everything I love - "Etudes" seems to be a ballet that breeds contempt with familiarity and Macauley gave good reasons for his disdain. He also had some honest criticism of specific productions like the revised "Sleeping Beauty" and the "Swan Lake". However several of his comments seem to belittle the artists without balancing the equation by weighing his criticisms against all of their qualities. Anna Kisselgoff had been seeing ballet in NY when ABT and NYCB were new companies just starting out, she knew all the dancers in each company intimately and even if they were miscast, misdirected or in poor shape always had a good sense of each dancer's (and the company that created them) intrinsic worth. I don't trust Macauley in the same way.

I think that Makarova felt that the music was too folk dancey in sound and the steps were too jaunty for Nikiya. So Lanchbery came up with that lyrical whirling theme and more liquid, sinuous choreography. I think it was a personal taste of Makarova's having danced the original jaunty uptempo theme at the Kirov to change it for her version in the West which seems to be the standard version outside of Nureyev's version for the POB (which follows the Kirov 1940 template very faithfully).

I find this summation rather patronizing and vague. What I guess he is driving at is that individual dancers are good but the productions of the classics are spotty and lacking a consistent style. Therefore, it is up to the individual dancers to bring distinction to the repertory. Okay, I'll buy that. However the dismissive and patronizing tone: "don't set your expections too high" and "would you know that from it's performances? (that ABT is America's national ballet company)" and "The company keeps showing you that, though it could be great, it has deliberately chosen to fall short." Well is that true? You would know that it is a leading ballet company because of the level of the dancing. I don't think that the corps, if not on the POB or Kirov level, is anything to be ashamed of though they vary from production to production depending on the quality of the coaching and staging. Does any company "choose to fall short"? - well they may compromise or dumb down the classics (i.e. "Sleeping Beauty" last year) - but what are these self-destructive or reductive choices? Also, if "Le Corsaire", "La Bayadere" and "Don Quixote" are all worthless trash with very little appreciable choreographic value, then other top-level international companies share this lack of taste with ABT: the Kirov, the Bolshoi, the Paris Opera Ballet and the Royal Ballet for starters. Now you can pick apart these productions individually. The ABT "Le Corsaire" is a musical and choreographic patchwork but it is fun and colorful and a great vehicle for dancers. The Makarova production of "La Bayadere" does attempt within what was available to her in the West to stylistically streamline and complete a work that until the Kirov's reconstruction of the 1900 version was performed incomplete in Russia and has character and exotic dancing that might not go over with Western audiences and many ballet companies aren't equipped to effectively restage. A better recension might be made from the complete 1900 version and the original orchestrations used instead of the Lanchbery reorchestration and ersatz Act IV but it is a good workable staging. I can't believe you can dismiss the "Kingdom of the Shades" with one flick of the wrist. Tobi Tobias was similarly dismissive of performing these ballets complete in her articles in New York magazine in the 90's basically saying that outside of the "Kingdom of the Shades" everything else in "La Bayadere" is worthless. I don't agree - I even love the kitsch elements and the classical purity of the "Shades" is like a beautiful oasis in a wild landscape of exoticism and yes, even camp and 19th century oriental kitsch. "Don Quixote" has its share of magnificent choreography. However, the tendency to dismiss the ballets of Minkus, Glazunov, Pugni et al. as dispensable fluff while the Petipa/Ivanov/Tchaikovsky collaborations are sacrosanct doesn't begin with Macauley. Dame Ninette di Valois was interviewed during the BBC relay of the Kirov "Raymonda" with Kolpakova in the early 80's. She decried the revival of what she felt were minor and marginal works - "Raymonda" included - and stressed that the Tchaikovsky ballets were the real jewels and everything else was paste. Well, I love costume jewelry too as well as diamonds if they are put together with taste and style. Quote: "But this season, like every Ballet Theater season I've ever watched since I first saw the company in 1977, bequeathed another, larger but much vaguer impression: whenever Ballet Theater starts to be artistically of major value, something makes it fall short." unquote Well, how is let's say the Royal Ballet or the Kirov or the NYCB doing better? How or why do they outperform ABT in serious artistic achievement? Why isn't ABT serious about ballet? - they present a wider repertory of classical, neoclassical and even some modern dance than almost any other company in the world. I admit that lacking a great, living choreographer creating important new works for the company as Ballet Theater did in the 1940's and 50's with Tudor and DeMille and NYCB with Balanchine and Robbins is a major demerit. But outside of let's say, Ratmansky and the Bolshoi (and not for long) or Eifman and his company (if you consider him great, I like some of his stuff) almost every other international company suffers from the same problem. Lots of great dancers, not many great choreographers and the art form in a kind of transitional, eclectic mode not knowing where to develop next. So Macauley patronizes and dismisses these awfully ambitious but hopeless colonials for falling short of great art but manages to drop a few compliments to certain dancers. How nice of him. BTW: Clive Barnes deeply loves ballet and has since his early youth when he might have been one of those poor students in the high balcony cheap seats in the movie "The Red Shoes". Anna Kisselgoff had a long and informed history with all the New York dance companies and the foreign ones as well. But she wasn't a partisan of one company over another, loved each company for its own qualities even as they changed over time and remained enthusiastic about "Don Quixote" or "Symphony in C" even after having seen it dozens of times. Macauley sounds terribly jaded and tired in comparison. He isn't afraid to drop his opinions and allude to a vague set of standards that he is sure aren't being met but no specific vision of what is missing.

Many seasons ago ABT was to stage Kudelka's production of "Firebird". They even had a picture of Nina Ananiashvili on the brochure in costume for the part. However, there was a financial crisis and the production had to be canceled. ABT which in it's infancy as Ballet Theater had Fokine himself supervising and restaging his ballets, had a very authentic old production of Fokine's "Firebird" in its repertory but they haven't done it since the very early 1990's. Might be a nice thing to see Nina out with a new starring role in a new production in New York - either the Fokine or Kudelka "Firebird". (Nina does the Fokine Firebird in the "Return of the Firebird" movie with Andris Liepa) Might I suggest Carreno or Malakhov as her Prince?

My feeling about this season is that Kevin shot his fiscal load last year with the expensively disastrous "Sleeping Beauty" premiere and the costly retuning and refitting this year. So basically all there was money for was a short Tharp ballet with no scenery and basic costumes (Twyla don't come cheap though). So basically everything else were retreads of old material we have seen before with much of the casting we have seen before. Nice way to catch up on some favorite dancers in some roles you missed them in but no real revelations with the exception of Sarah Lane and Herman Cornejo's major new assumptions. I agree with Susan about the company depending on its star dancers to add interest in their season rather than ambitious repertory or daring experimentation. Kevin I think has borrowed all the full-length ballets he can (the Crankos, Ashton's Sylvia, Othello, the Merry Widow, etc.) from other companies. Not that I am complaining about this but eventually some novelties will have to be found. Since the company doesn't have a resident choreographer, this is a problem - basically they are a boutique importing other companies choreography. However, this really only applies to the Met season which frankly isn't suited to chamber ballets or experimentation. I don't know how he can look at the City Center season and dismiss that programming as lacking seriousness. It is also quite obvious that Macauley only saw Veronika Part as the Lilac Fairy but skipped her Nikiya (reviewed by a second stringer) and her Odette/Odile. So he is dismissing her for "posiness" based on his reservations about one performance - which many here thought definitive. He is entitled to his opinion but he didn't see the full range of her work this season at ABT. On the other hand, he didn't bitchily dismiss her as "boring" which is what he has done in the past but acknowledged her ballerina potential. The "Merry Widow" revival was largely superbly performed though you can quibble about the quality of the piece. Bon-bons do have their place at the table as well as more substantial fare.

Just curious, why did the RBOF seem "a very, very good company" to you? Any particular dancers you remember? The dancers who were dancing on the left side in Act I seemed to be soloist and corps dancers. Since I am not familiar with the company and they were all dressed in simple grey leotards and black tights it is hard to pick them out. They were not identified in the program. Unlike ABT and NYCB, I don't follow this company so I can't pick out who they were. The lead soloists in "In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated" were the same dancers who danced on opening night. I don't have my program with me. The lead girl was Aki Saito. There was a lead male who was quite exciting and surprisingly expressive and one soloist girl (dark hair, muscular torso) who impressed me very much. I think she was Joelle Aspert. There also was a blonde who was very, very good. Jim de Block who danced Mr. Pnut did wonderful hip hop moves in the last section. Anyway, they had very good technique with clean footwork, speed and placement in demanding choreography. There was a sense of precision in all their movements and they looked thoroughly coached in the style. This is due to the fact that the artistic director Kathryn Bennetts was Forsythe's ballet mistress and a former soloist in his Frankfurt company. I would imagine these dancers would be very good in Balanchine. Sorry I can't give you more details but I am unfamiliar with the company and these dancers and there were very many onstage - particularly in Act I where they were all doing a lot in short spurts all the time.

I saw this on the last performance on Sunday afternoon. This was presented at the Rose Theater which is the new Jazz space at Columbus Circle. In my experience there are two William Forsythes. One is a very talented, brilliant within a limited scope modern neoclassical choreographer with the edgy, athletic, angular style we all know from "In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated" and "The Vertiginous Thrill of Exactitude". The other is rather Eurotrashy despite being American who specializes in sub-Pina Bausch "danz-theater" with all sorts of random goings-on all over the stage, dialogue mixed in with repeated random actions and little dance riffs thrown in to keep the audience off-balance. In "Impressing the Czar" both Forsythes were on display in their best form with some other aspects revealing themselves as well. The good news: even the Eurotrashy stuff has its entertaining features and the evening as a whole is not too long. Those who are expecting pure dance will have some disappointment with the first and last thirds of the evening. Others who know what to expect will sometimes be bored but not for long and will have lots to enjoy throughout the performance and even more to talk about afterwards. The first act seems to be Eurotrashy Bill F. with a large chess board on the right of the stage, various dancers on the left enacting dance steps from various millenia from the Renaissance on, narrators speaking bizarre commentary, a TV set on the right, simulated violence, etc. all punctuated with lovely little neoclassical dances on the very far left on the stage at regular intervals. There was constant action all over the stage with dozens of dancers in various historical costumes doing various tasks at a fast pace to a musical conflation of Beethoven and a modern electronic score. This act was longer and seemed to baffle the audience - the applause at the end was the tentative "is it over? what was it? I don't know if I liked it or hated it" type. The middle section is the ballet choreographed for the Paris Opera Ballet "In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated" and is gorgeous and received a fine performance by the RBoF dancers. This got rapturous applause at the end of the act. The last act is in two sections - the first is a short 12 to 14 minute vaudeville with an auctioneer selling off various dancers dressed in gold impersonating various bizarre luxury items. Lots of fast commentary that was obviously newly rewritten and was hilariously topical and wicked - jabs at the fall of the American dollar, the price of oil, election shenanigans, etc. The last fifteen minutes had the entire corps dressed in schoolgirl uniforms getting down in hip-hop and stomping formations. This had a jumpy beat and was quite energetic - it was not ballet but it was entertaining. And not too long. Enthusiastic applause at the end since the fun stomping and hip-hop dancing had high energy. The Royal Ballet of Flanders btw is a very, very good company. I don't know how they would dance "Swan Lake" but there was lots of finished, exciting talent throughout the ranks. I had trouble taking in the first act because I was in a side box and a lighting bar blocked the far left edge of the stage which totally blocked out the ballet portion of the action (the best part). Later I was reseated in the orchestra and enjoyed it much better. There were various recurring characters like Mr. Pnut (pronounced "peanut") and Agnes (the auctioneer) and Rose but what they were up to was kind of "experiential" - you know, don't try to figure it out just let it happen and take it for whatever you want it to be and enjoy the experience. Kind of sums up the whole evening for me. I enjoyed various parts of the evening but they were all very different and didn't seem to coalesce into one central unifying theme. I mean Forsythe was throwing out ideas about how classical dance started out as courtly ritual and entertainment for various royalty including the Czars of Russia where most of our central ballet classic rep comes from. Then he goes on to corporate power, television, the commodification of high art for the moneyed classes, etc. but he is kind of shooting all over the place at once. Supposedly at the question and answer sessions, the stagers taking a cue from Forsythe were mysterious about "what the piece is about".