Manhattnik

I used to think that if a dance needed a program note to "explain" what it was all about, it was a failure. But the more I see dance, the more I realize that what we bring to it is often as important as what's "there" onstage. That doesn't necessarily excuse the rococco (if amusing) program notes of, say, an Eifman (surely there should be a special Bulwer-Lytton award for any program note which beings with "The great composer is dying...."), but it's not for nothing that most dance fans I know take a somewhat perverse glee in counting off on their fingers the exceptions to Balanchine's oft-quoted law about there being no mothers-in-law in ballet. Well, of course there are -- or there would be, if one or both of the afianced didn't have the nasty, albeit picturesque, habit of dying before (or during) the nuptials.

The works of Merce Cunningham, while free of explicatory program notes, are, for me, the most extreme example of works where the viewers own act of observing and internalizing the dance is almost as much "the work" as the choreography itself. While, ultimately, that's the heart of any experienced work of art (that is to say, all of them), it's seldom expressed so poignantly as in Cunningham's Zen-gardenish creations.

I'll never forget my first Giselle (not likely with its Makarova/Baryshnikov/van Hamel casting!). I was so busy yakking with some folks sitting next to me that I didn't get around to reading the program, and, while I had no problem following the story of Act I, I was certainly rather shocked that the heroine seemed to die by the end of the act. As the curtian fell on Baryshnikov's histrionics over the supine Makarova (this was back when he was still doing his "nice-guy" Albrecht) I asked myself, "Well, now what? She's dead!" Little did I know what was in store for me in Act II, or at least I didn't know until I dug up my program. "Aha, ghosts. Of course. I knew that."

Was my naive first viewing of Giselle somehow more valid or true or useful because I was reacting to every moment in Act I without the benefit of having a clue beforehand what might be going on? While certainly it made for interesting viewing, I'm not as certain as I once was that this was a good or useful way of exposing one's self to an unfamiliar dance (especially when I decided my narratives of this event were usually more about how clever I was to "follow" the story without benefit of reading the program). I remember trying to present this viewpoint to a certain critic of a major metropolitan newspaper here who's well-known for the detailed historical explications she inserts, wherever possible, into her reviews, and cringing at her rather unsympathetic response to my attempt to lionize my own ignorance.

So what was the question again? Oh, I think every dance is a narrative (sometimes they're just dull narratives, but that's another kettle of worms). I have no problem with dancers expressing themselves at one moment with mime, either "realistic" or stylized, and at another with more-or-less "abstract" movement. It's no more odd than that Broadway-musical world where people alternately talk and sing, after all. And, really, mime and "pure" dance are just different steps on the same path to enlightenment, or, rather, different paths towards the same destination. The whole idea that the serres in White Swan, for instance, can mean, well, a "climax," or that a dancer sweeping his fingertips around the circumference of his face (and then, God forbid, kissing them, sometimes) can mean "beautiful," if you've been taught, or learned, to see that meaning, speaks a bit to my pet theory of the sublimation and abstraction of sexuality in ballet as a kind of calculus. (This is also why James Canfield's ballets really stink, but that's another story.)

So what do I think about when I see the dancey bits in a narrative ballet? "... the plot? The themes? The dancing itself?" For me, the cute, but nevertheless true answer is simply "yes," just because they're not simply inextricably entwined, but because they're really all one and the same. A cigar is always just a cigar, except when it's not, which is always and never. Same goes for those serres, which always send me into transports of rapture (except when they don't, or when they're not there -- Mr. B, what were you thinking?).

The things a guy will do to put off cleaning up his apartment.....

Of course the most poignant moments between Edward and his lover came when the latter was reduced to a head inside a bloody bag....

Am I the only reader of this thread to whom the memory of Arpino's The Relativity of Icarus springs, unbidden? I remember Arpino saying quite emphatically that it had no nudge-nudge, wink-wink, know-what-I-mean? gay subtext. Perhaps there were even viewers who actually believed him.

OK, I can't sleep and I'm imagining Allegra Kent's Giselle.

I can't speak for their California visit, but when I saw the Bolshoi at the NY State Theater a couple of years ago they looked world-class indeed, and turned in the best Shades scene I've ever seen, uh, viewed.

Nice: Ulanova

Naughty: Plisetskaya

I couldn't help but notice that Yoel (or Joel) Carreno's name wasn't listed in the roster last night.

Don't forget the Steve-Martin arrows through the heads of the waitresses, or whatever they were supposed to be.

Well, someone has to get this started, and it might as well be me.

(Did you know that in the computer-geek world it's become a mark of status to be the "first poster" on a particular subject? My beloved thinkgeek.com even sells a "first poster" t-shirt, but that's getting off-topic.)

Here's what I wrote in the "shoes" thread, inspired by the Manolos the women wear briefly in Martins' piece, in case anyone missed it. I'll try to bring myself into going into more excruciating detail later:

If you blinked you missed the shoes. Would that the same could be said about the entire evening, except for the happy surprise of an unannounced visit by Bernadette Peters to sing the final number of Martins' ballet, which made me doubly happy it was finally over.

Aside from the gorgeous dress for Darci Kistler (which made it look as if she actually has a curvy figure), the rest were nice, but not spectacular, except for Yvonne Borree's red-splotched number (what was that around her torso -- surely they weren't wearing corsets on the outside in the thirties?), which was kind of ugly, I thought.

As for the rest, only Wheeldon seemed to have a clue what Rodgers was all about, with his occasionally poignant boy-meets-girl story in Carousel, but he should've bought a few more vowels (at least we now know beyond a shadow of a doubt that a carousel does indeed move in a circle). The kindest thing to say about LaFosse's embarrassment would be a discreet silence (I'll dish the gory details later). The kindest thing to say about Martins' is that, given the elaborate sets it will probably be the last number on the nights its performed, so once again he will have succeeded in his apparent desire to get audiences out of the State Theater as early as possible. Well, at least this audience.

While it is indeed the season for (forgive me) turkeys, that NYCB could spend so much money and deliver such an oven-busting Butterball is beyond contemptible.

Oh, this is a thread about costumes? I'll go start an NYCB opening-night thread, then.

Tutus are among the sexiest articles of clothing ever devised by humanity. The sexiness in ballet is abstracted and refined many, many removes away from people "doing it," or looking as if they're about to do it, or would like to tear off their clothes (or yours) and do it. In ballet it's presented at a higher plane (thank you, Mr. Balanchine!) than in most art forms (some might say displaced to a fetishistic level, but that's another story), but it's certainly there, and the tutu speaks very eloquently of this artistic calculus.

That a fashion designer, of all people -- someone supposedly well-versed in ways of presenting the human body in our cultural milieu -- can be incapable of performing the simple act of reification necessary to see, indeed be dazzled by, the astounding sexiness of a ballerina in a well-made tutu is just beyond belief.

And, dear dirac, that's what's "dreadful" about an erstwhile designer calling a tutu unsexy. I could look out the window at the sky right now and say that it's fuschia, and would it be "wrong" for me to say it (Remember that Peanuts cartoon where Lucy [or was it Linus?] drove Charlie Brown crazy by colors in the sky which only she could see?) Certainly not reproachable as in shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater, but wrong in that it wouldn't say much for my powers of observation and ratiocination.

If you blinked you missed the shoes. Would that the same could be said about the entire evening, except for the happy surprise of an unannounced visit by Bernadette Peters to sing the final number of Martins' ballet, which made me doubly happy it was finally over.

Aside from the gorgeous dress for Darci Kistler (which made it look as if she actually has a curvy figure), the rest were nice, but not spectacular, except for Yvonne Borree's red-splotched number (what was that around her torso -- surely they weren't wearing corsets on the outside in the thirties?), which was kind of ugly, I thought.

As for the rest, only Wheeldon seemed to have a clue what Rodgers was all about, with his occasionally poignant boy-meets-girl story in Carousel, but he should've bought a few more vowels (at least we now know beyond a shadow of a doubt that a carousel does indeed move in a circle). The kindest thing to say about LaFosse's embarrassment would be a discreet silence (I'll dish the gory details later). The kindest thing to say about Martins' is that, given the elaborate sets, it will probably be the last number on the nights its performed, so once again he will have succeeded in his apparent desire to get audiences out of the State Theater as early as possible. Well, at least this audience.

While it is indeed the season for (forgive me) turkeys, that NYCB could spend so much money and deliver such an oven-busting Butterball is beyond contemptible.

Perhaps a performance of The Green Table would have kept him awake.

Doubtless he'd be puzzled by, and condemn, Jooss' depiction of the War Profiteer. After all, he's just trying to help out the economy, right?

I remember being impressed with Ullate as a dancer, but not the Bejart dreck in which he appeared. I seem to recall him as a young newcomer to Paris in Bejart's version of Gaiete Parisienne, where he gets taken under the wing of the kindly older Baron and....

Doesn't this mean he can't be demolished without a court battle?

You can get 4th Ring Soc. tickets for the opening? Dang. I'll have to get my order in right away. There's always standing-room.

For the Nuts, I'm most excited about the Dewdrops. Taylor, Ansanelli, Somogyi. Can't wait.

Although I'm sad not to see Whelan's name anywhere...

While attending to my spring cleaning recently, I contributed to my procrastination by walking down memory lane in a bin filled with old NYCB programs, where I discovered, much to my surprise, that in 1977 I'd seen Jean-Pierre Frohlich dance Apollo. Wish I could remember it.

My mother (who knows little and cares less about ballet) saw peter on television once and remarked "that face belongs on the front of a ship!"

A slow boat to China suggests itself.

Throughout Act III and IV, Nikiya behaved herself as if a psychopathic ex-lover.

Well, she is dead after all. Probably suffering from posthumous-traumatic stress disorder. I'd cut her some slack.

Let's not forget Le Corsaire, with music by, well, too many cooks.

Or Giselle, with added bits by Burgmuller (the Peasant Pas) and Minkus (the Spessivtseva solo in Act 1).

Drigo had a hand in the posthumous orchestration of Swan Lake, didn't he?

I bought tickets just about as soon as they went on sale. I can't wait.

I hope I get to see the glamor-puss Russian Mimi, but I'll be happy with any cast, I'm sure.

Gelsey Kirkland was far from conventional in any respect, and would probabably not be considered a Bournonville stylist, yet her Sylph lives on in my memory as one of the most stunning things I've seen on any stage, anywhere, at any time. I'm fortunate enough to be a short walk away from the Dance Research Collection, where anyone can see the bootleg 28-year-old films of her Sylph, which, though grainy and silent, still attest to that fact.

I'll never forget her breathtaking jetes across the front of the stage during the reel (the audiences would gasp), leaving one with an indelible final image of her flying into the wings while gracing James with an imploring and flirty come-hither glace over her shoulder at the very height of her final jete. I imagine Bournonville would not have approved, and I don't particularly care.

I managed to miss ABT's most-recent go-round with La Sylphide (they programmed it against NYCB's Liebeslieder Walzer -- such cruel choices one must make in this city). I'm not sure any of their current dancers would make a good Sylph (if they ever give it to Reyes I'm bringing a flyswatter to the theater). I suppose Ananiashvili could make it work through her great dramatic skill, although her punchy style is about as far from Bournonville as one could get. Kent might be nice, or might be overly saccharine. I think Ferri would be lovely but I don't think she's got the technique for it anymore (if she ever had it).

Actually, I'm running through ABT's roster of current female principals and soloists, and either groaning or shuddering when imagining them as the Sylph.

(Maybe Kevin could engage Matthew Bourne to make an all-male La Sylphide? God knows ABT has enough guys who can jump!)

I'm not conversant enough with foreign dancers to hazard much of an opinion, but I think Cocaraju might be quite lovely with the right coaching.

Didn't Balanchine live in the Hotel des Artistes?

It's sad that so many of these landmarks are gone -- the old NYCB/SAB/New York School of Ballet studio, the Empire coffee shop, the Ballet Shop. And that's just what I can think of off the top of my head.

It's sad that Ballet Alley is pretty much gone. In a few years nobody in the theater will even be able to afford to live in the Theater District. Well, that's progress.

Didn't Balanchine live in the Hotel des Artistes?

It's sad that so many of these landmarks are gone -- the old NYCB/SAB/New York School of Ballet studio, the Empire coffee shop, the Ballet Shop. And that's just what I can think of off the top of my head.

It's sad that Ballet Alley is pretty much gone. In a few years nobody in the theater will even be able to afford to live in the Theater District. Well, that's progress.

I found all the cool people were drifting away from a.a.b, and I just assumed I'd driven them all away, so I decided to follow them to BA where despite my best efforts, here they remain.

(Actually, there are still cool people on a.a.b; they're just not as loquacious as they used to be.)

I found all the cool people were drifting away from a.a.b, and I just assumed I'd driven them all away, so I decided to follow them to BA where despite my best efforts, here they remain.

(Actually, there are still cool people on a.a.b; they're just not as loquacious as they used to be.)

I, too, thought the Boal solo was wonderful. I'm not sure that it's the best Leigh has ever done for Boal, simply because I thought the previous two solos were also wonderful. Leigh's work usually has a theme which sometimes borders on a conceit. In the pieces we saw, the more successful ones were those in which the movement grew organically from the Idea, less so when the Idea seemed a bit of a bed of Procrustes for the movement.

In this light, I think the Boal solo (oh where, oh where is my program?) was the most successful work. While there were moments when it was quite clear that the Theme was being Demonstrated, I never felt myself thinking "Oh, look, Peter is Teetering on the Edge again!" And I don't think this was entirely, or even mostly due to the fact that Peter Boal could make tying his shoes engrossing, but because Leigh painted his movement pictures with a fine and sensitive brush.

It is always heartening and a joy to see a choreographer working in an expanded classical idiom. And, as mentioned above, even at his most romantic, Leigh's approach is always that of a classicist. And I know classicism in ballet terms means not quite what it does in the general artistic lexicon, but I think both usages are apt here.

More when I figure out what I've done with my program....