On Pointe

Nothing I've read about Johnsey indicates that he suffers from gender dysphoria,  or that he desires to transition.  He simply wants to perform onstage in women's roles.  In that regard,  he is similar to Alex Newell,  a male singer who often presents himself onstage as a woman.  (He is currently performing a lead female role in the Broadway revival of Once On This Island.)  Years ago,  the late Robert Blankshine  performed with the Radio City Ballet Company,  dancing on pointe in a tutu.  With his slim torso,  strong turnout and fantastic feet,  Blankshine  had a far better "female" presentation than Johnsey.  (Even so,  there was something of the Uncanny Valley about him as a ballerina.  It didn't help that despite the high standard of his dancing,  the women in the corps visibly rolled their eyes and snickered in contempt.)   

Does anyone honestly believe that Tamara Rojo would hire a thirty-two year old female dancer with Johnsey's body,  legs and feet?   If Johnsey wants to perform as a woman,  he should be judged by the same criteria that actual women are judged by.  "Gender fluidity" is the flavor of the moment.  But as someone commented in the NY Times,  the bottom line is this - a job that should have gone to a woman went to a less-qualified man.  But it does make for good trendy publicity for ENB and Rojo,  who could use a little deflection about now.

6 hours ago, Vs1 said:

Except everyone here says sue for age and sexual harassment, go to the union, be fair employers, etc..... So you agree no one can achieve fairness or justice, or should not try to, or don't rock the boat, or the rich and powerful should make an example out of a peasant, or do you think one should seek to stand up and be fair and just?

I don't agree with any of that.  If you are abused,  harassed or mistreated in any way by a supervisor or colleague,  you should document the instances and take every step to seek justice.   But anonymous claims of improper behavior,  without specific names or dates,  should not trigger an investigation.  There was tons of contemporaneous evidence against Weinstein,  Lauer,  Dutoit,  Rose,  Spacey and others.  Martins is definitely not a perfect person,  but the case against him reeked of sour grapes and score settling.

Is there anything to be learned from this?  Besides the obvious - launching and publicizing an investigation against a person in a position of power,  based upon an anonymous accusation,  is probably not a good idea.  Peter Martins is not really exonerated,  as his past bad behavior has been brought to public attention once again.  Darci Kistler has been humiliated through no fault of her own,  while having to deal with her daughter's serious substance abuse problem.  Dancers who were secure in their career arcs have to start over with "the devil they don't know".  And the NYCB board has the unenviable task of finding a new AD who won't be run out of the city on a rail by the critics and the fans.  As the current tenant in the White House would put it - sad.

I never really "got" Tharp's choreography for ballet companies.  It seemed to me that she was making fun of ballet and didn't respect its conventions,  for instance her tendency to have a fantastic turner like Baryshnikov deliberately fall out of pirouettes.  But like Madonna,  the woman is a marketing and organizational genius.  I especially admire how she paid her company year round in the days when NYCB and ABT dancers were subject to long layoffs every year.  Whoever takes over for Martins would be wise to consult Tharp,  if she would allow it.

13 hours ago, Drew said:

I thought Wolftrap was just anorexia--she talks about being introduced to cocaine later no??...Anway, I find the Wolftrap Coppelia pas de deux rather charming despite her thinness though I saw her dance Swanilda in the full length Coppelia more brilliantly in the theater both with Baryshnikov (just after she joined ABT) and more exquisitely, so to speak, later in her career with Charles Ward. I remember the former as one of the best ballet performances I ever attended--Clive Barnes wrote about it, at the time, as one of those special nights at the ballet when everything comes together; the two of them were sparking off of each other on stage in an absolutely fantastic way. And in the latter Coppelia, Ward and she just looked wonderful together in a different way (he was quite tall, fair, and--I thought--very good looking). Along with Mcbride, Kirkland was my favorite Swanilda of that era -- in the 21st century I must admit I took a huge shine to Osipova in the Bolshoi Vikharev production. But yes...publicly available video is not the place to find out much about Kirkland's dancing other than hints. Unfortunately, I haven't seen the materials available at NY Public library.

Okay...so all this now just has nothing to do with Peter Martins and sexual harassment. I guess I'm "sorry-not-sorry" I got so carried away when her name first came up. My memories of Kirkland at her best are just wonderful treasures, so I can't always help myself  -- especially since I know a lot of younger people reading these threads never saw her dance. (And over time I have tried to deal philosophically with the complexities and disappointments of her career.) At any rate, her writing did prefigure a little of NYCB's #metoo moment and was, as best I remember, dismissed by many in the ballet world who found it unacceptable to write about Balanchine and NYCB the way she did.

Thanks for the shout out to Charles Ward.  I worked with him,  and besides being a very handsome tall partner,  and very talented dancer in solos,  he was an immensely kind and humble human being.  Definitely one of the good guys.

4 hours ago, California said:

I am old enough that I saw Kirkland numerous times from October 1975 (when I saw her do Giselle with Baryshnikov at the Kennedy Center) until about 1985, when I left the east coast. This was the height of the ballet "boom" and many of us in that era trooped all over DC and New York and points in between to see as much of them as possible. One thing so special about both of them (together or separately) was that you were constantly surprised with something you couldn't believe humans could do -- technique, interpretation, expression. I also felt, especially with Kirkland, that if she had a bag over her head, I'd immediately recognize her distinctive style anyway.

There are quite a few tapes of her (often without sound) at the NYPL Dance Collection that are worth seeing, including her work in Baryshnikov's Don Q when it premiered at the Kennedy Center in 1978, her Giselle with Baryshnikov, etc. Her academy's web site has some nice clips, too. But I agree that it's enormously frustrating that so little of her remains on tape (certainly compared to the historic record of Royal Ballet, Russians, etc.)

It's unfortunate that in many of her recorded performances,  Kirkland does not look healthy.  She is thin and underpowered in the Don Quixote pas de deux with Baryshnikov,  which is otherwise well filmed.  In the Nutcracker she is additionally burdened with a horribly unsuitable costume,  a narrow nightgown that obscures her line.

But I know of young students who watch her  T and V obsessively,  so there is a younger generation familiar with her work,  but blessedly,  not her troubles.  They don't impress kids who watch reality television and tabloid TV anyway.  What was shocking in the 70s and 80s is small potatoes today.

40 minutes ago, Drew said:

I don't remember every page, though I can say I wasn't comfortable with all that detail about sexual relationships myself (which she did apologize for--that is apologized to Martins and Baryshnikov in an interview in Dance Magazine at least).  But as far as the rest goes, perhaps it's worth noting that Kirkland's second memoir The Shape of Love, published not too long after Dancing on My Grave, describes any number of people and experiences in glowing, positive terms. I remember her as especially eloquent about Anthony Dowell.

I don't imagine she would write either book the same way now, but as long as we are in the #metoo moment, her candor in an earlier era seems to me something valuable and worth remembering. Unless one believes she was SIMPLY delusional and, like you, I don't.

Anyway, I was responding to what I thought was a report of Heather Watts taking a (humanly very understandable) dig at Kirkland, and in that context brought up Kirkland's candor about things that at least a few people seem to want to be candid about now...even if they didn't at the time she published or for some years after.

Oh ... plus what a great ballerina!

To be clear,  in the interview I attended,  Heather Watts had nothing but good things to say about Kirkland's dancing,  which struck me as very generous at the time.  She didn't have to say anything.   But she did seem to feel that Kirkland was unappreciative of the opportunities she had been given,  that she wasn't very nice,  and that if she disliked Balanchine and NYCB so much,  she should just go perform Giselle for the rest of her career.  She did not go into their personal beef.

I remember the book as a juicy read,  with all kinds of people who had zero interest in ballet buying it for the sexy parts.  At that time,  lots of people thought of female ballet dancers as almost nun-like,  and assumed that all male dancers were gay.  That dancers were just as prone to messy love affairs as anyone else was a revelation.  I don't recall anyone I knew in the dance world being particularly outraged by it.  

1 hour ago, Helene said:

Not at all true:  Tonya Harding was barred from any US Figure Skating Association activities as a skater or coach.  She was not legally barred from skating on cruise ships, skating in shows -- Stars on Ice, for example -- or competing in non USFS (then USFSA) activities.  She obviously couldn't skate at ISU competitions or the Olympics, since USFS controls the qualifying gate.  

In Harding's case, it was also like Farrell and Mejia not being able to get work after leaving NYCB:  companies that relied upon Balanchine's approval and good-will wouldn't touch them.  Harding was shunned and couldn't get work elsewhere, both by organizers and by pressure from fellow skaters for work for which she was qualified and eligible.

I should have written that Harding was banned from any figure skating that mattered, to be more accurate.  Unable to skate for a living,  she became a boxer and raced cars.

37 minutes ago, Helene said:

I think being ostracized and vilified by former NYCB colleagues is quite the backlash.  The definition isn't limited to employment to be backlash.  Though given the wide network of Balanchine affiliates -- in the US, the only two medium to major companies that weren't were run/staffed by former Balanchine people were ABT and Houston -- and she went to Europe to dance after ABT. 

Tonya Harding got interviews, too.

Tonya Harding was legally barred from any activity having to do with figure skating,  for life.   That to my mind is a backlash with teeth,  and while some people think it was excessive,  many figure skaters have been quite vocal about their disdain for her to this day.    People didn't like what Kirkland said,  but she wasn't arrested for it,  and no court ruled that she couldn't ever dance or teach or coach ballet because she ruffled some feathers.  I don't think she was ever sued civilly either.  There's a whole generation of dancers who are not even aware of what happened with Kirkland,  and likely wouldn't care much if they did know.   (By the way I,  Tonya is a great film.)

1 hour ago, Helene said:

Kirkland wrote very negatively about Watts in "Dancing on My Grave," but I thought Martins came across the worst -- all talk, no action -- in that account, although I didn't think that was Kirkland's intention.  

I was always impressed by Kirkland's candor in that book, and the reaction to the ballet world to it is a textbook definition of backlash.  Villella was the only one I read to defend her in any way at the time, and that was more in a "We should be kind to our broken child, not ostracize her" kind of way.  

Is disagreement,  even vehement disagreement,  a "backlash",  or just a difference in opinion?  To me a backlash has to have some teeth in it to meet the definition.  Someone speaking out against an accuser may just be defending themselves.  Kirkland was not fired or barred from the stage because of her book that I am aware of.  (Although she may have lost engagements because of her admitted drug use.  It would be a major liability to a company to put a known cocaine addict on stage.)  She got a 60 Minutes interview and lots of sympathetic articles written about her as I recall.  But no doubt she burned some bridges.

19 minutes ago, BalanchineFan said:

 

AGMA  stands for the American Guild of Musical Artists. I haven’t reread Flack’s letter with regard to this comment, but perhaps that clears something up.

AGMA is the union for musical artists,  like opera and concert singers.  They have also represented ballet dancers for decades.   Musicians are represented by the American Federation of Musicians.

5 minutes ago, Drew said:

I infer "choice" means negative...so I can't help but mention that Kirkland is in my pantheon of all time great ballerinas. She was also one of the few (only?) ballet dancers in her day to speak with some candor about issues in the ballet world in general and New York City Ballet in particular that were not often, in my experience, spoken of with candor publicly.  I can't speak about what Kirkland or Watts was like to work with when they were younger (both have generated their share of negative stories including stories they tell 'against' themselves) and I don't doubt Kirkland brought her own problems to the ballet world--problems about which she has also spoken--but looking back at Kirkland's willingness to speak out about her experiences at New York City Ballet  and the criticism, not to say ostracism, she faced for that--my admiration for her tends to grow.

Watts was portrayed quite negatively in Kirkland's book,  on a personal level.  At the interview,  Watts was actually very complimentary about Kirkland as a dancer.  But besides being ballerinas,  these were two young women who were sexually involved with the same man.  The "ballet world" was just the backdrop.  Some of the greatest artists in history,  some of the greatest writers and scientists,  have gotten into feuds and squabbles that are clashes of personality,  not reflections on their work,  for example Mary McCarthy and Lillian Hellman.  It's just human nature.

42 minutes ago, Drew said:

I am far from caught up on all the interviews and biographies about SAB and NYCB and had never heard or read this story--do you remember its source? Is this a story Watts told in the rest of the live interview you mentioned or has told elsewhere? Or have others told it? 

Sorry,  I don't remember where I first heard the story.  But Watts was very open and entertaining in that interview.  She talked about the dilemma she and other students were in as to whether they should go to class or demonstrate against the war,  and she indicated that Erik Bruhn,  whom she knew primarily as a friend of Martins,   had a crush on her.  She also had a few dignified,  but choice words about Gelsey Kirkland.

19 minutes ago, abatt said:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/07/arts/television/louis-ck-fx-investigation.html

 

FX recently released information regarding its investigation into the workplace conduct of Louis C.K. The investigation revealed that there was no evidence of workplace misconduct by Louis C.K.

Let's hope that NYCB, which receives some public funding, will exercise the same level of transparency upon its completion into the investigation of Peter Martins' workplace conduct.

That's just nonsense.  I've heard about Louis CK's little masturbation habit for years.  It was no secret.  However he did it in his hotel room,  not at the FX studio,  so maybe he got off on a technicality  (no pun intended!).  He even admitted that he had "problem".  I don't get it.

1 hour ago, KayDenmark said:

 

On another topic, I find it absurd that anyone could make Heather Watts out to be the trembling, demure victim of the towering strongman Peter Martins. Watts was (and is) a strong, loud personality who can give as good as she gets, which is probably why she hasn't been interested in jumping into the discussion about Martins' misdeeds. If we're going to discuss what Martins did to Watts, we need to discuss what Watts did to Martins too. 

 

Watts exasperated the administrators at SAB with her wild ways,  like the time she marched around the studio naked,  which Balanchine loved,  as to him it indicated a tempestuous artistic spirit.  Many years ago,  I attended a live interview with Watts where she said she was threatened with expulsion many times,  and that the school would sometimes call Balanchine himself to deal with her.  

4 hours ago, McJagger said:

 

4 hours ago, McJagger said:

 

4 hours ago, McJagger said:

Has Frankfurt's video interview in Salon been discussed?

https://www.salon.com/2018/01/08/peter-martins-sexual-misconduct-wilhelmina-frankfurt/

Frankfurt makes claims that should be verifiable,  or challenged,  and which raise questions of their own.  She says that Martins'  girlfriend  (presumably Watts) was constantly covered with bruises because of his beatings.  Surely if she saw them,  plenty of other people did, too.  They would be hard to hide in a ballet setting.   Frankfurt  also says that during a performance,  apparently of Stars and Stripes,  Martins pulled her into his dressing room and exposed himself to her,  and that she slipped away because she had to do the finale.  She says that at a party at Martins' house,  her (Frankfurt's) father was so outraged at Martins for beating his girlfriend,  he punched him and knocked him out,  leaving him sprawled on the ground outside.  She also alludes to some incident that was so terrible,  she couldn't bring herself to describe it.

Pretty explosive stuff.  One has to wonder,  if Watts was getting beaten up on the regular,  why didn't any teacher at SAB,  any ballet master,  or Frankfurt herself call or even send an anonymous letter to her parents to let them know how their daughter was being brutalized?  If anyone did,  and they took no action,  shame on them.

Are the dressing rooms at the (then)  State Theater so close to the stage that a dancer who should be waiting in the wings for her next entrance could be pulled into one?  Maybe they are.  Male dancers are so "exposed" in their everyday attire flashing someone almost seems superfluous.

Getting knocked out is a serious neurological event.  Did anyone take Martins to the hospital or otherwise tend to him?  Hard to believe that no one else saw or noticed this.  Someone should ask the others who were at that party.

Frankfurt seemed nervous,  which is understandable,  even though the interviewer is her son's fiancée and presumably not intimidating to her.  She makes a couple of mistakes,  like calling Balanchine the "greatest living choreographer",  and referring to AGMA as a musicians' union.  To me her general affect was a bit odd,  but maybe she's like that all the time.  

16 minutes ago, nanushka said:

I believe this is a misunderstanding of the term sexual harassment.

I may be wrong, but I believe that if I, as a supervisor, pressure a subordinate to marry me and professionally punish his/her later spouse (also an employee) for her refusal, and if none of those facts is in dispute, then I am legally guilty of sexual harassment — and the employee, his/her later spouse, and all of my other subordinates (because my actions have communicated to them that, if they do not submit to my potential future sexual advances, they will in some way be professionally punished) are all victims of that offense.

Whether Balanchine punished Mejia by not casting him is in dispute,  if you believe that an AD has the right to make those decisions.  No doubt,  the optics are not good.

27 minutes ago, Helene said:

It's your right to be as anti-trans as you want.  That is even became an issue on Ballet Alert! in this context is a diversion.

Our policy is that racist, sexist, and discriminatory language will not be tolerated, and that includes buzzwords or phrases. 

We also have policies against discussing the discussion, and this is not the place to voice approval or disapproval of each other.  

It was not my intent to derail the discussion.  In Parliamentary terms,  I rose to a point of personal privilege.  My apologies.

1 hour ago, aurora said:

McCallum is a rapist but that is no excuse for mis-gendering her 4x in one short passage. That is a move straight from anti-trans right wing playbooks.

I am not right wing,  but I am anti-trans and I make no apologies for it.  I will not refer to a man as "she" just because he wears a dress and pearls.  Your mileage may vary.  I don't care.

57 minutes ago, aurora said:

You must be speaking of Dana McCallum in 2014. She was no longer employed at Twitter following her case. Dropping in obliquely referenced (and incorrect) evidence of other people's horrible behavior doesn't invalidate the fact that most employers would have acted on the allegations against Martins long ago (if not by firing, then at least in some way).

Flack did not say they don't have the same right to speak their truth as the accusers. You are once again twisting her words. Robbie Fairchild managed to both speak his and express compassion. Something that is sorely lacking in this thread.

It took several months after McCallum's bail was set at $350,000 for him to leave Twitter.  He had multiple issues,  including alcohol abuse,  that could have impacted his leaving.  Considering the nature of the charges,  one would think that dismissal would have been swift,  but it wasn't,  if it ever took place at all.  He may have quit on his own.

I was writing in response to Helene's post,  where she suggested that she believed that Martins' supporters should not speak up.  If I have mischaracterized her post,  I'm sure she can speak for herself.

37 minutes ago, Helene said:

Again, what she wrote is that even if the dancers didn't believe the dancers who came forward -- and Dronova was one of them -- the DUI arrests and arrest for hitting Kistler -- something she never denied: she made excuses for how stressed he was, and declined to file charges to work on their marriage -- would be enough for someone to lose their job in the outside world.

She doesn't have to give her own account to write that she supports what her fellow dancers have claimed, and to ask current dancers not to discount them.

 

At no time have the dancers who support Martins discounted or disparaged anyone else's account of their experiences with him.  They have simply espressed that their experiences were good.  Are you suggesting,  as Flack is,  that they don't have the same right to "speak their truth" as the accusers?

Silicon Valley is the "outside world" and a staggering number of executives there charged with sexual abuse have kept their jobs,  including a transgender engineer who beat and raped his estranged wife while claiming to be a feminist and advocate for womens' rights.  This,  along with the rampant sexual harassment  the STEM field is notorious for,  doesn't excuse Martins' actions one bit.  But he isn't the first exec to get a pass for his actions and he's hardly the worst.

57 minutes ago, nanushka said:

For a supervisor to professionally punish the husband of a woman that supervisor has unsuccessfully attempted to initiate a sexual or romantic relationship with absolutely falls within the most common (and legal) definitions of sexual harassment, as one would learn in any basic workplace training on such matters.

(Note that I'm making a point about the definition, not about Balanchine.)

If you don't get a position,  promotion,  role that you wanted,  is that professional punishment?  Supervisors use their discretion to make business decisions,  especially in the arts.  Married couples working in the same company can be walking a minefield.  There are several prominent media couples who had to split up professionally when they married,  as per their companies' policies.  (That would really be hard on ballet dancers as there are not nearly as many positions for dancers as for news reporters.)

There are at least two sides to every ballet story.  One of my teachers was a soloist at NYCB during the Farrell years,  and I heard first hand how many company members resented Farrell's power and influence over Balanchine.  His favoritism was blatant.   She could have had any role she wanted,  but she overplayed her hand when she made a demand on her husband's behalf.

14 minutes ago, aurora said:

She has just as much right to as anyone else has to state their opinion.

Why are you entitled to a view and she is not?

Flack,  and those of us who post here,  are all entitled to our opinions.  But she's the one who has been given the platform of an open letter in Dance Magazine.  She's the one publicly telling other dancers that their feelings don't matter.  Would you feel the same if she had come out against Martins' accusers?