Mis-casting in ballet -- do it yourself

[bart]

I was browsing in the invaluable No Fixed Points (Nancy Reynolds) and came across the following example of incredible mis-casting.

Jose Limon's "The Moor's Pavane" with an all-star cast of Rudolf Nureyev, Karen Kain, Paolo Bortoluzzi and Margot Fonteyn.

Anna Kisselgoff described this as "very much like kicking a football on a baseball diamond."

Have you seen -- or can you imagine -- any comparable examples of choosing the wrong people for a wonderful ballet?

P.S. Anyone know the details of the above production? For instance -- who played which roles?

[Leigh Witchel]

Heck, it's a great cast. . .for another ballet.

I don't know for certain, but I'd assume those mentioned were Othello, Emilia, Iago and Desdemona respectively.

[Hans]

Margot Fonteyn in "In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated."

Sylvie Guillem in "Marguerite and Armand." (Yes, I know she's danced it.)

Baryshnikov as Prince Desiré.

Suzanne Farrell as Amor in Petipa's Don Quixote.

Alla Sizova in The Cage.

Makarova in Concerto Barocco.

[sandik]

Heck, it's a great cast. . .for another ballet.

I don't know for certain, but I'd assume those mentioned were Othello, Emilia, Iago and Desdemona respectively.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I saw Nureyev as Othello, in one of those Friends tours (can't remember the rest of the cast, but they were all POB people) He was strangely compelling in it -- so many times when the work is set on a ballet company they substitute balletic virtuosity for the weighted quality that it needs, but this was towards the end of N's performing career and his struggle with technique "read" as the kind of tension that works well in that role.

I saw him in Apollo and in Bejart's Songs of a Wayfarer on the same bill, and they were equally unusual readings of the works, but believable on some level or another.

[bart]

so many times when the work is set on a ballet company they substitute balletic virtuosity for the weighted quality that it needs

A very helpful observation! Thanks.

Hans, your list actually made me laugh out loud -- rather rare for me.

Some others come to mind:

Nijinksy as Prince Desire

Pavlova in Agon

Helpmann in anything by Balanchine

Tallchief in N.Y. Export: Opus Jazz

Bruhn in Spartacus

Ulanova (alternating with Hans's Sizova) in The Cage. Add Darcey Bussell to that.

Kirkland as a trans-gender Rothbart

Verdy in anything by Pina Bausch

Mukhamedov in Sylphides

Ferri in Balanchine's Firebird

Corella in the Grigorovitch Ivan the Terrible

But what about classisc mis-casting that actually took place ????

[atm711]

Tallchief in N.Y. Export: Opus Jazz

In defense of Tallchief---she could have done it :rolleyes:

[bart]

It's wonderful to hear thatl Thanks!

I tend to foget how versitile Tallchief was on the stage of the City Center -- and remember the rather grand (over-grand?) ballet performances on tv a bit later on.

[canbelto]

Mikhail Baryshnikov as Albrecht (yes I know he danced it and words can't describe how miscast he was)

Margot Fonteyn in "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue"

Alina Cojocaru as Myrtha (who would she scare? No one)

Natalia Makarova in Petit's Carmen (and I know she danced that too)

Maya Plisetskaya as Cinderella

Tatiana Terekhova, Wendy Whelan as Giselle

Gillian Murphy as Nikya or Mary Vetsera

Erik Bruhn as Puck in Balanchine's MND or Ashton's "The Dream". Erik Bruhn as Ali the Slave in "Le Corsaire."

Patricia McBride in Agon

Suzanne Farrell in Rubies

Veronika Part as Swanilda or Lise. Svetlana Zakharova, Sylvie Guillem, Darcey Bussell, and Cynthia Gregory in these roles also.

[drb]

Sorry, but I saw nearly every Baryshnikov (with Markarova, Kirkland) Albrecht in NYC and he was very great. Perfect dancing, of course, but also profound intensity, living the character and the relationship. I attended just one poor (for him) performance, the one that was telecast, where he made the wrong decision to act and dance "large" because of the small tube (TV was small in those days). The next matinee (with Gelsey) he started out looking fatigued and not into it, but Gelsey kept pushing (intensely), seducing him back into character in Act 1, and he came around to deliver a memorable performance.

Maya might have pulled off Nureyev's version of Cinders. Especially with him!

Bruhn as Puck!!!

Alina as Myrtha: what a waste when she IS Giselle. But with her ability to inhabit a character, she might pull it off. A lot of people thought she wouldn't work as Manon, but she triumphed.

Suzanne would have been magnificent in Rubies: not the choreography we see, of course, but Balanchine would have remade the role to work for her. He could do nothing else.

[canbelto]

I thought of a few more:

Xiomara Reyes as the Dying Swan or Odette/Odile

Altynai Asylmuratova or Irina Kolpakova as Gamzatti

Herman Cornejo as Apollo

Maria Tallchief as Giselle

Peter Martins as the Spectre, along with Maya Plisetskaya as the Young Girl

[Hans]

One that actually happened: Whelan as Aurora.

[bart]

Peter Martins as the Spectre, along with Maya Plisetskaya as the Young Girl

I'd pay a LOT to see that.

[carbro]

One that actually happened:  Whelan as Aurora.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I can one-up you. Suzanne Farrell -- who was anything but a soubrette -- in the Flower Festival pdd! Opposite Martins, of course. She just couldn't carry off the ingenue's sweet shyness, intrinsic to the choreography.

[Helene]

One that actually happened:  Whelan as Aurora.

I loved Whelan's Aurora during the first year she performed the role in Martins' production. I thought her performance was very clean, direct, and unaffected, and that the core of the choreography shone through. I don't think it was Central Casting, but, nonetheless, I don't think she was miscast.

[canbelto]

How about Maya Plisetskaya, Irina Dvorovenko, Diana Vishneva, and Tatiana Terekhova in Pas de Quatre? What a bloodbath that would be.

[Leigh Witchel]

It's been mentioned before, but here at Miscasting Central we would quite enjoy seeing Symphony in C with Irina Dvorovenko doing all four leading ballerinas. Perhaps at the same time.

Few dancers bring more to a miscasting than Dvorovenko, and I say this with admiration. She's never boring.

[Farrell Fan]

carbro, I beg to differ on Farrell's Flower Festival pdd, which I saw (but I'd differ even if I hadn't seen it.) She could dance anything by any choreographer whose name begins with B.

[canbelto]

carbro, I beg to differ on Farrell's Flower Festival pdd, which I saw (but I'd differ even if I hadn't seen it.) She could dance anything by any choreographer whose name begins with B.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

She couldnt have been more miscast than Maria Tallchief and Rudolf Nureyev in that Bell Telephone Hour performance. I know Tallchief and Nureyev were great friends IRL (as she describes in her autobiography) but talk about a mismatched pairing.

[bart]

Some of the disagreements here suggest that one person's "miscasting" is another person's "hey, I liked that."

Some suggestions are matters of personal taste. Others of rather more obvious incongruity.

One possibility is that most dancers today can do a greater range of roles because they project (or, indeed, have) less of a strong, innate personality than the dancers of (for example) the Ballet Russe generation.

Here are a few more examples of stretching the personality aspect of casting -- if not the technical ability to do steps -- to the limit:

Paloma Herrera as the Glove Seller in Gaite Parisienne.

Gillian Murphy in Petit's version of Carmen.

Julie Kent as Aegina in Spartacus.

Damian Woetzel as Aurora's father.

Vladimir Malakhov as Petruchio in Cranko's Taming of the Shrew.

[Giselle05]

First thing that came to mind was Whelan as Giselle. Or Bouder.

Gillian Murphy in Petit's Carmen is another good one.

[canbelto]

Mikhail Baryshnikov as the Spectre. Shocked at how miscast he was in that Wolf Trap video. With his blond bouffant and huge glassy expressionless eyes, he so did not conjure up any ethereal dreamy images.

[Hans]

I agree with you on that, canbelto. Completely wrong.

Farrell dancing Bournonville...what a thought. I'm sure she could dance the steps, but that's about as far as my imagination will go.

Regarding Whelan as Aurora, I suppose I would say that she was unaffected, but considering how bad Martins's choreography is, I can't say I find that to be a virtue! I found that she lacked characterization--she danced it as if she were doing Agon or Theme and Variations. The steps were there, but she wasn't a princess.

[drb]

"First thing that came to mind was Whelan as Giselle. Or Bouder"

I see Bouder as a dream Giselle. She can surely be innocently girlish early in Act 1 and her Aurora Vision Scene bodes well for the needed depth and spirituality of Act 2. With Asylmuratova as coach...?

But this is academic since Giselle will never be a part of City Ballet. More problematic will be Odette/Odile next weekend. Seeming now as improbable as Aurora was 23 months earlier. If she brings this challenge home, I surely want to be there, especially the second performance, so often a quantum leap for her.

[miliosr]

To digress back to the original post, the production in question was part of a Nureyev&Friends performance at the Kennedy Center in the mid-70s:

Nureyev = Othello/The Moor

Fonteyn = Desdemona/The Moor's Wife

Bortoluzzi = Iago/ The Moor's Friend

Kain = Emilia/The Friend's Wife

Anna Kisselgoff's review of the performance is a real paint-peeler. She more or less describes it as a disgrace (and disrespectful to Limon.) Nureyev comes out the best as Kisselgoff felt he was legitimately trying to honor the technique and steps. Kain does OK in the review but Fonteyn and (particularly) Bortoluzzi take it on the chin. Kisselgoff chastises Fonteyn for not bothering to adequately learn the part and faults her for substituting walking for dancing. She saves her real venom for Bortoluzzi, however. Apparently, he completely distorted the Iago part by adding or subtracting steps to the point that the carefully calibrated balance between the four members of the pavane was destroyed.

[bart]

Many thanks, miliosr, for tracking down the original Kisselgoff review. It seems like the problem is violation of the choreographer's steps as well as his style, something which did not occur to me.

I wonder how often THAT happens !