Designer? Character? Ballet? Intended dancer?

[rg]

this is a scan of B&W publicity photo of a designer's sketch for the premiere of a ballet still in active repertory.

Can you name:

the character?

the ballet?

the designer?

the dancer for whom the costume was designed?

(the choreographer, the company, the premiere date will fall into place accordingly if the above information is correct.)

[Paul Parish]

My first guess was "Lady into Fox"

but it's not in active rep.

COuld it be for 7 Deadly SIns, for Allegra Kent as Anna/Anna?

Or maybe "slaughter on whatever street," for Zorina as the strip-tease dancer?

Inrtriguing, RG.

this is a scan of B&W publicity photo of a designer's sketch for the premiere of a ballet still in active repertory.

Can you name:

the character?

the ballet?

the designer?

the dancer for whom the costume was designed?

(the choreographer, the company, the premiere date will fall into place accordingly if the above information is correct.)

[atm711]

My first reaction was 'Judgment of Paris'---those fishnet stockings cast a low blow to the rest of the otherwise elegant outfit; which Tudor would have appreciated.

[Mme. Hermine]

hugh laing?

but it looks longer than those costumes were.

lucia chase?

minerva?

going out on a limb here:

1938

charlotte bidmead?????????????????????

shots in the dark!

[rg]

in this case i'll let the guesses keep coming but one of the above nearly has it.

[Mme. Hermine]

agnes demille/venus?

[Dale]

I vote for Tudor's Judgment of Paris.

[rg]

i'll soon post the data that comes w/ this still, but i will readily admit that i didn't know what all to make of this photo myself when i first saw it.

more by day's end.

[Dale]

Now that I've looked at the sketch again, it looks like is was drawn by Karinska.

[carbro]

My first guess was Gala Performance -- maybe the Russian Ballerina?

I don't know, though, whether GP remains in "active" rep.

You'd think that such a flowery, ribbony bustle would have made a strong impression, but I don't recognize it.

[rg]

before posting the data i have on this illus. as an aside i can relate what i learned from Edward Bigelow, long a close friend of Karinska's, that Mme K rarely did sketches, and when she did them they came after the fact, which i assume meant that when her costumes were built and on stage she might do a drawing of some sort to note what she did. (i think the few illustrations we have of her costumes for THE NUTCRACKER for ex. were all made after the production was built and up and running on stage.)

more soon...

[Dale]

Not to get too off track, but there is a sketch on the cover of the Karinska book. It is in that style this one looked like. Did she not do that sketch?

Another guess. Orpheus in the Underworld? I'm not sure if the costumes we see on the stage now are the same ones the ballet debuted with.

[rg]

more 'on topic' soon but as i understand it, the Karinska book cover does reproduce a sketch by Mme K of her headpiece for Bourree Fantasque, but as i also understand it, it was done by her after her designs were executed b/c someone asked for a sketch of it, etc.

or so my not necessarily reliable mem. tells me Bigelow once suggested.

[Juliet]

My guess was originally Minerva, but as an original design, not the one used now.....which is much, much shorter and less complicated. I think this one is fabulous!!!!!!!!

Offenbach is the second guess, but this one isn't in the current production.........

[rg]

here's a scan of the once stuck-on-the-back-of-the-press-photo identification from NYCB's p.r. office headed by Virginia Donaldson.

so Paul was on the right track, tho' it wasn't for Zorina that Sharaff's design was destined, but for Suzanne Farrell.

i didn't see the first years of this ballet, but my sense is that the Stripper's costume got shortened and otherwise altered when it was built for the stage. Certainly the palette for the costume was changed to a lighter color and the sash seems to have been discarded and, while the Stripper's hair (as seen in a Fehl photo in Repertory and Review) was down originally, eventually it was slicked back and done with loose, shiny curls.

[Juliet]

I think that the current costumes for the other 'girls' are very much in this vein, although shorter. They are among my favourites......I can see how this original design would have been lovely, but the costume that evolved, as so many designs do, was much more effective for Farrell and the choreography.

Thanks for sharing this, rg--

[Mme. Hermine]

that's marvelous, rg, thanks!!!!

[bart]

Setting aside the stockings, the look, hair included, is really rather sweet. I wonder what it looked llike from the front?