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Stella Abrera retires from ABT in June, 2020


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ABT released this 24 minute tribute to Stella today, acknowledging her 24 years in the company (I guess the 24 min mark was intentional) and cancelled farewell performance at the Met in 2020.

I found it so sad. It features interviews with her, her husband Sascha and McKenzie (but, why no other interviews?? Gillian? Irina? other company members?). I had read an interview with her where she seemed to have made peace with her farewell having been cancelled (and her Giselle in DC actually being her last Giselle), but here she is definitely regretful, sad, melancholy and definitely not at peace with it. Not that I fault her for having had those feelings, and still having those feelings. For such a beloved and extremely classy artist, it's incredibly unfair (esp considering her career trajectory and how long she remained stuck in soloist purgatory...) for her to not get a final performance. It's just interesting how that print article (I can't remember which publication) and this video gave me anyway, two conflicting impressions. The editing for either/both could be to blame as well.

Regardless, this video absolutely hit me in the feels, as the kids say these days, and fills me with longing once again to see the farewell performance that we'll never get. 🥲

 

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I wish they could find a way for Stella to join one performance, perhaps in a non-dancing role, so she could have a retirement ending -- flowers, cheers, former partners. How hard would that be to organize with all the ballets they are doing with Queens and elders?  And judging from Instagram, she's certainly in shape to move well in a character role.

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I don't think they would have have bothered to produce this tribute video if they had an in-person retirement planned for her. But I'd relish any opportunity to see her even in a character role. She has such an incredibly expressive face and upper body. 

I don't expect much from ABT's video productions, but they could have bothered to have more than two talking heads in this tribute video. It would have added so much energy and interest to have more interviewees. They also flipped the chronological order of her first Giselle and her promotion to principal. I don't think the narrative would have suffered from telling it in the order it happened. The looping Giselle music became pretty ridiculous after a while.

 

Edited by fondoffouettes
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4 minutes ago, fondoffouettes said:

I don't think they would have have bothered to produce this tribute video if they had an in-person retirement planned for her. But I'd relish any opportunity to see her even in a character role. She has such an incredibly expressive face and upper body. 

I don't expect much from ABT's video productions, but they could have bothered to have more than two talking heads in this tribute video. It would have added so much energy and interest to have more interviewees. They also flipped the chronological order of her first Giselle and her promotion to principal. I don't think the narrative would have suffered from telling it in the order it happened. The looping Giselle music was pretty ridiculous after a while.

 

Are they considering her and Sascha for the AD position? Just wondering.

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