(photo by Lauren Duque)

I was out of town and unable to attend the recent Dance Times Square showcase, Ballroom Unleashed (my first time having to miss it since I stopped dancing there), but writer D.J. McDonald was kind enough to cover it for me. Because it’s easier (too many problems pasting from Word to Wordpress), I am just going to link to his own blog, where he covered it as well. It’s here.

Next Monday evening, May 11th.

See my earlier post for more info.

Ridiculously, I won’t be able to make it; I’m going out of town and won’t be back yet. But I met a very nice guy, DJ McDonald, in the Facebook Dance Bloggers group and he’s going to cover it for me!

I’m really interested to hear — of course what Pasha and Anya do, and Travis, and Twitch, and Sabra, and Eugene and Maria — but also how audiences like David Parsons’s Caught. I’m sure they’ll go absolutely wild over it. This may be a way to bring modern dance and ballet to a wider audience, integrating it with forms of dance that are more popular and accessible right now, like ballroom! So I’m really glad Tony and Melanie are exposing fans of ballroom and SYTYCD to something like this. Big huge kudos to them! And with Sabra now a part of Cedar Lake, who knows what future collaborations could happen…

Anyway, if anyone else is able to go (Shim?! — or any other fans of ballroom, SYTYCD, or Parsons — or modern dance — expose yourself to ballroom!, and it’s on a Monday night, so is not going to interfere with most other dance performances in the city), please please let me know what you think and I will post your thoughts!

Go here for tickets.

(photo of Murder at the Masque, by Julieta Cervantes from NYTimes)

On Friday night I saw Dances Patrelle, who is celebrating its 20th anniversary, to see their Murder at the Masque: The Casebook of Edgar Allan Poe, a world premiere, and Come Rain / Come Shine, a revival from 1986, both choreographed by artistic director Francis Patrelle. Funny, it’s the first time I’ve ever seen anyone besides Dance Times Square perform at the Danny Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College, so, I was a slight bit confused throughout the evening because of that. I couldn’t figure out what Marcelo was doing on the stage instead of Pasha and what people were doing in pointe shoes instead of Latin stilettos… I guess it’s fitting I brought with me my ballroom friend, Mika.

And I’m so glad I did. She had a blast. Said it was some of the best ballet she’d ever seen. AS I KNEW IT WOULD BE!!! Said Marcelo was very Slavik (as in Kryklyvyy, as in man drama queen total show-off show-stealer, as in I’m totally predictable in my taste in male dancers whether it be ballet, ballroom, or whatever style. Oh well…)

Anyway, Murder, on first, was a dramatic ballet murder mystery that was interestingly told. The figure of Poe seemed to be writing the story as we were seeing it, from afront a scrim, and it seemed to me he was changing things throughout. I’m still not sure who committed the murder in the end (but that may well be because I was so excited about the second piece of the night). It had an air of Balanchine’s La Sonnambula about it — unsettling, foreshadowing tragedy, and set at a ball and in the same period — and Patrick Soluri’s music set that tone perfectly. Matthew Dibble, guest starring with the company (he’s danced with Twyla Tharp’s company), danced the lead very well, expectedly.

(photo of Marcelo and Maria in Come Rain / Come Shine by Jade Young)

Second on was Come Rain / Come Shine, Patrelle’s longish but lovely set of dances for three couples set to a group of Judy Garland songs. Sorry I’ve posted that picture above about 10,000 times on this blog; it’s the only one I have of that dance All six dancers in that ballet were guesting from ABT: Roman Zhurbin (ballet god) and Gemma Bond danced the first, youngish, romantic couple; Isaac Stappas and Kristi Boone (who BLEW ME AWAY) danced the second, more mature, argumentative couple; and Marcelo Gomes and Maria Riccetto danced the third couple, consisting of cocky, taunting, teasing, out-of-control man and the poor woman whom he’s got his eyes on. Of course Marcelo had to have the cocky part, and his role, which was very “That’s Life” from Tharp’s Sinatra Songs, consisted of him flying all about and around her, doing every trick in the book — ginormous jetes, Balanchinian continuous twisty jumps, turns and turns and jumps jumps jumps galore — which of course I love Oh, and Maria’s tiny, so he did a bunch of the one-handed assisted pirouettes he often does with Julie Kent that drove the audience here WILD. The guy behind me was seriously orgasmic. Mika and I were giggling throughout, and finally, on the last assisted pirouette, I just burst out laughing.

What would the world be like with no Marcelos? Ballet would just not be fun. To say the least.

Roman was Roman — not doing a thing wrong, everything perfect, perfect form, perfect precision, perfect acting, just sheer perfection.

Gemma was likewise perfect and Isaac was strong and Maria sweet.

(headshot of Kristi Boone from ABT website)

But it was Kristi who really blew me away. Where did she come from?! I guess I’ve never really seen her up close before … well, I did notice her before — in Tudor’s Jardin des Lilacs, which ABT put on in their Tudor centennial celebration last season — she danced the role of the lover of the man betrothed to another and she danced with such longing for him and anger at the situation and beautiful composure in the face of despair. But time got away from me and I never had time to write about that performance… Well, she had a similar character here: a woman fighting with her man, seemingly not able to fully trust him, not wanting to give herself completely to him for that reason, but unable to stop loving him nonetheless. She and Isaac (who happen to be real-life husband and wife) are really the emotional centerpiece of this ballet and she acted it with such intense emotion. She made me feel everything her character was feeling, really took me to that place. And she made such amazing shapes with her body! Isaac kept throwing her into these overhead and waist-high fish positions and she’d raise her arms up and curve them over, turning her head to face the floor. At times it looked like she was letting him lift her but was also rejecting him, couldn’t bear to look at him. At other times, she kind of looked like a dove, and in a way she was trying to make peace, so the image made sense. So she didn’t just make original, remarkable shapes; she made shapes that had meaning, and were also original and cool.

And also, her feet and legs — such strength! Her feet were almost like Veronika Part’s her points were so pronounced!  If I was a ballerina I’d want people to notice that — strong feet and legs. I wouldn’t want to look like I was floating through the air like a feather, I’d want to look more strong and toned and powerful, like my legs were carrying me through the world. Anyway, I am a new Kristi Boone fan, needless to say.

It was an intoxicatingly rich evening and I felt like I always feel when I leave the Kaye Playhouse after seeing divine dancing: deliriously high, and then kind of sad…

…For their May 11th “ballroom” showcase at the Danny Kaye Playhouse. I put ballroom in parenthesis because, though the studio specializes in Latin / Ballroom instruction (and is the studio where I took lessons with Pasha), it seems that they are really expanding, at least for their biannual showcases, which used to be student-oriented and are increasingly centering on pro performances — and pros of all kinds, not just ballroom.

The May 11th show will feature, in addition to Pasha and Anya (!); David Parsons Dance Company performing Caught (regular readers of this blog know how I feel about that dance ); Sabra Johnson, Travis Wall and Twitch from So You Think You Can Dance; the Mark Stuart Eckstein Dance Company (which I don’t know of); choreographer Tricia Brouke’s OtherShore; opera star Aprile Millo; and for ballroom, the EXCELLENT Eugene Katsevman and Maria Manusova, top American Smooth contenders J.T. Thomas and Tomas Mielnicki, and (the very good, very sexy) former Latin junior champs Manuel Favilla and Karolina Paliwoda.

Expected guest attendees include Baryshnikov (!), Desmond Richardson (!), Edie Falco, Susan Sarandon, Cynthia Nixon, Mickey Rourke, Barbara Walters, Antonio Banderas, Harvey Keitel, John Turturro, and more — including judges and choreographers from SYTYCD (which DTS studio owners Tony Meredith and Melanie LaPatin choreograph for as well).

I’m happily stunned that my ballroom studio has become kind of this major outlet for popular concert dance in the city!

There’s also an after-party at the studio, as well as a pre-show reception at the Danny Kaye Playhouse for Angel on a Leash, which the program is benefitting. Angel on a Leash sponsors rehabilitative dogs (for people with seeing, hearing disabilities, etc.)  Go here for more info.

From April 16-19, the favorite will be performing with Maria Riccetto at the Danny Kaye Playhouse on the Upper East-Side. They, along with four other ABT dancers, will be dancing Francis Patrelle’s Come Rain/Come Shine, in celebration of the 20th anniversary of Dances Patrelle.

Go here for more info. And don’t worry, I’ll be posting muchos reminders as the time approaches

Because I can’t resist, here’s Marcelo’s new headshot again in color:

Both photos copyright of Jade Young; courtesy of Jade Young and Scott Schlexer.