Daniil Simkin and cast in Benjamin Millepied’s Everything Doesn’t Happen at Once in Gene Schiavone photo, courtesy of ABT; all photos by Gene Schiavone (except for Arron Scott headshot below and bottom picture).

Just to let people know, as the photos shows above, the guy who was flinging himself into the group lifts in the first cast of the Millepied was Daniil Simkin; in the second cast it was Arron Scott (below). The program notes only gave a special mention to the two dancers doing the pas de deux and a lot of people were asking who the main soloist was.

Anyway, here are a few more reviews:

Here is James Wolcott on opening night gala (and our fab Shun Lee dinner afterward ), here is Apollinaire Scherr’s FT review; and here are more of Apollinaire’s thoughts on her blog, Foot in Mouth. I’m surprised there aren’t more reviews — this was a pretty big season, with three world premieres — but that’s all I can find at the moment. (Update: Robert Greskovic’s WSJ review just went up; thanks to Meg for letting me know.)

Re the Wolcott write-up: I forgot to mention the models — Iman and Veronica Webb, who, instead of A.D. Kevin McKenzie, thanked the gala sponsors and introduced the program — screwing up Benjamin Millepied’s name. It wouldn’t have been such a big deal if they wouldn’t have been so giggly over it. It seemed like they were reading their notes for the first time and were really unprepared. I really don’t know how to pronounce his name either — I’ve always said the last two syllables to rhyme with plie (without the “l”) but have been told that’s wrong. But damn did ABT get a lot of press for signing them on. Just Google “ABT Fall 2009 Season” and it’s all about Iman.

(Gillian Murphy, Cory Stearns and Eric Tamm in Aszure Barton’s One of Three)

Anyway, I saw four of the six programs, saw the Ratmansky and the Millepied ballets four times and the Barton three, and they each grew on me the more I saw them. The Saturday matinee was my last performance and I found it by far the best. I felt like the dancers were finally comfortable with the new dances, knew what they were all about, and really made them meaningful. I described the ballets here.

Oh and regarding SanderO’s comment on that earlier post: yes, I do need to see the story in the dance. The dancer and choreographer won’t pull me in at all if they don’t each tell me some sort of story. That doesn’t mean the ballet has to be a traditional full-length dramatic novel or something with a clearly defined beginning, middle, and end, inciting incident, rising action with crises 1,2, and 3, climax and resolution, etc etc. but there needs to be some kind of story; there needs to be some intention in the abstraction. A lot of critics use the word “evocative” — a dance needs to be evocative of something, and I just mean the same thing. If there isn’t something meaningful going on, there’s no reason for me to see it. I can appreciate the neat geometric patterns and pretty images, but that’s not enough to make me go.

Anyway, I saw more in Millepied’s Everything Doesn’t Happen at Once on further viewings. At first I thought it was kind of everything but the kitchen sink the way Apollinaire kind of describes, but after several viewings I saw more of an evolutionary, battle of the sexes theme throughout, which becomes a more literal battle by the end. The piece starts with the stage looking swimming-pool like with the dancers making broad strokes with their arms. The stage gets over-crowded and eventually someone in charge — looking rather conductor-like, kind of throws his arms up and dismisses everyone.

Then, there’s a pas de trois (two men one woman), which becomes a double pas de trois (same), which turns into the central pas de deux (man-woman). Throughout there seems to be struggle going on — in the pas de trois the men kind of manipulate the woman around, until she’s practically on her side. In the central pas de deux is in places tender, in places more angsty as if the girl is trying to get away from the guy or fight him in some way, and he is struggling to hang onto her.

By the end, the scene has evolved into a kind of battlefield with marching music and the ballerinas doing those Balanchinian marches en pointe. Except they’re more unsettling than cutesy, like in Balanchine. This is the part where Daniil / Arron gets tossed into the crowd, throws himself with wild abandon at the groups of men, who catch him mid-split, then gets caught up with a bunch of grabbing girls.

Interestingly, the audience laughed when this role was danced by Simkin — I think because he is small and a bit long-haired and it kind of looked like he was afraid he’d be taken for one of them and was trying like hell to assert his masculinity. (I think it would have worked better had the girls been chasing him and then he flings himself into the groups of guys rather than the other way around, but not a big deal).

But no one laughed when it was Arron. It looked far more serious with him in the role — it looked like he was practically getting raped by that rabid group of girls.

Also I noticed with Arron that after the rabid group of girls leaves him alone, he kind of internalized the tauning; there was now an invisible fist punching him all about. It really looked like he was getting beaten up by that thing. But the fist was invisible so it was like he’d been driven mad. It was very unsettling, and I think, with the music and the rest of the action, this feeling is more of what Millepied was going for — not all the high air flips, crazy long spins, and windmill jumps that Simkin is known for and did here. Simkin’s character made the end of the ballet more playful than battle-like.

There’s also a short section where there’s all this marching music and there’s more centerstage chaos with all 24 dancers out there at once and suddenly a group of dancers standing at one corner break into partners and go waltzing through the crowd. But it’s really short-lived, like even courtship is a battle.

I don’t know — that’s what I saw on further inspection. But I could be making it all up. It’s kind of fun with abstract ballets (the ones that have a lot going on in them anyway) to make up your own story. I mean, the way dances get made anyway, as I learned at a Guggenheim event last night featuring ABT’s efforts to adapt ballets to different stages (including this small one in AF Hall, meant for concerts), is that things get changed depending on space, depending on the logistics of the stage, depending on dancers. Whoever knows if the end product is what the choreographer originally had in mind anyway.

I don’t think Millepied’s was a perfect ballet — I found a lot of the bird-like patterns from his recent NYCB ballet, Quasi Una Fantasia, to be out of place here – he didn’t need all that; he should have focused more on the battle — but I found his the darkest, the most thematically clear and the most absorbing.

Stella Abrera and Gennadi Saveliev in Alexei Ratmansky’s Seven Sonatas.

The Ratmansky grew on me, as did the Barton. On the last day, Michele Wiles danced the main female character (in the long white ballgown) in the Barton and I loved her. She gave the character a real story. When she comes out onstage she is all bitchy and glamorous, but Michele it’s really an act; she is seeking attention from the main man (in that cast Blaine Hoven) while trying to maintain her haughty demeanor so as not to be shown up by him if he dismisses her. At one point, she extends her arm out to him, as if he’s supposed to kiss it but he turns and runs offstage. She crumbles. It’s heartbreaking.

I also really loved Craig Salstein, Jared Matthews and Daniil Simkin in Barton’s second cast (Matthews and Simkin alternated parts opposite Salstein). They danced a section in the second part and all three made it clear (Salstein most so) that they were in a little competition for the girl’s attention. The girl (Luciana Paris), meanwhile, was just dancing on her own, in her own world, paying them no mind at all. It was hilarious.

But back to Michele Wiles for a minute: a wonderful ABT patron gave me her ticket for a company class, which she couldn’t attend, and Michele seemed so sweet — smiling out and waving at people during the class and even during warm-up.

Also, can some choreographer please please please create a little solo or some kind of dance just for Gillian Murphy! Please! During that company class, during the center floor work when the dancers divided into groups and did turns in a diagonal down the center, Gillian blew everyone completely away. She was like a tornado. But a technically perfect tornado! Everyone in my section literally began to laugh and shake their heads in amazement. She needs something to showcase her technical brilliance and athletic prowess. C’mon ABT!

Each of the dancers brought their own special thing to the Ratmansky. Christine Shevchenko (an up and coming corps member) was gorgeous with the role created by Julie Kent (danced opposite David Hallberg). She was more lyrical than Julie, with flowing, expressive arms that resembled Natalia Makarova in Other Dances. Julie’s arms were more staccato. Hee Seo, who completely blew me away as well, did a combination of the two — by turns feathery and lyrical, and modern and staccato. Alexandre Hammoudi and Jared Matthews both danced David’s original part and they were very different than David. Both connected with their ballerinas much more — when they were left alone onstage they clearly looked about for her, wondering where she was, then accepting they were alone and falling into their solo.

David Hallberg. I can never get enough David Hallberg. He didn’t look around for his ballerina when she left him, but when she returned to the stage, he danced well with her. But when she was offstage, she was out of sight, out of mind with him — he was too busy making Ratmansky’s movement wholly his own. He seems to be a rapidly maturing artist, playing with the music, playing with rhythm, giving some things more emphasis than others. When I first saw him dance this role I thought his “character’s” movement was more modern than classical, but I think that was just because of the way he did one section where he keeps pushing out with his hands, like he’s stopping the air, or stopping something from getting too close. He slowed down that movement a lot, really emphasizing the arms, and then did some ensuing footwork at the speed of light, whereas the others did everything in equal measures -so it didn’t have the same look.

Jared Matthews and Maria Riccetto in Some Assembly Required, photo by Rosalie O’Connor.

ABT also put on Clark Tippet’s Some Assembly Required from 1989, a male-female pas de deux evoking a lovers’ quarral replete with difficult-looking angst-filled lifts, struggling pushes and pulls, then more tender making up. It went on a bit too long; some middle parts that were repetitive could have been taken out, but the cast I saw — Jared Matthews and Maria Riccetto did very well with it. Jared is dancing and dramatizing better than ever before, imo.

And the company also did Robbins’ Other Dances, another male-female pas de deux (this one pretty famous) that was choreographed on Baryshnikov and Makarova. I saw both casts — Marcelo Gomes and Veronika Part, and David Hallberg and Gillian Murphy. I liked both — although I think I honestly prefer Tiler Peck and Gonzalo Garcia’s at NYCB. Gonzalo has a smaller body, more like Baryshnikov’s, and I think some of the gestures — like the placing the hand behind the head, kind of primping, looked sweetest on him. Ditto for Tiler. David is dancing very aggressively these days. He’s making the absolute most of every movement — it can be stunning at times, and at times it seems a bit overdone, which it seemed to me a tad here.

I also think that joke on the Kirov dancers getting dizzy and losing their footing because they don’t spot-turn doesn’t come across as such to new audiences. When Marcelo and Gonzalo did it, many in the audience honestly thought the dancers screwed up for real, not on purpose. David really didn’t do the joke because he’s a cheat I’m kidding — he did, but he spun, stopped, got dizzy, shook himself out of it, and started the next phrase all in the blink of an eye, so you didn’t even notice he “got lost.”

Gillian was good but it didn’t seem to be a dance that showcased her talents to their fullest. I’ll say it again — I really think she is the most athletic and technically one of the best female dancers in the world and she desperately needs more roles that prove that!

Photo of Veronika Part in The Dying Swan, taken from Vogue; photos of the three premieres coming as soon as I receive them.

After ABT’s fall season opening night gala performance last night, the really wonderful James Wolcott and Laura Jacobs took friend Siobhan and me out for dinner at Shun Lee (I’d never been there — but wow, excellent excellent food!) and when Laura asked me if I was going to write about the performance, I kind of rolled my eyes and said, “I’ll try!” We all agreed that dance is absolutely the hardest art form to review, especially on seeing a dance for the first time. Let alone THREE dances seen for the first time. With visual art you can stand there all day and examine at it, with music you have recordings and scores, film critics generally see a movie several times before writing a review. With dance you have one chance — often one split mili-second — to remember a half an hour or so of movement, images, patterns, structure, costumes, music, lighting — everything. It’s impossible. Since starting this blog I have so much more respect for dance critics.

Anyway, there were three premieres last night: Seven Sonatas by Alexei Ratmansky, One of Three by Aszure Barton, and Everything Doesn’t Happen at Once by Benjamin Millepied. Also on the bill was a performance by Veronika Part of Fokine’s The Dying Swan. ABT performed, for the first time, in Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall, a concert hall not accustomed to housing dance performances. (ABT usually holds its fall season in City Center, but changed venues because of City Center’s renovation plans.)

I’m going to be seeing each premiere a couple more times this season and prefer to write after I’ve seen each more than once. But since the season is so short (it ends October 10, this Saturday), I’ll write something up front. These are only first impressions though, and I’ve found I see so many more things with repeated viewings.

Honestly, everything kind of blended together for me. Part of this was because of the sparseness of the Avery Fisher stage — there were no sets, no wings, no curtains — so dancers warmed up onstage before us, giving each piece a kind of Cabaret-like feel; and part of it was because costumes for each piece were all black and white. I remember lots of black, lots of white and the hardwood of that stage.

1) Ratmansky’s Seven Sonatas was performed to Domenico Scarlatti music by three male-female couples: David Hallberg and Julie Kent, Herman Cornejo and Xiomara Reyes, and Gennadi Saveliev and Stella Abrera. Costumes were all white — flowing dresses for the women, classical tights and 18th-Century tops for the men. The movement was a combination of classical and modern and, though the ballet was generally story-less, each couple seemed to have a little narrative: Cornejo and Reyes were the young, playful couple, Herman full of high jumps with many beats of the feet that really wowed the crowd and Xiomara dizzying rapid multiple turns. At one point Herman did this crazy turn in the air, landed on his back, and caught her. Crowd went wild.

Abrera and Saveliev seemed to be a more mature couple, perhaps in mourning. It seemed Abrera was a woman, possibly a mother, who’d lost a child or something — Saveliev seemed to be trying to console her and keep her from self-destructing. It seemed like she kept trying to break free of him and reach out to some invisible thing.

I’m not sure what Hallberg and Kent were meant to represent except maybe a modern couple — they seemed to have the most modern movement. David appeared to be trapped in a box and he kept pushing out; he had a lot of quick movement with fast stops in different directions and a lot of it in parallel — not turned-out — position. Julie had a lot of sharp, staccato movement. They could’ve also been a courting couple: at one point, David was on one knee and he invited Julie to run at him and jump on him. When she did, he took her into this lovely lift. It’s sweet and many in the audience lightly laughed.

The ballet was broken into duets and solos and bookended by two ensemble movements, the first pretty and lyrical, the latter more chaotic as they all perform their very different movement motifs at once, some trying on others’ movement styles — everyone does the staccato arm patterns for a while, etc. At the end, the women lay on the floor and the men wrapped their bodies over them.

One other thing: our David Hallberg is sporting longish hair these days I think it looks good, and fun for a change! Funny thing is, he’s so beautiful and glamorous, I tend to get jealous if him, even though he’s a man… which I guess should be kind of odd…

2) Barton’s One of Three was set to Maurice Ravel’s Violin Sonata in G and danced by a whole slew of tuxedoed men, and three women — Gillian Murphy, Misty Copeland, and Paloma Herrera. Why is it that women choreographers tend to use men so much more! (And female dance-writers tend to focus on male dancers — is this feminist?)

Anyway, the piece begins with Cory Stearns walking out dressed in a tux and black jazz shoes. He does a little solo and his movements are all modern, angular, which contrasted in an intriguing way with the tux. I don’t know if it was his being a bit weirded out by the curtainless stage (which forced him to walk out in the dark with all of us watching) or whether it was part of the character, but he seemed to have this loopy smile in the beginning, that was really rather endearing. I chatted with a friend during intermission and she felt just the same.

Anyway, soon Cory was joined by more tuxedoed men, and then by Gillian, who came prancing out in a long white cocktail gown with her radiant red hair tied back into a sleek twist. The men would kind of veer toward her, sideways, their bodies leading their heads in, to me, a rather amusing way. Gillian’s character was very haughty, very glam and posh and she acted like she was ordering the men around with her little finger. The men often seemed led by their bodies, moving first with the back, or at times one leg would take a step, the rest of the body reluctant to follow (I noticed that most with Jared Matthews, who I thought was dancing at his best last night). I found this a very interesting movement motif.

Misty Copeland was the lead character in the second movement. She wore a short black and white dress, her costume and character more flirty and wild. But same thing — she seemed to kind of taunt her tuxedoed men.

And third movement was led by Paloma, wearing a black lacey top and black pants. She smiled a lot more than Misty and Gillian, but she seemed to move in a slinky, sexually-empowered way, like a tanguera.

Now that I think about it, though there were many more men here, the women seemed to have all the power. Fun!

3) Next on was Part’s Dying Swan, which was really poignant, as I knew it would be. It’s a very short piece, but it’s funny how the ballerina can really do it however she wants to; I just saw Diana Vishneva perform this in the Fall For Dance Festival and her Dying Swan was very different. Whereas Diana spent most of the time on her toes, bourreeing, Veronika spent more time on the floor, one leg stretched out before her (like in above picture), then rising again to her toes for one more breath. Diana’s swan seemed to flutter about more, like she was fighting death, she lay down only at the very end. Veronika kept holding her arms up in front of her, her wrists bent and her hands cupped over, as if to foreshadow what would happen to her body. In general, Veronika’s swan accepted and approached death more gracefully or willingly, but Diana’s, with that broad wingspan, at times really looked strikingly birdlike. I don’t know if I can say I liked one interpretation better than the other — both were breathtaking and both very poignant.

Did anyone else see both swans?

4) And the program ended with Millepied’s Everything Doesn’t Happen at Once, set to David Lang music that was at times mellifluous and at times cacophonous or eerie. He used a large group of dancers but Marcelo Gomes, Isabella Boylston and Daniil Simkin had the main parts and so stood out the most (and Kristi Boone shone in a smaller role).

There was a lot going on here — both in the music and in the dance, and I felt that, unlike with Millepied’s earlier piece for ABT — From Here on Out — composed to music by Nico Muhly (who was in the audience) — in this one the movement kept up, didn’t let the music outshine it. The stage is set up to resemble — at least to me — a pool. Dancers would gather around it and watch the people dancing in the lit-up center. At the beginning there seemed to be a swimming motif, with large, rounded arm movements resembling breaststrokes. Movement is also evocative of birds as well though, and some of the same lifts were present as in Millepied’s recent work for NYCB, where the women are perched on the men’s shoulders, their arms outstretched sideways.

In the middle part, Marcelo and Isabella have a rather haunting solo. The ballet is generally story-less but as far as I could make out any narrative, it appeared she was sort of struggling against him. He seemed very careful and gentle with her (in sharp contrast to a later, more hostile duet he has with the super-strong Kristi Boone, who seemed to be either Isabella’s competitor or her double), but she — Isabella — nevertheless kept trying to push away from Marcelo as he held her. The duet ends with them walking toward the back of the stage holding hands, connected, but her body is lunging as far as possible away from his. A rather warped relationship.

Then there’s a rather amusing section where bravura dancer Daniil Simkin is struggling with a bunch of women. He tries to break free of them but then he keeps throwing himself into their arms, making them catch him in these rather breathtaking group lifts — one of them ending in a perfect split in the air. And he has a bunch of crazy multiple pirouettes that had the audience audibly gasping. It all went with his character though, who seemed rather crazed, like he may have just escaped from an asylum or something. I kept wondering who else was ever going to be able to perform that role…

I didn’t go to the gala party but in addition to Muhly, I saw Alessandra Ferri in the audience, one of the Billy Elliots, and apparently Natalie Portman was there.

Anyway, I’ll write more at the end of the season, when I’ve seen these new dances a few more times. Here is Haglund’s review.

Photo by Rosalie O’Connor, for ABT, of Craig Salstein acting as angel between a warring Ethan Stiefel (airborne) and Herman Cornejo (crouching) in Tharp’s Rabbit and Rogue.

So last night I went to Christopher Wheeldon’s Morphoses at Central Park’s SummerStage, who were performing to live music by Martha Wainwright. Of course I would have gone no matter, but hearing that my favorite, Marcelo Gomes, was guest-performing with the company, made it all the more urgent.

Anyway, Morphoses events are often very well-attended and there was a bit of a mix-up with my tickets — they’d issued me a guest, rather than press pass and so my friend and I got ousted from the section up front. I understand these things happen, especially with very popular dance companies and it wouldn’t have been a big deal if I could see well at long distances at night (and if I hadn’t helped others get in whose tickets weren’t mixed up….) But whatever, I could deal I thought, even though I felt like a total loser.

So, my friend and I walked to the back dejectedly. But, then, when we got all the way to the back, it ended up our tickets weren’t for the reserved risers but for the skybox, a tent-covered, elevated section that put us far above the standing crowd. And in that elevated section, sat (among others) ABT soloist and one of my favorite dancers, Craig Salstein! He was sitting next to a really cute dancer-looking guy who turned out to be Marcelo’s bf Then a waitress came by serving us free wine and I knew this was THE place to be, not down there on the ground with those earthlings! I still couldn’t see tremendously well, but I can always see Marcelo from wherever I am and I kind of felt better being with the ABT peeps anyway.

So my friend Susan and I ended up chatting with Craig and Marcelo’s friend throughout the show and they are the sweetest guys! Craig seemed so different than he is onstage! For people who don’t know him, he’s the type of dancer who always gets the bravura roles that require a big personality, and very good acting (not to mention dance) skills, like Mercutio in R&J and the bespectacled nerdy guy who can nevertheless dance up a storm in Taylor’s Company B, and the poor guy who gets girls tossed at him from every which way in Tharp’s Baker’s Dozen, etc. etc. So because he has such a way with comedy I expected him to be cracking jokes every five seconds and acting all clownish and all. But he wasn’t like that at all – -he was really serious and calm, albeit gregarious and easy to talk to. I told my friends, who I went out with afterward, the same and one said, “well, he can’t be Mercutio ALL the time; he’d go crazy.” True.

He’d just got back from vacation (in Italy, where he saw “Roberto Bolle and Friends” — hmmm, didn’t know there was a “Roberto Bolle and Friends”!), and was sporting a serious tan. We talked about ABT’s upcoming season at Avery Fisher Hall and Italy and his choreography and how much I liked it and how great Marcelo is and what I tweet about (you, tossing your mandolin into the wings instead of Jared Matthews’s hands during R&J I said; he seemed bemused) and other chit-chat. Fun fun fun to meet a favorite dancer and another favorite’s boyfriend

Okay, I’m running off to another Morphoses performance today and have to get going but will write about the actual show tonight or tomorrow morning. Obviously Marcelo was god, Martha Wainwright was good but to me it was too much about her — too much music, almost a music performance with some dancing thrown in — highlights were Edwaard Liang’s premiere and Wheeldon’s Fools’ Paradise (which I saw anew thanks to Marcelo), Tiler Peck, Gonzalo Garcia, a duet between Maria Kowroski and Jared Angle, Wendy Whelan, Rory Hohenstein, a funny joke by Wainwright about lying down and having people do things to her and Wheeldon’s somewhat embarrassed response, and did I mention Marcelo Gomes…

Yesterday’s Romeo and Juliet was the most “dancerly” cast, by which I mean, it was full of ABT’s most quintessential dancers, as opposed to actors. Cast was: David Hallberg and Gillian Murphy as Romeo and Juliet, Jared Matthews as Mercutio, and Blaine Hoven as Benvolio. Photo above, of ABT’s poster of the ballet outside in front of the Met, showing David Hallberg with Paloma Herrera (and two adorable little girls posing in front)

David Hallberg has got to be the most beautiful male dancer now alive. I couldn’t find any photos of him and Gillian dancing this ballet together, but below are a couple of the two of them dancing Antony Tudor’s version, which the company did last fall at City Center.

Look at his gorgeous feet!!! (photo from Tobi Tobias’s ArtsJournal blog)

Photo by Andrea Mohin, from NYTimes.

Because he is such a tremendously beautiful dancer, I really prefer to see David in more pure movement roles, like Balanchine ballets or some of the newer ballets, like those created by Lauri Stallings and Jorma Elo and Stanton Welch.

He really came alive here when Juliet first sits down to play her lute at the Capulet ball and he dances for her. Those series of high jumps with the continuous turns high in the air landing on one foot almost made me cry. David is most at home when he’s just dancing, and any time he had a solo where he could kind of transcend the story, transcend everything around him and just dance, it really almost made me cry — I’m not kidding! For that reason, I will never ever tire of seeing him dance Romeo or anything else.

But this, to me, is the most dramatic of ballets. It’s Shakespeare, so it’s first and foremost theater, albeit using MacMillan’s poetry to advance the storyline instead of Shakespeare’s. During the first intermission, a girl behind me exclaimed to her friend, “I can’t even tell which one is Romeo!” And I’m sure she meant not that she didn’t see David, but that she didn’t know he was Romeo. And I kind of know what she meant.

For one thing, I think it was wrong to cast Grant DeLong as Paris. He’s too good-looking and charming and suave. Paris needs to be a bit of a dork, or there needs to be something off about him, or else you’re thinking, “Oooh Juliet, great catch!” Which is exactly what I thought when I saw DeLong.

And the other thing is David’s enormous dance skills being so far ahead of his acting. He didn’t really fully inhabit Romeo. But I still think he’s done far far better than before and I think he’s getting better. There were points where he really brought himself into that universe, into Romeo’s specific situations. He was very good with all of the sword-fighting, both at the beginning and in the second act, when he slays Tybalt. During those scenes, he really became a reckless kid not really thinking about the consequences of his actions. And my favorite acting part for him was before he killed Tybalt. When he picks up the sword that killed his friend, he looks at it, at first in disbelief, and then he traces its blade, wiping the imaginary blood, and what’s happened hits him and his rage against Tybalt takes off. I thought he did so well with that.

And then there are things I don’t think will ever look right on David, no matter how hard he tries — like his cavorting with the prostitutes. Roberto and Marcelo and Jose Carreno (wherever he’s been this season — he seemed to abscond after his turn in Giselle?…) are just so much more believable when they grab the harlots and play with them and toss them madly into the air. David’s just too much of a romantic It’s partly just the way he looks. But he kind of plays off that by having his Romeo internally reject them, and by playing it as if he’s trying hard to be a sport and take their taunts with amusement.

I also heard people in the audience say they thought there was no chemistry between David and Gillian. I was reminded of something Chimene said on seeing them dance in Chicago, something along the lines that they’re both too ethereal, and she needs someone who’s grounded. I think the problem with the two of them together is that they are both quintessential dancers. No one’s humanizing this drama. Everyone’s concentrating on the stylistics and the plastique and the bodily expression of things, on making the most of every shape they possibly can, and of course on dancing with technical perfection. Gillian is probably technically the greatest female dancer in the world — at least that I’ve seen. And I loved her in Swan Lake — she was all-around my favorite Odette  / Odile. But Swan Lake is more of a dancerly ballet. I’m probably not using the right terms, but you know what I mean? It’s all about making shapes with your arms and torso and legs that most evoke a swan, a swan-maiden. And in the Black Swan pas, it’s all about seducing Siegfried with your pyrotechnics — those crazy fouettes and lightening-speed turns all over the stage. So the story is all in the body; you don’t really need to express anything with your face (at least if you’re the female lead).

But, again, Romeo and Juliet is fundamentally theater. No one arches her back like Gillian and no one looks as gorgeous running around the stage with her back and head thrown back and her arms out while fleeing her bedroom and running off to Friar Lawrence. And her form was beautiful too when she woke up in the crypt and freaked out about being in the midst of the dead and then began running about trying to figure out how to get out of there, when she nearly trips over Romeo. Diana Vishneva did much the same thing in that final scene, and I prefer Irina Dvorovenko, who kind of collapsed into herself and covered her face when she saw Romeo lying on the ground. Irina’s reaction to Romeo might not have been as “dancerly” as the other two, but it was human and it was real and it moved me the most. I also thought I saw the most in Irina’s eyes during that scene where she’s simply sitting on the bed staring out at the audience trying to decide what to do after Romeo’s been banished and she’s told she has to marry Paris. It takes a real actress to have that kind of thought behind her eyes, to be able to express so much while sitting shock still.

So, I don’t know. Everything David and Gillian did, both separately and together in the pas de deux was absolutely perfect, and absolutely beautiful. David almost went on pointe reaching up to her at the end of the balcony scene, when she’d gone back up to her bedroom. It was so gorgeously stylized, it should have been full of passion. But somehow it wasn’t. I don’t want him to stop making stylized choices like that — the way he apparently stopped taking his breathtaking dive at the end of Swan Lake. He just needs to learn how to make the passion come from within as well. Same with Gillian — she makes beautiful shapes, but they didn’t fully embody the passion here.

Jared Matthews got a lot of applause as Mercutio, but he didn’t do that much for me. His dancing was often stellar – -he had an excellent sequence of pirouettes — but the acting wasn’t there, and the role of Mercutio more than any other I think requires a good actor with decent comical ability. Am I going to see Daniil Simkin at all in this role, ABT? Patrick Ogle didn’t stand out much as Tybalt. He had the stern look down but it didn’t come through in his dancing. He danced it way too cautiously. Blaine Hoven was very very good as Benvolio — those cat-like sideways jumps made me want to jump up and whoot right then (of course I didn’t; I would never!). He seriously deserves a promotion to soloist. But I think he’s going to have to learn how to make some sort of facial expression if he’s ever going to make it to principal. Simone Messmer, as one of the harlots, gave a particularly memorable performance when Tybalt died.

I know now why I fell so for Roberto Bolle when he danced here with Alessandra Ferri two years ago: Romeo is his role. This is the best I’ve seen him this season. He thoroughly inhabited the character — from flirting with the prostitutes, to dreaming of Rosaline, falling for Juliet, raging uncontrollably at Tybalt after he kills his friend, immediately and horribly regretting what he does to Tybalt, and to his heart-clenching grief on finding Juliet seemingly dead.

Both he and Irina acted perfectly — no melodrama, no underacting, nothing the least bit overwrought — they were just two young people in love whose situation tornadoed suddenly and tragically out of their control. I preferred Irina’s death scene to Diana Vishneva’s the night before. Irina didn’t do any of the throwing the arms up and the head back; she just kind of contorted her body and cried while she realized what she had to do. Which, to me, was more real — less spectacle, but more real. And they danced superbly. I’ve never seen him dance so well — he nailed every twisted jump, his turns were faster and more precise than I’ve ever seen them, and the lifts were gorgeous. Very perfectly pashmina!

Craig Salstein was an excellent Mercutio, acting the part probably better than anyone (as I’d expect him to). Something rather funny happened at the beginning of the mandolin dance, though. Craig tossed aside his mandolin with a bit too much gusto and whoever was supposed to catch it didn’t and the thing went flying through the air like a saucer, sailing right over Roberto’s head, nearly missing it, and continuing on straight into the wings, where it made a very loud crash. Everyone onstage laughed as did the audience, and Craig shrugged his shoulders, smiled cutely, and continued on with his dance. I couldn’t stop laughing throughout that whole dance. It was okay, though — it’s a rather frivolous scene, pre-double homicides. Would be pretty wild though if the lead was knocked out by an out of control prop.

Jared Matthews not only danced Benvolio very well but acted the role well too. I didn’t catch him doing any of his usual cliched gestures and he genuinely seemed like Romeo’s playful friend. I think everyone feels at home in this ballet. I really think it’s all-around ABT’s best production.

Anyway, I’ll write more later. But now I have to go to bed. So … I can get up and go back for more ABT

(headshot by Jade Young)

I had an insane weekend (out from early evening until not so early next morning both Friday and Saturday at Brooklyn ballroom competition, with ABT Saturday matinee of Sylvia sandwiched in between. Then spent all day today doctoring ballroom photos –mostly frustratingly unsuccessfully– then met with a friend to discuss a possible excursion to Jacob’s Pillow this summer.) Anyway, I haven’t slept in some time and have to get up early tomorrow morning so I have to make this short, but I saw Sylvia Saturday afternoon. Cast was Marcelo as Aminta, Paloma Herrera in the lead, Alexandre Hammoudi as Orion (making his debut in the role I believe), Arron Scott as the god Eros, and Kristi Boone as the goddess Diana. This viewing confirmed that Marcelo is still my favorite dancer, far and above over Roberto Bolle

Roberto has beautiful lines and a tall, long-limbed, lean-muscled body and all (and of course he’s really handsome) but Marcelo is a better actor, his facial expressions are more visible, he uses movement to convey meaning well, and his movements have more strength and sharpness and are just athletically astounding. Not that it has to be a competition of course! I was just worrying myself that I might be changing favorites They’re each very endearing of course in their own special way — Roberto has a sweet boyish shyness about him while Marcelo seems more graciously personable, but all of the principals have a certain quality that endears them to you — that’s why they’re principals.

Anyway, I love how desperately Marcelo was searching for Paloma’s Sylvia at the beginning, how in love with her he was, how he prayed to Eros, how he took Sylvia’s arrow in his heart when running desperately to protect the god, etc. etc.. Even that glimpse we get of him behind the scrim when Eros shows Sylvia, still in Orion’s cave, that Aminta is looking for her — even though he’s just in a static pose, he looks so forlorn it’s just heartbreaking! And his movement is all so enunciated and precise — his jumps were stellar; I noticed for example, that every time he did one of those jumps where he brings the first leg up in attitude (that Roberto is doing in the photo here), he brought the first foot all the way up to the other thigh. But all of the jumps were there to show Aminta’s quiet desperation, not necessarily for show. And of course Marcelo’s swooping fish dives are to die for.

(photo by Gene Schiavone of Marcelo as Orion from past productions, taken from here; I couldn’t find any of him as Aminta)

I do have to point out Roberto’s gorgeous feet though. I noticed them as he’d walk, slowly and pensively, tracing the ground with pointed toes. They’re very flexible, like Veronika Part feet.

(image taken from here)

Paloma Herrera was the most athletic of the Sylvias I saw (I didn’t see Gillian Murphy in this role). I said earlier that those jetes look very difficult — well, not on Paloma; she made them look like cake! She pulled everything off with such ease. I liked her better though in the first act. She really seemed like a nymph elated with success from her hunt, very happy with herself, very independent, and very annoyed at what she perceives as Eros’s intrusiveness into her life. I thought she was less compelling in the second and third acts, where she’s held in captivity by Orion and then is reunited with Aminta. I felt like those parts — particularly the captivity scene — became a bit Corsaire-like, just kind of about the silly theatrics. Apollinaire Scherr mentions that you never really know what you’re going to get with Paloma, how into the character she’s going to be, and I have to agree. I’ve loved her and felt she was really into the character at times and at others just thought she was so so. She’s always a spectacular dancer though.

(Paloma as Sylvia, photo by Gene Schiavone, taken from ABT website)

Alexandre Hammoudi was excellent as Orion, the evil hunter. He acted the part very well, reacted well to Marcelo — I loved his early scene where he does a wicked dance over Aminta’s limp body — and his spectacular jumps with his legs slicing through the air like swords really showed his wickedness and formidableness.

Arron Scott danced Eros as a very good god, smiling a lot, particularly when he whipped off the old man-healer costume. Daniil Simkin’s Eros was a bit mischievous, but Arron’s was all heroic. He danced the bravura solo in the third act with all the nimble-footed kick-flicks very well.

I loved Kristi Boone, again, as Diana. I also thought a lot of Sylvia’s fellow huntress-nymphs stood out: Isabella Boylston for her expressiveness and Romantic touch, Simone Messmer and her completely original style and sense of timing, Sarah Lane for her sweet eagerness, and I liked Jared Matthews and Leann Underwood in the last scene as Ceres and Jaseion. I definitely prefer Jared in more movement-focused, non-dramatic parts. And conversely, I like Cory Stearns in the more dramatic parts. He danced Apollo with Maria Bystrova as Terpsichore, and while both danced well and were very regal, I just think Cory excels in acting parts. Also Anne Milewski and Carlos Lopez gave quite a show as the cute goats, as did Alexei Agoudine and Luis Ribagorda as Orion’s slaves. Very good Fourth of July production!

Oh but only thing — it being a matinee, and a holiday one at that — there were so many little children in the audience. One had a crying fit right during the hardest-looking part of the last act, with all the difficult partnering for Marcelo and Paloma — the huge overhead lifts and the fish dives! And I mean CRYING FIT. The poor mother! But Marcelo and Paloma kept their concentration and delivered same as always. Audience went wild with applause — partly, I’m sure for that reason alone!

Yesterday I had one of those crazed balletomane days where I went to both matinee and evening performances of Sylvia at ABT. Cast for matinee was the esteemed Diana Vishneva as Sylvia, forever-a-heartthrob Ethan Stiefel as Aminta, the shepherd in love with her, Jared Matthews as Orion, the evil hunter, and Craig Salstein as Eros, or Cupid.

Michele Wiles as Sylvia, photo by Rosalie O’Connor, from ABT’s website.

Second cast, which, with the exception of Vishneva was overall far better, was Michele Wiles in the lead, Roberto Bolle as Aminta, Cory Stearns as Orion, and Daniil Simkin as Eros. In the second cast, Kristi Boone also stood out as Diana, the goddess of the hunt and of chastity, and both goats Misty Copeland and Craig Salstein; Carlos Lopez in the first cast was a good goat (feel a bit funny saying that). Both Terpsichores I saw really magically devoured the stage quite well: Simone Messmer and Veronika Part.

Roberto Bolle as Aminta, photo by Johan Persson, from BalletCo.

Anyway, this is my first time seeing a full-length Frederick Ashton ballet and now I’m curious to see more. It reminded me a bit of Midsummer Night’s Dream, with the gods and nymphs and the love unrequited and then requited theme and the mystical, enchanting, dream-like quality of it all.

Here’s the story: scantily-clad Aminta the shepherd is in love with Sylvia, one of goddess Diana’s nymphs who, at the top of the ballet has just led a very successful hunt. She and her fellow huntresses celebrate their victorious hunt. Then, having renounced love, Sylvia taunts the god Eros, who, painted in silver and wearing a leaf fig over his private parts, spends the first act standing atop a pedestal. (This is a very fun ballet.) Evil Orion is also in love with Sylvia and seeks to possess her.

Continue reading ‘TWO SYLVIAS: ROBERTO BOLLE & MICHELE WILES AND DIANA VISHNEVA & ETHAN STIEFEL’

Top photo from here; bottom photo by Mark Haegeman, taken from here.

The Bolshoi! Russian ballerinas! Insane extensions, insane jumps, insane speed!

Last night Bolshoi ballerina Natalia Osipova guest-performed with American Ballet Theater as Giselle. David Hallberg was her Albrecht, Jared Matthews Hilarion, and Veronika Part was Myrta. (Go here for a synopsis of that ballet).

It was all-around some of the best dancing I’ve ever seen, but I have to say, on a scale of 1-10, in terms of chemistry between Osipova and Hallberg, I’d give it a 1.5, and in terms of all-around acting (excluding Kristi Boone’s captivating turn as Bathilde and a rather amusing Vitali Krauchenka as her father), a 2. Regarding the chemistry, to be fair, Osipova was originally supposed to dance with Ethan Stiefel, but because of an injury, David danced in Ethan’s place. A Twitter friend DM’d me asking why she didn’t dance with Angel Corella and I think it’s a good question. He would have been a better fit size-wise and stylistically for her.

But as I said, the dancing was tremendous. During the second act, Osipova did a develope to her ear, she did those hops with her arms in the air as if she had springs in her toe shoes or had a trampoline beneath her, and she did that flat-footed jumping turn at the speed of damn light. Seriously, when she made her entrance during the Wilis act, I put my opera glasses to my face, watched her walk out, and suddenly she was gone from my frame of view. I searched around and around for her with the damn glasses attached to my face wondering where in the world she went. When everyone around me suddenly started screaming BRAAAVAAAA BRAAVAAA BRAAAVAAA, I nearly dropped the glasses. When I took them away, I saw her mid-jumping turn going around and around, in a blur.

Audience (largely Russian, at least in the back orchestra) went stark raving nuts for her. I nearly had my left eardrum blown out over the ear-high develope. And those hopping jumps — seriously, she was half-way to the ceiling. I mean, when Paloma did them (I really did like her Giselle the more I think about it) she raised her head, like those jumps were a prayer to return to life. But here Natalia was going boing boing boing, up to the sky, head straight forward probably so as not to take away from her springing height. I mean, I don’t know. I love to be moved by the image a step creates, as Paloma did, but I can’t deny the thrill of those insanely high jumps and that lightening-fast turn and that insanely high develope.

The high bravura jumps in the first, peasant act, though, worked with her characterization. Her Giselle was all frolicking gaity, a girl in love with dance, in love with life. Her mad scene was over-the-top histrionics. The critic next to me described it as traditional.

And then David. Well, at the beginning he did his Albrecht as a romantic not a carefree playboy. But his was a romantic who was pretty madly infatuated with her. I think David is trying hard to get rid of his nice guy image. He rapped on her door like her mother’d better let her out or else. And when his squire didn’t full-out approve of his peasant costume, I thought he was going to kill him. And after the mad scene, he had kind of a mad scene of his own: I thought he was going to throw poor Jared’s Hilarion straight into the orchestra pit.

But ditto for David on the virtuosic dancing. I think by the time the second act came around, he was following Natalia’s bravura lead, doing sky-high jetes. He only did a Marcelo throw back of the head on the first jump in the diagonal, and then did the ten bizillion entrechats, same as Roberto Bolle. But David’s Nureyev feet!  His feet are so heavenly — I think he has the best of any dancer around today, at least any dancer I’ve ever seen. Those entrechats were from God.

As Myrta, Veronika Part jeted around the stage like I’ve never seen her leap before. She really takes up the stage when she leaps and she appeared to just be flying. I don’t even think I noticed all those jumps before! Her Myrta was icy cold and remained so throughout. Of course it was hard to concentrate on her face with all the theatrics going on behind her, but I didn’t see her peeking over her shoulder like Michele Wiles did. After she directed Hilarion’s death, she turned from him, toward us, and gave a wickedly simple little “and that’s that” nod right to the beat of the music, right as he fell, a smug smirk crossing her lips. Splendidly frightful!

I loved Kristi Boone as Bathilde, Albrecht’s betrothed princess. This is a pure character role, no dancing, and she was radiant in that gorgeous red dress, initially all supremely bitchy and regal, then softening when Giselle started pressing her skirttails to her face, allowing the poor girl to have one thing in common with nobility — a love of clothing. Then, when she realized Albrecht’s betrayal, instead of stomping all over Giselle’s pride and insisting Albrecht kiss her gloved hand, she looked more wounded and discomfited.

Vitali Krauchenka was rather amusing as Bathilde’s father, the prince, probably unwittingly so. He seemed to have his eyes half-closed the whole time and the way he looked at her, following her all around as she decided where to sit, whom to talk to, etc., it looked like he was saying “yes, yes, miss priss, whatever you want.” It cracked me up. I think he might have been better opposite Maria Bystrova’s Bathilde though. Hers was more of an unrelenting snobby witch.

Hee Seo and Blaine Hoven were very good in the peasant pas de deux. It was one of the most entertaining peasant pdd’s I’ve seen, which I guess went along with the virtuosity of the whole night.

Only the Russians I’ll be excited to see more of Osipova next week. She’s dancing La Sylphide with Herman Cornejo on Monday night and again with David Hallberg on Wednesday evening. Go here for the full schedule.

(Desir, photo by Cylla von Tiedemann, from ABT website)

On the Dnieper grew on me after seeing it the second time on Tuesday night, with the new cast, although I still generally preferred the first cast. If you missed my earlier post on Ratmansky’s new ballet, it’s here. Second cast was: Jose Carreno as Sergei the returning soldier; Hee Seo as Natalia, his betrothed; Diana Vishneva as Olga, the flirt who steals his heart; and Alexandre Hammoudi as Olga’s volatile fiance.

I absolutely loved Diana as Olga. She and Hee Seo, who was excellent as well, really drove home the ballet’s pathos and heartbreak. A BalletTalk poster said that with Diana, Olga became the central character and I think they’re right. Diana’s Olga was the most dynamic character in the whole thing; she really underwent a change in those mere 40 minutes. And it was believable. She starts out this carefree and careless flirtatious girl, frolicking around, teasing Sergei, teasing her boyfriend. And when her flirtatiousness with Sergei sets the whole disastrous string of events in motion — Sergei falls for her and she for him, her fiance has an emotional breakdown and beats Sergei, her parents are distraught, and she realizes what she and Sergei have done to poor Natalia — she really grows up, overnight, becomes a totally different person, takes responsibility for her actions. When she and Sergei bow to Natalia at the end in a prayer for forgiveness, before running off to their new life together, you feel equal heartbreak for both women.

Hee Seo and Veronika Part were equally compelling, although Seo seemed a little younger and more naive up front and I didn’t notice the holding out of the arms and the resting of the head on the shoulder like I did with Veronika. Jose, who’s generally ABT’s best actor I think (he never overdoes it; everything is authentic), was good as Sergei, but different from Marcelo. Jose seemed to be searching for something at the beginning, trying to rediscover his hometown with those short, staccato steps in each direction. His movements at the beginning were more modern than ballet, sharp and staccato at points, like he was unnerved that he didn’t recognize things or that things were different. (That kind of movement is more visible on a smaller body though.) Marcelo didn’t seem as sad or desperate up front. But then when torn between the two women, with Jose I  didn’t notice the back and forth of the jumps, this way and that, as I did with Marcelo. The jumps first to one woman, then the other, are my favorite Sergei movement trait, along with the throwing himself to the ground in anguish, almost like a half push-up.

Alexandre Hammoudi was a very different fiance from David Hallberg. Alexandre was quieter, especially up front, not seeming to realize the potential dangers of Olga’s flirtatiousness. He underwent a character change, like Diana’s Olga, then, becoming aggrieved and angry when he realized what had happened. David was more volatile up front, as if that was fundamentally part of the fiance’s character. Those extremely fast-paced steps during his anger scene were not as pronounced with Alexandre as with David. It looked more like he was kicking up leaves (which they had strewn on the ground); with David he was using those feet like daggers. David made such an impression with that character, and specifically that going nuts scene — I’m never going to forget it; I’m never going to forget that insane, almost terrifying, tap dance.

Okay, can I stop talking about this ballet now and focus on the other Prokofiev pieces?!

I generally wasn’t in love with Desir (photo at top of post) by James Kudelka, at least not as it was danced here. The movement is lovely and much of it original and the dancers are excellent but something was just lacking and I can’t figure out exactly what. It’s a ballet about several different couples, and I think my problem is that all the couples are basically the same, at least the way it’s being danced by ABT. With someone like Tharp or Robbins, different couples have different issues — there’s a romantic couple, a sexed-up couple, a fighting couple, etc. Here, the first two couples on first, dressed in fiery red — the women in long, flowing dresses that really whirl when they turn, the men in brown pants and long-sleeved colored tops –  both seem passionate and in love, all but Gillian Murphy from the first night’s cast, wearing bright smiles. But I don’t know if the happy smiles are supposed to be there. Some of the movement is rather chaotic. The woman seems to want to go one way and the man keeps turning her the other, mid-air. Gillian was the only one who made this dramatic, as if there was something not quite right going on between the characters. Apollinaire Scherr noticed that as well; read her very insightful comments on the whole program here (scroll down).

Then we move to a set of four couples, all dancing at once. My favorite part of the whole ballet is the men of these couples. At one point, men and women split and the men all dance together, followed by the women doing a group dance. When the men group dance in this way, each is doing his own thing — one jumping arms up toward the sky as if in ecstasy, another jeteing back and forth as if confused, another spinning himself into a whirlwind, etc. Then the women dance and they all do exactly the same thing — hold up their skirts and tip toe around, jump waving the skirts all about, all in unison, in sync. They’re all the same character — what does this say about men and women? Then, the couples pair up again, each man to a woman, and there’s one really funny part where the women stand still and the men do a bunch of high, twisty turning jumps,their limbs flying — as if to protest, “what’s up with that?,” “how can you say that to me?” It’s very funny, very evocative of real life relationships. The audience seemed to laugh louder on the first night though.

Still, in all, the couple who stood out to me the most is the more adagio one with all the beautiful lifts. The second night it was danced by Jared Matthews and Maria Riccetto, who were very good, but there was just something extra special about Cory Stearns and Isabella Boylston that really took my breath away the first night. Another performance I’m not going to forget.

And then Prodigal Son. This isn’t really my favorite ballet and I don’t honestly see how critics can trash Boris Eifman so and love this. What’s with all that fist-pounding on the thighs, the wide-mouthed screams at what, being asked to get water from the well with his sisters? How melodramatic is that? I know it’s a classic now, but I feel if it premiered today people would laugh and roll their eyes. Unless Balanchine meant for parts of it to be funny, like that up front melodrama, and the “sex” scenes. Anyway, read Apollinaire’s comments about Prodigal too, though; she made me appreciate it more, and talked about how certain dancers can play up the immaturity in those early thigh-pounding scenes so that it doesn’t look so full of melodrama.

Herman Cornejo as the son and Michele Wiles as the Siren danced the leads on opening night; Angel Corella and Kristi Boone the second night. Unfortunately I have to miss the third cast — the magnificent Daniil Simkin and the tantalizingly beautiful Irina Dvorovenko. If anyone sees them, please report! I’m dying to know how they do together!

Herman was excellent dance-wise. As expected, he nailed all those high-flying, angst-ridden jumps at the beginning. He danced a little more carefully than Angel, who had a minor slip at the beginning, then looked like he might fall on his way down that slide in the middle section. But I felt Angel delivered on the drama better; he took me through the emotions with him. The way he watched his Siren, he was like a little boy mesmerized. It made you mesmerized by her too. And then the way he danced with her — it was like an awkward, boy losing his virginity, sex scene. I’ve never seen it quite look like that before, though it’s probably supposed to! Then when he was robbed and left to die (Herman was really shockingly stunning  in this part too — he was a horrid sight, his body up there, leaning almost lifeless against the cross-like slide), and came crawling back home body all dirt-encrusted, then into his father’s arms, like a baby. It does end up being very emotionally compelling, silly as it is at the top. I’d like to see Herman in this later, after he’s had a few goes at it. I think if he could up the drama more, he’d be perfect.

Kristi so far has been my favorite Siren! This role I find a bit inherently awkward too — all that wrapping the long train of her costume around her legs, crouching to get it between her thighs. It almost always looks more weird than sexy, but somehow Kristi whipped the fabric around so fast, it was spellbinding, practically had a dominatrix feel. And then when she does those — what I call upside-down crab walks — where she’s on her hands and toe pointes, belly up and she walks past him develope-ing her legs up with each step, spider-like — most dancers kick straight up, but Kristi’s developes went all the way back, practically to her chest. It looked so much more tantalizing than I’ve seen that before. Kristi’s pointed toes are so pronounced, her feet practically look like ensnaring sickles — she probably has a better Siren body than anyone (except for maybe Veronika Part — I wonder if she’ll ever be cast?)

Okay, I’m done. Sorry I keep writing so much! If anyone sees the Daniil / Irina Prodigal cast, please let me know!

(photo of Marcelo Gomes and Veronika Part, by Gene Schiavone, taken from ballet.co.uk)

So ABT is in the midst of its week-long Balanchine-Tchaikovsky program, which began last night, after Monday’s opening night gala. I’ve gone to both performances thus far, last night’s and this afternoon’s.

Last night I was seated next to Irlan Silva — ABT studio company dancer, and movie star! (actually, I’d noticed his dancing before the movie; I was only drawn to the movie because it was about Brazil, and only when I was sitting there during the Tribeca Film Festival did I realize I’d seen one of the documentary’s subjects before!) Anyway, he seemed really polite and quiet, but then he applauded and hooted loudly during dancer bows, so is obviously very supportive. I like seeing dancers at performances; Julio Bocca wasn’t right about everyone when he said young people are too into their cell phones these days to watch and learn. And, today I saw Ashley Bouder (of New York City ballet), sitting in the front orchestra.

Also last night, on the way in I saw Laura Jacobs. I wanted to thank her for sending me an advance copy of her new novel, but she appeared to be engaged in conversation and I didn’t want to interrupt. I didn’t see her husband, but I assume Mr. Wolcott was there at some point since this was Veronika Part’s first full performance of the season, and as principal ballerina!

Anyway, first on was Allegro Brillante, danced by Ethan Stiefel and Gillian Murphy. Today it was danced by Xiomara Reyes and Daniil Simkin. I noticed both in this and in the two Mozartianas that I saw that there seems to be a difference between the way Russians and Americans (Latin Americans included) dance Balanchine.

Continue reading ‘I WANT TO DO FISH DIVES WITH MARCELO’