Apparently the New York Post’s Page Six people have found out about Benjamin Millepied’s prior relationship with ABT’s Isabella Boylston (and are finding it newsworthy) because they’re now depicting Natalie Portman as a “homewrecker” who tore the two apart. (Doesn’t that term usually apply to someone who splits a family apart?) They’re saying Millepied and Boylston were together for three years, lived together before Portman moved in on him, and were thinking of marriage. Really? Wasn’t he dating Saskia Beskow until pretty recently? And isn’t Boylston rather young — were they really together for that long? And marriage??? Celeb bloggers are picking the story up as well.
Isn’t it so surreal though that Page Six is interested in this at all? I guess I’ve repeatedly bemoaned that we haven’t had a famous dancer since Baryshnikov — and I think Millepied may be the first since him to date a celebrity. I wonder if more people will actually turn up at NYCB when he’s dancing, or at ABT to see Boylston?
Last weekend I went to another fabulous Guggenheim Works & Process event, this one in celebration of Frederic Franklin, the 95-year-old formerly of Ballets Russes who’s worked with American Ballet Theater for many years now performing non-dance character roles and setting ballets on the company and its studio company, ABT II. I’ve written about him here.
ABT, ABT II, and some of the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School students performed some ballets Franklin has staged for them. My favorite was the Hungarian Czardas section from Petipa’s Raymonda, performed by ABT II, with Irlan Silva and Meaghan Hinkis as the lead couple. So much fun — and really made me want to see the whole ballet. I’ve since gotten my hands on a couple videos — more on them later. But for now I just want to say how wonderful I thought Silva was — how much he stands out, how much strength and discipline and precision he has, along with that ever elusive star necessity, Presence. Even doing basic heel toe steps, he just brings it to another level.
Here are a couple of videos of him at the 2008 Prix de Lausanne, where he danced for his native Brazil and placed very well. The first is of his contemporary solo, a little-seen work by Nijinsky, and the second is his classical variation, from Le Corsaire.
And here is a video I found of that Czardas, danced by others.
Also performed, by others, were the classical Raymonda variations and the Sleeping Beauty Bluebird Pas de Deux. And, ABT dancers were David Hallberg and Xiomara Reyes dancing the Giselle Act II Pas de Deux. Which was far too short! But of course one must never miss the opportunity to see David Hallberg dance up close 🙂 Among other things, he knows how to make the most of a pose, to take the lines — particularly the leg lines — to their fullest and most sublime.
Photo of Hallberg dancing with Gillian Murphy, taken from here.
Here are some photos Jade Young and Avi Scher sent me of Monday afternoon’s performance at City Center’s studio 4.
All photos by the fabulous Jade Young, who I was able to finally meet (along with Marcelo and Veronika’s agent — and former ABT dancer — Scott Schlexer)! It was a great afternoon — SO many people were there: James Wolcott from Vanity Fair, Mark Kirshner from TenduTV, Reese Thompson from Ballet.co, and practically all the bloggers I know of — like Philip and Taylor — and many many blog readers. It was a small room but it was so overcrowded I know there are several people there that I missed (which was probably a good thing since my laryngitis was so bad I really sounded like a frog). Apart from Veronika’s fame, I think Avi is just such a nice and talented guy that people turn up to support him and check out what he’s doing, even if the program is really short. Which this was … it was a couple of excerpts he showed (for APAP) from his larger work, Touch, which will premiere at the Alvin Ailey theater later this spring. I will definitely post when I have more details!
in 2010 includes NYCB’s Robert Fairchild (& SLSG fave, pictured below in Paul Kolnik photo), ABT’s Eric Tamm, and SYTYCD alum William Wingfield (pictured above with Whitney Jensen of Boston Ballet), and Alex Wong (also of Miami City Ballet of course).
And go here for a behind-the-scenes video of the January 2010 cover shoot.
Tuesday night, the Pacific Northwest Ballet opened its 5-day run at the Joyce. This was my first time seeing this company, and it has a reputation as one of the most prestigious in the U.S. Helmed by Peter Boal, a former dancer with New York City Ballet, the company is already familiar to many NYCB fans, but not yet to me.
I really wish they could have brought the whole company and danced at City Center, a more suitable stage for ballet. The Joyce is small and known for modern dance and so they could only bring a small portion of the company. And, the small stage limited their choice of choreography and prevented the dancers from dancing full-out. So I felt it lacked a certain balletic grandeur, although I still greatly enjoyed the evening.
For one thing, I was thrilled to finally be able to see Brazilian ballerina Carla Korbes dance, after being introduced to her on the Winger. She had a part in just about every ballet and she did not disappoint — she has great charisma and dances with great dramatic intention.
I was also happy to be able to see Seth Orza again 😀 (Everyone who’s read this blog for a while knows how downright devastated I was when he left NYCB…) He’s so sharp and precise, and so strong — I think he definitely needs to be promoted to principal (he’s now a soloist, as he was when he left NYCB).
So, there were four pieces on the program: Opus 111 by Twyla Tharp, Fur Alina by Edwaard Liang, Mopey by Marco Goecke (my favorite, and pictured above, James Moore dancing), and 3 Movements by Benjamin Millepied.
I’ll start with my favorite — Mopey, by Goecke, danced very intensely by Moore.
I’d always been curious about this young German choreographer ever since this little exchange (the “Evan M.” being Evan McKie, a principal with Stuttgart Ballet).
Anyway, Mopey is hard to describe — basically just a solo for a man who by turns twists and contorts his body into awkward shapes, bounces up and down, makes muscle-man poses, waves his arms about gracefully, appears to be possessed and struggling to control his limbs — his fingers bent and curved down somewhat grotesquely, almost monster-like. It was short but really engrossing. Here’s a YouTube clip of a dancer from Stuttgart dancing an excerpt from the piece. Unlike in the clip, which is danced only to one piece of music, Moore danced first to silence, then to Bach, then to pop punk by The Cramps.
I also liked Millepied’s 3 Movements, pictured below (dancers are James Moore and Lucien Postlewaite).
All photos by Angela Sterling, by the way.
It was abstract but I thought I detected a bit of a men versus women showdown (I think this is a recurring theme of his — at least in his recent works). It was set to rather unsettling Steve Reich music and filled with original movement, the way the groups of men and women would go at each other at times, almost like they were from separate clans. But the costumes were contemporary: almost casual work attire for the men and little flirty dresses for the women. Costumes were designed by Millepied’s girlfriend, Isabella Boylston, corps dancer at ABT.
I also liked Fur Alina by Liang. It was a man woman pas de deux danced by Carla Korbes and Karel Cruz and it seemed to be the somber story of two lovers slowly deciding to part. It was set to Arvo Part (who it seems, understandably, is becoming the most used composer for contemporary ballet these days — at least for these despairing pas de deux).
Oddly, the Tharp was my least favorite (below: dancers in front are Korbes and Batkhurel Bold).
I’ve never seen Opus 111 before and this one (set to Brahms) didn’t seem to have any of Tharp’s signature comical character roles or her theme of ballet versus other kind of dance (fill in the blank: American social — like in Deuce Coupe, Scottish folk, hip hoppy aerobics — like in Upper Room) or her crazy, almost death-defying lifts. It was pretty and lyrical and the dancers lightly flew around the stage, at times coupling off. But sweet as it was, it just seemed to lack something. Might have been the small stage though and they just couldn’t dance it full-out?… Sir Alastair saw something more in it though.
I hope the company comes to NY again — to City Center.
With all of my book hysteria, I’d missed this news (which was released the same day as the novel): a favorite dancer of mine was finally promoted to soloist.
Here is a YouTube video I found of her (dancing a modern piece with a small company, not ABT):
Former Royal Ballet ballerina and current American Ballet Theater mistress Georgina Parkinson has died of cancer. She was 71. In addition to her work with ABT, she was apparently coaching Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis for their dance roles in the upcoming film, Black Swan.
Photo above, by Ruby Washington, of Parkinson rehearsing, it appears, Gillian Murphy and Ethan Stiefel, taken from the NY Times.
Alvin Ailey audiences are always so fun! Last night was their “Target night” (tickets were severely discounted, sponsored by Target), and these kinds of audiences are the best — people screaming and cheering throughout; yelling “yeah” and “go girl!”, unable to help themselves from taking pictures — with the flash (!), and this one guy kept yelling out “Praise the Lord” during Revelations.
I have no time to write — am off to Art Basel for the weekend — but it was an excellent night. In addition to the always moving Revelations (I will never tire of seeing that), they’ve done something to Bigonzetti’s Festa Barocca — it’s so much better now; they captured the humor this time, and they’ve really amped up the passion / sensuality / struggle in those pas de deux. The audience went wild for it, including myself.
And Judith Jamison’s Divining was so magnificent. It’s a beautiful combination of ballet and African and the music is fascinating. She made it in the 80s but they’ve restaged it. Don’t miss it!
ABT may have the world’s top ballet dancers, but this company has the best all-around dancers who can do just about anything and look like the best in the world at it. And does Antonio Douthit have a skeleton? That man’s body moves in ways I’ve just never seen a body move before!
Go see them — they’re at City Center through the very beginning of January.
More when I get back (and the interviews with Bell and Tayeh as well). Now off to Miami!
Photo above of cast in Jamison’s Divining, by Nan Melville.
Yesterday morning at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, ABT announced their plan to hold an annual Nutcracker season at BAM. Above is SLSG favorite, soloist Craig Salstein, enthusiastically speaking to the crowd. He was the only dancer to address the crowd; David Hallberg was there too but stood in the back the whole time. A group of young dancers from the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School of Ballet (associated with ABT) was there as well — they’ll be dancing in the party scenes when the production opens next year, on December 23, 2010. For the first year, the season will be two weeks, but after that the company hopes to have a longer run.
ABT resident choreographer Alexei Ratmansky will be choreographing.
Here’s a slightly better picture of him, by Fabrizio Ferri. Someday I will get a pro camera, I swear!
This was the first time I’d heard Ratmansky speak. He is very soft-spoken and has a heavy Russian accent and seemed to know what he wanted to say but struggled a bit to get the words out in English. And he makes the same grammatical mistakes as Pasha and Baryshnikov (mainly leaving out articles — there are no definite or indefinite articles in Russian — a, an, the — so they tend to leave those out: “…is great score,” etc.) I think English must be the hardest language to learn, especially for Russians. I know Russian is the hardest language I ever tried to learn…
Anyway, Ratmansky seemed shy and soft-spoken but genuinely excited, especially when talking about Tchaikovsky’s score, which he called the greatest ballet music ever written. I felt vindicated 🙂
But Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz really kind of stole the show with his little speech. He was so out of place in this crowd of rather gentle artists with that booming Brooklyn-accented voice! He of course praised ABT’s decision to hold the season in Brooklyn, then told Ratmansky he should move to the borough since it boasts the greatest Russian population in the U.S. He also called Brooklyn the dance capital of New York (in terms of studio space — which leads to the great number of companies rehearsing there), which is in turn the creative capital of the U.S. These politicians do kind of know how to make their constituencies proud. After bemoaning the fact that the last time ABT was in Brooklyn was before Baryshnikov defected, he called the ABT / BAM plan “a grand jete into the future for Brooklyn.”
The project is expected to cost $5 million and is being partly funded by David A. Koch (yes, of the Koch Theater — he’s matching dollar for dollar donations up to $2.5). ABT also plans to perform community outreach, particularly in Brooklyn schools, including pre-performance workshops for the children, attendance at dress rehearsals, and dance classes.
The rest of the production team includes Jennifer Tipton, lighting designer extraordinaire, and Richard Hudson, an award-winning theater designer, who will design costumes and scenes. Below are some of his sketches:
I’m surprised there’s been so little written about American Ballet Theater’s recent, historic trip to Beijing. It seems that newspaper art reviews are declining everywhere, not just in the U.S. Anyway, the company was recently in China to participate in the Beijing International Drama and Dance Festival. They presented the same three new works they performed at Avery Fisher here in October: Ratmansky’s Seven Sonatas, Barton’s One of Three, and Millepied’s Everything Doesn’t Happen at Once. You can see part of the Ratmansky in the video posted here, on CCTV.com, an English language website.
There’s an excellent interview with young, newish ABT virtuoso (and very intelligent-sounding) Daniil Simkin at the Ballet Bag. Simkin talks about his experiences thus far with American Ballet Theater, dancing with major stars at the World Ballet Festival over the summer in Japan, and a gala he’s organizing next month in Athens. He also talks about how dance professionals can use social media to connect with fans and what he thinks ballet companies need to do to keep ballet alive. Excellent interview, superb questions, “bag ladies”!
And it gives me the opportunity to post, for people who don’t have the opportunity to regularly see ABT, some of his more astounding YouTube clips. Enjoy:
And The Flames of Paris, the first thing I ever saw him do (but with Sara Lane, at ABT). Look for the barrel turns around the 5:55 mark:
Haha, I kept my TV on (for once) after SYTYCD ended and I just overheard some story on Fox News about an ABT dancer who also models. I turned around to face the screen and there was our Cory Stearns, lifting Stella Abrera in Benjamin Millepied’s Everything Doesn’t Happen at Once during ABT’s recent season at Avery Fisher Hall! I didn’t hear the first part of the story because I wasn’t really paying attention, but apparently Cory was standing in line at a deli and was discovered by some modeling agent. He’s now a model, as well as of course, an up and coming ABT danseur. Then they showed an excerpt of a music video he did with Kylie Minogue, which he apparently made when he was 17 — so a few years ago. Wow — I’d never seen it: he made her look like a real dancer.
Then they had a little interview with him. They asked him if he had a girlfriend and he laughed and said no, he’s currently available, but added that he prefers dancers. Funny how male ballet dancers (well, the straight ones) always do that. Female dancers seem more willing to “date outside the box” so to speak. Hmmm…
Anyway, since I didn’t get the first part of the story I have no idea what the point was — is he in a new modeling spread in some magazine this month? Did anyone else see it?
