Near-Death Experiences_And Others
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Again, what is The Peony Pavilion? Feeble ballet plus Robert Wilson plus Radio City Music Hall? It’s not the spawn of any single recognizable art form—it’s pastiche glued together by hardworking, sincere people who have no organic relationship to the elements they’re working with. The Russian Revolution stored everything away and brought it out again when the storm had passed. The Cultural Revolution just destroyed. Sadly, the reason these two works have nothing to reveal to us about China and its art is because they’re not really Chinese and they’re not really art.
The New York Observer
JULY 14, 2015
Michelle Dorrance: Tapping for Joy
ONE OF THE PLEASURES of watching Dorrance Dance—the tap group founded and run by Michelle Dorrance—is registering the contrast between her and the phenomenal Savion Glover, who has dominated the field for so long. Glover has clearly grown to resent what presumably seemed to him the audience’s patronizing reaction to his early adorableness, and has come to project a surly aura of go-fuck-yourself-ism that defies his audiences to resist him—difficult to do, given his amazing aptitudes. It has become, for me at least, a trial to watch him: I know when I’m not wanted.
But if Glover has become the Miles Davis of tap, Michelle Dorrance is Dizzy Gillespie—the message is joy. Is she the technical phenomenon Glover is? No, she isn’t, and neither is anyone else, but she loves her art form and she wants you to love it, too—not her, but what she and her colleagues are up to. The relief! And since she’s abundantly talented as both dancer and choreographer, you do indeed love her. Her recent two-week season at the Joyce, which featured nine dancers including herself, and a five-person musical ensemble led by the prodigious Toshi Reagon, had the audience reeling with pleasure.
Dorrance is tall, lanky, angular, and it’s not just her tap shoes that sparkle—her legs are everywhere, her body keeps swinging and swaying, her face is animated (sometimes too animated—there’s an occasional touch of the smiling sickness). Her two principal co-dancers are also formidable, most strikingly Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards, a veteran of the honor roll of recent tap history: After Midnight, Black and Blue, Bring in ’da Noise, Bring in ’da Funk. She’s worked with Gregory Hines and Spike Lee and Michael Jackson (she was his tap coach). She’s won countless awards. And when you watch her long solo in the current Dorrance production, The Blues Project, you see why. Here is effortless and endless invention as she ranges around the stage, delicate in detail yet accumulating force. You never want her to stop. And you quickly forget you’re in the presence of tap virtuosity—this is just remarkable dancing, generous, secure, ego-less, and captivating.
Derick K. Grant is the other powerhouse, also with an immaculate pedigree. He manages to be both dazzling and just so slightly held back, but he too is also all over the place, not locked in one position while drumming his taps. Grant—like Sumbry-Edwards, like Dorrance herself, like all their colleagues—loves to move. And Dorrance keeps them all moving, as one burst of activity flows into another: now a couple, now a threesome, now a solo, now the whole gang.
The Blues Project embraces a number of styles, from the hoedown to the Lindy Hop, by no means all of them blues-related, but the overall tone and approach are consistent; this isn’t a revue, it’s a progress. Nine very individual dancers who complement rather than challenge each other, all of them fully charged and unflagging, create a tumult of joyous excitement. Dorrance is in charge, yes, but she encourages the others to fling in their individual ideas and quirks. And all of them are in constant touch with the astounding Reagon and her fellow musicians performing up on a conspicuous riser at the back of the stage—at times the dancing seems to be accompanying the music rather than the other way round.
What’s so gratifying is that despite occasional moments of flirtation with the audience, the overarching impression is of the dancers’ pure-of-heart-ness and goodwill—toward each other, toward tap, toward us.
The New York Observer
NOVEMBER 30, 2016
City Ballet: Act III
WHEN GEORGE BALANCHINE DIED, in 1983, it was a tragedy, a catastrophe, the end of civilization, but it wasn’t a shock—he had been ill for a year, and more or less out of commission. We had known the end was coming and we knew who the future was: Balanchine and his partner, Lincoln Kirstein, had made it clear that Peter Martins was to run New York City Ballet together with Jerome Robbins. But that was a formality: Robbins, at sixty-four, had no serious interest in performing the kind of administrative labor—and undergoing the stress—that being an artistic director involves.
Through Kirstein, I had become a member of the City Ballet board, and then had found myself, as a volunteer, deeply involved with programming and marketing. Perhaps a year and half before Balanchine’s death, Kirstein said to me, “Bob, you have to look after Peter. I’m too old.” I didn’t know what he meant, and he probably didn’t either, but I always took Lincoln literally—the only person I have ever been happy taking orders from. In due course I got to know Peter well, and the dancer Heather Watts, with whom he lived for a decade or so. The two of them were fired with devotion to Balanchine’s art and to the company—the omens were good.
So Martins became Act II in the history of our great ballet company, and he has kept it thriving, if not always great. But his departure, after thirty-five years, has been abrupt, ugly, and unresolved; there is no appointed heir, and there is no agreement over whether he deserves what’s happened to him, or even about what has happened. He was first accused of misbehavior in an anonymous letter sent to the School of American Ballet, and it seems that no one except current members of the board of directors of the school and of the company knows what was in that letter.
Martins was then denounced by several ex-dancers, including one woman who accused him of violent behavior and another of sexual abuse, who made their allegations to the press. Unhappily, Martins’s history is checkered with instances of violence (toward his wife, the ballerina Darci Kistler), abuse of alcohol, and romantic relationships with dancers. An official outside investigation is proceeding, even though Martins has resigned his posts at the company and the school, but questions have already been aired about whether the investigation is disinterested or in some way a board-directed ploy to exonerate him. I myself have no special information about what did or didn’t happen, and no direct knowledge of his personal behavior these past twenty years, which is as long as it’s been since we were in touch.
All this is anguishing for those who grew up in or around Balanchine’s City Ballet. (Balanchine himself was, to put it tactfully, a ladies’ man: a serial marrier, but also frequently involved with young women to whom he was not married. Certainly, though, there was never a hint of violence toward women—he was famously courteous, elegant, appreciative, and loyal.) Nothing excuses the use of violence or the abuse of power, and Peter Martins may have been guilty of both, in which case it’s right that he is gone. But his sudden silent departure—after fifty years of service to City Ballet—is dismaying. And the board’s reticence about what has happened and is happening is disquieting.
As for City Ballet’s Act III, obviously the choice of the next artistic director is crucial, and the board is taking its time before making a move. Its task is not an easy one: As Bette Davis sang in the 1943 movie Thank Your Lucky Stars, “The pickings are poor and the crop is lean.” Although the company is considerably more than a Balanchine museum, Balanchine ballets—and Balanchine style and technique—are the heart of the enterprise. If the board wants that to continue, and it’s inconceivable that it doesn’t, it must identify the best Balanchine-inspired person for the job. Among the candidates most frequently mentioned, there are several excellent dancers whose excellence did not lie in Balanchine. There are those with little or no administrative experience, and those who have modest or no choreographic abilities or who are simply not seasoned. And there may well be others whose sense of self-preservation makes them hesitate about wandering into the gladiatoria
l arena.
So everything’s on hold, with the entire serious ballet community unsettled and anxious. As it should be. New York City Ballet is the most significant American dance company, and if it founders, we’re all in big trouble.
Meanwhile, the company is dancing. The first two weeks of the current season have come and gone, programmed and cast by Martins, of course, and “supervised” by three ex-dancers plus the resident choreographer, Justin Peck, who is still dancing. As it happens, the repertory has been Balanchine-dominated, apart from some inconsequential leftover new ballets from last season. (The current two weeks, oddly enough, are devoted to Martins’s Romeo + Juliet.) The heartening news is that the dancers, faced with crisis, rose to the occasion. There was nothing dispirited or slack about what they gave us. Almost everything looked rehearsed and energized. Cortège Hongrois, for instance, which a few years ago looked sloppy and limp, was bouncy and convincing—or as convincing as this far-from-top-level Balanchine ballet can be. The Four Temperaments, a masterpiece that deserves superb casting, more or less got it, although I’m still not convinced by Anthony Huxley’s “Melancholic”—he’s more sprightly than it is. Savannah Lowery was vastly improved as “Choleric.” Both Sara Mearns and Tiler Peck were dominating as “Sanguinic.” And two very different corps girls shone in the first “Theme”: composed and strong Lydia Wellington and beautiful Olivia Boisson, whose attack and amplitude are thrilling.
The company’s two senior ballerinas were in fine form. Maria Kowroski is dancing with a new refined command—ravishing in Chaconne and Ratmansky’s Russian Seasons. Ashley Bouder was as wonderful in Divertimento No. 15 as she was last year in Square Dance, a welcome relief after Megan Fairchild, who can do the steps but doesn’t make anything of them. Both these Bouder roles were made on Patricia Wilde, another phenomenal technician whom she actually resembles.
This season confirmed that Unity Phelan is a major player—a star—with her dark ballerina beauty and her graceful strength. Indiana Woodward is another first-rate talent, bursting with pizzazz. And both Ask la Cour and Adrian Danchig-Waring have broken through—we’ve been waiting a long time.
There was a premiere: corps member Peter Walker’s dance odyssey. (Why do young choreographers think that odd spellings or lack of capitalization make things more interesting?) This is Walker’s second piece for the company, and it’s more ambitious than his first, ten in seven (also denied capital letters). The new work goes in for effects—flashing lights, silhouetted dancers across the back of the stage, a neon strip that rises and falls against the backdrop—but they don’t add up to anything. Not even appealing music (by Oliver Davis) or colorful costumes (by Marc Happel) could hide Walker’s lack of a compelling idea.
And then, pure pleasure. The curtain goes up on Alexei Ratmansky’s Russian Seasons and you’re at once in a complete world—the music (Leonid Desyatnikov), the stylized peasanty costumes of Galina Solovyeva, and most important, an individual and alluring dance vocabulary, combine to create a gripping and seamless work of art full of happy surprises. Russian Seasons is a dozen years old and as fresh and impressive as it was when new. Ratmansky unleashes Mearns, enhances Kowroski, respects and nourishes all his dancers. Who can deny that he is the world’s leading classical choreographer? If only he were available to run the company! But why would he want to? Running the Bolshoi years ago must have been traumatizing. And as things stand, he can create ballets more or less wherever he wants to—without having to worry about donors and boards.
The New York Observer
FEBRUARY 9, 2018
Note: Several days after this piece was posted, the ballet and school, according to The New York Times, announced that the outside investigation “did not corroborate the allegations.” But—no surprise—axes are still being ground. Meanwhile, Act III goes on waiting in the wings.
NOTES
A Trio of Go-Getter Trumps
1. Recently reprinted with a new preface and a new subtitle: Three Generations of Builders and a President.
“The Most Beautiful Girl in the World”: Diana Cooper
1. The Rainbow Comes and Goes, The Light of Common Day, Trumpets from the Steep.
The Magic of Ashton
1. The finest of all pairings would eventually be Murphy with David Hallberg.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thanks, to begin with, to the various editors who commissioned these pieces or accepted them for publication—first among them the late Robert Silvers of The New York Review of Books. Where would we be without it? Early on, Chip McGrath, and recently Pamela Paul, invited me to write for The New York Times Book Review, and I thank them. Corby Kummer of The Atlantic took charge of my essay for the magazine on Rodgers and Hart, and since then has cast an unofficial stern but always beneficial eye on what I write.
It’s been twenty years since I began reviewing both books and dance for The New York Observer (once fondly known as the pink paper). I have had countless editors there, all of them helpful, solicitous, and calming. The crucial one through this entire time has been Adam Begley, who at first was my official editor, and who, years after retiring from the paper, has gone on tormenting me, piece after piece, with his withering—but, alas, essential—interventions. I do the same for him, though of course I am far kinder. By now we’ve enjoyed two decades of fun together, mostly over the transatlantic phone. And our friendship has deepened.
At FSG, I’ve again had patient and genial support and encouragement from everyone I deal with, from president and publisher Jonathan Galassi to Lord High Everything Else Jeff Seroy, to devoted (and captivating) editor Ileene Smith and her highly able assistant, Jackson Howard, to the exemplary and endearing Debra Helfand, executive managing editor. Special thanks, yet again, to my production editor, Scott Auerbach, with whom it’s always a joy to negotiate semicolons and indents, and to Abby Kagan, a superb designer whose fanatical love of detail and unerring eye make our work together pure pleasure.
As for the illustrations: My decades-long association with Photofest has once more proved invaluable and agreeable, as have my dealings with the terrific group of curators at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center: Linda Murray for dance, Jeremy Megraw for theater, Jessica Wood for music, and Phil Karg for everything. Their Beloved Leader, Jacqueline Davis, sets the tone of benevolent efficiency. Finally, thank you to Condé Nast for the Steichen portrait of Dorothy Parker and to Edward Sorel for his ravishing imagining of the ravishing Mary Astor.
ILLUSTRATION CREDITS
Grateful acknowledgment is made to Photofest for the images from Heaven Is for Real (© TriStar Pictures), Genius (© Roadside Attractions), Flesh and Bone (© 2015 Starz Entertainment, LLC), Black Swan (© Fox Searchlight Pictures), Million Dollar Mermaid (© MGM), Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (© Sony Pictures Classics), and the two versions of Jane Eyre (2011: © Focus Features; 1944: © Twentieth Century Fox Flim Corporation); to the Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, for the images from George Balanchine’s The Firebird and Maya Plisetskaya; to the Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations, for the images of the Booths and Ethel Merman, and for Martha Swope’s image of Elena Tchernichova coaching and the image of Lorenz Hart and Richard Rodgers; to the Music Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, for the image of Leonard Bernstein; to the Everett Collection for the image from Tokyo Story; to Condé Nast for the images of Dorothy Parker and Ethel Waters; to the National Portrait Gallery for the image of Wilkie Collins by Rudolf Lehmann; to Magnum Photos for the Elliott Landy image of Clive Davis and Janis Joplin; to the Archivio GBB / Agenzia Contrasto / Redux for the image of Toscanini; to the William P. Gottlieb / Ira and Leonore Gershwin Fund Collection, Music Division, Library of Congress, for the image of Frank Sinatra; to The Irish Times for the image of Sebastian Barry; and to Edward Sorel for the image of Mary Astor.
ALSO BY ROBERT GOTTLIEB
Avid Reader: A Life
Great Expectations: The Sons and Daughters of Charles Dickens
Lives and Letters
Sarah: The Life of Sarah Bernhardt
George Balanchine: The Ballet Maker
Reading Dance (editor)
Reading Lyrics (editor, with Robert Kimball)
Reading Jazz (editor)
Everyman’s Library Collected Stories of Rudyard Kipling (editor)
The Journals of John Cheever (editor)
A Certain Style: The Art of the Plastic Handbag, 1949–59
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Robert Gottlieb has been the editor in chief of Alfred A. Knopf and The New Yorker. He is the author of Sarah: The Life of Sarah Bernhard, George Balanchine: The Ballet Maker, and Lives and Letters (FSG, 2011), and is the dance critic for The New York Observer. You can sign up for email updates here.
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