The Mikhailovsky Shows Its Depth

Class Concert. Angelina Vorontsova and Leonid Sarafanov. Photo by Stas Levshin

The Mikhailovsky's mixed bill offered us a snapshot of how the company envisions itself in the historic past, present, and recent past. It's a bit confusing, chronology-wise, but it is revealing.

Le Halte de Cavalerie (1896, company premiere: 1975) is ancient history, relatively speaking. With a libretto and choreography by Petipa, it is old enough to embrace slapstick chauvinism and broad caricature. In a way, this permits the dancers to sink deeply into their cartoonish characters, and simply have fun. Two young women pursue a local lad (Leonid Sarafanov, who was, delightfully, omnipresent in the programs I'd chosen); they in turn are wooed by officers in a military platoon. There's a lot of ogling and flirtation and silly walks, all in outdated fun. One of the women even gives the men some comeuppance by imitating their foolish mannerisms. 

Class Concert. Ekaterina Borchenko.
Photo by Stas Levshin

Class Concert is familiar in form—the re-enactment of a ballet class starting with the little sprouts (area ballet students), up through company principals. It displays the structure and rigor of the art form, which can evoke fond reminiscences from those of us who studied ballet. The performers are all excellent and clearly chosen for their physical gifts, even if the strenuous effort to raise their legs the highest shows. As the exercises build in amplitude, we are reminded that the classroom is a crucible of pressure—Natalia Osipova, the company's biggest star, landed on her fanny after a line of grand jetés. No risk, no reward. (Another dancer fell shortly thereafter.) Ivan Vasiliev, another of the troupe's stars, showed why he's the dancer some love to hate and hate to love, with his wrestler's build, ballon, speed, and deliberate lack of art. Principal dancer Ekaterina Borchenko danced the most sections, showing her pristine line and textbook placement.

Duato stuffed a lot into the subtext of Prelude, a one-act ballet; unpacking it was not an easy task. All but a few of the pointe shoe-clad women wore soft slippers; the ensemble women wore floor-length tulle skirts (Duato also designed these and the sets). All the men wore slick black separates except Sarafanov, in gold. The long skirts alluded to Wilis and swans and Romantic ballets, as did the painted backdrop that resembled so many artificial riverine realms familiar to the story ballet. But creeping under that backdrop were two dancers—modern allegories—who soon took over the stage lit by a chandelier and blue beams; a shimmering bronze drape now covered the cyc. I got the feeling that it was a loose parable for Duato's desire to bring the company into the contemporary era. That said, while he's still affiliated with the company on paper, he is now at the Staatsballett Berlin (read about the company in Marina Harss' NY Times profile). His style is well presented by the Mikhailovsky—Sarafanov is in some ways a prototypical Duato dancer, lean and all line—but the fit has always seemed odd.

Bolshoi Ballet—the drama moves onstage

Mikhail Lobukhin as Spartacus. Photo: Elena Fetisova, Bolshoi Ballet

The Bolshoi Ballet was in town recently as part of the Lincoln Center Festival, in the wake of the scandalous acid-throwing incident suffered by artistic director Sergei Filin, who watched from the audience and is looking in better condition than I had feared from all the news reports. It was a relief to see the drama move onstage.

Spartacus, a historical ballet choreographed by Yuri Grigorovich to swashbuckling filmic music by Aram Khachaturyan, is a genre that is rarely produced in New York, with reason—there's a fine line between a historical costume dance and spoof. In the first scene's demonstrations of Roman military might, I had to stifle the giggles and adjust my mindset. Athletic bombast became the norm throughout the three-hour ballet, as the large cast's many men stomped and punched their expressions of prowess while carrying shields and swords, and wearing armor including shinguards and helmets. Many of the women, on the other hand, wore hand scarf-sized stylized togas with pointe shoes. Well, why not?

Mikhail Lobukhin chomped heartily into the title role, flexing his tanned muscles and flinging his lank hair in rhythm. He literally flew across the stage in jetés and even a rivoltade (a fancy, floor-stabbing tour jeté), flinging his arms wide and thrusting his chest out in extreme confidence. Simon Virsaladze's costumes for the principals, despite their mixed messages on veracity and a tendency to over-weaponize, were flattering, including Spartacus' red, one-shouldered obi/loin cloth over grey tights.

Svetlana Zakharova as Aegina in Spartacus. Photo: Stephanie Berger

Svetlana Zakharova, glamorous and conspiratorial, gobbled even more scenery as the courtesan Aegina. Dripping with rhinestones to complement her mini toga, she used her fabulous forced arches as lethal weapons, repeatedly brandishing them at anyone nearby. You could practically hear her purring as she minxed her way through the ballet, slicing the poor air with her ferocious developpés, upturned palms, and in one scene, a floral staff. In the less gratifying "good" roles, Alexander Volchkov as Crassus, leader of the Roman Army, and Anna Nikulina, as Phrygia, Spartacus' gal pal, fared as well as could be expected. 

While Spartacus reads as kitsch much of the time, it has entertaining pre-battle pep rally scenes and bacchanales, although a little goes a long way, and many of Grigorovich's choreographic inventions—duly repeated, again and again—are artless and bone-jarring. Virsaladze's expressionistic scenery—columned stone temples—is modernized by an evocative, hammocked scrim raised up and down to conceal and reveal stage elements. This ballet may not be one that you'd want to catch repeatedly, but as a staple of the Bolshoi's repertory, it was a fascinating glimpse into the Russian cultural canon.
    

Alexander Petukhov (Sancho Panza in Don Quixote) in flight. Photo: Stephanie Berger

Last week, I saw the company perform Don Quixote. There are few surprises since it's comparable to the ballet that ABT just performed earlier this summer. The Bolshoi's production, by Alexei Fadeyechev after Petipa and Gorsky, goes for busily milling crowd scenes, Cubistic painted flats by Sergei Barkhin, and a sultry Flamenco number, although in this scene both the pace and the leg-hiding floor-length dresses drag. 

Kristina Kretova, a leading soloist (the rank below principal) danced Kitri, flashing huge smiles and fanning her ruffled skirt with fervor. Lobukhin was her Basilio; despite its broad comic strokes, the role requires far more restraint than Spartacus, not to mention more clothing (the black tights tend to make Lobukhin's legs look skinnier than they are). But the bold, joyful attitude of Don Quixote is well-matched to the Bolshoi's nature. 

Random notes:
The orchestra sounded bright and lustrous; Pavel Klinichev conducted.
The Koch Theater is perhaps slightly small for these productions, but the closer proximity than the Met (where ABT performs its spring season) makes it easier to read.
Some of the technique looked slightly ragged, especially in Don Quixote.

Beauty, Beast, and Balanchine

It's high ballet season at Lincoln Center. Pretty amazing that on any given day, for the last half of May anyway, there might ostensibly be 5000+ people simultaneously watching ballet within a couple of square acres of Manhattan. Crazy, right? Notes on last week, when I saw NYCB's All Balanchine program and ABT's Don Quixote.

ABT's Don Quixote, May 16, Met Opera House

Paloma Herrera. Photo: Gene Schiavone

Bear with me while I descend to clichés: it starred Beauty (Paloma Herrera as Kitri) and the Beast (Ivan Vasiliev as Basilio). Herrera's cool charm and elegant lines nicely balanced his kangaroo-like jumps and leaps. Her center was clearly spot-on that night as she sustained ridiculously long, watch-checking balances. And no one can extend a leg in second and present a perfectly arched foot with such care.  

Vasiliev adds scissor splits to jetés, does three revolutions in the air instead of the standard two, holds Herrera overhead on one hand while  relevé-ing on one foot... things that have no terms because no one else does them. It's bizarre and sensational, but it pushes male ballet beyond the limit, and that's exciting if not always beautiful. They're an unlikely pairing, but that also makes for an interesting, quirky dynamic.

Veronika Part and James Whiteside danced the second featured parts of street dancer Mercedes and toreador. He is well-suited to this juicy, if brief, morsel of ham, with its taut-bow lines and bang-bang rhythms. She looked happy to be in this midi skirt-swishing role, less stressed out than she can while bearing the full weight of primary leads. Part also danced the Queen of the Dryads, magisterial, Amazonian, and elegant, in full tutu.  

NYCB's All Balanchine program, May 13, Koch Theater
The selection of repertory showcased the depth of corps members and soloists.

Lauren Lovette and Anthony Huxley in Raymonda Variations. Photo: Paul Kolnik

Raymonda Variations (1961) featured Lauren Lovette, clean and sparkling, with Anthony Huxley, technically a perfectionist, if slightly bloodless; could benefit from partnering work.

In The Steadfast Tin Soldier (1975), Erica Pereira and Daniel Ulbricht made the most of this mostly syrupy fable saved by a poignant ending. The part of a toy soldier suits Ulbricht—physically superhuman, but whose facial expressions can lack nuance. Good to see Pereira, a victim of the "lost soloist" syndrome.

Le Tombeau de Couperin (1975), a b/w leotard ballet inspired by the intricate interactions of Baroque dance, which could also be read as square or folk dance. Comprising two "quadrilles" of 16 corps members who perform four movements—it feels like work to watch, after a time, and one can only imagine the effort that went into choreographing it—but there's a warmth and graciousness to it that resists the affect of modernism. 

Le Tombeau de Couperin. Photo: Paul Kolnik

As I've likely written before, Symphony in C (1947) is the big test of major companies' depth, skill, and musicality, and among my favorite high classical Balanchine works. 

• 1st movement: an injured Andrew Veyette was replaced with Zachary Catazaro to partner Tiler Peck. While Catazaro looks the part of a swain, he needs polishing and partnering rehearsal; all in due time.
• 2nd movement: The luminous Teresa Reichlin glittered extra brightly with the relatively new crystal-encrusted costumes. Tyler Angle is a consistently brilliant, suave partner, but that seems to mean that he is cast with the taller, often more difficult to handle women, rather than those of a more suitable relative height (as is his similarly-skilled brother, Jared). A pleasant problem, indeed.
• 3rd: Hey, there's the elusive Gonzalo Garcia!, dancing with corps member Ashly Isaacs, in the danciest section. They treated the lilting rhythms fairly lightly but suited one another well. 
• 4th: This section is really more like half a movement, but it's always a pleasure to see Taylor Stanley's technical confidence and charisma; here he danced with Ashley Laracey, featured more and more often, with reason.

This week brings "Classic Spectacular," a mixed bill at ABT including La Gaieté Parisienne, and Jewels at NYCB.

ABT—Quixotically Entertaining

Say cheese! Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev in Don Quixote. Photo: Gene Schiavone

The ABT principal Ivan Vasiliev soars so high in jumps that he arrests time to fit in extra tricks. I don't even know the names for some of the things he does... A triple scissor split jeté? (Although for once in a single ballet, more than one man performed an intriguingly named rivoltade—a move is so complicated that I can't even describe it, but it ends by sort of vaulting over your own leg. Joseph Phillips, who shone as the head gypsy, performed it with even more brilliance than Vasiliev.) In his one-handed lifts of his partner Natalia Osipova, he balanced on one leg, which is not the most beautiful pose, but it impressed if simply for hubris. Perhaps even more astonishing is that Osipova soars nearly as high with quadriceps half the size of his, which resemble a bullfrog's. (As Dance Mag's Wendy Perron noted, the on and offstage celeb-ballet couple has been irresistibly dubbed "Vasipova.")

It's all great entertainment on the gymnastic end of the spectrum, and isn't that why we go, at least sometimes? Interestingly, Osipova will soon be partnered in Romeo & Juliet (Jun 14) by Vasiliev's polar opposite, David Hallberg. Obviously they are completely different physical types—one might even believe different species. Hallberg is a bunch taller, lean, loose, alabaster cool, and naturally floats into perfect positions; Vasiliev is coiled, compact, explosive as a powder keg, and brusque. And that's the beauty of ballet, which has room for such disparate artists whose characteristics and gifts can be appreciated on their own merits, but not to the exclusion of others.

And Osipova? Indeed, she hovers between the two extremes, the rare ballerina who can match the ballon of men, and retain precision when snicking through chainés or passés so fast that the orchestra cannot keep pace. (This raises a question—is it proper for the ballerina to dictate such a too-fast pace any more than it is for a conductor to make the tempo too fast for a dancer? I suppose the answer is that the audience gobbled it up.) Yet despite these gifts of power and speed, she can be delicate, lyrical, gamine-like. Her demeanor tends to read as playful and coy rather than maturely romantic, although she is still just 27, with many years of experience yet to invest in suffusing her technical skills with soul.

With the addition of Vasiliev, ABT's principal roster skews a little more rough and muscular. Several additional new imported leading men will dance soon and make their mark, including Denis Matvienko, James Whiteside, Vadim Muntagirov, Steven McRae, and Alban Lendorf, in addition to ABT-seasoned, but still relatively new to lead roles, Alex Hammoudi, Daniil Simkin, and Jared Matthews. None of these fine dancers should distract from the strong middle ranks including the aforementioned Phillips and Joseph Gorak. 

Newish principal women Hee Seo and Polina Semionova have huge role lists this season, as opposed to Gillian Murphy and Alina Cojocaru, who have a lot going on in other parts of the world but will touch down for a few shows (Cojocaru with Herman Cornejo in The Sleeping Beauty on July 3 sounds mandatory). The corps flaunted talent in Don Q: as flower girls, Skylar Brandt danced with effervescence and crispness, and Luciana Paris, heretofore best known from dancing the Sinatra Suite, showed a silken warmth and finesse. 

I've touched on just a handful of dancers, but there are so many diverse artists who deserve attention, perhaps in future posts. ABT may not have a cohesive style, but its dancers range across the diversity of humanity.