My newest book:
Romeo and Juliet - Debuts and Farewells
I'm very excited about the array of Juliets soon to be on NY stages, with both New York City Ballet and American Ballet Theater. I have tickets for NYCB's Spring Gala on May 1st when Peter Martins's new R&J will premiere and for June 23rd at ABT when Alessandra Ferri will be dancing her last Juliet in her farewell performance.
When my daughter was little she loved watching videos of ballet - more than Sesame Street, more than Barney. Ballet had everything: drama, music, movement, costumes - the best kind of magic! One of her very favorite tapes was a recording we had of Alessandra Ferri as Juliet. Her beautiful performance was mesmerizing and I think it was an integral part of why Lydia wanted to start ballet in the first place when she was a little girl. It will be sad to see Alessandra dance for the last time, particularly in this role which she has always danced so exquisitely.
Meanwhile over at the NYCB there has been a certain amount of mystery and anticipation building around who will be debuting as Juliet. Will she be played by SAB students? (as close as possible to Shakespear's Juliet who was just shy of 14) Several girls started rehearsals in October, but from what I understand the casting now includes company members as well. None of them are actually 14 of course but they are all very young, petite dancers that will easily bring their youthfulness to the stage. I'm sure they will bring a big range of qualities to their dancing and I will want to see them all! I wonder if they feel at all daunted by the rich history and traditions of the role? Often it seems that young people can innocently and naively, but eagerly, jump into such experiences, with bold exciting results. For NYCB and Kristen Sloan's video project go to: "behind the scenes with R&J"
And while we wait for all this, Alastair Macaulay just made his debut as chief dance critic at the NYTimes with his first article on Sunday, "Confessions of a Romeo Fiend" - his story of how R&J, played by Nureyev and 56 year old Margot Fonteyn, started his lifelong dance obsession. He is such a good writer that I felt like I was right there at that performance too. Three years after Fonteyn's Juliet changed his life, he writes, he was on the plane to NY and on line for tickets to the NYCB: "Nothing in 'The Four Temperaments' was narrative, but all of it was dramatic, and nothing I had ever seen in any theater had been of such power. This wasn't sexy; it was too volcanic for that. Some 28 years later I am still haunted by the memory of the bellowslike alternation of through-the-body convex and concave shapes made by Bart Cook's Melancholic and Merrill Ashley's Sanguinic. But I might never have awoken to ballets like that had I not first lost my heart to "Romeo," and had certain Juliets not shown that great dancing is great drama." For his entire article: NYTimes
We are lucky because in addition to R&J, there is a great season coming up with the NYCB. The 4 T's is right there, along with other favorites such as Jewels, Symphony in C, La Sonnambula, Serenade - I could go on and on... And then I will be looking for Nikolaj Hubbe in the casting and try to catch him as much as possible because another farewell is on its way. Absolutely wonderful for him: he is to become the next director of the Royal Danish Ballet! But sad for us here in NY because he is such an exciting, committed, and dramatic dancer. (Just think if he was going to be Romeo with Jenifer Ringer as his Juliet, and with Ashley Bouder on alternate nights! - I'm sure I'm not the only ballet fan who loves to do some imaginary casting!)
PS 4/18: We all know those dreaded slips of paper in the playbills about cast changes: "Due to injuries..." It turns out, the students will not be performing the leads. That is hard for them, they put in alot of hard work. But I'm sure we can rely on the company members to be fresh and youthful! Sterling Hyltin, opening night, is a natural for this. The only student who started out in the original rehearsals who will be dancing is Erica Pereira (since named an apprentice in December and now company member in May) With casting officially up now, we have tickets for her debut on Sunday May 6 - Exciting!