danceviewtimes

Speeding Beauty

"The Sleeping Beauty"
New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York, NY
January 3, 2007

by Gay Morris
copyright 2007, Gay Morris

Whatever one thinks of Peter Martins’ 1991 production of "The Sleeping Beauty," there is no doubt it is a quintessentially neoclassical interpretation of a classical ballet. To this degree, Martins has been true to the legacy of George Balanchine. He may possibly have out-Balanchined Balanchine. Speed and clarity are the hallmarks here, and the devil take the hindmost. Martins’ two-act version of what is normally a ballet in three acts and a  prologue, opened New York City Ballet’s winter repertory season on Wednesday.  Despite having seen this "Sleeping Beauty" off and on for more than a decade, it still seems as if Princess Aurora barely has time for a nap, let alone to sleep for a hundred years.

Fortunately the ballet has virtues that compensate for the extensive cuts Martins has made. One of them is the chance to meditate on New York City Ballet’s style in relationship to classicism. For Martins has bowed to enough of the original Marius Petipa choreography to emphasize the path Balanchine took from his classical roots. This is shown not only in a penchant for cutting extraneous material that may take attention away from the dancing, but to open up the classical technique so that it is freer, and to increase the dancers’ speed and attack. The price for this increased brilliance, though, is a loss of exact placement of the feet and of nuance and expressiveness in the upper torso and head. In Balanchine’s own works the lack of emphasis on these elements is compensated for, but Petipa’s dances call for academic correctness, which is then embellished by épaulement in order to give the choreography color and shading. When New York City Ballet does these dances, it is as if one were looking at line drawings rather than paintings, and not always very precise ones. City Ballet dancers have often been accused of being lackluster actors, but the problem in the Petipa repertory is not a question of acting, it is a matter of approach to technique.

Wednesday’s cast was led by Wendy Whelan as Aurora, Nikolaj Hübbe as Prince Désiré and Jennie Somogyi as the Lilac Fairy. Whelan is perhaps the least likely Aurora of all the City Ballet principals. She does not have a body that lends itself to classical line and technique; she is a ballet dancer on her own idiosyncratic terms and she is at her best in contemporary choreography. It was not surprising, then, that she appeared uncomfortable in Aurora’s dances. She was constrained by the exacting academic demands, and consequently her movement was brittle where it should have been flowing. Although normally a strong technician, she was nervous in the balances of the Rose Adagio, and even the pas de deux of the last act seemed to have her on edge.  

Hübbe’s years at the Royal Danish Ballet prepared him for princely roles and, indeed, he looked every inch a prince. He also partnered attentively and with a generosity of spirit. Over the years he has lost a good deal of plié, which affected his solo in the wedding pas de deux, but if not virtuosic, his dancing was certainly respectable. Somogyi was a beautiful and appropriately gracious Lilac Fairy with expansive movement in her first act solo. Merrill Ashley, who has made an indelible impression in the past as the evil fairy Carabosse, was once again a glamorous villain.

The five fairies who bring gifts for the christening of Princess Aurora in the first act were Amanda Hankes, Ana Sophia Scheller, Rebecca Krohn, Alina Dronova and Ellen Bar. Each fairy has a solo and like much of the rest of the dancing, these suffered from a lack of developed épaulement. But Scheller was memorable for bright footwork as the Fairy of Vivacity, as was Krohn as the Fairy of Generosity.

The last act wedding festivities included Stephen Hanna, Teresa Reichlen, Abi Stafford and Tiler Peck in the Jewels variations. Reichlen was particularly stunning in the Diamond solo. She is tall and long-legged, which often indicates a lyrical dancer, but she has amazing speed and power. She only needs more control of her upper body, especially her head and neck, to give her dancing variety.  

Megan Fairchild was more relaxed and expansive than usual as Princess Florine and Andrew Veyette had the thankless role of the Bluebird, managing to get through the endless series of brisés without succumbing to cardiac arrest. Austin Laurent, Allen Peiffer and Daniel Ulbricht were high flying Court Jesters and Stephanie Zungre and Sean Suozzi the irritable White Cat and sex-starved Puss in Boots. Hideka Hanafusa may have been the littlest Little Red Riding Hood on record. A tiny child, she danced with complete confidence, so much so that it came as a surprise when Henry Seth, as the Wolf, captured her.

Martins’ production as a whole still looks magical thanks in good part to David Mitchell’s story-book illustration projections, which lead the eye from a far away view of a Loire Valley castle into garden and ballroom. Patricia Zipprodt’s costumes are interesting, if sometimes a little strange, especially in the first act. It is customary to set the opening act of "The Sleeping Beauty" in the seventeenth century and the last acts in the eighteenth century, since Aurora sleeps for one hundred years. What exactly Zipprodt’s first act costumes are supposed to be, is not altogether clear. With heavy, armor-like tunics and helmets, the courtiers look more like Russia fifteenth century, than France seventeenth. Zipprodt may have been inspired by the costumes for the original 1891 production in St. Petersburg, at least to judge from nineteenth century pictures. Whether or not that was a good idea is open to debate, but the costumes are unquestionably opulent.

Maurice Kaplow led City Ballet’s wayward orchestra through the Tchaikovsky score. Surely with New York’s vast talent pool of musicians, a brass section could be assembled that is capable of playing hunt music without sounding like a hen-house at feeding time. Perhaps Fayçal Karoui, the company’s new music director, will be able to improve things in the pit.

Photos:
First: Wendy Whelan and Nikolaj Hübbe in "Sleeping Beauty." Photo: Paul Kolnik
Second: Wendy Whelan in the Rose Adagio. Photo: Paul Kolnik.

Volume 5, No. 2
January 8, 2007

copyright ©2007 Gay Morris
www.danceviewtimes.com
©2003-2007 DanceView