ABT's Closes Spring Met Season
"Cinderella"
by Leigh Witchel
American Ballet Theatre closed its season with a pinch-hitter and a guest. Stella Abrera danced the lead in “Cinderella” substituting for Xiomara Reyes; Guillaume Côté from the National Ballet of Canada was her Prince Charming. This version of “Cinderella,” created by James Kudelka and set in a Roaring Twenties of Marcel waves and society photographers, deletes most of the oppressive elements of Cinderella’s family and life. Her stepmother is a drunk, her sisters nasty, and she still has to dust, but she is not the suffering maid we usually see. READ MORE
Glen Rumsey's "little virtue"
by Susan Reiter
In the opening moments of Glen Rumsey's new "little virtue", shadowy figures teetered in high heels along the perimeter of the St. Mark’s sanctuary, illuminating their lower bodies with flashlights. In the near-darkness, as bird sounds and whistles were heard, one could make out the long tresses of their extravagantly tacky wigs as they made their way up to the altar at the far end of the space. Three pairs of legs, barefoot now and artfully highlighted by the flashlights, came downstage to flick and dart alluringly. READ MORE
Shakespeare in the Park: "Romeo and Juliet"
by Tom Phillips
This spring and summer, New York has been treated to a three-ring circus of Romeos and Juliets — a pair of ballets by New York City Ballet and American Ballet Theatre (reviewed here in recent weeks) followed by the real thing — a lusty production of the play, before rapt audiences in the most romantic of settings, Central Park’s Delacorte Theatre. Thursday night’s performance began in a light rain, which beneficently ended midway through act one, accompanied by birdsongs and a flight of herons from the pond in front of Belvedere Castle, just in time for the balcony scene where the star-crossed lovers’ flame ignites.
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