© Paul Kolnik 'Mother Goose' reviews 'Episodes' reviews NYCB 'Firebird' reviews 'Firebird' reviews Stafford in reviews Neal in reviews recent NYCB reviews more Eric Taub reviews Discuss this review (Open for at least 6 months)

Anyway, to begin at the beginning, Mother Goose uses a clever theatrical device that's pure Robbins: the curtain rises on a backstage scene, where a large flock of dancers is sprawling over boxes, ladders and bits of backstage flotsam. All are intent on the grandmotherly Dorothy Cummings, who's finishing up reading them stories from a book of fairy tales. She finishes reading, and the kids who'd been listening at her feet decide, in the fine tradition of Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland, to put on a show, enacting the fairy tales they'd just been read. Originally premiered for City Ballet's 1975 Ravel Festival, Mother Goose is set to Ravel's eponymous (in French) suite Ma Mere L'Oye, which describes musically the tales the youngsters are about to enact. Rushing about the stage, the dancers use props lying around and small embellishments of their practice clothes to depict the fairy-tale scenes and characters. There's a bit of an inside joke here, as the kids in Mother Goose borrow some distinctive properties from City Ballet's own repertory: the traveling bed from Nutcracker, the tall, vibrating reeds from Robbins' Watermill (shall we ever see it again?), and most delightfully, the flaming backdrop Chagall designed for Firebird's closing wedding scene. That by the end of the matinee we'd be seeing that same backdrop used in its proper place made this little appropriation all the more delicious.
 

If Mother Goose contains these echoes of City Ballet's recent past, it also reminded me of Robbins' own youth, where, working at various artsy summer camps, he'd put on shows in similar, low-budget situations (this as told in Deborah Jowitt's wonderful recent biography of Robbins). It's not hard to imagine a young Robbins pulling theatrical magic out of next to nothing, as he portrays in Mother Goose. The fairy tales are presented as a sort of dreamtime divertissement for Princess Florine, who pricks her finger and falls asleep at the ballet's beginning, until rescued by Prince Charming at its end. This ballet is usually performed by corps dancers, giving them a chance to shine. Tiler Peck was a breezy Princess-next-door, arriving for her birthday party jumping rope in her tutu. Gwyneth Muller handled her wand like an old pro, as the Good Fairy who orchestrates the proceedings. Kristin Sloan was beauteous indeed, even when menaced by Andrew Veyette's crumpled and sulking Beast, until he's transformed by her love. As the Empress of the Pagodas, cursed to ugliness, Savannah Lowery made a glamorous return to beauty in a stunning red dress; Jason Fowler, her lover transformed into a snake by virtue of green fabric draped over his head, similarly was brought back to humanity by a bath in magical waters, represented by yards of silk which other dancers held an rippled. Seth Orza's Prince Charming wandered through a forest of those reeds from Watermill, held up by more dancers, until Muller's fairy unites him with Peck's Princess, aided by the young Austin Bachman's Cupid. As Muller and Orza prepare to be wed, that backdrop from Firebird is unveiled, and all live happily ever after.

There's nothing deep or profound about Mother Goose, and some of the dances for kids dressed as Blackamoors (who are also the "stagehands") and vaguely Chinese "Pagodines" veer uncomfortably close to unfortunate ethnic stereotypes, although they also represent nicely the imagery young and naive dancers might choose. While over the years some critics have found Mother Goose to be shallow and trite, it carries its conceits lightly. It's clever and sweet and charming, aiming to do little more then entertain and divert, which it does for us just as prettily as for the sleeping Princess onstage, who's napping in that bed from Nutcracker.

Juvenile criticisms aside, Episodes is one of Balanchine's finest works, and even almost fifty years after its premiere in 1959, it still has the power to amaze with the quiet brilliance with which Balanchine's dancers interact with the Webern's often-cryptic compositions. Made as part of a celebrated collaboration with Martha Graham (whose own work to Webern for this endeavor has been long forgotten), Balanchine's contribution also included a floppy solo for the profoundly flexible Paul Taylor (then a member of Graham's troupe). The solo has been reprised occasionally at City Ballet (I remember Peter Frame performing it in the Eighties), but not for quite some time; it's absent this year as well. As this was the third performance of Episodes this season, the dancers exuded confidence and looked well-rehearsed and together (not something one can take for granted at City Ballet); you could almost see the strands of the web Balanchine builds over the stage out of his subtle echoing of ever-evolving themes and motifs between the lead couples and supporting corps dancers: sometimes in unison, or syncopated, or as elements of a calm crescendo. Balanchine builds an edifice of architectural construction and visual rhythms, where dancers move in delicate counterpoint to each other and to Webern's score. Episodes reminds us that Balanchine was an accomplished, classically trained musician. Not merely echoing Webern's own themes, Balanchine marshalls his dancers and plays them like a musical instrument. He doesn't simply react or illustrate the Webern; he creates a duet with it.
 

Abi Stafford and Philip Neal led the first episode, Symphony, Opus 21,, with three couples. For much of Symphony, Stafford and Neal stand downstage center, with the three couples spread out behind them. The pair lead the group through vintage Balanchinian twists and turns, as pure a vision of his neo-classicism classic ballet taken to extremes as anywhere in his canon. Movement themes ripple from Stafford and Neal to their charges and back again with mesmerizing subtlety. Sometimes the pair lead, sometimes the corps dancers, and sometimes a movement visits each couple in a canon. The most famous neo-classicism comes when each woman is slowly turned upside down and held aloft by her partner as she performs slow-motion entrechats with her feet to the ceiling: an oft-noted instance of Balanchine quite literally turning ballet upside-down. Abi Stafford, who elsewhere can seem bland and affectless, here looked clear and precise, a vehicle for Balanchine's designs in this epitome of a "just-do-the-steps" role. Neal, too, danced well and cleanly, as did the well-rehearsed ensemble.

In Five Pieces, Opus 15, the mood shifts from lambent to obscure, as Teresa Reichlen and Jason Fowler (another newcomer) advance and retreat from each other in troubled gyrations on dark stage, lit only by dim spotlights. In black, Fowler seems effaced to the point of invisibility, while Reichlen, in white tights and leotard, glows like a moth in moonlight. Dispassionately, they stretch and twine themselves about each other, only to separate as if lost, before curling up together at the last piece's conclusion. At one memorable moment, Reichlen drapes herself down Fowler's back. He carries her with her legs reaching high over his shoulders, his arms held wide. Her legs look like wings, or the antennae of some reclusive beetle. Throughout, Reichlen and Fowler remain dispassionate and calm; it's the lighting and their entanglements which hint at mood and meaning. Long-limbed and direct, Reichlen can sizzle, even in the dark, while Fowler found an ideal setting for his refined but self-effacing style.

In Concerto, Opus 24 Jennie Somogyi and Sebastien Marcovici lead four corps women in what sometimes seems like an extension and elaboration on Balanchine's seminal pas de deux from Agon, choreographed two years previously. Here, too, is the theme of the man manipulating the woman: the long duet begins with Somogyi standing in a narrow second position (feet slightly spread apart), while Marcovici crouches behind, pushing her left knee out to the side, moving her as if she were a child or a lifeless doll. He then lifts her and proceeds to flip her through some wide-reaching splits as she rolls her over his back and hips. Some imagery echos Agon,, but without the latter's odd and endearing quirks. Throughout the duet, Somogyi remains under Marcovici's control, whether she's a passive object of manipulation, or a limp figure draping herself over him. Strong and generous with her phrasing, Somogyi was well-complemented by Marcovici trouble-free partnering, great plastique and stage presence, which had shed most, but not quite all, of his familiar brooding.

Episodes ends with Ricercata in six voices from Bach's "Musical Offering. A fugue which builds steadily to a thundering resolution, the Ricercata is matched by Balanchine's use of what I can only call a movement choir, an ensemble of fourteen corps women deployed in three groups, one along the back of the stage, and the others at the left and right sides. Unlike the ensembles in Symphony or Concerto, these women stay in place, presenting Balanchine's motifs here profoundly simple in ever-changing order. Darci Kistler and Charles Askegard led this ensemble with an appropriate gravitas, walking measuredly, with the occasional arabesque for emphasis. There's none of the contortions of the previous movments here. All is happily and resolutely vertical and simple. Here, Kistler's beatific smile seemed right at home in this almost-religious experience, as the ballet ends with the corps on their knees, as if in prayer or wonder.

The biggest treat of the afternoon was the concluding Balanchine/Robbins version of Firebird, with Chagall's brilliant decor and costumes. This was Sofiane Sylve's debut as the Firebird, and once more I find myself singing her praises. Again, Sylve leavened the impressive strength of her technique with subtle and telling artistry. Her circling of the stage, after presenting Charles Askegard's Prince Ivan with the sword he uses to defeat Kastchei and his monsters, had the power and grace of curling breaker: she'd become a force of nature. Unlike Odette, the Firebird never transforms. She always was and remains a bird, although not without intelligence, curiosity, and yearnings at least as portrayed by Sylve. Sylve never let you forget she was a bird. Her arms never stopped being wings, sometimes fluttering, sometimes curling and uncurling delicately, suggesting Art Nouveau tendrils. The Firebird's legs often turn resolutely parallel, and there's also something of Art Deco angularity about her. Although always in her bird persona, Sylve also showed us a Firebird that finds Prince Ivan as intriguing, alien and exotic as Ivan finds her. At the beginning of their duet she eyes him with subtly disguised curiosity; as they dance together she lets you know, subtly but with no uncertainty, exactly how much the Firebird trusts Ivan. By the end, she's letting him swirl her around in a swooping turn, with one leg raised high in second, and then she allows herself to go completely limp in his arms, just before she gives him her magical feather, and flies into the wings.

Later, in the long, slow Berceuse, she bourreed about the darkened stage, magically rolling the defeated monsters offstage and gave her blessing to Prince Ivan and the Princess he's rescued (Rachel Rutherford) as they depart for the glorious final wedding scene. The Firebird's left alone, and Sylve made the most of her final pose. Bourreing with her arms and head thrust back up and back behind her, suddenly she looked very avian indeed. Again, Sylve showed us she knows the value of stillness, and just before the wings she stopped in mid-bourree, balancing high on her pointes, and just held that pose for a glorious instant, before she bourreed offstage. Usually when I've imagined the Firebird's life after Ivan leaves, I think of her flitting about in this enchanted forest with the happy energy she shows in her opening solo, before Ivan captures here. Sylve made me wonder if that might now be a lonelier condition than before.

While the monsters, choreographed by Robbins, might've been a bit more high-spirited (they are supposed to enjoy being monsters!), Askegard was suitably awe-struck by his discoveries. Rachel Rutherford led her bevy of princesses with the kittenlike grace she's honed to a fine edge lately, and Henry Seth, practically invisible in Kastchei's guise as a giant beetle, dragged his garlands of captured princesses about with the exuberance of a miser counting his coins, before dying with gusto under Ivan's sword. The princesses, in their flowing dresses and ribbons, were beautiful as ever, and the Princess' wedding dress gleamed in a scarlet that made you wonder a bit if the Prince chose that color, and why.