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On May 22 at the Metropolitan Opera House, Thomas performed Lar Lubovitch’s 1997 Othello with American Ballet Theatre. Thomas and Lubovitch share the experience of being ABT foreigners. Lubovitch, a modern-dance choreographer, recalled in a PBS interview pitching ABT artistic director Kevin McKenzie about “taking the existing form of the romantic story ballet and seeing if I could carry it a step further, and unite it as well with the shape of modern dance.” In McKenzie’s office, Lubovitch realized his decision to do an Othello was personal. The first professional dance Lubovitch saw was Jose Limon’s Moor’s Pavane, which tells Shakespeare’s story in masterful abbreviation. At the late age of 19, it inspired Lubovitch to make a career in dance. Lubovitch plots Othello’s complex story line the same way Limon advanced his: by using a dance form with historical significance and making it the lynchpin to unite the ballet’s elements—steps, scenery, music and characters. Limon chose the court dance called the Pavane. He contrasted its stately grandeur, where couples lightly touch fingers and mirror each other’s movement, against the characters’ machinations that occur behind each other’s backs. Lubovitch chose the tarantella—a southern Italian dance in 6/8-time, which gets faster and faster and whose speed and frenzy purportedly cured a tarantula spider’s poisonous bite. In Act II, the Tarantella begins with ABT corps dancer Sarawanee Tanatanit moving in swirling lusciousness, in soft shoes and trailing raven black hair. Her solo infects the townspeople. Othello becomes infected too. But it is Iago who dispenses Othello’s particular brand of poison: jealousy. He is made to believe that his wife Desdemona is having an affair with his favorite ensign Cassio. He transforms from a doting husband to a physically explosive madman.

Because Lubovitch’s ballet hinges on one dancer’s ability to convey the state of being slowly poisoned, it’s a monster role. To ambitious dancers like Thomas, the role is doubly alluring because it’s about being an outsider, something that Thomas knows on a gut level. In 2002, Dance Magazine quoted him as saying that “he preferred to be independent of organizational bureaucracy, outmoded traditions, and choreography selected by others.” At the time, Thomas had finished an unsatisfying four-month stint at The Kirov Ballet, where he wasn’t chosen for major roles and where he consequently felt sidelined. Since that time Thomas has not joined a company, preferring to freelance and perform as a guest artist.

Though an understanding of being an outsider is key to playing Othello, it may not be ideal for performing the role, which requires constant interaction with other dancers. Thomas’ freelance lifestyle doesn’t permit him time to develop relationships with dancers on stage. When he performed across from Xiomara Reyes, who danced Desdemona, he didn’t appear to be in love with her as much as in love with the idea of playing Othello. In Act III, Thomas cradled Xiomara in his arms and set her down on the floor so awkwardly all 90 pounds of her bounced. In Act I, Thomas did a lot of smiling while interacting with Iago, played by Carlos Lopez, and Cassio, played by Jared Matthews. I didn’t, however, see him demonstrate any of the affection for Cassio, which enrages Iago, and sets the plot spinning toward its tragic end.
 

Rasta Thomas and Xiomara Reyes in Lar Lubovitch’s Othello
© MIRA

Truth is Thomas slept walked through his acting and dancing until he was given the opportunity to dance alone. This happened in Act II. Then his energy and enthusiasm ramped from 0 to 60, making him look like a bull in a china shop. In his first solo, Thomas tore at his hair, bulged his eyes, threw himself into jumps and dropped to his knees. He looked supremely confident, but it felt like overkill in contrast to how he danced with others: mannerly, a bit stiff and careful.

Fortunately, Thomas’ lack didn’t ruin the ballet. There is so much to it. In Act I, George Tsypin’s scenery introduces the ballet’s psychologically layered world through a series of sliding glass panels. The first one shows Thomas alone on his knees in Muslim prayer. The second reveals the court dancers mingling among marble columns and below a frescoed ceiling painted gold and blue. The third panel introduces Desdemona as she walks out from a church nave to marry Othello. In Act II, a gargantuan ship is projected on the Met’s vast cyclorama. It “arrives” into port when two ABT corps dancers haul 100-foot ropes across the stage from the theater’s flies. Then Iago appears on a gangplank, moving out from stage right like a New World conqueror.

Composer Elliott Goldenthal’s commissioned score also has its brilliant moments. The composer, who won an Oscar for the sound score of Frida, transforms Act III from the dire scene where Othello strangles Desdemona to an oral treatise on the power of love. “The music brings into death the way it brought her into love,” said Goldenthal in a PBS interview. This occurs through a duet for harp and the Armonica, played by Cecilia Brauer. The duet’s high-pitched tones during Desdemona’s last gasps for air have a serenity and ethereal coolness that sounded holy.

Lubovitch’s choreography for Othello and Desdemona’s last pas is also super-subtle. It shattered all former visions I had of how violent death should look. As Thomas lunges toward Xiomara, she skimmed the floor with bourrees moving backward and arms hanging lifeless. She looked like a sale at half-mast. When Thomas circled Xiomara, she reminded me of a deer being stalked by a predator, who knowing death is near, awaits it with sacrificial patience. In the final moments, Thomas lifted Xiomara by her throat. Then she extended and wrapped her legs around his pelvis. Not struggling, she floated her four limbs outward as though free falling through space. The moment that Thomas “strangled” her, she was soaring like a bird. When the deed was done, her feet stood on air.

Like great ballet, Lubovitch’s choreography momentarily transcended concerns of the flesh. If Thomas could transcend his desire for having it all, he too could move audiences to their feet—not only for his chutzpah but for his investment in his roles.