Performance Reviews | THE 109th BEAD

From the moment I heard that Paris Opera Ballet was coming to the U.S., I immediately began a daily search for information. The tour is basically three stops – Harris Theater in Chicago, the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and Lincoln Center in New York. I was going to see them – period. PERIOD. Harris Theater was the first to post information regarding tickets. I love Chicago so POB in Chi-town sounded like good times. Package deals went on sale first, so I bought a “French” package that included seeing the Trocks earlier this year and then tickets for both programs. I usually like to see casting for a production and then buy tickets accordingly but casting wasn’t up and for goodness sake, its POB!

I was not to be disappointed. My Giselle was Dorothée Gilbert and my Albrecht was Stéphane Bullion. I’ve long thought Dorothée to be completely lovely and I love Stéphane. Did you know that he is a cancer survivor? Truly, he’s a hero in more ways than one. Hilarion was danced by Vincent Chaillet and Myrtha by Emilie Cozette (isn’t that just the cutest name ever?!).

You might remember that I told you about Harris Theater back in January with my Trocks review so I’ll keep that short and sweet. Back in January I wondered how POB would even fit Giselle on this stage! Harris stage is nice but feels small for a huge company like POB and in truth, it was a tad bit teeny. Some of the diagonals were right up to the end of the stage, they didn’t have to do the “ballet run” off the end of the stage because they pretty much danced right up to the end up of it. Fortunately no one danced right off but there were a couple of close calls, whoa!

The sets were very French fairytale, that is, not Disney fairytale, but a little darker, a little more realistic, and heavier. Everything was quite gorgeous. Dorothée is a wide-eyed doe, lovely and elegant, she brings innocence and happiness to her Act I Giselle. There are glimpses of Elizabeth Platel in her feet and Monique Loudieres in her upper body. You see the proof of traditions of Paris Opera in her dancing. And when she get’s her crazy on, you are simply riveted, unable to take your eyes from her, knowing her fate and absolutely fearing for her.

Stéphane is a truly masculine dancer, capable of both a prince and a villain. There is music in his every movement, his walking is dancing. There is something very minimalist about his dancing that tells the story without ever being overly dramatic or too much in any way, it’s always just enough. His lines are intensely beautiful. Does he love Giselle or is he playing with her heart? He is flirty, then gently loving, he is mortified when Bathilde shows up and devastated in Giselle’s death.

The Wilis… oh, the Wilis!!! So intensely, incredibly beautiful, I had tears in my eyes. It is beyond me to put into words the perfection of the Wilis, the sadness, the anger, the coldness but also the desperation born of heartbreak. The dance of the Wilis was one of the most emotional moments that I have ever experienced in a theater seat. As Giselle dances to protect Albrecht, to save him, to beg for him, to gift him not only with his life but with her forgiveness, dawn breaks and the Wilis depart leaving Albrecht alone, barely alive but knowing what true love really is.

So my ballet class has been threatening to all get together to go see a performance. A few people did it once before, a venue here in LA set up a link so that you could buy group tickets on your own. That way you could buy tickets as a group but not necessarily sit together. They went to see NYCB. I didn’t go because that was the night that I was going to go see boys in tights, hot men dancing, you know… Kings of the Dance. At any rate, the Los Angeles Music Center doesn’t do the link thingy. You can buy group tickets that aren’t together, but you have to buy them from the box office all at one time. FYI, in case you ever want to do that, they are very nice and very efficient and the savings is substantial. Anyway… I posted a “hey let’s do this” onto Facebook and got enough positive interest that I asked the Awesomest Ballet Teacher (formerly known as the Awesome Ballet Teacher) if he wanted to organize a field trip. You know how when you suggest something you end up being in charge of it? Yeah, that happened. Long story short, we got a group of 16 people together for an evening at the Dorothy Chandler Theatre to go see some ballet!

It was the second performance by the Bolshoi Ballet of a four night run. Our cast included Ekaterina Krysanova as Odette-Odile, Rusian Skvortsov as Prince Siegfried, Vladislav Lantratov as the Evil Genius (known to us as Von Rothbart, doesn’t translate into Russian perhaps?), and Denis Medvedev as the Fool (who we more magnanimously refer to as the Jester). It was a gorgeous production – luscious costumes, beautiful sets and lighting, good tempo, and nice storytelling. The dancing was pure Russian, high jumps, torso’s pulled up to the sky, wicked fast footwork and meticulously perfect corp work. That’s not to say there weren’t any mistakes but that’s something that makes live performances so awesome. When Ekaterina was doing her 32 pirouettes she started to lean over somewhere abound the 12th one or so and bam like a warrior, pulled back up straight and finished them coming forward on the stage. Gorgeousness. To see that kind of strength was just so amazing. Then during the swans sequence, one of the swans bit it, she fell right on the floor. But instantly she bounced back up and within seconds, literally, seconds she was right back in synch and we completely forgot which one almost ate marley floor. It’s really inspirational for a ballet student to realize that ballerina’s don’t always get it perfect, but they fight for it and they can win!

And when it was over, we all stood around sharing that goofy smile that only yummy ballet can give you and we chatted in the plaza with a ballet glow that rivaled the twinkle lights in the trees and fountain. It was a great evening and one that I hope we repeat and often. I’ve said before that I believe watching ballet to be an important part of studying ballet as a dancer. I think it’s another plus in learning to attend the ballet with the people that you study with! We had some great conversations, the Awesomest Ballet Teacher talked about it in class today, and I’m sure that we’ll be talking about it for weeks, months, to come!