American Ballet Theatre / Metropolitan Opera House, NYC / October 20 – November 7, 2004 Le Spectre de la Rose is a nine-minute ballet choreographed by Michel Fokine in 1911 for Vaslav Nijinsky and Tamara Karsavina. It is set to Carl Maria von Weber’s Invitation to the Dance and based on a poem by Gautier that opens “I am the spirit of the rose / That you wore last night at the ball.” A young woman, having danced in society, comes home to her Biedermeier boudoir. The ecstatic dreams of young romance surround her like a perfume. She … [Read more...]

American Ballet Theatre / City Center, NYC / October 20 – November 7, 2004 It doesn’t matter how many classics a ballet company harbors in its repertory. If it doesn’t have new work to show, it’s dead in the water when it comes to ticket sales. The audience, so goes the theory, lusts for the new—as, by the way, do the dancers, but that’s another story. Advertising is based on premieres, as is the general buzz. Should the subject of dance come up outside the tiny circle of certified aficionados, “Have you seen?” or “What … [Read more...]

Basil Twist: Symphonie Fantastique / Dodger Stages, NYC / ongoingMark Dendy: choreography for Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte / Metropolitan Opera House, NYC / October 8, 11, 15, 18, and 21, 2004; April 5, 13, 16, 20, and 23, 2005 The idea of Basil Twist’s Symphonie Fantastique is magical: You’re sitting in this small neo-Bauhaus black-box theater—one of five spaces at the new, ingenious Dodger Stages complex on West 50th Street. And you’re staring in anticipation at an oversize fish tank or, if you will, a Lilliputian aquarium. … [Read more...]

Johannes Wieland / Diane von Furstenberg the Theatre, NYC / October 7-10, 2004 Johannes Wieland opened his recent concert with his 2002 Parietal Region, which, for the uninitiated, might serve neatly as Wieland 101. As this piece reveals, the choreographer, whose stern aesthetic may be related to the Bauhaus movement in his native Germany, favors austere architectural settings and groupings, along with a parallel emotional reticence. Frederica Nascimento’s set for the piece features six austerely white boxes, two of which, with … [Read more...]

Molissa Fenley and Dancers / The Kitchen, NYC / September 29 – October 9, 2004 More than a quarter-century after Molissa Fenley first appeared on the postmodern dance scene, an oddity in her way of moving—apparent throughout the cycles of solos and group works she’s choreographed—remains a distinct personal signature. She holds her hands sharply angled at the wrist, palms very flat, fingers tight together, thumb joined to them or splayed outward. This articulation, at once awkward and graceful, is accompanied by an … [Read more...]