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Bourne's "Swan Lake" in SF
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Matthew Bourne's male-swan version of "Swan Lake" is finally coming to San Francisco. I talked to Bourne for the Chronicle:
"It's played Paris and Tokyo and kept London audiences queuing around the block. It's been a smash hit on Broadway and in Los Angeles and left an impression on millions of viewers who loved the film "Billy Elliot." And yet Matthew Bourne's "Swan Lake" -- the famous version featuring powerful, bare-chested men instead of the usual flock of ballerinas en pointe -- has never been performed in the Bay Area. In fact, surprisingly little of Bourne's work has.
"That's going to change, I hope," the 46-year-old British choreographer and director says as he settles into an armchair at the Clift Hotel, parting the drapes to view a city he has rarely had occasion to visit. "I've always felt 'Swan Lake' would do well here. Sometimes people say, 'Please, why don't you come' to someplace or other and you think, 'Er' ... but I'm so glad we're coming to San Francisco now because I feel it's the right place for the work."
"Now" is a decade after "Swan Lake's" wildly received premiere, on an international tour. Why such a long wait for the most popular work by Britain's most popular contemporary choreographer? Strangely, Bourne's oeuvre has never gained a foothold in the Bay Area. In 2001, Cal Performances brought "The Car Man," his noir twist on the Bizet opera, to UC Berkeley, to a warm reception, but when Bourne's "Nutcracker!" came in 2004, ticket sales tanked. So Cal Performances canceled its 2005 presentation of Bourne's breakthrough "Play Without Words" -- and yet again Los Angeles fans lauded a Bourne production while San Franciscans missed out.
"Swan Lake" should reverse that trend. Set in a modern-day England where the Queen keeps Corgis and the Prince takes to a vulgar girl who bears more than a passing resemblance to Sarah Ferguson, "Swan Lake" brought Bourne huge audiences and fame in 1995 and became a contemporary classic. Dozens of choreographers have tinkered with the story, but none have created an image as widely resonant as Bourne's menacing winged men pecking mercilessly at an aristocrat who yearns for freedom.
"It's proved to be a great trailblazer for our work," Bourne says. "It constantly amazes me, the audience reaction. Always we get this roar -- we call it 'the "Swan Lake" roar' -- at the end of the show. It's an incredible thing that happens, and it doesn't matter who's playing the lead, what bobbles we had, anything. It always gets that reaction." "
Click here for the full story.
March 12, 2006 · 09:08 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
SF Ballet's "Faun"
My review of San Francisco Ballet's all-Robbins program hit the stands in the Chronicle today; the paper's website gives it the unfortunate headline "Mediocre Faun." That sounds harsher than what I wrote, which was simply that Yuan Yuan Tan was not the best pick for the part:
"These are famous roles boasting a long line of illustrious interpreters; small wonder Tuesday's cast looked tentative. Ruben Martin made a solid first effort, fittingly naive as the beguiled boy, arching languorously into the poses that recall Nijinsky's orgasmic faun. But Yuan Yuan Tan's interpretation stressed narcissism over vulnerability, and the full risk of Martin's impulsive peck on the cheek missed its impact. I'm keen to see Rachel Viselli and Sarah Van Patten try the part. "
I saw Van Patten in the role last night opposite Moises Martin; the pair was ravishing, the "fragile atmosphere" of the ballet, as Deborah Jowitt called it in her lecture last night, was restored, and I felt confirmed in my disappointment on opening night. With her impossibly long, lithe lines and elegant reticence, Tan is too much an idealized creature to be believed as a flesh-and-blood young dancer. Her gymnastic developpes at the bar made you gawk at her flexibility, not feel the tension of the story unfolding. Whereas Van Patten, one of the most naturalistic dancer-actresses I've ever seen, was a rich character: naive, self-absorbed, even a little bobbling in her unsupported developpe a la seconde. She and Moises Martin had wonderful chemistry, and when he kissed her you felt the shock of the idealized sexuality of ballet made corporeal. This was truly the cast to see.
March 09, 2006 · 10:15 AM · Dance · Comments (0)
Speaking of Deborah Jowitt--and with San Francisco Ballet's All-Robbins program opening tomorrow night--it's well worth noting that Jowitt will be lecturing on Jerome Robbins Wednesday at 6 at the Main Library's Koret Auditorium. Jowitt's biography of Robbins cane out in paperback last year. The lecture is free; click here for more info.
March 06, 2006 · 07:16 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
Entrances and Exits at ODC
My review of ODC's opening gala hit the Chronicle today:
"ODC/Dance Artistic Director Brenda Way may run her company with a socialist, counterculture spirit, but she knows a marketing coup when she sees one. For the troupe's 35th anniversary season, which opened with a gala Thursday, she invited former San Francisco Ballet principal Joanna Berman to dance the duet in Way's "Part of a Longer Story." It's a tribute to both Berman and the company's artistry that her performance was exquisite without ever overwhelming the considerable ensemble charisma now on display at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theater.
Worthier star vehicles are difficult to think of; Way's 1993 duet (the opening section was added in 1995, the closing in 2002, hence the title) ranks among her finest works. Set to Mozart's Clarinet Concerto in A, it uses whimsical gesture like throwaway seasoning -- a dash of wiggling hand here, a pinch of bobbling head there -- yet it's the accrued movement motifs that steadily tug at the heart.
The tentative, testing dance of intimacy Berman shares with Brandon "Private" Freeman is built around a turn in attitude -- one leg bent behind, arms reaching straight as an arrow until one hand grabs the foot. When, after Berman has begun to succumb to his pull, she grabs that back foot and then releases it as though she's touched a hot stove, it communicates more clearly than the most passionate embrace. That's the suggestive power of masterful formalism.
Berman and Freeman gave the duet the dramatic shadings of love in all its complexities. Both have technique to spare, but the virtuosity here was in the subtle emotional shifts, she at first fighting her attraction but ultimately panting with longing; he tender and then, in the way even caring men can be when they've won what they wanted, retracting. And it was all in the dancing, not the acting. When Freeman pulled Berman into a balletic supported retiré on a surge in the music, the clarity of shape and intention was captivating.
With a duet of such intensity, perhaps it's natural that the first and second movements would feel like incidental bookends, even with a spirited solo performance by retiring 15-year veteran Brian Fisher. In truth, the choreography does not rise to the standard of Way's own pas de deux sets. And in fact, the rest of the program will probably be remembered more for the dancing than the dances. "
Click here for the full review.
March 04, 2006 · 12:52 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
Critics and Choreographers
I'm giving a guest lecture on dance criticism tomorrow afternoon at San Francisco State University, and while I'll be taking a mostly nuts-and-bolts approach, it's rather nice timing that Deborah Jowitt's interview with Tere O'Connor should come out this week. Its hook is O'Connor's angry letter to New Yorker critic Joan Acocella and his contention that critics should enter into in-depth conversation with choreographers so as to approach reviewing the work through the lens of the choreographer's intentions. Jowitt respectfully objects to this methodology, while Acocella, John Rockwell, and Jennifer Dunning weigh in with their ideas of the critic's role. I'll be passing this article out to the students. It's a must-read.
UPDATE: Downtown Dancer follows up with further provocations.
March 02, 2006 · 11:38 PM · Dance · Comments (0)
