Varying `shades' of ballet

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by Jon Adler

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Le Bayadère featured a number of technically excellent dancers, including relative newcomer Carlos Acosta, who performed amazing turns and jumps. He dances better than he walks, though. After a bow for a stunningly executed solo, he tripped over his own feet when he was making his exit. The audience was amused.

Bela Bartòk's The Miraculous Mandarin was the second item on the program. This rather remarkable piece featured Janie Parker as a prostitute who is hired by three thugs to lure men that they can rob. We see Parker bring in two potential victims, but, as it turns out, none of them have any money. The third man she attracts is Li Cunxin, a Mandarin who alternately frightens and attracts both herself and the audience. Parker and Cunxin, who I saw in Houston Ballet's recent production of Swan Lake , were much more convincing in this modern dance than they were in the longer Tchaikovsky program. They seemed to have suddenly learned how to act. Part of this is probably due to Stevenson's excellent choreography, which features elaborate, highly erotic movement for the ensemble of seven.

The program concluded with Jiri Kylián's imaginative Symphony in D , a satire of classical ballet set to two symphonies by Franz Joseph Haydn. Featuring male dancers groaning while lifting female dancers high above their heads and female dancers carrying some of the men around, Symphony in D was highly amusing. The farcical choreography questions traditional gender issues in ballet. At the same time, the pink and blue costumes (for the women and men respectively) serve as a reminder of the gender role that each dancer is supposed to have, and which we remember from the highly traditional piece which opened the program.

The program was well chosen and, particularly with Symphony in D , fun to watch. The dancers of the Houston Ballet seem to be much more suited to this type of mixed program than they do to the major productions such as their recent Swan Lake . This is because they lack, for the most part, the acting skills neccessary to sustain this sort of major piece.

Another gripe that I have was with the orchestra. The sound they create is not as full as I would hope. The soloists, particularly the violin, trumpet and french horn, are not quite good enough to successfully play their solo lines. Leaving Swan Lake , I remember complaining about them to my roommate. "They'd do better to use musicians from the Shepherd School of Music," one of us mentioned.

The costumes, lights and scenery were excellent; I particularly loved Tony Tucci's lighting for the opening of Le Bayadère . The technical side of the performance was only bogged down by the fact that no one ever bothered to mop the glossy black floor, so it was covered with a lot of dirt and scum. Not a pretty sight. You would think that if they charge upwards of $70 for some tickets, they could afford to pay someone to push around a mop.

This item appeared in the Arts & Entertainment section of the March 18, 1994 issue.

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