CHAPTER 25
Dance In Tucson
Stephanie Stigers, who had danced with me in the Civic Ballet, still
had her intense visions, but no longer was about to produce a
full-scale ballet about the Bolshevik revolution as she once had
tried to do. I did manage to insert a comic dance of my own as Groucho Marx, doing a tango in full get-up of false nose, horned rim glasses, overgrown eyebrows and cigar. It got plenty of laughs at the first rehearsal. Subsequent rehearsals went silent as by then they knew all the jokes! All stand-up comics are familiar with that experience.
Another ballet had me as a drunken tramp who had died, gone to
heaven and came down to earth periodically to visit and comfort my
sorrowful daughter. Quick scene changes back and forth from earth to
heaven were done with Stephanie’s off stage narration such as,
‘meanwhile, back in heaven” and suddenly the stage would be filled
with angels, en pointe. All this to Beethoven’s gigantic Choral
symphony!
Tucson Regional Ballet This ballet on Armenian themes would later become a kind of signature piece of mine and done all over the country, with great audience appeal. Here it served as just another vehicle for Linda’s students and with audiences made up of parents, relatives and friends, whose attention was directed only at their own. It was not an artistic atmosphere.
Like every other dance school, not only in Tucson but also across
the country, Linda decided to do a “Nutcracker”. I never told her
that my own “Nutcracker” 1967-1972 was the very first in the entire
State of Arizona and had opened the downtown Music Hall, Tucson’s
biggest professional theater. Or that in At interviews, Linda always told how she had suddenly had the idea to make her Nutcracker regional, but in truth, it was my idea. I was beyond seeking acclaim of any kind so let it pass. But she did have some fresh ideas of her own. Making it truly Southwest in look and flavor, the dancers appeared as Indian maidens, chili peppers, cactus, sage brush and all things associated with the Southwestern desert. The Mice battle became King Coyote and his army of Coyotes against the American Cavalry. I danced in this production as Drosselmeyer, but, as with the Colonial Nutcracker where I was more or less costumed as George Washington, in this Southwest version I became Tio Diago, a kind of El Zorro character, with cape, mask and sword. The Nutcracker doll I carried was dressed as Union soldier, or perhaps it was a Confederate soldier. At any rate, it won a National prize and ended up on the White House Christmas tree in Washington, DC.
Meanwhile, I was staging “Le Carnaval” and “Cinderella” in New Jersey. “Cinderella” as a full, three-act version, took a month for me to stage. Although elaborate, with professionals from Manhattan in the lead roles, it was a school production, therefore, rehearsals were mainly held on weekends. Traditionally, the two ugly sisters are played by men. As luck would have it, one broke his ankle during dress rehearsal. The other one dropped out. I had to get a replacement in a hurry. On a rainy evening before the opening performance, in New York City, I hurriedly rehearsed one of the Balletfore dancers. As he had to perform all night in a rock band he got no sleep, but appeared in New Jersey the next day, a half hour before curtain. He took over the role perfectly, in fact, far better than the original dancer. That left the other role empty. There was no other solution than for me to step in and do it. It was my third appearance in a drag role, this time in pink! I vowed it would be my last.
Although I had staged my “Firebird” several times for various companies, the first being for the New York Theater Ballet, I always felt the one I did in Tucson for Linda’s company was the best. I had an wonderful Firebird in Sabrina Vasquez and two excellent mimes as Kashchi’s leading monsters.
Ballet Arts Ensemble Here was an opportunity to choreograph “Upstairs Downstairs” that I so long had in mind to do. I based it on the BBC award-winning TV series of the same name, the episode when King Edward the Seventh comes to dinner at the Bellamy household in 1910. I had no profound message. I just laid it out before the audience. If anything, I wanted to evoke an era in an English household that happened to be aristocratic.
The Bellamy residence was a house divided, by wealth. Upstairs, all
was spacious elegance. Downstairs it was bare, scrubbed and crowded.
I found the downstairs servants more interesting balletically.
Downstairs with the servants, there was for more opportunity for
dancing. For the entire household, As Americans, we may find it difficult to relate to this class system. Even in England it had for the most part disappeared, although when I lived in London during the 60s, it still lingered on. Certainly in the ballet company I was then dancing with, we dancers were still considered, in certain upper class circles, as second class citizens and of ill repute. The ballet is a blend of reality and stylization. I used care in fulfilling the particular characteristics of the individual roles, but perhaps relied too much on the audience having seen the TV series. When I re-staged it in Santa Barbara, California, one critic complained that it had no focus. He must have been blind. The main focus was Rose, the leading character. The ballet opens with Rose, It ends with Rose. Everything is focused on her. Rose has stayed on through thick and thin. During her ‘tea cup variation’ [an entire variation danced while drinking a cup of tea] she has a letter in her pocket from her one great love, who has just been killed in the World War 1914-1918 then going on. But she’s resourceful, all enduring. She outlasts them all. At the finale, when I had all the characters freeze in poses, Rose enters with her suitcase, kisses each one in turn and leaves the Bellamy household for good. Sarah is beguiling. She’s aware of her effect on men. She once had an affair with James from ‘upstairs’ and in fact, bore his illegitimate child. Of course, this would be impossible to convey in a ballet. In spite of this, she is happy and lively. She is only too glad to have the attentions of Thomas, the chauffer. This I made into a loving pas de deux, ending with her accepting his proposal. Ruby, the scullery maid is not too bright, and happy to have such a home. In her dreams of silent film star Rudolph Valentino, she completely lets loose all inhibitions and becomes seductive and alluring, not the drab, plain creature that she really is. For her I made a comic pas de deux, patterned after “Spectre de la Rose”. She falls asleep in a chair with Valentino’s picture. A dream Valentino leaps in through the window and they go into a comic tango.
Mrs. Bridges the cook, is a bully but a kindly one. She is basically
kind-hearted, but irascible. For her I created a jig, which she
falls into when angry, or when street urchins come in asking for
something to eat. King Edward enters at the very end. I wondered how I could get him downstairs. He was a gambler and a womanizer, so it wouldn’t have been that unusual for him to come downstairs to the kitchen to compliment the cook, though all heads are lowered on his entrance.
I had searched all over for proper music to fit the period.
Naturally, I thought first of Gilbert and Sullivan, but just by
chance, in a London record shop I came across some music by Joseph
Horowitz. It fit perfectly.
Dance Southwest For a company that she was starting, very much like the old Tucson Civic Ballet in form and function. I helped set for her a “Sleeping Beauty” - teaching all variations, and a revival of “Khatchaturiana” that was performed at the University. She did a beautiful ballet version of “A Christmas Carol” to Glazunov’s “The Seasons” music. In this I played Scrooge. It went on for several years during the holiday season. It recalled my life in England, dancing with Ballets Minerva on endless tours throughout the United Kingdom. Ballets Minerva also did “A Christmas Carol” to music by Smetana and Berlioz. Then being much younger, in that version I danced a ‘barrow boy’ selling hot potatoes with a demanding variation, and ‘the young Scrooge’.
Petrushka The next time I saw it on the stage was when I was on the staff of American Ballet Theater. This ABT production was staged by Fokine himself in 1941 and kept intact by Dimitri Romanoff who had danced in it. “Dima” and I became good friends. We sat together at rehearsals and often talked about Petrushka. During every performance I would stand in the wings and watch every detail.of the choreography and study how the scenery, an exact reproduction of the Benois design, was put together.
Petrushka originated in the mind of its composer, Igor Stravinsky.
According to him, his search for a title ended with the sudden
realization that the real subject was the puppet Petrushka, a kind
of Russian equivalent of Punch. The sound of a drum calls attention to a curtained booth in the middle of the stage. The old Showman appears and shows the crowd his three puppets: the Ballerina, the Blackamoor and the sad-faced Petrushka. They perform a dance, marionette like, in which Petrushka and the Moor are rivals for the Ballerina’s love.
After a blackout, we see Petrushka’s cell. He is bemoaning his fate,
his hopeless love for the Ballerina, his subservience to his master,
the Showman. His heart beats in his puppet body. He has a soul.
The Ballerina enters and they do a flirtatious dance, but they are
interrupted by the lovelorn Petrushka. The Moor throws him out.
Horrified, the crowd calls for the Showman, who picks up the body to
reveal it is nothing but a puppet made of sawdust. The crowd drifts
away and the Showman slowly makes his way homeward, dragging the
puppet behind him. Suddenly, above the puppet booth the ghost of
Petrushka appears, mocking the Showman who runs from the scene in
fear. Petrushka becomes lifeless again and swings helplessly over
the edge of the booth as the curtain falls.
I danced the leading Coachman role while snow began to fall. Starting by beating my body to keep warm, I did all the squat kicks and Russian tricks required. Photo: Backstage of me and partner Kathleen Schwartzman as gypsy
I enjoyed dancing this role.
Of course, being a school production with students of Jane’s studio, the audience again was basically made up of parents, relatives and friends. The fascinating history of this ballet and the Diaghilev/Nijinsky era that it came from was beyond them. I thought it would be a good idea to have a pre-curtain talk about the ballet and its origins, which helped some, but basically they were there only to see their teen-age children. It was extremely doubtful if they had ever heard of Stravisnky, Diaghileff, Fokine, or Nijinsky, let alone Petrushka. The early 20th Century creative geniuses meant nothing to them. They did understand and laugh at the rude gestures I made, as Petrushka’s ghost, to the Showman at the end of the ballet, swinging from the top of the puppet theater. But the ballet mainly served only as a show-piece for their offspring and what mattered most was that their children should be seen downstage. I’m not saying Tucson audiences are ignorant, only that, other than their own children’s participation, amateur ballet, no matter how expert it may be, is low on their list of priorities.
A Post-Script On Petrushka “Who are you”? was his reply. I had just danced the title role and had even coached his daughter, yet he hadn’t a clue of who I was. Even though an immense amount of work went into producing this “Petrushka” and making it as authentic as possible, it was shown before audiences of know-nothings. I felt as a voice in the wilderness. True, there are other voices far stronger than mine that are unacknowledged. How dare I lift up my voice in the wilderness of the artistically unconscious? I am sure I am not moved by egotism or arrogance, but simply out of my deep love of dance. Our society promotes knowledge of commerce and sports but not the arts, and this is both regrettable and evident. At least I could be personally satisfied. My life-long dream of dancing Petrushka, even if at a late date in my life, had materialized. |
The role of Petrushka was danced by P.J. Mann who had been on
Broadway in “A Chorus Line” and had retired to Tucson. She did it
beautifully, though it could be easily seen by the audience that it
was a woman.
I danced what I think were reasonably good performances, in fact,
remarkable for my age. Most dancers who had danced the role had been
in their 20s. The famous cell scene I found physically not difficult
to dance. It is mainly acting, with pathos. My main concern was
whether I could go directly into the cell scene, after spending all
my energy on the dance preceding it. I need not have worried. It all
came out fine.
