{"id":1213,"date":"2011-05-24T19:54:39","date_gmt":"2011-05-24T23:54:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=1213"},"modified":"2011-10-11T16:32:21","modified_gmt":"2011-10-11T20:32:21","slug":"the-seven-deadly-sins-at-city-ballet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=1213","title":{"rendered":"The Seven Deadly Sins at City Ballet"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Rachel Straus<\/strong><\/p>\n

New York City Ballet\u2019s new staging of\u00a0 “The Seven Deadly Sins,\u201d which had its premiere at the company\u2019s spring gala on May 11,\u00a0 puts Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht\u2019s dark, sinister \u201cballet chant\u00e9\u201d of 1933 into a new context:\u00a0a tinsel-town soundstage, complete with unison hoofers in the grand finale.\u00a0Choreographer Lynn Taylor-Corbett, whose credits include Broadway\u2019s \u201cSwing,\u201d has essentially created a Cliff Notes version of this irony-laced yarn, dragging\u00a0 principal dancer Wendy Whelan and guest artist Patti Lapone through seven shallow scenes of human transgression and stripping the work of its brooding soul.<\/p>\n

In the original 1933 production, choreographed by George Balanchine for Les Ballets 1933, singer Lotte Lenya and dancer Tilly Losch were presented as Anna I and II, yin yang composites of the same woman. The fact that Lenya and Losch bore a striking resemblance to each other, and were about the same age, probably helped Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht\u2019s scenario. It concerns the Annas experiencing seven American cities, encountering seven \u201cdeadly\u201d sins, and struggling with each other\u2019s opposite personalities.<\/p>\n

When Balanchine revived the work in 1958, he cast the 21-year-old Allegra Kent across from the significantly older Lenya. New York Times<\/em> dance critic John Martin dubbed the production\u00a0 \u201ca stunning revival of a minor masterpiece.\u201d But not all critics concurred, though the vision of Kent carried aloft on a human-size plate wearing just lingerie lingered in the mind, says dance writer Deborah Jowitt.<\/p>\n

Balanchine was never afraid of being naughty. He also wasn\u2019t afraid of \u201cSeven Deadly\u201d dissapearing after its run. No one filmed the performance. This may say more about what Balanchine thought of his \u201cminor masterpiece\u201d than City Ballet\u2019s capacity to film performances in the 1950s. But this point is conjecture.<\/p>\n

Now flash forward\u00a060 years. At a City Ballet studio event, Lynn Taylor-Corbett suggests to Peter Martins that she make a reintepreted revival of \u201cSeven Deadly Sins.\u201d With a penchant for commercially-driven projects, Martins agrees to the venture and to Taylor-Corbett\u2019s casting of the matronly-looking Patty Lapone, who sings like a battle ax, and the bone-thin Wendy Whelan, who dances like a steely wraith. The hope was that the project would bring in new audiences (read Broadway ticket holders). At the gala, I did see Matthew Broderick arm and arm with his wife Sarah Jessica Parker.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, on stage Whelan and Lapone never formed a convincing relationship, twin-like, sisterly, or otherwise. Lapone mostly stood on the sidelines, serving as singing narrator. Whelan danced Taylor-Corbett\u2019s forgettable choreography, becoming a pawn rather than a protagonist in the rapidly unfolding events.<\/p>\n

The greatest interest in Taylor-Corbett\u2019s ballet was Beowulf Boritt\u2019s sets of seven cities. In Memphis, where the sin is \u201cPride,\u201d Whelan flitted about in imitation of Isadora Duncan during an audition for a sleeze-style cabaret. The black and red d\u00e9cor said bordello, as did the lighting by Jason Kantrowitz. In San Francisco, where the sin was \u201cEnvy,\u201d Boritt\u2019s backdrop of quaint Victorian row houses against a boundless blue sky was enviable. In Baltimore, where the sin was \u201cGreed,\u201d Boritt created a salon, channelling both Phillipe Starck\u2019s overblown modernism and the Belle Epoque\u2019s love of patterns. From two gargantuan black and white striped, tasseled love seats, Anna\u2019s overfed suitors embarked on a mutually fatal duel.<\/p>\n

As for Taylor-Corbett\u2019s choreography, it lacked movement invention or good movement imitation. In Boston, where the sin was \u201cLust,\u201d Whelan and Craig Hall peformed a romantic pas de deux.\u00a0 Muscular and in a wife beater, Hall looked like Marlon Brando in Elia Kazan\u2019s film version of \u201cStreet Car Named Desire.\u201d He lifted Whelan aloft in shapes and transitions that looked exactly like moments in Christopher Wheeldon\u2019s \u201cAfter the Rain\u201d\u2014which Whelan and Hall perform frequently.<\/p>\n

Following the performance, this reviewer read the Brecht text, which was translated into English by W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman. What crystalized from the text, but not from Taylor-Corbett\u2019s production, is that the production hinges on demonstrating the conflict between the Annas: Anna I wants money and power; Anna II wants love and a creative outlet. Also, Anna II allows Anna I to push her around. But only in the last scene of Taylor-Corbett’s work is their conflict delivered without a doubt and Anna II emerges triumphant. As Anna II\u00a0 (Whelan) collapses in front of her families\u2019 spiffy new home, Anna I (Lapone) walks up the stairs in a mink, looking like a character from \u201cThe Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.\u201d<\/p>\n

The gala\u2019s second half was devoted to Balanchine\u2019s \u201cVienna Waltzes,\u201d which premiered at the 1977 City Ballet gala.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t care for the music of Johann Strauss II, Franz Lehar, or Richard Strauss or for watching a carousel vision of dancers waltzing for 46 minutes, this ballet may not be for you. But despite the work\u2019s repetitiousness, \u201cWaltzes\u201d is visual spendor at its finest;\u00a0 Karinska\u2019s five sets of costumes, ranging from full-skirted 1860s crinoline ball gowns to sleek white silk Roaring Twenties dresses are a fashionista\u2019s delight.<\/p>\n

In the pit, Clotilde Otranto energetically conducted such ditties as the \u201cExplosions-Polka\u201d and excerpts from \u201cDer Rosenkavalier.\u201d Principals Maria Korowski, Jennifer Ringer and Megan Fairchild demonstrated their strikingly differing styles through the same steps. That said all City Ballet dancers waltz with a brilliant elegance.<\/p>\n