DIY Princess Takes Centre Stage in Canadian Premiere
Posted: October 19, 2012
Columns
Twyla Tharp’s The Princess and the Goblin co-produced by the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and the Atlanta Ballet at the Centennial Concert Hall, October 17, 2012
Reviewed by Stephanie Adamov
Twyla Tharp in rehearsal; photo by Charlie McCullers, courtesy Atlanta Ballet
Dancer, visionary, choreographer and storyteller, Twyla Tharp has already had audiences and dancers star-struck with her newest creation. Co-produced and already having had an opening with the Atlanta Ballet, her name precedes the title of The Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s seventy-third season opener, The Princess and the Goblin. This kick-starts artistic director Andre Lewis’ year of fairytales with The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty to follow suit.
Tharp’s name is synonymous with the infusion of ballet with modern dance. She continuously evolves in the performance world, constantly breaking boundaries in dance for all audiences. Her new ballet is no different.
Despite a technical stage difficulty abruptly halting this eighty-two minute Canadian premiere, most audience members were understanding. At the final bow, they even delivered the standing ovation as predicted by Andre Lewis in his pre-show address. However, the unclear narrative and several inconsistent choices had a sprinkling of audience members stay firmly seated at curtain call.
Building a dance narrative from a nineteenth-century fairytale of the same name by George McDonald, The Princess and the Goblin is at its heart a story about forgiveness, humility and the dreadfully sensitive feet of goblins.
How fitting for a dance narrative to take on the prestige of pointe and have the heroine, through dazzling skill, destroy the ghouls that reside beneath her kingdom. This heroine is far from the traditional repertoire of damsels in distress saturating many of the folktales to also be re-told within the same century.
Princess Irene takes charge from the curtain to close. Played by the vibrant and revered special guest principle, Paloma Herrera, she offers a jubilant presence to the stage. Clearly not the eight-year-old girl of the Victorian fairytale, Herrera’s character work and Tharp’s choreography create the illusion of a much younger dancer.
Through her adventures in the underworld we see Herrera mature in both her step and delivery. This eventually climaxes as she joins her male partner, Curdie, in action in their final pas de deux. Irene is assisted by her great-great-grandmother underplayed by Yayoi Ezawa as she appears in spiritual form to guide the young heroine.
Curdie, a commoner, is characterized through his oversized tunic designed by RWB’s Anne Armit. A boy desperately seeking to be treated like a man, Dmitri Dovgoselets seeks King Papa’s, Irene’s father’s, approval at the opening garden party. The arrogance and ignorance of King Papa causes Irene’s sisters to be abducted by the goblins and Irene and Curdie to take charge and rescue the ill-fated children when the adults won’t listen.
King Papa is played by special guest artist John Selya and spends much of the ballet in his solo attempts highlighted by the waxing and waning of the celestial light. He struggles to find the children and seek their forgiveness for his previous inaction.
The Goblins were more mischievous then menacing as they jumped and slinked about the stage, chasing the captive children. Half expecting more ghoulish makeup and facial embellishment, Armit’s choice in tattered rags of costumes allowed for a freedom and range of movement from the corps as the Tharp choreography took full effect. Each and every performer was admirably characterized, creating a collage of jazz, ballet, boxing and contemporary dance, amid this mosaic of movement. Their flexed footed extensions and diverse postures highlighted the range of skill these dancers have at portraying such an array of ghoulish characters.
The children, both from the Professional and Recreational Division of the RWB, were a first for Tharp (now 71) to include in her ballet. The use of street shoes for the children made it difficult for them to execute particular and simple ballet steps as they danced with their idols. The silent shoes of the RWB performers conflicted with the flat-footed running of the twenty-one aspiring young performers. Though the New York or Atlanta critics did not mention this difficulty, I found this to be quite the contrast in the performance.
The exhilarating combination of Franz Schubert’s music arranged and orchestrated by Richard Burke, and the hues, skillful shadows and beams of light arranged by award-winning lighting designer Donald Holder transformed the relatively bare stage. Caleb Levengood’s scenic design was supremely minimalistic. This design was a definite change of pace from the adorned drops and set pieces so commonly associated with the RWB’s Nutcracker or Romeo and Juliet. The fabric stalactites were perhaps my largest reservation with regards to the less than grand design. Descending from the Goblin’s cave dwelling, they tended to move about much like ribbons of fabric or tights in the wind on a clothesline when the corps of Goblins executed tour de force or even chose to interact with the set.
The King Goblin, played by commanding Yosuke Mino, and the assertive Queen of the Goblins, Sophia Lee, controlled most of the attention on and off stage. Lee’s dexterous entrance exalted her talent and legwork as she slowly and meticulously crawled to centre stage. Lee was most certainly a highlight and delight of this show.
The experience of witnessing Tharp’s piece was definitely a treat in spite of my issues with several aspects of the production. Despite the obvious technical difficulties and several questionable decisions, Twyla Tharp’s The Princess and the Goblin certainly foreshadows a shift in The Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s repertoire. The dependence on movement to tell the story is certainly a unique new destination for ballet as a whole. Extending repertoire will predictably diversify an aging audience. The infusion of diverse movement and range of dance talents adds to Tharp’s vision, which radiates through her choreography beyond the stage as well as the audience.
Twyla Tharp’s The Princess and the Goblin co-produced by the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and the Atlanta Ballet with accompaniment by the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra at the Centennial Concert Hall, 555 Main St. Showtimes: October 17-20 at 7:30 with an October 21st matinee at 2:00 pm.
DIY Princess Takes Centre Stage in Canadian Premiere
Columns
Twyla Tharp’s The Princess and the Goblin co-produced by the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and the Atlanta Ballet at the Centennial Concert Hall, October 17, 2012
Reviewed by Stephanie Adamov
Twyla Tharp in rehearsal; photo by Charlie McCullers, courtesy Atlanta Ballet
Dancer, visionary, choreographer and storyteller, Twyla Tharp has already had audiences and dancers star-struck with her newest creation. Co-produced and already having had an opening with the Atlanta Ballet, her name precedes the title of The Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s seventy-third season opener, The Princess and the Goblin. This kick-starts artistic director Andre Lewis’ year of fairytales with The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty to follow suit.
Tharp’s name is synonymous with the infusion of ballet with modern dance. She continuously evolves in the performance world, constantly breaking boundaries in dance for all audiences. Her new ballet is no different.
Despite a technical stage difficulty abruptly halting this eighty-two minute Canadian premiere, most audience members were understanding. At the final bow, they even delivered the standing ovation as predicted by Andre Lewis in his pre-show address. However, the unclear narrative and several inconsistent choices had a sprinkling of audience members stay firmly seated at curtain call.
Building a dance narrative from a nineteenth-century fairytale of the same name by George McDonald, The Princess and the Goblin is at its heart a story about forgiveness, humility and the dreadfully sensitive feet of goblins.
How fitting for a dance narrative to take on the prestige of pointe and have the heroine, through dazzling skill, destroy the ghouls that reside beneath her kingdom. This heroine is far from the traditional repertoire of damsels in distress saturating many of the folktales to also be re-told within the same century.
Princess Irene takes charge from the curtain to close. Played by the vibrant and revered special guest principle, Paloma Herrera, she offers a jubilant presence to the stage. Clearly not the eight-year-old girl of the Victorian fairytale, Herrera’s character work and Tharp’s choreography create the illusion of a much younger dancer.
Through her adventures in the underworld we see Herrera mature in both her step and delivery. This eventually climaxes as she joins her male partner, Curdie, in action in their final pas de deux. Irene is assisted by her great-great-grandmother underplayed by Yayoi Ezawa as she appears in spiritual form to guide the young heroine.
Curdie, a commoner, is characterized through his oversized tunic designed by RWB’s Anne Armit. A boy desperately seeking to be treated like a man, Dmitri Dovgoselets seeks King Papa’s, Irene’s father’s, approval at the opening garden party. The arrogance and ignorance of King Papa causes Irene’s sisters to be abducted by the goblins and Irene and Curdie to take charge and rescue the ill-fated children when the adults won’t listen.
King Papa is played by special guest artist John Selya and spends much of the ballet in his solo attempts highlighted by the waxing and waning of the celestial light. He struggles to find the children and seek their forgiveness for his previous inaction.
The Goblins were more mischievous then menacing as they jumped and slinked about the stage, chasing the captive children. Half expecting more ghoulish makeup and facial embellishment, Armit’s choice in tattered rags of costumes allowed for a freedom and range of movement from the corps as the Tharp choreography took full effect. Each and every performer was admirably characterized, creating a collage of jazz, ballet, boxing and contemporary dance, amid this mosaic of movement. Their flexed footed extensions and diverse postures highlighted the range of skill these dancers have at portraying such an array of ghoulish characters.
The children, both from the Professional and Recreational Division of the RWB, were a first for Tharp (now 71) to include in her ballet. The use of street shoes for the children made it difficult for them to execute particular and simple ballet steps as they danced with their idols. The silent shoes of the RWB performers conflicted with the flat-footed running of the twenty-one aspiring young performers. Though the New York or Atlanta critics did not mention this difficulty, I found this to be quite the contrast in the performance.
The exhilarating combination of Franz Schubert’s music arranged and orchestrated by Richard Burke, and the hues, skillful shadows and beams of light arranged by award-winning lighting designer Donald Holder transformed the relatively bare stage. Caleb Levengood’s scenic design was supremely minimalistic. This design was a definite change of pace from the adorned drops and set pieces so commonly associated with the RWB’s Nutcracker or Romeo and Juliet. The fabric stalactites were perhaps my largest reservation with regards to the less than grand design. Descending from the Goblin’s cave dwelling, they tended to move about much like ribbons of fabric or tights in the wind on a clothesline when the corps of Goblins executed tour de force or even chose to interact with the set.
The King Goblin, played by commanding Yosuke Mino, and the assertive Queen of the Goblins, Sophia Lee, controlled most of the attention on and off stage. Lee’s dexterous entrance exalted her talent and legwork as she slowly and meticulously crawled to centre stage. Lee was most certainly a highlight and delight of this show.
The experience of witnessing Tharp’s piece was definitely a treat in spite of my issues with several aspects of the production. Despite the obvious technical difficulties and several questionable decisions, Twyla Tharp’s The Princess and the Goblin certainly foreshadows a shift in The Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s repertoire. The dependence on movement to tell the story is certainly a unique new destination for ballet as a whole. Extending repertoire will predictably diversify an aging audience. The infusion of diverse movement and range of dance talents adds to Tharp’s vision, which radiates through her choreography beyond the stage as well as the audience.
Twyla Tharp’s The Princess and the Goblin co-produced by the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and the Atlanta Ballet with accompaniment by the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra at the Centennial Concert Hall, 555 Main St. Showtimes: October 17-20 at 7:30 with an October 21st matinee at 2:00 pm.