ABT 2016 - La Fille mal gardee

This summer's ballet season is especially exciting for me because I'm seeing all sorts of ballets I've heard about but have never seen before.  It's good that I've had other things to think about in this first post-Julie season.  I enjoyed seeing Ratmansky's new piece a couple of weeks ago and I'm looking forward to seeing  his new setting of an old ballet next week. Last night was my first time seeing a Frederick Ashton ballet I've long read about but knew next to nothing about: La Fille mal gardee (badly interpreted: The Badly Guarded Young Girl). I adore Ashton choreography - I think he finds the timeless beauty in steps and characterizations and I always find new things to sigh over in his ballets. I was so happy with La Fille last night - I found it filled with lovely innocence and lyricism, with lots of charm and rueful smiles throughout.

A simple pastoral story, La Fille mal gardee is about Lise and Colas, a young country couple who are in love, but Lise's mother wishes Lise to marry a rich man's son.  Most of the ballet consists of either gorgeous love pas de deux between Lise and Colas, or silly dances by the countryfolk or the rich fiance.  All of the dancing is filled with mime and character-work that was truly delightful - there's a dancing rooster and his chicks, a dorky yet adorable young man and a real pony. Yes, a pony.  I will admit to feeling fear every time the pony came onstage, but he was always followed by a couple of gents with brooms and buckets...

Lise and Colas were danced by two of my current favorites, Stella Abrera and James Whiteside.  Stella was simply enchanting, so silky and sweet, with gorgeous arms and beautiful phrasing.  She was playful, petulant, lovestruck and clever.  It was a lovely lovely performance.  Whiteside was a grand partner - his lifts were effortless and he had charm to spare.  He had a playful, teasing manner about him that was very appealing and he was also a very ardent lover.  The two of them make a terrific pair.

Lise's mother, the Widow Simone, was played by the uberfabulous Marcelo Gomes, who could have a serious acting career when he stops dancing (which I hope never happens, actually).  He found the comic in this batty older lady, yet still had some youthful dreams and he clog danced up a storm.  And Aaron Scott as Alain, the doofy fiance, was fantastic. He comes out in an ill-fitting suit, with a crazy wig and a red umbrella he's rather abnormally attached to, and does the funniest character choreography I've seen in a long time.  I thought he was just delightful.

photo credit: Andrea Mohin (not the cast I saw)

The lovers Lise and Colas have no less than five love dances and each one is different in its storytelling method.  I especially liked the pas de deux where they made the cat's cradle with the long silk ribbon they had been dancing with - at first the dance is rather silly, using the ribbon as a toy, but when they started wrapping the ribbon around each other and getting closer and closer together, you could see a true love emerging from the kidding around and the way they got the ribbon into its final shape was really wonderful. I can't imagine how long it would've taken to figure those steps out!  Oh, and the bit where Lise becomes a kind of maypole?  She balances on pointe as her girlfriends in the chorus revolve her slowly and the effect is stunning.

I really enjoyed La Fille mal gardee and hope to see it again soon - it hasn't been in ABT's repertory for over ten years and I hope it doesn't disappear for that long again.  It just has such a lovely sweetness to it, and an innocence; the dancing may not seem overly complex or bravura at first sight, but the magic that is woven by the whole piece is wonderful.  The corps de ballet seemed especially engaged last night as well, so this seems a piece that brings out the best in everyone.  Even the pony, who happily did not leave any remembrances on stage!  :)

Seat neighbor wise:  the cranky gal was next to me again, though she did apologize for her attack of whooping cough near the end of the first act.  It took all my self-restraint not to say "at least you apologize for your mistakes," that would've been rude.  Besides, I heard her talking with her buddies about tennis, so if she knows tennis, she can't be all bad, right? There was an oddball lady standing in line at the ladies room after the show; I guess the line wasn't moving as quickly as she thought it should because she suddenly shouted "What's going on in there?!"  That was a little odd.  And then, when I left, I noticed a large NYPD presence all over the Lincoln Center campus - the path I usually take to the subway was blocked and there were lots of police cars around the front of the building.  That made me nervous, but I couldn't see a ruckus or anything.  I just ran over to the bus stop to head home.  Thankfully, the trains were running local and it wasn't a two-hour trip back.  That would've made my holiday Monday a bummer.  But the beauty of the ballet prevailed and I can't believe my summer season is already more than half over.  Slow down, please, ballet season!