by Julia Rosica | Dec 16, 2020 | TBT
In need of extra Nutcracker cheer? Watching Dame Margot Fonteyn and Michael Somes, two former stars of The Royal Ballet, dance the ballet’s grand pas de deux is an instant fix. In this clip from a 1958 Nutcracker television broadcast, even black and white film...
by Julia Rosica | Nov 11, 2020 | TBT
Polina Semionova, principal guest artist with the Staatsballett Berlin, is serene and luminous. Mariinsky Ballet principal Vladimir Shklyarov is stylish and refined. Together, unsurprisingly, they make a sublime partnership, as seen here in their wistful and...
by Julia Rosica | Oct 7, 2020 | TBT
Sir Kenneth MacMillan’s Manon shows the extremes of opulence and poverty, love and greed, bliss and sorrow. While the ballet ends in tragedy, the bedroom pas de deux at the end of Act I is one of its most joyful, brimming with promise and passion. In this clip...
by Julia Rosica | Sep 9, 2020 | TBT
Creating an authentic, youthful character onstage often requires an enormous amount of artistic maturity. Such is the case with former American Ballet Theatre principals Alessandra Ferri and Angel Corella. In this 2000 performance of Sir Kenneth MacMillan’s...
by Julia Rosica | Aug 26, 2020 | TBT
Among her storied gifts, Maya Plisetskaya, former prima ballerina of the Bolshoi Ballet, was renowned for her ability to imbue classical choreography with rich layers of meaning. In this 1963 clip of Aurora’s Act I variation from The Sleeping Beauty,...
by Julia Rosica | Aug 12, 2020 | TBT
Sylvie Guillem and Éric Vu-An, two former leading dancers with the Paris Opéra Ballet, were both muses to Maurice Béjart. The boundary-pushing choreographer created several roles for each of them throughout their careers, including the 1985 duet “Mouvement,...
by Julia Rosica | Jul 8, 2020 | TBT
It’s not often that you get to see eight principal dancers sharing a stage, but Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s centennial is a special circumstance. In a 1993 gala honoring the composer, former Royal Ballet principals Darcey Bussell and Zoltan Solymosi, Leanne...
by Julia Rosica | May 13, 2020 | TBT
Marcia Haydée and Richard Cragun, one of ballet’s storied partnerships, danced together from the mid-1960s through the early ’90s as leading dancers of Stuttgart Ballet. Their repertory included dozens of ballets, most famously John Cranko’s The...