by Leigh Witchel
“Namouna, A Grand Divertissement” can be a bear to sit through; it’s two ballets masquerading as one. But the pairing of “La Source” and “Namouna” at New York City Ballet makes sense. Both take on 19th century repertory from the Paris Opera Ballet. As the run continued, as often happens as the season goes on, there were cast shuffles, hellos and a goodbye.
Anthony Huxley has gone from a side dish to the main course. His height may have slowed that progress, but NYCB needs him. Badly. He added “La Source” to his repertory earlier in the season, and found an individual phrasing as part of his plowing through one variation after another in the canon.
It’s interesting to watch Erica Pereira move from the sidelines as well. She and Huxley encouraged large scale movement from one another, doing expansive port de bras and filling out the musical phrase. Pereira is long limbed, and a little wristy, but her first variation didn’t get too twittery. Her footwork was detailed in her second variation. She wasn’t aggressive in beats or entrechats, but she could sustain them.
With Megan Fairchild out, Huxley and Pereira are forming a partnership. They match well; in “La Source,” there are a few promenades that switch grips and require the man to have a good arm’s length to work. Huxley doesn’t have to finesse that with Pereira.
Olivia MacKinnon added the second ballerina to her portfolio. Only just promoted to soloist, it’s not yet fully clear who she is onstage. She’s amiable and expressive, but in a role that often marks the debut of a major jumper, such as Ashley Bouder, that wasn’t her calling card. We’ll have to keep watching to see what that will be.
The corps looked cleanly rehearsed, and the Naïla waltz was taken at a good speed. Particularly here where the music suggested it, Pereira’s musical approach was usually to take a breath at the top of her phrases.
“La Source,” “Walpurgisnacht Ballet,” “Raymonda Variations,” are all from the later, established period in Balanchine’s career and all related examples of how Balanchine glossed the 19th century repertory. Each originated in a different theater (The State Theater, Palais Garnier and City Center) but they were set in the same imaginary opera house.
Alexei Ratmansky fell in love with the 19th century as well, and he’s been responsible for some of our era’s most vivid reconstructions of its great ballets. “Namouna” wasn’t a reconstruction, but a goofy Technicolor riff – Ratmansky’s imaginary opera house lives somewhere near Toontown.
“Namouna” used music by Edouard Lalo, originally composed for an 1882 ballet choreographed by Lucien Petipa. Serge Lifar dipped into this for 1943’s “Suite en Blanc,” a work that still is a mark of technical prowess for POB and any other company that attempts it. It jettisoned the original slaves ‘n swashbucklers libretto by Petipa and Charles Nuitter, but kept some of the sobriquets for the musical numbers. Keeping only the manic energy of the original plot, Ratmansky brought some of those titles back even more literally.
The large female corps, all in simple lemon dresses and caps that looked like Louise Brooks wigs, entered, walking, curving, crouching in. In “Namouna,” the Ratmanskyness happens early, as one dancer broke into a brief solo, and without warning the rest of the women pushed her. It was “Serenade” as danced by the cast of “Mean Girls.” The women fluttered and ran off.
Dressing Roman Mejia in a sailor suit and the leading women in caps recalling bathing beauties, designers Mark Happel and Rustam Khamdamov seemed to push Ratmansky’s gloss from the late 19th century to the Roaring Twenties.
In the part he originated, Daniel Ulbricht wore a brown, utilitarian costume resembling overalls that made him look like a factory worker who wound up at the beach. He accosted Mejia, then MacKinnon and Emma von Enck, also in brown, came out to make a trio. Mejia, MacKinnon and von Enck, along with Ashley Laracey, all made their debuts earlier in this run. Flicking her leg in every direction in her first solo, Georgina Pazcoguin said hello to her role and farewell to the company over the weekend.
Ulbricht flew through variations on turns with his leg to the side and like a model Soviet worker, lifted both women off at once. The ensemble women returned with cymbals; the props were part of Ratmansky’s zany take on the plot and score’s original directions and sobriquets.
Mejia raced in to dance as the women accompanied him, clanging. His promotion to principal was a no-brainer. He’s got technique to burn, but also musicality and taste, and he returned Ratmansky’s favor of making dancers look good. With a lofty jump and full phrasing, he made Ratmansky look good, too.
Pazcoguin returned, having changed from a short stiff tutu to a soft, longer skirt, for another dance with props inspired by the score, this time a cigarette. Because Pazcoguin is so vivid it’s easy to lose sight of her technical ability. She’s a ferocious turner, but what you remember is her suddenly breaking into a flat footed walk like an old lady, squinting as she took a drag on her cancer stick.
Ratmansky’s goofiness was on display; after she left, the corps of eight men brought her on again, tumbling her over their backs and on to the ground like a cadaver. She got up more casually than Lazarus. While she danced the men went splat, overcome. Pazcoguin’s goofiness was a match for Ratmansky’s. She tucked her unfinished cigarette into her bodice to dance; gotta save them butts ’cause they’re expensive, you know.
Sara Mearns reentered, also now changed to a longer skirt. Her role was also made on her and studded with turns that flew to side extensions that then swung to the back in arabesque. As always Mearns threw herself on to the knife’s edge of balance. But that’s Ratmansky’s gift – he could make Mearns look more Mearnsian. After von Enck sped through, then Mejia with Pazcoguin, then a solo for Laracey, Mearns returned for an adagio with the men falling for her. Literally. She dismissed them and MacKinnon and Von Enck danced.
Ulbricht came out to soar, legs splitting sideways, in front of eight couples. There have been times recently that Ulbricht hasn’t looked like he used to, and then others, here and guesting with Tharp, when he looked phenomenal and ageless. It may be a sign of maturity or the youth of middle age, but it seems to have a lot to do with how engaged he is by the role.
Mearns hurled herself among the men, and Mejia took center stage like a Tigger springing in entrechats – BOING! BOING! But we were only at the halfway point. Though the ballet is shown as a single unit, it’s almost two acts, both in its hour-long length and its structure, with an “Act 1” finale in the middle.
The second half began with a slow, sleepy section (Lalo’s title is “La Sieste”) for Laracey and the women as they reclined and lounged. As he often does, Ratmansky wove ballet moves with naturalistic-ish ones. When he asks someone to roll on the floor or walk, he doesn’t want it done like a ballet dancer, but like just plain folks. Still soporific, the women changed places, and Mejia searched among them, ending up with Laracey.
Is this Laracey’s moment? With enough women injured, she’s been needed and gotten more to do, but she nailed all the turns in her solo and she’s gained consistency. She’s been more than a reliable pinch-hitter; she’s risen to every challenge. Instead of crumbling under pressure, the more she gets, the better she looks.
Mejia did a solo to castanets backed up by the men, then danced with Laracey. The women pulled them apart, but they got back together for The Big Pas de Deux. Laracey’s calling card has always been her Gumby extensions; when she took her heel and stretched her leg out, it went way past a split. The two danced a joyous duet culminating in Mejia lifting her high overhead, popping and catching her.
They bowed as the corps entered, and a kitchen sink of Ratmanskyness meant the real finale was upon us. Everyone raced back in, MacKinnon and von Enck pursuing one another, Mejia and Ulbricht competed in jumping. The massive 20s-style physical culture of bathing beauties and healthy men in sailor suits and coveralls ending in triumph reminded us of Ratmansky’s Soviet roots – but at the end Mejia and Laracey smooched.
A few days later Pazcoguin took her final bow, again in this new part. This was a great role for her to go out on. Because she had such a strong presence, she often got acting parts by default. It was almost a surprise when you saw how technical she was – and that happened in Ratmansky’s works. Pazcoguin kept up with unnatural turners such as Sofiane Sylve in “Russian Seasons.” “Namouna” used Pazcoguin’s gifts optimally both technically and as a performer. The part, tormenting the hero as she smokes, let her exit exactly as she sees herself: as a provocateur.
copyright © 2023 by Leigh Witchel
“La Source,” “Namouna, A Grand Divertissement” – New York City Ballet
Lincoln Center, New York, NY
May 3, 2023
Cover: Georgina Pazcoguin in “Namouna, A Grand Divertissement.” Photo © Erin Baiano.
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