NYCB – 2&3 Part Inventions, Apollo, Mercurial Manoeuvres – 9/21

A lot of people missed a fab performance last night at NYCB.  There were so few people there that it had the feel of a donors' dress rehearsal event.  The fourth ring was completely empty.  The orchestra level had long sections of empty prime seats.  The rings were a little fuller.  The third ring's first couple of rows were filled, followed by mostly empty rows above which the FFRS were corralled.  (FFRS = Former Fourth Ring Society)  When some of the FFRS tried to move down into empty seats for a better view and more air, the weapons-bearing ushers pounced on them and issued citations to appear next Monday before NYCB Executive Director Katherine Brown for FFRS tongue branding.  What a terrible nightmare.  Whatever.  Ms. Brown's new pricing strategy is a big, fat failure that is driving away the audience and alienating the most faithful.  Ms. Brown, herself, is making lots of money, though.

Christopher Wheeldon's extremely likeable Mercurial Manoeuvres was on last night's bill and received sharp, exciting, and personable performances by Tiler Peck, Tyler Angle, Gonzalo Garcia, Lauren King, and Brittany Pollack.  Garcia, in a bold red unitard, blazed through the choreography and had an especially good night from a technical standpoint, including a pirouette where the revolutions appeared to begin in attitude to the back, evolved to retire, and finally ended with the attitude in the front – that's the best description that Haglund can give.  King and Pollack as demi-soloists flew through their manoeuvres with extreme joy and faultless precision.  The PdDs of Peck and Angle were filled with inventive, balletic lifts punctuated with instant stops as the dancers' energies soared.  After an initial couple of "Glass Pieces" intro moments where it seemed there might be a collision on stage, the corps snapped into form and ended with what can only be described as thrilling perfection in the finale.  Mercurial Manoeuvres repeats on Saturday night with the same cast of dancers.  They're hot, and you want to be there to see them.

Apollo with Chase Finlay, Sterling Hyltin, Ashly Isaacs, and Ana Sophia Scheller was far more than enjoyable although not the best performance that Haglund has seen from these dancers.  Finlay could have been working off of a long, hard day of rehearsals and was throwing whatever energy he had left without always being able to control the end result.  However, from an audience standpoint, that is the preferred response to fatigue as opposed to settling for marking steps and resting between counts as sometimes happens elsewhere in Ballet Land.  Apollo at NYCB is in fine shape with Finlay and Robert Fairchild at the helm.

Also on the program was Robbins 2&3 Part Inventions in which Lauren Lovette and Ashley Laracey danced with matured musicality and nice breadth within the port de bras. 

These days, Haglund looks forward more and more to each performance by Gonzalo Garcia.  And while some may view it as not fair for Garcia to receive two consecutive HH Pump Bump Awards, just remember – "life is very short, and there's no ti-i-i-i-ime for fussing and fighting, my friend . . . We can work it out."  Christian Louboutin's serpentine with red tongue – only $180 – awarded to Garcia: