Month: October 2001

The Bolshoi’s Maya Plisetskaya was one of the great ballerinas of the 20th Century. “The humiliations she and other artists endured at the hands of government handlers and arts bureaucrats challenge popular notions of the privileged lives of Soviet artists. Always forced to beg — to travel, to prepare new works, to be paid fairly — Plisetskaya and her colleagues more closely resembled Russian serf artists of the 18th century than cultural workers in a modern socialist state.” The New York Times 10/23/01 (one-time registration required for access)

Scottish Ballet says it may ask for an extra £1 million when it submits its budget plan to the Scottish Arts Council next month. The company, which already receives £2.8 million a year from the Council, wants the money to help transform itself from a traditional company to a modern company, despite heavy criticism. The Scotsman 10/22/01

Scottish Ballet management insists on transforming the company from ballet to modern despite overwhelming opposition from all quarters. “The board say there has been consultation but so far the consultation has been very unsatisfactory. The dancers have repeatedly asked for another meeting for the board to explain their decision, but there has been none.” The Scotsman 10/19/01

Canada’s National Ballet posts a small “symbolic” surplus for the year despite declines in funding and donations. “The company’s accumulated deficit of $4-million almost exactly matches what the National Ballet has lost through cutbacks in Ontario government funding.” National Post 10/18/01

Scottish Ballet company members are contractually prohibited from publicly criticizing the company. But the dancers are furious about management’s decisions to turn the company into a modern company, so they started a website with a forum where they discussed their unhappiness. After the company threatened the website managers, saying “that some of the content was defamatory and should be removed,” the offending comments were deleted. The Scotsman 10/17/01.

American Ballet Theater has suffered under a series of managerial woes and money woes. Tuesday ABT appointed Wallace Chappell, 60 as its new executive director. Chappell is “the director of the Hancher Auditorium at the University of Iowa since 1986, who has also held ranking staff positions with the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, the Alliance Theater in Atlanta and the Repertory Theater of St. Louis.” The New York Times 10/17/01 (one-time registration required for access)

Oakland Ballet is struggling. Last weekend’s performance was “a disappointing affair that brings the company’s recent struggles painfully to light. After hiring a new artistic director last year, Karen Brown, the company has been trying to knit together a mostly new group of performers and to fill its ranks with enough qualified male dancers, all on a shoestring budget. It’s a big job, no doubt, but the results Sunday were dismal.” San Jose Mercury News 10/17/01

“Willam Farr Christensen, a Utah dancer who started on the vaudeville stage and went on to become one of the most important figures in American ballet, died Sunday. He was 99.” Dallas Morning News (AP) 10/17/01

“Despite incurring a disastrous $459,626 deficit in their 2000-01 season, Alberta Ballet officials asserted that the past season was a success Friday at their annual general meeting.” Calgary Herald 10/13/01

“American modern dance, a genre spawned and nurtured by women over the last century, has also produced a proliferation of extraordinary male dancers in the last decade. Wider public acceptance of men entering the dance field, the fostering of versatility among dancers and the accessibility to better training across America have produced discernible results. More men in contemporary dance have stronger techniques, dance with refined musicality and possess a more mature artistry than ever before.” The New York Times 10/14/01 (one-time registration required for access)