S.F. ‘SYLPHIDE’: BORROWED BOURNONVILLE

One approached the War Memorial Opera House either with anticipatory glee, or with trepidation. It depended on one’s prejudices.

For the first time in its spotty 53-year history, the San Francisco Ballet was venturing “La Sylphide.” All of it.

Until now, the San Franciscans had mustered only a set of isolated excerpts from Act II, and that was back in 1964. The effort in question had represented nothing more, literally, than a few star turns by a pair of guests called Fonteyn and Nureyev.

Although some audience members, and even a local writer, have seemed confused on the subject, the new production certainly wasn’t “ Les Sylphides.” Fokine’s ever-popular ode to abstract Chopiniana had entered the local repertory back in 1948.

No. This, emphatically, was “ La Sylphide,” the fabled, 150-year old monument of storybook Romanticism, Bournonville style. The ballet represents the epitome of popular Royal Danish fantasy. It is a bagatelle of airy bravura, gossamer charm, pretty tragedy and historical significance.

The quaint tale of the Scottish lad who loves and loses a doting wood-sprite was, after all, the work that launched the gushing-and-sighing romantic revolution in ballet. It also was the first vehicle that happened to require the heroine to dance on pointe , creating an image that presumably suggests weightless flight.

In recent years, the San Francisco Ballet had become a haven for the mild-mannered quasi-classicism of the late Lew Christensen at one repertory extreme, the brash show-biz indulgences of Michael Smuin at the other. With the advent this season of Helgi Tomasson, however, one had every reason to look for new accents, new policies, new directions.

It seemed logical to assume that the directions in question would point, in some manner, toward Copenhagen, where Tomasson had trained, and toward the New York City Ballet, where he had built his estimable career as a danseur noble.

Unmistakably, “La Sylphide” would demonstrate the influence of both institutions. It is, of course, the archetypal Royal Danish pastry. Moreover, the staging chosen by Tomasson is credited to Peter Martins, a Royal Danish alumnus who went on to become a leading dancer at the City Ballet and, ultimately, the successor to George Balanchine as its director.

By making “La Sylphide” his first full-length ballet in San Francisco, Tomasson obviously was honoring his own artistic roots. He also felt, no doubt, that the disciplines inherent in the muted bravura of the Bournonville style would be beneficial to a young and versatile ensemble whose accomplishments still owed more to enthusiasm than to technical prowess or expressive finesse.

For the leading roles, Tomasson selected two pairs of promising dancers from the home team. Significantly, however, they functioned as follow-up casting. For the opening-night festivities and other key performances, Tomasson broke with San Francisco tradition and used principals whose international credentials hinted at a star system (everything is relative).

The introductory Sylphide was Ludmila Lopukhova, who had spent a dozen years at the Kirov, having achieved soloist status in Leningrad by 1984 when she emigrated to the States. Her partner was Jean-Charles Gil, born in Spain and raised in Switzerland, whose feats as a Roland Petit hero in France recently earned him a controversial debut replacing Mikhail Baryshnikov with American Ballet Theatre.

It wasn’t just the casting, however, that promised to make the San Francisco “Sylphide” unusual. If one could trust certain out-of-town reports, the most newsworthy aspect of the venture was likely to be the staging.

Martins had been in charge of a similar production in Philadelphia last spring. San Francisco borrowed the actual Pennsylvania Ballet decors and, we are assured, implemented Martins’ narrative concepts without change. Although the Danish director-choreographer did not personally oversee the San Francisco version, his wishes were enforced by his Philadelphia collaborator, Solveig Ostergaard--formerly a celebrated Bournonville ballerina and herself a beloved Sylphide in Copenhagen.

The program credits in San Francisco sorted the responsibilities this way: “Choreography by Peter Martins after August Bournonville, staged by Solveig Ostergaard.”

At the time of the Pennsylvania premiere, Anna Kisselgoff, dance critic of the New York Times, liked what she saw but found the concoction potentially unsettling.

She called Martins’ interpretation “a startling and modern approach to a classic that often has been performed as a museum piece.” She made much of what she regarded as Martins’ “very contemporary perspective.” She described the results as “stylistically and dramatically bold--interesting enough to upset many traditionalists.” She noted “a touch of cynicism here that is very different from the Romantic view.”

When the same “Sylphide” came to Brooklyn a few weeks later, she seconded the motions, dwelling on Martins’ “unconventional approach.”

What struck Kisselgoff as revolutionary was not the essential choreography. That adhered doggedly to tradition. It was character definition.

The hero James, she claimed, no longer was “an idealist (and) seeker of illusion.” He was just a fellow with a short attention-span. Kisselgoff was surprised to find Effie, James’ would-be bride, easily consoled by James’ rival, Gurn. The New York critic even noted, with a certain element of shock, that Effie’s mother blessed the hasty ersatz union. According to the iconoclastic Martins, Kisselgoff concluded, “Love is fickle.”

It gives one pause.

But love seems just as fickle in traditional productions of “La Sylphide.” Erik Bruhn’s versions, long familiar to American Ballet Theater audiences, place the protagonists in the identical perspective. James is a dreamer who--seduced by the mischievous, irresistibly adoring sylph and cursed by the witch Madge--jilts Effie without so much as a second thought. Unable to seize his mercurial vision, he resorts to the malevolent assistance of the witch. In a climactic pas de deux, he inadvertently strips the sylph of her wings, and with them, her life. The tutu-mortal ballerina jerks heavenward, with a little help from some antique stage machinery. After instant reflection and a little prodding from Mom, Effie goes off merrily with Gurn. Madge conveys her triumph in a silent cackle as the curtain falls.

That’s the way it is. That’s the way it always has been.

And that’s the way it was, again, in San Francisco. Martins’ concise production may reduce some complex mime episodes. It may strip away passages of dubious authenticity. It may settle for a smaller scale than one can find in the quasi-operatic Ballet Theater edition. The designer, Susan Tammany, may flirt with high-school primitivism in her ugly first-act manor, and with comic-book surrealism in her eerie forest glade. In the final analysis, however, these are minor matters.

In all major respects, this “Sylphide” validates conservative convention. It could hardly upset even the queasiest of traditionalists.

Either something drastic has been lost in the transplantation from Pennsylvania to California (San Francisco authorities swear it isn’t so) or Kisselgoff, usually a sane and savvy exponent of Fourth Estate terpsichore, saw something we didn’t.

Be that as it may, the meek and cozy San Francisco production proved more notable for promise than for achievement. Ostergaard and Tomasson have not yet managed to get the company to simulate the fast, light, bright and gentle manner that defines the Bournonville rhetoric. What should look easy and natural still looks, in many cases, like hard, self-conscious work. Energy and good intentions often have to compensate for the absence of delicacy, precision and a unified expressive approach.

Nevertheless, the stylistic stretch can only be healthy for a company that has often managed to hide technical deficiencies behind glitz and gimmickry. This is a tough, honest, exposing beginning. Conditions can only get better.

Lopukhova, who danced the title a week ago Friday, is a lovely, soulful, willowy thing with a strong technique and an imposing, extended line. She understands the value of soft attacks, subdued virtuosity and generalized tragedy. She knows how to seize the stage. She would, no doubt, be a compelling Odette.

A swan queen, unfortunately, is not a sylph. The necessary playful, nimble, ethereal, ultra-innocent accents elude her in a role haunted, for local audiences, by such disparate paragons as Carla Fracci, Natalia Makarova and Gelsey Kirkland.

Gil built his James on passionate, muscular, propulsive dancing contradicted, to a degree, by distant, blank-faced acting. For all his macho speed and whiz-bang power, he seemed to be moving in some sort of a trance even when the libretto insisted he wasn’t. The problem would seem to involve focus, not resource.

The following afternoon, the central assignments passed to Laurie Cowden and Jim Sohm. She was sweet, wholesome, decidedly competent, decidedly bland. He was essentially neat, frail and technically modest--the princely boy next door. (A schedule conflict precluded assessing the third pair, Wendy Van Dyck and Simon Dow.)

For better or worse, Cowden and Sohm looked as if they really belonged in this nice American company. Lopukhova and Gil looked as if they had just flown in from abroad.

Nigel Courtney, the first Madge, offered a well-oiled impression of the customary caricature crone in drag. So, for that matter, did Val Caniparoli, although his tendency to use his cane as an oar to propel his body forward needs adjustment.

David McNaughton managed the now-sympathetic duties of the temporarily jealous Gurn deftly. Marco Carrabba didn’t.

Jean Louis LeRoux stirred the ancient Lovenskjold broth competently in the pit, even when his tempos offered less than optimum comfort to the dancers.

As a curtain-raiser--and, possibly, an afterthought--Tomasson added his own “Contredanses,” designed in 1984 for Finis Jhung’s Chamber Ballet. The short work offers abstract solos, duets and trios involving three happy-happy-happy couples in bucolic dress, who twirl and leap and unite with always elegant, sometimes quirky, essentially neoclassical nonchalance.

The Balanchine language is spoken very distinctly here, and very knowingly. Tomasson creates telling patterns and beguiling maneuvers to the strains of lightweight Beethoven. Then, alas, he trivializes the musical source by playing cutesy with the heroic “Creatures of Prometheus” finale.

The dancing of two different sextets ranged from inept to eager to refined. The San Francisco Ballet isn’t the New York City Ballet West. Not yet, anyway.