DANCE REVIEW : NEW PRINCIPALS PERFORM IN JOFFREY ‘ROMEO AND JULIET’

John Cranko’s “Romeo and Juliet,” currently being danced by the Joffrey Ballet at the Music Center Pavilion, demands a personal intensity from its principals that the choreography often does not provide. So if the first local glimpse Thursday of lovely Deborah Dawn and appealing Philip Jerry in the title roles seemed less than the tragic thing Prokofiev and Shakespeare had in mind, blame the dance-maker.

Nevertheless, this tall Juliet, who towered over her nurse and thus could hardly suggest anything childlike, was too self-absorbed in the pleasures of approaching womanhood to see much difference between Paris and her supposed sweet prince.

Indeed, she took her cues from Cranko’s choreography--which reduces the sweeping, transcendent, rapturous love to what ordinary high school kids might feel on a comedy-ridden first date. Under the circumstances, Jerry had his most telling moments while quietly musing on Juliet. Yet, both conveyed the arbitrary despair and doom of Act III.

Neither Jerry nor his cohorts--Mark Goldweber as Mercutio and Carl Corry as Benvolio--mustered the ultimate precision or dash for their bravura trio but were thoroughly admirable elsewhere.