TV DANCE REVIEWS : ROBBINS’ ‘MEMORY’ ON PBS TONIGHT

On TV, Jerome Robbins’ 1985 one-act ballet “In Memory of . . . “ remains as frustrating an experience as it is in the theater--memorable for its brilliant central pas de deux, uninventive and fatuous elsewhere.

In the “Dance in America” production tonight on PBS (8 p.m. on Channel 24; 9 p.m. on Channels 28 and 15; Saturday at 8 p.m. on Channel 50), the larger-scale outer sections of the ballet again look arbitrarily imposed on Alban Berg’s feverish Violin Concerto.

Like the score, the ballet is a portrait of a young woman’s untimely death. But while the music for the opening section expresses seething agitation, Robbins offers merely deft partnering gambits for Suzanne Farrell and Alexandre Proia plus fluid evocations of social dancing for members of the New York City Ballet corps.

A few portentous dramatic eruptions (Farrell rushing wildly away from the ensemble, for instance) only emphasize the empty pictorialism of the choreography, the sense of dogged but pointless and even dislocated craftsmanship.

But midway through, when Robbins launches a harrowing death-and-the-maiden duet for Adam Lueders and Farrell, “In Memory of . . .” suddenly achieves a brooding glory.

Here are passages depicting the delirium of a terminal illness through spectacular transformations of classical partnering conventions--especially deeply cantilevered supported balances in which Lueders seems to hold Farrell suspended over an abyss.

The fear, pain, release and surprise of dying are embodied in such primal terms in this sequence that Robbins’ “transfiguration” finale looks like ingenuous, religioso hack work in comparison.

Taped a year ago in performance at the New York State Theater, the telecast may well provide our last look at Farrell, who is scheduled to retire at the end of the City Ballet’s current winter season.

Strongly partnered by the noble Proia and the intense Lueders, she dances with her customary power, though not with all the daring she brought to the ballet in its first season. Robert Irving capably conducts the company orchestra with Cyrus Stevens forcefully dispatching the thorny violin passages.

Emile Ardolino directed conscientiously. The telecast also features lengthy and often revealing interview segments with Robbins.