Music and Dance Reviews : Leslie Browne in ABT ‘Pillar of Fire’ Triumph

Watching Leslie Browne evolve from the wide-eyed simp of “The Turning Point” to a dancer of distinction has been one of the happy surprises of American dance in the ‘80s.

As the protegee of the late Nora Kaye, Browne developed an affinity for the ballets of Antony Tudor in the American Ballet Theatre repertory. At 31, she is a thinking dancer, a feeling dancer, an artist of great daring--qualities that made her portrayal of Hagar in “Pillar of Fire” full of exciting discoveries Wednesday in Shrine Auditorium.

Bracketed on the three-part program by formal music visualizations (Clark Tippet’s “Bruch Violin Concerto No. 1” and George Balanchine’s “Ballet Imperial”), Tudor’s 1942 masterwork represented an anomaly: the sort of gesture-based, psychological dance-drama that American dancers supposedly don’t know how to do any more.

Nonsense. From the first convulsive shudder away from the town women through the lunge into weeping-arabesque near the end, Browne’s detailed, deeply sculpted characterization reclaimed “Pillar” for her generation.

This was only Browne’s third performance as Hagar, and some celebrated passages could have been more forceful: the sudden turn ending in an outward reach, like a plea, for example. The interplay with Ricardo Bustamante--sensational as the embodiment of contemptuous sensuality--also could have been less cautious.

Give her time. In her best moments, Browne brought us closer to the heart of Tudor’s creation than we could have hoped.

Michael Owen partnered Browne superbly but proved bland as the suitor. Alessandra Ferri made the Youngest Sister a kittenish tease--the suggestion of claws was apt. Cynthia Anderson gave the Eldest Sister nothing but rigidity.

Browne and Bustamante had another intense (but more successful) partnership as the “hot” couple in “Bruch Violin Concerto,” Tippet’s fluent, musical but imitative neoclassic showpiece, introduced in Costa Mesa three months ago.

Their “cool” counterparts: Amanda McKerrow and John Gardner, both stylish but none too compelling. Susan Jaffe and Ethan Brown endured the endless lifts of the lyric adagio with grim proficiency and Cheryl Yeager and Wes Chapman looked effortless in their bravura passages in the finale.

The second cast for “Ballet Imperial” found McKerrow marginally more commanding in the ballerina role than she had been in a secondary assignment the previous evening, but her uneven (often tentative) dancing was outclassed by Yeager’s scale and surety and Chapman’s elegant bravado.

Charles Barker conducted authoritative performances of the Bruch concerto (with Lawrence Shapiro brilliantly dispatching the violin solos) and the Schoenberg score used in “Pillar.” Jack Everly again led “Ballet Imperial.”