DANCE REVIEW : ABT’s Birthday Bash Hits the Road

The massive party took place last month at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York when American Ballet Theatre celebrated its 50th birthday. No one pretended that the event was coherent, but a lot of push-button sentimentalists enjoyed the glitzy rituals.

This, after all, was a very big socio-aesthetic deal. A good seat cost $1,200. The on-stage guest list included such bona fide ballerinas as Alicia Alonso (dancing in the face of dotage), Carla Fracci, Gelsey Kirkland and Natalia Makarova. Agnes de Mille contributed a few testy words. Twyla Tharp made a surprise appearance shoving a delirious danseur out of her epochal “Push.”

Only one beloved body was conspicuously missing. It belonged to Mikhail Baryshnikov, who had abandoned his company in the wake of a major managerial imbroglio.

Whether his self-imposed absence made the collective heart grow fonder became a moot point. Fernando Bujones, a rival matinee idol, provided compensation of sorts, returning to the fold from which he had been ousted. Moreover, one could find distraction in home movies, production numbers, nostalgia indulgences and orgies of self-congratulation.

Had all gone as planned, Los Angeles would have caught up with some manifestation of the anniversary festivities this summer. The projected ABT engagement at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion was canceled, however, when the Music Center failed to reconcile an unfortunate booking dispute with the company.

Ergo, the version of the historic event mustered Tuesday night at the War Memorial Opera House provided California with its only exposure to the great balletic bash. As the ever-perverse fates would have it, alas, this Gala didn’t turn out to be particularly gala.

San Francisco got the economy-size road-show version. The top ticket fetched a paltry $250. The only live guest in sight was Makarova, who, having finally hung up her toe shoes, rambled through some charming, ultra-affectionate anecdotes. Not incidentally, Bujones had been promised by Jane Hermann, the new executive director, but he didn’t show.

Each half of the three-hour would-be extravaganza began with a razzle-dazzle overture energetically conducted by Jack Everly. Then came tantalizing--and frustrating--collages of film clips. Some were ancient and some recent, some rare and some commonplace.

The often fuzzy, nearly subliminal images on the screen flitted forward and backward in time, reducing significant art to stream-of-consciousness snippets. The musical pastiches on the sound track sometimes forced the protagonists to dance to the wrong tune. The uncredited, hyperbolic narration, voiced-over by Peter Donat, proved notable neither for good grammar nor for good taste.

When it came to show time, the company mustered a little bit of this, and a tiny bit of that. The dancers plucked highlights from highlights, strung together in willy-nilly chaos. Place the accent on nilly.

The viewer was allowed no sense of context. No continuity. No edification. No substance.

Turning 50, American Ballet Theatre turned to a slick collection of variety acts. The tone was flashy, the pace fast, fast, fast. Here was another fancy installment in the annals of balletic vaudeville, conceived and directed by Michael Smuin.

Finding specific things to savor in the hippety-hop jumble seemed akin to picking the peanuts out of a box of Cracker Jack. One’s hands got sticky, yet the rewards--beyond indigestion--remained small.

The company performed chunklets of 25 repertory items frantically, and often well. Although Baryshnikov’s dancers may not command instantly compelling personalities, they are strong technicians and careful stylists.

Amanda McKerrow, sympathetically supported by Kevin McKenzie, floated exquisitely through a moment from Antony Tudor’s “The Leaves Are Fading.” Alessandra Ferri, sensitively partnered by John Gardner, arched poignantly amid the “Lindenduft” of Eliot Feld’s “At Midnight,” and ignored a chronically off-pitch mezzo-soprano in the process. Susan Jaffe, nobly seconded by Ricardo Bustamante, exuded lyric refinement as the White Swan.

Johan Renvall glittered as the Bronze Idol of “La Bayadere.” Julio Bocca gobbled space ferociously as Solor, and Cynthia Harvey breathed refinement as his Gamzatti. Martine van Hamel defined Petipa grandeur as Raymonda. Cynthia Gregory, the obvious audience favorite, sustained the poetic balances of the Rose Adagio even better in the flesh than she had on the screen.

No one, unfortunately, had a chance to establish a serious interpretive statement. There was no time to set, much less develop, a specific mood. Everything and everyone passed in a pretty blink.

The choreography of “La Sylphide” melted into “Giselle,” which blurred into “The Sleeping Beauty.” Tudor got scrambled, Baryshnikov got slighted, and, inexplicably, Clark Tippet got snubbed.

At the end, Smuin & Co. trivialized Balanchine’s “Theme and Variations,” transforming the elegant finale into a motley costume parade. This act of violence heralded the arrival of tinsel streamers, balloons and curtain calls for the anonymous administrators.

The applause wasn’t deafening.