Artist lends star power to young troupe

Coincidences can be enlightening -- Jiri Kylian choreography from both Nederlands Dans Theater and American Ballet Theatre on Southland stages in the same week, for example. Or Ballet Theatre dancing “Romeo and Juliet” downtown on Saturday while Julio Bocca -- one of the company’s stellar former Romeos -- performed other company repertory and a new work at the Cerritos Center the same night.

Appearing with his youthful, chamber-sized Ballet Argentino, Bocca exercised his star prerogative by taking on no fewer than four roles in Alvin Ailey’s “The River,” an abstract, atmospheric suite created for Ballet Theatre in 1970 to music by Duke Ellington.

However, his dominance helped unify and upgrade a performance suffering from the Argentino men’s technical limitations (particularly their rough terminations) and the women’s inability to get the jazz music into their bodies. Not only could Bocca dance Ailey idiomatically, but he brought a surprising depth of soul to the “Spring” opening and, especially, the “Twin Cities” finale opposite the capable Rosana Perez.

Earlier Perez had displayed the same well-coached security in the pas de deux from “Le Corsaire” (credited to A. Lojo after Jules Perrot, though other names belonged on the list, starting with Marius Petipa). That quality also distinguished the dancing of Gabriel Martinez, Stephanie Bauger and a few others on the program.

However, besides Bocca, only Hernan Piquin projected his dancing into the larger-than-life dimension that gives ballet its special aura. In the “Corsaire” duet and various assignments in “The River” (in particular his comic strutting showpiece in “Riba”), Piquin’s technical shortcomings mattered far less than his magnetism.

If Cecilia Figaredo looked underpowered in Ailey’s forceful “Vortex” solo, she exuded strength and flair in the central role of the evening’s main event, Ana Maria Stekelman’s new neo-Expressionist dance-drama “The Man in the Red Tie.”

Setting the magic of art against the corruption of commerce, the plot had Figaredo torn between Bocca as a boyish painter (anguished in life, sexy after death) and grotesque art dealer Jean Francois Casanovas.

Feverish dream scenes, interludes blending costume spectacle with social satire and melodramatic mime dominated the work. However, it achieved considerable urgency and a distinctive style thanks to Stekelman’s mastery of contemporary movement expression, a lush tango-tinged score by Lito Vitale and fantastic projected environments by Tito Egurza that incorporated paintings by Antonio Segui. Inimitably Argentine, “The Man in the Red Tie” helped explain why Bocca wasn’t dancing with Ballet Theatre on Saturday but, instead, lending his star-power and artistry to a growing Buenos Aires company and repertory.

Ballet Argentino can’t compare with Ballet Theatre just yet, but its fire burns with greater heat, and there’s no question of who supplies the spark.