Dance Review

Lucinda Childs and the Ballet du Grand Theatre of Geneva
"Daphnis and Chloe"

By Patricia Boccadoro

PARIS, 1 July 2004 - Lucinda Childs, one of America's leading modern dance choreographers, is known for her minimalist style and plot less, abstract works. Her dance is usually rather cold, logical, and almost mathematical and is usually set to contemporary scores by such people as Philip Glass, John Adams or Steve Reich. It was therefore a great surprise to discover her first narrative work, Daphnis and Chloe, set to Ravel's magnificent score, composed in 1912 for Les Ballets Russes, which she created last year for the Grand Ballet of Geneva.

The slim and elegant 64 year old was recently in Paris to present her recent creation at the Theatre de Saint- Quentin-en-Yvelines, and when I asked her the reason for this surprising turn of events, she replied that she was simply enlarging her field of work. "Why not", she said. "It was time to do something different and I felt the need to turn to the classics. When I was invited to stage this work, I took up the challenge and since then, I've also created my own version of Le Mandarin merveilleux. ".

For some time now, Childs, a classically trained dancer, has been moving towards opera, directing and then being responsible for productions, as well as working with classical companies including the Paris Opéra Ballet, but even so, her new staging of the Ballets Russes favourite is a far cry from her beginnings.

While keeping close to the general plot that Fokine took from Longus, which tells the story of the love of Daphnis and Chloe, Childs has eliminated what she considered the excess narrative. The pirates who captured Chloe have disappeared, but all the characters remain, including Dorcon, excellently danced by Antonio Ruz*, whose role has been enlarged.

The choreography, full of diagonal entrances and repetitive short turns and jetés in the unmistakeably Childs style, was well danced by the thoroughly rehearsed company, itself not totally familiar with such a classical work. It was at all times fluid, very musical, and the one regret was that it was overshadowed by Roland Aeschlimann's highly complicated decor which had actually taken stagehands four days to erect. The dancers, barefoot, had to perform underneath a monumental giant-sized helix that hung over them horizontally, and which turned on axis, slowly, then more rapidly. It was nothing short of mesmerising, particularly under some spectacular lighting effects, now crimson, then dark blue. Many people in the audience commented after that they had scarcely noticed the dancers, so engrossed were they by the decor. Was Aeschlimann so afraid of paling into significance beside Chagall's wonderful painted backcloths for the Paris Opéra's 1958 version of the ballet that he concocted this oversized scenery that few other theatres in France could house? In itself it was most impressive, but it did dwarf the dancers.

*Antonio Ruz, a pupil of Spain's Victor Ullate, will shortly be joining the Lyon Opéra Ballet.