"Balanchine the Movie"-- what do you think? Options

[Mel Johnson]

Or we could just telescope the time and make it into one uproarious bedroom farce. Have lots of doors in the set.

[Ray]

And I'd rather see PAUL MEJIA! (a new musical), which would of course include B. Like everything else, this would need Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role (and also as B...) and Penelope Cruz as Shari Mejia and Judi Dench as Romana Kryzanowska...Rona Barret as Arlene Croce, etc....PeeWee Herman as David Daniel..have I left out anybody? (IMG:http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

Hey I'm still stuck on MEJIA: THE MUSICAL! Don't forget Minnie Driver as Maria Teresia Mejia (nee Balough), PM's current wife whom he met while co-director of Tallchief's Chicago co. in the early eighties--and still married to Farrell. Other casting would include:

Tallchief--Faye Dunaway?
Farrrell
The young and swarthy Pascal Benichou, important for a memorable duet with PM where Benichou sings to PM, "You're not George Balanchine"-- in the vein of Robin Williams to Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting: "It's not your fault."
Bejart
Some of the late sixties NYCB figures, like Vilella (as a mentor figure, of course) and John Clifford (who had to have been competing w/PM for choreographic attention, if I have my chronology right; or, if I don't, we'll just make it all up!).

How tall is Daniel Day-Lewis? Remember that Mejia is on the short side--George De La Pena could work for the current-day Mejia. Maybe "Freddie" from Six Feet Under as the younger PM?

OK...back to work!

[bart]

Hey I'm still stuck on MEJIA: THE MUSICAL!

There's a place on the screen for everything, I suppose. As our Balanchine is to Hamlet, this "Mejia" might be to ... what? ... Rosenkranz and Guildenstern are Dead? (IMG:http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/style_emoticons/default/wink1.gif)

I do think there'd be a real benefit to a serious film about Balanchine and his Work as well as his Women. I hear casual ballet attenders saying again and again, "I don't like Balanchine" even though they've seen very little of his work.

I personally love the tongue-in-cheek approach to this. Mel's suggestion of multiple stage doors in the style of the Marx Brothers or Noises Off! is brilliant. When your dealing with the average movie-goer, however, is it possible to communicate satire about people they don't know or don't care about? I'm not sure.

In the 30s and 40s Hollywood studios were constantly turning out films about famous creative geniuses: their suffering, their troubled love lives, AND their work (however simplified). To an extent, the Nijinsky and Tchaikovsky biopics of the 80s tried to do this as well. Is there an audience for such works -- whether about Balanchine or anyone else in classical arts -- in the current cultural marketplace?

[papeetepatrick]

The young and swarthy Pascal Benichou, important for a memorable duet with PM where Benichou sings to PM, "You're not George Balanchine"-- in the vein of Robin Williams to Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting: "It's not your fault."

THAT is hilarious...as is Faye Dunaway as Tallchief.

My take on Mel's would be more like a Marivaux play.

[Helene]

I don't think there's an actress in her teens, 20's, or 30's that could compete with the young Maria Tallchief's beauty (ETA), but Faye Dunaway is a stroke of genius.

My cast, ignoring that they'd never all be the right age (or alive) at the right time, and the accents would be all over the place:

Allegra Kent: Ludivine Sagnier, the young actress from "Swimming Pool"
Conrad Ludlow: Leslie Howard
Vera Zorina: Lena Olin
Suzanne Farrell: Juliette Binoche
Edward Villella: Al Pacino
Jacques d'Amboise: Bill Nye (The Science Guy)
Lincoln Kirstein: Orson Welles

For Balanchine, maybe Charlie Chaplin.

[Ray]

I don't think there's an actress in her teens, 20's, or 30's that could compete with the young Maria Tallchief's beauty (ETA), but Faye Dunaway is a stroke of genius.

My cast, ignoring that they'd never all be the right age (or alive) at the right time, and the accents would be all over the place:

Allegra Kent: Ludivine Sagnier, the young actress from "Swimming Pool"
Conrad Ludlow: Leslie Howard
Vera Zorina: Lena Olin
Suzanne Farrell: Juliette Binoche
Edward Villella: Al Pacino
Jacques d'Amboise: Bill Nye (The Science Guy)
Lincoln Kirstein: Orson Welles

For Balanchine, maybe Charlie Chaplin.

Inspired choices! I LOVED Swimming Pool, btw!

There is an actress out there now in film who looks like the young Tallcheif, btw--darned if I can remember her name.

Other Kirstein choices: Bill Irwin (he's tall--wait, maybe he could play d'Amboise) Harvey Fierstein (for the voice?!?)
Conrad Ludlow: Another Bill: Pullman

[papeetepatrick]

Better than a miniseries (because everything is going to fall short, no matter what) is an 80s-style nighttime soap called BALANCHINE ! after 'Dallas', 'Dynasty' and 'Falcon Crest'.

I can't wait for the opening credits which zoom in on the KOCH THEATRE, with rousing music by MIKE POST. I want the closing credits to be a MEDLEY OF FRANZ WAXMAN MOVIE MUSIC, including 'The Theme from Peyton Place'.

Lee Radziwill as Barbara Horgan...hasn't had a part since 'Laura'...Robin McNeil as Himself and Lesley Stahl as Herself...Rin Tin Tin and/or Lassie as one of the Famous Dogs of Ballerinas...

[dirac]

Yes, the meticulous setting of Apollo and the Prodigal Son would make the subject of a good film (director between Truffaut of Day for Night and Bresson of a Condemned Man Escaped).

I thought of Truffaut too, Quiggin. Bresson wouldn't have occurred to me but I think you're on to something. (On the other hand he might cast Léaud as Balanchine.)

Alan Rudolph isn’t a director on that level but he’s taken an interest in the period and he can handle a crowded canvas.

[Quiggin]

Lincoln Kirstein: Orson Welles

For Balanchine, maybe Charlie Chaplin.

Welles would create his own solipsistic world for Kirstein, and Chaplin would be nicely enigmatic for Balanchine. The place to use Johnny Depp might be for Conrad Ludlow--or even for Leslie Howard.

[dirac]

I just realized my post reads as if I'm suggesting Bresson would cast Leaud. Didn't mean that, obviously.

Welles is a great idea for Kirstein.

[bart]

I've been trying to imagine Welles (even if he were alive) as Lincoln Kirstein. I saw, as a number of us on Ballet Talk saw, Kirstein occasionally and know what he sounded like and how he moved. I've also seen most of Welles's movies, including all the biggies. Somehow, I'm not making the connection. (IMG:http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/style_emoticons/default/helpsmilie.gif)

I don't know many of the actors who've been named, but I have seen a bit of Juliette Binoche's film work. I'm having trouble imagining her as Suzanne Farrell. Not that she couldn't act the part, but in the areas of appearance, quality of movement, and that strange, serene blankness that could take over Farrell's face while performing. I'd think that an American actress would be required to portray the very young Farrell's appearance of midwestern normality in daily life. Was Binoche ever so innocent and unformed?

A question: assuming she's included in the film, is there any contemporary actress who could do the Melissa Hayden-as-acerbic commentator role suggested by dirac? I think we need grittier than Eve Arden. Who'se available today who could portray Hayden in her dancing years and, if required by the screenplay, as in retirement, looking back.

Young Pacino as young Villella is great. They not only are similar physical types, they're both capable of playing very smart characters.

[Helene]

A question: assuming she's included in the film, is there any contemporary actress who could do the Melissa Hayden-as-acerbic commentator role suggested by dirac? I think we need grittier than Eve Arden. Who'se available today who could portray Hayden in her dancing years and, if required by the screenplay, as in retirement, looking back.

Not a contemporary actress, but maybe Agnes Moorehead in her Bewitched days. Meryl Streep can be ascerbic enough, but she doesn't look tough in the same way.

Maybe Juliet Stephenson could play Karin von Aroldingen, who, at least when interviewed on film, has a combination of warmth and wryness. A young Helen Mirren could have played Tanaquil Leclerq, at least the sensual Leclerq from the "Afternoon of a Faun" film with d'Amboise.

[Ray]

Inspiration: Martha Plimpton as Heather Watts!
And maybe Judy Davis as Melissa H?
Joachim Phoenix as Jock Soto

[Helene]

Inspiration: Martha Plimpton as Heather Watts!

Yes!!!! Perfect for Mortensen as Martins.

[Mel Johnson]

I've been trying to imagine Welles (even if he were alive) as Lincoln Kirstein. I saw, as a number of us on Ballet Talk saw, Kirstein occasionally and know what he sounded like and how he moved. I've also seen most of Welles's movies, including all the biggies. Somehow, I'm not making the connection. (IMG:http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/style_emoticons/default/helpsmilie.gif)

I can't either, even with the slimmer Welles of the 30s. He might have made a sort of saturnine presence, which Kirstein was certainly capable of projecting from time to time, but I doubt that Welles would make much of Kirstein's quiet ebullience, of which he was equally capable. The liveliest I ever saw Kirstein was at a military history conference, where he lectured on the 54th and 55th Massachusetts Regiments in the American Civil War.