The idea was entirely worthy in its appreciation of Diaghilev's genius in shaping ballet though collaboration that opened eyes, ears and minds. What "the spirit of Diaghilev" means today is harder to define: certainly better new scores, less timorous decoration. But not the ineptitudes and, in the case of Javier de Frutos's Eternal Damnation , an insolence that disgraced the evening.

The brief for the choreographers was to investigate an idea owed to Diaghilev. The ensuing mayhem brought one work that rose to the challenge: Russell Maliphant's (and his lighting designer Michael Hulls') AfterLight . Inspired by those circular drawings with which Vaslav Nijinsky expressed his descent into psychosis, Maliphant has made dances set to Satie's Gnossiennes . Hulls has defined a ravishing arena of light in which Daniel Proietto tremendously, subtly turns and swoops, his movements shaped by the whorls of Nijinsky's lines. The effect is obsessive, revealing, true to Maliphant's manner and to Nijinsky's imagery.

McGregor's choreography, for seven dancers, bears its trademark of rubbery articulations and energy in a constant state of flux. There are romantic couplings that hint of ecstasy and sequences when the dancers seem to be swimming on dry land, a potent image of futility and exhaustion. It ends with two dancers marooned in a desolate emptiness, walking nowhere. One wishes the movement had striven for greater shape, but the mood convinces.

As an artist who has always been fascinated by the shape of things, Russell Maliphant was bound to find inspiration in the abstract drawings of Nijinsky (Diaghilev's star dancer). Afterlight, Maliphant's solo for Daniel Proietto, travels in two concurrent circles, defined by the turning movements of the dancer's body on the spot and the larger arc he travels onstage. Satie's Gnossiennes works perfectly as music; Michael Hulls's lake of dappled lighting is breathtaking.

The centenary is being celebrated with the Diaghilev P.S. festival, a suitably diverse showcase of arts and culture, including ballet performances, concerts, art exhibitions and conferences.“The main aim of the festival is to bring Diaghilev’s name back to Russia,” said Natalya Metelitsa, the festival’s artistic director.

Diaghilev’s name is closely connected with that of St. Petersburg. As a young man, he moved to the imperial capital from Perm to study law, but soon began taking music lessons at the St. Petersburg Conservatory as well as at the university. He was one of the founders of the Mir Iskusstva (World of Art) movement, as well as the publisher of the eponymous journal at the turn of the 20th century.

Key to this production are Prudence and Petunia, Cinderella's ugly stepsisters. The duo adds comic relief to the show, but Stark is giving audiences even more to laugh at by casting Orlando Ballet dancer William Marshall Ellis as Petunia, performing with his partner in crime Anamarie McGinn as Prudence.

We spoke with Ellis, McGinn and Stark about this Cinderella.

This season, the ballet company is challenging itself – to present a series of programs that not only will attract audiences but will show, once and for all, the exciting, edgy nature of the adventurous modern ballet troupe.

To start things off, the company will present the first of what it plans will be an annual choreography competition, featuring new dances commissioned by the Sacramento Ballet, created for its dancers and performed by them at the Crest Theatre.

When the final reckoning on the season was done, the company was left with a shortfall of $638,000 on revenues of more than $24 million, which when calculated against the company's accumulated surplus of $215,000 now leaves the company $423,000 in the red.

And while that's certainly not good news, it could have been worse. Initially, the company had predicted a $1-million deficit on the season.

The program features the Las Vegas premiere of two of his ballets and of his new company — a reshaped and reconfigured Nevada Ballet.

Eleven new dancers have filled positions at the scaled-down company. Tiered hierarchies — principals, soloists and corps de ballet — have been replaced by a troupe exchanging solo and ensemble roles. Moreover, new members and Nevada Ballet dancers who stayed on know what to expect from the demanding, unapologetic and ambitious taskmaster, who is in his first full season with the company.

Take six dancers, and dress one as a hunchback pope so bulbous he could be an It's a Knockout contestant. Stir in equal measures of the sexual depravity and surrealist anti-clericalism (respectively) of filmmakers Pier Paolo Pasolini and Luis Buñuel. Season liberally with potty-mouthed language, garnish with a Tracy Emin-esque neon sign that reads "Amuse me" – oh, and leave pretty much anything resembling choreography in the deep-freeze. Bizarre as it may seem, you've just whipped up your very own Eternal Damnation to Sancho and Sanchez, the priapic new work by Javier De Frutos.

The piece concludes Sadler's Wells' In the Spirit of Diaghilev bill, marking the 100th year since the troupe, under the impresario Sergei Diaghilev, first performed to an astonished Paris. Sadler's has commissioned four A-list contemporary choreographers to create one work each that honours his legacy. And it comes as little surprise that, in the manner of Diaghilev's famous dictum to collaborator Jean Cocteau, "Etonne-moi!", it's the troupe's shock-factor that naughty-boy De Frutos has opted to emulate.

1. The question that nags at me whenever I sit through dance is one of narrative. Should I be able to understand the narrative from the dance itself? And if I can't follow the story, am I watching lousy dance? Or is the narrative in a dance closer to, say, the existentialism in a film -- inferred instead of literal?

All of the above. Older dance, like older films, conforms to our conventional Western idea of narrative -- 19th century ballets such as "Swan Lake," "Giselle" and "The Nutcracker" tell clear-cut stories through mime and dance, often in ways that are precursors of silent movies.

Cinderella can be a paper doll -- two-dimensionally pretty -- but Chiaki Yasukawa makes her a living, breathing heroine whose happy moments and sorrow balance delicately on the tips of her pointe shoes. She never pushes for dramatic effect -- it comes as easily to her as a string of fouette turns. Joseph Gorak, an Orlando Ballet School alumnus now with American Ballet Theatre, brings an easy elegance to the role of Prince Charming. That and incredible technical ability: His legs fly up in leaps as if attached to marionette strings; his form is almost perfect.

But Gorak is an actor, too, and the visceral connection with his partner makes the ballet work. There is an arresting moment in their pas de deux where Yasukawa leaps cannonball-style against his chest and then slowly unfolds in an arabesque as they spin and spin. Lovely. (Saturday's audiences will see Katia Garza and newcomer Patric Palkens as the lead couple.)

The piece reflects interests that the artist pursued in previous projects, namely Work No. 850 (1998), which set 850 runners sprinting through the Tate weaving in and out of crowds of visitors, and his Turner Prize winning piece The lights going on and off (2001). The artist pointed out that Work No. 850 prompted him to think about movement and The lights going on and off uses the gallery as it is, "So to me, trying to use the human body is one step further in trying to make work that doesn't add things to the world. It's not adding extra stuff, it's people."

Johnson does not faithfully replicate "Cleopatra," "The Firebird," "Le Dieu Bleu" and "Scheherazade." Instead, he summons the Ballets Russes' essence, then reveals his version of the dances. The costumes are ornate, the makeup bold and the lighting design by Mike Grogan saturated with abundant color. The music is contemporary, but Johnson stays faithful to the source material by exaggerating expressions as if in a silent movie and romanticizing aspects of other cultures. Overall, the program is a time-traveling experience that occasionally goes astray but mostly asserts itself as a fond homage.

The drawing card is the stylishly trim “Carmen,” choreographed by artistic director William Whitener. But even more alluring are the three short pieces that make up the first half of the Kansas City Ballet’s fall program, playing at the Lyric Theatre through Sunday.

Thursday’s opening-night performance began with two stylistically opposite 19th-century works: the deliberately feminine “Frescoes,” a coy women’s quartet from the Romantic-era ballet “The Little Humpbacked Horse;” and the pas de deux from “Le Corsaire,” a flashy classical showpiece.

Lots of people walked out on opening night, something most definitely in the spirit of Diaghilev, who loved causing kerfuffles. De Frutos knows this, and his running amok surely aims to spoof rather than shock.

His exaggerated means tease our excessive respect, while the music (Ravel’s La Valse) and choreography, when it arrives, reference Diaghilev’s diaspora and devotees — both George Balanchine and Frederick Ashton used the score and De Frutos includes fragments of their styles.

"The dancers are trying to protect their bodies," King says, sinking into the chair at the front of the studio as they all take a break. "It's understandable. We have such a hard schedule."

That's an understatement, coming from this soft-spoken, ubiquitous choreographer. Only a week after Oakland Ballet has finished performing a revival of King's "Love Dogs," Lines Ballet's home season begins Friday at Yerba Buena's Novellus Theater with the premiere of a collaborative effort with jazz musician Jason Moran. Then, in December, the company will premiere King's "Scheherazade" to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of the Ballets Russes at the Monaco Dance Forum's festival in Monte Carlo.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?...e#ixzz0UEaQHlOU

After a frustrating search for a rental, they were introduced to Mr. Brown by a friend. Mr. Brown invited them out to his summer home in Southampton, where they tried to work through the classic Manhattan real estate dilemmas: buy or rent? Live near the school or near the office?

Within a few weeks, Mr. Brown had helped them find a place to live, a new condominium on 340 East 23rd Street near First Avenue, a few blocks from the United Nations International School, where they had enrolled their son, Vasily, 11. They signed a contract for $1.1 million for a 14th-floor apartment at the Gramercy Condominium, a 22-story building with walls of bluish glass and interiors designed by Philippe Starck.

Ballet company founder Phyllis Papa has directed and choreographed a lush and atmospheric adaptation of the rarely performed contemporary ballet.

From the moment Dracula, played by Kristaps Kikulis of Latvia, opens his coffin in a haze of smoke on the red and purple stage while eerily enchanting music pulses, the audience is mesmerized – caught under his spell. Every element of the ballet draws one into the Count’s world, including the beautifully designed backdrops of Romania and London, the lighting and stark blackouts, the elaborate 19th-century costumes, and sound effects evoking galloping horses, thunder and a beating heart.

The new era for the company is reflected in a big, bold program for the 2010 season, which was announced by artistic director Ivan Cavallari at special business breakfast with Woodside executives.

The vibrant Don Quixote, which opens on May 7, will be the marquee production. Doyenne of the WA dance community Lucette Aldous will restage the original choreography of Marius Petipa.