NYCB: Justin Peck revisits the familiar in Mystic Familiar

Last year, Alexei Ratmansky’s Solitude premiered to universally glowing reviews. Solitude is inspired by the struggles of the Ukrainian people. It starts with Joseph Gordon (as the “father”) kneeling beside his dead son (SAB student Ethan Schmidt). Critics praised the ballet for being Ratmansky’s masterpiece. A year later, I’m finally reviewing it. Would it hold up in a revival?

Well, yes and no, though Solitude is a very impressive ballet. It is split into two parts: the first part is set to the Funeral March from Mahler’s Symphony No. 1. I call this part of the ballet “the Ukrainian people”. The stage is darkened as a bunch of people crawl, dance, jump across the stage. At one point, all of them fall to the floor as if hit by bullets. A dancer (the incredible Mira Nadon) is launched across the stage like a grenade. The first movement captures a dystopian, war-torn society.

The second movement, set to Mahler’s Adagietto from Symphony No. 5, is the heart of the ballet. The father figure does a long, impassioned solo that turns into a fever dream. There is a guardian angel for the son (Sara Mearns) who seems to invisibly lift the son’s spirit the way Giselle guides Albrecht. A mother and daughter (Ashley Hod and Alexa Maxwell) stand behind the father and son. Throughout it all, Gordon is off-center, as if his axis has disappeared. He leans forwards, backwards, his legs in extreme developpé or arabesque. His arms flail, he jumps through space, he pirouettes, all the while in agitation, as if he is trying to find his son. It is a remarkable performance from Gordon, who uncovers emotional depths I had never seen in his dancing prior (he’s often cast as the sunny, all-American dancer).

At the end of the ballet Gordon and Schmidt got a solo curtain call. The audience loved it. I loved it. But weaknesses in the ballet also were more apparent upon second viewing. The war symbolism is rather heavy-handed. There is something too on-the-nose about the use of the Mahler music, as if the audience couldn’t thread the needle themselves. One wished for more subtlety, more show and less tell. As of now I find it a compelling but slightly flawed work.

The other two works on the program were less ambitious. Caili Quan’s Beneath the Tides is a pleasant, soothing ballet. Quan chose a lovely piece of music (Saint-Saens’ Cello Concerto No. 1) and utilized the company dancers in rather predictable ways. There was a virtuoso solo-girl (Indiana Woodward), and we know she’s a virtuoso because she does fouettés! There’s also the adagio couple (Unity Phelan and Preston Chamblee) and we know they’re adagio because they have a pas de deux with a big overhead presage. It went down as easily as the inexpensive bubblies they give at cocktail parties. Forgettable, but nice.

Justin Peck’s Mystic Familiar is very … familiar. He drew from a genre he’s had great success in (sneaker ballets), collaborated with a composer with whom he had his greatest hit (Dan Deacon, who was also used in The Times Are Racing), and used the dancers that are regulars in his ballets.

The ballet was divided into five sections (Air, Earth, Fire, Water and Ether). Eamon Ore-Giron’s backdrop looked vaguely like Native American symbolism. The costumes by Humberto Leon were a mix of athleisure-wear (sweats, gym shorts) until the final section, in which everyone changed into white space suits. (Get it? We’re in the Ether now.) The commissioned score by Dan Deacon could be called “Theme and Variations of my big hit Become a Mountain.”

If this is all seeming rather recycled, that’s because it is. The second section of the ballet is a long adagio solo for Taylor Stanley that looks a lot like the adagio solos Kyle Abraham made for Stanley, but without the on-the-note musicality Abraham injected into the solos. The third section had a duet for Tiler Peck and Preston Chamblee that looked exactly like the “love” central duet in The Times Are Racing. There is a solo by Peter Walker that is a less frenetic version of the tapping duet that (you guessed it) Peter Walker dances in Times Are Racing! Another duet for two women (Naomi Corti and Emily Kikta) that harkens back to the female duet in Partita. The corps work incorporated favorite Peck themes, like lining up in the center and then leaning almost to the point of falling (first seen in In Creases).

The only difference between Mystic Familiar and those prior works is the vibe. The Deacon score is gentler, more soothing, than the pulsating electronica of The Times Are Racing. There is a spiritual transcendence that recalls Twyla Tharp’s In the Upper Room. It’s as if Justin Peck is revisiting his old haunts with a more mature, zen point of view.

As derivative as Mystic Familiar is, it might be the Justin Peck ballet I most wanted to hit “rewind”. Balanchine used to liken himself to a cook who had to make many kinds of dishes to please the public. Mystic Familiar is like Justin Peck’s version of comfort food. Predictable, but goes down easily.