One of my favorite Saturday Night Live sketches is Eddie Murphy’s Mr. Robinson’s Neighborhood. It is a parody of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, except if Mr. Rodgers was … well, considerably less wholesome. Over thirty years after he left SNL, Murphy returned to host and revived Mr. Robinson’s Neighborhood. The parody was as funny and fresh as ever.
What makes this sketch so classic? Well, for one, it comes from a place of love. Murphy obviously studied Fred Rogers closely, and that keen sense of observation is present in the sketches. It’s half parody, half tribute.
Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo’s greatness is based on the same principle. The drag company’s send-up of ballet classics does lightly mock classical ballet’s mannerisms and customs, but they’re also tributes to these ballets. You can feel the love just from looking at the costumes of the Trocks. Each tutu is a beautifully crafted gem. In fact, the tutus for Symphony were a throwback to the much-missed Karinska tutus with their ribbons on the net skirt.
The company returned to the Joyce for a three-week residency. I caught their opening night, which mixed a tried-and-true classic (Act 2 of Giselle, staged by Yelena Tchernychova), with a world premiere (Symphony, choreographed by Durante Verzola). Symphony is a parody of Balanchine’s Symphony in C.
Giselle was mildly disappointing. There were funny aspects: the grimacing facial expressions and clawing arms of the Wilis; Albrecht’s billowing cape; Giselle emerging from an actual coffin; and Giselle and Albert retreating to the coffin at the finale, but otherwise it was a surprisingly straightforward rendition of Act 2 of Giselle.
The good thing is that the Trocks are amazing dancers. Their pointe work was incredible, and they performed all the iconic choreography. Giselle (Shohei Iwahama aka Anya Marx) flew in the arabesque turns of the Wili initiation, she floated her leg up in the exposed developpé of the grand pas de deux, she bounced in the hops and backwards entrechats. Albert (Raydel Caceres aka Mikhail Mudkin) crossed the stage in a diagonal of brisés, and he lifted Giselle in the table-top presages. The Wilis got applause for their forward arabesque shunts, just as they do in an actual Giselle.
The issue was they seemed so focused on getting the choreography right that they forgot to Trock it up. Giselle in particular seemed like he/she was doing a mere imitation of Giselle (down to the tendrilly arms and weightless jumps) rather than a send-up. It was up to the Wilis and the Myrtha (Takaomi Yoshino aka Varvara Laptopova) to add the comedy.
Symphony, on the other hand, was a delightful send-up of Balanchine’s Symphony in C and also Balanchine’s neo-classical style. The only disappointment is that the music used (Gounod’s Symphony, which Balanchine actually used for another ballet of his) is not nearly as great as Bizet’s Symphony in C.
But the dancers nailed the Balanchine style, from the exaggerated rose claw hands to the floppy arms to the fast way of rolling on and off pointe. I loved Andrea Fabbri (aka Tatiana Youbetyabootskaya) in the first movement. He/she is broad-shouldered and commanding, just like Maria Tallchief (the role’s originator) was. When he/she did the famous entrance with the arabesque-to-passé in both directions, you felt Maria Tallchief’s regal presence in a way you don’t necessarily when you see even New York City Ballet do the first movement. The last first-movement ballerina I saw at NYCB was Megan Fairchild, who is many things but decidedly not broad-shouldered and commanding.
I was a little perplexed that the dancers played the famous adagio so straight. Jake Speakman and Raphael Spyker (aka Colette Adae and Meduli Lobtomov) did the dramatic dips, but with rather plain smiles.
Small quibble. Symphony was a joy. The steps are a recognizable parody of Symphony in C without being overly literal. You had the fast tendus, the “bent flower stem” pose, the off balance pirouettes, the grand allegro finale with the flying entrechats. When the four ballerinas of the four movements pirouetted into the iconic knee-bend in the finale, I was smiling ear to ear. This piece gets it.
The evening ended with a nice encore. The dancers lined up with Statue of Liberty helmets and did a kick-dance routine to New York, New York. This is a wonderful company, go see them.
