Ballet: Not Quite It

Manhattan balletomanes had been waiting for months, and now the Royal Ballet was actually in town. Impresario Sol Hurok's Barnum-sized package included 500 tons of scenery, 160 people, and the most spectacular new dance partnership in half a century: Dame Margot Fonteyn and Russian Defector Rudolf Nureyev, starring in a ballet created expressly for their extraordinary talents.

But even after opening night the wait went on. Impresario Hurok filled the stage with ballets as old and rococo as the Metropolitan Opera House itself. Then he tried the most loyal fans' patience by first presenting Fonteyn and her young new premier danseur in Giselle—one of the most forgettable of all ballets. She danced well, but that was nothing new. So did he, but still nobody could tell whether he could live up to his billing.

Last week the suspense was scheduled to end. In Swan Lake, the two visitors brought the house down. Then, for an audience starring the President's wife, one ex-President's daughter (Margaret Truman Daniel), and one presidential also-ran (Adlai Stevenson), Hurok presented Fonteyn and Nureyev together in the U.S. premiere of Marguerite and Armand, the latest version of Camille.

Sophomoric Sycophants. Sir Frederick Ashton, slated to succeed Dame Ninette de Valois as the Royal Ballet's director, knew that everyone from Verdi to Garbo had taken a whack at Dumas' story since it first appeared in 1848. He redistilled it in his own mind into a prologue and four concentrated scenes. Still he could not decide on the music. Then he heard Liszt's B-minor sonata. To most classicists, the piece is sadly second-rate, but it was the answer to Ashton's yearning. He assigned the orchestration to Humphrey Searle, got Cecil Beaton to do the sets, and plunged into the choreography.

The result is a ballet the like of which has never been seen on any stage. The curtain rises on Marguerite, lying on a chaise longue in her nightie, and dreaming. Of what? Of Armand, of course. And to leave no doubt, Nureyev's face, a hundred times lifesize, flashes on a giant screen. Next come the flashbacks.

Marguerite shows up on the chaise again, surrounded by sophomoric sycophants, her elderly ducal paramour in the background. Enter Armand. With no gravity-defying leaps, but pedestrianly, and with a disconcerting knee jerk, he moves in on Marguerite. It is love at first sight.

Ashton has combined his choreography with the acting. Fonteyn has always been one of ballet's greatest actresses, and now that she is 43, the rest of her body is even more expressive than her articulate legs and feet. For one exquisite moment in their carefree love scene, as Rudolf carries Margot downstage, holding her high, the bones seem to melt out of her joints and she becomes more limp than a rag doll. Nureyev is inspired by her virtuosity. In scene after scene, they act out the passionate affair of Marguerite and Armand. Denied an opportunity to show off his airborne virtuosity, only in the betrayal scene does Nureyev show the hot Tartar blood of which he boasts. Fonteyn dies fetchingly in her nightie.