STAGE AND SCREEN The Ballet
Russian Ballet at Covent Garden Union Pacific, the new ballet whose subject is the building of the American railways, is notable for Massine's amazing dance as a potman. This dance possesses to the highest degree the quality that Union Pacific lacks as a whole, conciseness, inevitability. One of the most stimulating powers of modern ballet resides in the completeness of characterization that the dancing can convey. We experience a whole history in watching great ballets : we do not taste, but feed off, an essence. Union Pacific is not a great ballet. Perhaps there was not enough material for presentation in the form of comedy : yet so compelling is the potman's (lance, the centre around which the ballet has been built and to which the ballet as a whole provides the necessary scene, that Union Pacific will probably survive. Let it be said that on first and on subsequent performances this dance has raised an unparalleled tumult of applause. In some respects it is not unlike many dances that have been achieved in the music-hall. But it is certain that only a ballet dancer could incorporate in the design and execution of such a dance the entire history of a character. Whereas we cannot hope to experience in the music-hall so complete a reduction of character, the classical ballet style, with its emphasis upon pride in movement, is suited to convey that concise substance, that virtu of a person which he possesses as far as he is a positive or exteriorized force, and which is the dramatic aspect of character. The basis of Massine's dance is certain slow jazz movements, particularly of the shoulders. These movements are given a wider and, so to say, more universal meaning than would be possible in a jazz dance proper. The denouement comes towards the end of the dance when the potman begins to strut round. We have seen already the history of his professional life, the eternal uncorking of bottles which is as one with his loose-jointed hanging and gaping and the cross-eyed stare of his kind. Then, as he struts round, we become more conscious of the comic pride that sustains his otiose condition. We witness the virtu of this cross-eyed character, a subject worthy of William Faulkner, the American novelist. The wonder is that Massine should be equally versed in Americana.
The decor of this ballet is not in any way remarkable. I think that it is in the matter of the settings alone that De Baiil's new productions seem to compare unfavourably with those of the later Diaghilev ballet. The settings of Jeux D'Enfants, Concurrence and Cotillon (in that order) are excellent, even by Diaghilev standards. The settings of the other De Basil creations are not in the same class. But one must remember that this has been due partly to lack of funds and partly to a difference of aim in the construction of certain of the ballets. The three ballets mentioned above belong to the Diaghilev style : whereas Choreartium is a choreographic symphony of which I gave some account in my last article. It seems inevitable that Choreartium's setting should, so to say, reflect the music. Except in the last movement, the decors and the costumes provide no purely pictorial interest whatsoever. At the same time these costumes enhance the structure of the music. The colours are what one might call musical colours, washy aquatint-like duns, russets and mauves. They are the colours of some inner process, some brown study." They perform a function as intermediaries between the Germanic music and the classical dance that is imposed upon that music. The case of Les Presages, Massine's other choreographic sym- phony, is different. The setting sides with " the triangles and circles of the choreography, or, rather, dictates them. At the same time, musical magentas and sand colours are employed. Ballet lovers are still discussing this decor and these costumes and wavering in their opinions. The truth is that Masson's decor and his costumes, though perhaps unattractive in themselves, play an enormous part in the con- struction of this ballet, the most abstract or geometric of all ballets. We cannot imagine Les Presages without Masson's setting. He has invented a harsh and effective goad to the
Previous page
