BALLET
Grand Ballet du Marquis de Cuevas. (Cambridge.)
SINCE last week the de Cuevas Company has presented three of its new productions, Skibine's Tragedy of Verona, Taras's Le Bal des Jeunes Files and the Tarasiana pas de deux. Skibine's ballet is based on the love-story of Romeo and Juliet, and, while the problems of such a condensation would tax the powers of a far more experi- enced choreographer, his work, though slight, reflects the composer's own sensitivity and appreciation of mood. John Taras is greatly influenced by the Balanchine approach, and therefore it is not good programme making to present Le Bal des Jeunes Filtes on the same evening as the latter's Concerto Barocco. From the audi- ence's point of view a little of this busy brittle type of choreo- graphy goes a long way, especially as from the dancers' it is more exacting than rewarding. After the smooth and fey-like quality of her performance in Night Shadow, Marjorie Tallchief showed her- self a dancer capable of much vitality in the last part of Le Bal des Jeunes Files. Besides having an astonishingly beautiful developpee, she threw herself with such zest into the finale that, even at this late stage, she gave some semblance of life to a rather clumsy wprk.
In Tarasiana, Rosella Hightower danced more in the spirit of her old self. She met the choreographer's high demands without flinch- ing and with the dignity necessary to the period. Some of Taras's open-legged lifts are very ungainly, and, although the ballerina could do nothing to improve upon these, it would add much to the grace and truth of her performance if she could keep her legs generally nearer to each other, especially in the taking of arabesques.
Serge Golovine, looking like a charming, well-trimmed little poodle in Jean Robier's costume, did not seem to find this pas de deux so well suited to his style. Its quick footwork needs the precision of an Eglevsky, while its difficult enchainement, with tours-en-l'air . following immediately upon each other, db not give the dancer time to make his point. A more simplified arrangement would be much more telling. Earlier in the _week Golovine had danced Le Cygne Noir with such brilliance and artistry as to give a thrill to the most
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