Modern Moves

Jerome Robbins

Pennsylvania Ballet, March 13, Merriam Theater

Everything on Pennsylvania Ballet’s program last week seemed totally current, and yet there wasn’t a truly recent dance performed. Oldest honors on the Merriam Theater bill went to Jerome Robbins’ 1945 "Interplay," which was followed closely in time by José Limón’s 1949 "The Moors Pavane." Forty years later comes "The Waltz Project," from 1988, by Peter Martins of the New York City Ballet. Interesting program, yes — the dancers gave it life.

"The Waltz Project," the work new to PAB (and us), is as multifaceted as a diamond, and just as hard, just as cold. Martins uses the atonal waltzes of 10 composers, Philip Glass and John Cage and their ilk — admirable but very hard to sway along to. To this onstage piano sound, Martins adds an apparently endless collection of tortuous body constructions performed on opening night by four excellent, and fearless, couples. It was a relief when perky Martha Chamberlain came out in clunky sneakers to a welcome chuckle. Arantxa Ochoa and Amy Aldridge, with the lean bodies and angular dance styles suited to Martins’ pretzel dance, stood out. Martins’ dance invention is encyclopedic, but the moves are as atonal as the music, with no emotion driving them. Ultimately, one is left admiring and nothing more.

Limón’s "The Moor’s Pavane" is all heart, and each of the four dancers who filled out this small cast dance-drama opening night gave the kind of performance that makes you rifle through the program trying to find out more about them. Risa Steinberg, the José Limón Foundation coach, selected the cast for this dance retelling of Othello, and she knew what she was doing picking Meredith Rainey, Hawley Rowe, James Ihde and Meredith Reffner. Rainey’s an admired soloist, but the other three are corps dancers, and yet this young cast made the story seem immediate, real and full of emotion, not just a respectful restaging of a dance classic.

"Interplay" may be old, but it’s important Robbins. Here he’s settling into his signature choreographic style, combining ballet, jazz dance and athletic street moves — tough stuff to perform. Anyone who might have doubted the degree of difficulty had ample opportunity to see the men slipping and stumbling opening night — these same guys later whipped off Martins’ contortions effortlessly. Robbins’ choreography always has been deceptively, cruelly hard for performers while looking easy and buoyant to the audience. In his lifetime, Robbins was famous for dances that looked "contemporary"; the word still applies.

—Janet Anderson