Dallas International School: Globally Inspired. Distinctly Different.
I’ve never been much of a ballet person, unless you count the years in early childhood I spent sharing the stage with my dad at a small dance company in South Jersey. (Those vivid memories of my dear papá, 10 feet tall, on stilts and in full drag as Mother Ginger shall haunt me ‘til the end of my days.)
No, we were more of an opera family, with season tickets to the Academy of Music in Philly, where we’d squeeze into the cramped nosebleed seats four times a year to watch La Bohème, Carmen, or La Traviata. (Which, at 13, I found equally chic and boring.) I suppose you could blame my flair for the dramatic on Bizet or Puccini.
This past weekend, however, I was given a taste of just how effective ballet can be—with no skimping on the stilts, nor the drama. Scottish Ballet’s new production, Mary, Queen of Scots, made a brief, if impactful stop at Lincoln Center, impressing audiences with its fresh take on the Scottish queen’s relationship with her cousin and eventual executioner, Elizabeth I.
The narrative is told from Elizabeth’s perspective, as she contemplates their story on her deathbed: two powerful women weaving their own deadly webs, trying desperately not to be the one who ends up spider chow. She and Mary, who never meet, dance on the margins of each others’ lives, and there is a palpable yearning to consummate this rivalry that could, in another world, be a friendship defined by mutual admiration instead of fear and paranoia.
Choreographed and co-created by Sophie Laplane, a Paris-based Franco-British choreographer, the dancing is inventive and evocative, whether you’re watching Elizabeth strut the halls of the English court on stilts, towering over all, or a dangerously flirtatious ménage à trois between Mary, her husband Darnley, and her secretary Rizzio.
Some of the fashion and prop choices were a bit out of pocket (looking at you, Brat-green Jester of Doom), though used to comic effect (such as a balloon meant to symbolize baby James, future King of England).
Overall, however, it was a riveting depiction of the life of one of Europe’s most fascinating monarchs. Mary, named Queen of Scotland at six days old, shipped off to France as a child to marry the Dauphin. Teen queen consort of France, rejected by her mother-in-law Catherine de’ Medici after the Dauphin’s death. Targeted by Elizabeth as a legitimate threat to the English throne. Harangued by her wannabe king second husband. Forced to remarry his murderer. Overthrown, imprisoned, but never done scheming to get her way out. Beheaded for treason. But never forgotten.
Faire du sport… In other impressive corporeal feats, I’ve been enjoying watching the on- and off-court exploits of NBA superstar Victor Wembanyama. The Frenchman was spotted sketching a statue in Gramercy Park before leading the Spurs to victory on Monday night. Because of course he was. Anyway—Go Knicks!
