Tis the season when the Bagger has to go to other people’s holiday parties. On Monday night, we stopped by the Fox Searchlight party at the Hudson Hotel, where Sam Rockwell, Juliette Lewis and Darren Aronofsky mingled among hordes of Oscar bloggers and other media people out for the free drinks and trays of cheese.
Anyway, we made a beeline for the mustachioed Mr. Aronofsky, drinking a beer from the bottle by the bar. Now that his movie “Black Swan” has opened across the country – doing impressively well at the box office, even in a limited release – the dance world has had a chance to respond. Aside from a discussion about judging bodies in ballet, it is the hot topic this week.
Wendy Whelan, the veteran principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, whom Mr. Aronofsky initially approached for research, was a skeptic turned fan. In The Daily Beast, she praised Natalie Portman’s performance as Nina Sayers, a ballerina torn apart psychologically by the pressures of “Swan Lake.”
“Dancers learn to take on these subtle head-trips every day,” Ms. Whelan wrote. “Going to those depths is a unique part of our job as performing artists.” The movie made her reflect on her entire career, she said.
“I thought it was absolutely awesome,” Ashley Bouder, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet and prolific intermission Tweeter, wrote in The Huffington Post. But Ms. Bouder went on to acknowledge the pervasiveness of dance stereotypes – “the stage mom, the anorexic or bulimic, the other ballerina out to get your roles, the obsessive perfectionist, etc. They are all represented in this movie to an extreme level,” she wrote – and noted that the movie has “offended” some people.
“I thought it was absolutely awesome,” Ashley Bouder, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet and prolific intermission Tweeter, wrote in The Huffington Post. But Ms. Bouder went on to acknowledge the pervasiveness of dance stereotypes – “the stage mom, the anorexic or bulimic, the other ballerina out to get your roles, the obsessive perfectionist, etc. They are all represented in this movie to an extreme level,” she wrote – and noted that the movie has “offended” some people.
In a blog post titled “Black Swan – Better Than I Thought, But…” Wendy Perron, the editor in chief of Dance Magazine, lists the convincing and unconvincing parts of the movie. Among the believable things: the perfectionism of the dancers and the little-girl voices in which they often speak.
“The artistic director Tom, who is supposedly choreographing his own version of Swan Lake, seems much more involved in mind games with his leading ladies than actually making a ballet,” she writes. “If he were really working on the choreography, he wouldn’t have time for those power trips.”
“I think it’s time for a dance movie with a happy ending,” Ms. Perron added. “Where a ballerina actually takes pleasure in performing. Where she stays psychologically on balance and enjoys camaraderie with her fellow dancers. Where she finds satisfaction in her career.”
At the Fox party, Mr. Aronofsky took the criticism from the dance world in stride. “It’s one story,”he said. “It’s Nina Sayers’ story, and ultimately, it’s not really about the dance world, it’s about ‘Swan Lake,’ ” Then he accused the Bagger of stirring up trouble. (Us? Never!)
“My feedback from dancers so far has been really positive,” he added. “I went to ‘The Nutcracker’ on Saturday with my son, and we went backstage, and there was Peter Martins and he came to say hi, and he said he hasn’t seen it, but we said, what are they saying, and he said, my dancers love it.”
For the record, the Bagger loved it, too. Even better: Mr. Aronofsky paid for his own tickets to “The Nutcracker.”
