TWO MORE NYCB PREMIERES: “LUCE NASCOSTA” AND “CALL ME BEN”
It’s been a season of new ballets and principal dancer farewells at New York City Ballet, and, between that and all the goings-on at ABT, it’s hard to keep up! I realized when meeting a blog reader yesterday at Philip Neal’s farewell performance (so nice to meet you, Vanessa!) that I hadn’t yet written about the last two premieres and people were waiting. I was going to wait until I’d seen each once again, but at least with one of them I won’t get that chance since there was a programming change.
Anyway, Maura Bigonzetti’s Luce Nascosta (two photos above, cast in top, Teresa Reichlen and Adrian Danchig-Waring directly above. All photos by Paul Kolnik): I really don’t know what to think of it. The title is translated in the program notes as “Unseen Light”. The stage was very dark except for a Santiago Calatrava moon-like disc, which throughout the course of the ballet expanded into multiple discs. Everyone was in black (costumes by Marc Happel), the men in flare-legged pants and the women in tight black tops and big ruffled skirts that resembled trendy Latin ballroom costumes from a couple years back.
The dancing was at times in ensemble,...
