Marina Nebro: Arts and Culture

The Day that SYLVIA Falls In Love

Please click here to listen to the overture as you read my review.

I’m not much of a ballet goer, and the performances that I have had the fortune to see are all similar in one way: their plot. The story always involves some sort of magical or supernatural element: witches, Greek gods, nymphs, you name it! At first, this doesn’t make for an easy understanding of what’s going on. You should have seen my mother trying to decipher the dance as she read the synopsis in the Playbill! But as the production progressed, I believe the story line was easy to follow and quite enjoyable.

Sylvia (Paloma Herrera) is a follower of Diana (Leann Underwood), the Greek goddess of the hunt. She is a strong woman, and hence, scorns love and anything that can possibly make her weak. When a young man, Aminta (Jared Matthews), confesses his love for her, she becomes disgusted and decides to shoot an arrow at the statue of the god of love – Eros (Arron Scott). In an effort to protect his god, Aminta jumps in front of the arrow and sacrifices himself. Eros, as punishment, shoots his own arrow at Sylvia and she promptly falls in love with the now deceased Aminta. Eros is the Greek version of the Roman Cupid! As all of this drama is under way, in the background lurks Orion (Sascha Radetsky), the evil hunter who lusts over Sylvia. When everyone exits the stage and leaves Sylvia alone to weep over her lost love, Orion snatches her and brings her to his hidden cave.

Act II takes place entirely in Orion’s “love den.” He tries to get Sylvia drunk and weak in an attempt to lure her to bed, but this plan backfires as he is the one that ends up getting drunk and confused. As the Act concludes, Eros comes to save Sylvia from the terrible hunter, and brings her to the festival of Bacchus (the god of wine) where Aminta – resuscitated by Eros at the end of Act I – is searching for his love. When Orion comes to and realizes what has happened, he runs out of his cave after Sylvia, and a fight ensues between the love-triangle. It takes Diana to stop the struggle. But when the goddess of the hunt realizes that one of her nymphs, Sylvia, has fallen in love, she refuses to condone the relationship. That is, until Eros reminds the goddess that back in the day, she was once in love as well. Obviously, the story ends happily ever after.

So what of the production? My favorite number was most probably in Act II as Sylvia tricked Orion into drinking himself into a stupor. Along with his slaves and concubines (Julio Bragado-Young, Kenneth Easter, Nicola Curry, and Melanie Hamrick), Sylvia was able to pull off this fantastic feat. The slaves, especially, were quite amusing as they did cartwheels and seemed to be the jesters of the production. Another cute number, during the Act III, occurred during the celebration at the Bacchus festival, as the choreographer Sir Frederick Ashton allowed for individual couples to be featured: Persephone and Pluto (Luciana Paris and Joseph Phillips), Terpischore and Apollo (Karen Uphoff and Daniel Mantei), Ceres and Jaseion (Zhong-Jing Fang and Eric Tamm), and lastly but definitely the cutest, the goats (Sarah Lane and Joseph Gorak).

I also really enjoyed the costumes. The traditional “tutus” during the last Act were gorgeous, as were the chiffon skirts worn by the corps de ballet as they jumped and twirled. I loved the peasant costumes during Act I, as I’m a huge “peasant-o-phile!” That being said, the costumes, though accurate in portraying what I think was the feeling of the piece, were not historically/geographically accurate. The peasant costumes were definitely more of a Northern European, medieval stock, while the hunting costumes were definitely reminiscent of Roman armor. However, the ballet seems to take place during the Greek era! I am a little bit more forgiving about the Turkish inspired costumes during Act II in Orion’s cave, as I can definitely imagine the setting to be in Cyprus – a sort of halfway point between continents.

The sets were equally (if not more) as stunning as the costumes. There was such depth and dimension to the stage due to the multiple layers of drops! Lighting was also used in a very clever way to depict “flashbacks” or visions. In the background, stairs and other types of entrances were hidden and camouflaged by hills and mountains, and said terrain would shift throughout the different acts to create various sorts of settings.

As for the dancing? I’m not sure, to be completely honest. As I’ve said before, it is difficult for me to understand the art of dance and I don’t have an eye for talent and technique in this art form. I did, at some points, believe that the members of the corps de ballet were not in sync with each other in numbers such as Sylvia’s first dance with the huntresses, and the woodland creature ensemble right at the beginning of the production. But would I recommend seeing Sylvia? Definitely! The music is absolutely phenomenal, conducted by David LaMarche. Léo Delibes, the composer, definitely composed a powerful and emotion-filled score for this ballet.

Sylvia
American Ballet Theatre – Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center
June 26, 2013

Marina B. Nebro