The Caramel Variations by Ian Spencer Bell from Ballet Review Spring 2012 Cover Photograph by Stephanie Berger, BAM : Silas Riener in Merce Cunningham’S Split Sides

Spring 2012 Ball et Review

The Caramel Variations by Ian Spencer Bell from Ballet Review Spring 2012 Cover Photograph by Stephanie Berger, BAM : Silas Riener in Merce Cunningham’s Split Sides .

© 2012 Dance Research Foundation, Inc. All rights reserved. 4 Moscow – Clement Crisp 5 Chicago – Joseph Houseal 6 Oslo – Peter Sparling 9 Washington, D. C. – George Jackson 10 Boston – Jeffrey Gantz 12 Toronto – Gary Smith 13 Ann Arbor – Peter Sparling 16 Toronto – Gary Smith 17 New York – George Jackson Ian Spencer Bell 31 18 The Caramel Variations Darrell Wilkins 31 Malakhov’s La Péri Francis Mason 38 Armgard von Bardeleben on Graham Don Daniels 41 The Iron Shoe Joel Lobenthal 64 46 A Conversation with Nicolai Hansen Ballet Review 40.1 Leigh Witchel Spring 2012 51 A Parisian Spring Editor and Designer: Marvin Hoshino Francis Mason Managing Editor: 55 Erick Hawkins on Graham Roberta Hellman Joseph Houseal Senior Editor: 59 The Ecstatic Flight of Lin Hwa-min Don Daniels Associate Editor: Emily Hite Joel Lobenthal 64 Yvonne Mounsey: Encounters with Mr B 46 Associate Editor: Nicole Dekle Collins Larry Kaplan 71 Psyché and Phèdre Copy Editor: Barbara Palfy Sandra Genter Photographers: 74 Next Wave Tom Brazil Costas 82 London Reporter – Clement Crisp 89 More Balanchine Variations – Jay Rogoff Associates: Peter Anastos 90 Pina – Jeffrey Gantz Robert Gres kovic 92 Body of a Dancer – Jay Rogoff George Jackson 93 Music on Disc – George Dorris Elizabeth Kendall 71 100 Check It Out Paul Parish Nancy Reynolds James Sutton David Vaughan Edward Willinger Cover Photograph by Stephanie Berger, BAM : Silas Riener Sarah C. Woodcock in Merce Cunningham’s Split Sides . Natalie Wright. (Photo courtesy of Natalie Wright)

18 ballet review The Caramel Variations known. She didn’t wear her hair in tight braids with pink plastic poodle barrettes, like my friend Andrea. She didn’t shout and curse and slap my face and tell me she deserved to be the lead in the school musical, the way Ian Spencer Bell Porscha had. And she wasn’t like those timid, overly polite girls who hid in their mother’s I am interested in black and mixed-race danc - skirt during one of those all-churches picnics, ers, ballerinas in particular, because I see al - where we’d see the Baptists once a year. most none in the major classical companies. At SAB, Natalie didn’t call people out like Like me, the gay boy who didn’t want to be Nikkia had: “Oh, hell no. Someone tell that Prince Siegfied but Odette, they too are “oth - white girl to stop staring at me.” And she did er.” Now, when I am teaching “swan arms” to not have a name like Aesha. She dressed like my students I think of Darci Kistler and Ju- the ninety-nine other girls there: short den - lie Kent. I wish an image of a black ballerina im shorts, Gap Ts, Keds, Lipsmackers lip gloss, doing swan arms came to mind. hair tightly slicked back in a bun. In ballet I was fourteen when I met Natalie Wright. class she was the same, too: black leotard, Eu - She was walking toward me, or dancing, it was ropean pink tights. She looked like another hard to tell which. We were in front of Studio girl I had fallen in love with, Riolama Loren - One, on the fifth floor of Lincoln Center’s Rose zo. I thought maybe Natalie was Latina, like Building, at New York City Ballet’s School of Rio. They were both from Miami. American Ballet. Her arms and legs were so It was Natalie’s third summer at SAB in 1993 long that when she walked her whole body when we met. Balanchine’s muse, Su zanne seemed to make a swinging motion, like a Farrell, had recommended her for a scholar - chandelier earring, sparkling, dangling, gold - ship and had taken her into the school a year en. I fell in love with her immediately. She was early. Natalie had the highest extensions of everything I wanted to be: an exaggeratedly anyone at SAB, except maybe Maria Kowros - proportioned ballerina. She was exotic, too – ki. She could extend her leg to the front, and caramel-colored, blond-streaked hair, eyes it would nearly touch her nose. To the side it darker than the chocolate she ate every after - tickled her ear. And when she lifted her leg to noon. the back in arabesque, teachers occasionally I’m not sure I knew she was black, or half looked concerned or told her to bring her leg black, rather. She was one of four black girls down. I befriended during my three summers at SAB. When Natalie stood on pointe, her feet I recall only five black girls and four black boys looked gooey, like that caramel I mentioned during those months. I don’t know why I was earlier. She could turn three perfect pirou - drawn to the black girls, other than maybe ettes to the right, and beat her legs in the air because my mother, whom everyone in our as fast and neatly as anyone. She was also small Southern town thought was a “commu - musical. In the late afternoon Natalie would nist,” made friends with the few black ladies take her hair down from her bun and let it who worked in our church, loved our nanny loose on her shoulders and the sun would come like a best friend, and picked up the old black in from the windows high above the studio. guys in front of the Safeway and drove them Then, she looked ready to dance one of Bal - wherever they needed to go. Maybe it was be - anchine’s ponytail ballets. cause I was a gay boy who, like the black girls, I was surprised and upset when Natalie felt more than slightly out-of-place in that called to tell me that she would not dance in straight, white world. NYCB. We were sixteen or seventeen then, and Natalie wasn’t black like anyone I’d ever she was at the school full time. Her breasts

©2012 Ian Spencer Bell 19 had developed, and the faculty told her that cle and curtsied to the teacher and then to the the company would not take her. They said her pianist. Then we marched to the barre and did shoulders were too broad. the entire barre in that same height order. We So she moved out to Seattle, to train at Pa - wore leotards that were different colors, a col - cific Northwest Ballet, a kind of sister com - or for each class level, with matching belts. I pany to NYCB. We were in the same class there. think my mom thought it was run like a ship, At PNB, Natalie was the only black person in and that’s where she wanted me. the school and company. There were two oth - There was this girl at Martha Mahr named er darkish girls in our class, an Italian girl and Elita Jarvis, and I remember thinking she was a Latina. They weren’t even that dark. There so beautiful. She had an incredibly beautiful were no black or brown boys. I don’t think face, and she was very tall, and her body was there were even any black people working in very long, and she danced very long. the building at the time. Bell: What did you look like? In class the main correction aimed at Na - Wright: My hair was very fair and my eyes talie was to dance less. “You move too much,” were always really dark – and the nose is un - they told her. Our favorite teacher told her she mistakable. I’m sure I had a little bit of tan. I was “too sensual” for the company. Natalie was was by no means white. My skin has never sensual all right: she used all of her senses to been white. Being in Miami, there were lots dance, as great dancers do. We weren’t aware of people of color. There were girls there who then that our teacher was saying the same were my color or darker. There were Cubans, thing SAB had implied: You’re not right for the a Brazilian girl who was darker than me. We company because you have breasts like a wo - were all variations of caramel. But I do not re - man and you move like a woman and it threat - call a black girl. ens the way we see ballet. I have a distinct memory of being in second Natalie never did get a job in a major com - grade and the kids pointing out that my moth - pany. She pursued teaching dance in outreach er, a white woman, was dropping me off, and and training programs in Miami, New York, my dad, a black man, was picking me up. I re - and Los Angeles. She’s teaching at Los Ange - member the kids noticing it and me noticing les Ballet now, and I talk to her nearly every that it might be unusual or unfavorable. That day over the telephone. When I hear her, some - was the first time it was presented. times I imagine her walking, dancing, toward In first or second grade, I remember a girl me. named Xotcele. Her mom was white, her dad Bell: How did you begin dancing? was black. I remember understanding that Wright: My mom and whole a bunch of oth - she was mixed like me. I thought, We have this er moms organized classes out of a house. I thing in common: you’re like me and our par - took creative movement there. I don’t know ents look the same. It was later in public school, for how long. I first started ballet when I in third grade, that it became an issue for the was five. I started with Miss Mahr, at the other kids. Martha Mahr School of Ballet. My mom had I also remember early in my life that my looked at a whole bunch of studios. As soon dad used to go to city events, as an architect, as she walked into this one, she knew she was in “black parts” of the community. I remem - going to send me there because they were so ber going to the parties and thinking, I don’t orderly. My mom was a schoolteacher – and look like the inner-city kids. I remember my English. dad being on the roof once and a neighbor, an Each class we had to enter in a march, and old Jew, called the cops because she thought a when we were older a polonaise with our hands black man was trying to break into the house. on our waist. Everything was in height order. It was Miami Beach, and at the time, every - After we entered, we made a perfect semicir - one was old and Jewish. The cops came, and

20 ballet review my dad had to go into the house to get his dri - that she was black, that she was black in a ver’s license to prove that he lived there. My white environment. mother had no tolerance for social injustice. I felt I had an understanding with her not And I do remember her giving people tongue- because we were the only people of color at lashings over things like that. SAB, but because I grew up in Miami, and I Bell: Were you perceived as black? felt like I could imagine what it was like for Wright: I don’t know. To so many people, I her to be a black girl living a normal life in look Hispanic, and since I’m also from Miami, Rochester, where she grew up. I knew of black people just assume you are. Suki Schorer called dancers at Dance Theatre of Harlem. I believe me Natalia for years. I remember in my later I knew of Lauren Anderson at Houston Ballet. years at SAB Roland [Culler] saying to me, “I Bell: Do you feel like you were treated dif - remember the first time I saw you, I knew you: ferent from your peers because of the color of that’s a caramel girl with blond hair, or light- your skin? skinned black girl with light hair.” There was Wright: I was different because of my D that kind of chiming in on how I looked. boobs. I remember when SAB told my mother In retrospect, I think about how, when I got that my shoulders were too broad. My mom a little older, my body wasn’t that different had asked for a meeting. They told her that from white kids’. It was that my feet were I hadn’t developed as they thought I would, different from black kids’. I remember when and that my shoulders were too broad. I re - I was a kid other kids saying, “You black, but member my mom telling me and me crying in you got white feet.” the cafeteria downstairs. I wasn’t upset that I Bell: Was there a dancer at SAB you want - wasn’t going to get a contract. I felt like a dis - ed to be like? appointment to everyone: SAB, my teachers in Wright: Not really. And I never was very in - Miami, my family. terested in the culture. I never read the ballet I remember feeling a sense of shame about books or kept the programs. I did collect a few my body then. Looking back fifteen years, I pairs of pointe shoes. I had some from the Roy - feel I can be objective now. Even if I had felt al Ballet, when I performed with them at Lin - like there was racism, I’m not sure how I would coln Center. I was maybe twelve or thirteen. I have perceived it. I did have a sense of “oth - wonder how much of that was because I was er” there, but I wouldn’t say I was ever singled swept up with the other girls collecting them. out. But I don’t ever recall wanting to be like a I told Natalie I’d call her back. I was think - dancer in City Ballet or ABT. I had an affinity ing of Misty Copeland, the only black female for certain ballets. I kind of looked up to them, soloist in American Ballet Theatre. Misty is like one day I might want to do that. I do re - black like Natalie is black: caramel or mocha member the Wendy Whelan craze. I remem - or dark cream, depending on the makeup and ber looking up at her picture on the sixteenth lighting. I see her as I saw Natalie: an extra - floor, taking time to look at her workshop pho - ordinarily attractive dancer with legs and feet to. She wasn’t a soloist or anything. She was so perfectly pretty for ballet that her racial just one of the girls. I wanted to dance every - ambiguity is secondary to her identity as a thing from Agon , anything from Four T’s . In - dancer. Misty is one of two black women in teresting that they are the black-and-white the company and one of three black women ballets. to have ever been a soloist in ABT. There has Bell: Were you aware of black ballerinas never been a black female principal dancer in then? ABT. Wright: There was Andrea Long, who had The first time I saw Misty dance was in been in the company [NYCB]. I was in school ABT’s Studio Company. I watched her perform with Aesha Ash. She was black. I was aware the wedding pas de deux from The Sleeping Beau - spring 2012 21 ty . Princess Aurora is one of the big three – filled out paperwork at school that said I was along with the leads in Swan Lake and The Nut - black. Those were the boxes I checked. cracker – for a classical ballerina, designed to Misty laughed. She laughs a lot. But she’s show off your technique and style. Copeland serious when discussing race. Both of Misty’s was exquisite. She was in control of the slight - parents were mixed race. Sylvia DelaCerna, est details: the tilt of her head, the shape of Misty’s mother, was Italian and black, adopt - her hands, the height of her legs. But in the ed and brought up by a black woman and decade she has danced for ABT, I have rarely her black husband in Kansas City, Missouri. seen her perform these classical roles. I see DelaCerna’s adoptive mother worked for child her onstage in contemporary work mostly. I services. DelaCerna grew up to be a profes - wondered if it had anything to do with the sional cheerleader for the Kansas City Chiefs. color of her skin. Misty’s father split for Chicago when Misty I met Misty in the lounge at the Mandarin was a child and left her mom with six kids. Oriental Hotel, uptown near Lincoln Center. Copeland: My mother was my role model. She had just come from a late afternoon re - Growing up I felt close to Mariah Carey be - hearsal at the Metropolitan Opera House. She cause she is a mixed-race woman. I’d dance to strolled in wearing black leggings and tall Mariah – lyrical, flowy movements – and I’d shoes and a chain necklace and hoop earrings. choreograph on friends. She was glamorous, sexy too, ready to work Misty’s mother choreographed on her for an MTV red carpet. But her soft manner and talent shows. But Misty didn’t pursue dance thoughtful gaze dispelled any notions of her training until she was thirteen. They were liv - as a strident starlet. ing in California, and at DelaCerna’s urging, Up close, Misty has all the attributes of a Misty auditioned for the San Pedro Middle classical ballerina: delicate hands, gentle School drill team. Misty choreographed a rou - countenance, warm and sweet and friendly. tine to George Michael’s “I Want Your Sex.” When she sat, she sat like Giselle on that lit - She became the team captain: “If I’m going to tle wooden bench in the first act of that “white do this, I’m going to be captain.” ballet,” so called because of all those long white Elizabeth Cantine, her drill coach, led a girls in long white tutus. ballet class in the gym and encouraged Misty I had arrived early and was having tea and to dance. She told her she had the body and thinking about the opening of Nella Larsen’s feet for it. The Boys and Girls Club offered 1929 novella, Passing . Irene Redfield is seated free classes, and Misty started taking ballet at a table in a fancy Chicago hotel restaurant there, on the basketball court. At first, she observing her color rise as a woman stares at watched from the bleachers but eventually her. Irene wonders, “Did that woman, could was coaxed onto the court. that woman, somehow know that here before Shortly after, Misty began training with her very eyes on the roof of the Drayton sat a Cynthia Bradley, at San Pedro Dance Center. Negro? ” Bradley was like a mother, and Misty began Thinking of Misty, I was wondering if taking two classes a day, five days a week. She pass ing for white or Latina has helped the was on pointe after a month and was accept - twenty-eight-year-old achieve success in our ed to San Francisco Ballet School, where she “national ballet company.” I asked her if she studied for the summer. She continued her had ever read the Larsen book. She said she training at the Lauridsen Ballet Centre, in hadn’t. She had been reading Brainwashed : Torrance, and eventually won the Music Cen - Challenging the Myth of Black Inferiority , by Tom ter Spotlight Award, in Los Angeles. Burell. Copeland: I never thought of my color dur - Bell: How do you identify yourself? ing that time. I can’t remember a black girl Copeland: My mom told me I was black. I around, but it never bothered me. My talent

22 ballet review got me everywhere. I was looked at as a danc- ris’ Gong was one of the first things I did, and er. All of that changed my first year in ABT. they saw I was a good mover. It’s easier to slip A board member said, “There hasn’t been a me into neoclassical ballets. I don’t think I pass. black woman in the corps de ballet in fifteen For the white ballets I powder my body. years.” That had always lingered in the back In all the photos, I think I look darker than of my mind. It was the first time I thought all of them – even the Thai and Spanish girls. my talent wasn’t going to get me what I want - Swan Lake is the pinnacle of classical ballet. I ed. can’t imagine any company giving it to a Then that thing in the back of my mind black woman. Black women are thought of as made me begin to question myself. I was be - the complete opposite of what a ballerina is coming an adult. I was sixteen or seventeen. supposed to be: black women are thought to I felt lonely in the company. I felt a huge sep - be loud and strong. I feel like they picture aration from the other dancers. I was relieved black women as big butts and flat feet. Com - when Danny Tidwell and Eric Underwood pany members say, “We don’t think of you as [black corps de ballet dancers] joined. They black.” could relate to little things, like a new musi - Black women in general aren’t encouraged cal artist. to do ballet because they know what the out - I felt pigeonholed into contemporary work. come will be. The girls I mentor are told, I wasn’t trained in tap, jazz, or hip-hop. I’m a “May be you should try a contemporary com - classically trained ballet dancer. Mark Mor - pany,” so not many even go to the auditions.

Misty Copeland. (Photo: Weiferd Watts) spring 2012 23 Complexion has something to do with it. There notoriously expensive. So poor kids can’t get are no dark-skinned women except Lauren into schools. Then there is this mentality that Anderson at Houston Ballet. blacks don’t want to do it, but it’s just that they I had never considered anything like that, haven’t had the opportunity. being a principal, until I saw Lauren Ander - There is so much about ballet that seems son on the cover of Dance Magazine . People say unattainable. And there has been no template I’m the first, but I’m not. I had to do the re - for young black girls to see themselves. Dur - search myself. There were other women: Janet ing a lecture-demonstration, Ruth [Weisen, Collins, Raven Wilkinson, Virginia Johnson, director of the Thomas Armour Youth Ballet Nora Kimball, Anne Benna Sims. My career and the Miami Conservatory] had a little girl would be completely different if I were dark - tell her that she wanted to be a ballerina, er. I’m not sure I’d be given as many oppor- but that she knew she couldn’t because she is tunities as I’m given now. It’s like the ballet black. world hasn’t changed since the 1950s. When Ruth looked onstage, she saw only me I called Natalie back. She was pacing, or – and I looked Puerto Rican. That was the walking. Often in the late afternoon when spark for Ruth to begin her entire outreach we talk, she is hiking up to the Griffith Park program. She said to herself, I can’t ever do a Observatory. performance with only white kids again. Wright: I’m acutely aware of the lack of Natalie stopped walking. She was panting. minorities in the arts. I am aware of just how “Who’s going to the ballet anyway?” unique it is to be a minority in ballet – not Next I called my old friend from SAB, Rio - unique like special, but unique like atypical. lama Lorenzo. She does Odette in Christopher Ballet is an elitist art form – well, the culture Wheeldon’s Swan Lake at Pennsylvania Ballet, is, I’m not sure the art form is. Because of that, where she is a principal dancer. It was a Sun - there is not really a large black audience for day morning. Her three-month-old baby girl classical dance. was sleeping and her four-year-old son and I think the reason there is not a large black husband were at church. Her voice was soft audience is because ballet companies don’t and warm, and I could picture her deep-set think to include minorities in their audience eyes and long dark hair. She told me she was because they haven’t done so for four hun- retiring soon, in February, dancing some bal - dred years, so they don’t really create an in - lets made for her by another SAB friend, Penn - clusive repertory or have black dancers. As sylvania Ballet choreographer-in-resi dence, an audience member, what attracts you is the Matthew Neenan. ability to recognize yourself in the work. And The last time I saw her dance was at New if you don’t see yourself, you can’t be drawn York’s City Center in Serenade . She and prin - in. cipal dancers Amy Aldridge and Arantxa Minorities are not given quality classical Ochoa made the ballet look new to me. I recall ballet training. There are thousands of bal- being told that when Balanchine wanted to let schools in the Unites States, but only a make a ballet look fresh, he put a young dancer fraction of them offer quality training. in the lead role. These women danced with the And only a fraction of those schools focus on freedom of sixteen-year-olds. teaching children of color. I don’t think that Bell: You’ve said you don’t remember ex - schools are even conscious of that. That lack actly when you started ballet. Your mother, of conscious ness and inclusion creates no Maria Eugenia Lorenzo, danced for the Na - desire for families of color to participate. tion al Ballet of Cuba. In 1980, during the Mariel I’m not even touching on poverty. As far Boatlift, when you were two years old, your as socioeconomic problems, ballet is a very family left Havana for Miami. expensive hobby – for any neighborhood. It’s Lorenzo: I would go to ballet with my

24 ballet review Riolama Lorenzo with Sergio Torrado in Giselle . (Photo: Paul Kolnik, Pennsylvania Ballet) mom and sit in the corner and watch. We had Bell: You began formal ballet training at the just come from another a country and had Martha Mahr School of Ballet, where you and no money. I remember my mom complaining Natalie met, and continued training at the about how her older students never knew what Harid Conservatory in Boca Raton, and then they were doing. One time, when someone at the School of American Ballet, first for the wasn’t there, I raised my hand and said, “I summer and then the school year. know it.” I was five, and I knew the steps, and Lorenzo: I never realized I was so differ- mom organized the older girls around me. ent until I went to SAB. Never did it occur to spring 2012 25 me that I was dark-haired, dark-eyed, dark- in Robbins ballets. He always struggled with skinned, and curved. Then it got all wrong. being different. I wasn’t that cookie-cut ter It got even worse when I joined NYCB in ballerina. Jerry knew that about me. If it had 1995. There wasn’t any particular moment at not been for him, I wouldn’t have lasted six SAB. I think Nikkia [Parish] had a lot to do months. with that. She was the only black girl, and I then called Nikkia Parish. I wanted to hear I was the only Hispanic girl. We stuck togeth - her voice. Nikkia grew up in Fort Worth, Texas. er like flies on flypaper. We weren’t around She began ballet at a school named for So - any other people. We didn’t feel accepted, and journer Truth, and was recruited by a dancer we didn’t want to put ourselves in a position named General Hambrick to attend the Gayle where we felt uncom fortable. We pretty much Corkery School of Ballet. isolated ourselves. Parish: It was an extremely segregated city. There was an incident at City Ballet. It was There’s still a place in Fort Worth called White during one of my many meetings with Peter Settlement. Can you believe that? When I was [Martins] to talk about my weight and my body. in third grade, I got the opportunity to attend He basically said that he would use me more a private school. There were like five minori - if I looked more like Wendy [Whelan]. Even if ties. Pakistani was more acceptable than plain I starved myself to death, my body would nev - old black. er look like Wendy’s. That was something I learned from the third I met with Peter more often because I did grade. It was something I already had to deal not have that typical body; American women with, prior to going into professional dance. don’t have the Cuban curves and the rounded Where I lived, everyone looked like me. Get - butt and hips and breasts that come with be - ting the opportunity to go away every sum - ing Hispanic. It didn’t matter how thin I was, mer was not something that kids in my neigh - those things weren’t going to go away. That’s borhood were exposed to. My dad told me, “You my heritage. can go anywhere you want to go, but don’t for - There was a joke going around NYCB when get where you came from. They won’t forget. I joined: If you want to be promoted, you’d At any given moment they might throw it better be blond. There were very few brunettes against you.” in the upper ranks when I was there. I tried My experience at SAB was extremely diffi - highlights one summer and ended up looking cult. In the summer of 1993, I got called into like JLo. It didn’t really work. There are the the office. [Nathalie] Gleboff, Kay [Mazzo], light-skinned Hispanics, like Puerto Ricans, Suki [Schorer], and Susie [Susan Pilarre] were and then the darker ones, like the Dominicans. there, by Gleboff’s desk. They said, “We un - The light-skinned Hispanics can get away with derstand that your mother has made arrange - more. They sometimes look like brunettes. ments for you to stay, but we don’t think you’ll Bell: You left NYCB in 2000, following an ever be a professional ballerina. Your body has injury, and joined Pennsylvania Ballet two changed. And we heard you’re really smart. years later. We heard you people” – and I’m quoting – “we Lorenzo: For once I had the correct hair col - heard you people are really good at modern.” or. Roy [Kaiser, artistic director of Pennsyl - It took everything in me to not burst into vania Ballet] likes his brunettes. Both Amy tears. Aldridge and Arantxa Ochoa have dark hair. You can’t be shaped like a twelve-year-old Sometimes younger dancers see their dif - boy forever. I had to spend the rest of the sum - ferences as a crutch, or a disability. You just mer session with a plastered-on smile like, I have to accept who you are and that will shape know they don’t want me. But my mom said, you. I was more of a Jerry [Robbins] danc- “Well, pumpkin, we’ve already made financial er. Most of my principal roles at NYCB were commitments.” They made huge sacrifices for

26 ballet review herself. That was a turn - ing point in my life. I de - termined that ballet was not going to define me. I was going to make it my own. I quit for a couple of years and enrolled at TCU [Texas Christian Univer - sity]. Fernando Bujones was the choreographer in residence. I took classes as an elective. I got my love for it back. There were people there who wanted to be there and teachers who wanted to teach. It wasn’t a cattle mill. It was - n’t: Who’s right for the slaughter? We’ve got to cut you up in pieces first. I was able to enjoy it for me. My teacher asked, “Are you ready to audition?” It was a total setup. She got me. It was for The Rock School at Pennsylvania Ballet. These little girls got all this glitter on, pink tights, bun pulled back tight. I was not prepared to audition. I had on cut- off tights, a ponytail with hair stickin’ out. I was eighteen. I already looked like a grown ass woman Nikkia Parish. (Photo: Rosalie O’Connor, Washington Ballet) with all these girls. I’m go - me. That was a very difficult time for me. I ing to an audition with all these white folks! had to be there knowing they didn’t want me I remember them looking at me with this kind because I didn’t fit their mold. You get your of, What is she doing here? junk. It all starts to fill in. Then I heard it, this lady say, “You stand I was so fortunate to room with Riolama. next to her.” I was thinking, I know why you She felt the same way. She’s Cuban American. tellin’ your daughter to stand next to me. And There was nothing I could identify with the this woman gets this grin on her face. I was other girls. I remember there was this one lit - thinking, If I could take your ass outside right tle girl, giggling. I heard out of her mouth, “I now . . . I’m the only black girl in there. It’s don’t need a boy friend. I have ballet.” like having a ’hood rat in there with all those I thought to myself, This girl is going to kill cookie-cutter girls. spring 2012 27 Class started. Gloria Govin taught. Once were nodding and crying: “You’re right, you’re center started, I remember my dance teacher so good to us . . .” but I thought, This is some telling me that that lady leaned over to her slave stuff. He was looking at me and saying, and said, “Where does she train? She’s beau - “Those of you from other places . . .” tiful.” Now you want to know where I train? After having dealt with Arthur for a peri - Save it! I don’t need it! od of time, I get it. You go off your meds, When class was over, I started walking to - boo. But to see the older dancers nodding in ward the back of the room, putting my stuff agreement! Eric and I did come from other in my bag. Everyone was standing, waiting to places. To us, it was any other company. You hear their numbers. They called my number, would think there you would feel more in and I thought, What the hell? Bo Spassoff, the place. But I never felt so out of place in my life. director of the school, asked, “Were you audi - It was the complete opposite of what it should tioning today?” I said, “I’m sorry if I was in be. the way. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful with I started to be Sojourner Truth. If there was my attire. I was just trying to get my confi - an audition anywhere, I’d ask, “Anyone need dence back.” He said, “Can we offer you a schol - a ride? There’s an audition? Meet me at 145th arship for the summer? We really think the Street, and we’ll drive down.” I started wear - artistic director should see you. It will be like ing pink tights. I got very SAB – leotards with an extended audition.” spaghetti straps. If I hadn’t learned anything That was what launched my career with else from my experiences I’d better at least Pennsylvania Ballet. You know Heidi [Cruz, have the right outfit on, if I’m going to have former corps de ballet dancer at Pennsylvania a tan darker than everyone else. Pink tights Ballet]. Honey, we would always ki. [laughs] to us are like white tights. I got a lot of back - They had to keep us as bookends. If she was lash from the other dancers: “You’re not be - stage left, I was stage right. I loved it there be - ing loyal. This company is for us and by us.” I cause we were in a city that was very mixed, just knew it was so wrong and I didn’t need to and they tried their hardest not to see color. be there. At the end of the day, it’s not something they That’s when I got my position with Wash - can avoid. ington Ballet. I have always been typecast. For whatever reason, I don’t think ballet Every director tells me, “We see you in a strong, has progressed to that point. It shouldn’t have powerful role, a Hippolyta. I never felt com - taken Misty as long as it did to become a solo- fortable with that. I liked the soft roles, the ist. Heidi did a lot of parts, but I don’t think Auroras. We might hold muscles in different she ever became a soloist. It’s crazy. Not one places. But why do we immediately get type - of us wants to think it’s a conspiracy. It’s not cast into athletic roles? in our nature. But this is becoming too obvi - I have a degree in business management. ous. I’m sure you understand it as a gay man. They didn’t expect me to ask questions about Bell: So you left Pennsylvania Ballet to per - the contract. At the end of the first season, form with Dance Theatre of Harlem. he [Septime Webre, artistic director] said, “I Parish: “That Girl That Talks Back To Me” think we may have had a rocky start. But peo - – that’s what Arthur Mitchell called me. I sat ple love you onstage. I want us to work on our in a meeting with all of DTH one day. Eric Un - working relationship. I think what you want derwood [former DTH and ABT dancer, now a to do . . . well, I read an article about how black soloist at the Royal Ballet] muttered, “This is women are getting typecast as a sassy sister going to be funny,” and I said, “We need to get girl kind of thing.” a priest in here.” Mitchell said, “You think you He was suggesting that maybe I not speak can leave me? They don’t want you anywhere up for myself so that people didn’t take it else.” I couldn’t believe it. The older dancers the wrong way. I never did any of that kind of

28 ballet review thing: “Hold up, hold up, you tellin’ me my ing to be a Broadway dancer. A guest teacher money goin’ be late?!” came and said I had a lot of talent for ballet. In the second season, the dancers wanted It was really hard for me. I was a jazz baby. to join the union. I got blamed for it. I was al - Then I remember starting to hear chitter- ready a card-carrying mem ber. I could not chatter. I heard another mom tell my mom have changed twenty people’s minds. I don’t have any bitter - ness against the industry be - cause I’m a black wom an in a white field. My bitterness came from them not caring for the dancers the way they should have. Bell: You took a leave of ab - sence from Pennsylvania Bal - let to complete your degree at TCU, and now you work in fed - eral contracting. Did you ever think about teaching? Parish: I don’t mind teach - ing black students. I don’t want to teach their parents: “Those shoes cost too much.” “Sorry I’m late – I had to get my nails done.” Because the ballet is not something they were exposed to, they do not take it seriously. People, white and black, don’t encourage their kids to do something serious ly. I started thinking about our old classmate Aesha Ash. She retired from dancing a few years ago and is a stay-at- home mom. Aesha has been working on a photo essay, The Swan Dreams Project . The im - ages picture her in a white practice tutu on the streets of The Swan Dreams Project : Aesha Ash. (Photo: Paul Van Hoy II) her hometown of Rochester, New York. She is that it was hard for black women in ballet, just as I remember: assertive, bold. and I thought, This is it. Ash: It’s bigger than just bringing a kid Bell: But you trained at SAB and were ac - to the ballet. It’s bigger than saying let’s hire cepted into the company. some more black dancers. It didn’t take me Ash: I really had a mission at City Ballet. seeing an African American woman to start When I left, I could just dance. The main rea - ballet. My mom would see me dancing. And I son I started ballet in the first place was be - started up the street. They thought I was go - cause of the challenges that I could overcome, spring 2012 29 the stereotypes. For me, it’s always been this to see each girl throw down her hair for a feeling that everything is different – my skin ballet. When I took out all the pins, my hair and hair. Everything is so different. We have puffed out, and he laughed. Had I not been nothing to relate to. My life as a ballet danc- so mature as a dancer, I would have felt er was constantly trying to show that we are crushed. more than just stereotypes. We are mul tidi - But it doesn’t take those moments. You feel mensional. We can be that vulnerable, angel - it immediately. It’s what you don’t see. If I’m ic character that we see in so many ballets. one black girl entering a studio of all white Most people are being politically correct. girls you feel other immediately – like watch - Maybe there was something in my career, but ing girls take down their long flowy hair. I cannot say that this and that happened Bell: You then moved to San Francisco to because I was black. It’s definitely prevalent, dance for Alonzo King’s Lines Ballet. though. Just look at the major companies and Ash: After a while, with Alonzo, you just it’s obvious: what is not seen is just as power - become a dancer. He really wanted to see you. ful as what we see. He wanted me to start from scratch. Not hav - There was never any comment that made ing to fit in was foreign territory. I’d spent so me feel uncomfortable while I was at City many years trying to be someone else. I was Ballet. At the same time, you still feel so dif - trying to figure out who Aesha was. There was ferent and other and like you’re constantly never a moment I wished I was white. But trying to fit in, into a world that looks like I have been angry: Why do I have to work it has nothing to do with you. The only real harder to get noticed? I wanted to feel I didn’t instance was when one of the ballet mistress - have to prove my worth. es said [for Swan Lake ] that she didn’t want to After talking with Aesha, I repeated the see any tans. I was like, What am I? word to myself: worth, worth, worth, worth. When I left, it was definitely a challenge, As I said it, I thought of Lauren Worth, née but that alone wouldn’t have pushed me out Porter, spinning twelve pirouettes in old black the door. When I went to ask for a leave of clogs in the lobby of the Rose Building. Why absence, he [Peter Martins] said, “You’re not had I forgotten to include her here? She had going to be a star here.” It was very hard for been my other mixed-race ballet friend. Lau - me to leave City Ballet. I didn’t feel I had done ren had been enormously talented and had enough. also danced for Alonzo King. We used to dye Bell: You danced with Béjart Ballet in Lau - each other’s hair blond. Dancers had joked sanne for two years, after the seven-and-a- that she sounded and acted white. Then it half years at NYCB. Did you still feel a sense occurred to me: I had forgotten to include her of otherness? here because she never felt like an “other” to Ash: In rehearsal one day, Béjart wanted me. She always seemed to fit in.

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