‘Giselle’ in the #MeToo age

April 9, 2018

The ballet “Giselle” – the quintessence of 19th century Romanticism – tells the story of a simple, open-hearted peasant girl driven mad for love of Albrecht, a man who’s hidden his aristocratic identity and engagement to another. Dying, Giselle becomes a Wili, one of the female spirits compelled to avenge themselves on the men who wronged them in life by dancing them to death.

In the excellent, though far from perfect, Bolshoi Ballet production given an encore simulcast last Sunday in theaters around the world, there was a great moment in Act 2 when the Wilis dispensed with Hans, Giselle’s unrequited suitor, whose jealousy of the beloved Albrecht sets the tragedy in motion. Under Yuri Grigorovich’s choreography, two of the lead Wilis basically tossed Hans away. They were like elegant bouncers. The ladies sitting behind us ...

When Donnie called Vladdie

March 24, 2018

Just when you thought you could take a break from the greatest love affair of the 21st century – which is actually sort of like one of those horror movies in which the dead guy’s hand keeps rising up out of the grave – it’s back and hotter than ever.

No sooner had Vladimir Putin – alias “Vlad the Lad Rootin’ Tootin’” Putin – won another six-year term as Russian president, an outcome that was never in doubt, then President Donald J. Trump, alias “Donnie Two Scoops,” was on the horn to congratulate him. ...

Trump’s crisis of leadership

March 17, 2018

The continuing Revolving Door Policy of the Trump Administration has thrown the systemic failure of Alexandrian leadership – leadership from the front – into sharp relief.

President Donald J. Trumpet has surrounded himself with Trumpettes – yes-men and, to a lesser extent, yes-women – and distanced himself from the No, No, Nanettes. Which is odd, considering his professed love of chaos. Wouldn’t you want some tension, some conflict? ...

When Donnie meets Kimmie, a preview

March 11, 2018

As spring approaches, everyone is abuzz at the prospect of a thaw in relations between the “my button is bigger than your button” guys – President Donald J. Trumpet and L’il Kim Jong-un.

It was South Korea that actually announced the rapprochement on the White House lawn Thursday and, if you think that was unusual (having an intermediary make an announcement of a major foreign policy step involving the American people that has thus far included no actual address to the American people), well, you have to remember that nothing is usual with the act unilaterally (he wishes) Trump. ...

The myth of the strongman

March 4, 2018

Syria’s Bashar al-Assad. Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu. North Korea’s Kim Jong-un. The Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte. Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro. Russia’s Vladimir Putin. China’s Xi Jinping. And, of course, our own Donald J. Trump.

The world is in the grips of the strongman – tough, reactionary and taking no prisoners. Part of this is a response to the terrible, fascinating transition in which we find ourselves – a backlash to the global, multicultural, digital age to which so-called “feminine” energies (communications skills, sensitivity, a sense of service) are better suited. Part of this is the envy, rage and resentment, particularly in this country, of white, blue-collar males, who lacked the courage, intelligence, industry and imagination to confront their greedy employers and, failing that, reinvent themselves when manufacturing jobs began to dry up in the 1970s. ...

Farewell (for now) to PyeongChang

February 26, 2018

Experts will tell you that the high-pressured setting of the Olympics’ global stage is like no other. It can make the favorites fall and rise again and the dark horses surge to the front of the finish line.

That was certainly the case of the magical two weeks in PyeongChang, whose motto might’ve been “Expect the unexpected.”

It was a time when America lost its record for most medals in the Winter Games (37, Vancouver) to Norway (brilliant with 39) while setting a new record for medaling in the greatest number of different events (11). So what Team USA sometimes lacked in depth, particularly in the glamour sports of alpine skiing and figure skating, it made up for in breadth ...

Zagitova tops Medvedeva for skating gold

February 23, 2018

Well, it’s official: Alina Zagitova has Tara Lipinski-ed Evgenia Medvedeva.

It was at the Nagano Games in 1998 that Lipinski landed seven triple jumps in the long program, or free skate, to overtake Michelle Kwan and become the youngest Olympic gold medalist in the individual ladies’ figure skating event.

On Thursday night, with Lipinski calling the competition with Johnny Weir and Terry Gannon for NBC, another 15-year-old overtook her celebrated countrywoman for gold as Russia’s Alina Zagitova bested Evgenia Medvedeva. ...