Rossini and Lew’s Ballets

KDFC, the classical music station in the San Francisco and Northern California area, frequently airs Giaocchino Rossini’s overture to The Thieving Magpie. It’s a wonderful title to an opera I’ve never seen, but it more or less coins musical equivalents of the words “sprightly,” “cheeky”, “playful.”

Hearing it reminds me of a world premiere in what is now Herbst Auditorium in the Veterans Building at the corner of McAllister and Van Ness Avenue with San Francisco Opera House anchoring the southern end at Grove and McAllister. In between lies the courtyard of green and a recent fountain installed to honor the war dead of World War II. About five years ago a tiny woman close to ninety informed me earth from all the battles of World War I involving US soldiers had been brought there. “I can’t say I appreciate it when expensive dinners and dances are placed there,” she said. While I agree with her in theory, I continue to be amazed that the City and its movers and shakers of the time constructed these buildings and opened them in the midst of the Great Depression. When the Veterans Building was finally retrofitted, the auditorium’s dressing rooms were placed off stage, replacing those minuscule changing rooms in the building’s depths reached through narrow, circular iron stairs. It even acquired a green room at the back of the building where Nina Menendes hosted a reception following a flamenco performance in 2019.

The “world premiere” I referred to was Con Amore, a Lew Christensen romp, created in 1954, to Rossini’s overtures, starting with The Thieving Magpie as the setting for the camp of the Amazons, invaded by the Thief, Sally Bailey danced the Queen of the Amazons, Nancy Johnson the errant wife, Leon Kalimos the husband and Carlos Carvajal the sailor who arrives at the wife’s door. I’m sure Fiona Fuerstner was one of the Amazons. Leon Danielian was the thief; his role subsequently was danced by the likes of Michael Smuin and John McFall; at New York City Ballet Jacques d’Amboise became the thief where Violette Verdy took on the Amazon assignment and Tanaquil leClerq that wife. When Marc Platt saw San Francisco Ballet’s revival under Helgi Tomasson’s direction, he exclaimed, “How brilliant, such wit.”

As I was drifting off to sleep my mind ticked off the Lew Christensen ballets I particularly enjoyed and want to see again. Chronologically, of course, the
first is Filling Station, Lew’s debut as a choreographer. Such rich, raffish roles for any of the dancers with a comic bent. Then there is Jinx, created while Lew waited to be called up for service in Germany in World War II, using the music to Frank Bridge by Benjamin Britten, almost Brechtian in its plot.

Con Amore comes next, although Carlos Carvajal mentioned Le Gourmand, a work I never saw but had the dancers as various viands who end up destroying the title character. From the 60’s summer series came Shadows, with Jocelyn Vollmar and Robert Gladstein in the principal roles, another of Lew’s psychological comments worthy of revival.

I don’t have either book on the company handy but somewhere in between, came Divertissement d’Auber pas de trois for a man and two women, where one woman, I think Fiona Fuerstner, was required to dance a dizzy array of turns and for the man, Michael Smuin as I remember, a series of jumps with his legs jack-knifed under him. Anatol Joukowsky mentioned to me that he had coached one of the men to take a quick breath as he jumped, saying it sharpened the step. Subsequently when watching it did make a difference. Virginia Johnson completed the trio.

Norwegian Moods was created for one of the summer seasons the company danced at the Geary Theatre, a ballet which Richard LeBlond remarked broke Lew’s several year creative block. I often think that the presence of Keith Martin and Susan Magno, Royal and Joffrey Ballet dancers respectively, had something to do with the waters flowing once more.

When Attila Fizcere joined San Francisco Ballet, Lew cast him in the title role of Don Juan where Lew’s vaudeville experience launched a chase through a convent, a marvel of timing. Anita Paciotti danced the role of a seduced peasant who spat out her anger. Tina Santos said she spat when auditioning and Lew liked the reaction so much he incorporated it.

Scarlotti Portfolio more or less marked Lew’s return to Italian-laced social comment with a hoop dance danced by David McNaughton at the first ever USA IBC Competition in Jackson, Mississippi, 1979, resulting in a medal for Lew.

There were others, but I dwell on the warmth and wit of those I listed first. To be fair, among other ballets Lew created, Leslie Young, who assumed responsibility for staging his choreography following the death of Virginia Johnson, mounted Beauty and the Beast for Pittsburg Ballet Theatre at the invitation of Terrence Orr, former American Ballet Theatre principal who danced Divertissement d’Auber during his years with San Francisco Ballet.

When the company was performing at the Alcazar, Lew cast Sally Bailey, Roderick Drew and Michael Smuin in Original Sin, Lew’s telling of the Bible’s Creation and Fall. He also mounted a Herb Caen libretto titled Life: A Do It Yourself Disaster , a biting sketches on mishaps youth through retirement.

In my fantasies, I envision a full program of works over several seasons so I can revel once more in the Christensen wit and perspective. Such riches.