Beauty and The Beast
Updating classic tales is a tricky business, as any creative type will insist. It requires a delicate balance of timeless sentiment and modern vocabulary, relatability and fresh twists.
That makes Colorado Ballet's "Beauty and the Beast" all the more a balancing act, considering the fairy tale's overly familiar story and this version's exotic origins.
In 1999, the Hong Kong Ballet asked decorated choreographer Domy Reiter-Soffer for a piece to commemorate the millennium and the recent handover of the island from the British to the Chinese.
He didn't need to think long before making a decision.
"It actually winked at me," Reiter-Soffer said of the tale. "What I wanted to bring to it was the authenticity of the original Charles Perrault story, which he wrote in 1697.
"There have been many creative retellings of it in theater and opera and stage musicals and animation, and I thought I could actually give it a different kind of interpretation."
As audiences will see when "Beauty and the Beast" premiers tonight at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House, there are no dancing candlesticks or computer-generated ballrooms in this version. Reiter- Soffer has infused the tale with a taut physicality that sheds more light on the playful, at times aching, interactions between principals Belle and the Beast. It feels thoroughly contemporary in both its attitude and movement.
But there's a reason some stories stick around for centuries. The emotional core of "Beauty and the Beast" remains in the Reiter-Soffer's choreography, the narrative taking precedence over dance-for-dance's-sake.
"In some of the letters Charles Perrault wrote to his publishers, he said that we are all beasts and we can all be beasts, but we need love and understanding to really change us into princes — or nice human beings," said Reiter-Soffer, who visited libraries in Paris to examine those original letters. "It's a very fundamental and very important thing to say."
Because it's a ballet, it's also something that needs to be said without words. And for the theatrical-minded Reiter- Soffer, who has choreographed more than 50 works and written and directed plays and operas, that's a specialty.
"I like that it's not just the physical technicality of all of the steps," said Dmitry Trubchanov, the dancer in the demanding role of the Beast. "It combines the athletic part of the dancing with some emotional aspects. Some of my soul is in the person when I go from this powerful beast jumping around like crazy into this little kitten. It's a combination of the power and the drama, and that's what interests me."
Reiter-Soffer has been praised internationally for his "brilliant translation of words into movement," as The New York Times put it, and his professionalism helps polish the otherwise raw emotion on the stage.
"He's intense," said Sharon Wehner, who's dancing the equally demanding role of Belle. "He's very passionate about his work, and he's very passionate about seeing what he wants to be seeing. He wants to see a fullness and depth in the dancing. It's the language of ballet, but it's his own dialect."
If "Beauty and the Beast's" ability to resonate across time, culture and language says something fundamental about all of us, it also says it in a manner that lets us hear it — and see it — in our own beautifully subjective ways.
"All the decor and the costumes are not country-specific and are taken from folklore of different countries," Reiter-Soffer said. "It's a much wider spectrum of fantasy rather than a specific place or reality."
John Wenzel: 303-954-1642 or jwenzel@denverpost.com
"BEAUTY AND THE BEAST."
Ballet. Ellie Caulkins Opera House, 14th and Curtis Streets. Feb. 19-28. Various times. $19-$129. 303-837-8888 or coloradoballet.orgRead more: http://www.denverpost.com/entertainment/ci_14421059?source=skipframe-www.domyrs.com#ixzz0hUmTPhPm
