So before I start ranting on and on about my amazing beyond amazing night last night, lets get the boring stuff out of the way. I had Jazz class yesterday, and was sad because a lot of people quit. I was thinking of quitting myself when my teacher pulls out hats and says, "We're doing a Chorus Line!" I will be for sure staying in that class.
Now onto the Love Stories review! (This will end up being very...very...very...long)
Last night, after a hectic day of running around, going to class and rehearsal, going to my brothers swim meet and getting my hair cut (phew!) I managed to squeeze in some time to go to see Love Stories at Pacific Northwest Ballet. I had been looking forward to going to see Love Stories for a long time, seeing it has the Black Swan Pas de Deux in it.
I have already explained my Swan Lake obsession in a post and am not going to go over it again, just keep it in mind that the Black Swan Pas de Deux is my most favorite piece of all time. (and I WILL do it someday)
My friend Isla and I abandoned rehearsal early and my mom took us down to McCaw Hall (I changed in the car!). Once we got there, we were greeted by our other friends Lily and Lilia. We messed around in the gift shop for a while (with these awesome fans!) and Lily told us that she had a surprise for us all.
Lily's father knows a man who works backstage at every PNB performance. Her father told him that Lily and her friends were going to the ballet on Saturday night and he said he would take us backstage during Intermission! I TOTALLY freaked out and hugged Lily. Even if we were just going backstage for Intermission, hey we were still going backstage!
After Tess and Lilia's friend Katie showed up, we all went to the food court at Seattle Center and I got my ceremonial frappachino.
Once I downed the whole thing, I really had to pee so I went to the bathroom with Lilia and Tess. In the bathroom, there was this family going to this event or something and they were doing their make up and took over the whole bathroom (I mean they literally had suitcases full of makeup). So I was like whatever and started washing my hands. I scanned the bathroom while I waited for Lilia and Tess, and while I was scanning, I saw what I though was a girl...except the girl was holding a camera and not putting on makeup...and had a buzz cut...and was not a girl...! Yeah, you read that right, there was some weird guy, with a camera, in the Seattle Center girls restroom. He saw me staring at him and awkwardly shuffled out. When we were walking back to our seats I asked Tess if she had seen him she was like, "...Wait...are you sure it was a boy?" Me, "Yeah I'm REALLY sure." Then we ALL cracked up about it on the way back to McCaw Hall.
Once we got there we got to our seats (not good ones, they were WAY at the top of the theater) we sat down and began watching our first performance of the night.
Divertimento from "Le Baiser de la Fee" tells the story about a baby who is kissed on the heel by a fairy, and is then visited by it on his wedding day (or something along those lines). I found a few flaws with this plot line. 1) We never see the baby being kissed, 2) Why the baby's heel? It's a little creepy..., and 3) There are like 10 fairies, not just one. Confused by the plot line, I rated it a 7 out of 10. So did Lilia's friend Katie. Lilia disagreed and gave it a 5. Tess and Lily both gave it an 8. And Isla gave it the highest score of an 8.5. This is probably because I find Isla to be a bit of a fairy person. :)
After they closed the big shiny red curtain, Lily said we were supposed to go meet her dad's friend down by the orchestra pit. After an elevator ride and may flights of stairs, we met up with her dad's friend, who led us through a door to the backstage area. We walked up a few more flights of stairs (much to Lily's feet's dismay) and, shaking with anticipation, we walked out into the wings of the stage.
I had never been backstage at a PNB show before, and it was all I could do to keep from screaming, crying or hugging the dancers. I saw Laura Gilbreth (who is actually REALLY tall) warming up for the Black Swan Pas de Deux and almost died. Kaori Nakamura walked past me (she's actually REALLY short) and started warming up for Romeo et Juliette. I heard Lilia start hyperventilating and knew that Lucien Postlewaite was coming. He and Kaori started warming up as we were introduced to the lighting, costumes and set crew. They were all really nice!
By this point intermission was almost over and I was sad that they were going to have to shoo us back to our seats. One of the stagehands asked us if we had good seats. When we said not really he invited us to watch the next few performances backstage! We all squeaked out yes! and they said we could sit on stage left.
I died.
After we put our stuff down, we made our way across the back of the stage. "I feel like dancing!" said Isla. "Well it's not every day you're backstage at PNB!" I said as I tombe pauda bourre gliesde assombled, pretending I was a real professional, in pointe shoes, wearing a crown and tutu, having the time of my life.
We got situated backstage and one of the dancers, Lesley Rausch, who would be dancing next in Afternoon of a Faun, walked right up next to us and got her water bottle. Lesley Rausch was Giselle when Lilia and I went to see PNB's World Premiere staging of Giselle, so it was very exciting to see her. (Oh and she has very pretty long blonde hair that I want really badly!)
They dimmed the lights backstage, the curtain rose, and Afternoon of a Faun began. I'm going to have to say, I was a little too jittery to full appreciate the performance, but what I saw was very good. I rated it an 8 out of 10. Isla, Lily, Tess (I corrected it! :D) and Katie all rated it a 9, and Lilia gave it a 10.
Once it was over, they rose the lights and brought down the curtain and we were ushered over to the side so the stagehands could get the set offstage for the next performance. I stood next to Lilia, and before I knew it, a professional dancer was standing next to me! He was incredibly tall, and wore a royal blue, velvet, gold trimmed shirt with white ruffles peeking out of the top, and I knew he had to be Prince Sigfreid in Black Swan! Shyly, I asked him, his name is Karel Cruz, if it was true. He said it was. Lilia then butted in and told him EVERYTHING about my Swan Lake fascination. Oddly enough, I don't think he thought I was a TOTAL freak...in fact he said he greatly enjoyed the ballet as well! We talked on for a little longer about something I cant remember, I was too excited, and then he said he had to go warm up.
How...awesome...is...that...?
We then got to move back into our spots for the next performance of Romeo et Juliette, The Balcony Pas de Deux.
It was danced, as I have previously stated, by Kaori Nakamura and Lucien Postlewaite. It was absolutely fabulous, as I love the story of Romeo et Juliette. I rated it a 10, as did Lilia, Katie and Tess. Maybe Lily's achy feet were getting to her, because she only rated it a 7 out of 10 (Just kidding Lily I love you! Mwah!)! Isla said it was an 8.
I really wanted Kaori's autograph, but the Black Swan Pas de Duex was starting, and I wasn't going to miss a second of it.
I am not much of a crier, but I knew there was some chance of me doing it last night. Sure enough, as the music in the beginning swelled, I began crying a little...or maybe it was just hyperventilating...or maybe both! I guess after watching it on youtube nearly every day (enough so I could memorize the whole thing!), finally seeing it live, backstage, at PNB, after having a conversation with Prince Sigfreid (who reminded me so much of Zane and when I was Odette) finally got to me. I tried to calm myself a little, and was able to eventually, but I still knew I had the fouettes coming, and that I would most likely break down a little again.
Both Sigfreid's and Odile's variations were fabulous, and experiencing them from backstage just put the icing on the cake. I heard the music for the Coda starting, and started hyperventilating again. When Odile came out to do her fouette turns, time slowed down. I watched her turn and turn and turn, and for a second, I was Odile, on stage, in a costume adorned with feathers, my feet on fire, my head dizzy, hot lights blazing into my eyes, but having the time of my life.
That's when I decided I will do whatever it takes to become a professional ballet dancer. For when I try to imagine my life without dance, I cant, and I know that some way or another, I will do it.
Our ratings for the Black Swan Pas de Deux were as mainly unanimous and as follows, 100000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000(cont. to infinity)
Lilia was the only stickler, giving it a 9.5. >:(
We then had to leave, because the next piece required a lot of backstage movement and we would get in the way. We collected our stuff and were led through the dressing rooms, through abandoned pointe shoes, corn pads, rosin boxes and stretching dancers back to the orchestra pit. On the way out I noticed a wall that had been signed by all the ex-dancers of PNB. I saw Oliver Weaver's name, along with my idol, Patricia Barker's. I thought it was cool and specifically remember telling myself, "Remember this! This is cool! Blog about it!"
We then went back up to the concession stand and bought ourselves some brownies and soda. While we were in line, we were talked to by an elderly man, who told us that he saw the Beast (Donald Byrd's season opener with Spectrum Dance Theater) and he said he loved it so much he bought season tickets as well as donated money! Yay!
The bells rang to signal intermission was ending, and we all got in line for the elevator when we looked up to see Karel Cruz waving to us and saying goodbye! He walked out the door and started walking towards his car when Lily pops her head out the door and shouts, "CAN WE HAVE YOUR AUTOGRAPH?!" He said sure and walked back over. I was chowing down on a brownie that had I had suddenly lost interest in, and in a fit of un-ecofriendlyness, recycled my brownie. He signed my program (which I am going to frame) and asked us all if we were dancers. We said yes and then I cant remember what we talked about...I was too jittery and worried that an ecologist had seen my failure to get my brownie in a compost bin.
We thanked him profusely and then ran back to our seats! In the elevator, I reminded Lilia that we hadn't danced in the elevator yet (like we normally do during intermission) and she just looked at me like I was really stupid and said, "Well we were backstage...duh!"
We decided to ditch our original seats and movie closer to the front, seeing no one was sitting there. I had just texted my mom, "I JUST SAW THE BLACK SWAN PAS DE DEUX BACKSTAGE...AND I CRIED!" and had to turn off my phone really quick because the lights went down. Aurora's Wedding from The Sleeping Beauty, was fabulous! Tess, Lilia and Isla were happy they included the Bluebird and Princess Florine, seeing as they had learned the variation themselves.
We all thought of Zane, seeing that he loved Bluebird. Princess Aurora, danced by Maria Chapman, was fabulous (well duh it's Maria Chapman!) and Lilia was happy that Lucien Postlewaite was dancing in the Gold and Silver Pas de Trois.
Oh! I forgot to mention, Lilia, last year at Spectrum's Gala, nearly DIED when Lucien bought raffle tickets from us (a whole arms length too!). She got to measure his arm...I think this encounter greatly increased her liking of the dancer.
I just realized I forgot to get the ratings from everyone from Aurora's Wedding, but I'm positive it was an absolute hit!
After the show Lilia thought it would be cool to stand outside (in like 30 degree weather) at the stage door and wait for Lucien Postlewaite to come out so she could get his autograph. Isla and I stayed there for a while, but her mom came and we had to leave. (Which was fine by me! I was FREEZING!)
On the way home Isla and I talked in the car about hopes and dreams as well as how we were both astonished that we were doing Waltz of the Flowers. Isla however was sad as she will be doing it in a suit (she's the White Rabbit).
We pulled up at my house and I got out. I then ranted on and on and on (much like I am right now) to my mom what I just ranted to you all about. She finally fell asleep and so I ceased to talk. I then turned on the TV and began watching something on Hawaii, not really paying attention to what was on the screen.
Instead I thought of being backstage and watching Laura Gilbreth spin round and round on her pointe shoes in her black, feathered tutu. Laura then morphed into me, and I was dancing on the PNB stage as a professional, thinking to myself, I did it.
And someday I will.
<3
