My wonderful wife put an article from the NYT in front of me a few days ago with the note "This sounds wonderful" about a new ballet - Le Parc at the Garnier. Now even though I met her in standing room at the "old" Met for an opera (Walkure), I trust her judgment on ballet. And so, for the first time since I went to the Jerome Robbins' tribute here, when as loyal readers will recall, I rubbed ah, ah, ah, derrieres with Madame Chirac, I found myself at the last minute trying to get "rush" seats for a ballet, since their website said no tickets were left.
After paying a scalper the equivalent of a ransom for my oldest born son (easy cuz I don't have one) we entered this great shrine. Frisons! Wonderful; good view, settle in for a treat - not!
After 10 minutes of jerks banging chairs on the parquet, jerks dragging ladies back and forth and jerks making some militaristic motions toward other jerks, I was ready to leave - screw the Euros wasted. But I know my beloved wife wanted to stay and since I didn't have a car parked nearby, I could bus home. So I waited 15, then 20, then 25 minutes and finally exited the plush box out onto the street and up to the Galeries for some foie gras, chorizo, herring, white beans, caviar and spicy olives for the Reveillon.
I've read and followed the recs of the NYT's critics for 60 years; been devoted to Craig Claiborne, Frank Rich and John Martin and Anna Kisselgoff not to mention Brooks Atkinson, but this "new" (since 2005 yet) ballet critic lady, one Roslyn Sulcas, sure had this one wrong. Or maybe it was the fault of the choreographer - one Angelin Preljocaj - in any case I ain't goin' again 'til they bring back Robbins or Nureyev's stuff. It was dumb, boring and involved too many jerks.
