Je me souviens et 'La Vie Bohéme'
When you're an arts journalist, there is no experience quite like attending an arts festival for the first time and experiencing the summertime trifecta of outstanding performances, scenic views and conversations that will solve all the performing arts world's problems. Or try to.
So oui, I was grateful to be invited to Festival des Arts Saint-Sauveur this week, and that the northern stars aligned for me to be in Quebec for 48 hours of dance magic in the Laurentian Mountains, only about an hour north of Montreal.
What I'm seeing
Friday night in Saint-Sauveur, Canadian choreographer Guillaume Côté debuted Burn Baby, Burn, a title that made me laugh out loud and legit intrigued to see a new dance work about... climate change?
It's good. Better than Dix, the last piece of Côté's that I saw his company perform. Burn Baby, Burn has a sense of cohesion that contemporary works sometimes lack. There are no projections or text, so the subject matter is instead conveyed through Amos Ben-Tal's drum-and-guitar soundscape and various onstage ephemera.
I see, on average, three Nutcrackers a year, and I appreciate a good self-reference in dance. In that latter half of Burn Baby, Burn, black confetti fell from the rafters and onto the front of the stage, reversing the warm-hearted purity of a good Tchaikovsky snow scene with a sense that something is very wrong, and even choreographers want you to do something about it.
What I'm Following
In the aftermath of the next-level nincompoopery that was NBC's coverage of the Paris Olympic Ceremony, it's been fun to watch names, images and video clips of the artists who participated trickle out online. Here are two I recommend tracking down on X, Instagram, etc.
Guillaume Diop: The first Black étoile at Paris Opera Ballet, spotted dancing on roof but nameless on American television.
Germain Louvet: Another étolie at Paris Opera, Louvet danced on pointe in the rain, in the footbridge fashion show, and was mocked by the likes of Elon Musk. Torn tights revealed a few centimetres of skin on his thighs, and the poor guy was accused leaving his balls hanging out. "Breezy," Elon wrote on X, but A) Obviously Louvet was wearing a dance belt and B) I'd like to see Elon try a hoping pirouette.
If I Could See Anything
My northern travels sadly coincide with the run of Nine at the Kennedy Center. This concert staging is directed by Andy Blankenbuehler, aka the guy who choreographed Hamilton, but he's doing it all in this production. Dancers onboard include NYCB vet Georgina Pazcoguin and Kamille Upshaw, a Baltimore School for the Arts grad. Sorry to miss!
If I Could Write Anything
En route to Quebec, I visited my undergrad BFFs in upstate New York. Pete was an English ed major; I was "straight" English, and we ran our student newspaper like a black coffee-oiled machine. Fast forward 25 (gulp) years: I'm still in journalism—or trying to be—and he's a high school principal who green-lighted a production of Rent at his high school in the Adirondack foothills. Last fall his music and drama teachers sat down in his office and said, "Look there's this musical called Rent. We have two BIPOC boys who want to play Angel and Collins, gay guys with AIDS. They're really good. Can we please let them?"
Pete had never seen Rent. We went to a Baptist college in Ohio, and I confess that the Madonna Evita was my favourite cast recording of that era. Our college sent us to the Stratford Festival every year, so we had seen some great Shakespeare but not much live theater otherwise, at that point in our lives. Pete had to do some research on Jonathan Larsen's 1996 cultural phenomenon, and was a little worried about putting "La Vie Bohéme" onstage.
With all the Trump signs down the street, a teenage Rent could have caused a small town uproar. But Pete and his superintendent let his students, teachers and drama parents do the show. He even made a cameo as a patron at the Life Café. We spent Thursday night drinking cocktails and watching his Rent on Youtube. Not my usual night at the theater, but inspiring none the less.
I'm tearing again just typing this. Pete knows every lead actor's report card, what obstacles the kids face at home and school, and what a difference it made for each of them to sing "Seasons of Love" at the top of their lungs.
Not sure if this qualifies as fair use, but here's a parent-filmed bootleg finale featuring the very best of Scotia-Glenville High School, made possible by one of my very best friends.
