WEBVTT

1
00:00:20.640 --> 00:00:27.600
I don't know. I have no idea. But Chart's ideas were all very good. We did need a new

2
00:00:27.600 --> 00:00:43.240
orchestra. He was absolutely right. That ballet was the hardest one I ever had to do because it was difficult. I had to spend a week in A's, I think it was, with his old man, Hans May, to get the orchestration right.

3
00:00:43.240 --> 00:01:01.160
And I got so sick of the music, listening to it all day long and thinking, well, it should be like this, it should be like that. And even after he did it, the orchestration wasn't right. I had to do it over three different times. I did it first with, I think...

4
00:01:01.160 --> 00:01:03.360
Wait, let's get this done and take. Are we rolling?

5
00:01:03.360 --> 00:01:03.720
Yes, we are.

6
00:01:03.880 --> 00:01:10.440
Okay. Why don't you start out by saying I had to do the orchestration of the Mary Widow three different times.

7
00:01:10.440 --> 00:01:32.620
I couldn't get the orchestration for the Mary Widow right. The first version I knew wasn't right. And so I had worked with Hans May, who was a real Viennese composer, and I spent a week with him someplace going over the Mary Widow every single day. And then his orchestration wasn't right either.

8
00:01:32.620 --> 00:01:46.700
So I had to have it done three different times to get it right. Now it's a marvelous orchestration, I think is exactly right. But it was a lot of trouble and I got awfully sick of the music. But now it was worth doing because now it's fine.

9
00:01:48.220 --> 00:01:56.320
Do you wish that you had taken the, if you had redone the music, worked as much redoing the music for Billy Sunday?

10
00:01:56.320 --> 00:02:06.780
Right. Well, Billy Sunday was specially written and so it's an entirely different problem from the Mary Widow.

11
00:02:07.000 --> 00:02:09.360
Nonetheless, it was not quite right.

12
00:02:09.460 --> 00:02:16.020
No, it wasn't right at all. I didn't like the first version of it at all. And so I had it redone.

13
00:02:17.380 --> 00:02:19.020
And do you think it's right now?

14
00:02:19.020 --> 00:02:20.240
Yeah, I think it's very good now.

15
00:02:25.960 --> 00:02:37.120
It's awfully hard to get the music right for ballets. It's a very important problem. It's sort of the backbone of everything, what music you use, you know.

16
00:02:38.360 --> 00:02:46.640
Unless you don't, some people don't use music at all. You can do a ballet without any music. But it's less interesting, I think. Once in a while it's interesting.

17
00:02:49.280 --> 00:03:01.140
You also had a rather difficult experience speaking of music with The Bells. The music for The Bells was composed by Darius Mio.

18
00:03:02.680 --> 00:03:04.580
And it was apparently very difficult to play.

19
00:03:04.720 --> 00:03:12.120
Yes, it was stunning music. I loved it. But we didn't get good, with Ballet Ritz and Monte Carlo, you didn't get a very good orchestra.

20
00:03:12.120 --> 00:03:19.220
And you didn't get very many rehearsals. And it was just too difficult to do. I loved the music for The Bells.

21
00:03:19.320 --> 00:03:26.600
But we couldn't do it very often because it was too difficult. Darius Mio just made it so difficult that the orchestra couldn't play it.

22
00:03:26.780 --> 00:03:36.020
Which was, see, he's from Europe where you get better orchestras and they have better orchestras for their ballets over there and you get more rehearsals.

23
00:03:36.020 --> 00:03:40.460
Here it was impossible to get rehearsals. It was so expensive.

24
00:03:43.140 --> 00:04:00.860
In France, when you were there and doing The Bells and the 1950 performance in Paris, the French musicians had a terrible time with it.

25
00:04:00.860 --> 00:04:04.980
Because apparently there is a tradition there that they don't come to rehearsal.

26
00:04:08.080 --> 00:04:14.220
Well, that happens once in a while. Of course, that's impossible for us to believe. But it was true at that time.

27
00:04:14.680 --> 00:04:20.760
Apparently there was some kind of long-standing practice that if a French musician couldn't come to rehearse.

28
00:04:21.000 --> 00:04:26.620
He sent somebody for him, yes. And of course that was impossible for me.

29
00:04:26.620 --> 00:04:31.800
And on opening night, then you had an orchestra that had never rehearsed together.

30
00:04:31.980 --> 00:04:36.980
Well, not all of them, but a lot of them hadn't. So that, well, you can imagine.

31
00:04:39.080 --> 00:04:47.100
The dancers rehearsed differently in France, too. You've written about French dancers needing to be taught individually.

32
00:04:47.100 --> 00:04:53.380
Oh, I don't know if that's true anymore. But there you had to stop and do it for each one.

33
00:04:53.820 --> 00:05:01.520
You can't just do it the whole bunch together. They're too individualistic, I guess. I don't know. I found that difficult.

34
00:05:02.500 --> 00:05:13.460
It seems to me in reading about your work as a choreographer that you were and are an extraordinarily patient choreographer.

35
00:05:15.020 --> 00:05:19.220
Oh, well, you have to be, I guess. I had no choice.

36
00:05:21.620 --> 00:05:25.320
Well, what do you mean you had no choice? You could have turned it over to someone else to supervise.

37
00:05:25.320 --> 00:05:28.540
Oh, how can you turn it over to somebody else? I don't know what you want.

38
00:05:29.640 --> 00:05:36.840
Did it ever bother you, Ruth, that it would take so much time, very often, for you to teach the dancers?

39
00:05:37.200 --> 00:05:42.540
And it was enormously time-consuming. It must have been tedious sometimes.

40
00:05:42.540 --> 00:05:49.760
Well, you had to do it. That was all. You didn't find it tedious if they did it right when you finished with them.

41
00:05:52.520 --> 00:05:59.160
Now I have a good assistant. This Larry Long can rehearse almost all my ballets for me.

42
00:05:59.460 --> 00:06:05.040
But at that time I didn't have an assistant. I had to do it all myself. I don't have to anymore.

43
00:06:05.040 --> 00:06:14.860
He can do the Merry Widow and Freddie Franklin can do Frankie and Johnny and Billy Sunday also Freddie Franklin can do.

44
00:06:15.820 --> 00:06:22.860
And Flater Mouse, I think Larry Long can do. So I don't have that problem so much now.

45
00:06:24.040 --> 00:06:34.040
You were also given not enough time, very often, to rehearse the dances, the ballets, before opening night,

46
00:06:34.040 --> 00:06:36.240
particularly when you were working with the Ballet Roost.

47
00:06:36.700 --> 00:06:41.040
Well, you never get enough time. No matter how much time they give you, it isn't enough.

48
00:06:42.460 --> 00:06:50.800
Because you want to make them perfect, and it takes time. And it's very expensive. It's awfully expensive rehearsing ballets.

49
00:06:51.220 --> 00:06:57.380
It is rehearsing operas, too. But they have more money than the ballet companies, so you have to do it awfully fast.

50
00:06:57.760 --> 00:07:01.060
And it isn't very thorough, so it drives you crazy.

51
00:07:02.200 --> 00:07:09.480
You once wrote something about the contrast between performing in your own ballets

52
00:07:09.480 --> 00:07:16.860
and being a choreographer who sits in the audience and watches them.

53
00:07:18.640 --> 00:07:26.120
You said something about when you dance yourself, you're relieved at the end of it.

54
00:07:26.280 --> 00:07:28.980
But when you sit in the audience and watch...

55
00:07:29.720 --> 00:07:32.820
Yeah, because you never even get exactly what you want.

56
00:07:33.120 --> 00:07:37.020
Sometimes the dancers surprise you and give you more than you had expected.

57
00:07:37.220 --> 00:07:40.900
But sometimes they disappoint you. It depends on what dancers you have.

58
00:07:41.500 --> 00:07:48.860
It's a very chancey thing, you know. And you're in the hands of the dancers. They can make you or break you, of course.

59
00:07:49.980 --> 00:07:55.960
What kinds of things have you... Wait, let me ask this again differently.

60
00:07:56.840 --> 00:08:01.420
What did you do, Rose, when a dancer disappointed you? How did you handle that?

61
00:08:01.980 --> 00:08:08.180
I gave them hell and said I wanted it this way and tried to help them again. And sometimes they did it. Yeah.

62
00:08:09.160 --> 00:08:12.160
No, the dancers aren't difficult at all, mostly.

63
00:08:13.200 --> 00:08:14.040
Even the stars?

64
00:08:14.280 --> 00:08:20.980
Oh, no. They want to do it the way you want it. At least that's been my experience.

65
00:08:21.820 --> 00:08:26.660
Extra rehearsals, then, would you call if it wasn't right?

66
00:08:26.820 --> 00:08:30.260
Well, if you're just working with one person, it isn't hard to get a rehearsal.

67
00:08:31.280 --> 00:08:34.600
It's when you call the whole group that it's so expensive and difficult.

68
00:08:37.120 --> 00:08:43.260
It seems as though you were very persistent about working with them to get it right.

69
00:08:43.640 --> 00:08:44.360
Oh, sure.

70
00:08:45.660 --> 00:08:57.140
Even after the opening performances and people knew, you were always demanding and insisting that there be more performances and more so that they would have a chance to get it right.

71
00:08:57.200 --> 00:09:03.340
Yeah, that's right. And then you get dependent on certain dancers. I was very dependent on Freddie Franklin.

72
00:09:03.840 --> 00:09:09.460
And Ruth Anaboros always did my ballets very well. And Danilova also did my ballets very well.

73
00:09:09.460 --> 00:09:16.280
I'm trying to think of who all did it. Nikita Talon was very good in certain things. And I'm trying to think of who else.

74
00:09:16.580 --> 00:09:23.420
There were a lot of the dancers that just put themselves in your hands and tried to do it the very best they could the way you wanted it.

75
00:09:24.280 --> 00:09:30.020
Do dancers sometimes fight you, disagree, argue with you about what's right?

76
00:09:30.240 --> 00:09:32.600
No. I never had to do that.

77
00:09:33.700 --> 00:09:35.780
So the choreographer is king or queen?

78
00:09:35.780 --> 00:09:37.480
Oh, yes. Absolutely.

79
00:09:40.720 --> 00:09:47.260
When you were working with... Who danced the widow the first time?

80
00:09:47.880 --> 00:09:48.960
Wasn't it Alicia Markova?

81
00:09:49.020 --> 00:09:54.320
It was Alicia Markova. Tell us about the selection of Alicia Markova for the role of the widow.

82
00:09:54.660 --> 00:10:02.640
Well, she's a very unusual artist. I think she's a wonderful artist. And I thought she would be original as the widow.

83
00:10:02.640 --> 00:10:07.640
I did the widow slightly tongue-in-cheek, you know, and I didn't want it to be just too serious.

84
00:10:08.540 --> 00:10:16.640
And that's why I picked her for the role. And I thought she was marvelous in it. But she never rehearsed it. She didn't like to rehearse.

85
00:10:17.780 --> 00:10:24.420
She drives you crazy. There was one little very hard dance that I put in just for her, which wasn't a waltz.

86
00:10:24.460 --> 00:10:29.700
It was a little sort of a pizzicato thing, very difficult little dance. And I did it in Saint-Rapé for her.

87
00:10:29.700 --> 00:10:34.400
And she came down there and was going to work. But she always wanted to stop after an hour and say,

88
00:10:34.500 --> 00:10:38.680
Isn't it time to go to the beach? And she never wants to the dance. And I was scared to death.

89
00:10:39.040 --> 00:10:45.660
But when she came out on the stage, she was just perfection in it. So I guess she was just talented, that's all.

90
00:10:45.860 --> 00:10:48.260
And she saw what I wanted, of course.

91
00:10:48.900 --> 00:10:51.480
Is that an especially difficult role, the role of the widow?

92
00:10:52.160 --> 00:10:53.760
I think it's difficult, yes.

93
00:10:54.200 --> 00:10:56.640
Is it the dancing or the personality?

94
00:10:56.640 --> 00:11:02.020
No, the dancing's hard. It's a foolproof role, though.

95
00:11:02.020 --> 00:11:08.020
I think if you do it not very well, it's still a success. It's a very gratifying role in that sense.

96
00:11:08.220 --> 00:11:11.920
Everybody who's done it, even if they haven't been very good, they were successful.

97
00:11:12.580 --> 00:11:17.720
Everybody's danced it now. So I've known one who wasn't a success in it, really.

98
00:11:18.380 --> 00:11:20.680
Who do you think's been the best widow so far?

99
00:11:20.780 --> 00:11:24.000
I told you, Alicia Markham. I liked the best.

100
00:11:26.640 --> 00:11:30.420
Because she had a tongue and cheek quality about it, and she was witty.

101
00:11:32.340 --> 00:11:35.000
I liked them all, though. They all gave it something.

102
00:11:37.300 --> 00:11:40.960
I can't remember all the moves done it, but everybody's done it, it seems like.

103
00:11:41.580 --> 00:11:47.720
Everybody's danced Danilo, too. A number of famous male dancers have danced Danilo.

104
00:11:48.060 --> 00:11:49.580
Who do you think was the best Danilo?

105
00:11:49.580 --> 00:11:52.900
Well, I liked the last one who did it very much, Peter Martins.

106
00:11:52.900 --> 00:11:57.740
He came in at the last minute. He's very handsome, and he's a good dancer, too.

107
00:11:59.120 --> 00:12:02.340
I liked the way he did it very much. Oleg Bryansky was good in it, too.

108
00:12:02.340 --> 00:12:06.900
He was the first one who did it. I can't remember all the ones who danced it.

109
00:12:07.820 --> 00:12:09.740
Skabeen danced it, and he was good.

110
00:12:12.300 --> 00:12:17.000
But I think I liked the last one the best, maybe just because I remember him the most,

111
00:12:17.040 --> 00:12:18.840
because he just finished doing it.

112
00:12:19.520 --> 00:12:21.380
That was the ballet that was danced for television.

113
00:12:21.380 --> 00:12:26.460
That's right. He stepped in at the last minute because I wanted Anthony Dowell,

114
00:12:26.460 --> 00:12:30.200
and for some reason he couldn't come. He didn't come. I don't know what happened.

115
00:12:31.040 --> 00:12:33.660
But he didn't come, so I said, well, you're here. You do it.

116
00:12:33.660 --> 00:12:36.840
So he did. He said, all right. It was as easy as that.

117
00:12:38.580 --> 00:12:42.680
Is that your favorite ballet of all your ballets, the Merry Widow?

118
00:12:44.380 --> 00:12:48.200
Oh, I don't know. I haven't got a favorite one. I don't like any of them.

119
00:12:50.800 --> 00:12:52.420
I'm sick of them all.

120
00:12:55.860 --> 00:12:58.660
Do you ever think about bringing back some of the ones you were saying

121
00:12:58.660 --> 00:13:01.220
it would be really good to do revenge again?

122
00:13:01.640 --> 00:13:05.220
Yes, except that I don't have a film of it, and I don't think I can remember it.

123
00:13:05.400 --> 00:13:09.180
I would love to do it all the ballet. I'd love to revive all the old ones.

124
00:13:09.620 --> 00:13:14.060
We don't have films of them, so they're difficult to revive.

125
00:13:15.160 --> 00:13:18.520
Carmina Burano, we have a film of that. It would be very easy to revive.

126
00:13:21.260 --> 00:13:23.180
But I don't have a company, you see.

127
00:13:23.240 --> 00:13:26.200
It would be easy if I had my own company, but I don't have a company,

128
00:13:26.820 --> 00:13:29.220
so it's difficult to know where to do them.

129
00:13:30.420 --> 00:13:32.960
There was a period when you did have your own company,

130
00:13:32.980 --> 00:13:39.200
and it happened in the 50s when you came back.

131
00:13:41.220 --> 00:13:45.200
I always had my own company until the last ten years.

132
00:13:45.200 --> 00:13:47.400
No, you did. The Chicago Opera.

133
00:13:48.760 --> 00:13:49.820
It changed names.

134
00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:51.160
Chicago Ballet Company.

135
00:13:51.640 --> 00:13:54.100
I always had my own company. It was much easier that way.

136
00:13:54.500 --> 00:13:56.420
But when you began with the Lyric Opera,

137
00:13:57.580 --> 00:14:02.180
that gave you an opportunity to really, once again,

138
00:14:03.960 --> 00:14:07.220
launch a company that would have a substantial season.

139
00:14:07.220 --> 00:14:07.660
Yeah.

140
00:14:09.940 --> 00:14:15.860
It was an interesting negotiation, the Lyric Opera negotiation,

141
00:14:15.980 --> 00:14:20.900
the way the relationship was set up between you as ballet master

142
00:14:20.900 --> 00:14:22.720
and choreographer and the Lyric Opera.

143
00:14:24.100 --> 00:14:30.460
It seems as though it was very important that the ballet be considered

144
00:14:30.460 --> 00:14:32.080
an important part of the opera.

145
00:14:32.840 --> 00:14:37.120
Well, Carol Fox never cared about ballet, never liked it at all,

146
00:14:37.120 --> 00:14:40.580
so I wasn't allowed to do very many ballets.

147
00:14:40.620 --> 00:14:42.980
I got the Mary Widow in. I don't know how I got that in,

148
00:14:43.000 --> 00:14:47.300
but that was a big hit, so I never got to do any others.

149
00:14:48.000 --> 00:14:52.640
I asked her if they would go in with me on the Nutcracker,

150
00:14:53.320 --> 00:14:56.060
because I thought that might get her interested.

151
00:14:56.260 --> 00:15:00.060
But she wasn't interested at all in doing the Nutcracker

152
00:15:00.060 --> 00:15:01.520
down at the McCormick Place.

153
00:15:02.020 --> 00:15:03.280
Although it wouldn't have cost her any money,

154
00:15:03.280 --> 00:15:08.800
but it was all paid for by the Chicago Tribune on the McCormick Place.

155
00:15:09.460 --> 00:15:11.780
That, of course, is a big hit, and it's still running.

156
00:15:11.900 --> 00:15:13.740
It'll go on forever, I think.

157
00:15:13.920 --> 00:15:14.480
Oh, yes.

158
00:15:15.720 --> 00:15:17.680
So, I don't know.

159
00:15:19.060 --> 00:15:21.620
Most opera companies aren't interested in ballet.

160
00:15:23.680 --> 00:15:25.080
They're interested in opera.

161
00:15:25.280 --> 00:15:26.340
Well, yes.

162
00:15:27.020 --> 00:15:31.280
In 1954, when the Chicago Lyric Opera was being formed,

163
00:15:31.280 --> 00:15:34.960
and they asked you to become the ballet director.

164
00:15:35.700 --> 00:15:37.680
It involved...

165
00:15:37.680 --> 00:15:39.960
Why did you agree to do it, Ruth?

166
00:15:40.520 --> 00:15:42.080
Well, I was delighted to do it.

167
00:15:42.100 --> 00:15:45.100
I had to live in Chicago, and there was nothing to do here.

168
00:15:45.140 --> 00:15:47.640
I was delighted to do the Lyric Opera.

169
00:15:47.880 --> 00:15:48.880
More than delighted.

170
00:15:50.320 --> 00:15:53.420
It liberated you from traveling so much.

171
00:15:53.620 --> 00:15:54.140
Yes.

172
00:15:56.240 --> 00:16:01.600
The first year, you did a rather unorthodox thing,

173
00:16:02.580 --> 00:16:04.560
ballet for the fourth act of Carmen.

174
00:16:06.560 --> 00:16:11.900
You inserted El Amor Brujo into the...

175
00:16:11.900 --> 00:16:13.820
Oh, did I? I didn't remember that.

176
00:16:13.920 --> 00:16:16.500
Hmm. In Carmen, I put El Amor Brujo?

177
00:16:16.600 --> 00:16:18.180
Yes, in the fourth act.

178
00:16:18.400 --> 00:16:23.080
Oh, that surprised me, because there's excellent music from Carmen for the fourth act.

179
00:16:23.080 --> 00:16:28.960
Well, apparently you decided it needed a little more, and you did it.

180
00:16:29.760 --> 00:16:31.060
I've forgotten that.

181
00:16:32.000 --> 00:16:34.180
I've done Carmen in so many different ways...

182
00:16:34.180 --> 00:16:34.900
Yes, you have.

183
00:16:34.940 --> 00:16:36.420
...that I can't remember them all.

184
00:16:36.700 --> 00:16:38.680
I've done it with four different designers.

185
00:16:39.160 --> 00:16:41.000
I've done it just in the opera.

186
00:16:41.000 --> 00:16:42.240
You do it all the time.

187
00:16:42.680 --> 00:16:46.720
And then I've done it as a ballet, but aside from the opera,

188
00:16:47.220 --> 00:16:48.800
I've done it with four different designers.

189
00:16:48.880 --> 00:16:49.940
Each one was different.

190
00:16:49.940 --> 00:16:53.640
You can do anything with Carmen, and it's always a success.

191
00:16:54.200 --> 00:16:56.140
It's foolproof, like the Mary Widow.

192
00:16:58.640 --> 00:17:03.040
There is a ballet that we didn't talk about, Salome.

193
00:17:04.100 --> 00:17:05.760
I didn't do that very often.

194
00:17:05.840 --> 00:17:07.780
I think it was a very interesting ballet,

195
00:17:08.320 --> 00:17:11.880
and the music is very, very difficult, you know.

196
00:17:13.060 --> 00:17:14.940
And it's...

197
00:17:14.940 --> 00:17:22.300
The dance of the seven bales is so difficult to do in an interesting way,

198
00:17:22.540 --> 00:17:25.040
and I think my version was very interesting,

199
00:17:25.500 --> 00:17:28.620
but I never did it because it was too complicated.

200
00:17:29.620 --> 00:17:30.940
It was...

201
00:17:31.560 --> 00:17:37.880
I read of it that it was a dance, a ballet, with no ballet steps in it.

202
00:17:37.880 --> 00:17:39.940
It was more of a dance drama.

203
00:17:40.300 --> 00:17:41.180
What does that mean?

204
00:17:41.440 --> 00:17:44.320
Well, it's not a classical ballet, that's all it means.

205
00:17:44.320 --> 00:17:46.320
It was...

206
00:17:46.980 --> 00:17:48.800
Well, it wasn't classical at all.

207
00:17:50.140 --> 00:17:53.420
It wasn't in tutus, it wasn't in long skirts.

208
00:17:53.820 --> 00:17:55.200
It wasn't in skirts at all.

209
00:17:55.600 --> 00:17:57.680
I thought perhaps it meant something else,

210
00:17:57.820 --> 00:18:03.220
because modern dance, by this time we are into the 50s, 1953 or so,

211
00:18:03.660 --> 00:18:05.360
was well established.

212
00:18:05.640 --> 00:18:08.740
Why anyone would write of it that it was so unusual

213
00:18:08.740 --> 00:18:11.220
that it had no ballet steps in it?

214
00:18:11.440 --> 00:18:13.660
Well, it wasn't modern dance either.

215
00:18:13.660 --> 00:18:15.580
What was it then?

216
00:18:15.940 --> 00:18:21.460
It was a real expression of the drama in the story,

217
00:18:22.000 --> 00:18:24.660
the idea back of it, the idea of the...

218
00:18:25.300 --> 00:18:27.860
I call it the daughter of Herodias, you know?

219
00:18:29.020 --> 00:18:29.020


220
00:18:29.320 --> 00:18:31.700
And I wish I'd done it often,

221
00:18:31.780 --> 00:18:33.800
because I think it was a very, very interesting ballet,

222
00:18:34.680 --> 00:18:36.800
but I couldn't because it was too complicated.

223
00:18:37.320 --> 00:18:39.300
The music was complicated.

224
00:18:39.840 --> 00:18:41.880
At one point you called it retribution, too.

225
00:18:41.880 --> 00:18:44.120
It went through several different title changes.

226
00:18:45.700 --> 00:18:46.740
Oh, we've got to change?

227
00:18:46.960 --> 00:18:48.420
Do you want to walk around for a little bit?