Festival Ballet Providence is celebrating its 25th season with a clutch of romantic classics, from Giselle to Cinderella to A Midsummer Night's Dream. Artistic director Mihailo (Misha) Djuric, looking to tradition in another way, has engaged Festival's co-founder Winthrop Corey to set his choreography of Cinderella on the company. And he has hired Festival's former ballerina (who portrayed Cinderella) Elizabeth (Corey) DeFanti to re-stage the choreography of her late mother, co-founder Christine Hennessy, for A Midsummer Night's Dream in May. This weekend, Cinderella will be performed at the VMA Arts & Cultural Center.

Corey and Hennessy founded Festival Ballet in 1978, and Corey left after 12 years to head up Mobile (Alabama) Ballet, where he has been artistic director and principal choreographer for the past 15 years. He first created Cinderella for Festival in 1985, has presented it three times with Mobile Ballet, and four times with other ballet companies around the country. But each production must be re-worked to fit the personalities and the technical prowess of the dancers.

"Each time I come to it, I'm a little bit different and the abilities of the dancers are different," Corey explained, in a phone conversation from his home in Mobile. "The caliber of Festival's dancers is very, very high, and I tried to challenge them technically, as well as working with Tatiana and Jennifer on their characterizations of Cinderella."

Tatiana Berenova (Saturday) and Jennifer Ricci (Friday and Sunday) portray Cinderella, with Pavel Homko and Gleb Lyamenkoff as their respective Prince Charmings. Seen in rehearsal, they bring different images to the role. Berenova's long legs make her heels-over-head extensions look quite elegant and dramatic. Ricci's more petite frame gives her a darting, bird-like quality as she sweeps the kitchen. Berenova's Cinderella shows a patient but urgent longing for her late father and for her own chance at happiness. Ricci's Cinderella seems more intensely anguished about her situation, more hurt by the barbs her stepsisters throw at her. Yet each dancer must convey a combination of sadness and joy, and each must convince the audience that she is a lowly servant girl.

"I told them to think about who they are -- a scullery maid in a big house," Corey noted. "They can't necessarily be a ballerina every time they stand up from the fireplace. I said, `You need to think about who you are and where you are and just walk and then let's incorporate that.' If Cinderella's supposed to look forlorn and slightly pathetic, that's not going to be conveyed in a precise classical pose. But standing with shoulders hunched and head down might do it. With good dancers, you can do that -- these two knew exactly what I was talking about."

In telling this oh-so-familiar tale in dance, Corey took some cues from Sergei Prokofiev's 1945 score, which indicates the roles of the four seasons who present Cinderella with her clothing and accessories for the ball, and some from London's Royal Ballet, which has always cast the stepsisters with male dancers. Drawing from Festival's principals, and choosing the tall, muscular Piotr Ostaltsov to pair up with the shorter, wiry James Brown, Corey found two very funny (and inventive) performers.

Seen in rehearsal two weeks ago, Ostaltsov and Brown were trying on their ball gowns (bright purple satin with pink swags, bows and flowers; and bright green with an orange inset, respectively) and the attendant hoops that go under them. They were taunting Cinderella and fawning over their mother (played wonderfully by Marrie Hadfield); they were miming a meal in the kitchen; they were sitting on the laps of the Prince's cohorts when he brings the missing slipper for everyone to try on. Without stealing the show, they were both hilarious.

"I told them, `Don't play it for comedy,' " recalled Corey. "I said, `Don't push it. Don't make it vaudeville. Just do what the stepsisters would do.' I love to give them that freedom, because I was given that. But you have to keep the overall picture in mind."

Corey will be back in town for final rehearsals this week to make sure that happens. And as for his lasting impressions of Cinderella: "I think the audience needs to root for her, even though they know what's going to happen. They have to see that she's sad, but when she gets to the ballroom, she just glows. And when she encounters the stepsisters, she's not vindictive. She wins in the end, but she doesn't lord it over anyone."

"Good does triumph over wrongdoings or inappropriate behavior," Corey continued, "but I didn't want it to seem like the stepsisters were getting their come-uppance. I'm a gentle soul and that reflects in my work."

In addition to his choreography, Festival Ballet Providence is using costumes designed and constructed by Corey. He began sewing costumes in the early days of Festival Ballet, and he now has tutu customers around the country. Even some of the sets will be on loan from Mobile Ballet.

But the talent and hard work of the dancers surely belongs to Festival. In addition to the dancers mentioned above, Carolyn Chamberlain and Jacyln Ricci portray the kindly Fairy Godmother, with four skittering girls as the mice. Eivar Martinez gives the jester his best high leaps and dizzying turns. Festival's large ensemble of young dancers portray "oranges," special gifts from the Prince, and elves, who prance around Cinderella with large numbers that signify the countdown to midnight. Nineteen female dancers, in gold and blue gowns, along with six of the male dancers in blue, create a swirling spiral of color in the ballroom scene. The whole is a rags-to-riches romance danced with great feeling and precision, played with broad emotions and much laughter.

"I do it for the little girl in the fourth row," reflected Corey. "The thrust of it is there and then everyone understands it."

And most likely they leave the theater either humming or skipping.

Festival Ballet will perform Cinderella this Friday and Saturday, February 14 and 15 at 7:30 p.m. and on Sunday, February 16 at 2:30 p.m. at the VMA Arts & Cultural Center, 1 Avenue of the Arts, Providence. Tickets are $40 to $12. Call (401) 353-1129.

Issue Date: February 14 - 20, 2003