For Mother's Day we went to the Austin Ballet production of Coppelia. It was billed as "ballet's greatest comedy". Let me start out by saying, I like funny. I am a big fan of comedy. Mel Brooks, Brandon Fraser, Kathryn Madigan, slapstick, parodies, I like most comedy. To be honest though, the ballet brand of comedy escaped me. Not funny. Many of the more refined audience members were amused. They laughed at the simplest things. They may have never seen an episode of Lucy or Dick Van Dyke so they have been comedy deprived. I may be jaded by the likes of Airplane, Blazing Saddles and the 2000 Presidential Election. I just did not find it funny. The ballet has no dialog so it relies on facial expressions, hand gestures and an occasional funny dance move. That pretty much limits their bag of tricks when it comes to being funny. They could have at least called on some a pie fight, some pratfalls and even some old Three Stooges gags, minus the nyuck nyuck's.
Even though the humor was beyond my comprehension, I have to say that the ballet was great. The dancers have some amazing athletic abilities. For a classy guy like myself, the talent of the dancers and the complexity of their moves, did not escape me. There were a large number of women in the audience and I think it is partly due to it being an occasion to dress up and be seen. I think it is also due to the butt factor. The male dancers wore very revealing tights and the muscular definition of their butts was not shrouded by anything. Many women were women leaning over, whispering about the "fantastic butts". I hated to shush my wife. When not balleting, I think that the male dancers must model their butts for mannequins used at Nordstrom's, or Macy's. The choreographer missed out on a great comedic routine. He should have integrated the muscular butts of his dancers into some kind of routine where they bounced things off their asses. Ping Pong or tennis balls, anything, maybe have one of them do some stunts where he picks up quarters with nothing but his butt cheeks,, now that would be funny.
Maybe I found the ballet amusing after all and maybe, just possibly, I am not so classy?
No comments:
Post a Comment