BALLET DESERVES

SPOT ON

NATIONAL

STAGE

 

BY DOTTIE ASHLEY

 

The Post and Courier

1991

 

As two dirt-covered, female
dancers move tigress-like to claim sensuality               

on their male prey, the Charleston Ballet's

Theatre's world premiere of The Rite of Spring" reveals the ferocity of women in combat.

 

Without question, Jill Eathorne Bahr's breath-taking choreography danced to the music of Stravinsky belongs up there with national dance companies, such as Paul Taylor, Pilobolus and Martha Clarke.

 

As the audience rose to deliver a standing ovation at the ballet's opening on Friday night at the Garden Theatre, the line that Ms. Bahr crossed in presenting such a seamless dance brought local dance into a new dimension. Indeed it would be a shame for this "Rite of Spring" is not performed in a national venue 

 

Charleston Ballet Theatre co-directed by Patty & Don Cantwell should be congratulated on staging such an innovative work filled with heavy acrobatic jumps, angular thrusts of hips, undulating torsos and flexed feet   

 

The star of the piece was Perry Mauzy who was raw and compelling as the Matriarch, the leader of a tribe of women that exists in primitive conditions and lives without the benefit of male companionship. Miss Mauzy brought a fearless strength to her role, tossing. her head and stomping the ground, and overflowing -with. confidence and sensuality.  But then, The Matriarch discovers in a mound of dirt a male fig­ure­ the First Man. Soon, other such creatures begin struggling through the stark high tech steel set of heavy netting and faux steel girders. Alain Charron

​

brought a brutal passion to the role who mates passionately with the Matriarch. And later in a red glow we see that The Chosen One has been born.