CHAPTER 24Tucson Becomes My New Home. It was during the heat of mid-summer that I arrived in Tucson. It had become a sprawling boom-town, but after seven years living in the Bronx, it seemed to me a paradise. Even the tiny, rundown house I moved into on the Shaw property was welcome. Being a pragmatist, I immediately set about painting and decorating until it was quite attractive and comfortable. From my windows I had a spectacular view of the Catalina mountains. I was really quite happy there.
The summer heat, unbearable to most, didn’t bother me in the least. I went for long hikes in those mountains and canyons and on the hottest days, often lying prostrate on a rock in full submission to the blazing sun, like a sacrificial victim. Birds hovered over and critters gathered around me in disbelief.
Sonya Winter brought one day of snow, well, actually it was only a
morning’s worth before it all quickly melted away. Snow, no matter
how scarce, is most unusual for the desert. So rare, I had to take a
picture of it.
London
Photo: Stevenage Muscovy Duck in Stevenage, New Town park
The dance performance was typical recital low quality but I wasn’t there to see that. The balalaika orchestra was what I went to see. Afterwards, I went backstage to meet the orchestra’s conductor, Mia Bulgarin Gay. After expressing my love for Russian music, language and dancing, I mentioned that what the orchestra really needed was a dance group to go with it, performing authentic Slavic dance and that I could easily supply it. This idea immediately appealed to Mia. Not only that, but I also joined the orchestra as a balalaika player myself, an occupation that was to continue for many years to come.
Photo above: First set of Kalinka dancers in class Photo right: I join Balalaika Orchestra. In garden on Shaw property where my first Tucson house is located Ballet Arts Studio Before long I was teaching ballet and character classes there, as
well as at the studio that used the balalaika orchestra. There was
also an occasional character class to teach at the University, as a
guest professor. More Choreography and Beginnings Of The
Kalinka Russian Dancers My life had come full circle. I had started out at age fourteen as a Russian folk dancer back in Boston with the Russakoff troupe, now, after a full career on the professional stage, I was back doing the same thing I’d started out with.
It wasn’t short on mammals either, with two live camels that were led across the stage in the triumphal scene, a sight that delighted the audience just before the ballet was to begin. I always held my breath that these beasts didn’t leave anything behind during their walk across stage that the dancers might slip and fall on! The camels reappeared in the third act’s Nile scene. In defiance of the sleepy atmosphere they were meant to evoke, they drew thunderous but disruptive applause at every performance.
The Arizona Opera director, Glynn Ross, then in his 80s, came to Tucson after directing the opera in Seattle and had put both companies on the global stage with a complete Wagner’s “Ring” cycle. A cruel joke going around among the orchestra and chorus members, was that he looked and acted as if he was daily taken out of a cryonic chamber! Probably unaware that he was being discourteous, he never thought to introduce me to the stream of conductors that I had to work with. While they would look on in amazement at his bad manners, I had to introduce myself. As often the case with haughty and self-important individuals, like John Neumeier and Renzo Raiss from previous experience, they consider the choreologist or choreographer not important enough to introduce. It’s true that In opera, dancers and choreographers are never given much consideration, but this breach of etiquette would never have happened at the Metropolitan Opera; well, possibly it would have, but rarely. James Lucas, a gadabout operatic stage director came to Tucson to direct “La Sonnambula”. He was the same director I had worked with in New York for “Le Villi” in Central Park. He was generally downright rude. I didn’t take his dictatorial attitude as personally offensive, as most did, and said to him once that I thought that underneath his abusive exterior he was no doubt not mean at all but rather, a teddy-bear. His response was a definite no - that underneath he really was mean! He was so insulting to the singers and everyone else connected to the opera, that rehearsals were dreaded and many went home in tears. It was surprising that Glynn Ross continued to invite him back unless the fee was so low he couldn’t get anyone else.
Photo: Die Fledermaus It always amazed me how stage directors, musicians, even conductors know so little about dance. More often they know nothing at all about it, while dancers and choreographers know music as essential. Well, not always. I know several ballet teachers/choreographers who simply don’t have a clue about music.
Photo: Backstage picture of some of my gypsy dancers in "La Traviata". Left to right: Jennifer Wood Bonnell, Sabina Valic Burke, [unknown chorus singer], Jenni Hynum, Kathleen Schwartzman Once, when I was to choreograph a “Cinderella” somewhere in Pennsylvania, I arrived for the first rehearsal to find the director had already choreographed most of the first act, including the four ‘seasons’ variations, only she did it as one continuous corps de ballet number. She hadn’t a clue that they were individual variations, indispensable to the ballet. She just put on a recording of the music and plowed through, without preparation or concept. I doubt if she even knew who the composer was. Every choreographer should at least be able to read an orchestral score, but I guess that’s a thing of the past. When Arizona Opera asked me to be “dance consultant” for “Ariadne Auf Naxos”, a Richard Strauss opera, I became suspicious. I knew the leading singers had to dance a little and do some general clowning around. Presumably, the director would set this, and as consultant I was expecting to be called on only for professional advice. Consultant in this case was a misnomer. At the first rehearsal, when it came to a needed dancing sequence, the director, Nando Schellen, indicated I was to take over. Surprise! I was suddenly not a consultant at all but the choreographer. I didn’t mind, only I was not being paid to choreograph, only to consult. He was a nice enough man, but this was the job he himself was supposed be doing. It could have really thrown me for a loop if I had not had enough sense to prepare all the stage business and operatic dancing beforehand. Taking up the gauntlet, I was able to step in and do it, effortlessly. He was obviously more than relieved to have a Johnny-on-the-spot, but I could sense the reason behind it. Apparently, this director knew nothing about choreography, or even how to stage some fake dancing, and rather than admit it to the company, he requested a ‘consultant’, basically to cover for him. In that way, they could get away with paying me far less than as a choreographer. It was not a complete waste for me as this lesson came in valuable use for my film work that was yet to come. The Tucson Weekly “The Tucson Weekly” featured journalism with an edge. It had built a readership of over 200,000 with insightful, cultural coverage, provocative analyses of local politics and offbeat feature writing. They were looking for a dance reviewer. I put together a portfolio of the best articles I had written for magazines and presented myself for the job. My first review was of the Bill T. Jones company that came out the day after their performance in Tucson, just another stop on their tour. Admittedly, it was difficult not to win out on this one. My first paragraph was: That was enough to grab attention. I weighed in with a full-page write-up. Bill T. Jones was Black, admittedly homosexual and had HIV. The entire show was based on these subjects. “Last Supper at Uncle Tom’s Cabin/The Promised Land’ was a sprawling work of operatic length. The 42 local dancers were of all ages, and most didn’t have the sleek look of dancers, especially to be seen stark naked in front of thousands, several of them my friends. One of the most interesting sections of the ballet was after
Jones himself danced a long solo, naked, as the anguished prophet
Job. He then sat down, breathless, to discuss religion with a local
minister, whose answers to his questions were unscripted and
spontaneous. What is sin? Why does God permit AIDS? There had been a
different minister in each city on the tour, but Tucson had a hard
time supplying one. When they found out about the nature of the
work, and the nudity, they dropped out. At the last minute they came
up with one from the United Methodist Church, who sat at the table
of the Last Supper for their discussion. Along with the press passes and increased stature in the dance community as the “new guy in town who really understands dance”, this was an exciting, full-time job. That is, when I was writing about a professional company appearing in Tucson. But when none were in sight I had to write about the local, amateur groups, started, for the most part, by women with very little dance training, but all the same, considered themselves choreographers. Perhaps they had a dance major degree from College, or had the brilliant idea to put street kids on trapezes and call it dancing. More often than not, there was just very little I could say about these performances of faux choreography. Even if I interviewed them on a personal level, their lives were hardly interesting enough to write about. I wracked my brain trying to come up with something that might have some drawing power. There were just not enough professional groups coming through to keep my interest up. After a year or so I left the “Tucson Weekly”, but continued to write occasional dance reviews for the other, established Tucson papers, but only when it was something worth writing about. A New House
Photos above: My Tucson house from 1989 to the present George Zoritch I could never have guessed then that, well after my prime, he would
be a neighbor of mine. Then in his 80s, he had retired after
teaching at the University for many years. He took care of Sonya in
his house during my many trips out of town. I helped him write his
memoirs and it was good practice for me, speaking with him in the
Russian language.
Through George I met Vassili Sulich who ran the Nevada Dance Theater in Las Vegas. Vassili had been a top dancer for many years in the Tropicana Hotel stage shows. He was well known in Las Vegas. One evening we were being entertained as his guests at a special dinner party in the Tropicana. I felt left out, sitting at a table with ten other people in a private dining room, the only vegetarian among them! Usually, vegetarians have to wait until last to be served, so, feeling ostracized, you are left to watch everyone else eat while waiting for yours, that never seems to come. Being a vegetarian on a plane is another problem. If you’ve ever
tasted a cold burrito you’d think twice about accepting any plane
food, vegetarian or otherwise.
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Hatfield House, where Elizabeth the First had lived, was nearby.
Also the homes of Lord Bulwer-Lytton, English novelist, playwright
and politician, author of “Last Days Of Pompeii” and other
nineteenth-century novels, and E.M Forester; “A Passage To India”,
“A Room With A View” and so many others which were made into
remarkable films by Merchant-Ivory. Other than visiting these places
there was nothing much to do in Stevenage. Walks, pubs, reading.
Charles had retired from the banking business to this village, yet I
never knew why he moved away from all the attractions of London
life. It was good to leave the severe Winter of England and return
to the warmth of Arizona.
The
reviews were good for this “Aida”:
Other operas I choreographed for the Arizona company were “Die
Fledermaus” and “La Traviata”. When Glynn Ross finally retired, the
new director didn’t use dancing at all, even for a revival of “Aida”
ten years later. Imagine, “Aida” without a ballet. It was
inconceivable.
had grown comfortable in. Too
many women, who know little or nothing about the real estate
business, set themselves up as agents. The one I found was
apparently only interested in collecting a fee. We met each other in
a coffee bar and had become close friends, but the houses she was
showing me were ludicrous; student housing, family homes or houses
located out of town on the further side of the mountains. I began
looking for a house myself. There were plenty of developments going
up so I easily found a nice corner lot to build on, in the Tucson
Mountain foothills.
dancing, were shown at the Metropolitan Theater in
Boston when I was a teen-age usher there. He was a masterpiece of
masculine grace, with long, supple ballet proportions and flawless
executions.
