Indescribable

I just wanted to let you all know that this past Friday, I got to go to the ballet! Yes, the ballet. Perhaps you are not as excited about this as I am, but you must understand, I love the ballet. Love. With deep, everlasting passion. I would go to every ballet that came down the pike if I could. As it was, this one was an extra special bonus because it was FREE! In Houston, we have this place called Miller Outdoor Theatre, which basically does only free shows for the edification of the good people of Houston. So we can just show up and watch the ballet for nothing. And, as such, they were the best seats I have ever had for the ballet.

Furthermore, in case you were wondering, you are right, Madame Butterfly was first an opera before it ever became a ballet. But I guess this fellow, artistic director, I should say, named Stanton Welch decided to take Puccini's score and choreograph to it for this ballet.

The story, in case you are not familiar with it, is as follows: Cio-Cio San, aka Madame Butterfly, is a young girl who was forced to become a geisha after her father commited ritual suicide. She meets Lieutenant Pinkerton, who is an official of the United States Army and is stationed in Nagasaki. They fall in love, and agree to marry, in spite of the fact that Pinkerton has a sweetheart to whom he is engaged waiting for him in the States. Butterfly converts to Christianity so that she can worship the same God as her husband. Butterfly's family interrupts the marriage ritual and disowns her because she renounced the faith of her family. They leave in a huff and Pinkerton comforts his weeping wife. And, as the synopsis puts it: "she gradually surrenders her innocence and they lie down beneath the stars." Racy. End of Act One.

In the second act, it is 10 years later, Butterfly is living in destitution in Nagasaki. Pinkerton has left her and gone back to the States and married his sweetheart Kate, although Butterfly doesn't know it. Another officer from the States brings her a letter from Pinkerton, the contents of which she can't read and he can't bear to relate to her, so he just doesn't tell her the bad news. He asks her what she would do if Pinkerton never returns. She is horrified by the idea and triumphantly shows the officer her son as proof of Pinkerton's inevitable return. She dreams of him coming back to take her and her son to a wonderful new life in America. Pinkerton returns to Nagasaki with his wife and visits the home of Butterfly, hoping to find her away and quietly convince her only servant to turn over her son to he and his American wife. Pinkerton can't bear the memories evoked by being back in her home, so he flees, just as Butterfly arrives. Kate convinces her to turn over her son to be raised as an American. After losing Pinkerton once and for all, Butterfly has no more resistance; she gives Kate her son and they leave. Desperate with grief and utterly hopeless, Butterfly turns to the only avenue available to her, and kills herself with the same sword that her father used. Pinkerton returns just in time to cradle her dying body in his arms as she breathes her last. (Hey, what do you want, it is based on an opera.)

Wow, I didn't mean for that synopsis to take up so much space. Anyway, I thought it was a pretty decent story, and in watching the ballet, I was just amazed at the way dance communicates. The different movements can portray so many different things, anger, grief, lust, timidity, mirth, it can all be writ large without anyone having to utter a word. It was also really interesting to try to understand a medium which baffles me, music, through one which I understand a little more, dance. It was interesting to watch how the choreography matched and intensified the emotion created by the music.

Oh, another thing that I have to mention is the INCREDIBLE scenery that was used in the ballet. One of the most amazing parts was the very first scene of the ballet, which is supposed to portray Butterfly dreaming of her future. It showed the dancer behind a huge screen which covered the entire stage and was painted with these huge, white, splashy flowers with deep blue centers. Through this you could see the dancer and four people who held these giant wings, like 25 ft. long, made of some kind of diaphanous fabric, and they were all coordinating the movement of the wings. Anyway, it was awesome.

But what none of that conveys, what I am struggling to get across, is the feeling of sitting in that audience, watching them dance. The thing that first comes to mind when I think about the ballet is perfection. It makes me ache inside, to see the way they dance, the perfect and impossible lines they make with their bodies, the effortless way that one dancer can leap and be caught and spun by another, the feather-light way they move through the air. The raw emotion that is displayed in a pas de deux. Oh, and this incredibly beautiful scene where Butterfly is waiting up all night for the return of Pinkerton and it showed her and her servant behind two screens, lighted from behind. It was referential, I think, to a style of Japanese theater, but it was incredible to see the sharpness of the lines and the variety of shapes they made, using just their bodies and a fan.

I don't know. Four years of studying writing, and I am absolutely at a loss to describe what it was like. Well, maybe not absolutely. It's not like I've been working on this for a month. Anyway, I've done a crap job trying to convey what it was like, but suffice it to say it was wonderful, and I love the ballet, and you should love the ballet too, and if you ever get a chance, you should go. Go now, in fact. The blog will still be here when you get back.

S.