Review: Jealousy Sets a Dance in Motion at American Ballet Theater

New York Times

02-07-2025

American Ballet Theater is always here to remind us that we are living in a man's world. From 'Swan Lake' to 'Giselle,' two full-length productions presented during its current summer season, men lie, cheat and are forgiven in the name of true love. They get away with everything. It's exhausting.
Christopher Wheeldon's 'The Winter's Tale,' a company premiere based on the Shakespeare play that opened this week, involves much of that bad behavior and, unfortunately, quite a bit more. In Act 1, Hermione, Queen of Sicilia, is accused of cheating and is brutalized by her husband, King Leontes, in such an excessively drawn out way that your skin doesn't so much crawl as scream.
But though much in this ballet is long-winded — even in its most robust section, the dance-filled Act 2 — 'The Winter's Tale' does have something that Ballet Theater needs: a number of substantial leading parts. For the principals at this company, there are never enough roles to go around.
In the work, originally a co-production between the Royal Ballet and the National Ballet of Canada from 2014, six main characters explore themes of love, jealousy and forgiveness. Set to a commissioned score by Joby Talbot with designs by Bob Crowley, it showcases an all-too brief visual feat, an effect with silks by Basil Twist, the brilliant puppeteer. In the play, there is a well-known stage direction for Antigonus, an adviser to Leontes, after the king tells him to take away his baby Perdita: 'Exit, pursued by a bear.'
Twist's bear appears in a swirl of rushing fabric. It's both ravishing and frightening as its face, imprinted on the silk, seems to be caught in a wave — and just as impressive a sight as it was in 2016, when the National Ballet of Canada presented the dance in New York. But in this Ballet Theater production, running through Saturday with cast changes all week, certain weaknesses remain as the dancers move through Talbot's cinematic, sugary score, which grows increasingly thin with each scene. The choreography can seem cinematic, too, and with that, cartoonishly repetitive.
The plot, through the lens of ballet, is convoluted, but Wheeldon's introduction of its events, at least in the beginning, is clear enough. Leontes (Aran Bell) and Hermione (Devon Teuscher, who performs with commendable subtlety) have a son. Leontes presents her with an emerald necklace.
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