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Article Excerpt
On November 14, the 51st annual Dance Magazine Awards will be presented to five outstanding people in the dance field: Alessandra Ferri, Donald McKayle, Christopher Wheeldon, Jimmy Slyde, and Clive Barnes. The awards program, which includes excerpts of performances, takes place at Florence Gould Hall in New York City. For more information, see page 72.
Alessandra Ferri
Alessandra Ferri is a ballerina who is all woman. Her sensuality, impulsiveness, and soul transform ballet's classical and contemporary heroines. Her Juliet is a playful, keen, fiery girl who erupts with passion and grief at losing Romeo. As The Accused in Agnes de Mille's Fall River Legend, Ferri is downright frightening, a repressed world of rage and abuse in her every step. Her expressive facility--owing to loose hips, an articulate back, lush arches, hyper-extended legs, and a juicy line--along with her large, dark eyes and piquant features, help to amplify her every move to the back row of the theater.
Born in Milan, Ferri studied at the Teatro alla Scala and was accepted into The Royal Ballet School in London at the age of 15. She captured a Prix de Lausanne in 1980 and joined The Royal Ballet later that year. Sir Kenneth MacMillan, the company's principal choreographer and artistic director at the time, spotted her potential and placed her front and center. By 1983 she had been promoted to principal and had won the Sir Laurence Olivier award for her work in MacMillan's Valley of the Shadows. But it was her debut as Juliet at the of 21 that made her a star.
In 1985 Ferri accepted a principal contract with American Ballet Theatre, where then artistic director Mikhail Baryshnikov chose her to be his partner in several ballets, including Giselle (excerpts appear in the movie Dancers). Within a few years, ABT would go on to provide Ferri with her most perfect match onstage--the Argentinean Julio Bocca. For almost 20 years they have been ballet's golden couple. Their performances are filled with immediacy and abandon, and they remain a model of passion and sophistication.
In 1990, ferri decided to go forward as a freelance artist, while still appearing with ABT and La Scala as a permanent guest artist French...
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