{"id":1595793,"date":"2025-10-27T12:32:19","date_gmt":"2025-10-27T16:32:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/observer.com\/?p=1595793"},"modified":"2025-10-27T17:18:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T21:18:14","slug":"what-to-see-dance-abt-american-ballet-theatre-2025-fall-season-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/observer.com\/2025\/10\/what-to-see-dance-abt-american-ballet-theatre-2025-fall-season-preview\/","title":{"rendered":"At 85 Years Old, American Ballet Theatre Has Never Looked Better"},"content":{"rendered":"
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L\u00e9a Fleytoux in Natalia Makarova\u2019s The Kingdom of the Shades<\/em>. Photo: Emma Zordan<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On the evening of Thursday, January 11, 1940, the curious audience at the Center Theatre in New York City held playbills that read The Ballet Theatre: America\u2019s First Ballet Theatre Staged by the Greatest Collaboration in Ballet History. The first part of the description wasn\u2019t entirely accurate\u2014across the country, Adolph Bolm had founded the San Francisco Opera Ballet in 1933, renamed San Francisco Ballet in 1942\u2014but the second part just might have been.<\/p>\n

In the playbill\u2019s An Introduction to the Ballet Theatre<\/i>, journalist Lucius Beebe wrote: \u201cIt has been the purpose of the Ballet Theatre to stage, organize and undertake ballet for the sake of dancing\u2026 The other determination of the Ballet Theatre is to present the greatest possible variety of choreographic repertory. It essays the staging of the best that is traditional, the best that is contemporary and, inevitably, the best that is controversial.\u201d<\/p>\n

The brand-new company, founded by American dancer Lucia Chase and Mordkin Ballet\u2019s Colorado-born director Richard Pleasant in the fall of 1939, organized a jam-packed first season that consisted of 18 ballets by 11 of the greatest choreographers of the day, like Agnes de Mille, Anton Dolin, Michel Fokine, Bronislava Nijinska and Antony Tudor. The large cast featured 20 principal dancers, 15 soloists and a company of 56, which included units for both \u201cSpanish\u201d and \u201cNegro\u201d dancers. In the segregated America of 1940, it was almost unheard of for Brown and Black dancers to be seen on a large-scale concert stage. This inclusion, though imperfect in its execution, was quite a radical act for its time.<\/p>\n

Much has changed in the past 85 years: the Center Theatre was demolished in 1954 and is now a 21-story office building; most, if not all, of the people involved in that inaugural season are now gone; Ballet Theatre was renamed American Ballet Theatre (ABT) in 1957; journalists don\u2019t often use \u201cessay\u201d as a verb anymore (though maybe we should); and the Company is now very diverse, with principal dancers and soloists hailing not only from the U.S. and Europe but also Argentina, Brazil, China, Japan, Mexico and South Korea.<\/p>\n

But some things have stayed the same: ABT is still committed to presenting \u201cthe greatest variety of choreographic repertory\u201d from the past and present and pushing the boundaries of what ballet can be and do. Their 85th Anniversary Fall Season, running from through November 1 at the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center, is a testament to that vibrant spirit.<\/p>\n

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