Romeo and Juliet Before Parting (1989)
James Kudelka has choreographed for many of the world’s leading ballet companies, as well as for smaller contemporary companies and ensembles. This week, Peggy reflects on her first work with him:
“James has been a hugely important presence in my life, and I was fortunate enough to work with him as a dancer on four very different works. The first, Romeo and Juliet Before Parting, was at his invitation and the others were commissioned by me: This Isn’t the End (1991), Pelléas et Mélisande (1997), and A Woman by a Man (2008). The first and last of these dances are duets, and they stand as the only male/female duets concerning relationship ever choreographed for me.
It was always thrilling to be in rehearsal with James – he works extremely quickly and likes to see the dancer working at the brink of their ability. For Romeo and Juliet Before Parting, Sylvain Lafortune and I were in almost constant contact, negotiating a succession of complicated lifts, precarious counterbalances and intricately interlocking actions. The complexity of the partnering was way beyond me, but between them, James and Sylvain were somehow able to teach me everything I needed to enter into the fray and reach the heart of the dance.”
James writes about this piece: “Romeo and Juliet Before Parting was initially commissioned for a film, Romeos and Juliets, produced by Rhombus Media. It was choreographed at the Montreal Danse studio on Rue St. André, and we used Paul-André Fortier’s table from his work Tell for the bed. Peggy was staying at my condo in Old Montreal with me, and Sylvain was at that point no longer with Les Grands Ballets Canadiens. It is remarkable that this dance lived on and found a usefulness for Peggy in her stage performances but also danced by new casts. Remarkably I think each new cast is still wearing the costume that Peggy purchased for herself in the ladies lingerie department at The Bay.
I wanted to begin the duet at on odd place musically. In the ballet this dance opens Act 3. There is a short overture to this act that I cut, so that the first sound we hear is the deep notes from the lower strings. Like a horrible feeling in your gut the morning after a boisterous one night stand, and the admission that life has changed and the characters have both won and are about to lose all at the same time. Love hurts.”
“On videotape, Peggy Baker is dancing a beautifully articulate Juliet to the familiar passionate violins of Prokofiev. But this Juliet is not fluttering demurely on her toes--she is barefoot, with starkly cropped blond hair and a solidly weighted sense of longing. In James Kudelka’s duet, “Romeo and Juliet Before Parting,” Baker strikes an exceptional balance between active and passive energies. Caressed and lifted by partner Sylvain Lafortune, she also makes some advances: holds him firmly, lowers him to the floor. She is the perfect postmodern romantic heroine, lyrically strong and muscularly delicate.” Jennifer Fisher, Los Angeles Times, 1996
Sylvain Lafortune was a guest faculty member at Peggy Baker Dance Projects’ August Intensive in 2018 and 2019 leading courses in Partnering. Read more about his approach here.
