Alicia Alonso Takes the Stage by Rebel Girls

Author:Rebel Girls
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Timbuktu Labs
Published: 2020-06-25T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVEN

In 1939, Alicia auditioned to study at the School of American Ballet. SAB was the school that Fernando had mentioned to her back in Havana, the one cofounded by the famous Russian dancer and choreographer George Balanchine.

When the letter came in the mail saying that she’d been accepted and that she would receive a scholarship to pay for her tuition, she danced around her and Fernando’s tiny living room.

“Yes! I’m going to become a professional ballerina!” she shouted. She didn’t care if the neighbors complained. This was the moment she’d been waiting for!

Alicia said goodbye to her brief musical theater career and happily turned her focus back to ballet. At SAB, she worked hard to perfect her ballet technique and soon she was invited to join a new dance company called Ballet Caravan. Her career was finally taking off!

Then, in the spring of 1940, Alicia learned that another new dance company, Ballet Theatre, was holding auditions. Alicia decided to try out. To her delight, she was offered a position in the corps de ballet, the big group of “background” dancers in dance companies.

After that, Alicia’s career grew quickly. Her life in dance was a whirlwind. At Ballet Theatre, she was given many different roles—first in the corps and then in small ensembles. When she performed in a ballet called Pas de Quatre at the Majestic Theater, she and the other three dancers received seventeen curtain calls. Seventeen! Alicia could hardly believe it.

Eventually she was asked to dance a solo role in Peter and the Wolf when another ballerina had to drop out at the last minute. Alicia knew this was a huge opportunity for her, and she put everything she had into the part. After that performance, the New York Times dance critic John Martin wrote that Alicia “showed herself to be a promising young artist with an easy technique, a fine sense of line and a great deal of youthful charm.” Other critics were full of praise for her, too. Alicia wanted to frame those reviews!

The Ballet Theatre choreographers liked to cast Alicia in their dances because she was a gifted actor as well as a skilled ballerina. She was endlessly curious, always seeking the hidden meanings beneath the steps so that she could express those emotions onstage. What was the young swan feeling in Swan Lake? What was the bird’s motivation in those scenes from Peter and the Wolf? What was the spirit’s relationship with the other spirits in Les Sylphides? Alicia was a true artist, and the choreographers—and the audience—adored her.

When a journalist compared Alicia to a young Anna Pavlova, Alicia thought she would faint from happiness. The future she’d dreamed of was happening right here, right now! Like Pavlova, she’d worked hard to achieve her ambitions. She felt unstoppable!

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