American Ballet Theatre’s annual City Center season opens tomorrow, and several occasions make this season worth watching.

This season marks Alessandra Ferri’s 20th anniversary with ABT – in ballet, that’s a major landmark. This deeply expressive, fluid dancer joined the company in 1985 after dancing with the Royal Ballet and training at that company’s school. But rather than absorbing that company’s Ashton-centric style, she melded it with her early training at La Scala, in her hometown of Milan.

In recent seasons Ms. Ferri has danced a limited number of roles, focusing mainly on “Romeo and Juliet.” She has made the role of Juliet a trademark that she dances with heartbreaking poignancy. Her Juliet sets the modern standard. If you didn’t catch it last season, say a little prayer that it comes back around soon.

Ms. Ferri is dancing only two works this season: Jerome Robbins’s “Other Dances” on opening night, and Christopher Wheeldon’s “VIII.” Both are worth catching.

Speaking of “VIII,” this work by ballet’s current it-boy receives its American premiere on Friday night. Though it was originally created for the Hamburg Ballet, it has been retooled with new choreography, scenery, and costumes. “VIII” is based on the life of Henry VIII and set to Britten’s “Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge.”

The season also includes the world premiere of Trey McIntyre’s ballet “Pretty Good Year,” using Dvorak’s piano trio – not to mention several important revivals, with a special emphasis on the work of Michel Fokine. Both “Les Sylphides” and “Le Spectre de la Rose” are slated for this three-week season.

“Les Sylphides” is the quintessential “ballet blanc”: long white skirts, a dreamy atmosphere, and no narrative other than the magic of the lithe sylphs who dance in the moonlight. Gillian Murphy will dance the lead for the revival premiere on Thursday night. Julie Kent – recently back from maternity leave – will dance the lead on November 3. Herman Cornejo will dance most of the performances of “Le Spectre de la Rose,” but on October 27 Ethan Stiefel will debut in the role of the rose. The ballet is unusual, in that it is only for two dancers, but those two dancers create a swirling romantic mood on stage.

In this short work, a young girl returns from a dance, holding a rose that her first love has given her. She falls asleep in her room and the spirit of the rose dances with her in her dream. The role of the Rose requires great skill and buoyancy from the male dancer, and between Mr. Cornejo and Mr. Stiefel, there’s plenty to go around.

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The situation at Dance Theatre of Harlem worsened over the weekend when the company’s ballet school was forced to cancel classes. The sudden closure was a result of the company losing the liability insurance that covers its building.

Every week the school sees 800 to 1,000 students, in addition to the company’s professional dancers who still train there. Though a company spokesman says one insurance payment was late, the check had been cashed by the Marsh insurance firm, which is handling the policy. Additional payments are needed, and the school had to shut its doors rather than risk the injury of one of the students or dancers.

DTH has had a tough time as of late. The classical ballet company, run by artistic director Arthur Mitchell, announced last month that it would suspend operations until July 2005. During that time it intended to reorganize its board and raise $2.3 million to eliminate its debt. Though lawyers will be meeting this week to discuss how to proceed, the fact that the money crisis is now affecting the school suggests that DTH is in even worse shape than it originally let on.

Staying off stage is one thing. Closing the school is a different and deeper problem. Keeping its school open is the least that any shut-down dance company can do to maintain the training of its dancers and the handing down of technique. The Martha Graham Dance Company, for example, was absent from the stage for several years, but the dancers and students were able to preserve the form by training at the school.

A school’s closure affects company professionals, who need to stay in shape and work with their peers. But it also affects the future of the company, perhaps irreparably. Children and young dancers are taught a technique that is filtered down from the top.

DTH’s school has only been closed for a few days, but who knows how long this will continue? One thing’s for sure: The situation is going to continue unless the company is able to find itself some forward-thinking patron willing to turn this company around. What’s needed is leadership – well-financed leadership. Otherwise Dance Theatre of Harlem will become part of New York’s history, rather than its present and future.

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There was a dance performance of a different sort on Friday afternoon at the Digital Life conference at the Jacob Javits Center: the first national tournament for fans of “Dance Dance Revolution.”

If you spend your time watching dance at Lincoln Center, you might not know that in the arcades of Chinatown and Times Square dance has been mixed with the competitive spirit of video games. “DDR,” as its known to its followers, has been in the States for a few years, but is still not quite as popular a video game here as it is in Europe or Japan.

DDR consists of two parts: a screen that tells you what direction to move and an electronic pad on which you step in the appropriate direction. There are increasing levels of difficulty in the game, and while you can simply step on the squares, it’s much more fun if you ham it up while stepping on the keys.

Watching these kids compete in the “freestyle” dance competition was just too much fun. A 13-year-old, John Stoffel, came from Rochester (thanks to his grandfather) to enter the tournament in a full ninja costume – with mask and sword. He had memorized the stepping pattern so he could dance without keeping too close an eye on the screen. “I’m really bad at normal dancing,” he told me.

Edwin Fu, 19, who took the “stage” later, got the crowd going with his speedy footwork. Mr. Fu had also memorized the steps and so was able to turn and face the teenaged audience instead of the screen. He put on a slick show of street dance. “It helps if you have experience in dancing,” he said, admitting that he’s been into break dancing and “pop and lock” for a while.

The only two-man team in the tourney – Julio “Vyzor” Guadalupe, 20, and Anthony “Sketch” Carella, 22 – was the best-rehearsed act of the bunch. The two pumped their hips and jumped around like backup dancers for Justin Timberlake, and even came down off the “DDR” footpad for a little dancing on the floor.

DDR is a form of fun (and exercise, some of the teens told me), but it’s also one of those great ways in which dance is incorporated into popular culture. It’s not going to boost ticket sales at ABT this week, but it does get people dancing. I wonder what these young people – who so clearly have an appreciation for speed and style – would do if they saw a ballerina spin through 32 fouettes. I’d bet they’d go batty.