Keeping the Family Together
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

They say it was only “semi-unexpected,” but when the Dance Theater of Harlem last month announced it would suspend operations until July 2005, the news was a tremendous disappointment for company members. They had good reason to have become more optimistic.
The classical ballet troupe had just completed a year-long tour of America and the U.K. They were dancing more works by George Balanchine than ever – thanks to the centennial celebration. Artistically, the dancers felt at the top of their game, and financially, the company doubled its box office earnings in the last year.
“This year has been the best we’ve had,” said principal dancer Ramon Thielen, who has been with the company for six years. “After all that work, it feels bad.”
All 44 dancers were laid off last month so that artistic director Arthur Mitchell can get the back-office in order – which includes finding a new executive director, rebuilding the board, and finding the cash to get the company out of its $2.5 million debt.
So who are these dancers?
Well, three of them – Mr. Thielen, Melissa Morrissey, and Akua Parker – have landed a gig with Sensedance, a small, New York-based company led by choreographer Henning Rubsam. They are dancers at quite different points in their careers. But they agree on one thing: Dance Theater of Harlem defines opportunity.
Ms. Parker – an intense young woman who speaks pointedly but also laughs heartily- has grown the most within the company. Originally from Delaware, she entered as a member of the second company, moved up to apprentice, and was in the corps de ballet when the closure was announced. During the tour, Mr. Mitchell picked her to dance several lead roles in Balanchine ballets, including “Agon,” “Serenade,” and “Concerto Barrocco.” She was hoping for a promotion to soloist this year.
“I know I wouldn’t have had those opportunities at another company,” she said. “I have to not take those opportunities for granted.”
For her, the tour was about learning new roles and building the stamina for the rigorous demands of Balanchine works. But had she known she was to be jobless soon, she might have behaved differently in London: “I definitely shopped till I dropped. I didn’t come home with any money!”
While her time with the company has been formative, she’s looking to head off to another company as soon as possible. Her best shot is a slot at Pacific Northwest Ballet – a pick on the basis of technique and repertory but also politics. Ms. Parker is eager to see companies increase the number of female dancers of color (her preferred phrase).
She’s also firm on the fact that she doesn’t want to have to deal with the ups and downs of a financially unstable company. For her, the financial meetings and explanations just produced stress: “As a dancer, why do I need to know all that? I don’t want to know. I’m here to dance.”
For the quieter Ms. Morrissey, the information shared by the company was welcome. “I wanted to know the reason why,” she countered gently. “Some dancers do want to know.” Ms. Morrissey is a wispy dancer with doe eyes and a soft voice who came to the company about four years ago.
“I came from a bigger company, the National Ballet of Canada,” she said, adding that when she came to New York, the much smaller size of the company allowed her to grow artistically by taking on new parts. “I got a lot more opportunity to do leading roles. Arthur Mitchell was willing to use me.”
Of the three dancers, Ms. Morrissey is the most optimistic. “I am hoping we can go back sooner,” she said. So instead of packing her bags and looking elsewhere, she’s working on getting herself cast in a few performances of “The Nutcracker” and working with various small companies.
The goal is to work as much as possible, but to be available if Mr. Mitchell calls the group back together. And when she saw the writing on the wall, she started socking away her paychecks: “I’m very good at saving money.” (Ms. Parker was duly impressed.)
If Ms. Morrissey is optimistic, her pas de deux partner, Mr. Thielen, is positively buoyant – and gorgeous enough to give Usher a run for his money. He was the first Hispanic man to be a principal dancer with the company. He’s enormously proud of that, and, in a way, he’s in love with the idea of this company.
“I had an image of a ballet company. I go to my job, and I dance,” he said. “This was more than a job.”
Mr. Thielen, who started dancing late (at 16), is especially proud of the lectures and demonstrations the company does regularly for children in Harlem. “It’s their first exposure to the theater,” he said. “It’s a big part of the dream that Mr. Mitchell made happen.”
In his relentlessly positive way, he’s eager to talk about the work he and his colleagues are doing with Sensedance (at the Joyce SoHo beginning October 13). Mr. Rubsam’s choreography is in a contemporary style, but he wanted dancers who could cross over from ballet to modern.
For Mr. Thielen, that’s a silver lining. “It allows us to explore. [Ballet dancers] can be a little more symmetrical and mechanical,” he said. “I was very honored.” He has already booked roles in two Nutcrackers this winter, which came as no surprise to the ladies.
The ranks of male ballet dancers are these days vibrantly diverse; the female ranks are still pretty much lily-white. That makes the situation even more difficult for Ms. Parker and Ms. Morrissey. “To put all of us out there at the same time, it’s a lot of competition,” said Ms. Parker. Competing fiercely against former company members is doubly hard with these dancers. “Mr. Mitchell makes it a focus that this company is a family,” said Ms. Parker.
To let that family go would be a terrible shame.
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On the dance and fashion front, Diane von Furstenberg has designed the costumes for two works by contemporary choreographer Johannes Wieland, to be presented in the fashion designer’s studios from October 7 to 10.
In “Parietal Region,” Mr. Wieland says he extrapolated from the concepts of memory and forgetting. Erdem Moralioglu, who is on the design team at DVF, created jersey turtlenecks that are “very Bauhaus” for the dance, which make the dancers look like they are on the subway, rather than on a stage.
Mr. Wieland’s “Corrosion,” however, was built on a theme New York women know well: “We’re always trying to get into relationships. And sometimes we’re happier without a partner.” For the costumes, the designers kept up the couples theme by dip-dying colors, causing them to bleed into one another.
Though the dance and fashion connection is sexy, Mr. Wieland knows he’s treading a fine line: “You have to be careful that it doesn’t become a fashion show.” Well said.