A mix of clouds and sun. High 66F. Winds light and variable..
Mostly cloudy. Low near 50F. Winds light and variable.
Updated: December 27, 2023 @ 2:10 pm
The Hollywood Ballet’s Corps de Ballet takes the stage.
The Hollywood Ballet’s Corps de Ballet takes the stage.
Los Angeles’ newest dance company invites the public to join them at the Orpheum Theatre to celebrate the dawning of a new year.
At 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Dec. 28, the Hollywood Ballet will present an all-new show, “Hollywood Holidays,” set on New Year’s Eve and journeying through a dreamscape set to music from such Golden Age giants as Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald.
The company, co-founded by international principal ballerina Petra Conti, performs fusions of ballet, modern and contemporary dance to live music. “Hollywood Holidays” is their second full production, following “The Nutcracker,” which ran on Dec. 1 and Dec. 2 of this year.
Conti said Hollywood Ballet’s vision is to grow into a large company that consistently performs the greatest classics to live music. They also plan to launch what Conti calls a new genre that is perfect for LA — ballets based on Hollywood movies.
“We thought, why don’t we unite what’s the most important thing in Los Angeles, the Hollywood movie industry, and translate all the greatest movie titles and make them into ballet?” Conti said. “That’s why we’re called Hollywood Ballet in the first place. … There’s a lot of people who don’t want to go see a ballet because they think it’s an old style, all old stories of fairy tales, but what if the title of the ballet is a title that they know and love because they’ve seen it on the TV or the big screen?”
“Hollywood Holidays” isn’t based on a movie, but it does use classic Hollywood music to explore the emotions and feelings that people have during the holidays. Conti points out that as the last day of the year approaches, people tend to experience a myriad of emotions from nostalgia to frustration that the year did not go as planned.
The ballet performs some of those activities and moments that people experience at the end of the year, whether they’re making New Year’s resolutions, spending it alone or experiencing stress because of dysfunctional family behaviors.
“We’re just trying to tackle all different aspects and emotions that people go through during a holiday season and that is going to be very interesting,” Conti said. “We have the greatest recordings of the greatest music of all time, and we have live musicians that will accompany certain moments for our dancers.”
Conti said she’s obsessed with the show’s playlist that includes such tunes as “Stand by Me,” “Unchained Melody,” “Sing, Sing, Sing,” “Mr. Mambo,” “Winter Wonderland” and “Feeling Good,” performed by such artists as Sinatra, Nina Simone, Benny Goodman, Ella Fitzgerald and Dean Martin.
They’ll also be taking many classical pieces and presenting them in new ways. The Hungarian Dance will provide the soundtrack for a dysfunctional family dinner. While some music will be recorded, others will be performed live by members of the Dream Orchestra of Los Angeles, including musicians playing piano, violin, cello and viola. There will even be moments where the musicians join the dancers on stage and interact with them.
Throughout the show, Conti said, they’ll tap into many individual emotions from deep sadness to great happiness to love.
“It’s a roller coaster of emotions and we hope for just one hour of a show that the audience falls in love with what we’re doing and takes this journey with us,” Conti said. “We hope it’s something unique and different and that people will like it.”
The show’s choreography is a collaboration between three artists — André Megerdichian, Jennifer Deckert and Tigran Sargsyan. Each choreographed individual dances and then they collaborated on the transitions and the overall storytelling for the ballet. For the dance about the dysfunctional family dinner, the three of them worked together to create the choreography.
The ballet will be performed by the 13 company members of Hollywood Ballet, a guest star, Fabrice Calmels and some of the company’s trainees. The trainees are part of the educational branch of the company, and all perform with a 100% scholarship as part of the mission to make ballet inclusive and accessible.
“We try to put them on stage as much as possible and be with the company as much as possible to enjoy and give them the opportunity to work with professional dancers and great choreographers,” Conti said.
Conti added that the entire company has been working hard to create a work that will get people excited about their young company.
“I just hope they come and stick for an hour with us and see how crazy, how different and hopefully how magical that show is,” Conti said. “Come with an open heart and see for yourself what we’re trying to accomplish.”
One of the things that she said she and her husband, Eris Nezha, the co-founder and vice-artistic director, want to accomplish is to offer work opportunities with a fair pay and healthy environment so that top-level dancers can live in LA and not have to leave to find work.
All the dancers in “Hollywood Holidays,” even the guest artist, are local artists who call LA home.
“It’s incredible the potential that this city has,” Conti said. “We just need to feature all of that and help those artists grow and become superstars.”
In the upcoming year, Hollywood Ballet has plans to expand on its mission of inclusivity and of reaching out to communities that have traditionally been excluded from ballet. They’ll perform on Skid Row on Sunday, Feb. 25. They have plans to perform in hospitals where people are being treated for cancer and to go into prisons.
“We are (reaching out to) different communities of people that need to have hope, to be elevated and to be inspired,” Conti said. “We want to really impact on a deeper level.”
“Hollywood Holidays”
WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 28
WHERE: The Orpheum Theatre, 842 S. Broadway, Los Angeles
COST: Tickets start at $45
INFO: www.ticketmaster.com
Never miss an issue. Sign up for free today.
Your browser is out of date and potentially vulnerable to security risks.
We recommend switching to one of the following browsers: