Memories of Juliet

As Ballet Manila prepares to stage a new version of Romeo and Juliet on February 18 and 19 at Aliw Theater with Martin Lawrance’s contemporary retelling, we take a trip down memory lane.

From the Ballet Manila Archives, we present a virtual scrapbook featuring the thoughts of prima ballerina Lisa Macuja-Elizalde on the iconic role of Juliet and photographs of the times she danced as Shakespeare’s famous heroine.

Dancing Juliet

Excerpts from the column On Pointes published on January 21, 1994

By Lisa Macuja

There are roles in the classical ballerina’s repertoire that sometimes become tiresome to rehearse. These are usually roles that require minimal portrayal and characterization and maximum choreographic mastery of steps.

Roles that I love to rehearse again and again, and of course, perform more often are those that involve not just a lot of technical steps, but acting analysis as well. Juliet is one prime example.

In a span of two hours, she transforms from an awkward teenage girl/ child to a woman capable of such intense love and passion whose entire world has become Romeo. To fully realize this transformation, not only do you change facial expressions (for the audience way up in the balcony won’t see them no matter how twisted your face becomes). What you change are body movements that most of the time are individually unnoticeable.

Take for example the way Juliet would run or walk. The way she would set and behave at her first Capulet ball. The warm trusting way she holds her hand out to reach for Romeo in the balcony scene as opposed to the almost twisted painted way she bids him farewell as he jumps off that same balcony from her bedroom in the beginning of Act 3. Have you ever stopped to think and count the very many ways that you can hold hands with someone? When you’re dancing Romeo and Juliet, you do. There’s tender and sweet, hesitant and shy. A hand hold can become intensely sexual and impassioned to desperate and brutal with simple twists of angles and fingers. Fascinating.

After some dealings with action, the analysis of feelings becomes easier, transitions smoother. What does one feel before and after taking a drug that simulates death? What does one feel when you wake up in a tomb? What does one feel when you grasp a dagger in front of your breast with the intent of making one quick thrust into your flesh? I really don’t know for sure. I’ve never tried it. Have you?

Whether other artists will agree with me or not, this particular performing artist always feels she’ll get it exactly right in the next performance. And then the next one come along… and the next, and the next…

1988. “My first Juliet was choreographed by Malcholm Burns and performed with The Royal New Zealand Ballet during a grueling performance tour of Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch, Dunedin and Invercargill. My first Romeo was the towering Ou Lu, principal danseur of Beijing’s Central Ballet of China. I was so young and inexperienced.”

1994. “My second Juliet was in the version of Atlanta Ballet’s Tom Pazik which was choreographed on prima ballerina Maniya Barredo. My Romeo was already Osias Barroso and we were dancing with Philippine Ballet Theater. I had grown up quite a bit since New Zealand so I was more satisfied with my portrayal. The Pazik choreography was also a lot more athletic and needed a more solid technique. The spinning was particularly difficult to do with my long ringlet hair flailing all over the place!” Philippine Ballet Theater publicity photo

1996. “By the time I reached my third version of Juliet, there was no need to over-analyze every step. I could relax and just go with the flow. This was the Philippine premiere of Romeo and Juliet with music by Peter Tchaikovsky and choreography by Sergey Vikulov, performed in a show marking Ballet Manila’s first year, An Anniversary of Russian-Filipino Rarities. A choreographic miniature, it premiered in 1983 in St. Petersburg Academic Ballet Theater and retells the story of Shakespeare’s star-crossed lovers using the tragedy’s five central characters. The choreographer develops the concept of Tchaikovsky’s music to celebrate the victory of love, rather than death. With Osias Barroso as Romeo, Andrei Katuntsev as Tybalt and Jeffrey Espejo as Mercutio.” Photo by Ocs Alvarez

2001. “My husband Fred J. Elizalde presented me with an 850-seat performance venue, the Star Theater. Right after the priest blessed the sparkling new stage, we mounted our very first performance there: Sergey Vikulov’s three-act Romeo and Juliet (with Osias Barroso as Romeo), choreographed to the music of Prokofiev. Ballet Manila had just unveiled its world premiere at the Cultural Center of the Philippines Main Theater a month before, but somehow, an immortal romance seemed to be a fitting christening for Star Theater because it truly was a ‘gift of love.’” Photo by Ocs Alvarez

2004. “Dancing with Osias Barroso to Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture as played by the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra in An Evening of Tchaikovsky at the Cultural Center of the Philippines. Ballet Manila’s performance with the PPO is made extra special for me because the guest conductor Sasha (Alexander Vikulov) is a long-time friend and buddy from when I was still a student in the Russian Ballet Academy. He is the son of my teacher and second mother Tatiana Udalenkova. The Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture was choreographed by Sergey Vikulov, his father and People’s Artist of Russia. It is like a family event!” Photo by Ocs Alvarez

2011. “Romeo & Juliet as part of my Swan Song Series. Rudy De Dios was just a toddler when I first came back from Russia in 1986. He is a very capable young danseur but during rehearsals, I had to coax him to be the man and pull me more assertively towards him. I think he’s still a bit scared and I don’t blame him. Not only does he have to dance with his artistic director, he also has to do some torrid love scenes with her extremely possessive hubby – the theater owner – breathing down his back!” Photo by Ocs Alvarez

2014. “Lisa Macuja: Gold. As this will be the last time I will be headlining a full, classical concert, I wanted the show to be extra special and kept it in the direction of presenting the purity of the classics. (Among the numbers in the repertoire), I chose Romeo and Juliet (with Rudy De Dios as Romeo) because Juliet is a favorite role. Now that we are preparing for our 20th anniversary celebration, I thought it would be a fitting piece to include in the concert as I remember dancing this same piece in the first year of BM.” Photo by Ocs Alvarez

Excerpts from A Ballerina’s Notes

Swan Song Series 2011: Romeo & Juliet

By Lisa Macuja-Elizalde

Twenty-three years have passed after my first Juliet. Has it really been that long? At this point in my career, the challenge is now trying to look like a 13-year-old innocent girl who is manipulated into a marriage to a man she does not love… who falls in love so swiftly and heavily that she is willing to forsake all sense of duty and love of family in order to be with her beloved. And to be convincing enough in character that – when she finally plunges that knife into her heart at the end of the ballet – the audience knows that she was a victim who had grown brave enough to decide her own fate.

I just love exploring the many facets of Juliet: From how she reacts to Romeo’s first touch and their first kiss, to how she pulls open the bottle of potion and drinks the drug that puts her into a deep sleep. And I love dying on stage. I have practiced “dying” so many times and experimented with so many of Life’s last lingering looks. Up to now though, I still can’t decide what happens in correct chronology – is it the closing of the eyes, the last gasp of breath, or is it the slump and relaxing of the hand that grips Romeo in a final embrace?

Juliet, in the three-act ballet Romeo and Juliet, will always remain one of my favorite ballerina roles ever. The only reason I had included it into my Swan Song Series this early on is because I know that even with all the latest anti-aging creams at my disposal, I just do not look like a teenage virgin on stage anymore. Parting is such sweet sorrow… but it’s time to let her go.