Word: ashton
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Rome's ruling on the Mansour case might raise a question for the president of the U.S. hierarchy, Archbishop John Roach of St. Paul-Minneapolis. In February he gave approval "at this time" for Sister Mary Madonna Ashton to become Minnesota's health commissioner...
Although she has nothing to do with abortions, Ashton does run a program on birth control, a practice that also violates Roman Catholic doctrine. But the ultimate issue in the Michigan case was simple obedience to the hierarchy, and Roach has not demanded that Ashton denounce public funding of birth control...
Sibley, 44, and Dowell, 40, have not danced together regularly since 1976, when Sibley retired after a knee operation. The couple that first breathed life into the Ashton classic The Dream (1964) and danced together in 18 other ballets won renown as one of the most poignant and refined in dance history: a sleek, sensuous welding of two bodies into a single winged entity. In 1980, at Ashton's urging, Sibley made her comeback at a charity gala in London: "Get up there and dance," commanded Sir Frederick...
Varii Capricci finds both soloists in splendid form, but paradoxically playing against type; Ashton seems to have in mind a parody not only of his own romantic aesthetic but also of the origin of the fabled partnership as well. Here is the regal Sibley, the gossamer Titania of The Dream, reduced to a semislattern with one thing on her mind. Here is the princely Dowell, once her dashing Oberon, as an even more unsatisfying lover, a sexually indeterminate gigolo with Saturday-night fever. At the end of the first, teasingly erotic pas de deux, Dowell effortlessly lifts Sibley aloft...
...Ashton's Capricci is a lighthearted, winking jape, it is also a winning tribute to a major figure in British music. Just before his death at his villa on the Italian island of Ischia (the inspiration for Hockney's set), Walton had put the finishing touches to his score. The music is carefully crafted and sparklingly orchestrated with sprinkles of harp, celesta and xylophone-qualities that are reflected in Sir Frederick's deft choreography. Like his great colleague George Balanchine, Ashton has an unerring ability to match movement with sound in a way that slights neither, creating...