Word: twyla
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Splat Falls. Push Comes to Shove is the name of the ballet; its inventor is Choreographer Twyla Tharp. Last week it was unveiled by the American Ballet Theater at Manhattan's Uris Theater, and it just might be the most important event of the dance year. With cinematic speed, the cast of characters tumbles around the stage to the sounds of Haydn's 82nd Symphony. Isn't that Buster Keaton? There's Joe Namath and a courtful of jokers, heroes and heroines all. Linked by sheer velocity, the steps merge in combinations that are silly...
...Twyla Tharp has been seriously watching movies starting from the tune that she worked as a carhop in drive-in theaters owned by her parents. A native of Indiana, she was named after a Midwestern pig-calling contestant known as Twila. "My mother thought Twyla would look good on a theater marquee," explains Tharp. Her ambitious mother also laid out a marathon course of piano, violin, viola, drum, baton-twirling, ballet and tap-dancing lessons that occupied Tharp's childhood. It all paid...
...enjoy us." In 1970 a man was added to the troupe, which was gaining a reputation in the avant-garde of dance. Impatient with foundation questionnaires, Tharp's replies were typically blunt: "I'm sorry, I write dances, not application forms. Send me the money. Love, Twyla...
These days Twyla is very well supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts and private contributors. She plans to continue exploring the boundaries of dance. "In every good work of art there is a huge story, whether it is a Matisse cutout at the end of his life or a portrait at the beginning. The story has to do with guts and vitality." In a way, of course, that defines Tharp's art as well as her life...
...roles drawn from outside the classical repertory. Les Patineurs is one of these, as is Le Jeune Homme et la Mort, which he flew to Paris to learn from Choreographer Petit. In the summer he will add Shadowplay, which Antony Tudor is reworking especially for him. Such innovators as Twyla Tharp and Alvin Ailey are also working on new ballets for him. John Neumeier, director of the Hamburg Opera Ballet, will stage Hamlet for him-probably next winter...