Fancy Free

In which our heroine adores Jerome Robbins.

When I first moved to New York, I began taking myself out on a lot of dates, a practice I continue. It happens in part because there are some interests I don’t share with anyone I know, in part because sometimes I forget to invite people who might also be interested, in part because, well, I just really enjoy being alone sometimes.

One of these evenings arose recently, where I journeyed to the National Arts Club for “Jerome Robbins: American Dance Master.” I have found myself at the National Arts Club many times over the years because they have wonderful programming for a whopping FREE-99, as the kids say. Yes, it’s true, world-class artists, writers, dancers, and more take to their public spaces for all manner of presentations, and all you have to do is RSVP on their corresponding Eventbrite links. The club itself is something to behold in all of its landmarked glory, dark wood interiors hearkening back to the early 20th century, red carpets, portraits of notable cultural figures, marbled foyer.

I’ve long had a penchant for lectures and similar informative presentations, and I’ve found myself at the National Arts Club for many of them. Tonight’s Jerome Robbins event featured legendary New York City Ballet dancers Robert La Fosse, Jean-Pierre Frohlich, Heléne Alexopoulos, and Sterling Hyltin, in addition to Linda Murray, curator at the New York Public Library’s Jerome Robbins Dance Division, and Diana Byer, New York Theatre Ballet’s founder and artistic director. There would be a selection performed from Robbins’s ballet “Fancy Free,” followed by a panel discussion.

I knew only a little about “Fancy Free” before the evening began, but in its own way it is a love letter to New York City, as I’d learn a lot of Robbins’ work was. “Fancy Free,” the story of three sailors getting into mischief while on leave in New York, was first performed in 1944 and became one of the first solid American footprints in the world of ballet choreography, one that really only had European influences before that. As City Ballet shares, it was also a collaboration with a fresh-faced composer named Leonard Bernstein. It was Robbins’ first ballet, inspired by his time as a dancer performing aged European classics. He found there was nothing in them he could relate to in a modern context, so he created his own.

With “Fancy Free,” Robbins, a first generation American born to Jewish immigrants, was able to proffer a genuinely celebratory spirit of uplift and pride. The ballet became his own version of what it meant to be a New Yorker and an American during World War II when Americans needed it most. It wasn’t about casting darkness on others, but creating light.

When “Fancy Free” first played in New York, performed by the company now known as the American Ballet Theatre, it received 24 curtain calls and became an instant classic. American ballet had made a name for itself the same night Robbins made a name for himself as a choreographer. You can watch a 1986 presentation of the ballet in full on YouTube here. It later became the inspiration for the wildly successful Broadway musical Robbins also choreographed and a subsequent 1949 film On the Town (though Gene Kelly did the choreography in the film version).

That night at the National Arts Club, a dancer from the New York City Ballet performed one of the solos in full sailor regalia. It’s funny and sprightly; I learn later, too, that the word “vaudevillian” is occasionally used to describe it. I’m trying to remember the last time I laughed appreciatively with ballet, if I ever had. I also marvel at the mere possibility of walking into such an elegant venue, seeing a world class dance artist perform, and listening to stories about Jerome Robbins from people who danced for him, all for free. On the days when New York is the most challenging, it’s the opportunities like this that keep me going. The panelists spin yarns about “Jerry” as they called him, and I am entranced. I almost see him in the studio with them.

One idea that comes up regularly, and in the program for the event, was how much Robbins loved and was inspired by New York. His own biography runs the gamut of the city, from the Lower East Side to the Upper East Side to Broadway to what became Lincoln Center. It’s not just in “Fancy Free” and On the Town, I learn, but in his later works like “Glass Pieces” for the New York City Ballet, which opens with dancers walking as if they’re in Grand Central Station. The pace of the city, the inspiration that lurked on every literal street corner or subway station, was in his work.

I become entranced by his story. Endlessly creative, intellectual, hardworking, challenging, and original, he was what it meant to be an artist, to create because what else would you even do? I loved learning about his legacy.

When the event is over, it’s raining and a little too cold for the lighter jacket I’m wearing. Still, I’m seeking sushi, and I find a spot on Irving Place on GoogleMaps to escape the chill and satisfy my craving. I almost miss it. Nestled amongst the 19th century brick townhouses, there’s a trio of windows encased in white wood, and stairs in front of it curving downward into a basement restaurant called Yama.

There are people at many of the tables, but luckily there’s a spot for me at the sushi bar, as if it had been waiting for me. I sit down to read the Robbins program–it’s dotted with language about New York as his muse, which is always one of my favorite experiences to read about. But there isn’t time–the waiter shows up quickly, and shortly after so does the food.

I spoil myself with a chirashi, which I have been ordering since David and I went to go see Taylor Mac up at Bard College’s Spiegeltent over a decade ago, and only order once in a blue moon these days. There are thick, cold, bright layers of fish accented with red dots of masago, and I fold each of them into the rice and dunk it into the soy sauce. I love that in New York a respite from the rain can be a quiet, unpretentious underground sushi bar, a place not about show, but tell. Here is the food, it is excellent, now please go home. And I do, trotting myself through the now drizzle. There’s a chill still in the air and I tuck my jacket around me. Even in the rain it feels like freedom.

Later, when I get home, I am still in full Robbins mode, learning about the life he chronicled in his papers, now in the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts collection; there was a centennial exhibition for him there in 2019. In the program, there’s a quote from Robbins’s journal:

“My city lies between two rivers–on a small island. My beautiful city is set on rock between two flowing paths of water that run to the sea. My city is tall and jagged–with gold + slated towers. My city is honeycombed with worm tunnels of roads. My city is cut + recut + slashed by hard car filled streets. My city chokes on its breath, and sparkles with its false lights–and sleeps restlessly at night.”

I am entranced, and I must know more of him, this person who lived so fervently for New York, for the art it made without trying and the art he made by trying so hard it sometimes nearly broke him. Luckily the program recommends “Something to Dance About,” the American Masters documentary about Robbins, and I remember yet again why I love PBS. I spend the next few days watching “Fancy Free” and the documentary, living in his moments. I love doing this so much I am able to live more fully in my own.