Manhattan, Wry and Sweet

George Balanchine's 115th ballet is an evocative tribute to a corner of his own past. Who Cares?, which was given its world premiere by the New York City Ballet last week, is a nostalgic, gently ironic reminder that "Mr. B." spent a few lean years in the '30s as a creator of dance for stage musicals. In Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, which he designed for the 1936 Rodgers and Hart hit, On Your Toes, Balanchine brought a touch of ballet to Broadway. Who Cares? brings back a little bit of old Broadway to ballet.

It is set to 17 lilting show tunes by Balanchine's longtime friend, George Gershwin. The backdrop is a softly focused photo of the Manhattan skyline, suggesting the unreal city of cities in countless half-remembered Astaire musicals. The casual costumes look as if they might have dressed the working chorus in a hundred would-be Show Boats that never made it down the Hudson. Only the opening and closing numbers, Strike Up the Band and / Got Rhythm, have so far been orchestrated for a brassy pit band. The rest of the evening the dancers were accompanied by Pianist Gordon Boelzner, plunking away in imitation of Gershwin's strutting, rag-timey style. (In one number, Clap Yo' Hands, the dancers prance across the stage to the sound of Gershwin's own piano playing, recorded in 1926 and raspily reproduced on tape.) The solo piano is pure serendipity--suggesting the feverish, will-the-show-go-on mood of a storybook Great White Way that never was.

In other hands, Who Cares? could have been nothing but return to camp. Balanchine has too much pride in his own past and too much love for the American stage for that. In structure, the solos, pas de deux and dances for the corps are almost chastely classical; yet Broadway keeps breaking in. After a serene, supple lift, two dancers will suddenly embrace in a highly stylized foxtrot. A sequence of pirouettes will lead into a flashy split or a sensual side step. The incongruities somehow blend into a consistent display of Balanchine's mastery of forms. Who Cares?, in fact, is practically an anthology in action of his knowledge of dance. Male Lead Jacques D'Amboise has separate pas de deux with three different ballerinas (Marnee Morris, Patricia McBride, Karin von Aroldingen). The mood of each dance is bittersweet romantic; yet they are wholly different in shape, tempo and feeling. And Balanchine's leaping, exactingly athletic solo for D'Amboise, in Liza, should forever dispel the snide rumor that he does not choreograph well for male dancers.

Just before the premiere, Mayor John Lindsay presented Balanchine with the city's Handel Medallion in recognition of his cultural contributions to New York. "If we could bottle the New York City Ballet," said Lindsay, "it would be the city's finest export." Then Who Cares? returned the compliment by offering a splendid sampling: Manhattan, oldfashioned, wry and sweet.

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