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Ballet Stars

Windy City Wonder: The Joffrey Ballet's Prodigious Amanda Assucena

Photo by Nathan Sayers for Pointe.

This is Pointe's August/September 2017 Cover Story. You can subscribe to the magazine here, or click here to purchase this issue.

With her sunny spirit and unaffected charm, Joffrey Ballet dancer Amanda Assucena is often cast as innocent characters like Marie or the Sugar Plum Fairy from The Nutcracker. But in Yuri Possokhov's The Miraculous Mandarin, a tabloid-like tale of corruption and cruelty, she played a chillingly manipulative seductress who lures men into the clutches of three street thugs. Dressed in leather shorts, a bra and corset, she was largely without mercy. And from the moment she emerged from the glass box that was her prison-like home—moving with angular, acrobatic choreography that seemed to turn her legs into daggers—it was clear she had nailed this enigmatic siren, even suggesting a hint of vulnerability and loneliness.

The 40-minute marathon of a work not only served as a showcase for Assucena's superb technique, but also revealed her impressive dramatic skills. "Amanda has a natural instinct for music and theater, and a dramatic sense that can convey any story," says Joffrey's artistic director Ashley Wheater. "She has shown herself to be remarkably mature as a person and an artist, and she's fearless in taking on demanding roles and technical challenges."

Add to this the fact that Assucena has a beautifully proportioned body and an innate musicality and it's easy to understand why the 23-year-old has enjoyed such a rapid-fire rise at the Joffrey.

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Christopher Wheeldon’s Windy City Nutcracker

From left: Ashley Wheater, Anastacia Holden, Christopher Wheeldon and Joan Sebastián Zamora rehearse The Nutcracker. Photo by Todd Rosenberg, courtesy Joffrey Ballet.

It's a truth universally acknowledged that any ballet company worth its sugar plums must have a production of Nutcracker as part of its holiday season repertoire. And for nearly three decades, through its final performance at Chicago's Auditorium Theatre in December 2015, the Joffrey Ballet was well served by its uniquely Victorian-American setting of the classic. It was choreographed by founding artistic director Robert Joffrey shortly before his death, and featured major contributions from Gerald Arpino.

Now the Joffrey is about to get a brand-new $4 million version of the ballet, choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon. He has assembled a stellar team of collaborators, including set and costume designer Julian Crouch, author and illustrator Brian Selznick, puppeteer Basil Twist, lighting designer Natasha Katz and projection designer Benjamin Pearcy. And while the production will retain the Tchaikovsky score, and many of the ballet's classic elements, the story will be reimagined with a distinctly Chicago backdrop.

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Christopher Wheeldon's Windy City Nutcracker

From left: Ashley Wheater, Anastacia Holden, Christopher Wheeldon and Joan Sebastián Zamora rehearse The Nutcracker (photo by Todd Rosenberg, courtesy Joffrey Ballet)

It's a truth universally acknowledged that any ballet company worth its sugar plums must have a production of Nutcracker as part of its holiday season repertoire. And for nearly three decades, through its final performance at Chicago's Auditorium Theatre in December 2015, the Joffrey Ballet was well served by its uniquely Victorian-American setting of the classic. It was choreographed by founding artistic director Robert Joffrey shortly before his death, and featured major contributions from Gerald Arpino.

Now the Joffrey is about to get a brand-new $4 million version of the ballet, choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon. He has assembled a stellar team of collaborators, including set and costume designer Julian Crouch, author and illustrator Brian Selznick, puppeteer Basil Twist, lighting designer Natasha Katz and projection designer Benjamin Pearcy. And while the production will retain the Tchaikovsky score, and many of the ballet's classic elements, the story will be reimagined with a distinctly Chicago backdrop.

Keep reading... Show less
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A Choreographer’s Vision: Christopher Wheeldon On The Inspiration Behind His Unconventional "Swan Lake"

From left: Elizabeth Hansen, Alexis Polito and Cara Marie Gary bring Degas' paintings to life. Photo by Cheryl Mann, Courtesy Joffrey Ballet.

What was the appeal of creating your own version of Swan Lake?
I grew up loving The Royal Ballet's staging of it by Anthony Dowell, and then I danced Balanchine's version with the New York City Ballet, with a “white act" I particularly admired. I wanted to remain faithful to the original, but I never felt obliged to be slavishly faithful. So I created the framing device inspired by Degas' paintings, and, in the third act gala scene (which replaces the usual court festivities), I thought about the raunchier work of Toulouse-Lautrec. I even put my own twist on the pas de deux. I just wanted the whole thing to feel less regimented.

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From Studio to Stage: The Joffrey Ballet Puts Its Stamp on Christopher Wheeldon's "Swan Lake"

From left: Anastacia Holden, Cara Marie Gary, Amanda Assucena and Caitlin Meighan complete a perfectly synchronized Cygnet pas de quatre. Photo by Quinn Wharton for Pointe.

The Joffrey Ballet has presented many narrative ballets during its 58-year history. But until last October, it had never waded into the waters of that quintessential test for any classical ballet company, Swan Lake.

So when artistic director Ashley Wheater decided the time was ripe to meet this challenge, he wanted something special. He felt the ideal version of the work was one he had seen a decade earlier—Christopher Wheeldon's reimagining of Swan Lake, created for the Pennsylvania Ballet in 2004.

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Work In Progress

Whenever The Joffrey Ballet needs a bravura allegro dancer, Allison Walsh, a powerful natural jumper, is at the ready. But at 25, this small, muscular, dark-eyed dancer—who joined The Joffrey as an apprentice in 2004 and was invited into the company the following year—has started to develop a new profile.

 

Ashley Wheater, The Joffrey’s artistic director, has been helping Walsh find another aspect of her talent. He told her: “You are a powerhouse, so now work on being a ballerina, and don’t always hit so hard. Be more nuanced.” While Walsh remains ever ready to soar—and has been tapped in recent seasons to perform a wide range of new works by such choreographers as Edwaard Liang, Jessica Lang and James Kudelka, as well as to dance the lead in Twyla Tharp’s demanding Waterbaby Bagatelles—she also has begun exploring the subtleties of adagio and partnering. Not surprisingly, she has jumped into the process with her usual brio. —Hedy Weiss

 

Allison Walsh: Things changed for me at The Joffrey with the arrival of Ashley Wheater as artistic director, although I already had begun doing new roles. I love Ashley’s classes and feel they’ve improved my technique. And his advice about becoming a real ballerina—his belief that I could be doing more principal roles but first I had to see myself in that way—really started to change my thinking.

 

Edwaard Liang, who asked me to learn a solo and pas de deux for his Age of Innocence last year, also had an impact. He told me I had a great adagio; I had never thought that. And working on his piece with my partner, Matthew Adamczyk, was a terrific experience, because I usually dance by myself and depend on myself. I had to give up some of that self-reliance and let the boy be in control. It irked me at first, because I like to lead, but I learned how to compromise and communicate.

We also worked recently with James Kudelka. He knew exactly what he wanted, and he likes things danced with full force, so that was natural for me. We were all dressed in long tulle skirts, so we looked classical, but he wanted us to really work our legs and feet, move quickly and take the classical line to an extreme.

 

In the company, I now keep my eye on Victoria Jaiani and Christine Rocas because adagio comes so naturally to them, and you can learn so much from other dancers. Ultimately, you really are on your own as a professional dancer. And as you get older, you become more responsible for your own progress.



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