Chester Theatre Company Artistic Director to Helm American Ballet Theatre's 75th Anniversary Gala

Chester Theatre Company Artistic Director Byam Stevens has been engaged by American Ballet Theatre to conceive, direct and produce, in partnership with ABT Artistic Director Kevin McKenzie, the company's 75th Anniversary Gala celebration. The Gala will take place at the Metropolitan Opera House on Monday, May 18.

Stevens has enjoyed a long term relationship with ABT, where he helmed a previous Gala honoring British Choreographer Kenneth MacMillan, taught acting workshops for the ABT Studio Company and the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School (official school of ABT), and even choreographed fight sequences for the ABT II production of Romeo and Juliet. For the past decade, he has served as an Acting Coach and mentor to ABT dancers under the auspices of an Annenberg foundation grant. He continues to coach past Annenberg recipients including Misty Copeland and current Principal Dancer Isabella Boylston.

Part of the project entailed writing speeches about ABT's history for Ambassador Caroline Kennedy, Joel Grey, Sigourney Weaver, Kevin McKenzie and past ABT ballerinas Susan Jaffe and Ruth Ann Koesun. The speeches will be accompanied by video sequences produced by Stevens featuring archival stills and footage going back to the company's founding in 1940.

Stevens says: "This is a great honor, one that comes along once every 25 years. I'm thrilled that ABT entrusted me with this event and it has been a treat to work with Kevin again, having done the MacMillan Gala together some years ago. We've collaborated on everything from the concept to the casting. It's also thoroughly stimulating to delve into the archives and come to know the history of one of the world's great ballet companies."

Stevens designed the event to unfold in three sections, each focusing on a word in the company's name. "We're not doing them in order," says Stevens, "though we start with American, presenting excerpts from ballets by American choreographers on American themes." The second part focuses on Theatre. "The founders didn't call it American Ballet Company for a reason - Theatre would be at the heart of their artistic vision, so the second section features excerpts from the dramatic repertoire." The third section - Ballet - celebrates the artistic range that ABT dancers must master and their extraordinary virtuosity.

Research took Stevens to the Library of Congress in Washington, the New York Public Library's Dance Collection at Lincoln Center and even the archives put together by Ric Burns for his American Masters documentary celebrating 75 years of ABT, airing on PBS Friday, May 15.

Among the twenty-two excerpted ballets to be presented are works by Agnes DeMille, Jerome Robins, Twyla Tharp, George Balanchine, Antony Tudor, Paul Taylor, Natalia Makarova, Jiri Kylian, and current ABT Resident Choreographer Alexei Ratmansky.

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