Emails between Lynn Seymour and Alastair Macaulay, 2013-2022

Mar 20

For the ten years 2013-2022, it was my privilege to correspond with Lynn Seymour, whom I had watched onstage between 1975 and 1998, and whom I came to know offstage in 1999. When I was living and working on New York in 2007-2019, I often mentioned - in print or in conversation - my memories of her dancing, about which I began to ask her in these emails.

I print here the sixty-seven emails I can find between us. There were a few others, now mysteriously lost. I have included everything apart from a very few references to living people that might cause unnecessary hurt. Most of the text is by myself rather than Seymour, but I include it because I was researching both Seymour’s performance history and related issues. AM.>

5 April 2013

Dear Alistair,

Jon passed your note on to me*. Of course I'll be happy to answer any questions.

The S.B. act 3 in Margot's film was shot in a studio with the costumes from Ninette's production, but I have no idea where the set came from. Rudolf and I actually danced S.B. at Covent Garden the nights before and after the filming so the sets could not have been from that production.

Very best regards to you and David <Vaughan>,

Lynn

6 April 2013

Dear Lynn,

Thank you so much. I think you've answered my main question. I'd always vaguely assumed that "Magic of Dance" performance of the pas de deux was filmed at Covent Garden because of the costumes, and because it resembled the performances I saw you give then - but recently I realized the decor was different.

David, Robert, and I will be presenting an evening of "Sleeping Beauty" films and illustrations and discussion on April 24. Mainly we're showing one performance each of certain key sections, but when it comes to the Act III variation we're showing five ballerinas: Fonteyn (live between 1949 and '55), Sizova (1964), you, Merle Park (1978), and Kolpakova. I think it will show not just how the steps can differ but just how much individuality can be released. We're talking mainly about why "Beauty" matters so much as a work of art, but we'll also be discussing lots of textual and interpretative details; I hope we can make it add up to something of note.

Have I ever told you that your Aurora was one of the great revelations of my life? You and Nureyev danced three performances in November '77. I had watched the new de Valois "Beauty" at almost every performance, and loved getting to know the ballet: my third production but the first I'd seen more than once. And I'd enjoyed all the Auroras. When you and Nureyev danced your first performance, I loved it - but it was the second one that just amazed me. I remember how much elevation you somehow drew out of the music in the final entrance in Act One (I was in the Upper Slips, and an Italian standing behind me said to his family at that moment "E fantastica!"), and above all - it was overwhelming - I remember the amazing rippling upper-body crescendo you made of the diagonal of sixteen petit developpes in the Act Three variation. I didn't have a ticket for the third performance, and stood outside the opera house for two hours after work trying to get one - in vain: I can feel my frustration to this very day.

David is now eighty-eight: lame and slower and deafer, but very much with all his marbles. I see him often in New York. You may not have met Robert Greskovic, but your Juliet in '65 was his very first ballet performance and he was in love. He's been a critic since the early 1970s, and is now critic for the "Wall Street Journal". The three of us now spend each Christmas Day together in New York with three other friends.

I began this job at "The New York Times" six years ago, and often find myself referring back to your performances. You stopped dancing at Covent Garden (in 1978) only a few months after I became a critic, but the performances I saw you dance of well over twenty roles ("A Month in the Country" twenty times, Juliet six times - even Fairy Summer in "Cinderella" once) in 1975-78 stay with me very powerfully. Those from later too: last spring I recalled in print your amazing Tatyana in "Onegin" - amazing because I had no clue, even from Haydee, Keil, or Makarova, how powerful that role might become, and because my breathing changed while I was watching you.

I'm actually in London now. I arrived last night, and visit the US Embassy on Monday to renew my visa. Mainly I'll be outside London for the next two weeks, visiting friends and family (and the Lake District for the first time), before flying back on Sunday 21. Here's hoping the visa comes through all right....

I will write again, but needed not only to thank you for this information but to assure you that your performances from over thirtyfive years ago still matter hugely to me.

Every best wish,

Alastair

6 April 2013

Dear Alastair,

Thanks for your sweet letter of reminiscences. Your appreciation means a great deal to me as one's input is so often treated with scant regard.

You might like to know that the musicality I decided to adopt for that variation was inspired from Violette Verdy's performances in the role, some years before. She was already with NYCB and influenced by Balanchine's musical knowledge!

I wish you all the luck in the world for your "'Beauty Evening" (how can you fail with such a dream team) and your visa.

Love, Lynn

June 18, 2013

Dear Lynn,

I was just about to write to you about my memories of your dancing (and how often they have surfaced in my reviews here in New York), and I will. But I've just heard of the death of David Wall, from cancer, and am in shock. I saw you dance together in so very many ballets, and remember how extraordinary his kind of heroic naturalism was. I don't know if your paths crossed in later years, but your memories of him will surely make you feel bereft; I feel that way myself.

Love and all best wishes,

Alastair

19 June 2013

Dear Alastair,

I was at David's home when he died yesterday. He was a truly sweet man and superb dancing partner. He will be missed by many.

By the way, my email was hacked into last week and contact list stolen. I hope you didn't get any requests for money from Manila! * Would you be so kind as to inform David V. of this as I cannot now send out any warnings. I'll be changing my address soon but will keep you informed.

Many thanks and very best regards,

Lynn

*<I did. AM.>

23 June 2013

Dear Alastair,

I did have to change, even my son couldn't fix the old one!

kabukilil74@gmail.com

It's Rudolf's nickname for me!

Very best, Lynn (Seymour)

21 July 2013

Dear Lynn,

It's the quiet time of the New York dance summer, and so I'm spending time doing research in the amazing troves of the New York Public Library Dance Collection. And today I discovered and watched a documentary that contains footage of you and Christopher Gable rehearsing the bedroom and tomb scenes. Do you remember this? I'd never heard of it before. It's a fairly frail old film that you have to watch on a special machine at the library, but as far as I know it's unique (a) to find anything of Gable as Romeo (though alas, here he doesn't dance, and you're both in rehearsal mode) (b) to see anything of your tomb scene, where your physicality is really the knockout of the whole film.

I took notes, then used them to describe the film to friends. Now it occurs to me I should send this account to you, to Jann Parry, to "Dancing Times", and to others. See below

Earlier this week I watched many hours of silent film of the Sadler's Wells Ballet dancing "Lac des cygnes" in the early 1950s, filmed at about eight or more Fonteyn-Somes performances in New York and on the American tour, but also with a few clips of John Field and Nadia Nerina as Siegfried and Odette too; the footage is semi-unedited, so one watches Fonteyn doing the same phrase eight times from different angles at different performances - it's fascinating and marvelous to see how utterly beautiful and moving she was at every single performance. The film also contains Ashton's old 1952 Act One waltz pas de six with its first and second cast (always Alexander Grant, with either Rosemary Lindsay or Julia Farron, and Svetlana Beriosova occasionally visible as a side girl. Pamela May is fabulous as the Queen, Benno (usually Leslie Edwards) is in Act Two (not just the adagio but with Odette taking arabesque on his planted thigh), and there are the first two casts of Ashton's 1952 Neapolitan Dance (Alexander and Julia, or another couple I can't identify). Unfortunately, the man who filmed it all decided UNFORGIVABLY there were four parts of Act Two where he preferred Ballet Theatre's one-act version with Alicia Alonso (and once for a moment Nora Kaye) and Igor Youskevitch: so you never see Fonteyn meet Somes or their mime scene (Ballet Theatre had a bit of mime, but no narrative from Odette about her past or plight), you never see Fonteyn protecting her flock or asking Siegfried and his huntsmen not to shoot, you never see her solo, and you never see her leavetaking of Siegfried at the end. But you do see her in the great adagio, and then in the coda up to the arabesque on Benno's thigh. Later you see her in all Act Three and Act Four; she's in gleaming form throughout, thrilling.

I also found today silent but colour footage, about 14mins, of a Fonteyn-Nureyev "Giselle" Act One, with Sibley-Shaw peasant pas de deux; it's all footage of the dances, not of the acting, until the Mad Scene, which, though complete, is very blurry.

Anyway, I can't tell you how pleased I am about this "Romeo" material. See below.

I hope you're thriving. I will write more soon.

Love

Alastair

It's a 25-minute documentary "Behind the Scenes at the Royal Ballet" (alas, I've mislaid its catalogue number, but you have to watch it in a side room on a special machine), dated 1967 but almost certainly filmed in 1965 or 1966.

It's framed by footage of Ashton being driven to the opera house and smoking, and by his voice talking about the Royal; we're told, of course, he's artistic director. We see Gable, Nureyev, Seymour and Fonteyn separately at the barre; Fonteyn, on point at the barre, does a slow grand rond de jambe en dehors that's wonderful.

And we're shown three main topics:

(a) MacMillan's "Romeo" being rehearsed, with Fonteyn and Nureyev in practice costume doing the ballroom and balcony scenes and Seymour and Gable in practice costume doing the bedroom and tomb scenes; it's possible the rehearsals are conducted before the 1965 premiere but Ashton's voiceover comments imply the premiere has occurred and the production has been a smash

(b) design meetings with Georgiadis;

The main sequences go as follows:

1. Fonteyn-Nureyev rehearse an early chunk of the balcony pas de deux, lasting 1min 50 secs.

2. Then they rehearse much of the ballroom pas de deux for 1 min 24secs;.

(Ashton - after talking of the challenge of following the precedent of the Bolshoi and Ulanova and without mentioning his own Danish version - says in voiceover, "I believe tremendously in the talent of Kenneth MacMillan", praising it as very individual: "I knew that he wouldn't fail to do a great job". He does refer to "five" casts of Romeos and Juliets, which perhaps implies he's speaking before the premiere, since Annette Page ended up never dancing the opening season or dancing the role much anyway - and I think maybe there never was a fifth Romeo. The casts in the event were Fonteyn-Nureyev, Seymour-Gable, Sibley-Dowell, Park-MacLeary, and, later and briefly, Page with I forget whom.)

3. Gable-Seymour rehearse the "crypt" pas de deux, 2 mins 45 secs, from the moment he starts to pull/lift her "dead" body through to the moment he falls dead from the poison. There is no tomb, so she sits on a chair (much in the position she held on the bed!). He's in a thick-striped shirt over tights, she in a T-shirt over tights. At two moments, she steps out of character; the passage when he drags her "corpse" is omitted, and she walks across and then lies down again; and as he is about to deposit her on the "tomb", she flexes her feet and moves. But the greatest revelation of the MacMillan side of the whole documentary is the boneless look of her "dead" body; as soon as he lifts her, it's virtually as if she's been filleted or as if her body is just empty rubber.

4. There's a rather boring design meeting, I min, 40 secs, between Georgiadis and two colleagues.

5. Gable-Seymour rehearse without break the bedroom pas de deux, from soon after they've left the bed and she's got him to drop his cloak (there are no bed and no cloak and no curtain), up to the moment when she showers his face with kisses, he leaves, and she's left standing still. Two minutes or more.

6. Now a rather amusing design meeting with Georgiadis, Seymour, and others, as she wears the ballroom dress. He wants to give her a necklace; she gently but firmly protests ("I don't want anything on my neck... Oh, Nicholas, please... I know that Kenneth would be on my side...")

Ashton's voice is heard first saying that dancers have to do what they're told, but then adding that they also have to be listened to when it comes to such matters as costume.

7. Ashton rehearses "white" "Monotones" with Vyvyan Lorrayne, Anthony Dowell, Robert Mead, for 4mins 35 secs. One of the first things you see is the unison changement on the change of key.

In a voiceover, he remarks that he made it just because there was nothing to open the gala (March 1965). But then he says he wanted "some exercise in plasticity, in plastic movement... A kind of alienation" (my underlining)... something ritualized: "a ritual, for their own benefit".

In rehearsal, his comments/orders to the dancers are almost all qualitative: "follow, follow... deep plié, deep plié... Now keep off her buttocks when you turn her... Head down, head up, good... " He makes them do the big lift twice, getting the angle of her leg right the second time and makes them lower her slowly without ever changing her seated position.

Then - my favourite moment - all three arrive on the floor and bend in reverence to one another, and he says "Goldie, Goldie, eagle, Goldie!" This moment is unexplained, but I can explain it! When I interviewed him in 1984, I asked him for some reason about this very moment, and he said "Well, you see, Goldie the golden eagle had just escaped from London Zoo". And what the three are doing with their arms are the wings of the eagle. I laughed in glee because I was nine when Goldie the Golden Eagle escaped from London Zoo for almost two weeks http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldie_(eagle) in February 1965 ; we schoolboys kept looking up to the trees desperately hoping to see it. But I now think Ashton was using this to make an unspoken connection to "Apollo", which had just joined Royal repertory in 1964 and which he quotes more explicitly in the "green" pas de trois he added the next year; as you know, Apollo in his second solo bends forward from the waist, with arms, as here, that indicate the pinions of the eagle.

The "Monotones" rehearsal ends there.

8.Then 1 min 49 secs of the balcony pas de deux with Fonteyn and Nureyev; this includes an overhead lift, the bit where he kneels to kiss the hem of her robe and where they coil arms, the bit where he kneels and, holding her in his hands (she has one hand on his shoulder), sits up, sits down, and sits up again, and her solo.

At the end we see Ashton arrive at Covent Garden and enter the theatre from the front. His voiceover meanwhile is coolly saying that he thinks the Royal Ballet is the best company in the world, the most varied, the one with the largest repertoire, the most comprehensive company that exists.

The "Monotones" footage is not in itself so very remarkable; there is a complete film of both "Monotones" pas de trois during the late 1960s (Georgina Parkinson and Michael Coleman replace the original two in "green" "Monotones" beside Antoinette Sibley), and each is preceded by a different, short, film of Ashton rehearsing the dancers; that's almost my favourite dance film ever ever ever. But the two singular things here are (a) his remarks about alienation and ritualization (b) his "Goldie! Goldie, eagle" exclamation".

And the footage of Seymour and Gable in the Act Three scenes is unique. You can see Seymour dance the complete Bedroom pas de deux fourteen years later with David Wall on YouTube, and that's quite marvelous; but I know of no other footage of Gable as Romeo (too bad he doesn't dance a step in this act) and the footage of Seymour as a "corpse" are a knockout.

22 July 2013

Dear Alastair,

Thanks for the info. I have to say I have no recollection of the film you mention being made. Might it have been in NYC? the other Juliets were Annette Page* who danced with Christopher and Georgina Parkinson* who danced with Donald. The reason for not doing the drag would be that the floor was too rough and splintery. We didn't used to have lino. Originally, there was a floor cloth and we used to get absolutely flthy but splinter free. Sounds like you had fun!

love, Lynn

<*Although Annette Page was announced as one of the original five Juliets in 1965, injury kept her from the role until a later date.

Georgina Parkinson, the production’s original Rosaline, did dance Juliet, but not in the original 1965 series of performances. One rare medley, dating from perhaps 1970, shows successive sections of the Balcony scene danced by Sibley-Dowell, Park-MacLeary, Seymour-Nureyev, Parkinson-MacLeary. AM.>

On Jul 22, 2013, at 8:28 AM, Alastair Macaulay <alastair.macaulay@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Lynn,

I certainly had fun. If no copy ever emerges in Britain, let me know if EVER you return to New York and I'll get it shown to you.

But no, it's a very British film. I think the rehearsal studios are at Baron's Court, though maybe backstage at Covent Garden; they have a very British clock on the wall. I couldn't see who actually directed it, but Roy Round was involved in aspects of the photography. Yes, I wondered afterwards about splinters on the floor! Made me remember the splinters we got from the floor in boarding-school dormitories. Fonteyn writes in her memoirs about the splinters they used to get dancing Ashton's "Dante Sonata" barefoot in the War around Britain, but not minding at the time because they threw themselves into a dance that seemed to embody the passions of the period so intensely.

I plan to show this film to David Vaughan and Robert Greskovic around August 13, so will try to note then who directed it if I can't find out beforehand.

Love

Alastair

10.

Dear Lynn,

The credits for this 25min documentary that includes you and Gable rehearsing the "Romeo" bedroom and tomb scenes say:

"presented by Peter Snell and Ion Voyantzis; written, presented, and directed by Ion Voyantzis; executive producer, Peter Szell."

Do these names ring any bells?

Love

Alastair

12.

23 July 2013

Dear Alastair,

No bells, just an awful blank! It was a pretty horrible time for me both privately and workwise. I think I might have been on some form of auto-pilot.

Best,

Lynn

13.

July 25, 2013

Dear Lynn,

If so, it made you a fabulous corpse in the tomb scene! I loved you there in the six times I saw you dance Juliet in 1977-78 (with Nureyev once, Baryshnikov twice, Wall three times), but here's it's amazing to see you switch into "death" on cue.

How well do you remember the Tudor "Romeo"? They apparently have film records of most of it (and revive the bedroom pas de deux now and then) but not, I think, of the tomb scene.*

<-*Seymour danced Antony Tudor’s one-act “Romeo and Juliet” (1943), to Delius music and with designs by Eugene Berman, in 1976, as a guest with American Ballet Theatre. This proved to be the last ever revival of this “Romeo”, which Balanchine though the best ballet “Romeo”; Tudor never revived it during the remaining eleven years of his life. Ballet Theatre sold some of the Berman sets; film records of the production were incomplete. It can never therefore be revived with something close to authenticity. AM.>

I mentioned in a recent email that the "NYTimes" has asked its critics to write of moments of Damascene conversion. Here's my piece, which runs in the print edition tomorrow (Thursday), on "A Month in the Country: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/25/arts/dance/a-month-in-the-country-as-experienced-at-age-20.html?_r=0 I hope you can open it, and that it makes sense; it was a privilege to write it.

My unbounded admiration and thanks. All best,

Alastair

14.

25 July 2013

Dear Alastair,

Tudor Romeo! My favourite bits were; a scene where Juliet is being dressed for her wedding to Paris and, Mercutio's death. All the fights were without armament and his demise was signified by a shout from the orchestra! A coup de theatre in my view. It made my heart stop for a moment.

Tudor and I definitely did not hit it off. He was unbelievably rude to the 2 Romeos, Fernando Bujones and John Prinz, in a way that removed all their confidence. Because of the trompe l’oeil of the set Juliet was obliged to do the balcony scene on her knees! A year or so later I did "Pillar", an equally unhappy event. I only did one performance as the whole episode was so unpleasant.

Everyone has been sending me your "Month" arcticle. What a pity you weren't writing at the time. That kind of appreciation would have meant so much then. Still it is very nice having ones efforts of long ago burnished so dazzlingly.

Much love, Lynn

15.

25 July 2013

Dear Lynn,

For me it's a great privilege (a) to write of your dancing in retrospect (b) to converse with you now. I became a critic by accident, but it made immediate sense when I did, because I was always a memory person, trying to make sense (in letters) of last night's Aurora or last night's Odette. A performance happens in the moment and yet not only in the moment; it goes on happening in the mind afterwards. Long, long afterwards. And now I find I am Memory Queen. I feel as if I'm still coming to understand - coming to terms with - what you did as Aurora, as Odette-Odile, in "Les Sylphides", as Juliet, in "A Month in the Country", and in maybe twenty other roles. Do you know I was often one of the stage-door fans in 1977-78? My "Month" photos are all in the UK, and I long to collect them and bring them here, but I know that just about all of them are signed by you and Dowell. Two of my dearest old friends used to stand by the stage door in those days - we just needed to go on talking about what we'd seen! - and both of them wrote to me today about this "Month" piece, just because we all remember those performances so powerfully and so gratefully. They're both happily married now to Frenchmen and living in Paris; but one part of them cannot forget the dancing of those London days.

I think it was only in writing this "Month" piece that I began to understand the degree to which Natalia keeps "performing" or self-dramatizing - whether for Rakitin or Beliaev or her husband or herself. In the pas de deux, it's so much to do with that use of her wrist! She's feeling a real emotion, and yet at the same moment she's needing to act it out, to play out a role. Does that make sense to you?

I have a million questions, but here are two:-

1: I wrote of how you used your weight; and I could have written of how you used it in many, many roles. But how much were you conscious or intentional about this? I see you now in "Mayerling" standing on your flat feet gazing with death/love-ridden obsession at Rudolf through your veil and despite/with your bustle; and the flow of your weight down to the soles of your feet always wowed me. (I think I saw your every Covent Garden performance in the role.) That acting scene on flat foot with Vera in "Month", the opening solo with all those changing poses and rhythms: obviously Ashton would have worked with you on plasticity and dynamics and bending and feeling, but did you think about this use of weight then? Right through the body? And was there anyone else who resembled you in this? Or how much was it part of your deliberate unconventionality? (Perhaps where I miss it most was in Juliet's potion scene.)

2: David Vaughan, Robert Greskovic, and I are currently taping afternoons of detailed "Swan Lake" discussions for the New York Public Library Dance Collection. We're chums; we've all done masses of research into the ballet over the years; and we've been fascinated in the last week to have watched films of (Petipa-Ivanov) "Swan Lake" films with Danilova, Semionova, Ulanova, Dudinskaya, Markova, Fonteyn, Toumanova, Gollner, Plisetskaya, Kaye, Alonso, Beriosova, Makarova, Cojocaru, Nunez... (If you know of any footage of your Odette-Odile, let us know!) Did you ever dance Odette with a Benno in Act Two? And did he change the act's drama for you? I realize I still follow Odette's great adagio with Siegfried so much as a pas d'action, as such a narrative progression (rightly or wrongly), that every scintilla of how Odette may feel about Benno is of fascination to me. How much (do you think) does Odette think of Benno?

Much love

Alastair

16.

26 July 2013

Dear Alastair,

Lots of questions! firstly, film; In the early 60's, pre-Romeo, Christopher Gable and I did 3 pas des deux for Canadian TV in Toronto. I guess it was CBC. We did the balcony from Romeo (this is what inspired Kenneth to do the whole thing later. Swan Lake act 2 (no Benno) and "If love is blind" from "Images of Love". Whether or not this footage remains in their archive, I know not.

Weight; I always had tremendous difficulty with stability; standing on one leg and waving the other around was always verging on the impossible. I think it was a fundamental issue of real athletic strength, or rather, lack of it. It really ruled my life. In contrast, get me moving and I was capable of vertiginous, off balance feats and good speed and elevation. I think my struggle with this shortcoming affected everything I did and may have resulted in the quality you describe. The other thing was my fascination with the subtleties of foot use and how powerfully expressive they can be, even in repose. This came about after seeing Joan Plowright in "The Chairs": she was wearing old carpet slippers and I was riveted to them the entire performance. This was shortly before "The Invitation" , and I put this amazing lesson to work right away. All these factors lead to a heightened awareness of what you are actually doing.*

Benno did figure in all the early Swan Lakes I performed. His character really didn't affect the focus on Siegfried he was more like the little chair the Maryinsky brought on to elevate the Lilac fairy for a few moments, in their lovely attempt at recreating the original Sleeping Beauty. He was "a device".

Is any of this helpful?

Much love, Lynn

<*Plowright appeared in “The Chairs” in 1958. “The Invitation” had its premiere in November 1960. AM.>

17.

29 July 2013

July 26, 2013

Dear Lynn,

You once told me that what you did on the balcony in "Romeo" was "my Judi Dench rip-off - I was wild about that Zeffirelli production."

Years later, when I was a London theatre critic, I wrote to Judi Dench when she was playing the Countess in "All's Well That Ends Well". The letter connected her to Edith Evans (whose record of the Countess I had and knew) and Margot Fonteyn (to whom a friend always likened Judi Dench); and I told her your "Romeo" story. She wrote back, saying, among other things: "Edith Evans, Margot Fonteyn, Lynn Seymour! Three of my heroines."

I thought you should know.

Love

Alastair

18.

dear Alastair,

You remember correctly, Judi D, did a sort of swooning roll on the balustrade which I later used.

I adored working with Jerry Robbins, he was very good at describing what he was looking for, he was uncompromising and demanding, we had loads of rehearsal and detail after detail was heaped upon us, all of which I adored. He was highly critical and very hard to please but it was always justifiable and never personal. My kind of guy! Working with him will always be a highlight of my career. Although the 2 ballets we did were created on others, he made you feel like you were recreating it anew.

Love, Lynn

19.

Dear Lynn,

This is marvellous. Thank you.

I'm often tormented by the knowledge that I saw you in Edinburgh in '75 in several roles I was too inexperienced to appreciate: Giselle, Raymonda III, Terpsichore, all with Nureyev. Within a year I would know what I was seeing, but then my impression was largely generalized and largely to do with pleasure in the music. But I never saw you dance those roles* again: grrrrr.

Love

<*Actually I did see her dance Terpsichore once more, in 1976, but without absorbing enough. AM.>

20.

July 31, 2013

Dear Lynn,

Yesterday at the New York Public Library I watched that 1964 Canadian TV broadcast. It was 59 minutes with commercials; Boyd Neel presents and introduces; the other artists were Marilyn Horne (singing Handel, Rossini, and Nin) and Sviatoslav Richter (playing Brahms, something I've forgotten, and Ravel). You and Gable dance the "Images" and "Romeo" pas de deux. Alas, there's no "Swan Lake" pas de deux. I wonder if Canadian TV saved it for some later broadcast? This program seems pretty complete.

The contrast between your two MacMillan roles is very striking, and your face in close-up becomes different in each too. The "Romeo" pas de deux, dressed by Kenneth Rowell as if still in the ballroom dress, seems essentially the same as it has been in rep, though in a narrow TV studio. The staircase from the balcony curves down in a much fuller spiral than Georgiadis's. There's one short phrase (quite near the end, after your solo withe the little jumps onto point) I didn't recognize: Gable picks you up in a sort of arabesque lift, holds you in that shape and slowly carries you forward before putting you down again. Either it was something MacMillan later changed when you were on the big stage or you just rearranged it for the small TV studio. But of course I can't quite remember what normally happens there instead! Anyway, your whole impulsiveness is wonderful (contrasted with Gable, who is much more of a wide-eyed mooncalf, a dreamboat who is often content to gaze at you, while you can't quite keep still), along with the novelty of your line, which to me looks very Old Russian (like pictures of very early Vaganova ballerinas) in its plastique as well as totally beatnik. And your hair, with Renaissance ringlets, looks Botticelli meets Jane Austen/Tolstoy's Natasha meets Elizabeth Taylor, all in the right way.

The "Images" pas de deux, six minutes long, covers a wide range of mood. Again, you keep taking the initiative and changing the tone, with cruel moments. My favorite dance moment - I can't describe it adequately - is a supported grand rond de jambe phrase, late on, where you seem to keep on slowly changing shape as you turn under Gable's arm.

Amazing to see this 49 years on! I'm going to write about the NYPL's dance film wonders for the "NY Times" in late August (and for the British "Dancing Times" later this year), so I hope I get other dance people to watch these goodies too. Here's hoping life one day brings you to New York, when we can show them to you.

I write "upstate", as we say here, on my way to Tanglewood, where tonight Mark Morris presents the world premiere of his staging of Britten's one-act church parable "Curlew River" (not a dance event, I believe) and then his 1989 Purcell "Dido and Aeneas" with a new cast. Lots of New England wooden houses are flying past amid the greenery.

Then on Friday I'm off to the Rockies - an annual dance festival at Vail, Colorado - where I'll see ballet and modern and tango and Memphis jookin and more. Have you ever seen the great (and still young) Argentinian tangoist Gabriel Missé on YouTube? I think he's one of the most miraculous dancers of today, absolutely stylish (no fancy lifts or acrobatics), with sudden flashes of footwork like thunderbolts from a clear sky or top-speed cross-stitching. I think Ashton would have adored him. He used to have a sensational partnership with Natalia Hills, but now is back with his old partner Analia Centurion, who is temperamentally more like him. Usually the tango seems to me tragic or melodramatic; but he's often irresistibly witty and comic, though highly romantic - huggable, like a young Baryshnikov. Anyway, he'll be at Vail, along with the no less amazing Lil Buck (I hope you've seen him on YouTube doing his jookin version of the Saint-Saens Swan), and Paul Taylor dancers and members of New York City Ballet and American Ballet Theatre. All this in an open amphitheatre. On a good evening, there are hummingbirds above the mountain stream (this is my seventh year running there) as you approach the theatre, and then on the way back the stars of the Milky Way are far larger and more numerous than anywhere else. Here's hoping!

Much love,

Alastair

21.

1 August 2013

Darling Alastair,

If you see Mark in Tanglewood give him a squeeze for me and remind him of my undying admiration of him and his work. Your trip to Vail sounds nothing short of paradise.

Your enthusiasm for dance past and present is a wonder, For me the whole joy of dance was actually doing it . Becoming music. Being part of a creative team. Now that I no longer can really dance, my deep interest has waned to a sort of passive indifference. Certainly my past interests me not a jot. The only thing that occasionally stirs me is a new work and not a lot of that. I don't think I have the right genes for historic research and endeavour though I admire those who pursue that line of work. I also know how important it is for the future. So you see , it's very hard for me to share your devotion as other parts of my life, long neglected, clamour for my attention!

However, I am more than happy to help if I can, to sift through jumbled memories for relevant bits of info.

Much love, Lynn

22.

1 August 2013

Dearest Lynn,

I quite understand how you feel, but am very proud that you bear with me while I ask questions. Dance for me almost begins in memory. It's one thing to do (not that I know much about that), and a second thing to watch, but the third thing is the way it then grows in the mind afterwards. I know that I saw something and heard something, but I also felt something; and the initial effect is one of utter mystery, often wonderful. Then I have to put the three (sight, sound, feeling) together in my mind, and to reconcile head and heart. And I'm not kidding when I say that some of it is still falling into place decades later. I never meant to be a critic - I thought I was going to do something serious with my life - but this need to come to terms with the aftershocks of performances just took charge of me.

Much love

Alastair

23.

7 November 2013

My dear Lynn,

I shall be in London from Nov 13 to Dec 11: part of the bureaucracy for obtaining (I HOPE) a Green Card. But I shall see lots of dance. Would you be able to join me on Saturday 30 to see Mark Morris at Sadler's Wells? I know you love his work, as do I; I'd love to watch it with you.

I hope you're thriving.

Love,

Alastair

24.

8 November 2013

Dear Alastair,

My regard for MM Has no bounds. He IS music incarnate and he embodies all the untarnished elements that drew me to dance in the first place. I have already arranged to go to a performance Friday 29. That will probably satisfy me. So, thanks very much for the invitation but I will decline this time. Good luck with the green card business.

Love, Lynn

25.

8 November 2013

Dear Lynn,

What a marvellous tribute to MM. I'm so glad you'll see his Friday program, which contains "Socrates" - I think his finest piece of the last nineteen years. I see it two days before. But the Saturday programme is different, and contains two of his best recent years - "Festival Dance" (to Hummel music) and one of his rare duets, a long and slightly Strindbergian one, "Jenn and Spencer" (named after its dancers). So if you find you can make that programme too and you can bear to go to the Wells on consecutive nights, I'd be honoured to take you.

Love

Alastair

26.

Dec 14, 2013

This YouTube film http://youtu.be/pbNvhuiKo7A of a 1968 "Concerto Barocco" with Farrell, Marnee Morris, and Conrad Ludlow has been posted by John Clifford on YouTube.

Watch it before the Balanchine Trust removes it!

Best

27.

15 December 2013

Wow! Sublime, so tender.

Best, L

28.

21 February 2014

Dear Lynn,

You told me last year that Canadian TV had filmed you and Christopher Gable in the "Swan Lake" adagio. At my request, the New York Public Library Dance Collection asked Canadian TV if it had a copy. It did; and it sent a copy to the Dance Collection, where I watched it earlier this month. It's part of an hour-long Canadian multi-art programme; the compere at the start has a jokey interview with you about Englishness as you drink a cup of tea. The adagio is filmed under a studio set consisting of a hanging crown and drapes.

And it's just wonderful. You run on alone at the start, to the harp music; and from then on the drama is immediately absorbing. Gable joins you; in one beat you told from fifth on point to folded at his feet. The way you bend throughout the adagio is glorious - even just before the final finger fouettés, you bend in a kind of deep révérence, the torso descending below waist height - and the whole adagio comes as a single thought process, a slow emotional thawing from alarm to trust (if that's not too crude a simplification).

I'm in London now, but after my return on Monday 24 I hope to show this rarity to David Vaughan (who will be ninety in May) and Robert Greskovic; and I hope to persuade them that we should include this in the "Swan Lake" evening we will present at the NYPL on April 23 - along with fragments of the Odettes of Markova, Ulanova, Danilova, Semionova, Fonteyn, and Makarova.

I did see you dance Odette-Odile once; it was surely the last time you danced it, at least in London - January '77, Royal Ballet, with Nureyev; I was twentyone. I've now seen the ballet probably over three hundred times; even then I had seen five other O-Os, some of whom I had loved. But to this day I've never seen anyone shape the whole ballet as so vast an arc - not just the differences between Odette and Odile but between the second and fourth act, with the final act as the most emotionally intense and overwhelming. I've also never seen more vivid mime between Odette and Siegfried; and I can never forget the blazing attack you brought to Odile.

I hope you're well. I've been lecturing on Merce Cunningham at Oxford, in between a mixture of ballet and theatre in London. A ten-day trip from New York; back to the snows there on Monday!

Much love,

Alastair

29.

22 February 2014

Dear Alastair,

Thanks for latest update. It reminded me that I was wearing a Mary Quant dress and had the latest Vidal Sassoon hair. somewhere, there is a photo of the interview and the set. I remember the whole thing as being intensely cringeworthy at the time.

Good luck in Oxford, I hope you brought your wellies. Please give David my love.

As ever, Lynn

30.

My dear Lynn,

Last night, David Vaughan and Robert Greskovic and I presented a "Swan Lake" evening of rare films and photographs. When it came to Odette's adagio, we showed three Odettes: Ulanova, Fonteyn, and yourself. They all made a great impression - what three ballerinas! - but believe me when I say yours made a strong and moving impression on everyone.

It's not yet 8am, but I've just received this from Diana Byers, the artistic director of the small New York Theatre Ballet (which dances some Ashton and Tudor): "Thank you so much for inviting me to Swan Lake. It was a very special evening. The footage of Lynn Seymour will stay in my mind forever." And at the reception after the event others said the same.

I just heard last week that the Royal is reviving "Five Brahms Waltzes in the Manner of Isadora". And so I pluck up courage to ask you something. I have heard you speak about how you, working with Fonteyn, made a revision to "Five Brahms Waltzes" after Ashton's death. I've never asked you what that was, but I've always assumed it was the transition between the fourth and fifth waltzes - where now, as you stage it with current Isadoras, she remains onstage and then discovers the rose petals under the piano. I've always assumed that you felt this gave the whole piece greater continuity and perhaps motivation. But can I beseech you to consider returning to the old text?

I saw you dance it several times, and always used to think it my favourite-ever dance solo as you performed it. And for me the truly holy moment was when you slowly entered from the wings for the fifth waltz, with your hands over your solar plexus - Isadora at the very centre of her art, just walking and with her hands over what she described as the crater of all movement. And then you turning from profile to walk, still so slowly, down the centre-line - and then the great SURPRISE of the unanticipated rose petals; and then the slow lift of your arms until you arrived in that so heroic Isadora statuesque pose. That final entrance really was one of the greatest things I ever saw in my whole life. I had seen you dance it before the three Covent Garden performances of 1978, but I remember the thrill of watching those three in particular and getting to know the dance with greater familiarity. I loved it all (and was amused that some ballet people were still vaguely shocked by Isadora, as you showed her, in loose Greek chiton and barefoot) - but that surprise exit into the wings at the end of the fourth waltz and then the thrilling surprise of the change of mood as you returned to the stage for the fifth waltz: well, it was one of the great revelations for me.

Ashton kept it that way when he revived it at the Rambert with Lucy Burge, who must have ended up dancing it many more times than you because it became a repertory item there. So please, for the same of me your most passionate fan after all these years, please do consider reinstating the old ending! For me, the discovery of the rose petals under the piano has nothing of the same drama and wonder.

And if I've said the wrong thing, then just do what Fred used to do with some bad reviews: read it several times before screwing it up in contempt and hurling it away....

Again, my great thanks for your Odette with Gable. Nobody would ever have known of that film had you not told me in an email last summer; wonderful Daisy Pommer at the NYPL Dance Collection was able to get a copy from Canadian TV. And here it was last night, being watched by a New York audience that contained the choreographers Alexei Ratmansky, Joshua Beamish, and Troy Schumacher, the Odettes-Odiles Sara Mearns (NYCB) and Gillian Murphy (ABT), the Siegfried of Jared Angle (NYCB), as well as painters and designers and writers, and dancers both younger and retired - and I believe other star dancers I didn't have the chance to meet afterwards.... It made me very proud to show your Odette to all these New Yorkers.

Fond best wishes and much love

Alastair

31.

24 April 2014

Dear Alistair,

Nikolaj Hubbe told me of your preference when I was mounting the piece in Copenhagen and I have reinstated the entrance on all subsequent productions. Before that I made all participants aware of the 2 versions (Margot, Fred) and told the reasoning behind it. So there was a choice!. By the way, I did the production with Lucy* at Rambert, Fred came in at the final stage.

Very best, Lynn

<*Lucy Burge nonetheless has related that Seymour, after Ashton’s death, made several considerable changes to “Five Brahms Waltzes in the Manner of Isadora Duncan”, not just the transition before the final waltz. It is also worth noting that, when Burge gave birth to a daughter, Ashton sent her a telegram to say “Call her Isadora.” AM.>

32.

24 April 2014

Dear Lynn,

Heavens - I forgot I mentioned that in Copenhagen. Well, I blush. Many thanks.

Love

Alastair

April 24, 2014.

I just asked my old friend and literary agent Bob Cornfield which of last night's films meant most to him - they included Fonteyn, Ulanova, Beriosova, Grey, Makarova, Danilova, Markova - and he replied at once "Seymour and Gable, for one. The least studied, the most creative.".

Love

34.

24 April, 2014.

Dear A, So glad to hear the Swan Lake evening had such a positive response! best, Lynn

35.

June 11, 2014

Dear Lynn,

As you see, you made it to the delicious cake for the most recent of David <Vaughan>’s several ninetieth birthday parties.

Love

Alastair

<This was attached to a photograph of the cake. AM.>

36.

June 11, 2014

I'm truly honoured.

Love, Lynn

37.

October 1, 2014

Dear Lynn,

There is a young British ballet archive called Voices of British Ballet, run principally by Patricia (Trish) Linton. Because I'm based in New York, Trish recently asked me to interview Misha Baryshnikov: which I did yesterday afternoon.

I'm listening to the tape now, and he says about your Juliet "I never danced with anyone of that fire. There was no Lynn on stage - only Juliet. Not even Natalia Makarova, with all her spontaneity, had this kind of obsession on stage, in all my experience.... But also a lot of fun. And I admired this woman so much."

Trish is also commissioning me to interview five other important ballet figures, of my choice. Do I need to tell you that you are my first choice?

Somehow just now I would most love to ask you about the nineteenth-century classics, about Ashton, about varieties of classical style and points of technique, and about how you both learnt from Fonteyn and learnt to diverge tremendously from Fonteyn; but of course I remember you in roles by Fokine, Balanchine, Cranko, Neumeier, Tetley, Forsythe, and umpteen MacMIllan roles from "Solitaire" and both "Invitation" women to "Gloriana" and "Mayerling".

I'm aware you often feel you have to turn your face away from your ballet past and get on with the rest of life - and heaven knows I respect that (even envy it). But I learnt so much from watching you, and love your intelligence and memory. So I'd be profoundly grateful if you'd agree to be interviewed!

I'll be in London between November 2 and 16. Are you around then? Here's hoping.

Love and all best wishes,

Alastair

38.

October 2, 2014

Dear Alastair,

Of course I'll do your interview. The only snag is that I'm not very reliable due to being in the throws of a massive detox programme and occasionally I'm rendered useless. It seems that afternoons might be the best part of the day. Let's talk closer to the time.

Very best,

Lynn

39.

October 24, 2014

Dear Lynn,

Hello from the train to Philadelphia, where tomorrow I see ballets by Balanchine ("Allegro Brillante"), Robbins ("Other Dances"), Wheeldon, and Ratmansky. Beautiful city, with America's most beautiful opera house.

I hope you're thriving. Did I tell you that I have met more young Americandancers who watch your "Month in the Country" on YouTube with awe? I'm so glad it's there.

Trish Linton has emailed me to say she has called you today about times for the interview we spoke of; but I think she has slightly muddled the dates I suggested. So here are some times:

Tues 4 - Any time up to 12.15 or 3-6pm.

Wed 5 - Any time from morning till 3pm

Thurs 6 Any time

Fri 7 Any time before 5.30pm

Mon 10 Any time

Tues 11 Any time before 5.30pm

Are any of those any good? If not, I will see if there are others. Tricky juggling family visits to the country around with theatregoing! (Somewhere in the country I have all the photos of you in "Month" and other ballets I used to get you to sign at the stage door! Yes, yes, I was that kind of groupie.)

When we have worked out a time, I promise to send you a list of questions, so that you can start collecting your thoughts.

Much love

Alastair

40.

October 24, 2014

Dear Lynn,

I hope you're thriving. Did I tell you that I have met more young Americandancers who watch your "Month in the Country" on YouTube with awe? I'm so glad it's there.

Trish Linton has emailed me to say she has called you today about times for the interview we spoke of; but I think she has slightly muddled the dates I suggested. So here are some times:

Tues 4 - Any time up to 12.15 or 3-6pm.

Wed 5 - Any time from morning till 3pm

Thurs 6 Any time

Fri 7 Any time before 5.30pm

Mon 10 Any time

Tues 11 Any time before 5.30pm

When we have worked out a time, I promise to send you a list of questions, so that you can start collecting your thoughts.

Much love

Alastair

41.

October 28, 2014

Dear Alastair,

How about Tuesday 11th, just after lunch, 1:30 or 2:00ish? A list would be helpful, I often remember things days sometimes weeks after the question was asked. It's like an archeological dig. I hope you enjoy your trip home.

Very best, Lynn

42.

October 28, 2014

Dear Lynn,

I'll be there at 1.30. Can you remind me of your address? And phone number just in case?

Am working on the questions now. There are lots and lots! Much looking forward.

Every best

Alastair

43.

October 28, 2014

Dear Alastair,

Very best, Lynn

44.

<Paradixically, the list of questions is missing, though it seems I sent it twice>

45.

Tuesday 4 November

Dear Lynn,

I just sent you those questions again by mistake, not on purpose.

I'm in London, catching plays, dance, friends, and family, and much looking forward to seeing you a week today - Tuesday 11.

Love

Alastair

46.

November 4, 2011

Dear Alastair,

I hope you have a wonderful time with your nearest and dearest and old chums.

Best, Lynn

47.

November 19, 2014

Dear Lynn,

I'm back in New York, where it is now bitterly, bitterly cold and where I have got enough work to last me the rest of the year, eighteen hours a day. (But I shan't do it all, as I am off to India for four weeks on December 13 - dance and temples.)

1. My head is still full of some of the things you said. I have not made time to listen to the recording itself - I shall - but Trish Linton has the memory card for the Voices of British Ballet Archive, so we have begun to do our bit for posterity!

When I've listened to it, I will formulate questions for our next interview if that's OK with you.

2. Chris Powney of the Royal Ballet School wrote to me today to speak of the idea of a session of you and me in front of the RBS students. I think he'd love it if we can show some of the Seymour-Gable films I located; I don't have copies myself, but I've written to the New York Public Library Dance Collection and we'll see either if copies can be made or if the original can be loaned.

Maybe I could say a few words, show the films, and then bring you to the stage to have a Q&A with me. You can decide whether you would also like to take questions from the floor. As you know, I don't run out of questions for you.... It would be a big treat. Again, I could run questions by you beforehand.

I'm hoping to come to London February 9-15, and have written to Chris to ask if he can suggest times between February Tues 10 and Fri 13. Would that week work for you?

3. If that works, then let's plan our next recorded interview on another day that week.

I hope you're well. Oh! At my brother's in the country on Thursday, I found a whole mass of ballet photos, including well over 30 different ones (by Leslie Spatt) of the original cast of "Month in the Country", which make a marvelous series. Some of them are signed by you, from my days of waiting for you at the stage door; also by Anthony. Also some marvelous pictures of you and David in "Romeo". I will try to bring them when next I see you.*

Love and best wishes,

Alastair

<*Alas, I never saw her in person again. AM.>

48.

November 27, 2014

Dear Alastair,

I've been out of town, computerless, househunting, hence my tardy reply. Your February time table sounds OK Wednesday and Friday probably being the better days.

Very best, Lynn

49.

November 27, 2014

Dear Lynn,

Excellent. Alas, Chris Powney says the Royal Ballet School session won't work that week; but let's you and I try for Part Two of our recorded interview that week. I've told Chris that my next visit would have to be April, but I haven't heard back from him yet.

Today is Thanksgiving here in New York, which means that "Nutcracker" is upon us from tomorrow onward, like Christmas shopping. Did you ever dance in a "Nutcracker"? For me, most British and European productions don't work for one reason or another, but there is something about "Nutcracker" and America that suit each other, a certain "Yes!" vitality and abudance: Act One the Old World, Act Two a new one. I've never seen the Mère Gigogne (Mother Ginger) music used in any European or British production - I think they all think it's to vulgar for this refined ballet. Here it's a highlight of every staging, with Mother Ginger like a pantomime dame and children emerging from under her crinoline.

In 2010 the "Times" let me do a "Nutcracker" Marathon; I caught 28 stagings, from Seattle to Boston and from Las Vegas to Memphis. I loved it; the story is always different in every productions (some of which admittedly I couldn't have borne to see twice!) and the music does something completely different at last once every two minutes. Now I try to alternate: every other year I binge on a great many "Nutcrackers". But I binged last year, and so this year I'll concentrate instead on other dance - the Suzanne Farrell company in Washington this weekend dancing Balanchine and Robbins, the Alvin Ailey season, a few downtown things.

And then on December 13, visa permitting, I fly to India - my second trip there. (The first was 2010.) This time I hope to visit Rajasthan, Mumbai/Bombay, Kerala, and the dance festival at Chennai. I think I began to fall in love with classical Indian dance in the 1980s, but it's a vast field, and it's really only this century that I've begun to get any grasp of it at all. And, well, here's hoping I see some Bollywood fare too!

Love,

Alastair

50.

November 27, 2014

Dear Alastair,

Sounds like a gloriously diverse, busy, bill of fare for Yuletide. Enjoy! See you on your return.

Best, Lynn

51.

March 18, 2015

Dear Lynn,

I'm starting to book Voices of British Ballet interviews for my April trip. Can you let me know when would suit you on any of the following three dates? Any time that suits between morning and late afternoon.

Monday 13

Thursday 16

Friday 17

Best

Alastair

52.

March 19, 2019

Dear Alastair,

The most convenient is probably Friday 17th, 10:30 to 12:30.

Best, Lynn

53.

March 19, 2015

Dear Lynn,

Excellent: I'll see you then!

All best

Alastair

54.

March 26, 2015

dear alastair,

I'm afraid I can't now do this interview. I had a bad fall breaking my right arm, cracking my head and losing the sight of my right eye. it's all an enormous nuisance.

best, lynn

55.

May 20, 2015

Dear Lynn,

I hope you've now recovered from your fall. Here in New York I've been busy - with, among other things, an evening of rare Royal Ballet films for June 22, when we'll show (among other items) you and Gable in the "Romeo" Balcony and "Swan Lake" pas de deux, plus perhaps parts of the (even rarer) rehearsal footage of you both in the "Romeo" Bedroom and Tomb scenes. Lots of work!

In April, the Royal Ballet School was in touch with the renewed possibility of my interviewing you in front of their students in the autumn term. I've been too busy to organize myself that far ahead, but finally begun to draw up some possible dates, which I list here:-

September 21-22,

October 15-16,

November 9-13,

November 23-25,

December 3-4.

I've just sent these dates to Chris Powney's assistant at the School, at this stage to find out which ones wouldn't work.

Can you let me know which ones wouldn't work for you?

I imagine they envisage an afternoon session, but have asked them to tell me if they plan another time of day.

Then I'll go over my diary (and finances!) and see what's practicable.

I'll also be in touch about a second recorded Voices of British Ballet interview with you, the one about creating a role.

We're in the middle now of Lincoln Center Ballet Madness, with the two big ballet companies playing simultaneous at adjacent theatres for four weeks. Exhausting stuff. But I certainly thought of you last week as I watched two casts of "Pillar of Fire" - sorry I never saw you in this. Fascinatingly, we also had ABT played de Mille's original "Rodeo" in the same week as NYCB played Justin Peck's new "Rodeo: Four Dance Episodes," which, as the title leads you to expect, is a plotless dance to the four main dance sections of the music. De Mille's ballet stands up well, but Peck's ballet (one woman, fifteen men, a kind of abstraction of de Mille's scenario) gets a deserved standing ovation - one of those rare pieces that makes you proud to be sharing the same moment as a new work. There have been other goodies too: Sara Mearns in Balanchine's "Walpurgisnacht Ballet" (a 1980 vehicle for Suzanne Farrell - the only Balanchine ballet whose world premiere I managed to attend) now gives the greatest single ballerina performances to be seen anywhere today, fabulously musical and blazing.

Again, I hope you're well.

All best, and with great affection,

Alastair

May 26, 2015

Dear Alastair,

You sound madly busy, but I get the sense you LIKE it a lot. I am slowly recovering, cast is off arm which feels like somebody else's, The eye is still with only partial sight and the lesion on my brow is getting smaller but still rather ugly. The worst thing is loss of confidence and I leave the house rarely.

I'm afraid none of the RB school dates will work as I plan to move to the country late summer, early autumn. and I won't want to undertake any commitments around that time. Maybe the New Year.

All the very best ,

Lynn

57.

June 20, 2015

Dear Lynn,

A quick note to say that on Monday I'm presenting an evening of rare Royal Ballet films here at the New York Public Library for Performing Arts at Lincoln Center; these will include the complete "Swan Lake" pas de deux and the complete 1964 "Romeo" Balcony

Scene with Christopher Gable, as well as you two rehearsing the Bedroom pas de deux (second half) and Tomb Scene (from Romeo starting to partner your dead body up to his suicide). The audience is expected to include Kevin O'Hare, Monica Mason, Lesley Collier, and other Royal figures, as well as lots of New Yorkers. I think the films look marvellous.

I hope you're continuing to mend in mind and body. I write on the way to a double dose of the MacMillan "Romeo" at ABT - Misty Copeland's role debut in the afternoon and Julie Kent's farewell to the company (after thirty years) in the evening. Sigh.

Love and best wishes,

58.

June 21, 2015

Dear Alastair,

Thanks for the info… I'm back at exercise class which has made me feel that I have some control over my life and the way I live it! Great!

Very best, Lynn

59.

June 21, 2015

Dear Lynn,

That (exercise class) is marvelous to hear.

Of course Monica is too much the diplomat to let any of us know any negative/awkward reactions. I wish Julie Lincoln were there and the ABT rehearsal staff; Deborah MacMillan now has JL rehearse the Royal's "Romeo" rather than Monica, and nobody from the Royal has come to inspect ABT's staging since 2003.

The ABT version anyway has its own variants, some of them good; Romeo's Balcony solos begin with a much windswept renversé quality. Mercutio leads the Mandolin dance, a idea MacMillan had in the 1980s, which works well. There are so many different options for different Romeos on both sides of the Atlantic in his first Act Two piazza solos that I get lost; the Royal men all seem to do pique double attitude turns (was this devised for Dowell?), which doesn't occur here. ABT Romeos at another point do a string of double sauts de basque - one does four, another five, another six, and think in other seasons I've seen seven - which maybe doesn't occur at the Royal. All ABT Juliets now do your Act Three silent scream in the Tomb scene. Time for a "Romeo" sleuth!

Best always

60.

June 21, 2015

Carla stole the scream too, to great effect in Rudolf's version. Isn't that sort of theft described as "the highest form of flattery"?

best, L

61.

June 21, 2015

It's odd, though, when all the Juliets are taught to scream.

Some ABT Juliets are very good (Gillian Murphy really goes for the un-pretty headstrong side of the role), but at least of the two I saw this week were the passive/vulnerable kind. "You'd never scream!" I wanted to yell.

Did you always do the scream, or did you add it later on? I was wild about it, and have a photo of it somewhere.

(But there are far too many screams in the MacMillan repertory elsewhere.)

And am I right that you developed the wonderful (Judi Dench) writhing you did on the Balcony? It's already special in the 1964 film but in the six 1977-78 performances I saw you give (Nureyev, Baryshnikov, Wall) you were like a cat on heat and VERY voluptuous/erotic.

Am I right that you never smiled once in the Balcony Scene?

62.

June 23, 2015

Dear Alastair,

You're right, it IS odd being "taught* the scream. It was NOT choreographed and should be a matter of personal interpretation. I think I did it from the start. I also think I "used" The Judi Dench Roll from the beginning. I can't imagine NOT smiling in the Balcony pas de deux, it's all about the joyous, rapture of first love. Passive/vulnerable belongs in the Romantic/Operatic canon, nothing to do with Shakespeare, Prokofiev or MacMillan of the '60;s.

I don't remember the exact steps Christopher did in Act 2, but he was a very good turner and could do so with fabulous speed both en l'air and par terre and he did a very intricate combination of both when he performed the big diagonals.

Best, Lynn

63.

July 23, 2015

Dear Lynn,

The films of you made a great impression last night; the whole program was, I have to say, terrific. I copy the credits below; you were featured in four of the twenty-seven clips. Kevin O'Hare, Monica, Lesley Collier, Jeanetta Laurence, and quite a few of the Royal staff, patrons, and a number of the dancers were in the audience, which was packed to standing room. Richard Alston too, some NYCB dancers, several old Royal devotees, and more.

And there in 1964 you were doing the Judi Dench Roll - not as voluptuous as I remember it from 1977-78, but still very striking - in the original Canadian broadcast. There are a few subtle changes in the choreography; I think MacMIllan expanded Romeo's solos in every way once he got to the Covent Garden stage - the Canadian studio was quite limiting.There's one surprisingly lovely bit when he stands still in tendu back, hand on heart, like a Renaissance statue, just for a moment, and you come up behind him and bring him back into action.

But do you know, you smiled only once, and that fleetingly. Your face hardly did anything, but was totally compelling. So many Juliets now do the bright-eyes two-rows-of-teeth such-sweet-rapture act, but you were too bowled over to "play" anything. There are a couple of moments when you really come close to the camera for a closeup and the emotion, as far as we can label it, is one of wonder and amazement, your eyes moving as if you are trying to understand what this is in your heart.

In "my day" (not only when watching you in 1977-78 but in the subsequent decade), you were the only Juliet who screamed. I don't know if the Royal Juliets now scream, but the ABT ones all do: it suits Gillian Murphy, who really gives a bold, reckless, anti-pretty Juliet, and maybe Misty Copeland, but not some others. Julie Kent, a good dancer who regrettably played too many roles sentimentally (but was really good as Ashton's Cinderella, Titania and Natalia Petrovna), gave a sentimental, pious, weak Juliet for her farewell on Saturday, but she too screamed.

The films, as you'll see, includes the Entrance of the Shades in the 1963 dress rehearsal for "Bayadère" and five soloists at a practice-costume stage rehearsal "Raymonda" Act III (Lorrayne, Collier, Peri, Mason, Parkinson). This really showed what a great coach Nureyev was. I was a bit anxious about what Lesley and Monica would think of seeing themselves on screen in practice costume after forty-six years, but they were thrilled; Monica noted how much has been lost from those solos.

Lesley is reviving "Two Pigeons" next season, and asked if the NYPL Dance Division has a tape with music of the original cast. I asked the right people this morning, and it does. So here's hoping she'll be able to see it while she's here. I suspect the sound is piano added to a silent film, but actually that works brilliantly in many Edmee Wood films; the "Raymonda" solos were with piano added, and still showed the musicality to ravishing effect.

Every best always

Alastair

Rare or Unique Royal Ballet films

June 22, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center, Bruno Walter Auditorium

Special thanks to François Bernadi, Evan Leslie, Daisy Pommer, Jan Schmidt

If you have questions or can provide supplementary information, please send inquiries and further information to dance@nypl,org and/or alastairm@nytimes.com and/or leave messages at 212-556-3557.

A: The Sleeping Beauty

Music: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Choreography, Marius Petipa, 1890. Production: Ninette de Valois, 1946, adapted by her and Frederick Ashton from Nicholas Sergueyev's 1939 one. Designs: Oliver Messel.

1-3. The Sleeping Beauty - Prologue

Films by Victor Jessen, taken in various live performances by the Sadler's Wells Ballet 1949-55 on North American tours. Edited, with addition of sound, in 1979 by Mr. Jessen.

[Library Classmark *MGZIA 4-4675]

1. The Queen invites the fairy godmothers to dance further

2. The six fairy godmothers' solo variations

3. Carabosse and the Lilac Fairy

Most roles are taken by a changing supply of artists, but the following can at times be identified:

The Queen: Julia Farron (and June Brae?)

Fairy (1) of the Crystal Fountain: Violetta Elvin

Fairy (2) of the Enchanted Garden: Pamela May (and Anne Negus?)

Fairy (3) of the Woodland Glades: Nadia Nerina

Fairy (4) of the Songbirds: (?)Pauline Clayden

Fairy (5) of the Golden Vine: (?)Margaret Dale

Lilac Fairy: Beryl Grey - and Svetlana Beriosova

Catalabutte: Leslie Edwards

Carabosse: Frederick Ashton

B: Swan Lake

Music: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Choreography: Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov. Production: Ninette de Valois, 1943 and revised 1953, based on Nicholas Sergeyev's 1934 one. Designs: Leslie Hurry.

4. Swan Lake lakeside pas de deux

Telecast on October 28, 1964 on CBC’s Show of the Week series. Orchestra Conductors, Bert Niosi and Lucio Agostini. Produced and Directed by Norman Sedawie. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 6037]

Lynn Seymour, Christopher Gable

Swan Lake Acts Two and Three, live excerpts

5-9. Films by Victor Jessen, taken in various live performances by the Sadler's Wells Ballet 1949-55 on North American tours. Silent, edited by François Bernadi and Alastair Macaulay (with music added from a variety of sources) to excerpts listed below for reference purposes in 2014. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 1708]

5. Benno and Siegfried seek and find Odette

6. Odette ends her adagio with Siegfried and Benno

7. Odile and Rothbart arrive

8. Odile's variation

9. Siegfried swears to marry Odile

Benno: (?)Bryan Ashbridge

Siegfried: Michael Somes

Odette: Margot Fonteyn

Odile: Margot Fonteyn

C: Frederick Ashton, 1933-66

10. Les Rendezvous (1933)

Music: Daniel François Auber, arranged by Constant Lambert.

From the gala program Tribute to Sir Frederick Ashton. Live performance, 1970. Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. Devised and produced by John Hart and Michael Somes. Music arranged and conducted by John Lanchbery. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 5088]

Ballerina variation: Merle Park

11. Symphonic Variations (1946).

Music: César Franck, Symphonic Variations.

Studio performance telecast on Granada TV's Parade series in 1973. Producer, Peter Potter, Director, David Giles.

Dancers: Antoinette Sibley, Anthony Dowell, Jennifer Penney, Ann Jenner, Michael Coleman, Gary Sherwood

12-18. Monotones 1 and 2 (1965-66), complete.

Music: Erik Satie, Trois Gnossiennes (orchestrated by John Lanchbery) and Trois Gymnopédies (orchestrated by Claude Debussy and Roland-Manuel).

12-14. Trois Gnossiennes, (1966)

12 and 14, first and third Gnossienne, 1968 TV studio performance supervised by Frederick Ashton.

Telecast August 21, 1968 on BBC-TV’s Contrasts series, episode: “Monotones”. Conductor and orchestrator: John Lanchbery. Produced by Margaret Dale. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 5089]

Dancers: Antoinette Sibley, Georgina Parkinson, Michael Coleman

13. Second Gnossienne, 1966 rehearsal in practice costume.

Filmed by Edmee Wood in 1966. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 1736]

Dancers: Antoinette Sibley, Georgina Parkinson, Brian Shaw

15-18, Trois Gymnopédies, (1965)

Dancers: Vyvyan Lorrayne, Anthony Dowell, Robert Mead

15, 18. Opening of first Gymnopédie and third Gymnopédie, 1968 TV studio performance supervised by Ashton. See 12 for TV production information.

16. Rehearsal of first Gymnopédie and start of second, practice costume, with Ashton, 1966 TV documentary.

Behind the Scenes with the Royal Ballet telecast by BBC-TV on April 14, 1966. Piano: Edna Downing. Written, produced and directed by Ion Voyantzis. Executive Producer, Peter Snell. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 5084]

17. Second Gymnopédie, 1966 dress rehearsal at Covent Garden.

Filmed in rehearsal with costumes at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, in 1966, by Edmee Wood. Piano: Maureen Tomlin. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 1735]

D: Rudolf Nureyev's productions of Marius Petipa choreography for the Royal Ballet, (1963-65)

19. La Bayadère, Act IV - Nureyev production.

Music: Ludwig Minkus. Choreography: Marius Petipa, 1877.

The entrance of the Shades, corps de ballet.

Filmed in dress rehearsal onstage at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, in 1963, by Edmée Wood. Added piano soundtrack played by (?)Anthony Twiner. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 5087]

20-22. Raymonda, Act III - Nureyev production. Four solo variations and Raymonda's.

Music: Alexander Glazounov. Choreography: Marius Petipa, 1898.

Filmed in practice clothes by Edmée Wood, at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, circa 1969. Added piano soundtrack played by (?)Anthony Twiner. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 5086]

Dancers: Vyvyan Lorrayne, Lesley Collier, Ria Peri?, Monica Mason, Georgina Parkinson

E: Kenneth MacMillan, Romeo and Juliet, 1964-65

Music: Sergei Prokofiev.

23. Balcony Scene (1964)

Telecast on October 28, 1964 on CBC’s Festival series, episode: “Premiere”. CBC Festival Orchestra conducted by Victor Feldbrill. Costumes: Kenneth Rowell. Settings for “Premiere”: Murray Laufer. Segment produced by Eric Till. [Library Classmark *MGZIA 4-3427]

Juliet: Lynn Seymour

Romeo: Christopher Gable

24. Special film of Balcony scene with multiple casts, probably for Victoria and Albert Museum presentation, London, date between 1968 and 1973. [Library Classmark *MGZIDF 5085]

Juliet: Antoinette Sibley

Romeo: Anthony Dowell

25, 26. Studio rehearsals for Act III bedroom and tomb pas de deux, 1965

Behind the Scenes with the Royal Ballet. TV documentary filmed in 1965, voiceovers by uncredited narrator and Frederick Ashton. Production date 1966. TV Production information: see 16 above.

Juliet: Lynn Seymour

Romeo: Christopher Gable

F: Margot Fonteyn in The Sleeping Beauty,

Music, production, designs: see 1-3 above.

27. Victor Jessen film (see 1-3 above), live performances 1949-55

Act One, Aurora's entrance and pas d'action.

The Queen: Pamela May

Catalabutte: Leslie Edwards

Aurora: Margot Fonteyn

64.

June 24. 2015

Dear A.,

So happy your evening was a success.

best, L.

65.

June 24, 2015

Dear Lynn,

How extraordinary - a woman has just stopped me in the Library for the Performing Arts to say she was especially thrilled by the films of you, and that she studied ballet with you in Vancouver. She says you won't remember her; she was two years younger - her name is Diane Mahe (pronounced May). She says they were all so admiring that your talent took you beyond Vancouver. And she remembers the importance of Nicolai Svetlanov's teaching to you (have I got his name right?). I'm afraid I didn't find what she does or has done; but here she is in New York.

Best

66.

June 25, 2015

Dear Alastair,

I don't remember this woman, but she's right, Nikolai Svetlanov was a very formative and influential teacher in my young teenage. He was one of those dancers who fled Russia when they could no longer survive there, WALKING to Harbin in Manchuria and finally Shanghai. He was a sometimes partner of Vera Volkova doing nightclub adagio acts there. His big lesson, there is great honour in endeavour, and more value in a "personal best" than being top of the class. and rapport and contact with your partner was of Prime importance.

Best, L

67.

July 13. 2015

Dear Lynn,

This may be the kind of detail you've forgotten, but I ask anyway. You were the first Carabosse in de Valois's 1977 production, and I must have seen almost every performance you gave. Some critics were struck (happily) by the way Carabosse presented a spindle as her present in the Prologue, which at the time I (aged twenty-two) inferred to mean that she had never presented a spindle at the Christening until this 1977 production. But nobody now is sure. Do you remember whether it was new then or whether it was an inherited bit of business?

I hope you're flourishing and that the exercise classes continue to do you good.

Every best

Alastair

68.

July 13, 2015

Dear Alastair.

I don't remember the spindle being presented in ANY production until the end of

act 1! Fat lot of good I am in your search for truth. Christopher Newton was good at details like that, maybe he can shed some light on the matter. My classes are on the back burner because an ancient ankle injury flared up and compromised my mobility. The payback for performing with injury. It'll take a few weeks.

best, Lynn

69.

December 12, 2015

Dear Lynn,

A quick note to ask how and where you are. I was in London recently; of course "Two Pigeons" brought you to mind, even though I only saw you dance the final pas de deux once - a pas de deux with Christopher Gable at a gala c.1978. I hope you're well, and one part of me hopes you're still in London, so that I can come see you on my next visit (March or April, I hope).

I interviewed Monica Mason, who recalled how, when she was young, you once gave her some coaching on the Beriosova variation in "Birthday Offering". I know you've clashed with her in recent years, but I must say in interview she has no scores to settle: she mainly likes to talk of other people than herself, and always generously and intelligently.

I so hope on my next visit to tale a second interview with you, one in which we concentrate on creating roles for choreographers. To date, most of the dancers I've interviewed for Voices of British Ballet have had something interesting to relate, but often not much: the great exceptions have been you, Anthony, and Monica - all articulate and analytical (and unalike!)

One way or other I hope I see you before the New Year grows old.

Love and many merries,

Alastair

70.

December 14, 2015

Dear Alistair,

I am very likely to be in London in March. However, I am not yet very reliable. The blow to my head has left me some strange kind of migrainal disorder which occurs, seemingly capriciously and renders me useless for an unknown period of time. Chances are it will occur less frequently in time. But we can try to continue.

I hope you have a jolly Christmas.

Very best of eveything,

Lynn

71.

January 6, 2016

Dear Lynn,

The Royal Ballet School is still keen for me to conduct a conversation/interview with you if possible. I will be in London from Feb 28 to March 9; they've asked if Mon 29 Feb would be possible. Yes. Leap Year's Day! I've explained you may have to cancel at short notice due to migraine; they said that's fine. I don't yet know the time of day, but I guess the afternoon. Health permitting, would this work for you?

I have just discovered no fewer than 30 different photos of the first cast "A Month in the Country" in my files, most of them not only featuring you but signed by you in my stage-door days. I'll ask if we can show them!

Happy New Year.

All best

Alastair

72.

January 18, 2016

Dear Alastair,

Please forgive my tardy response. I've been off line for over 4 weeks due to glitch whilst switching providers.

I'm afraid to commit as yet. I find cancelling so depressing.My instinct says, " let's wait another 6 months". Give me a ring when you get here.

Very best, Lynn

March 8, 2019

Dear Lynn,

Many happy returns! Always a pleasure to think of you.

Love

Alastair

74.

March 9, 2019

So nice to hear from you.

best regards,

Lynn

May 13, 2022

Dear Lynn,

I hope you’re well; I’d love to see you. You’ve often been in my mind of late. For two particular reasons:

1. The recent revival of “A Month in the Country” made me think about an aspect of Natalia Petrovna that’s seldom discussed: the self-dramatising side, the way she places a wrist to her forehead in several important scenes, the way she sometimes turns her own real situation into an enacted one. Can you say how you and Ashton discussed and shaped this aspect when the ballet was being made?

2. In 2014, you gave me a fantastic interview for the Voices of British Ballet oral-history archive, in which you spoke about your classical training, your most important teachers, and your dancing of the nineteenth-century roles. We were hoping to go on to tape Part Two, in which you began to speak about dramatic interpretation and, in particular, your contribution to the creative process of a number of great choreographers. And maybe your way of reinterpreting recent roles made for others, such as Manon, where I still recall unique details of your performance - making the first bedroom pas de deux newly erotic; looking right through des Grieux on entrance ar Madame’s party; making Manon, not des Grieux, decide to rip off the bracelet at the end of the Act Two pas de deux.

Life got in the way. But now I’m permanently back in London. And Voices of British Ballet conducts its interviews in a wonderful building of private quiet studios in the West End, The Sound Company (23 Gosfield St, London W1), with a technician recording in the next room while interviewer and interviewee sit at either end of a spacious table with lots of water to drink. Please do join me. Could you make June 27 or June 28 any two hours before 1.30pm? 10-12 or 10.30-12.30 or 11-1 or 11.30-1.30? You know that for me it would be a great privilege and fascination. I saw you in more than thirty roles, though I sigh about some of those I missed.

Love and all best wishes,

Alastair

76.

Dear Alastair,

Welcome home, I hope you are enjoying your return.

Unfortunately, I am no longer able to do the sort of thing you ask….

Much happiness,

Lynn

Alastair Macaulay

Emails between Lynn Seymour and Alastair Macaulay, 2013-2022

Kaija Saariaho’s clever but cold “Innocence”

Wayne McGregor’s “Woolf Works”