Pulling Back the Curtain

In the summer of 2007, writer Stephen Manes, known for his best-selling Bill Gates biography, over thirty books for young adults and children, and for his work as a technology columnist, proposed a new endeavor. He wished to spend an entire season at Pacific Northwest Ballet to observe like a fly on the wall and capture in written word a world of which most people will never catch a glimpse. From long rehearsal days, injuries, and casting drama, to the hidden work of stagehands, lighting designers, costume crew, administration, and musicians, Manes reveals what it takes to operate a world-renowned ballet company.

Pacific Northwest Ballet company dancers in “The Nutcracker” by Kent Stowell and Maurice Sendak. Photograph by Angela Sterling, 2006.

Via diligent recordings, observations, and interviews, Manes brings Pacific Northwest Ballet circa 2007/2008 back to life, and today, fourteen years after the publication of Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear, it is still in a realm of its own, untouched in the scope, content, and detail of what it acknowledges and uncovers. There really is no other book that honors these artists in such a way and highlights the incredible work that they do.

When I stumbled upon this treasure of a book at the Seattle Public Library, I knew that I had to speak with the person who had devoted over a year to capturing the inner workings of Pacific Northwest Ballet. Some nine months later, I had the honor of sitting down with Stephen Manes to discuss his process and experience.

Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear is a world away from your other work as a writer. What drew you to attempt this ambitious project?

My wife was a native New Yorker, and when I dragged her out here many years ago, she had the view that it probably wasn’t any good because it’s not New York City Ballet. And it was surprisingly good, and we became season ticket holders. At the time, they had a special backstage program for season ticket holders. You got to see the stagehands, you got to see the conductor talking about how he works with the ballet, and I became so interested that I thought gee, I’m going to go find a book that tells me more about how all of this works, and there really wasn’t any such book. I was taking a hiatus from what I was doing at the time, which was writing about technology, and decided this would be a fun project. I pitched it to them, and they said ‘go for it,’ and so I spent a year there.

When you were starting, could you imagine the scope of what you were going to cover, could you have envisioned it becoming a 900-page book?

No, if you’re doing it right, you don’t decide what the book is before you write it. I mean, at one point, it was a 1500-page book. But I don’t think there’s another book that talks about rehearsal pianists, or music rights, or front of the house, or lighting design. I mean lighting design was a revelation. Nobody gets to see that because you only see the finished product, you don’t get to see the process. And the process is what’s so fascinating about it, both in rehearsal and all these other things that come together to make the ballet.

Noelani Pantastico and Lucien Postlewaite in Pacific Northwest Ballet’s 2008 production of Jean-Christophe Maillot’s “Roméo et Juliette.” Photograph by Angela Sterling

What was the reaction like from people at PNB when they learned you wished to spend a year there?

Everybody was so generous to me, I was just the fly on the wall. I think the deal was that people were surprised that somebody would actually be interested in what they do all day. Bruce Wells, who had famously been around forever, said when he first met me, “I'm going to tell you what I told that guy from Dance is a Contact Sport [author Joseph H. Mazo], which is you have to show up when we show up and leave when we leave,” which I did a lot of the time.

I'd love to hear more about what this process looked like on a day-to-day basis. In the book it seems like you were there to capture nearly everything.

I had a little notebook computer, and just sat there and watched and took notes. And the tricky part was I realized pretty early on that you had to pick a place. You have class, everybody's in the same place, now you move out to rehearsals, and there are three rehearsals going on, plus other stuff. And you had to kind of pick where you're going to be. And the question was, did I guess right? There were some narratives developing, like the whole Romeo and Juliet thing. And even that was sometimes being rehearsed in separate studios. And so you would have to pick, where's the story? And that was always just by your gut figuring out which place was going to have the real interesting thing that day. But I think I guessed right most of the time.

Your interviews shed a light on a world and history far larger than PNB. Did you expect to go so deep into personal stories and for those personal stories to reflect so much of ballet history on a national level?

I didn't know what to expect. I mean I tried not to let my prejudices rule, and as things developed, I learned. I didn't know anything about Pennsylvania Youth Ballet, and so people started talking to me about it. And the School of American Ballet was, of course, with Peter Boal's history and everybody who came through SAB either in the summer or some other way, I had to go see what that was about.

Do you think that as a writer you were able to capture the goings-on with more intimacy than film or recordings of rehearsal?

One of the reasons we have few good documentaries is the issue of music rights. And, of course, part of the problem is that you bring a camera. I think at some point I was sitting there, and I was like a fly by that time. But I didn't have lights. I didn't have a camera. I didn't have anything that got in their way. Somebody did a documentary on them while I was there, and I don't know what happened to it. I saw it, and it was shown once at the Seattle Film Festival, and there was supposed to be a second showing, and that never happened. I never heard why, but I would bet you it's music rights or choreography rights, and that's another whole issue. So strangely, this art of words, which shouldn't be particularly good at conveying ballet, it may be the best you get.

Former Pacific Northwest Ballet principal dancer Ariana Lallone with company dancers in “Prodigal Son” by George Balanchine. Photograph by Angela Sterling, 2007

What response did you receive after the book was published, both from people at PNB and elsewhere?

PNB was kind of quiet about it. It just kind of came and went. Frankly, I expected that people were going to figure out that it ought to be taught in arts administration classes. There's nothing else that takes you into an arts organization. I mean, with money issues and how long is it going to take to do X and logistics and can we do this within our budget? I mean, all that stuff, that's just not in other books, and it's to their credit that they let me sit in on all those meetings. It opened up a whole new world that I think a lot of people have no idea about at all. There's this whole enterprise behind the dancers and without the enterprise, we wouldn't have a business.

Did the way that you viewed dance change after getting to see so much of the rehearsal process?

Oh, sure, I mean, it couldn't help it. A lot of that was a real education in terms of seeing how things work. And there was a lot of stuff that, because you were closer to it and because it was juxtaposed with other things in ways that it wouldn't be on the stage. You get a sense of how much the people make a difference.

Was there an aspect of going behind the scenes that you most enjoyed recording or witnessing?

I think seeing the differences between the stagers was an eye-opener. Everybody had a different method. No two were exactly alike in how they decided to get this thing on the stage. Some were better than others in communicating. Partially because they knew the work better. I think that was a real key. And some were just not great with their time and the dancers' time.

Fourteen years later, what stands out to you most about the entire experience?

To write a book and spend the time, you really have to enjoy the process of what you're seeing. And I don't think there was a day that I didn't learn something. It was just a wonderful project.

You know, the writing took me longer than it should have, but I learned from that. It was a wonderful project. I learned an immense amount from it.

I was in second grade during that season, so I have lovely memories of that era of dancers, but to actually peek behind the curtain of the fairy tales I was seeing, to know how these pieces came together, is a tremendous gift.

It was just great. Every morning I'd get up, and it's like, let's see what we're going to find out today. There's always something interesting going on. There's a tendency, I think, to feel like you're one of them, but you're not. You're on the outside. And so, to an extent, you do your best to bring what they're bringing to it, but it's imperfect.

Well, and to show all the behind-the-scenes . . . all the people who don't get to take a bow at the end of a performance. They’re there every day, and it’s remarkable.

Louise Greer

Louise Greer is a Seattle-based writer focused on capturing a dance's fleeting moments and highlighting the work of artists both locally and nationwide. She is passionate about the creative artistry of dance writing and strives to give dance a life beyond the stage in her work. She holds a BA in Creative Writing and a minor in Dance, which weave together in her writings for seattleballetblog.com.

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