Weird and Whimsical

While the dancers traveled up from Florida, the Sarasota Ballet presented a taste of British sensibilities in its week-long engagement at the Joyce Theater. Performing works by Antony Tudor, Sir Frederick Ashton, and Sir Peter Wright, the company showed its strength in storytelling and strong partner work.

Performance

Sarasota Ballet: “Lilac Garden (Jardin Aux Lilas)” by Antony Tudor, “Ashton Divertissements” by Sir Frederick Ashton, and “Summertide” by Sir Peter Wright

Place

The Joyce Theater, New York, NY, September 29, 2026

Words

Rebecca Deczynski

Brooke Wilson and Ricardo Graziano in Antony Tudor's “Lilac Garden.” Photograph by Frank Atura

Sarasota Ballet’s anglophile programming stems from director Iain Webb, who spent his performing career largely with Sadler’s Wells Royal Ballet (now the Birmingham Royal Ballet) and the Royal Ballet, Covent Garden. As he approaches his twentieth year at the helm of Sarasota Ballet, he’s leading it through a particularly successful era: in 2024, the company made its international debut with a seven-day engagement at the Royal Opera House.

In a particularly dense dance season in New York, the Florida-based company made a strong impression at the Joyce, both thanks to its refreshing selection of repertoire (the weirder, the better) and its dancers’ overall sharp technique.

Sir Antony Tudor’s 1936 one-act ballet “Lilac Garden (Jarin Aux Lilas)” opened the program with a tale of forbidden love: Caroline (Marijana Dominis) tries to say goodbye to her lover (Samuel Gest) upon the eve of her wedding to the Man She Must Marry (Ricardo Graziano). As one can expect of these kinds of doomed affairs, they are repeatedly interrupted, by both partygoers and a woman from her future husband’s past (Brooke Wilson).

There is a simplicity in the movement: Dominis frequently steps out into a piqué arabesque with her hands low beside her. The women walk on pointe aristocratically. For a touch of drama, Dominis and Gest pair a renversé with a hand to the forehead. In the biggest musical climax of Ernest Chausson’s score, the dancers all pause, and Dominis walks forward raising a hand. Throughout the work, there is a fluidity to the way that the dancers cross the stage in simulation of a party—I wondered, while watching, if John Cranko saw inspiration here for act I of “Onegin”—and in the way that Dominis and Gest come together for swirling moments of intimacy, looking around as if they could get caught.

The storytelling here is effective without embellishment—moments of acting fit neatly into choreographic passages, rather than standing outside the movement. The emotional impact is sharp, as Dominis lets a bouquet of lilacs, presented to her by Gest, fall out of her hands.

Amy Wood and the Sarasota Ballet in Sir Frederick Ashton's “Illuminations.” Photograph by Frank Atura

Four divertissements by Sir Frederick Ashton follow (the fifth, the awakening from “Sleeping Beauty” was not included because of dancer illness). Of those performed, the strongest are the most inventive. A pas de trois from “Les Rendezvous” presents dancers Andrea Marcelletti, Pasha Levy, and Gus Payne as clownish figures who circle the stage in emboîté. Levy is like a wind-up doll who Marcelletti and Payne pull back and forth, and she maintains the appropriate, Swanhilda-like stiffness required to pull it off. The pas de cinq from “Illuminations” is another highlight, in which Iku Okura partners four male dancers, Trevin Ralphs, Jonah Glickman, Ze Ellis, and Simon Plante. Okura is something of an alien princess, carried around the stage by her court jesters; when she beats her legs, it is with insect-like precision.

Sierra Abelardo and Gest are charming in the balcony scene pas de deux from Ashton’s “Romeo and Juliet,” which includes some sweet partnering, including a passage during which Gest crosses Abelardo’s arms over her head as she stands in arabesque. There’s a bit of humor, too, as their heads bobble back and forth as the dancers hug—the kind of detail that reminds us that these characters are just kids, after all.

The weakest divertissement is the “Meditation from Thaïs,” which presents a kind of orientalist pas de deux, as Kaitlyn Casey joins Ricardo Rhodes on stage, bouréeing while covered in a veil. The repetitive—and comparatively less creative choreography—does little to bolster their minimal chemistry.

Danielle Brown, Ricardo Rhodes, Juliano Weber, and Thomas Leprohon in Sir Peter Wright's “Summertide.” Photograph by Frank Atura

Even in an overall strong program, Sir Peter Wright’s “Summertide” is a standout, especially with its vigorous opening with Levy and Okura swimming through swift partnered turns and promenades; both dancers have a strong sense of attack and a noteworthy line. Levy especially draws the eye for her soaring arabesques.

The second movement, an adagio featuring Dominis, partnered by Rhodes, Plante, and Nathan Smith, is the most compelling work. As the men lift Dominis in different permutations and stretch into arabesques of varying heights, the piece feels like a more abstract, gender-bent cousin to Balanchine’s “Apollo.” Dominis, here and in “Lilac Garden,” has an expressive sense of flowing through space, which makes her magnetic to watch.

The work has a lovely close, with all dancers returning to the stage in a frenzy of prints and bright colors, but the complex tapestry that the pas de cinq creates in the adagio lingers in the mind. Still, a few moments of perfect unison—the men promenading the women clockwise in a lifted position, their front legs bent and their back legs extended, while stretching an arm outward to complete the protractor-like effect—leave a feeling of perfect satisfaction.

Rebecca Deczynski

Rebecca Deczynski is a New York City-based writer and editor publishes the newsletter Mezzanine Society. Her work has appeared in publications including Inc., Domino, NYLON, and InStyle. She graduated from Barnard College cum laude with a degree in English and a minor in dance.

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