On a sunny afternoon in Los Angeles, I sat down to interview the charming and self-effacing Sébastien Marcovici, Associate Artistic Director, who spoke candidly about the LA Dance Project (LADP), his career, family, and work, in tandem with Founder and Artistic Director, Benjamin Millepied. LADP will be presenting a fascinating vision of Romeo and Juliet for the 2024 Season at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts on October 10 – October 12, 2024. Tickets are on sale now.
In between Sébastien’s busy schedule, we quickly proceeded to introduce ourselves and moved into a delightful conversation about his preparation for the production; a reinterpretation of Shakespeare’s classic tale of star-crossed lovers in Romeo and Juliet with Prokofiev’s brilliant masterful music as the inspiration.
Sébastien Marcovici, Associate Artistic Director, LAPD – Photo by Patrick Fraser.
Joanne DiVito: So wonderful to meet you Sébastien and so happy to be talking a bit about your life in dance and L.A. Dance Project. To get started, the always fun question for me is how and when did you start dancing?
Sébastien Marcovici: Yes, well it came from my mom. She was taking ballet classes to get in shape right next to our home. I was 2 ½ or 3 and one day I asked to go to her class…and that was it! I don’t remember any of this, but that’s what my mom told me.
JD: Ah, how lovely, and apparently it turned out to be a calling for you. Clearly through that time as a student at the historic Paris Opera you developed a brilliant background in dance which I wish we had more time to talk about, beginning with your training and onto your stellar career at New York City Ballet.
This is quite a leap, but please tell me more about how you bridged from NYCB to L.A. Dance Project.
SM: Well, I was 38 and in the New York City Ballet. I still had some more years to dance. But you know injuries take a toll on the body. So when you start pushing your forties, that’s usually when you have to think about what’s next?
Benjamin Millepied, Artistic Director/Choreographer at LAPD – Photo by Diego Uchitel.
Then really, what happened is Benjamin Millepied asked me to come to LA Dance Project. So that was an opportunity; he needed a rehearsal director, and I wanted to go to LADP. If he would not have asked me my wife, Janie Taylor, and I would have stayed a couple more years in New York. For me, there was a lot of repertoire there that didn’t require a lot of dancing but more partnering. So there were ways to keep dancing and not be in pain.
But when I looked at this opportunity, I thought, I’ve had a great career, I really liked everything that I did at City Ballet, but I felt like also I didn’t want to keep doing roles I had really enjoyed dancing full out, then having to face the fact that I would have to hold back. So when Benjamin approached me, I was like… I think this is it? This is the exit card. So… I took it.
It was a little bit different for my wife, Janie, because she’s five years younger. So she had a lot more dancing in her, but she also started very young. She was a very good dancer and got lots of opportunities very young. But she had a similar feeling. She had done a lot and also had a great career and obviously if she had said she wanted to stay, then you start evaluating your family… do we want to be separated for a little bit? Maybe finish her career and then come join me? We had to evaluate everything, and it just felt right for her as well to make the switch at that time.
JD: Yes, a major decision and very sane. And it had to be really hard.
SM: Yes, definitely very, very hard. The key things, and why we were able to do it is that we came to peace with it. And I think a lot of dancers are in a kind of denial and don’t want to do that. But when you reflect on your career, you know you have to end it yourself, and I think sometimes people are trying not to do that.
JD: Yes, so true. But it looks like your working relationship with Benjamin created a future for you. You’ve been with LA Dance Project for how long?
SM: Good question. When I left New York City Ballet, 2014, I actually joined L.A. Dance Project that year.
JD: As a dancer?
SM: No! As a rehearsal director. I think, after my retirement performance at City Ballet, two days later I was in Paris because LADP was on tour there. And I think, six months later, Benjamin, was picked as the Director of the Paris Opera Ballet for a couple of years, so I went with him. That was between 2015 and 2017, and then we both came back to Los Angeles. After that I was really full time with the company.
LADP – Daphne Fernberger and Nayomi Van Brunt in “Romeo and Juliet” by Benjamin Millepied – Photo by Julien Benhamou.
JD: So you had been really working steadily with each other for quite some time.
SM: Yes. We basically danced together at the New York City Ballet for 20 years.
JD: How did that background assist you in becoming the Associate Artistic Director? Or did it?
SM: So… yes and no, because I’m the rehearsal director and that was my connection at first, transferring from dancing to being in front of the room. Then I became the Associate Artistic Director because of my ongoing working relationship with Benjamin.
Even when we were in the company, that was also how I started becoming a rehearsal director, because Benjamin would choreograph some pieces on me, and then would ask me to set them somewhere, and I think he was pleased. He then asked me if I wanted to come to L.A and be his rehearsal director, and then our relationship grew and I could always be there when he needed help. I was somebody who knew him well and I would make decisions that would align with his own. So, I think that’s how it came about.
JD: It certainly was a long collegial relationship and such a good choice by Benjamin to hire someone who knows how he works and who could help expand the goals of the company.
Now, in thinking about the company’s most recent project at the Wallis, I saw that earlier Benjamin had worked with Gustavo Dudamel on a version of Romeo and Juliet in 2018. Is the work being done at the Wallis from that version? And did you also work on that?
SM: Yes, and yes, so I was the rehearsal director when we did a very small version of Romeo and Juliet at the Walt Disney Hall with Dudamel. The orchestra played the entire score, and we had maybe a half hour of dance. Also, if you know the setup over there, there’s not really a dance area, especially when the whole orchestra was there. There was very limited space.
So I’m not sure if the idea came from there but the fact that our version of Romeo and Juliet has live filming and takes place in other places was definitely a great fit because there was no room on the stage. So in staging the piece, we thought, let’s go do some dance elsewhere. And so yes, that’s when we all started and had few dancers. Then we did it again in 2019, at the Hollywood Bowl with Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic… and we had more space to dance, so we added more dancers…with the same idea. And what was already made, we kept, and we also added some offstage dancers.
LADP ensemble in “Romeo and Juliet” by Benjamin Millepied – Photo by Julien Benhamou.
JD: Were you also filming at the same time as the performance?
SM: Yes. So at that time I was not behind the camera. Actually, Benjamin did it himself at both of those venues.
JD: Ah yes, I saw Benjamin’s film work at his directorial debut of Carmen. A lovely work and it was so obvious he loved the camera and filmic possibilities. Was that something you were involved with?
SM: Unfortunately, I wasn’t. I was supposed to, and then, because of the Pandemic, it didn’t happen. It was supposed to be filmed in Mexico and in the States, but because of the pandemic he went to Australia and did it there…and, unfortunately, I couldn’t go.
JD: Carmen was truly a visually beautiful film. Millepied’s filmic talent is very engaging, also beautifully aesthetic.
SM: Yes, Benjamin made Carmen, but he also has done so many short films, short videos… so every time he creates a new piece, he likes to make a film out of it. And it’s different…we go outside somewhere… you know, he’s always had this passion for movies. And I think this time he really wanted to incorporate it in the piece. I think it’s pretty exciting for the audiences.
JD: Definitely. So obviously the filmic approach used with Dudamel, is what is being used as a kind of bridge to the Wallis version of Romeo and Juliet? Is there any difference?
SM: It’s the same approach. It was amazing, Dudamel conducting Sergei Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet with live orchestra. A definite difference in that way between a recording and live music. However, it didn’t affect the choreography or the piece using video off site.
We then premiered the full-length piece in Paris, and then we went on tour with it. Last May, we were very fortunate to do it at the Spoleto Festival in South Carolina with the orchestra. So we were able to do our full version on and off stage, and again have the orchestra in the pit. So, it was amazing.
JD: Wonderful, and could you give me some insights on Millepied’s unique approach to Romeo and Juliet?
SM: Yes, Benjamin, even if he’s done a full length piece, say Daphnis and Chloe, He always wants to stay away from “pantomime,” which is really the classical way to express things in ballet. He is more interested in really expressing everything through the music and dance. And even when a piece has a story, he almost doesn’t even talk about it.
LADP – Vincius Silva in “Romeo and Juliet” by Benjamin Millepied – Photo by Julien Benhamou.
JD: So his process appears more organic to the music and dance?
SM: Yes, and Romeo and Juliet, unless you don’t know it, which most do in some capacity, you still understand that the point is love.
Because our production has less dancers, it doesn’t necessarily identify the two families because with less dancers it’s a bit harder to do. But I think it is still reflective. There’s a moment, when the music calls for the fight, and we still have our dancers dance together, and then a sudden split, and you can see that there are conflicts, even if one character is a Montague, 10 min later they may be a Capulet. It’s not about identifying a specific person…but you can tell that there’s two families… and things shift. So when it’s necessary, there are two sides, but to me, it’s really just about love.
And one other fact, even from the beginning, starting at Disney Hall, we had a cast of Romeo and Juliet where both roles are played by men. We also have a Romeo, and Juliet played with women.
JD: It appears to be about different expressions of love.
SM: Exactly, it’s about forbidden love… which you know, sex, same sex. Love in our days is forbidden in some countries, in some states. So it’s about just unifying and showing that it is just love, no matter what you are, or what you do. But it’s not like a message that is pushed. It’s just, why don’t we have something that can just be everything we want, and represent every, or as much as possible, the kind of love that there is.
JD: So timely. I am so looking forward to seeing it. And what are the elements that make Romeo and Juliet interesting to you as you were processing through it?
SM: Well, working on Romeo and Juliet itself is exciting. It’s such a classic that has been done for so long, in so many ways, between musicals and plays and movies and so much more. And I think that’s why it’s exciting. Doesn’t everybody just love Romeo and Juliet? That tragic love is somehow very appealing.
JD: …and that music… so amazing.
SM: Exactly, so working on a production, with Benjamin, it’s all about music for him. That’s how he likes to tell stories with movement and using the music. He lets one of the solos, you’ll see how it’s all made, speak for itself. I really enjoy that, and I think the dancers do also because that’s really the language of the dancer.
And so, like I said earlier, staying away from pantomime, I could say, “Let’s go dance over there,” or we just… go and dance over there! It’s just finding ways to not be literal and have everybody understand what’s going on. So I really enjoy that and think everyone does; and then with the element of film, it is definitely very exciting.
One part that I actually like for the audience, and even for myself, is that people that regularly come to the Wallis are going to discover the theater in a whole different way. They may have never been backstage. We take some of the dancers backstage, or on the loading dock, and back outside on the plaza. So the audience will see everything differently.
It’s really filmed like a movie, not like a video. We really work on the cinematography, and on the lighting. So it’s very interesting how dance is filmed in the best possible way. We find a balance between the full body and moving closer into the close up; because the idea also is to have the camera bring the audience not only elsewhere in the theater, but closer to the dancer in a more intimate setting.
LADP – Shu Kinouchi in “Romeo and Juliet” by Benjamin Millepied – Photo by Julien Benhamou.
JD: As you’re talking, I’m wondering when working with LADP, did it also introduce you to new skills? Did you find that you had to learn or experiment, doing things that you never really thought you would do?
SM: Yes, I would say very much so, because it’s such a small company so you end up doing more things that you wouldn’t necessarily do in a bigger company where there’s a person for everything.
Also, I think I saw at some point I probably needed to step out of the studio a little bit more, because even as a rehearsal director, I love studying and setting pieces, Benjamin’s pieces, because I just know them so well. I know what he wants. And I could say the same thing about… let’s say Balanchine, because I’ve done them for a very long time, or Jerome Robbin’s pieces.
JD: So you could re-stage Millepied, Robbins and Balanchine pieces?
SM: Yes, correct. Not because I know them so well. But because I have backstories, I know the technique. When I did new roles at the New York City Ballet, I sometimes worked with Peter Martins on things he had been credited on, or I worked with Violette Verdy. There’s a lot of people that I got to know. The original people that the choreographers did the pieces on.
JD: It’s so wonderful that the essence of the classic pieces can be passed on…So important!
SM: Also, as a rehearsal director, you’re going to work with different choreographers, and even the same ones. For example, Benjamin, obviously a choreographer, I spent a lot of time with him. So I’ve learned a lot from how he works. Then watching and learning from other choreographers and how they do things. So you absorb a lot and have a wider mind on how choreography can be done. It’s also important how they listen to music, because everyone has a different way of doing that.
I’ve also been on movie sets with Benjamin because he makes movies and videos, even with the company. So that is something that I didn’t think I would do as a rehearsal director, because you could just be in a studio all the time. But when you’re on the set you end up helping. And you see how things are directed and how they’re made. I was always passionate about movies and watched movies like a cinematographer or director and not just somebody watching a movie. I was always really obsessed about, oh, this was filmed like this or that. So there was always something that illumined in me and I definitely learned a lot.
JD: Well, Sébastien, I so love all your wonderful insights. It so helped me find out more about you, Benjamin and L.A. Dance Project! It has been such a pleasure, and it’s very exciting what you’re doing. I’m looking forward to seeing Romeo and Juliet at the Wallis. What are the dates?
SM: Opening night at the Wallis in Beverly Hills is October 10 and goes through October 12.
JD: Well, thank you, and Congratulations. It’s been such a pleasure and I look forward to seeing the LA Dance Project in October.
SM: It was a pleasure for me, too. Yes, and fun.
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Benjamin Millepied’s Romeo and Juliet runs October 10-12, 2024 at The Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. For more information and to purchase tickets, please click HERE or visit The Wallis’ website. Ticket prices start at $49. You can also call 310.746.4000.
For more information about L.A. Dance Project, please visit their website.
Written by Joanne DiVito for LA Dance Chronicle.
Featured image: LADP – Courtney Conovan, Marissa Brown, Sierra Herrerra, and Mario Gonzalez in Romeo and Juliet by Benjamin Millepied – Photo by Julien Benhamou.
