American Ballet Theater held its Fall Gala Wednesday night, raising $1.4 million to support ABT's education and community outreach programs. Sponsored by Clinique, Lanvin, and Piaget, the theme for the 75th Anniversary Gala was Scarlett, White and Blue, and shades of these colors were spread among the performances as well as at the after party held on the grand tier.
The evening featured three different ballets. The first was the World Premier of Rondo Capriccioso, which featured young dancers of all ages from the American Ballet Theater Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School. Some of the dancers were practically toddlers and drew exclamations of delight from the audience, knowing they may be watching the next generation of accomplished principals.
"Watching the students is one of my favorite moments of the night," said Gala Co-Chair Caryn Zucker. "They have worked so hard and are so dedicated . I have loved ballet since my early days when I took ballet lessons as a child . The fall gala is always such a beautiful, New York night, and tonight is no different."
The second ballet, With A Chance Of Rain, also a world premiere, was followed by Christopher Wheeldon's Thirteen Diversions.
"I loved the Christopher Wheeldon piece," said Gala Co-Chair Sutton Stracke. "I grew up as a ballet dancer, I've always had my heart in it. I used to work for Merce Cunningham. I love to see contemporary dance celebrated with one of the most amazing ballet companies in the world. To see the students up on stage, and to see how the school has really grown is so impressive and remarkable, and so beautiful."
Guests included many ballet fans from the entertainment, media and fashion worlds, including Hilaria and Alec Baldwin, Chris Noth, Olivia Munn, Lauren Hutton, Taye Diggs, Deborah Roberts and Al Roker, Christian Siriano, Hamish Bowles, and Brian Atwood.
"The performances were just breathtaking," said Atwood. "It was very moving."
Susan Fales-Hill, former ABT board member and the current head of ABT Ambassadors, perhaps put it best.
"Tonight was a magnificent demonstration of the fact that ballet is a vibrant, thoroughly modern art form that can still express in the most universal way all of our core human emotions of love, confusion, passion, longing," said Fales-Hill. "Ballet is not dead!"
