True, this isn't as big a compliment as it sounds: in the last three decades very few ballerinas have given important performances in this ballet.
It is no secret that works of genius can survive less-than-perfect performances in the ballet world.
Though there's still occasional dispute about his effectiveness in certain heroic roles, Mr. Cornejo's performance in American Ballet Theater's production of "Romeo and Juliet" at the Metropolitan Opera House on Thursday should leave little doubt about his fitness for this one.
In June another ballerina, Alina Cojocaru, gave a single guest performance in American Ballet Theater's production of "The Sleeping Beauty," and in most of Act I she achieved something similar, making me and others feel we could forget for the moment every other interpreter we'd seen in the role.
Yes, you can see in this Ballet West performance how the men's double air turns should be straighter, the women's chattering footwork should be more scintillating, and how everyone could make a more pronounced use of the torso.
"I like history," Mr. Malandain, himself a former dancer, said in an interview after a recent Ballet Biarritz performance in this southeastern French city, its last before flying to New York.
No mime performance in ballet today surpasses that of Sorella Englund as Madge (I first saw her in this role in 1979), though she keeps giving it different inflections.
Surely no performance in ballet today is more definitive that that given by Herman Cornejo as Puck.
New casts in this ballet are a rarity; only Fonteyn and Nureyev danced it in the decade following the premiere, and after their final performance of the ballet in 1973, "Marguerite and Armand" was not seen until 2000.
Other performances in this closing weekend of the New York City Ballet's spring season are tonight and tomorrow at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. Tickets: $25 to $72 $10 forr student rush tickets.
