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Press Release

Press Release

San Francisco Ballet’s ‘Ballet Insights’ Returns September 22–October 6 With Exploration Of Ballet On Film And Television

SAN FRANCISCO, August 30, 2019—San Francisco Ballet’s Ballet Insights returns with three interactive seminars that explore the history and development of ballet on film and television: Early Days on September 22; The Dance Boom on September 29; and New Modes, New Media on October 6, 2019. Each will be held from 1–3 pm at 455 Franklin Street in San Francisco. Part of SF Ballet’s education and audience development initiatives, Ballet Insights offers public programs that present artists, scholars, and professionals discussing ballet in San Francisco and beyond. Ballet Insights programs are curated by Jennie Scholick, PhD, SF Ballet’s Associate Director of Audience Engagement.

Ballet Insights begins on September 22 with Early Days, featuring a conversation with dancer and author Sally Bailey Jasperson about the dawn of ballet on television and film. Bailey Jasperson danced with the Company from 1947 to 1967 and can be seen in ABC-TV’s 1968 broadcast of Lew Christensen’s Beauty and the Beast. Among Bailey Jasperson’s notable roles with the Company are Odette, which she performed at age 19 in Willam Christensen’s Swan Lake; and as Eve in Lew Christensen’s popular and provocative Original Sin alongside Michael Smuin as the serpent and Roderick Drew as Adam. Bailey Jasperson is also the author of After The Applause Stops and Striving For Beauty, a memoir recalling her experience in the era of the Christensen brothers at SF Ballet.

Ballet Insights continues with The Dance Boom on September 29. The Dance Boom brings together special guests Judy Flannery, Producer and Executive Director of Dance Film SF and San Francisco Dance Film Festival; and SF Ballet’s Jim Sohm and Anita Paciotti, who danced as Romeo and Lady Capulet in Michael Smuin’s Romeo and Juliet, broadcast on WNET-TV’s Dance in America series in 1978. Flannery managed the production department for KQED-TV during the 1980s and its partnership with SF Ballet, which resulted in broadcasts of Lew Christensen’s Jinx and Smuin’s Songs Of Mahler. Paciotti began dancing with the Company in 1968 and was promoted to ballet master in 1991, and Sohm, who danced in the Company from 1975 to 1993, now works at SF Ballet as Research Manager.

Ballet Insights closes with New Modes, New Media on October 6, 2019. SF Ballet General Manager Debra Bernard speaks about what it takes to produce dance films and live streams, and SF Ballet Principal Dancer Benjamin Freemantle and Soloist Madison Keesler discuss how dancing on film is different from dancing on stage, and how they transfer their skills behind the camera.

Tickets to Ballet Insights are $35 each; subscribers and donors of $75 receive special discounts. More information can be found online at sfballet.org/season/events/ballet-insights.

2020 Repertory Season tickets are available now via subscription packages, and single tickets will be available November 12. All tickets may be purchased through the Ticket Services Office at 415-865-2000, Monday through Friday from 10 am to 4 pm or online at www.sfballet.org. Discounts are available for groups of 10 or more.

Photo: San Francisco Ballet Company class during 2017’s World Ballet Day live stream (© Erik Tomasson)

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