Willy Shives And Matthew Adamcyk Take on 'The Stepsisters' in CINDERELLA

When Sir Frederick Ashton's "Cinderella," with music by Sergei Prokofiev, is revived this month by the Joffrey Ballet at the Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University, the roles of the two stepsisters will be portrayed at select performances by two dancers at very nearly the opposite ends of the career spectrum, Willy Shives and Matthew Adamcyk. In separate interviews this past weekend, I spoke with the veteran Shives and the young lion Adamcyk about their roles, their careers and the way they work, together and separately. 

Willy Shives is a company veteran, who first joined the Joffrey in 1999 and who danced all the leading "prince" roles with the company until his retirement from performing on May 25, 2008. Now 48 years old, he is one of three Ballet Masters of the company--a job he described to me as "hard, but it gives me so much satisfaction!" It's his responsible to help assure that the younger dancers in the company carry on the tradition and legacy of Robert Joffrey, Gerald Arpino and all the great ballet dancers of the 19th and 20th centuries, now gone. That's undoubtedly a big task. 

However, the company's artistic director, Ashley C. Wheater, asked him to step back on stage this season (after just one year off) and take on two "character roles" for the company, Drosselmeier in "The Nutracker" and the "little, younger stepsister" in "Cinderella," a ballet to which the Joffrey owns exclusive U.S. performing rights. Shives was thrilled. 

"I've had a great career" as a "prince," he told me, but "character stuff is great for me--I'm having so much fun." He disclosed to me that he would love to do the witch role in the Bournonville "La Sylphide," which has just been "talked about" for now. 

And, for a performer who trained for a time with Lee Theodore (Lee Becker when she created the role of Anybodys in the original "West Side Story"), and who knew and worked in New York with second generation musical theater legends Lisa Mordente (her parents are Tony Mordente and Chita Rivera) and Nicole Fosse (Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon are hers), Shives is fully aware of how closely linked ballet and Broadway really are, and how to bring acting skills into choreography that was first set in stone in 1948. 

It's apparently all in the subtlety, he told me about these ballet "character" roles, these men who wear dresses but are not on pointe. The humor is not "in your face, but more subtle," he says of his "reserved" character. And it's not American-style drag humor, like Harvey Korman on the "The Carol Burnett Show," he said, but it comes from observing people. Ultimately, "You have to be comfortable in your own skin" to tackle these roles, Shives said. 

Matthew Adamcyk, who is a mid-career dancer in his seventh year at the Joffrey (which he joined directly out of the Harid Conservatory's top flight high school dance program in Boca Raton, Florida) agreed. It is "all in finding the nuances" of the "older, bigger stepsister" (the characters don't have names here). "You have to use your own mannerisms," he told me. 

The performers have to be true to the very exacting nature of this post-World War II choreography, he said, but they also have leeway to add their own touches, adding that comic timing is extremely important. His stepsister is "bossy and sassy," the domineering one. This, even though the man he is bossing around is a company legend more than twenty years his senior, and is one of his bosses offstage. 

From onstage and off, Shives has enjoyed watching Adamcyk grow and mature into one of the company's leading dancers at a young age. And the admiration is mutual. "I love playing off of Willy," Adamcyk told me about "Cinderalla." "We are having such a great time." So great, in fact, that the two dancers have agreed on offstage names for their characters, names that were inspired by their extreme makeup and costumes, but may also derive from characteristics of their onstage antics. Adamcyk is "Joan Crawford," and Shives is "Bette Davis," from "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?" as well as from their separate film careers.

One wonders what Sir Frederick Ashton would think! 

Adamcyk noted that he has danced two roles at the far opposite ends of the character spectrum this season--he was the evil Iago in the Joffrey's "Othello" back in the fall. And he has never done a comedy role before now. He was proud that the company was "throwing at lot" at him right now, and he likes the challenge of showing what he can do. He has never felt pigeonholed as a dancer at the Joffrey, and feels that to this point he has been lucky to have a well-rounded career. And he mentioned the wide range of projects the company takes on, proud that they are presenting two world premieres later this season. 

Both dancers are thrilled that this "Cinderella" will be performed to live music, in the form of the Chicago Sinfonietta, under the baton of conductor Scott Speck. Adamcyk said that a live orchestra "makes the performance all the more powerful," and Shives called it a fantastic experience. "There is nothing like dancing to live music," he said. "It's part of you--it's inside you!" 

A few weeks ago, the company presented "Cinderella" in Los Angeles, which was, mentally at least, a form of an "out of town tryout" for the current cast, away from the eyes of the hometown subscribers and balletomanes of Chicago. The full production was there, of course, but Adamcyk felt it was a chance to find his comfort zone in the role, learning how to not be "too campy, not too over the top." And he noted that there is a little sadness with these stepsisters, too, in that they most likely will never find the kind of romantic happiness that Cinderella herself finds. 

So, whether they are fanning themselves, or each other, or are hitting poor Cinderella with those fans, these subtle stepsisters (or, at least, two of the dancers bringing them to life) are using their professional lives as dancers and their dry senses of reserved British character humor to enrich the timeless tale of the downtrodden fireplace figure who becomes a princess for all time. 

I'm sure that Sir Frederick would be proud. 

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"Cinderella," with music by Sergei Prokofiev and choreography by Sir Frederick Ashton, is being presented by the Joffrey Ballet from February 17-28, 2010 at the Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University. Tickets are available at the Joffrey Ballet's box office (10 E. Randolph Street), at the Auditorium Theatre box office and at www.ticketmaster.com.  

Performance photograph by Herbert Migdoll. All photos courtesy of the Joffrey Ballet.