All-Americcm Ballet

In 1934, a gaunt, Boston esthete and dance man, Lincoln Kirstein, decided that the U. S. needed home-grown ballet. Rich Balletomaniac Kirstein pooled funds with Edward M. M. Warburg (son of Banker Felix Warburg), got together a bevy of young U. S. ballet dancers, and hired famed Russian Dance Master George Balanchine to teach them. Impresarios Kirstein and Warburg started their venture as a school. But it soon grew into a fledgling ballet troupe, known as the American Ballet.

The American Ballet got a chance in 1935, when it was made the official ballet company at Manhattan's Metropolitan Opera House. The experiment did not work to suit anybody, and eventually Choreographer Balanchine huffed off to Hollywood. But Impresario Kirstein refused to give up. Picking the best members of the tottering American Ballet, he formed a little company of twelve dancers, got a bus for them to travel in, and in 1936 started them barnstorming as the Ballet Caravan.

The Ballet Caravan hired no fancy-named Russian choreographers, did no classical Russian ballets. Its 20-year-old dancers concentrated on U. S. subjects, did their own staging, hired U. S. composers to write their music, added a distinct U. S. flavor to their classical leaps and entrechats. They were so successful that Impresario Kirstein soon began to lake expenses.

Last week, after a tour of 50 one-night stands, the Ballet Caravan ratted back into Manhattan and set up its tents at Broadway's dingy St. James Theatre for four nights. This time it showed Manhattan's dance fans two new U. S.-made ballets: 1) Charade, an intricate, tasty bit of choreographic icing by husky Dancer Lew Christensen; 2) City Portrait, a dour tenement-street pantomime choreographed by Dancer Eugene Loring. Dance critics liked Charade's tricky trip ping and whimsey, found City Portrait somewhat incoherent. But Kirstein 's home made ballet, like Finland's home-made army, appeared able to hold its own against the Russian product.

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