Black Tights | |
---|---|
![]() French theatrical poster | |
Directed by | Terence Young |
Produced by | Joe Kaufmann (producer) Simon Schiffrin (producer) |
Starring | |
Cinematography | Henri Alekan |
Music by | Marius Constant (Cyrano de Bergerac) Maurice Barthet (Deuil en 24 heure) |
Release date |
|
Running time | 140 minutes |
Country | France |
Languages | French (singing) English (narration) |
Black Tights (1-2-3-4 ou Les Collants noirs) is a 1961 French anthology film featuring four ballet segments shot in Technirama and directed by Terence Young.
The dances in the film were abridged versions of ballets created for the stage by the dancer and choreographer Roland Petit, who appears in the three of the four sequences along with his wife, the ballerina Zizi Jeanmaire.
The film is also known as Un deux trois quatre! in France (short title).
The four independent stories are performed in the form of ballet, interspersed with introductions by Maurice Chevalier. In two of them (Cyrano de Bergerac and Carmen), he periodically explains events as the story progresses.
La Croqueuse de diamants translates as "The Gold Digger", or more literally as "the diamond cruncher". (Twice during the story, the title character swallows a diamond, with a crunching sound.) The story, a romantic comedy, opens in Les Halles. Amid the hubbub of street activity, a group of woman street vendors sing in French about their trade. A furniture delivery man (Dirk Sanders), while delivering a seating banquette to a cafe, encounters a woman pickpocket (Zizi Jeanmaire, The Gold Digger), who is the leader of a pickpocketing gang, based next door to the cafe. The delivery man and the gold digger fall in love with each other, the latter leaving her criminal gang to go off with her new love.
Cyrano de Bergerac is a tragic romantic story, based on a play of the same name. Both Cyrano de Bergerac (Roland Petit) and Christian de Neuvillette (Georges Reich) love Roxanne (Moira Shearer). But the poet Cyrano has a big nose and is too shy to declare his love to Roxanne. Instead, he helps his friend Christian woo Roxanne, writing love letters on his behalf.
Deuil en 24 heures translates as "mourning in 24 hours" or more loosely as A Merry Mourning. (A shop appearing in the film shows "Deuil en 24 heures" as the shop name.) Along the Champs-Élysées, a wealthy man (Hans van Manen) accompanies his wife (Cyd Charisse) on a shopping trip to buy a dress. A strange man (Roland Petit) flirts with his wife in a cafe. The husband challenges the flirting man to a duel which the husband fatally loses. The wife starts to enjoy her widowhood. The story is a black comedy.
Carmen is the tragic story of the soldier Don José (Roland Petit) falling in love with the Gypsy Carmen (Zizi Jeanmaire). The plot of the ballet roughly follows the story of the opera with some variations in plot detail. The ballet features music by Georges Bizet. In the Lillas Pastia scene, the ballet troupe sings l'amour est enfant de bohème in a half-sung/half-spoken fashion.
La Croqueuse de diamants
Cyrano de Bergerac
Deuil en 24 heures
Carmen
Black Tights received the Biennale Special Golden Award at the Venice Film Festival and the European Grand Prix by film critics in Europe. [1]
Reviews at the time of release were largely favorable. Writing in the Los Angeles Times , critic Philip K. Scheuer called the film "artistic without being forbiddingly highbrow" said that 'the film "could do as much to popularize French Ballet as West Side [ West Side Story ] did for American." He praised the cinematography as "visually dazzling" and said that the Carmen ballet was "the real show-stopper." [2] New York Daily News critic Wanda Hale awarded the film four stars and called it "a most unusual ballet picture, artistic, beautiful, saucy and naughty." [3]
The Boston Globe , while praising Black Tights an "intriguing picture to watch" and "rare entertainment," said that there are "occasional dull spots which slow up its pace and deaden its magic." [4] The Guardian called the film "threadbare" and "very lightly blessed with talent or imagination." The unsigned review described the dancing as "a mixture of modern wiggling and traditional ballet." [5]
New York Times critic Bosley Crowther said that the "over-all effect of the picture, apart from its meaning for those who are stringent ballet students or lovers and have particularly keen eyes for technique, is that of a great big package of dance numbers from a musical film - just that, ballet numbers. For our personal taste, that's too much." He called the Chevalier narration "a little foolish and patronizing." [6]
In a 1986 review when the film when shown at a revival house, Philadelphia Inquirer critic Carrie Rickey wrote that "whether seen as a significant chapter in the history of modern dance or as a camp curiosity," the film was a "rare record of Petit's Ballet de Paris." She said that Petit had as much influence on Hollywood musicals, especially An American in Paris, as it did on modern dance. [7]
A 1986 New York Times review of the video release of the film noted that Black Tights "had little success upon its release in 1962" but "is now a highly enjoyable record of Mr. Petit's contribution to ballet. And that is his ability to marry popular forms with a poetic realism." [8]
Three dancers who appear in the film—Dirk Sanders, Hans van Manen, and Gerard Lemaitre—went on to form the Netherlands Dance Theater. [8]
Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac was a French novelist, playwright, epistolarian, and duelist.
Renée Marcelle "Zizi" Jeanmaire was a French ballet dancer, actress and singer. She became famous in the 1950s after playing the title role in the ballet Carmen, produced in London in 1949, and went on to appear in several Hollywood films and Paris revues. She was the wife of dancer and choreographer Roland Petit, who created ballets and revues for her.
Cyrano de Bergerac is a play written in 1897 by Edmond Rostand. The play is a fictionalisation following the broad outlines of Cyrano de Bergerac's life.
Colette Janine Marchand was a French prima ballerina and actress. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1952 for her performance as Marie Charlet in Moulin Rouge, directed by John Huston.
Roland Petit was a French ballet company director, choreographer and dancer. He trained at the Paris Opera Ballet school, and became well known for his creative ballets.
Can-Can is a musical with music and lyrics by Cole Porter, and a book by Abe Burrows. The story concerns the showgirls of the Montmartre dance halls during the 1890s.
Cyrano is a musical with a book and lyrics by Anthony Burgess and music by Michael J. Lewis.
Le Jeune Homme et la Mort is a ballet by Roland Petit, choreographed in 1946 to Bach's Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor, BWV 582, with a one-act libretto by Jean Cocteau. It tells the story of a young man driven to suicide by his faithless lover. Sets were by Georges Wakhévitch and costumes variously reported as being by Karinska or Cocteau. Petit is purported to have created Le Jeune Homme et la Mort for his wife-to-be Zizi Jeanmaire, but it was danced by Jean Babilée and Nathalie Philippart at its 25 June 1946 premiere at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées with costumes by Tom Keogh.
Anything Goes is a 1956 American musical film directed by Robert Lewis, and starring Bing Crosby, Donald O'Connor, Zizi Jeanmaire, and Mitzi Gaynor. Adapted from the 1934 stage musical Anything Goes by Cole Porter, Guy Bolton, and P. G. Wodehouse, the film is about two entertainers scheduled to appear in a Broadway show who travel to Europe, where each discovers the perfect leading lady for the female role. Bing Crosby's character, Bill Benson, goes to England and meets Mitzi Gaynor's character Patsy Blair, and he signs her as the female lead. Meanwhile, Donald O'Connor's character, Ted Adams, travels to France and meets Jeanmaire's character, Gaby Duval, and he signs her to the same role. On the return voyage, with each man having brought his leading lady along, the Atlantic becomes a stormy crossing when each man must tell his discovery that she might not get the role.
Antoni Clavé was a Catalan master painter, printmaker, sculptor, stage designer and costume designer. He was nominated for two Academy Awards for his work on the 1952 film Hans Christian Andersen.
Roland Bertin was a French stage and film actor. He appeared in at least 100 films and television shows from 1970 onwards. Bertin died on 20 February 2024, at the age of 93.
Mischa Scorer is a British documentary film-maker.
Manuel Legris is a French ballet dancer. He was an étoile of the Paris Opera Ballet for 23 years. On September 1, 2010, he began direction of the Vienna State Ballet. He was appointed artistic director of La Scala Theatre Ballet in December 2020.
The Ballet National de Marseille is a dance company based in Marseille, France. The company combines modern dance and classical ballet.
Carmen is a ballet created by Roland Petit and his company 'Les Ballets de Paris' at the Prince's Theatre in London on 21 February 1949, which has entered the repertory of ballet companies in France and around the world.
Born Nina Rigmor Strom, Nina Stroganova was a prima ballerina with several ballet companies in the 1930s and 1940s.
Christiane Vaussard was a French ballet dancer, teacher and choreographer, and an Etoile with the Paris Opera Ballet.
Cyrano de Bergerac is a Franco-Italian silent romantic drama film directed by Augusto Genina in 1922 based on the 1897 play of the same name by Edmond Rostand. Genina began filming in 1922, at age 30, with the help of his cousin Mario Camerini, but its release was delayed by the colorization of the film.
Pierre Pradier is a French classical pianist.
Irène Lidova was a Russian-French dance critic, writer, presenter and producer. She worked in fashion journalism for the magazine Vu before reviewing dance for the weekly literary publication Marianne. Lidova worked as an organiser for concert performances and co-established the Les Ballets des Champs-Elysées in 1945. She joined Roland Petit's Les Ballets de Paris-Roland Petit in 1948 and then became an associate of Milorad Mišković's small dance company in 1956. Lidova also contributed to dance magazines and wrote 27 texts for the dance photographer's Serge Lido's 27 published albums. She was named Chevalier in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1979.