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Two Cuban sisters, principal
dancers at two U.S. companies
By Kim Curtis, Associated
Press Writer. Gainesville
Sun, FL, December 4, 2005.
Lorena Feijoo, bold and dramatic, dances
on the West Coast. Lorna Feijoo, graceful
and elegant, dances on the East Coast.
Somehow, despite their artistic differences,
both sisters typify the style and training
of the National Ballet of Cuba, which has
become known for producing some of today's
most talented and highly sought dancers.
And in the rarefied world of ballet, it's
uncommon, if not remarkable, to find two
siblings performing as principal dancers
with major companies at the same time. But
Lorena and Lorna Feijoo are anything but
average.
Trained by Alicia Alonso, the longtime
legendary artistic director of the National
Ballet of Cuba, the sisters are regarded
as two of the finest ballerinas among an
abundance of Cuban-trained talent. And as
Russian dancers such as Rudolph Nureyev
and Mikhail Baryshnikov have defined ballet
since the 1970s, Spanish-speaking countries
now dominate, particularly Cuba.
The Feijoos aren't the only dancing siblings
to star in the ballet world. Maria and Marjorie
Tallchief performed in the 1940s and 1950s;
Gelsey and Johnna Kirkland and fellow Americans
Lew, Harold and William Christensen, in
the 1970s; Daniel and Joseph Duell in the
1980s; and Czech-born brothers Otto and
Jiri Bubenicek are currently dancing in
Hamburg, Germany.
Lorena, 35, joined San Francisco Ballet
in 1999 and is considered the more fiery,
dramatic, passionate performer. Lorna, 31,
joined Boston Ballet in 2003. She's generally
thought of as more lyrical, dainty, soft.
However, both women are reluctant to make
such generalizations about each other and
both insist that they don't compete with
each other.
"My sister is my inspiration,"
says Lorna in an interview from Boston where
her season recently opened with "Cinderella."
"We don't try to do the same things.
I love how she does and she loves how I
do. ... We are really different and similar
at the same time."
While it's impressive that both sisters
became accomplished dancers, it's not surprising
they were drawn to the stage. Their mother,
Lupe Calzadilla, danced in the National
Ballet corps, while the wardrobe mistress
baby-sat her daughters backstage. Their
father, Jose Lorenzo Feijoo, is an actor
who lives in Mexico.
Lorena believes dancing is in her DNA.
"It's a little bit in your cells,"
she says during a break in a San Francisco
rehearsal room. She's tiny, much smaller
than she appears on stage, with a heart-shaped
face and dark, wide-set eyes. "Our
country was a mixture of Spanish with the
flamenco dancing, then they brought the
African slaves. ... We are the product of
the mix of two great cultures that love
music and dancing."
Both women are quick to credit their world-renowned
training in Havana. Lorena says she knew
when she was 2 that she wanted to dance
and she entered the National Ballet school
at 9. Calzadilla tried to steer the younger
sister away from ballet and toward modern
dance, reluctant to put the girls in direct
competition. But Lorna didn't listen. She
sneaked off to an audition at 10 and was
quickly accepted into the national school.
Under Alonso's strict tutelage, both girls
received a mixture of Russian, French, American
and Cuban ballet training. And they learned
more than dance steps: They took lessons
in piano, French, choreography, painting
and folk dancing.
"We are fortunate because we get this
very complete education that, at the time,
is overwhelming," Lorena says. "Imagine
a kid that's 9 years old carrying all the
books from regular school like literature
and math and Spanish and then doing all
the extra from the ballet school."
Lorena, always a perfectionist, won her
first ballet competition at 13. In 1988,
she joined the National Ballet and started
doing solo and principal roles after about
a year in the corps. At the time, the company's
co-founder, Alonso, was still dancing, along
with a generation of older ballerinas who
made it tough for Lorena to snag the more
challenging, meatier roles.
So, at 20, she left Cuba. While she didn't
defect, Alonso wasn't pleased and has since
prevented her from dancing with the company.
Lorena performed for a time in Mexico and
Belgium. In 1995, she came to the United
States, planning to dance with the Los Angeles
Ballet, which disbanded before it ever took
to the stage because of financial problems.
When the Joffrey Ballet offered Lorena a
slot, she took it and stayed in Chicago
four years.
The first time Chicago Tribune dance writer
Sid Smith saw Lorena, she was dancing the
Nutcracker's Sugar Plum Fairy.
"She just blew me away," he says.
"She did the whole time she was here.
I could never say enough about her. My take
on her? She's just got it all - strength,
form, perfect positioning, terrific acrobatic
strength. ... She charms the audience without
overkill. She just hits all the ballet buttons."
Lorena left the Joffrey because she missed
performing the classics such as "Romeo
and Juliet" and "Giselle."
With the much-beloved Evelyn Cisneros and
Sabina Allemann both retiring that year,
San Francisco's artistic director, Helgi
Tomasson, was quick to snatch up Lorena,
who had offered to accept a soloist's contract
until he had room for her.
"She has the quality of when she enters
a stage, she takes charge. Eyes go to her,"
Tomasson says. "She's very energetic.
She has a charisma about her. She moves
very fluidly in a big way. ... She's a hard
worker whose exuberance transcends on stage."
Lorna took a much different path. She was
accepted into Cuba's National Ballet at
18, rising through the ranks after her sister
had left. She didn't move abroad until 2002.
With much of her homegrown talent scattered
across the globe, Alonso offered Lorna and
her husband and fellow dancer, Nelson Madrigal,
an open invitation to perform in Cuba anytime.
"Cuba had many, many dancers,"
Lorna explains, her English not as smooth
as her sister's, but her voice, nearly identical.
"My sister was young. She was a great
dancer. When she left, it was better for
us. ... In Cuba now, it's more open."
But because the couple hasn't yet been
issued their green cards, the U.S. government
prohibits them from traveling abroad.
Los Angeles Times dance critic Lewis Segal
first saw Lorna perform in Havana in 1978.
He also saw her on several U.S. tours of
"Cinderella" and "Giselle"
before she joined Boston Ballet; he sees
Lorena frequently. He calls the sisters
very "well-rounded, accomplished women."
"Lorna is more naturally the dainty,
classical, delicate flower. Lorena is the
hot-blooded, tempestuous, dramatic firebrand,"
he says, noting that those generalizations
may be based more on their companies and
how they're cast, rather than their talents.
San Francisco has a lot of woman who can
be delicate and refined. They don't need
Lorena for that. They can release her to
other challenges."
Boston's Artistic Director Mikko Nissinen
says he's thrilled to have Lorna dancing
with his company. Alonso has a knack for
turning out many extremely talented men,
but fewer women, and he considers Lorna
and her sister among the finest.
Four of Boston's nine principal dancers
are Cuban-trained.
"Cuban style is ... the top of the
heap," Segal says. "For excitement
and technical flash, it's the epitome."
The Tribune's Smith has heard rumors about
a ballet being developed for both sisters
to perform together, which he and many others
would enjoy seeing. Lorna says she knows
of no such ballet.
The sisters performed publicly together
for the first time last year in "Swan
Lake." It was a sold-out, one-night-only
performance in which Lorna danced Odette
- a princess who is human at night, but
turned into a swan during the day by an
evil sorcerer - and Lorena danced the role
of Odile, the sorcerer's daughter. One dancer
usually dances both roles. Madrigal, a principal
for Boston Ballet, partnered both.
They were set to dance together again in
October at the Hispanic Heritage Awards
in Washington, D.C., but were sidelined
by Lorna's pulled hamstring.
Lorena says she considers herself lucky
that she hasn't been plagued by serious
injuries, but says it's unfair that a dancer's
body begins failing as she learns more about
her art.
"I'm not going to die when I stop
dancing," she says. "I love dancing
and I am sure I will greatly miss some aspects
of it, like performing for an audience or
getting the last applause or getting people
at the end of the show telling you you were
magnificent and we'll remember this performance
for the rest of our lives."
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