Camille Bacon-Smith

Philadelphia

UPenn. scholar/writer/editor/francophile. Dance reviewer for Broad Street Review. Photo is Monet's house at Giverny! Occasionally Curt Benjamin.

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Articles

Philadelphia Ballet presents August Bournonville’s La Sylphide

3 days ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

August Bournonville’s La Sylphide, created for the Royal Danish Ballet in 1836 and performed by the Philadelphia Ballet at the Academy of Music (May 8-11, 2025) marks a historical shift from Classical themes to eerie tales of mystical creatures and untamed emotions. This is not the first of the Romantic fairytale ballets. It isn’t even the first La Sylphide; that honor goes to Filippo Taglioni, whose creation for his daughter, the famed ballerina Marie Taglioni, caught Bournonville’s eye.
Roger Lee Dance Company presents Bloom

4 weeks ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

Roger Lee Dance Company is returning to the Performance Garage with the premiere of Bloom for two nights in April, the 18th and 19th. I first met Lee in 2022, when he was doing press relations for the Philadelphia Ballet, helping to coordinate panel discussions with Black men in ballet. But he’s been a part of the dance world since he was 13 and performing on local tv.
Philadelphia Dance Projects presents Dance Up Close: Seeds and Sounds…

1 month ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

BSR publishes on a weekly schedule, with an email newsletter every Wednesday and Thursday morning. There’s no paywall, and subscribing is always free. Choreographic collaborations Apr 07, 2025 | | 3 minute read This season, Philadelphia Dance Projects’ Dance Up Close series invites performers to think about collaborations in their own work and to invite a second group to share the spotlight.
The month in Philly Dance: April 2025

1 month ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

Kayliani Sood & Allison Smith: Jumper CablesWednesday April 2, and Thursday April 3, 2025, 7:00pmChrist Church Neighborhood House Theater, 20 North American Street, PhiladelphiaThis season, the Philadelphia Dance Project’s midweek Dance Up Close series is focusing on collaborations. Dancers and choreographers will work together and invite a second collaboration to share the bill with them.
Philadelphia Ballet presents Boléro, Water Dances, and Dance Card

1 month ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

BSR publishes on a weekly schedule, with an email newsletter every Wednesday and Thursday morning. There’s no paywall, and subscribing is always free. A triple bill of intense dance Mar 25, 2025 | | 4 minute read March has been a big month for the Philadelphia Ballet. The company held a topping-out ceremony to celebrate lifting the final I-beam to complete the structural skeleton of its long-awaited building on Broad Street.
The duality and musicality of Philadelphia Ballet’s Swan Lake

2 months ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

Musicality of the swansThis year, Golz is taking on one of the great challenges in classical ballet: the dual roles of the white swan, Odette, and the black swan, Odile. The dancing is complex, and then there is the acting. The swan-women are fantasy characters, but we have to believe their emotions are real. “You are really digging through your soul,” Golz said.
Alvin Ailey American Dance Company returns to the Academy of Music

2 months ago | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

The Jamison legacy Ailey created Cry in 1971 as a solo piece for his mother’s birthday, and maybe a bit for Jamison as well. We had a small sample of the piece danced by Jacquelin Harris, Samantha Figgins, and Caroline T. Dartey in those memorable white leotards and ruffled white skirts (by designer A. Christina Giannini). Each woman performed a short bit of the solo and then came together in a trio that spun across the stage, their skirts flaring out like flowers.
Chris Davis presents One-Man Nutcracker 2024

Dec 16, 2024 | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

We first see Davis in a maestro’s tail coat over white tights and tee shirt, his back to us as he leads an imaginary orchestra in the overture playing on the sound system. But he soon discards the coat for a Matryoshka doll of nested story-telling, performed sometimes in front of a white screen and sometimes as a shadow-play behind it.
PHILADANCO! presents Our Voices, Our Choices…This is Us!

Dec 10, 2024 | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

World-premiere Endings Commissioned pieces can be a gamble, especially with a choreographer who is creating on a full company for the first time, but when it works, you can catch lightning in a bottle. PHILADANCO! caught the lightning with Martha Nichols’s An Acceptance of Necessary Endings. The piece followed the course of endings in the abstract, from loss to acceptance. Nichols seamlessly blended contemporary dance with a mix of styles that brought the African roots of hip hop to the fore.
Meet the young Philly singers who help make The Nutcracker magical

Dec 3, 2024 | broadstreetreview.com | Camille Bacon-Smith

BSR publishes on a weekly schedule, with an email newsletter every Wednesday and Thursday morning. There’s no paywall, and subscribing is always free. The voices behind the Philadelphia Ballet’s “Waltz of the Snowflakes” Dec 03, 2024 | | 6 minute read In an era where technology is increasingly standing in for human performers, the Philadelphia Ballet’s Nutcracker has a secret weapon: two choirs of real Philly youngsters sing the snowflakes.