DO40 EVENTS FOR THE WINTER/SPRING 2017 SEASON!  

              
DO40 presents our Spring Panel:
 “Over 40” Years of Dance -  and Entertainment!
The History and Legacy of Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo
Wednesday, March 15, 2017 – 8pm
St. Luke’s Theater, 308 West 46th Street, NYC

Dancers Over 40 is pleased to feature “The Trocks” (as they are called) for our first panel of 2017.  They have been in existence for “over 40” years, and have a rich history which we would like them to share with our audience!  There will be video and performance and a cross-section of artists who have made The Trocks into a well established dance company, dedicated to the art of dance – and comic entertainment! 

The Troupe!  Photo:  Zoran Jelenic

Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo was founded in 1974 by a group of ballet enthusiasts for the purpose of presenting a playful, entertaining view of traditional, classical ballet in parody form and en travesti, Les Ballets Trockadero first performed in the late-late shows in Off-Off Broadway lofts. The TROCKS, as they are affectionately known, quickly garnered a major critical essay by Arlene Croce in The New Yorker, and combined with reviews in The New York Times  and The Village Voice, established the Company as an artistic and popular success.  By mid 1975, The Trocks’ inspired blend of their loving knowledge of dance, their comic approach, and the astounding fact that men can, indeed, dance  en pointe  without falling flat on their faces, was being noted beyond New York.  Articles and notices in publications such as Variety, Oui, The London Daily Telegraph, as well as a Richard Avedon photo essay in Vogue, made the Company nationally and internationally known.

The original concept of Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo has not changed. It is a Company of professional male dancers performing the full range of the ballet and modern dance repertoire, including classical and original works in faithful renditions of the manners and conceits of those dance styles. The comedy is achieved by incorporating and exaggerating the foibles, accidents, and underlying incongruities of serious dance.  The fact that men dance all the parts–heavy bodies delicately balancing on toes as swans, sylphs, water sprites, romantic princesses, angst-ridden Victorian ladies–enhances rather than mocks the spirit of dance as an art form, delighting and amusing the most knowledgeable, as well as novices, in the audiences. For the future, they plan to continue their mission: to bring the pleasure of dance to the widest possible audience. They will, as they have done for forty years, “Keep on Trockin’.”