“Everyone’s beautiful at the ballet.” And this new, ravishingly filmed and acted limited series, “Etoile,” is no exception. Words fail me in describing how these wonderfully immersive and stunningly filmed episodes have affected me. I am and always have been a fan of dance, whether ballet, modern or jazz, and regretted that my lack of coordination left me at the altar at which I worship. Literally erupting from the imaginations of Daniel and Amy Sherman-Paladino, who also directed most of the episodes, the dialogue is as crisp, trenchant and sparkling as you’ve come to expect. Casually dropped cultural references contribute greatly to rounding out the characters’ backgrounds and unique worldviews. They have created a world completely separate from “The Gilmore Girls” and “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” and let us in to discover how dance is all-consuming.
Executive Director of the Paris Opera Ballet, Genevieve (Charlotte Gainsbourg), and her counterpart in New York at the Metropolitan Ballet Theatre, Jack (Luke Kirby) are meeting at Lincoln Center to discuss strategies to bring back the audiences that disappeared during the COVID-19 pandemic. Both world-renowned companies are failing financially and something drastic must be done. Neither can afford the kind of marketing campaign necessary to get those seats filled and, despite world-class dancers and choreographers, there is stagnation. Genevieve proposes a radical solution. They should do a company swap, trading some of their stars for a year to reinvigorate their companies and give them a huge worldwide marketing push. It’s a great idea but, Jack points out, neither company has the resources for the marketing, transportation and housing that such a proposal would cost. But Genevieve has thought it all out and has found a donor willing to underwrite everything. Crispin Shamblee (Simon Callow), aka the devil himself, is eager to fund both companies. Not only is he a lifelong fan of the dance, but his reputation as a robber baron trafficking in arms, weapons and as a general destroyer of the environment could use a bit of burnishing. It worked for the Kochs and, for a time, with the Saklers. Why not him? Jack, furious that he has been backed into a corner, is outraged at the prospect, one he realizes he can’t refuse if he wants to save his company.
Both companies are full of international stars and there is a lot to trade. Genevieve’s “gets” are Jack’s brilliant but eccentric (to put it mildly) choreographer, one of his lead male dancers and, curiously enough, a young, emerging dancer that Genevieve had previously cut from her company. The whys and wherefores of this talented young dancer, Mishi, will develop over time. Jack, however, demands the impossible and gets it: Cheyenne, the world’s most famous and talented prima ballerina. Her name alone sells out houses. Genevieve will have hell to pay with the government, the company’s source of funding, and Jack will have to cope with the impossible dancer, one with whom blows are sure to occur.
“Etoile” is one of the most perfect, and I don’t use that term lightly, pilots I’ve ever seen. The Palladinos introduce almost all the characters in the first episode, each with his or her personalities and quirks fully on view. These complex individuals will grow over time as dance and its rigors, psychological and physical, are superimposed over their characters, growing stronger, more complicated and at times, more difficult. You will know them from the very beginning and be amazed at the growth that takes place as they succeed, as they fail and as they adjust to their circumstances. As is true for the dancers, it is true for Jack and Genevieve. They all go into the fire voluntarily and come out alive, most the better for it.
The cast is fantastic and relatable, even in such a rarefied atmosphere. Luke Kirby (a graduate of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”), all tousled hair, charming with boyish good looks that women find hard to resist, is the personification of a tightly wound New Yorker trying to keep the company together, battling a board more interested in commerce than art. Charlotte Gainsbourg is all arms and legs, sometimes in sync other times not unlike a colt trying to find its footing. Don’t be confused, however, as the interim director she can be silently ruthless, leading with her seemingly ingenuous manner. What a coup to get this international star, daughter of Jane Birkin, into American series television. But this is just the beginning of an intriguing cast. David Haig, the glorious British character actor, plays Jack’s artistic director with aplomb and inappropriate anecdotes. Yannick Truesdale, the quirky, snobbish concierge in “The Gilmore Girls,” is Raphael, Genevieve’s second in command. His comic timing, always with a straight face, is a joy to be anticipated during his scenes, as few and far apart as they are. He’s as droll in French as he is in English. Watch for Palladino favorite Kelly Bishop in the role of Jack’s high-society mother.
“Etoile” is as much about the drama as it is about the dance, and most of the core background players are professional ballet dancers who lend credence to the choreography, some of which was created by Christopher Wheeldon, one of the most famous choreographers working today. Two of New York City Ballet’s most famous stars, Robbie Fairchild and Tiler Peck, have small roles in this dramedy, adding wry humor and spectacular dancing. Taïs Vinolo, Mishi, the dismissed and then reclaimed dancer, and LaMay Zhang, Susu, a preteen student taken under the wing of the famous Cheyenne, are both highly trained ballerinas and have a marvelous presence on screen, developing exponentially as time goes on. Ivan du Pontavice plays Gabin, the needy bad boy of the Paris company who truly believes he deserves more recognition than he has yet earned. The personification of a legend in his own mind, his maturity will come slowly, but come it will with the choreography of Tobias played by Gideon Glick, another “Mrs. Maisel” transplant. Glick is all eccentric tics and on-the-spectrum quirks adding to his eventual blossoming. Another trained ballet dancer, David Alvarez, who recently starred as Bernardo in Stephen Spielberg’s “West Side Story,” plays Cheyenne’s personally chosen partner, a man with a complicated history, one that gets more and more complex with time.
Veteran British character actor Simon Callow effectively imbues Crispin Shamblee with the enormous charm of a self-made billionaire trafficking in society’s darkest corners. All sweetness and light, he’s a viper waiting to strike. And last, but most definitely the star most riveting to watch is Lou de Laâge as Cheyenne. De Laâge originally trained as a dancer, making her mesh all the better with her dance double. Her ballet is as compelling as her portrayal of this truly incendiary character. There is no way to take your eyes off her, whether dancing or exploding over her latest eco venture. Her talent sends a shiver down your spine in anticipation of her next move. Saying, “I don’t love to dance but it’s who I am, so I have no choice,” she has let us into her world, if only momentarily.
“Etoile” excels in painting the internecine battles centered around credit, roles and personality differences when casting is involved. But even with all the fabulous actors, dancers and storylines, what sets this series most apart from others is the photography. Filmed on location at Lincoln Center and the Opera Garnier in Paris, and other sites substituting for them, “Etoile” lets you into backstage domains exclusive to the dance world. Filming dance is notoriously difficult. Do you focus on individuals? Do you center the camera above the dancers executing their jumps and pirouettes? When do you concentrate on faces or arms or legs in extension? There are so many angles, almost acrobatic in nature, that filming must be done with multiple, possibly dozens of cameras looking for the right exposure or viewpoint and then editing it all together to make a seamless whole. The binational camera crews, led by cinematographers M. David Mullen and Alex Nepomniaschy, did just that, and better than I’ve ever seen before. After you’ve enjoyed the drama and the characters, go back and watch the series again, just for the dance. It will make you soar and you’ll not see better.
The Palladinos are a truly gifted writing couple, but it was Amy who had to choose between dance and writing. She chose writing, but they have now given us a view into the dance she loved and chose to give up. Thank you.
In English and French with English subtitles.
Now streaming on Amazon.
Neely Swanson spent most of her professional career in the television industry, almost all of it working for David E. Kelley. In her last full-time position as Executive Vice President of Development, she reviewed writer submissions and targeted content for adaptation. As she has often said, she did book reports for a living. For several years she was a freelance writer for “Written By,” the magazine of the WGA West, and was adjunct faculty at USC in the writing division of the School of Cinematic Arts. Neely has been writing film and television reviews for the “Easy Reader” for more than 10 years. Her past reviews can be read on Rotten Tomatoes where she is a tomatometer-approved critic.
