The Atlas

“We live in a world where amnesia is the most wished-for state. When did history become a bad word?”

“The New York City Ballet is always about the realm of possibilities, the realm of what the human body can do, what the human spirit can do. And it's about listening, it's about listening to remarkable music and how we respond to that.”

“It's amazing how a little tomorrow can make up for a whole lot of yesterday.”

“However, the moral center of New York City, I believe, is the New York City Ballet.”

“Plays have a celebratory nature that no other form has. Theater always meant celebration, a birthday, a reward for good grades. I felt at home in a theater. I loved being part of an audience. All the rules - the audience has to see the play on a certain date at a certain time in a certain place in a certain seat.”

“Does the New York City Ballet affect other places? Yeah, it lets people know they should come to New York.”

“Show business offers more solid promises than Catholicism.”

“People go to see beautiful paintings to see how much they cost. Wow. The practical value is that it shows you what the human spirit can do.”

“I think that every year that the New York City Ballet is alive is worthy of celebration. Because otherwise the terrible thing is just that we take it for granted.”

“And it is always Easter Sunday at the New York City Ballet. It is always coming back to life. Not even coming back to life - it lives in the constant present.”

“I think of the New York City Ballet as the Yankees without George Steinbrenner.”

“All the New York City Ballet does is hit beautiful home runs.”

“I ushered at the Shubert in New Haven during graduate school when plays en route to Broadway still went out of town to try out. I worked backstage at summer stock doing jobs from garbage man to strapping on Herbert Marshall's wooden leg to fixing Gloria Swanson's broken plumbing in her dressing room with her yelling at me as I worked the plunger.”

“I believe that the imagination is the passport we create to take us into the real world. I believe the imagination is another phrase for what is most uniquely us.”

“And what would be great numbers in a Broadway show are now on stage of the New York City Ballet.”

“What we're dealt with hopefully is two arms, two eyes, two legs, a head, a heart. The variations, the extensions, the possibilities of the human body, what that can do.”

“The life of a dancer is tragically short. What is remarkable about the New York City Ballet is that it makes us forget that. Because it keeps the ballet alive.”

“I like to ground plays in reality so they can jump higher. So we can account for the trampoline, so we can account for the leap.”