FALL RIVER LEGEND

Date of premiere: April 22, 1948. American Ballet Theatre.

Original cast: Alicia Alonso (Accused), Diana Adams (Mother), Muriel Bentley (Stepmother), Peter Gladke (Father), Ruth Ann Koesun (Accused as a Child) John Kriza (Pastor)

Music: Morton Gould

Running Time: 45 minutes

Cast: 3 female leads, 1 female soloist, 2 male leads, (Roles: The Accused, The Mother, The Stepmother, The Accused as a Child, The Father, The Pastor). 8 men, 8 women corps de ballet (Roles: Townsfolk, the “Nocturne pas de deux”).

Fall River Legend is based on the true story of Lizzie Borden, the Massachusetts spinster who was tried for the ax-murder of her father and stepmother. Although Lizzie was actually acquitted, in the ballet she is convicted and hanged. De Mille creates a portrait of a shy, sensitive but receptive girl, turned into a murderess by her father's abandonment in favor of his second wife, a jealous, manipulative woman who frustrates Lizzie's budding romance with her minister. Gothic in tone and deeply perceptive in its psychological depiction of the consequences of love thwarted,  Fall River Legend reveals a truth deeper than reality.

Cover Photo and above photo: Fall River Legend. Paris Opera Ballet. Laetitia Pujol (The Accused). Photo: ©Anne Deniau