THE DAY AFTER
We are reading the reviews in the newspapers eagerly, and in the specialist magazines that deal with dance - everyone is talking about it, about this extraordinary performance: a real success, a triumph!
Interviews with Madame Chloé, interviews with Romeo - judged 'divine' in his interpretation. For me, only a few lines. Yes, Gabriella-Giulietta, excellent performance but, as ever, a woman has to do anything twice as well as a man to be judged half as good.
But I have to settle for that, until yesterday I was a complete unknown, even if I have put all my soul, and especially my body, into achieving this little bit of fame - it has cost me sacrifices, voluntary sacrifices, but burning humiliations too, when I recall how I have had to trade in my dignity through the long, dark years of anonymity.
Et in cauda venenum, and there’s a sting in the tail ...
Certain newspapers, which defer to the patriarchy, have the headline: 'Juliet Scandal’, and they go on, 'Yesterday evening at the Teatro La Fenice, we witnessed such a show that calling it obscene is no exaggeration. Juliet, completely naked, hoisted up on a cross ... blasphemy ... pornography ... On stage there was an embrace ... The dancer rode the hero like a drunken bacchanal ... she devoured the raw meat with frenetic movements, prey to the ecstasy of an orgasm.’
Another rag, always priest-ridden, even publishes a photograph supposed to be of me, naked, posing in front of the water-gate of the theatre. No! I'm not the one there. You can’t just find a photo of a naked blonde who looks a bit like me, make a photomontage, and say it's me! Look at it well, that model has vulgar tattoos on her arms! It’s not me! Unless someone has stuck them on me while I was hugging my beloved Romeo ... So, don’t believe what they say about you, just believe what you know: you are not guilty of anything, nor are you dirty, nor provocative. Nor are you less important than he is, you’re not inferior. Nor are you a liar, a hysterical woman, a beast. Nor are you little, fragile, insignificant... You are what you choose to be!
Repeat performances follow from day to day; in the afternoon the matinée for young people is staged, where I dance fully dressed. Queues for tickets at the box office are already forming at the first light of day in the square in front of the theater.
The poisonous polemic that exploded in the pro-clerical sheets did nothing but trigger curiosity – I’d somewhat morbid curiosity. Spectators, even ones who wouldn’t normally dream of coming to a ballet are now queuing to get hold of a ticket. Success is guaranteed!
The frontal attack that I’ve provoked immediately arouses a movement of solidarity, both among my fellow dancers, and especially in Madame Chloé and Ruslan, who has defended my honour with a drawn sword! Also Frau Helga and the Director have exerted themselves in singing my praises.
It has also stoked up the interest of the national press. A well-known television journalist has asked me to give an interview, a short film will be broadcast this evening, during which I shall have to answer some of his questions, as well as a longer interview that will give me the opportunity to go more deeply into the several artistic aspects of my interpretation, and this will then be turned into a full-length documentary feature.