I Was a Dancer - Jacques D'Amboise [73]
Since I wasn’t speaking to Carrie and had dumped my Italian trio, I began to hang out with Barbara Bocher, a teenage ballerina. Another corps de ballet girl, Allegra Kent, perhaps the youngest dancer on the tour, would tag along wherever Barbara and I went. Allegra drove me nuts.
It was my habit to gobble two or three full meals at a sitting—insalata, pasta, a main course (sometimes a second), followed by another round of insalata and pasta, then several desserts—always with a bottle of vino, though neither Barbara nor Allegra drank. Occasionally, as an epilogue, I’d order a third pasta. Barbara would order one sensible dish, then politely converse and wait for me to finish stuffing myself, planning to get a spoonful of one of my desserts. Allegra never said a word, except early on, when we first ordered, as the waiter would stand, expectantly. I would say, “So, Allegra, what are you going to have?” She would stare at me, and reply dramatically. “What do you mean?” I’d repeat, “I mean, what do you want to order? What are you going to eat?” She’d answer, “Oh, we’re eating?” Irritated, I’d run through the menu, describing the entrees I knew so well, and launch myself into a sales pitch. When I finally ran down, she would warble, “Nothing.” I’d bellow, “Come on! You have to eat something!” Allegra would then squeak out “Oh, alright, then, fagiolini senza burro”—green beans without butter. Convinced she meant to insult their menu, the Italian waiter was livid. She never relented. For three and a half months, all through Italy, she ate only plain, unseasoned vegetables. We got to calling her “Allegra Senza Burro.”
On tour with Allegra Kent (image credit 8.8)
… and with a pigeon, 1953 (image credit 8.9)
Shaun O’Brien would ask, “Hey, Daisy, who are you dancing with tonight?” “Senza Burro,” I’d reply, and the whole dressing room knew it was Allegra.
Trieste, a seaport on the Adriatic, was claimed for Yugoslavia by their Communist dictator, Marshal Tito. Behind the scenes, Austria was lobbying to make Trieste part of their country. The Italian newspapers countered, “Trieste belongs to Italy!” Since the Cold War was in full bloom, the U.S. government actively supported Italy. Most of the dockworkers of Trieste were communists and favored Yugoslavia, so strikes and protests agitated the city constantly, and the ensuing chaos generated riots on a regular schedule.
Posted on the bulletin board backstage at the theater, we’d find a notice, “Riots planned for tomorrow. Get to the theater early before matinee.” I remember walking down a bustling street on a Saturday around ten thirty a.m., and hearing the iron shutters and gates on storefronts being closed down behind me, “Bang! Bang!” The sound spread along the side streets, like cages slamming shut in prison cells, one after the other, throughout the city, and not a cop in sight. As I made my way to the stage door, I glanced back. People had vanished from the streets.
Inside the theater, everything was normal. Outside, thousands of protesters had materialized to sweep down the avenues, chanting and singing songs, waving placards and banners. Riots erupted when rival mobs crossed at intersections. The theater crew told us that, parked in lorries on side streets, the carabinieri—police—waited in case they were needed. Despite the emotional thunderstorms, it was all over within an hour. Stores reopened, our orchestra tuned up, and an enthusiastic citizenry discarded their picket signs and filled the theater for the matinee.
I left for Hollywood after the matinee. My last image: an exhausted Todd Bolender, hacking with bronchitis, stretched out on a wardrobe trunk, trying to catch his breath before his next entrance. Dancers were dropping like flies with injuries, illness, and exhaustion, and the tour had several weeks left to go. I felt like a deserter.
Carrie told me about the end of that tour, in Amsterdam, with a ballet company so depleted that when the choreography called for the entire