The audience couldn’t let go of Natalia Osipova and David Hallberg on Monday night at American Ballet Theatre — even though they were due to return in 15 minutes. The two were so magical, they won a curtain call in the middle of a tragedy: Kenneth MacMillan’s time-tested “Romeo and Juliet,” a staple here for more than a quarter of a century.
As Shakespeare’s star-cross’d lovers, the pair gave their all — and at the first-act curtain, the audience wouldn’t stop applauding until they came out to acknowledge it.
Hallberg’s Romeo began as a jokester with sidekicks Mercutio and Benvolio, and he pursued another woman, Rosaline, as a lark. Osipova’s Juliet was playful, streaking around her nurse like a boisterous child.
Thrilled by her first ball, she danced with Paris, her intended, rapturously at first. But even as she fell into his arms, her face clouded. She instinctively turned away from the wrong man — and there was Romeo.
Adolescence got left behind, and their romance escalated to all or nothing, with huge gestures and open-mouthed but silent howls of despair. It was almost too much, and they took liberties with the choreography. But that unorthodoxy painted their characters. This Juliet was no tragic waif: She plotted and schemed to be with Romeo, and found her strength in impetuous decisions.
The real magic happened when they were together. Hallberg whipped around Osipova so expertly that she could remain balanced on her toes until she collapsed on him with wild abandon. More than that, their dumbstruck glances and passionate kisses went beyond chemistry to communion.
But you can’t be great in a vacuum. This ensemble cast is one of the company’s most deft. This season, Sascha Radetsky has been racking up one fascinating interpretation after another. His Tybalt was a Ted Bundy-ish sociopath who fiddled with his sword the way many of us play with our cellphones. The layered acting pulled you in all directions at once; he arrived comically smirking and drunk to confront Mercutio, but things quickly turned deadly.
Alas, Hallberg and Osipova won’t dance as the lovers again this season, but there’s still a chance for lightning to strike twice: The Royal Ballet’s stellar Alina Cojocaru performs as a guest tonight with her fiancé, Johan Kobborg. It will be totally different, but it could be just as miraculous.