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Ballet
Books&Other Works
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The
Gilded Bat
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The
Lavender Leotard
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The Gilded Bat, first published in 1966, tells the story of the rise and subsequent, dreadful demise of Maudie Splaytoe, a ballerina. Incidentally, Gorey dedicated the book to Diana Adams, his "favorite dancer of all time." Gorey himself makes an appearance in The Gilded Bat as the character of the unfriendly Baron de Zabrus. Many readers remember the book for the literary content, such as: ""Maudie was only five when she was discovered gazing at a dead bird by Madame Trepidovska." Compared by some reviewers to a Gothic novel, this book was considered by many to be one of Gorey's most somber pieces, and one of his best. Nevertheless, it seems that there is never one correct interpretation of a Gorey work. During his stays in Cape Cod, Gorey liked to stage small productions of his books, and wrote, directed, cast, and designed them all. He chose mostly non-professional actors, and, as he said, "...always [did] goofy casting. For instance, when we did The Gilded Bat, which is my ballet piece, I had Maudie Splaytoe, the ballerina, played by a young black man who was six-foot-four. He was absolutely hilarious." Another artistic group, the company Ballet West, became interested in Gorey's work as well. Composer Peter Golub wrote the music, and Ballet West danced The Gilded Bat, at the Kennedy Center.
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The Lavender Leotard, or, Going a Lot to the New York City Ballet was published in 1973. Gorey himself insisted on hand-painting the infamous leotards on the cover of each one of 1100 first editions, in order to achieve the exact shade of lavender. The characters in The Lavender Leotard are frail and sensitively drawn, most notably the three serious, well-dressed children attending to the story. The Lavender Leotard is a minute caricature of several decades of the New York City Ballet, complete with personalities, events and even atmospheres. from a review for The Lavender Leotard: "Gorey works with a delicate, nervous line. In Lavender Leotard he creates pages of sensitive, helpless bodies with their own unballetic grace. These frail people have no physical clout whatsoever; they seem held together only bey their extreme raffinesse. It's interesting to compare the delicacy and frailty of The Lavender Leotard to the finely etched, but chunkily muscled dancers in The Gilded Bat...Gorey recreates a world. Caricaturist not of personalities, but of events and ambiances, he chronicles the company's distinctive foibles, faults which have somehow become endearing to those of us who've seen the New York City Ballet through its lean years as well as the fat. There is its inability to cope with costumes and scenery, beginning with the poverty-stricken leotard and blue cyclorama days, when the company was rich only in aesthetic--'Don't you feel the whole idea of sets and costumes is vulgar?' Deadpan, Gorey notes the chronic and incredible misuse of scenery: the Novice, dressed in her intestinal thing, with Nora's wet-locked hairdo, says to the G-stringed male bug she is about, somewhat reluctantly, to devour: 'Just once we could use the Serenade costumes and the backdrop from Lilac Garden.' Of course, Gorey can't describe--only the actual experience could--just how beautiful and exciting those fifty seasons were. But he details everything around the beauty and excitement, which is enough to evoke it again for each of us, in the mind's eye, the gut, the secret heart, or wherever one's most vivid, passionate, lyric, and lavender images are stored." --Tobi Tobias, "Balletgorey," Dance Magazine January 1974 |
an
alternate cover for The Gilded Bat.|
other
works
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| pLaYs: |
| Gorey Stories (1978) was a theatrical adaptation of his work. Gorey says he "had nothing to do with it," in terms of production. The play opened and closed on Broadway in one night. |
| Tinned Lettuce was a play Gorey wrote and designed. |
| Try, Try! (1951) was written by Gorey's Harvard roommate Frank O'Hara; Gorey designed the sets. |
| Crazed Teacups was a "musical revue shown in seaside communities." Gorey wrote, directed and designed costumes and sets.. It was last performed in Provincetown, Massachusetts, in 1992. |
| Blithering Christmas: same as above. Written and directed by Gorey, with his costumes and sets. Last performed in Bourne, Massachusetts in 1993. |
| Dracula (also known as Edward Gorey's Dracula) Originally produced for summer stock theatre in Nantucket in 1973, this play was such a hit that Gorey's friend Harry Rigby (to much protest from all the Nantucket producers) got the rights to produce it on Broadway. The rights expired before Rigby could arrange the show, but John Wulp picked up where he left off. It was directed by Josh Logan and starred Frank Langella as Dracula. It opened on Halloween, 1977 on Broadway. Gorey had designed the sets for the Nantucket production and was horrified to see his artwork blown up to such a grand scale. However, he stayed with the production because, in his words, "...they offered [him] a lot of money." He said, "it just doesn't interest me very much." |
| Epistolary Play (1997) Gorey wrote and directed this play, again for summer theatre in Massachusetts. At the time, the play Love Letters, by A.R. Gurney, was very popular in Cape Cod. Love Letters involved two actors, a man and a woman, reading letters, and Gorey despised it, and decided to write something better. Gorey's exact thoughts on it: "Oh the hell with this. I'm going to write a two-character play that people can read sitting in chairs." |
| iLLuStrAtiOns: |
| Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats by T.S. Eliot |
| The Jumblies and The Dong With a Luminous Nose by Edward Lear |
| The Very Fine Clock by Muriel Spark |
| The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells |
| Countess Kade by Charlotte M. Young |
| Allegra Kent's Water Beauty Book, by Allegra Kent (and subsequent invitation to book-premiere party.) |
| assorted Fairy Books by Andrew Lang |
| The Turn of the Screw and The Aspern Papers by Henry James |
| Irene Iddesleigh by Amanda M'Kittrick Ros |
| The Salt Herring by Charles Cros |
| The Son of Martini Cookbook |
| Fletcher & Zenobia by Victoria Chess |
| cover art for biography of VR (Bunny) Lang |
| logo and animation for PBS series Mystery! |
| Samuel Beckett |
| John Ciardi |
| Saki |
| Aesop's Fables |
| Brer Rabbit |
| jackets for The Wolves of Willoughby Chase series by Joan Aiken |
| The House With a Clock in Its Walls by John Bellairs |
| The Mummy, the Will, and the Crypt by John Bellairs |
| The Drum, the Doll and the Zombie by JB |
| The Dark Secret of Weatherend by JB |
| The Doom of the Haunted Opera by JB |
| The Eyes of the Killer Robot by JB |
| The Ghost in the Mirror by JB |
| The Mansion in the Mist by JB |
| The Revenge of the Wizard's Ghost by JB |
| The Trolley to Yesterday by JB |
| The Shrinking of Treehorn |
| Sam and Emma |
| Red Riding Hood |
| baLLeTs |