Alexandra Jacobs at the NYT:
The choreographer’s collaborations were top-notch: the sculptor Isamu Noguchi; the composer Samuel Barber; and the designer Halston. Learning how she drew inspiration from so many disparate cultures (Greek, Indigenous, biblical) — with occasional gross insensitivity — one begins to realize that the term “modern dance,” like “classical music,” is if not a misnomer, then a massive oversimplification.
Critics could be “uncomprehending and denunciatory”; the public, “baffled but moved in some way they do not understand.” But Graham early on achieved one of the clearest marks of success: She was parodied. (By Fanny Brice, no less. And who can forget Robin Williams’s rapid-fire tour of American dance forms in “The Birdcage”?) Should she have gotten a piece of the Pulitzer that the composer Aaron Copland picked up for their ballet, “Appalachian Spring”? You bet your bottom Barbie.
more here.