Benjamin Millepied Answers Questions About His New Post With Paris Opera Ballet

PARIS â€" The journalists who arrived this morning at the Palais Garnier for the news conference introducing Benjamin Millepied as the new director of dance at the Paris Opera were ushered into the grandly proportioned office of its general director, Nicolas Joel. “I am sure that Serge Lifar came in frequently through this door to demand more for his ballet company,” he said. Then he looked at Brigitte Lefèvre, who has directed the Paris Opera Ballet since 1995. “It’s a tradition that has continued.”

When Ms. Lefèvre retires in 2014, tradition will be in the hands of Mr. Millepied, the 35-year old choreographer and former New York City Ballet principal dancer, who was today formally confirmed as the company’s new director, to the surprise of many who expected a Paris Opera insider to get the job. Mr. Joel, speaking first, warmly praised Ms. Lefèvre for raising the stanard of the company and vastly broadening its repertoire, then added appreciation for Laurent Hilare, a former etoile who is Ms. Lefèvre’s deputy and who was considered a likely candidate.

“To be polite, we call ourselves ‘one of’ the best companies in the world,’ ” he said. “We are the best company in the world.”
Then Stephane Lissner, the incumbent general director who will take over from Mr. Joel in 2015, and who seems to have largely determined the choice of the new head of dance, took over. Mr. Lissner, who now heads La Scala, was brief, saying merely that he had met with nine candidates and that he had very quickly found a lively artistic rapport with Mr. Millepied, and a joint interest in a closer collaboration between the opera and dance departments.

Mr. Millepied seemed composed, if slightly nervous. As well he might have been, facing a room of French journalists to whom he is not just “Not From the Paris Opera,” but more or less an American since he mov! ed to New York at 16 to attend the School of American Ballet and spent his subsequent dancing career with City Ballet.

“This is an unexpected honor, a long-held dream,” he began. He set forth his ideas in general terms: to support Ms. Lefèvre’s policy of bringing contemporary choreographers to work with the Opera, but to focus strongly on new classical work. “I am passionate about ballet,” he said. “I want to see that technique being used and evolving.”

Mr. Millepied spoke also of his ambitions to create a structure to encourage would-be choreographers that sounded rather like City Ballet’s Choreographic Institute. “Artists study drawing; musicians study compositions; only choreographers are left alone to learn their craft,” he said.

“Ben, you are young,” Ms. Lefèvre said. ‘That will sort itself out.”

The questions from journalists were on the polite side. What did he think about the Nureyev versions of the big classical bllets that the Opera performs (Part of the Opera’s tradition, he’ll keep them. At least for now.) Will he bring an entourage (No.) How exactly would opera and ballet be linked (No concrete details revealed yet.) How long was his contract for (Open-ended.) And then, the question that everyone wanted to ask. Why had Mr. Lissner chosen an outsider Mr. Lissner dismissed the insider/outsider dichotomy, saying it was the vision of the candidate that mattered.

To everyone’s delight, Mr. Millepied’s wife, the actress Natalie Portman, was waiting outside after the conference. They embraced and went off with the full complement of directors to endorse another venerable French tradition: a good lunch.