Carmen Suite Ballet: A Redux with Caroline Ball

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Caroline Ball is a soon-to-be graduate sociology and dance major. For her Honors Thesis, she reinterpreted the world-famous Bizet opera turned ballet, Carmen Suite, with help from her faculty sponsor, professor and director of the dance program Thomas Vacanti. She sat down to reflect on the immense project she undertook and the lessons she learned from her creative portfolio thesis.

How was the performance? How are you feeling afterwards?

I'm feeling really good. The shows went really smoothly — a couple technical hiccups here and there — but that's to be expected with these kinds of independent productions. But other than that, everything went really great. I am really proud of my cast. They did a really great job pulling through an awkward tech schedule. I'm really proud of how it turned out, and I'm really glad I decided to go and do the talkback.

What is a talkback?

An artist talkback normally happens after the show. We give people a couple minutes to stretch, we let the performers get out of costume and then we come back. We introduce ourselves, I talk a little bit about my process, how I kind of got started with it and why it's so important. Then we open up the floor for questions from the audience.

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Ball (left) and members of the cast answering questions from the audience.

Sometimes the questions were for me, and sometimes they were for the cast. People asked why I made this kind of decision or why I made this choice for costumes. Since Ruby was there, we were able to bring her on stage and have her talk about the process of costumes and makeup (Editor’s note: Ruby is Ball’s dramaturg). There must have been a lot of music lovers in the audience — we had a lot of questions about the score. People asked why I chose the Shchedrin version versus the Bizet version of the opera, and just a lot of really interesting questions about the process and what it took to get these characters into character. And it was a really good turnout, and I'm really proud of how it went.

How has the post-show experience gone for you?

There was definitely a post-show slump. I’d open my laptop and wonder, 'What do I do now?' My time had been filled with meetings, sending emails, and coordinating everything. I was floating on the high of it all — it went so great, and now it’s done. It took me about a week to get the ball rolling on finishing the final manuscript about the show for my thesis. The past few weeks have been devoted to sitting down and reflecting on the show, which has been quite difficult.

What are some of the reflections you’ve come to?

My goal was never necessarily to challenge gender norms in the sense that I was doing something completely new and different. I was reflecting on my original goal with my advisor, he asked me about it, and I explained that I wanted to see something different on stage—something I had never seen before. I feel like I definitely achieved that. I received a lot of feedback from people who thought it was unique, and that they had never seen anything like it before. 

This is something that the top ballet companies would never produce, and I think that’s a feat in itself – I’ve done something nobody else has done before.

But there is also the flip side when reflecting. I think I highlighted the role of gender performance in ballet, but I don’t think I challenged this role. I put my lead, who is male-presenting, in feminine clothes and choreographed a feminine style of dancing for him. However, I think I was able to showcase the absurdity of it all — every day, we do certain things in a certain way to portray a certain gender. I feel like I really honed in on this aspect, especially with the costumes and choreography.

What does the future hold for Caroline Ball?

I’m not entirely sure yet, but I’m applying to grad schools for arts administration and would love to be a director one day. I’m still figuring out what that career trajectory looks like, but we’ll take it one step at a time. 

I loved the job — the stress, the coordinating, and the planning.