“Moral kitsch & standing ovations,” by Max L. Feldman

“Moral kitsch & standing ovations,” by Max L. Feldman

At the Wiener Staatsoper this spring, George Balanchine’s Divertimento No. 15 and Merce Cunningham’s Summerspace supported Pathétique, the Staatsballett director Martin Schläpfer’s take on Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6. But Balanchine, representing swish uptown modernism, and Cunningham, the shadowy chain-smoking ennui of the downtown avant-garde, seemed less like context than energy sources from which Schläpfer’s new creation borrows its effect.…