Ballerina

The real benefits of being a film critic are not the ones people usually envision. It's not the chance to be among the first to see big studio blockbusters like "Wolverine." Rather, it's the opportunity to see unapologetically small films that don't last long in theaters though they offer a completely satisfying experience. Such a film is "Ballerina."

REMEMBERING HER DAYS AS A young girl--"No one would have accused me of being a happy child"--Leslie Abramson has an enduring memory of her favorite means of escape. After school, at the corner luncheonette, she'd buy button candies and chocolate marshmallow twists (two for a nickel) and spend hours at the comic-book racks, reading. Mad magazine was good for a giggle. But it was the spooky stuff, the horror comics like "Tales From the Crypt," that she really loved. And hated, too.

In the new and endearing movie "Billy Elliot," an 11-year-old boy from northeastern England decides, against all odds, that he wants to be a ballet dancer. His widowed father and older brother, both tough coal miners on strike, at first hate the very idea of Billy's dancing, believing that it means he's unmanly. But Billy, a tough and stubborn kid, perseveres and, in the end, reaches his goal. Is this a likely story?

Herbert and Nora Kaye Ross' eclectic collection--containing everything from blue chip artists' prints to ceramic cheese keepers and silver snuffboxes--will go on the auction block at 7:30 p.m. on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at Butterfield & Butterfield's new Los Angeles facility.

JUST hours before her first performance anywhere in more than 20 years, former ballet star Gelsey Kirkland is onstage at the Metropolitan Opera House, not only practicing her own moves but coaching American Ballet Theatre principal Irina Dvorovenko.

A top Russian ballerina, fired for being too heavy, lost a damages claim for $1 million against the chief of Moscow's Bolshoi Theater Thursday, Moscow media reported. Prima ballerina Anastasia Volochkova, fired by the theater in September for being too bulky for her partners to lift, sought the damages from the Bolshoi's general director, Anatoly Iksanov.

The next act of ballerina Anastasia Volochkova's battle with the Bolshoi will take place in court. Volochkova, who was fired from the Bolshoi Theater last month amid allegations that she was too heavy for male dancers to lift, has filed a lawsuit in a Moscow court seeking back pay and other damages, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.

In a change from its original plans, the Kirov Ballet has announced that Diana Vishneva will dance Nikiya in "La Bayadere" in its opening night performance Wednesday at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. The ballerina will also appear in the role Thursday and Sunday nights as initially announced. Her partner at all three performances will be Igor Zelinsky.

The Russian ballerina fired from the Bolshoi Theater and then rehired by court order was stripped of her passport and barred from going abroad amid a payment dispute over the renovation of her apartment. Anastasia Volochkova had her passport taken away by officials at Moscow's Vnukovo airport Monday as she was leaving for a tour in the former Soviet republic of Ukraine.

Russian ballerina Anastasia Volochkova -- fired from the Bolshoi Theater and then rehired by court order -- has sued the theater's director, seeking about $1 million in damages, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported. The report said Volochkova filed a lawsuit against Anatoly Iksanov, who dismissed her from the famed company last September in a contract dispute amid allegations that she was overweight. The Bolshoi reinstated her in late November after she won a lawsuit fighting her dismissal.