‘Étoile’ review: It feels so good to have ballet and Amy Sherman-Palladino back Together
5/5 Luke Kirby looks
Bunheads was Amy Sherman-Palladino’s forray into the world of ballet. Albeit with a less high stakes look but it was a show that highlighted the allure of dance and was beautiful. Which is why I love Étoile and the grit the series has.
The series takes us into a partnership between the New York City Ballet and The Paris Opera Ballet. Both staples of dance are struggling in a post-COVID world and when they are both run by Crispin Shamblee (Simon Callow), the two companies swap talent to try and drive ticket sales. It means that complicated primadona Cheyenne Toussaint (Lou de Laâge) ends up working with Jack McMillian (Luke Kirby) in New York.
Cheyenne and Jack have a complicated past and it makes their working relationship tense. And that tension and chaotic energy that exists within both Jack’s company and Genevieve’s (Charlotte Gainsbourg) world in Paris is what makes this show a captivating watch from start to finish.
It has all the usual quirks of an Amy Sherman-Palladino and Dan Palladino venture: Quick dialogue, messy relationships, and mothers that make their children miserable at best. But I do love seeing how the duo navigate the dance world. Especially since it is a different kind of fast-pace, toxic energy than something like The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and the New York comedy scene.
Étoile does a brilliant job of navigating the brilliance of some talent with their difficult to please egos and the series being led by Kirby and Gainsbourg makes it an easy to watch ride (and you’ll probably want to rewatch it as soon as you’re done).
Luke Kirby at his neurotic best
Luke Kirby as an actor has an energy that is captivating. Jack is neurotic, stressed, and yet Kirby brings it to life so beautifully that when he does, inevitably, break, you know why and feel for this man who was given a silver spoon from the day he was born. It’d be so easy to make a man like Jack deplorable, power driven, and not someone to root for and yet Sherman-Palladino and Palladino have shown yet again that they know how to make Kirby really shine in a show.
Previously, Kirby starred as Lenny Bruce in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and was a stand out from the series. Giving him a show all his own allows an audience to fall even deeper in love with Kirby and his charm while he gives Jack a necessary humanity that a lesser actor may have ignored.
Jack is rich, his family literally had one of the ballet theaters named for them, and yet I found myself rooting for him at every turn because he cared and that’s what made him different than others in charge. He wanted ballet to succeed because he cared.
Paris vs. New York
On the flip of Jack is Genevieve, a stressed out woman in charge of the Paris ballet who really hates wearing heels. She is, for lack of a better term, a mess but when she has a stroke of brilliance, it is beautiful. Sometimes, she’s at the top of her game and other times, she doesn’t know how to manage the team she has. But she is loved and that’s what makes us know that her dancers respect her, despite her hatred of heels.
Genevieve is alone and she has a sister in her life who keeps bringing up how hard she works but I do think that Genevieve and Jack balance each other well on the show. For all of Jack’s anger bouts and quick witty responses, Genevieve is a little more frazzled yet they both just want the best for their theaters.
A dancer so difficult yet beautiful to watch
The real star of the show though is Cheyenne. Her choice of Gael (David Alvarez) in a partner for her dances brings drama to the company but it all shows how strong-willed she is. She cares about the environment, knows what works and doesn’t with her dances, and it makes every scene she has dancing captivating to watch.
Much like Jack, Cheyenne could be a character that is insufferable but de Laâge plays her as beautifully complicated and so her more human moments hit in such beautiful ways. Which is why I think that Étoile really works as a show. It doesn’t shy away from the politics of ballet but it also shows the beauty of what happens when art finally all comes together.
It is a captivating watch and a series you will want to sit with again and again and god, did I miss the Sherman-Palladino/Palladino take on ballet. The Prime Video series is now streaming.
(featured image: Philippe Antonello/Prime Video)
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