Villella Extract

Edward Villella is the former boxer from Queens who became the most electric presence in American ballet. He has been his own category of danseur from when his debut as Balanchine s Prodigal Son in I960 made him America's first ballet sex symbol through to his current position as artistic director of the Miami City Ballet, a company he has brought to national attention. In vintage

Villella fashion, his autobiography, Prodigal Son (Simon & Schuster), written with Iwirry Kaplan, should register a few jolts. In his lean, taut account of his life—"Sweat was my ethic and my aesthetic"—the famous faces of the New York City Ballet come full •enter stage, right down to one priceless butt shot. Melissa Hayden bending the dancer over for some Bij: "Honey, take down your pants. " The most incisive portrait is of George Balanchine, Villella's "artistic father, " who gave him the run of his vast repertory uhile always insisting "he had the power to humiliate me anytime he pleased. " —OTIS STUART

OTIS STUART