I envisaged, for the good of ballet and its future, one big ballet company, embracing the talents and the repertoires of both. I genuinely feared the co-existence of the two companies, being certain that the United States and Canada were not yet ready to support two companies simultaneously. I pleaded with both to merge their interests, bury their differences. I devoted all my time and energy in a concentrated effort to bring about this desired end. The problems were complicated; but I was certain that if there was a genuine desire on both sides, and good will, a deal would be worked out. It blew hot. It blew cold. As time went on, with no tangible results visible, my hopes diminished. It was not only the financial arrangements between the two companies that presented grave obstacles; there were formidable personality differences. The negotiations continued and were long drawn-out. Then, one day, the clouds suddenly thinned and, to my complete surprise, we appeared to be making progress. Almost miraculously, so it seemed, the attorneys for Universal Art and de Basil sat down to draw up the preliminary papers for the agreement to agree to merge. Through all this trying period there was helpful assistance from Prince Serge Obolensky and Baron “Nikki” Guinsberg.
At last the day arrived when the agreement was ready for joint approval, clause by clause, by both parties to the merger, with myself holding a watching brief as the prospective manager of the eagerly awaited Big Ballet. This meeting went on for hours and hours. It opened in the offices of Washburn, Malone and Perkins, the Universal Art attorneys, in West Forty-fourth Street, early in the afternoon. By nine o’clock at night endless haggling, ravelled tempers, recurring deadlocks had, I thought reached their limit.
Food saved that situation. Prince Obolensky and my attorney, Elias Lieberman, fetched hamburgers. But, before they could be consumed, we were evicted from the offices of the attorneys by the last departing elevator man, who announced the building was being closed for the night, and the conference, hamburgers and all, was transferred to the St. Regis Hotel. At four o’clock the next morning, a verbal agreement was reached. The deed was done. I felt sure that now we had, with this combination of all the finest balletic forces extant in the Western World, the best as well as the biggest.
The “Colonel” departed for Berlin to join his company which was playing an engagement there. He was to have signed the agreement before sailing, but, procrastinator that he was, he slipped away without affixing his signature. Nor had he authorized his attorney to sign for him, and it took a flock of wireless messages and cables to extract from him the authority the attorney required. At last it came.
I had never been happier. Mrs. Hurok and I got ourselves aboard the Normandie for our annual summer solstice in Europe. On board we found the Julius Fleischmanns. At dinner the first night out, our joint toast was in thanks for the merger and to the Biggest and Best of all Ballets.
Although Fleischmann showed me one mildly disturbing wireless message, I had five days of peace. It was not destined to continue. When I stepped down from the boat train at London’s Waterloo Station, I was greeted by the news that the merger was off.
The “Colonel” had changed his mind. Massine also had become resentful at a division of authority. Confusion reigned. As an immediate result, almost overnight de Basil lost control and the authoritative voice in his own company. Altogether, it was a complicated business.
A new holding company, calling itself Educational Ballets, Ltd., headed by Baron “Freddy” d’Erlanger, banker and composer, whose bank had a large interest in the de Basil company, had taken over the operation of the company, and had placed a new pair of managing directors in charge: Victor Dandré, Anna Pavlova’s husband and manager, jointly with “Gerry” Sevastianov, the husband of Irina Baronova. The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, which was to have been the scene of the debut of the Big Merged Company, had been taken for the original organization.
It was all a bad dream, I felt. This impression was intensified a hundred fold when I sat in the High Court in London’s Temple Bar, as be-wigged counsel and robed judge performed an autopsy on my dream ballet. Here, with all the trappings of legality, but no genuine understanding, a little tragicomedy was being played out. Educational Ballets, Ltd., announced the performance of all the Massine ballets in the de Basil repertoire. This spurred Massine into immediate legal action.
Massine went into court, not for damages, not for money, but for a declaratory judgment to determine, once for all, his own rights in his own creations. The court’s decision, after days of forensic argument, conducted with that understatement and soft but biting insult that is the prerogative of British learned counsel, was a piece of legalistic hair-splitting. Under British law, unlike the American, choreographic rights are protected. Would that the choreographic artist had a like protection under our system! By virtue of having presented the works in public performance, the court decided that de Basil had the right to continue such presentation: any works Massine had created as an employee of de Basil, while receiving a salary from him, Massine could not reproduce for a period of five years. Only the three works he had originally created for Diaghileff: The Three-Cornered Hat, The Fantastic Toy-Shop, and Le Beau Danube, could be reproduced by him for himself or for any other company.