Alice Alyse is quite plainly a knockout: She’s slim, leggy and gorgeous, with long, dark hair and great cheekbones.
Also, she’s stacked.
And that, she says, is why she’s out of a job.
Alyse, 29, claims that her generous breast size got her fired from the cast of “Movin’ Out,” the Broadway show choreographed by Twyla Tharp to songs by Billy Joel. Alyse was an ensemble dancer in the national tour until her bra size “naturally increased” from a C cup to a D, according to her lawsuit against the production company. The growth spurt happened while she was on leave last year with an injured big toe; she says she neither gained weight nor got implants. When she returned, she needed new bras sewn into her costumes, and for this, she alleges in her 42-page complaint, she was sexually harassed, verbally abused and wrongfully dismissed.
Let’s leave aside, for the moment, questions about what other factors might have been behind Alyse’s dismissal (which we can’t really answer, because the show’s management won’t tell us its side) and whether a woman can continue developing well past puberty. Musical theater routinely depicts women as sexpots, curvy dimwits and window dressing — so if you believe Alyse’s account, the hypocrisy is evident, especially given that “Movin’ Out” bumps and grinds from start to finish.
But the dance world doesn’t necessarily view such firing decisions as hypocritical; they are merely business as usual. The Body Police enforce specifications that have nothing to do with talent, and some women have resorted to breast reduction. Anastasia Volochkova of Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet made headlines two years ago over a similar issue, when she was fired for being too fat (at a reported 110 pounds). She sued for damages and was unsuccessful, though she did get her job back.
Alyse’s $100 million lawsuit names Tharp, the production stage manager and the show’s producers among the defendants (though not Joel). Her notoriously combative attorney, Larry Klayman, relishes a scandal, judging from his record. Klayman, 54, founder of the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch, became famous for suing the Clinton administration over numerous alleged cover-ups and conspiracies. He has since taken on top Republicans, including Vice President Dick Cheney, over his secretive energy task force.
Alyse calls him “a blessing from God.”
“I lost my job for reasons that weren’t my dancing,” she says. “When they hired me I wasn’t flat-chested. I mean, a C means — ya got boobs.”
Producers are mum
The producers, who would not comment for this article, have filed motions to dismiss the case or proceed through arbitration. As for Joel, after Alyse filed suit in March he told the New York Daily News, “Under no circumstances would I ever have anyone fired for having breasts that were too large.”
To which Klayman replies: He’ll have to be deposed, because “he’s insinuating he was involved in hiring and firing decisions.”
The real targets are “Movin’ Out’s” deep-pocket backers, among them veteran Broadway producer Emanuel Azenberg and owners James and Scott Nederlander and Clear Channel Entertainment. Going up against them is like fighting the White House, Klayman says. “They’re powerful. And their arrogance is unlike anything in Washington.”
Isn’t it also arrogant to demand $100 million for Alyse’s losing her $130,000-a-year job? Klayman, whose hourly rate tops out at $600, says: “The only way you prevent this from happening again is to hit them in their pocketbook. $100 million from these owners is like a quarter in our pocket.”
He observes, “It’s a virtue to have bigger breasts on Broadway, in my expert opinion.” But from ballet companies to Broadway, the preferred look is slender, long-stemmed and minimally jiggly. Prevailing theater wisdom warns that an ensemble dancer must not distract.
“I want to stick up for this girl,” said Roberta Stiehm, a Maryland ballet and Pilates teacher who had featured roles in “Cats” and “A Chorus Line.” “But I have to tell you, what if Pamela Anderson were a great dancer? You couldn’t use her.
“You should be able to say, `I don’t care how big your breasts are; you should be in this show because you’re a fabulous dancer,”‘ Stiehm said. “But in reality, there is a look that has to be maintained to fit in with the whole cast.”
Maintaining the look is key on Broadway, where auditions are famous for their cruel specificity — if the part calls for a woman who’s 5 feet 8, those an inch off the mark need not apply. Alyse is up against more than just the folks behind “Movin’ Out” — she is battling an industrywide prejudice.
Unlike others, the late choreographer Bob Fosse “loved to take all body types, even though he’s famous for the long-legged American beauty,” said Ann Reinking, the famed Fosse exemplar. Absent Fosse’s unconventional tastes, matching the standard, generic body type makes being a dancer that much harder, Reinking said.
Acclaimed dancemaker Mark Morris is unusually open-minded about body types. He cast Alyse in two ballets he created for the San Francisco Ballet, and in an interview he raved about Alyse and her “fabulous legato,” referring to a smooth, unbroken style of dancing.
Asked if he remembered her as curvaceous, he said, with typical bluntness: “Sure. She’s stacked.”
American culture is hopelessly confused about women’s bodies, Morris continued. Big breasts are idolized in mass media “and yet it’s naughty to look at them. . . . In our silly culture they’re treated like primary sex characteristics. They’re like genitals, almost.”
Alice Alyse was born Alice Lewitzke, daughter of a Nicaraguan mother and a father from Wisconsin of German heritage. Early on, her dancing won numerous talent shows and competitions. She accepted a scholarship at the Joffrey Ballet School, and joined Miami City Ballet at 16 and the San Francisco Ballet at 19. She later changed her name to the softer-sounding Alyse.
Beyond ensuring that her bodice provided adequate coverage, her breasts had never been much of a liability, she says. And she was happy to see other dancers with noticeable breasts in “Movin’ Out.” So why did hers become an issue?
“No idea,” she says. “I can’t answer that.”
Klayman, who is always hovering within earshot during interviews, interjects: “You do have an idea why. There are a number of different reasons; it was discrimination. Sexual discrimination, national origin discrimination.”
As to why her body suddenly blossomed, Alyse chalks it up to genes.
“My mom developed later in life,” she says. “She continuously developed. It could be that when I was off, my hormones kind of took over.”
Of several medical groups approached about this issue, only one doctor would offer speculation. Angelo Cuzalina, a cosmetic surgeon specializing in breast augmentation at Tulsa Surgical Arts, said that once Alyse stopped dancing, her muscle mass may have decreased while her fatty mass increased, “and that fat could go to her breasts.” He added that he had never actually encountered such a case.
When she realized she had to buy bigger bras, “it was kind of a shock to me, and I was a little embarrassed,” Alyse says. “I think that was my ballet background. You’re self-conscious about that area.”
If Alyse is still shy about her body, she doesn’t show it. Her attire shows off her figure, and her Web site includes cheesecake photos of her wearing a nightie and black stockings.
Given to self-criticism
At a recent lunch, she is ensconced between her mother and Klayman, who’s decked out like Don Johnson in a sport coat and white slacks. Alyse wears a tight pale blue camisole and a short, filmy black skirt. Under any other circumstances, she’d have a to-die-for figure, but she is given to self-criticism.
Alyse turns to her mother, who is herself amply equipped, for reassurance. “They put in your head that you have big breasts, which you don’t,” says Moryns Lewitzke. “I say, give thanks to God. A lot of women have to pay for the big breasts.”
Asked to sum up her own feelings about her body, Alyse is speechless. “Umm,” she says, looking uncertain. Klayman has momentarily left the table; she glances at his empty seat as if willing him to materialize and help her out.
“I’ll answer for her,” says her mother. “She hasn’t come to realize yet that she has a great body. … She hasn’t realized yet: To hell with everybody.”
This is, however, exactly what Alyse is trying to say with her lawsuit. She says she is hoping to shatter the mold of the quiet, submissive dancer who shuts up about what happens backstage: “The way they treated me is, I’m nothing. I don’t matter. If I’m standing up, it’s kind of like for everybody.”
