Peter Pan dances on the edge of adulthood

By JoANNE VIVIANO
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
ALEXANDRA BURLEY HAS HER SHOULDER-length hair tucked into a bun and hidden beneath a moss green hat, sporting a bright maroon feather.
"Can we do the end?" she asks Anita Lin, who agrees.
"I hope I don't cry," Alexandra says.
Peter Pan doesn't cry, Lin reminds her.
The music starts, and Alexandra, a tall 17-year-old, is transformed into the boy who never grew up. In this number, Peter is waving goodbye to Wendy, John and Michael as they leave Neverland for home.
Alexandra spins, kicks and bows, gliding across the floor of a Ballet Western Reserve rehearsal room in downtown Youngstown.
Alexandra is practicing for the upcoming presentation of "Peter Pan," under the creative eye of Lin, the company's artistic director. Shows run Nov. 14, 15 and 16 at Edward W. Powers Auditorium.
Alexandra, as Peter, practices waving goodbye to Wendy -- her best friend Alysse Ferranto of Poland; John -- her 11-year-old brother Quentin; and Michael -- danced by Dori Levy of Liberty.
In the live production, Lin explains, there will be two spotlights, one on Peter Pan and the other on the children. As they move farther apart across the stage, one spotlight will fade and disappear.
"She'll be left all alone," Lin says, motioning toward Alexandra.
Alexandra's fear is that she'll cry on stage. Waving goodbye to Alysse and Quentin, she says, foreshadows the day next fall when she'll be saying goodbye to head off to college.
The high school senior hasn't decided where she'll go. She'll apply to universities in New York, Michigan, Massachusetts and Ohio. She knows she'll be far from the Poland home that has been her cocoon since the family moved here six years ago.
"It's really sad because I'm waving goodbye to my best friend and my little brother," she says. "It's kind of a reality check for me."
It's nearing 7 p.m., and Alexandra will be at the ballet company until 8. She's been here since about 4 p.m., when she sat on the floor among a dozen other girls in leotards and laced up ballet slippers to prepare for a class. Spinning on her toes and losing her breath, the dancer is challenged by the art.
School day
But this is far from the only challenge she's faced today. The ballerina has already spun through a day of college prep courses at Poland Seminary High School.
The morning began at 7 a.m. when Alexandra awoke -- reluctantly -- to get ready for school.
Concert band began at 7:55, and Alexandra played the saxophone for an audition. She did OK, she says. The night before she had helped her 13-year-old brother Ian practice for a trumpet audition. She practiced, too.
A study hall period followed concert band, before Alexandra and other members of an Advanced Placement English class tried to talk their teacher, Joan Schmitzer, into helping plan a trip to England and Paris this spring. The class reads Shakespeare, Dickens, Shelley and Keats, and they'll also read Dumas. The walls are decorated with scenes from England and posters of royalty.
They discuss the three short stories assigned from James Joyce's "Dubliners" the day before. Tonight, Alexandra says, she must read three more to prepare for tomorrow's class.
Physics class
The teen hopes to major in English and dance once she's in college. She's studying for her ACT test, which comes up on the weekend. She also has physics homework every night, she explains, as she enters Troy Massey's classroom.
He's wearing a tie and vest today, bringing comments and teasing from class members. Massey chit-chats with the students as he takes attendance, turning on a blue-and-white lava lamp. A poster of Einstein wearing a Cleveland Indians shirt and a Playboy hat looks over the students from the front of the room.
Massey finishes explaining the addition of vectors on an overhead projector before moving to a blackboard to review last night's homework. He completes a problem that required students to figure out vectors and angles using the example of a cannonball shot at a castle wall. They use tangent, cotangent, sine and cosine and Greek letters to illustrate the Pythagorean theorem. Massey ends the class by showing students how the problems could be applied to long jumping or golf.
Alexandra leaves the class to enter the crowded hallways. It's lunchtime, but Alexandra isn't thinking about her stomach.
"I still have to do my calculus," she says as she settles on a seat near friends Jen Johnson and Ashley Buza, both seniors.
"Hey Peter Pan, what's up?" says a boy who walks by.
Alexandra weaves among the noisy crowd of students to a cafeteria line, where she grabs a small salad and a fruit drink. She returns to her seat to figure out the calculus problems, but she's stuck.
Jen distracts her with a story about a boy she talked to after school. Alexandra's name came up and Jen told him: "Ali thinks you're kinda cute." Alexandra laughs and covers her mouth.
After lunch
The buzzer rings and Alexandra grabs her calculus book and heads to Mary Farina's classroom for calculus. Farina reminds the class that Alexandra stars in "Peter Pan."
"Are you Tinkerbell?" asks one boy.
"I'm Peter Pan. I'm too big to be Tinkerbell." Alexandra sits with seniors Rachel Glass, Allyson Simons and Chris Patrick. They talk about how they struggled to complete a homework assignment.
Farina looks over the dancer's shoulder, "Did you do your homework Alex?"
"Not all of it. I didn't understand it." She sets up a time to meet with Farina for some extra help. The teacher begins reviewing: "If f of x is equal to x squared ..."
The students groan. Farina says they'll be happy they learned this when they take a college advanced placement test. It'll be on there, she tells them. Tonight's homework is 13 more problems.
Another study hall is next, and Alexandra returns to the cafeteria, where she pulls out her Latin homework. The class is translating "The Aeneid" by Virgil. Because the course is so taxing, it meets only once a week, on Wednesdays.
This hour, the cafeteria is still. Alexandra sits with Branden Buxman, a senior studying for the weekend ACT test.
Other students work on various tasks. Alexandra keeps writing.
In Latin class, Sally Hofmeister returns vocabulary quizzes. Students' overall grades are listed on the top. Alexandra is disappointed as she glances at hers.
Walls in the classroom are a travelogue of Italy and also feature a few Roman gods and goddesses.
Translation today involves the goddess Juno asking Aoleus, keeper of the winds, to sink a ship sailing on the Tuscan Sea, carrying conquered pirates to Italy. The goddess promises him a nymph for a wife if he complies.
The students each get a chance to translate. On her turn, Alexandra scrunches her faces and taps her head when she errs. "Oops."
Classes end
As she gathers her things to leave at the end of class, Alexandra coughs; a cold is setting in. Her eyes close as she pauses for a moment before heading out the door.
"I asked my dad if I could have the car today," she says. Other times, she catches a ride with friends.
Alexandra totes some homework with her.
"I'm lucky because I have a lot of study halls," she says. She finishes much of her work during those quiet times, but loses some periods on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
On those days, her first two periods of class are spent at a sociology course at Youngstown State University. Her last two periods are spent tutoring first-graders at Poland Union Elementary School.
Outside of that, she spends much of her time dancing.
"Peter Pan" rehearsals rotate with rehearsals for "The Nutcracker" on Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Once "Peter Pan" closes, the company will practice "The Nutcracker," its winter show. On Tuesdays, Alexandra attends "hip hop" class at the dance center, if there's "not a lot to do."
Fridays, she marches with the band during halftime at varsity football games and wears a bulldog mascot costume during the rest of the game.
Short respite at home
Returning home, Alexandra takes a few minutes to rest in an easy chair, chat with her mother, Paula, and pet Mocha, their Great Dane.
Paula says her daughter has danced since she was 7.
"I used to dance, my mother used to dance," Paula said. Alexandra "loved it and never wanted to stop. ... If you go see 'Peter Pan,' you'll see, she loves being on stage."
The phone rings. Alexandra answers. She chats for a moment. "Bye, Dad. I love you."
Michael Burley is a cardiologist who practices primarily at Forum Health Northside Medical Center. His wife is busy with their children.
"Do you want me to make your lunch?" Paula asks Alexandra as the dancer goes toward her bedroom. "What do you want? Soup?" Mom also tosses in some red grapes. The teen will have a 15-minute break between ballet class and rehearsal to eat.
Alexandra returns to the easy chair, wearing a "NYC Ballet" sweatshirt and eating an applesauce fruit cup. Her hands twist her hair into a tiny bun, slipping bobby pins to hold it tight before wrapping it in a net. "Oh, I hate my hair," she says.
In bound Ian and Quentin.
"I bombed under pressure," Ian says, disappointed in his trumpet audition.
"I did too, though," his sister tells him.
Quentin, on the other hand, is first chair as a drummer among his sixth-grade class.
"That's awesome Q," Alexandra tells him.
Quentin and Alexandra get ready to leave. Mom asks when they'll be home. "By 8:30, 8:15," Alexandra says. "Bye. Love you."
Dance class
At the dance center, leotard-clad girls chat as they lace up slippers and stretch. Three males are in the class, including Quentin. They wear slippers -- Quentin wears his socks.
As class starts, Lin talks the dancers through various exercises, accompanied by a pianist. She helps the dancers stretch their legs high and hold their hips straight.
Alexandra is working. Muscles in her quadriceps tense, she is a bit flushed.
"I'm not really this bad," Alexandra says. Today, she's borrowing someone else's shoes because hers are missing a ribbon. "I really want my shoes."
While she pushes herself, Alexandra says Ballet Western Reserve is a place she comes to unwind. "When I have a bad day at school, I can come and dance all of it out," she says.
When class ends, it's dinner time and dancers sit on the floor around short tables. The area smells of TV dinners, popcorn and Chinese food.
Alexandra sips her soup and eats her grapes. Quentin eats Fritos.
Rehearsal
Soon Lin gathers the dancers for rehearsal. Today, some will wear costumes. Linda Terrell, the company's costumer, helps Tinkerbell fasten on her wings and tiara. Alexandra pulls on her moss green jacket and leg warmers covered with fabric leaves.
Quentin wears a long sleep shirt, getting teased by girls who call it a "nightgown."
"I'll be the most comfortable person onstage," he says,
Alexandra laughs as she sees Dori in her pajamas, with a button-up bum.
Alysse shifts around a white nightgown, trying to pull it farther up in front, to better cover her leotard.
The girls laugh and hug as they recall the first time they met, dancing in the seventh grade.
Alexandra's first number is with Peter Pan's "shadow," danced by Sarah Smith of Canfield. The pair spin and kick in synchronicity across the rehearsal floor. Sarah also has the role of Tiger Lily.
Alexandra says she tries to use her experiences to help with her art, an art that always uplifts her.
"With all the feelings I have, whether it be happiness or anger or sadness, I put it all into my dancing," she says. "When I'm on stage, I can't describe it."
Alexandra smiles, her words dancing when her feet stop. "I can't imagine myself not dancing. It's an indescribable feeling, being on stage."
Not focusing on the spotlight, Alexandra is well aware she is part of a team. She hugs other dancers when they enter rehearsal and encourages others as they complete their numbers. She calls the bond with the other dancers like family.
"It's the best feeling in the world," she says. "I'm afraid to leave all this behind."
Reaching to embrace Alysse, she adds. "I'm gonna miss you the most."
viviano@vindy.com