Weightlessness has its rewards.
In 1950 the ballerina was a featherweight slithering down her partner’s body and marching on her highest pointes as Balanchine’s snaky Siren in “The Prodigal Son.”
In 1969 the astronaut, seen at right, clocked in at 35 pounds while padding around the moon’s soft terrain like a stuffed doll.
Los Angeles County conferred upon these two physical lightweights some pretty heavy honors.
In a down-to-earth ceremony on Tuesday, Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky conferred a scroll for life achievement to ballerina Yvonne Mounsey. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin had just got the same tribute one week prior.
Observers feel the weight of the moment. Two magnificent space travelers … their shared destiny. It brings to mind one of our favorite Max Fleischer cartoons:
For further scientific evidence, watch the astronaut drop a feather on the moon!
Read my story in the Los Angeles Times.
eisenstadt,
gered mankowitz, photog, 1967
“the red danube” (1949)
Wow : O
I wanna go dancing on the moon for our second honeymoon!