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We drove through the rain to West Chester University—just the right mood, just the right weather—where we were granted the very special privilege of watching the dress rehearsal of "Dracula," a ballet for which the Brandywine Ballet has become rightly well-known.

This "Dracula" belongs to Nancy Page, a former dancer, a beloved Brandywine teacher, and the choreographer who brilliantly fit the essence of the Bram Stoker story upon the light limbs of delicate dancers, into the mauves and peaches and creams of fluid fabrics, and beneath the spackled lights of the Asplundh stage. It is a mesmerizing spectacle, perfectly steeped in visual and aural seductions. It makes room for dancers of many ages, asks the young to carry flames, bends into itself without repeating itself. The dancers wear masks, but we in the audience do not. We are open to this story, vulnerable to the talent, looking for the light inside the moody backdrop blues and purples and grays.

Among the dancers floats and lifts and reaches one Emma Yasick, the daughter of friends. She has been dancing much of her life. She is, even in a pair of jeans, a ballerina, pure. On a slender frame she carries her intelligence. With extraordinary poise she lengthens the distance between her chin and shoulderblades. She is integral to the dancing and she is very much herself, and when I sat there, beside her mother in the dark, I asked (a whisper):

Do you always see her at once when she enters the stage?

I always do, she said.

I am grateful that my husband was with us last evening. That he took his camera down to the edge of the stage and caught some moments on film. This is Emma Yasick dancing in "Dracula," with a company—the Brandywine Ballet—that is her second home.

I'm not sure if this extraordinary production is already sold out. It absolutely should be. But if tickets remain, and if you have time, I strongly encourage you to find out more here.

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