Olivia Flatto at the Paris Opera Ballet Summer Soiree at Lincoln Center. (Amber De Vos/ PatrickMcMullan.com)

At 6 p.m. last Wednesday, a gaggle of elegant ballet fans crowding out onto the balcony of the David H. Koch Theater murmured excitedly about the return of the Paris Opera Ballet to New York City for the first time in 16 years.

These were the attendees of the Lincoln Center’s summer soiree, a fundraising gala that featured cocktails and appetizers before the company's performance and a late dinner. One ballet enthusiast told The Observer that he and his wife had seen the company several times before in Paris. “For dance fans of both traditional ballet and contemporary ballet, this is as good as it gets,” said Steve Pesner. “And this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to see them in New York.”

The evening was in part a celebration of the history of collaboration between the power players of both the New York and Paris ballet world. Reynold Levy, president of Lincoln Center, told The Observer it was nice to have their French friends back. “We have a great kinship with the French ballet and we’re really happy to host them,” he said.

But facilitating the reunion was not an easy task, or a cheap one, mostly because of the huge size of the company of close to 150 dancers. Olivia Flatto, chairman of the American Friends of the Paris Opera Ballet, told The Observer that her organization worked to raise the funds for the show, which was part of a weeklong American tour with stops in Washington D.C. and Chicago. “It took an enormous amount of logistics and work,” she said.

“I was just saying tonight when I arrived in the taxi that we’ve worked so hard to make sure every single step was right,” Ms. Flatto told us, “And tonight it’s finally happening. I feel really relieved.”

Also in attendance was the theater's eponym David H. Koch and his wife Jennifer Koch and former secretary of state Henry Kissinger and his wife Nancy Kissinger. As Mr. Kissinger made his way out onto the balcony, he told The Observer he didn't know what to expect for the evening. “We’re great ballet fans,” he said. “But I have never seen the Paris ballet company.”

At 8 p.m., as the Lincoln Center bell sounded signaling guests to find their seats, the formally dressed crowd filed out of the balcony. The Observer caught actor and renowned dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov on his way to an orchestra level seat with a few friends. “We had a glass of wine before, which is important,” he told us. “So far so good.”

The curtain rose over hushed audience members, as the company launched into an all French program and fell to a standing ovation and even a few cries of "Bravo!" Three pieces, Suite en Blanc, L’arlésienne and Boléro, were performed, each composed and choreographed by French artists. After the two-hour show concluded, guests of the gala gathered on the first floor of Lincoln Center for dinner.

Ballet master Laurent Hilaire joined our table to decompress after what appeared to have been a somewhat nerve-wracking two hours. He told The Observer over the first course of crab cake and asparagus that he was satisfied with the results of the evening.

“I was really stressed and I’m quite happy,” Mr. Laurent said. “As a ballet master sometimes I cannot accept a mistake, but what is most important is just to be present and to give the best we can at the right moment.”

Mr. Laurent added that they prepared vigorously for the show, and when he sat down in the audience he was ready to accept the results. “You never know before the show what’s going to happen,” he said. “You built the ballet, but there’s only one moment for the show. You cannot miss it.”

“My work is to prepare people and after that they just have to get the choreography and be alive in it,” he told The Observer. “And for me, that is what they did tonight.”

Mikhail Baryshnikov, Liza Minnelli and Tony Danza. (Jonathon Ziegler/PatrickMcMullan.com)

The Observer stood in front of a less-than-generous red carpet on Monday—more of a red doormat, really—flanked by photographers and awaiting the arrival of fashionably late Broadway dancers, choreographers and filmmakers.

We were at NYU’s Skirball Center for the Performing Arts for the 30th annual Fred and Adele Astaire Awards, which recognizes outstanding achievement in dance on Broadway and film each season—the only award show of its kind, so they advertise.

If you’ve never heard of them that comes as no surprise, considering all past coverage has been done by Backstage, Playbill and the like. The award show evening seemed so nonchalant that even some of the nominees decided it wasn’t worth their while, leaving before the awards show even began—cough cough, the cast of Evita, cough—though they could be forgiven, as several had performances that evening. Some managed to stay long enough to strike a pose on the red carpet, but the cast of Newsies, for example, with six dancers nominated, didn’t make it. (Guess they were on strike.)

The red carpet might have been a complete bust had it not been for Matt Sandy, entrepreneur extraordinaire, and his bottle of Dutch vodka with a programmable LED display stealing the limelight, literally, as the name “Matthew” scrolled around the bottle. Fitting, considering the relative no-name somehow managed to sneak his way into photos with Matthew Broderick (and no, he didn’t bring Sarah Jessica Parker).

During his brief conversation with The Observer, Mr. Broderick was less than candid, letting his Nice Work If You Can Get It co-stars Kelli O’Hara and Robert Hartwell do most of the talking. Instead, Mr. Broderick seemed considerably more interested in the light-up bottle than his nomination for best male dancer. He insisted he’s not very good at it, anyway. Oh, nonsense, The Observer said. Tell us about your moves?

“It’s a pretty long dance we have, where we have to dance around on the furniture and on some chairs and a couch, tango up some stairs, slide down a banister,” Mr. Broderick said.

Sounds dangerous, we noted.

But Mr. Broderick was quick to retort no one had been injured—yet.

And as entertaining as it was learning Mr. Broderick didn’t consider himself a dancer, The Observer was distracted. Liza Minnelli, the woman of the night (she was to receive the Douglas Watt Lifetime Achievement Award), was nowhere to be seen. An impatient socialite yelled, “Where’s Liza Minnelli!” to no avail.

Instead The Observer was stuck waiting near the doormat with hard-to-recognize Broadway stars and a passing glimpse of the ever-impressive Chita Rivera, known as the original Velma Kelly, and Rob Ashford, the choreographer for Evita, who couldn’t stop doting over Ms. Minnelli and how quickly she picked up dance steps, her ability to watch him dance and effortlessly emulate the movement.

As time began to get away from The Observer, it was a relief to see the theater finally open, knowing we were inching closer to seeing Ms. Minnelli. But first we had to sit through a few awards and some better-than-advertised dance numbers.

After over two hours of anticipation and an introduction from Mikhail Baryshnikov and Tony Danza, Ms. Minnelli walked across the stage triumphantly to a deserved standing ovation after a career (still in the works, we might note) that contains four Tony Awards, an Oscar, a special "Legends" Grammy, two Golden Globe Awards, an Emmy, and now, she can add, the Douglas Watt Lifetime Achievement Award. Once the applause subsided momentarily, Ms. Minnelli took the time to graciously smile, bow before her adoring fans and gather herself for a few words.

“I am so surprised,” she said, very unexpected first words from an award recipient who knew in advance she would be receiving the award. “No, really, they told me to show up and I was going to get an award, but I had no idea that everyone that has made my life and who I’ve admired and loved and learned from and have worshiped would be here.”

Nice recovery.

Upstairs at the VIP reception, where you either had to be on Broadway or own it, The Observer got in a few words with Ms. Minnelli as she finished up her dinner. When asked what her favorite moment of the evening was, she pulled us in close and with a gentle motherly grip, she clasping our hands and retorted inquisitively, “What do you think it was?”

After a tense moment, she smiled and confirmed that it was winning the Lifetime Achievement Award. Because, she insisted (though it was hard to believe), she was clueless that her dearest friends and mentors would be speaking about her contributions to dance. She went on to argue she was a gypsy, more alive onstage than anywhere else.

A gypsy? OK, if she insists. But certainly a gypsy deserving of a lifetime achievement award.