I went to see the Kirov Ballet when they played the Met a while back.
I saw a fabulous ballet show.
The show was The Sleeping Beauty.
This new production was, they tell me, a deeply researched reconstruction of the ur-show: 1890, Maryinsky Theater, St. Petersburg, Russia. Let’s be proud of the people who kill themselves trying to reconstruct in minute exactitude the original symptoms of a historic production.
Although I am generally a big fan of things like the Early Music movement, I am skeptical. Are you sure about all of this? Really? Did Tchaikovsky hear it this way? Is that what Petipa meant? Did they like it? Was it performed beautifully? Was the show thrown together? At the last minute? Was it a hit? Was the dancing any good? Did anybody get it?
I don’t much care.
Here’s what I want to know: How was it the other night?
Great.
Four hours long. Three intermissions. The opposite of boring. The costumes were bizarre, wildly varicolored, a little bit Danny Kaye. Perfect. The sets were heavy and detailed; gobs of fake draperies, blankets of cobwebs, flocks of plumes.
The dancing was thrillingly all-over-the-place. Never less than interesting. Good mime.
Aurora (Irma Nioradze) was a real beauty—regal, shy, tentative. She resembled the original. The omnipotent Lilac Fairy (Daria Pavlenko), the real boss of the ballet, ruled with grace, strict kindness, and a bunch of flowers. The fairy dances were a fascinating mess of styles. The National and Fairytale divertissements were aggressive, distinct, a little bit violent.
My favorite character was King Florestan XIV (Vladimir Ponomarev). It was so exciting and fun to hear the King music and, at the same time, watch the tender, grand, romantic storytelling of this wonderful artist.
The music was astonishing. For the first time ever, I understood that The Sleeping Beauty might be Tchaikovsky’s best ballet score. The florid violin concertino as entr’acte, historically justified or not, was heaven. The band played extravagantly well under Gianandrea Noseda. He swings.
If the band plays so well, we have only Valery Gergiev to blame. Over the past few years I have seen him conduct the Kirov Opera and Orchestra. The music is consistently vibrant, passionate, big. I welcome the occasional mistake as proof of the players’ mortality. As chief music director of the Kirov Ballet, the Opera, and the Orchestra, Gergiev has rediscovered and exposed the miracles of Russian music played Russianly.
What a rush. What a Beauty.
Mark Morris is a dancer and choreographer whose Mark Morris Dance Group was founded in 1980. His works include Platée, Dido and Aeneas, and L’Allegro, Il Penseroso, ed il Moderato.
