Kirov Ballet 'Sleeping Beauty' - A sleepy opening night

Photo: Valentin Baronovsky

Kirov Ballet: The Sleeping Beauty
Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles
Wednesday, October 5, 2005


The arrival of the Kirov Ballet, aka the Ballet of the Mariinsky Theatre, is usually a big deal for balletomanes, especially when they’re doing one of those big famous Russian classics. They’re one of the best ballet companies in the world, populated from the top to the bottom with dancers of exceptional training and technique. They know how to put forth a ballet like “The Sleeping Beauty” with all the classical purity and grace that the ballets were made for.

But Wednesday night’s opening night performance of “The Sleeping Beauty” in Los Angeles was somewhat dispiriting. Not to say that the dancing wasn't beautiful (though the Prologue variations seemed a bit sloppy and clunky, with the exception of Tatiana Tkachenko's Vivacity Fairy). But there simply wasn’t any passion or excitement up there on stage, and most of the company didn’t even bother to try and tell us a story. Bright spots only came when the evening’s principals - Diana Vishneva as Aurora, Igor Zelensky as the Prince and Uliana Lopatkina as the Lilac Fairy - were on stage.

Never mind that the 3 hour 40 minute production is supposed to be a “story ballet.” Important moments in the story were rushed through, and everyone looked like they were just going through the motions. No one seemed to be giving us any reason why we should be interested that they were dancing this ballet on stage in front of us for 3 hours and 40 minutes.

Maybe it’s the production. The Kirov’s current preferred production dates from 1952, a revision by Konstantin Sergeyev that mostly strips the original production (dating in various forms from the original 1890 production by Marius Petipa) of mime and storytelling scenes. It’s not all his fault: Soviet commisars reportedly favored less mime and more dancing. The problem is that Sergeyev’s revisions are mostly bland and do little to further the story in anyway. The production loses, then, the storybook quality that adds charm and drama to, say, the Royal Ballet’s productions. The Kirov recently reconstructed the 1890 production, adding back all the mime and including pieces of music that have been cut over the years. The restored mime was reportedly a revelation; but the company prefers to tour with this flawed 1952 production.

Vishneva and Zelensky

Despite the flaws, one still has to mention the accomplishment of the three principal dancers on Wednesday night. From the moment Diana Vishneva started walking down the steps for her Act I entrance, it was clear she was in a different mode from everyone else on stage. She had a radiant stage personality, a clear sense of dramatic focus to both her dancing and her movement on stage, and she was simply more awake than everyone around her. The stage seemed empty when she left again. Igor Zelensky made the most of the Prince's limited role in this production. He was dashing and noble; quite nice to watch on stage. It's not clear what the Lilac Fairy is supposed to be doing in this Sergeyev production of Sleeping Beauty except parade on, look authoritative, and do a lot of arabesque poses. But Uliana Lopatkina, Wednesday's Lilac, is gloriously regal; her presence and exquisitely Russian style made up for the fact that she essentially wasn't doing anything except waving her wand around.

I prefer the Royal Ballet's method with story ballets - they stage them as complete works of dance theatre, taking care to give reason and clarity to the mime, and making sure that everyone on stage is dramatically present during the ballet's various scenes. Even if the big story ballet's don't make the same sense as, say, a Shakespeare play, that doesn't mean you shouldn't make an effort to tell a story - and I didn't feel the Kirov even tried on Wednesday night.

Photo: Diana Vishneva and Igor Zelensky in a publicity photograph for the US Tour. Photographed by Valentin Baranovsky.