Bolshoi Ballet: The Bright Stream -
Lyric Theatre, 7 June -
The context for Alexei Ratmansky’s 2003 reconstruction of the Soviet-era ballet The Bright Stream is concisely set before curtain-up with the front cloth displaying various slogans in Russian, surrounding a large image of the hammer and sickle. Stalin quotes, including “Tractors and kindergartens are the gearbox of the new village,” juxtaposed with the title of Pravda’s review of the 1935 premiere, “Ballet Falsehood” encapsulate the controversy that caused the ballet’s early demise. If the original ballet (called The Limpid Stream) was as half as joyous as this revival I can understand Stalin’s horror. The ‘peasants’ in the ballet would have been having far too much of a good time!
The Bright Stream honours the early twentieth century traditions of ballet comedy and mime and is created on a framework of cleverly described demi-character roles, supported by an energetic and animated corps. Told over two acts, the work is set in a collective farm (the Bright Stream) in north Russia, as a troupe of artists, including a Ballerina, her Ballet Dancer partner, and an Accordionist, arrive to perform at the harvest festival. Among the locals gathered to welcome them are Zina, a local entertainment organiser and her husband Pyotr. Zina and the Ballerina recognise each other as old friends from ballet school, while Pyotr (who is unaware of his wife’s ballet past), on being introduced to the Ballerina, is bedazzled. Zina becomes increasingly more jealous, which is the impetus for the ensuing confusion of mistaken identities, cross-dressing and improbable impersonations, all set within a complex, farcical plot worthy of Molière.
The diminutive Nina Kaptsova and statuesque Maria Alexandrova danced the roles of Zina and the Ballerina respectively on opening night. Kaptsova was engaging as the jealous Zina while Alexandrova epitomised the Ballerina role with effortless technical aplomb. A highlight was the waltz pas de deux with Ruslan Skvortsov as the Ballet Dancer, while her series of soaring grand jetés en ménage with a flying finishing leap in to the arms of Mikhail Lobukhin, as Pyotr was breathtaking.
Other colourful characters included the very tall, lean Alexei Loparevich as the Old Dacha Dweller and the much shorter and plumply padded Anastasia Vinokur as his wife, the Anxious-to-be-Younger-Than-She-Is Dacha Dweller, who were visually a match made in comic heaven; also the schoolgirl Galya (Ksenia Pchelkina), who is fancied by the Accordionist (Denis Savin), Gavrilych (Egor Simachev) the farm activist, and a Tractor Driver (Denis Medvedev) who dresses up as a dog to thwart the advances of the Accordionist.
Woven into the fabric of the convoluted plot were many opportunities for dazzling solo and pas de deux performances, always appearing quite effortless and reflecting the big, broad Bolshoi aesthetic. The swapping of identities between the Ballerina and the Ballet Dancer in particular allowed virtuoso solos by both as they danced as the opposite sex. A very ‘po-faced’ Skvortsov, hairy chest on display, cavorted as light as a feather in a romantic tutu, short socks and pointe shoes. His ‘love’ duet with the besotted Dacha Dweller, a study in understated comic timing, was a gentle but hysterical parody of the conventions of nineteenth-century romantic ballet.
A vibrantly coloured modernist setting of Autumnal tones by Boris Messerer (of the Messerer ballet dynasty) greatly enlivened the work and was complete with flying planes and a smoke spouting locomotive tracking across the backdrop, announcing the arrival of the performing troupe.
The Dmitri Shostakovich score, in parts recognisable from concert suites arranged subsequently by the composer, was a wonderfully danceable montage of adagios, waltzes and polkas played with vivacity by the Queensland Symphony Orchestra under Pavel Sorokin. As Shostakovich was also pilloried after the ballet’s premiere it was sadly the last ballet music he composed.
The Bright Stream revealed the Bolshoi’s natural flair for self-deprecating comedy, and by all accounts the dancers love performing it … maybe as much as we enjoyed watching!
- DENISE RICHARDSON