Thalictum

It's not Sarafanov's body so much as his manner which is too green and gauche for my taste, especially next to a great ballerina like Vishneva. Natalia, when you first wrote about him in Flower Festival two years ago you mentioned that he and Obratsova were a bit too "competition" in deportment. I agree, and it was painful to see his partnering problems with Vishneva. Novikova is a much better partner for Sarafanov. Fadeyev and Vishneva danced together beautifully when I last saw them paired last year. But I still think she has not found her ideal partner. Oddly enough I keep thinking she should dance Bayadere with Dmitri Pykhachev, who has never danced Solor. But he is tall, sexy and elegant both. A bit more mojo than Fadeyev.

I think Vishneva and Sarafanov are a total mismatch. In Bayadere they were like a goddess with a gauche young kid. Every time she came on I thought thank goodness the grownups are back. His partnering is not good either; no wonder Vishneva and the other ballerinas are up in arms. Yes he can do some tricks beautifully and he has a lot of enthusiasm. Anyway, even if Sarafanov were Baryshnikov redux, which he is not, he does not deserve to hog the spotlight like that. I have seen Samova live -- I may have misjudged her overall height. I don't think they will substitute Ballet Imperial for Rubies because frankly, despite Vishneva getting her own "evening" in January, the Kirov is much more concerned with making Sarafanov a superstar. This despite the fact that I wouldn't be at all surprised if he decamped as did Zakharova. I'd heard that Dumchenko might do Cinderella -- any news, Natalia?

Yes if one can say there is such a thing as a star coryphee it is Nekipelova -- she always seems to enter completely into the spirit of whatever she does.

Natalia, do you feel that the Vikharev restorations will be dropped?

Perhaps the complaints about favoritism have made them be more inclusive. Dumchenko danced together with Scherbakov at school alot, they would be a great pair in Beauty. I still think Ivanova has been needlesly overlooked. Did you see her Beauty? How was it? She certainly is more naturally suited than a lot of the other Auroras Vikharev seemed to sanction. Ivanova's teacher/coach Inna Zubkovskaya adored her, and Zubkovskaya was a very determined woman. But after Zubkovskaya's death in 2001 the Kirov seemed to lose interest in Ivanova. I have to say I thought Ivanova stole the show in the Forsythe program. Whatever the fate of Vikharev's reconstructions he is also artistic director in Novosibirsk. And a great coach -- got the performance of Kolb's life out of him as Solor in the 2002 Bayadere reconstruction premiere.

I give up. Everyone is free to believe what they want. I will put my material together and produce at least an essay on Le Clercq. I hope it will do her justice.

I have been in Russia for extended periods, never lived there. But I hadn't realized she was that much of an icon. I now am further convinced that Gergiev intends on installing her as director, co-director or de facto director of the ballet. But if she is spouting the nonsense about the 1999 Beauty that you cite, she is not offering logical or reality-based arguments and for me they carry no more weight from her mouth than anyone else's. I think Vikharev has been very capricious in the casting of his revivals, however, and that has resulted in more antagonism than necessary. Why has Maya Dumchenko danced Aurora in the 1999 production perhaps twice at most ? Why has Svetalana Ivanova never danced Aurora in Vikharev's production, only Konstantin Sergeyev's? Why did Vikharev refuse to let Vasily Scherbakov dance Desire in his Beauty after Vasiev himself cast him in it? These rebuffs of people who would be perfectly cast in these roles tend to antagonize a company.

I've watched many prima ballerinas at very close range and being willfull and manipulative would seem to be a sine qua non toward achieving prima status -- along with many other qualities. I repeat I have talked to many first hand sources including Edith Le Clercq -- hardly a third hand source.

With all due respect to Lopatakina's talent, she should in that case do less speaking out since what she says seems to be no more than the caprices of a single capricious ballerina.

It's not our programming friends at the Kennedy Center who are to blame, it's our programming friends at the Kirov. But Samova is much too tall for Sarafanov and I repeat, even in the old days of Kolpakova we wouldn't have seen someone dancing two out of four pieces on two of the three programs -- the Kirov has generously allowed Sarafanov to appear only once on the third program.

But Natalia, the Sergeyev Beauty HAS been performed in its entirety since 1999, apart from the Dudinskaya galas. In fact it was performed in January of this year I believe. What's new is Lopatakina and what we may be seeing is Gergiev's phasing her in as director or co-director of the ballet. The 1952 Beauty was performed at the Mariinsky January 21, 2004.

I'm referring to comments any number of people who knew her have made to me, among them her own mother, as well as comments in published interviews by colleagues, as well as her letters written to Pat McBride in the late 1940s which were published in Ballet Review three years ago.

Yes, and a willful and manipulative one at times -- a true prima ballerina!

The Le Clercq estate retains an enormous amount of archival material on her -- more than enough for a bio.

Gergiev is ceding far too much influence to Lopatakina, who is a wonderful ballerina but qualified only to determine what she wants to do, not what the direction of the company should be. She is not a ballet scholar, not an executive, not a person whose artistic judgment is at all infallible. Since returning from her injury her performances have aquired an authoritative air that borders on authoritarian, and I am loathe to imagine this kind of doctrinaire-ism impacted on the company. I adore the Vikharev reconstructions, like the Chabukiani/Ponamarev Bayadere very much and don't mind the 1952 Sergeyev Beauty. Hopefully all can be admired in the Kirov repertory. However, the disastrous and inequitable casting miscalculations -- Sarafanov is now dancing twice (Rubies and Corsaire) in two out of the three ballet/opera galas in Washington -- being made by the current ballet administration have left it vulnerable to a take over by Lopatkina and other Gergiev allies. Furthemore, although Kennedy Center has been advertising Daria Pavlenko's appearance in La Valse at the galas for months now, it is Lopatakina who will dance both La Valse and the Dying Swan at all three galas!! This is in direct defiance of the Balanchine stagers, who objected to Lopatakina dancing the premiere of La Valse in Petersburg because she refused to attend all rehearsals. [sorry is this gossip?] Is this the Sarafanov/Lopatkina show or the Kirov Ballet? Where does this end?

Veronika Ivanova will dance Maria in Fountain of Bhakchiserai at the Kirov in December.

I don't see how anyone could be better than Antonicheva, an impeccable classical stylist with superb taste.

Good point, and taste is rather inscrutable.

Paul, perhaps we should say there are soubrettes and then there are soubrettes. . . .

But wasn't the Washington Post forced not long ago to issue an apology about its failure to cross reference White House leaks about those phantom Weapons of Mass Destruction? OK enough about politics. A third-hand source is very dicey. I've stopped even THINKING about including anything like that in my work, even with an explicit proviso included.

But if you are writing a biography of someone who was born more than a certain amount of years ago, it simply may not be possible to find two sources for something and the one source you do have may be deemed completely credible in your mind. One simply needs to say at that point, "According to Mr. --" or "According to a man who lived next door and says that he used a telescope to watch Fonteyn -- ." By the way, journalistic ethics and standards have all but vaporized during the last 15 years anyway. Remember Whitewater?

Marc, you're right that of course hype or favoritism or simply personal preference exists everywhere, but given that the Kirov in the old days was beholden to a police state, the coordination between Kirov and Kremlin resulted in disinformation on a scale not quite seen here, I believe. Perhaps I'm wrong. At the Mariinsky earlier this year I heard an usher telling a tourist that Lopatkina, who was dancing Swan Lake that night, was the greatest ballerina of the Kirov. Was this simply the usher's opinion? I don't think so -- it had the sound of received pronouncement.

Since when are Vishneva, Lopatkina and Pavlenko the three leading Kirov ballerinas? They are three wonderful ballerinas, but not superior to others in my humble opinion. Sologub's recent Giselle was just as good as Vishneva's, and Dumchenko is a major star -- by virtue of the quality of her dancing, not the hype. It would behoove us in the West not to acquiesce to the Soviet style propaganda. Remember the days when Irina Kolpakova was said to be the Kirov's greatest dancer, and Alla Osipenko listed in reference books as "a soloist."???? It is unfortunate indeed that Gergiev is vehemently opposed to the Vikharev reconstructions and is pressuring Vasiev to drop them. Thus Vasiev's comment.

I didn't realize Struchkova danced Raymonda. Maximova was cast as a soubrette. The only other Russian soubrette Raymonda at the time was Kolpakova at the Kirov, although she certainly demonstrated grandeur in the role as well.

I recently watched Baryshnikov's 1977 Giselle with Makarova again, and was struck how wrong he was for the role -- he almost makes it demi-caractere, and over-acts his way through the entire ballet. His act 2 solo is phenomenal, of course.