Thursday May 29th, 2014 – This red-letter date had finally arrived: the guest appearance of ballerina Viktoria Tereshkina (above) in ABT‘s production of LA BAYADERE. I fell in love with Tereshkina when I saw her dancing Balanchine’s BALLET IMPERIAL with the Kirov at City Center in 2008. Vladimir Shklyarov was this evening’s Solor while ABT‘s beautiful Isabella Boylston portrayed Gamzatti.
ABT‘s BAYADERE is old-fashioned looking, but that’s fine…it’s an old-fashioned ballet. The Lanchberry arrangement of Ludwig Minkus’s melodious score often takes on a cheapish, ‘music hall’ feeling, yet nothing can destroy the perfection of the Kingdom of the Shades, in which the ABT corps danced so well tonight; they very much deserved the sustained applause they received after their entrée.
There was lots of excellent dancing to be seen all evening, starting with Aaron Scott’s energetic and commanding Head Fakir: very clever of him to slip the antidote to the High Brahmin just before Nikiya finds an asp at her bosom. One distracting element of attending ballet performances at The Met is the noise the toe-shoes make on the opera house’s stage. Somehow the lovely Stella Abrera overcame this problem in her Shade solo, lyrically and silently danced; her sister Shades were Skylar Brandt (very impressive as she crossed the stage in a series of arabesque hops on pointe) and Melanie Hamrick, always a pleasure to watch.
Zhiyao Zhang (above) stepped out from the corps to dance the demanding solo of the Bronze Idol and did a very neat and precise job of it; he is a young dancer to keep an eye on.
Casting about for a photo of Isabella Boylston, I recalled the day Jade Young and I watched Bella (above) rehearsing with Pontus Lidberg for MORPHOSES. She was on particularly radiant form tonight as Gamzatti, a more complex character than she at first seems. Though vengeful, she is merely acting as her position dictates: a princess can’t be trumped by a mere temple dancer. Gamzatti accepts and embraces her arranged marriage; it’s Solor who has thrown a monkey wrench into things by failing to observe the accepted etiquette and giving his heart elsewhere. Thus for all her spitefulness in Act I, Gamzatti does engage our sympathies when her wedding ceremony crumbles before her very eyes in the ballet’s final scene: Isabella was particularly lovely in the solo here, expressing a bride’s hope and quiet joy, shadowed by the knowledge that her husband’s heart is elsewhere. Earlier, at the betrothal fete, she showed her technical command with some elegant and very grand dancing. The audience loved her.
Above: Tereshkina and Shklyarov in the Mariinsky production of BAYADERE; photo by John Ross.
Vladimir Shklyarov completely won the Met audience’s collective heart tonight; enthusiastic applause greeted his solo passages and his partnering of Ms. Tereshkina was simply exquisite. Shklyarov’s dancing was marked by big virtuosity, his jumps sublimely floated and grandly elevated, his turns rapid and sure. His portrayal was marked by great tenderness for Nikiya and the despair of helplessly watching his beloved expire, forced by decorum to turn his back on her anguish. Remorse and guilt, and then the elation of finding Nikiya again among the Shades, were finely depicted by the danseur; by the time he stands before the Brahmin to be married, Solor is nearly mad, haunted by visions of his love.
Ms. Tereshkina was everything one can hope for in a Nikiya; her dancing – all rooted in a stupendously strong technique – was refined, spiritual, and deeply musical. Forming a particularly resonant relationship with her partner, the ballerina reveled in the tenderness and ecstacy of their mutual love. In the solo danced before the betrothed Gamzatti and Solor, Tereshkina’s lithe and fluid body revealed the temple dancer’s sense of both duty and humiliation in a finely nuanced performance. In the Kingdom of the Shades, the ballerina attained a remarkable level of technique and artistry, re-affirming the great admiration I had felt when I first saw her dancing with the Kirov. She made a stunning spirit in the final scene as she drove the bridal couple asunder.
When the final curtain fell on Nikiya and Solor ascending the stairway to heaven, the audience commenced an appreciative ovation that lasted longer than anything I’ve heard at the opera or the ballet in recent seasons. Tereshkina and Shklyarov bowed together several times, and even after the house lights were up and the gold curtain definitively closed, they were called out yet again. The audience clearly wanted solo bows, but the two stars remained resolutely a couple throughout the ovation.
One especially lovely moment during the bows: Tereshkina came to the very edge of the stage and gave a deep curtsey to the musicians in the pit, thanking them with a sweeping gesture.
I must remember in future not to spend the extra money for a balcony seat at ABT; there’s a massive invasion of the Balcony level from Family Circle: people who have paid less but want more clambering over me, marking seats with jackets and scarves, inquiring ‘Is that seat taken?’ The Met’s depleted ushering staff aren’t able to police the area, so this practice is virtually unimpeded. I myself retreated to the near-empty Family Circle once these eager, pushy people descended. I mean, if you are half-a-block from the stage, a few more yards either way hardly matters. But then, even during Shades, people continue playing musical chairs, much to the disadvantage of the performance. Had it been anyone other than Tereshkina, I probably would have left.
Oberon's Glade 