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Sarah Frater's rating
A tired Sleeping Beauty
By
Sarah Frater
17 Aug 2009
Closing its London visit with The Sleeping Beauty should be a hit for the Mariinsky.
As well as Tchaikovsky’s wonderful music and Petipa’s filigree choreography, the company has the ballet in its bones, having danced it pretty much continuously since the original was made for it way back in 1890.
However, it felt a bit thin on Friday night, with the tired 1952 Sergeyev production not a patch on the Mariinsky’s fabulous 1999 version (last seen London in 2001), and a cast comprising almost all dancers from the corps de ballet.
Admittedly, the Mariinsky juniors are often better than the higher ranks of other ballet companies but for a work on the scale and grandeur of Beauty, you need soloists in the many featured roles.
Even the two principals (Evgenia Obraztsova as Princess Aurora and Igor Kolb as the Prince) weren’t at their best.
Obraztsova is a small, pretty dancer but she didn’t deliver the regal grace you want in the role.
Nor did she connect with the underlying melancholy in Tchaikovsky’s melodies. Kolb looked strained, over-emphasising many of the steps, although he was much improved in the final act.
Also unappealing were the rather manic Fairies in Act I, and the feeble acting from Soslan Kulaev as Catalabutte (the King’s Master of Ceremonies).
That said, Islom Baimuradov was excellent as Carabosse, as were Daria Vasnetsova and Maxim Zuzin as Princess Florine and the Blue Bird, while Yana Selina’s White Cat epitomised feline playfulness and all its allure.
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Reader views (1)
This was, indeed, a disappointing Beauty on many fronts - not least the production itself with its often risible wigs, pared-down mime sequences and no panorama scene (although the exquisite panorama music was played anyway). At £100 a stalls seat, casting should be top-notch and I had specifically booked to see the Company's latest wunderkind, Vladimir Shklyarov at his Saturday matinee performance. Although he was clear and confident in the Vision Scene - clean line and thrilling elevation - his later landings were untidy with much shuffling and re-aligning of feet in his tours en l'air. Whether his partnership with Anastasia Kolegova needs more time to gel, we were denied any fish-dives in the final act and, throughout, Ms Kolegova's balances were sometimes perfunctory and occasionally noticeably unsteady. A well-judged Carabosse (Islom Baimuradov) should not be the yardstick by which a good Beauty is remembered but, lacking a cohesive partnership of principals and any real fizz in the Bluebirds, it came dangerously close. Matinees can be sublime occasions (think back to the scintillating 2007 London debut of young Ivan Vasliev in Don Q to get the picture): this Saturday afternoon with the Kirov was, unfortunately, not one of them.
- Clive Burton, London UK, 18/08/2009 09:12
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