La Bayadère - 123 mins
La Bayadere, along with Giselle, is among the most revered ballet of the classical period. But only well-established companies are able to perform it. It requires exquisite principal dancers and a deep and strong corps de ballet. It is perhpas the most operatic of all the ballets due to a very clean, pure and tragic story line.
It is not, however, without complaints about how out-of-date it is with respect to current sensibilities. Cultural appropriation, cultural errors and misrepresentations abound. Note that while the ballet was created in 19th century St. Petersburg about ancient India, that team got a lot of it wrong. In India and throughout the world there are Hindu scholars calling for the complete cancellation of Bayadère. Modern ballet companies handle it two ways. One, is to provide lecture material correcting the cultural and religious errors in the story. The other method is to present just the 30-minute long "Kingdom of the Shades" scene.
| Character | Role |
|---|---|
| Altynai Asylmuratova | Nikiya |
| Irek Mukhamedov | Solor |
| Darcey Bussell | Gamzatti |
| Tetsuya Kumakawa | Bronze Idol |
| David Drew | Rajah |
Our Showing
DVD cover of the 1991 Royal Ballet production of La Bayadè re, featuring Darcy Bussell in the role of Gamzatti. This production is updated by Natalia Makarova after Marius Petipa. Makarova was born in Leningrad and joined the Imperial Ballet School at 12 years old. She was a member of the Kirov Ballet in Leningrad through 1970, having achieved Prima Ballerina status in the 1960s. In 1970 she defected while on tour in London. She joined the Royal Ballet and she came to New York in the late 1970s along with Anthony Dowell to work with both the ABT and New York City Ballet. I had the good fortune of see them dance Swan Lake in 1979 at the Met by which time she had risen to Prima Ballerina Assoluta. As a repetiteur she brought her first-hand knowledge of the Russian ballets to both the Royal Ballet, ABT, and City Ballet.
Creative Team
Here are the creative team: On the left is Marius Petipa, the original choreographer. Next to him is Natalia Makarova, who brought the ballet to the West along with her own updates. Then Lucien Petipa who wrote the libretto based on the Kalidasa tale. Finally, Ludwig Minkus, the composer of this and many classical ballets.
Libretto
Libretto for La Bayadere from the great ballet website, Marius Petipa Society. Whereas the story is based on an ancient Indian story by Kalidasa, it was Petipa's brother Lucien who wrote the specific libretto for his brother's ballet.
Mariinsky Ballet dancing Kingdom of the Shades
Perhaps the most presented extract from any classical ballet. In this scene, Solor has smoked opium to dull the pain of having just lost Nikiya. In this scene, Nikiya visits him to promise that she will be his forever if he stays true to her. Petipa deliberately made the choreography simple and reptitive to create a mesmerizing effect. But for this same reason, it is one of the most difficult pieces for a corps de ballet to perform -- because any one mistake by any dancer will be immediately noticed and lamented. In the premiere, Petipa had 64 shades descending the from the heavens to the earth (the switch-back ramps at the rear of the stage) dancing at once.