In his recent review of the latest DVD release of Minkus’s
most popular ballet Don Quixote (see
here), my colleague Dan Morgan opined that he “wouldn’t
mind if [he] never saw Minkus’ La Bayadère
again”. While I think he was probably just having a bit
of fun with his readers, it’s certainly true that La
Bayadère (“The temple dancer”) doesn’t
have the earlier ballet’s endless vitality and joie
de vivre and - with the heroine killed by a snake-bite and
the hero ultimately crushed by a collapsing giant Buddha - it’s
not an entertainment that’s likely to send audiences flooding
out of the auditorium with wide grins on their faces.
It is, nonetheless, a work that’s been welcomed back with
open arms since it first began reappearing in the repertoire
of western ballet companies fifty years ago. And anyone who
assumes, on the basis of Tchaikovsky’s scores, that all
ballets revolve around swans, magic spells, glittering fairies,
beautiful sleeping princesses, subversive rodent armies, kingdoms
of sweets and kitchen implements that are suddenly transmogrified
into handsome princes, will find it a real eye-opener. For La
Bayadère actually has an almost believable story
behind it - one that features very human characters who, even
if they do happen to be rajahs, brahmins, half-naked fakirs,
temple dancing girls and the like, exhibit such realistic human
emotions as lust, jealousy and tranfiguring love. And let me
pre-empt anyone who points out that La Bayadère’s
most famous set-piece, The Kingdom of the Shades, features
some 32 (or 24 in this production) very fanciful and un-human
ghostly spirits of dead girls, by observing that they appear
merely as imaginary figments in an opium-induced dream rather
than as real characters in the drama. The ballet’s plot
is, in fact, an altogether “operatic” one and the
characters and their predicaments - very reminiscent of Aïda
- would certainly have appealed to Verdi, even if the exotic
setting might put one more in mind of Meyerbeer or Delibes.
One important point to note is that this DVD features Natalia
Makarova’s performing version of La Bayadère,
originally seen in New York a decade earlier and notable for
its recreation of the ballet’s lost final act that features
that collapsing giant Buddha. Anyone, therefore, who has seen
live performances by the Bolshoi or Mariinsky companies - both
presented in London in recent years - or the Paris Opera Ballet’s
production, either live or on DVD (NVC Arts / Warner Music Vision
4509-96851-2) will be in for the very pleasant bonus of an extra
21 or so extra minutes, even though they’ll be missing
out on Act 2’s spectacular romp of an “Indian Dance”
that Ms Makarova chose to jettison. This reconstructed final
Act, set to music specially put together by John Lanchbery who
also conducts the performance, rounds off the story in a far
more emotionally satisfying way and has since been widely adopted
by many ballet companies.
The dancing of the principal soloists is quite simply superb.
Altynai Asylmuratova conveys in every technically assured movement
the emotion that Nikiya is feeling, ranging from ecstatic, impulsive
young love to the darkest despair that leads her to reject an
antidote to the fatal snake venom. The role of her lover, the
warrior Solor, is danced by Irek Mukhamedov who combines obvious
physical strength and crowd-pleasing showmanship with great
artistry. If, however, the 1991 Covent Garden audience offer
unsinted admiration to those two Soviet-trained dancers, they
reserve their real affection for the home company’s very
own Darcey Bussell. In her portrayal of the rajah’s daughter
Gamzatti who will stop at nothing - murder included - to ensure
that Solor will marry her and not the humble dancer, she successfully
matches the considerable talents of Asylmuratov and Mukhamedov.
Anthony Dowell makes a truly flesh-creeping High Brahmin. David
Drew looks very much like one imagines a rajah ought to look,
even though there is little for him to do apart from appearing
generically regal (so much so, that when, in the final reconstructed
act, he actually gets to catch and partner Gamzatti for a few
steps, it comes as quite a surprise.) The very brief but crowd-pleasing
role of the Bronze Idol usually brings the house down and here,
with Tetsuya Kumakawa in the role, we have no exception. The
Covent Garden corps de ballet was not, in 1991, the best
drilled (the rival DVD that I mentioned earlier demonstrates
that the 1994 vintage Paris Opera Ballet standards were markedly
higher) and that detracts somewhat from the viewer’s enjoyment,
especially in The Kingdom of the Shades where, as the
Russian companies invariably demonstrate, complete precision
is and ought to be all. Conductor John Lanchbery knows Minkus’s
score inside out, of course, and gives it, whether movingly
sentimental melody or music-hall rum-ti-tumming, a fine outing.
Derek Bailey’s direction is utterly sympathetic to the
attractively exotic production, with well chosen camera angles
and cuts, but the fact that this was originally a TV broadcast
and is now 20 years old is apparent in the absence of the sort
of pin-sharp images that we expect to see today.
This particular production has also done the rounds before.
The copy that I have had for some years was issued in 2003 on
the TDK label (DV-BLLB) and that, in conjunction with the very
different Paris Opera Ballet version - and maybe the old Kirov
production featuring Komleva, Abdyev and Terekhova (Kultur DVD
D1113) - was probably enough at the time. There are now, though,
two more recent productions available, both offering Makarova’s
extended version: Zakharova, Bolle and Brusson at La Scala (TDK
DVWW-BLLBSC) and a new Royal Opera House DVD starring Rojo,
Acosta and Nuñez (Opus Arte OA 1043 D). I would be happy
with either - or, preferably, both!
What I would really love to see, though, is the legendary
1941 Soviet art deco production that starred Natalia
Dudinskaya as Nikiya and Vakhtang Chabukiani as Solor. You can
catch a glimpse of them in action - and, in the case of the
amazingly fleet of foot Chabukiani, that certainly does mean
action! - here.
I think that if that production were available in full,
even Dan Morgan might be happy to see La Bayadère
once again!
Rob Maynard
Nikiya - Altynai Asylmuratova 
[123:00] 
