The Bolshoi Theater and Covent Garden are hosting soirees to celebrate the 80th birthday of Yurii Grigorovich whose name marks an era in Soviet ballet. Critics lavished praise on him: both Soviet and foreign media used accolades ranging from the most trivial to such extraordinary ones as “great,” “fanatic,” “titan,” and “eternal Alpine meadows” (the latter formulated by Grigorovich’s colleague Maurice Bejart).
In such an authoritarian art as ballet, Grigorovich has always been the most talented dictator whom many accuse of harshness and toughness. Some even ridicule the nearly century-long affection that the authorities have felt for him, reports the Russian news agency Novosti. Meanwhile, stars that worked with Grigorovich for a long time at the Bolshoi and then were pensioned off by him for “dissent” still hold a grudge.
Today, however, young ballet dancers envy “Grigorovich’s generation,” i.e., stars that were able to fully display their talents thanks to him: Yekaterina Maksimova, Vladimir Vasiliev, Mikhail Lavrovsky, Maris Liepa, Natalia Bezsmertnova, and many others. From 1964 Grigorovich “ruled” the Bolshoi Ballet for 30 years, and this choreographic renaissance, marked by the triumph of the ballet master as well as artists, catapulted this theater to worldwide fame.
Its ballet productions, considered a national asset, were shown abroad — in Sweden, France, Italy, Denmark, Austria, and Eastern Europe. Under Grigorovich’s guidance, the Bolshoi Ballet confirmed its reputation as an elite brand in Europe, which it had enjoyed since the days of Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes in Paris. “Success can only be achieved through a joint effort,” says Grigorovich, who abandoned the Bolshoi 10 years ago and formed his own company in Krasnodar, where he still works with great inspiration.
The Grigorovich era in Soviet ballet began with his debut as a ballet master in 1957, when he produced Sergei Prokofiev’s The Tale of the Stone Flower at the Kirov Opera and Ballet Theater (now the Mariinsky in St. Petersburg). He “seasoned” classic choreography with folk dances and transformed pantomime, which was then dominant in art, into an expressive and psychologically acute dance — in fact the motive force. The fairy tale about the stonecutter Danila became “a poem of joy and the torments of creation.” Dmitri Shostakovich noted at the time, “This production displays all the finest traditional and modern techniques in a brilliant and convincing form. Dance reigns supreme here. Everything is expressed in the very rich language of the dance.”
The Tale of the Stone Flower and later Arif Melikov’s The Legend of Love (1961) soon ended up at the Bolshoi, like the choreographer himself, who continued to cultivate the Leningrad spirit of innovation. (A graduate of the Leningrad Choreographic School, Grigorovich considered ballet trail-blazer Fedor Lopukhov one of his teachers.)
Although Grigorovich preferred the classics, he never regarded them as “untouchable” or “museum relics.” He used to say, “Do as you please, but make good productions.” Staging Aram Khachaturian’s heroic ballet tragedy Spartacus in 1968, Grigorovich introduced many acrobatic numbers and made the male roles self-sufficient and fundamental. Spartacus has been in the Bolshoi’s repertory for nearly 40 years, shown all over the world, and released in a film version.
Grigorovich’s choreography has always been psychological and erotic; it also bears deeply-hidden philosophical reflections and often describes a situation where one has to make a choice. This applies to The Legend of Love, Romeo and Juliet, and Swan Lake (1969, updated by the Bolshoi in 2001).
In Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake, Grigorovich restored the original finale in which the heroes die. Here Siegfried’s love story is the chronicle of his vacillations between good and evil, dreams and reality. Odette and Odile instill exalted and down-to-earth features, respectively, in the prince’s soul.
Grigorovich also discovered a new Shostakovich for ballet audiences, producing The Golden Age, the first ballet whodunit. In Ivan the Terrible, the choreographer set Prokofiev’s music to Sergei Eisenstein’s homonymous film.
“Today, the Bolshoi is staging nine of my productions, so I am grateful to this theater,” Grigorovich says. In early January the Bolshoi hosted a festival of his ballets, and the gala concert that was held in the same theater on Jan. 18 included scenes from Spartacus, The Golden Age, and The Nutcracker.
These days, television is airing documentaries about the maestro as well as interviews with him, and bookstores are advertising books about Grigorovich. He holds high-ranking international posts in the world of art and is constantly receiving prizes (he has about 50 ranks and awards). He continues to serve on a prestigious jury, discover new talents, and “jump around on stage with young artists.” Grigorovich’s Krasnodar troupe will give a performance in London on Jan. 28.
“Mr. Grigorovich, can you tell us why you left the Bolshoi Theater?”
“I was not the only one to go: the Bolshoi’s top two masters, chief conductor Aleksandr Lazarev and production designer Valerii Levental, also left. We disagreed with the repertory policy of the theater manager, Vladimir Kokonin. So we gave our notice and went to different places. Lazarev now works in Britain, Levental in the US, and I am in Krasnodar. Sometimes we meet abroad.
“Naturally, when I left the Bolshoi, I felt bitter. But I did not sit still, I did not cry a river to Liulia (affectionate name for his wife, famous ballerina Natalia Bezsmertnova — Ed.), nor did I hit the bottle (I used to drink vodka, and still do, but never to drown my grief). I immediately went to Ufa to stage a production. Then the Ufa troupe went on a three-month tour of America, showing my productions. I was invited: this means they needed me. That’s the main thing. This has kept me afloat all these years.”
“Did you leave because your productions were struck from the repertoire?”
“When a ballet master leaves the theater, his productions are gradually phased out. This may be normal or abnormal depending on what comes in their place.”
“Did your productions get a good replacement?”
“When [ballet dancer and producer Vladimir] Vasiliev left the Bolshoi, I was invited there to revive my Swan Lake. The invitation did not come from the theater management but Gennadii Rozhdestvensky, who unfortunately had worked too little in the Bolshoi and he soon quit, too. I also revived The Legend of Love and Raymonda. What comes next, I don’t know. It is difficult to understand what is going on there. Managers come and go. Five managers in nine years — isn’t that too many? I still haven’t met the new management. Once a year I appear on the Bolshoi’s stage to present the Benois de la Danse award.”
“Aram Khachaturian once signed your program booklet for Spartacus, ‘To a choreographer of genius and a prominent artist with a bad character. Love.’ Why ‘with a bad character’?”
“Perhaps because the birth of Spartacus was accompanied by disputes — he fought for every note. But they were always settled peacefully.”
“People say that you are not staging anything new.”
“Other choreographers are also reviving their older productions, and nobody scolds them for this. But while some may be forgiven many things, I am forgiven nothing. You see, I never offer anything. If I am invited to stage one of my ballets, it means somebody needs this. I staged 16 ballets at the Bolshoi, and then I staged altered versions with pleasure at the Grande Opera in Paris, La Scala in Milan, and the opera house in Rome. I also staged productions in Copenhagen, Istanbul, Prague, Vienna, Seoul, Warsaw, and Stockholm. Every time I do ballets in a different way. I reposition the dance episodes, remove or add something, with due account of the actors’ capabilities. As for something new, I do have some projects.”
“Mr. Grigorovich, you are very tough and occasionally even cruel to artists. Isn’t there a different way of working with a company?”
“I give no peace to anyone, whether they are artists, costume designers, or lighting operators. Stanislavsky once said, ‘Actors are children. Of a bitch.’ That’s a joke, of course. I love artists very much, because I think they are the main characters in a theater.”
