Ballet is a curious genre. Its bones are French; the pliées and relevées, and pas. But the ballets of the popular imagination are Russian: Swan Lake, the Nutcracker, Sleeping Beauty. While Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre has better name recognition in the States, St. Petersburg boasts the Mariinsky Ballet, a formidable company in its own right. Raymonda, which opened Tuesday night at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., is very much Mariinsky’s ballet. After all, the Imperial Ballet at the Mariinsky Theatre was the first to perform it in 1898.
In many ways, this production, which uses the original choreography by Marius Petipa, is a return to tradition, striving to remain true to the original ballet rather than offering a new interpretation. To a newcomer to the world of ballet, this is no fault.
Raymonda is a fairytale through and through, from the wispy castle-in-a-cloud imagery of the painted set pieces, to the medieval costumes, the White Knight (Timur Askerov), and the princess, Raymonda (Oxana Skorik). The ballet opens during a celebration of her name day, when the princess is “told” (a term that seems admittedly odd considering that the tale is expressed in dance and pantomime) of a White Lady who protects the family from danger. She and her friends expectantly await the arrival of her fiancée, a young knight who had been off fighting with the King. Before he comes, however, a Abderakhman, a Saracen knight (Konstantin Zverev), appears and, struck by Raymonda’s beauty, attempts to woo her. At the end of the first act, the princess falls asleep, beginning an extended dream sequence that reunites her with her love. Their happiness is shattered by the unwelcome appearance of the Saracen knight, who again professes his affections for Raymonda and, rebuffed, eventually tries to take her by force.
The warning of the dream comes to pass in the second act, when Raymonda holds a feast for her fiancée, whose arrival is delayed. In the meantime, the Saracen knight decides to try to seize Raymonda by force, bringing his slaves to dance for her and trying to make the other guests drunk. Thankfully, she is saved by the return of her fiancée, the knight in shining white, who duels with the Saracen and kills him. The final scenes are a rush of color as the wedding is celebrated at last.
On paper, the story is simple. In dance, the tale unfolds over the course of about three hours. Mariinsky’s production blends the opulence of old Russia with a sense of 19th-century elegance and refinement. Not entirely France, yet certainly not Russia, the setting adopts elements of the medieval as well as the softness of romance. It’s majestic as only a fairytale kingdom with a delicate dancing young princess can be.
It would be an exaggeration to call this the last ballet of imperial Russia. After all, the ballet was first performed in the beginning of Tsar Nicholas’ reign, when both the First World War and the Russian Revolution lay far in the future. The story reflects, to some extent, the confidence and opulence of this period. At the same time, the fairytale world of dukes and princesses is delicate and fragile as an eggshell. During the dream sequences, the long soft skirts and hushed lighting make it seem enchanted.
At the same time, this is a world of motion and artistry. Even to the ballet novice, the Mariinsky Company’s technique is stunning, sweeping the viewer up in a whirl of color, music, and motion. The Saracen prince brings with him a crowd of servants dancing half-bent who turn the stage into swirls of orange. Later, the gauntlet is thrown down and he and Raymonda’s fiancée duel with swords. The court itself dances several intricate circles of celebration. And throughout, Raymonda appears, flitting delicately through the measures, her presence giving the ballet a particular tenderness. In the closing scenes, love conquers all.
One can’t help but think, as the pair ride off on white horses, that a beloved fairy tale might be welcome as many times as it wishes to return.
