© Nina Ananiashvili Ananiashvili reviews London shows in March 04 Ananiashvili non-political interview in 2004 Ananiashvili interview in 2000 Nina Ananiashvili web site Jeffery Taylor reviews

The latest to dip a satin clad toe into murkier waters than Swan Lake is Bolshoi Ballet superstar, Nina Ananiashvili who appears this week at London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre. And though her self publicising colleague, so called “Fat” ballerina Anastasia Volochkova, declared an intention to enter the Russian Duma if the Bolshoi would not stop being horrid about her weight, Ananiashvili has a more subtle approach. “Many people have suggested that I should be my country’s Minister of Culture,” she admits, appreciating that more mileage is gained from being swept into office on a popular vote than Volochkova’s threats. “Also,” she adds like an old hand on the hustings neatly scoring a number of political points in a single sentence, “if you don’t love your country and go into government just to make money, you end up cheating everybody.”

The award wining ballerina was born in Georgia’s capital, Tblisi, on 28 March, 1963, and though she owns a luxurious Moscow apartment in the expensive Frunzinskaya district overlooking Gorky Park, she still regards Tblisi, scene of the recent bloodless “Velvet Revolution” as her true home. Indeed, taxi drivers take tourists from airport to city centre via the riverside building site out of which Ananiashvili’s palatial new house is rising. Her political point number one then, is, she clearly does not need the money. Apart from over two decades of commanding fees on the international guest circuit of £10-15, 000 per performance, her millionaire husband, Gregory Vershadze, “something in energy” could bank roll her parliamentary career without noticing it.

When asked if her husband had a hand in the deal with Russian energy giant Gazprom, supplier of ¼ of Europe’s gas consumption, which triggered the Tblisi government’s downfall, she replies with a playful shake of her head, “No, we only have vineyards. And oil wells.” Like true oligarchs, Ananiashvili and her husband are cushioned from the uncomfortable fact that fifty-four per cent of Georgia's 4.5 million people live below the poverty line facing a State Old Age Pension at £4 a month.

Ananiashvili’s point number two is a side swipe at deposed Georgian President, Edward Sheverdnaze and his “patronage” system of government which allowed his enemies abroad to attempt establishing strategic control over his country. Not surprisingly, this was interpreted as cheating on a colossal scale by its citizens, and they deposed the administration. “We are a very small nation,” she says, “and we didn’t want people killed so thank God it was a quiet revolution. I love Russia, but nobody thought they would be so peaceful, all the propaganda said there would be terrible bloodshed and death. But look what happened.”

Nevertheless Ananiashvili and her husband were close to President Sheverdnaze from the beginning of Georgian independence in 1991. “Socially we met all the time,” says the great classical ballet dancer who power dresses for interviews in sharply tailored grey pinstripe suits, vibrant black hair framing porcelain fragile features. “He would throw a big party for me and my dancers when we appeared in Tblisi. It is not usual for Presidents to do this kind of thing, but he wanted to do this for me. I liked him very much.” And no wonder. Sheverdnaze’s Moscow clout no doubt helped turn Ananiashvili’s enormous talent into a national treasure. Not only is she a People¹s Artist of Russia and Georgia, she became the first ballerina to be awarded the National Prize of Russia "Triumph" for outstanding achievements in Fine Arts and the State Prize of Georgia for outstanding contribution to Georgian culture.

In 2001 Nina Ananiashvili became the recipient of the highest Russian State Award "Order for Outstanding Services to the Fatherland." More convincing credentials for government office are hard to imagine. “If Edward had resigned he would have salvaged his reputation in Georgia,” she remarks, “but when you reach the top in politics it seems that you always lose sight of real life if you stay too long.”

One priceless resource unimaginable to a faceless Georgian civil servant with an unpronounceable name but enjoyed in spades by Ananiashvili is the global affection her glorious dancing has earned over the years. “Niet” is not a word she is overly familiar with. “I agree,” she says. “Wherever you go it matters who you are and who you know, personal contacts are everything. An international Mafia of ballerinas as Arts Minister would solve a lot of problems.” And at 40 years old, a career change is imminent. “There is no getting away from the fact I must stop soon. When I retire from the stage I might just sit at home and be my husband’s wife.”

She married Vershadze who is her manager, producer and “best friend” in 1988. “I do not know where my husband might want me to be. But,” she adds, “I do know if my country called me, I would do it.”