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Have you ever wondered what life was like on a Collective Farm? There was much merry-making and romping in the haystacks, the odd extra-marital assignation here or there and very little sign of work, yet its produce – especially the king-size chillies – would have made even Alan Titchmarsh blush. Then the city folk arrived with their cross-dressing ways and Hey Presto!, there was The Bright Stream. Of course it was not really like that down in the Kuban and these anti-Socialist-Realist ways caused Stalin to declare it “Balletic Fraud” and Lopukhov’s ballet, together with its deliciously witty Shostakovich score, was banned.
Alexei Ratmansky created his version of Bright Stream (though retaining Lopukhov’s scenario and the score) a year before he took over as Artistic Director of the Bolshoi Ballet, and the powers that be who make these decisions must have seen in this choreographer an artist prepared to revolutionize the company from the bottom up. Literally – for Ratmansky’s choreography insists not on the vast Bolshoi jump, but on brilliant footwork and the speed he learnt from his years as a dancer with the Royal Danish Ballet. If you are looking for everything the Bolshoi Ballet wasn’t, choreographically, during its years under Grigorovich you are likely to find it here in Ratmansky’s masterpiece.
Anastasia Vinokur - The Old Dacha-dweller's-anxious-to-be-younger-than-she-is-Wife and Alexei Loparevich as The Old Dacha Dweller in The Bright Stream
© John Ross
The key to the work, as Jane Simpson so shrewdly noted in her August 2006 review, is that it is a company piece that relies not on big stars (though it is blessed with them) but on ensemble acting and ensemble dancing. Everyone on stage is there as a cog in the mechanism – take one out and it may very well break down. It also allows the opportunity to give meaty roles to the younger, lower ranking dancers of the company and especially good to see the scene stealing antics of Anastasia Vinokur’s Old-Dacha-Dweller’s-anxious-to-be-younger-than-she-is-Wife, who has got comic timing honed to the art of perfection. Egor Simachev gives the ripest turn as Gavrilych, the old farmer, and at one point dresses up as Death in a scene which reminded me of Woody Allen (and a drink to anyone who can remember which film it is). Alexei Loparevich (whose Don Quixote was brilliant, his Said Pasha less so, with a tendency to plunge into pantomime) is a lecherous pervert who gains our sympathy as the Old-Dacha-Dweller and Anna Antropva and Andrei Bolotin are splendid as the milkmaid and the tractor driver, who inexplicably chooses to dress up as a dog.
Sergei Filin in Act 2 of The Bright Stream
© John Ross
But were I dancing this piece (and you must send up devotions to the Lord of the Dance in thanks that I am not) the role I would covet is that of the Classical Dancer which belongs by rite to Sergei Filin. His “Trock-esque” flirtations with their brilliantly judged pastiche of Bournonville’s Sylph are the height of comedy, delivered with such artistry as only Filin can (and please let this not be his final appearance in this country). I am not sure Ekaterina Krysanova nor Natalia Osipova quite deliver the delirious comic fantasy which Lunkina and Alexandrova had the previous year, though both are superb (Osipova is as ever a spit-fire in her jump, and notice the way she flings her head back when it reaches its peak), but the role of Pyotr (that of the husband with the wandering eyes) is a gift to Andrei Merkuriev upon whom it appears to have been made (though it wasn’t). He invests all of his character, all his energies, all his majestic gifts, to make it vividly real and it is, undoubtedly, the definitive performance.
The Greeks always ended with a Comedy and Shakespeare always finished with a jig. So too does the Bolshoi, for whom this season has been the best yet. Thanks to them a million. The pleasure has been all ours.
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