La Sylphide
Mariinsky Ballet
Festspielhaus Baden-Baden
27 December 2009
One of the true delights of the Mariinsky Ballet’s annual tours to Baden-Baden lies in the repertoire they bring, which, apart from the mandatory Swan Lakes and Nutcrackers, regularly includes ballets never seen on tour. A Mariinsky La Sylphide is a curiosity, a confidential pleasure confined to Saint-Petersburg and usually performed at home while most of the company is on tour – this reversal of the situation, along with the luxury casting of Evgenia Obraztsova and Leonid Sarafanov, generated an excitement that has been missing from seasons plagued by safe programming.
Mind you, the Mariinsky Ballet has never been the finest exponent of Bournonville, and it showed again in a few awkward scenes. Vyacheslav Okunev’s designs make the first act look outdated – the bleak mansion and ill-assorted costumes might well be one of the reasons James so longs to go and live in a pretty forest full of elegant Sylphs. The corps de ballet and the demi-soloists also showed some uneasiness, including Xenia Romashova as Effie’s friend, slightly cramped in her character solo, and Soslan Kulaev, much too tall and properly over-the-top as Gurn (ah, his “I-saw-it-with-the-ping-pong-balls-I-call-my-eyes” mime). The Mariinsky’s acting style and expansive dancing simply don’t fit into this first act, but their hybrid encounter with a master, whether it be Balanchine or Bournonville, is a fascinating sight in its own right.
» Read the full review in Ballet.co Magazine
Evgenia Obraztsova and Leonid Sarafanov in La Sylphide © Natascha Rezina
