Swan Lake at The Everyman review

Swan Lake at The Everyman provided Cheltenham’s theatre-goers with an evening of magical entertainment that proved an overwhelmingly popular performance of plentiful plies and perfect pirouettes.

The stage was almost as packed as the auditorium when the Moscow City Ballet company pirouetted into The Everyman Theatre in January – for a breath-taking performance of one of the world’s best loved ballets, Swan Lake.

Set to Tchaikovsy’s timeless score the audience, well-versed in Swan Lake’s unforgettable music, would have been humming along with the ballet’s memorable melodies had it not been for the stylish grace and athletic dexterity exemplified by Moscow City Ballet’s dancers – which left most open-mouthed.

Re-telling the romantic tale of Prince Siegfried’s undying love for the Swan Queen, Odette, the petite female principle Anastasia Gubanova epitomised the graceful bird’s lithe movements and solemnity – with head-whipping turns, leaps seemingly suspended in the air and supple flexibility – while male principle Talgat Kazhabayev commanded the stage with royal authority, demonstrating great jumping prowess and an ability to lift the diminutive prima ballerina like she were made of feathers – leaving the audience suitably enthralled.

Other dancers of note included the Hungarian, Spanish, Neapoletan and Polish Brides who all showed sparkle during their moments in the spotlights, whilst the Jester added doses of sprightly humour to the plot. The four cygnets, who performed perhaps the most well-known part of the ballet – thanks, no doubt to Dawn French’s, ahem, interpretation – lacked a little personality in their dance however, but performed with uniformed discipline.

Set against the backdrops of the royal court and moonlit lakeside – complete with dazzling costumes and what one onlooker described as ‘awesomely tight tights’ – the corps de ballet of graceful swans glided in perfect symmetry with elegant lines of limber ballerinas tip-toeing across the stage with careful control. Despite the relative size of the Everyman’s stage for a full-company of around 30 dancers, the cast performed simultaneously without any obvious bumps or spills.

Performing within the conventional boundaries of choreography, under the direction of Victor Smirnov-Golovanov, the Moscow City Ballet stuck to their well-received traditional Russian approach to the classic – a timeless touch which made us imagine we could have been watching the same scenes unfold in a Russian palace several centuries ago, albeit amongst a bejewelled and fur-coat clad crowd perhaps – and the live orchestra added to this authenticity.

Bringing classical ballet brimming with magic and mesmorising skill to the public, the Moscow City Ballet’s week-long tour-stop at The Everyman Theatre offered a magnificent chance to see a world class performance within the Gloucestershire borders – and we can’t wait for the company to return.

Michelle Byrne
26 January 2008