I'm opening this thread for news & possible discussion of this important upcoming premiere at the Bolshoi. Choreographer & troupe director Alexei Ratmansky conducted a lecture-preview of his new ballet in the theater's Small Hall. A report of this preview, on the Russian website Mir Tanza -- www.mmv.ru/p/ballet -- mentions the demonstration of fascinating constructivist-style scenery, including a huge robot-like sculpture that will 'dance' along with the humans on stage!

A few photos of the rehearsals may be found on this link:

http://www.bolshoi.ru/ru/season/ballet/fir...26=info&id26=83


Factual previews and, after the premiere, reviews, will be shared on this thread.

Natalia, do you know what happened to the version of The Bolt that Grigorovitch was preparing some time back? There are some sequences from the rehearsals on the video "Master of the Bolshoi". Did he have to abandon the project or was it eventually shown elsewhere?

Very good memory, Mashinka! Indeed, Grigorovich had to abandon the project, due to lack of adequate funding & need to tour extensively in the last days of the Soviet Era. By the time of the 1990/91 political changes, Grigorovich was already less than powerful. There was talk about reviving the project for his private Ballet Grigorovich but, as far as I've heard & read, nothing came of it.

Last Friday's premiere of Ratmansky's The Bolt, at the Bolshoi's new theater, has been raking in highly positive reviews on the Russian-language sites. I'll try to translate bits & post links in the next day or two. For now, suffice it to tantalize you with the following link to the "Mir Tanza" (World of Dance) website's page of many photos of the premiere (dancers on the constructivist set, sparse front-curtain, etc.).

http://www.mmv.ru/p/ballet/2005/bb.html

Did any of our Moscow-based readers attend? Ina? Inga? Anyone?

UPDATE: Brief tranlation to captions of the above-cited photos --

Row 1 - Display of Tatyana Bruni's 1931 Mariinsky Theater designs

Row 2 - The usual front curtain of the New Bolshoi Theater...and the unusual front-curtain of "The Bolt"

Row 3 - (left) view from the photographer's 20-Ruble seat...way up high! (right) overview scene Act I - Denis Savin as the hero "Denis" about to sabotage a machine with a bolt...lightbulb hanging above the dancers will go off...big robot to the left stops moving.

Rows 4 & 5 - three scenes from Act II's "Ivashki's Dream" divertissement, including Dance of the Bicyclists...and Dance of the Red-Army soldiers & female gymnasts

Row 6 (last row) - Bows & bouquets - lots of applause for the dancers & creators but -- unusual for a Bolshoi premiere -- no obvious loud 'claque' for a principal because, in fact, there were no superstar principals (such as Zakharova & Tsiskaridze in 'Midsummer Dream' last December). The principals in 'Bolt' were Denis Savin, Anastasia yatsenko, Yan Godovsky, & Morihiro Ivata...all playing characters with their own names, e.g., Denis, Nastia, Yan & Ivashka.

No wonder: the claque is still devoted to Grigorovich and consequently against anything new. To tell the truth, Neumeier was also not good enough for them, not to mention Ratmansky. My impressions about “The Bolt” can be found on http://forum.balet.ru as well as the whole bunch of critical reviews (many of them – but not all! – severe). Sorry, but I am very pressed now to write something distinct in English about the new ballet. This Sunday our Society of Ballet Lovers is meeting Ratmansky and some of his dancers for an “after-curtain” talk. I hope that we’ll discuss arguments (pro and contra) and we’ll hear Ratmansky’s answers to them.

Thanks for posting the link, Ina.