State Ballet of Georgia's Swan Lake: well-drilled but lacklustre

In the absence of visits to London by Russian companies (not set to change any time soon!) ballet fans were excited to hear that Nina Ananiashvili would be bringing the State Ballet of Georgia, of which she is Artistic Director, to the London Coliseum this summer. A selection of dancers from the company has previously appeared in Edinburgh, but never in the capital, so after several weeks without ballet while our own major companies have been on their annual break, the auditorium pulsated with anticipation ahead of curtain-up on the Georgian Swan Lake.

It is unfair to conflate our expectations of the Georgians with the standards we became used to seeing from the Bolshoi and Mariinsky companies. The great Russian companies have centuries of history and are politically important representatives of Russian art and culture; thus huge sums of money are available to them and the standards of training and performance are the highest in the world. Georgia has a rich cultural history including immensely beautiful folk dances, and has produced many exceptional dancers. If we were disappointed that standards are not as high as those in Russia, it is, at least in part, our own fault.

Ananiashvili herself was one of the greatest ballerinas of her time, combining true artistry with a formidable, versatile technique, alongside a dark-haired, dark-eyed glamour. Her own Odette-Odile, among many other roles in which she excelled, lives on in affectionate memory. It is doubly surprising, then, that artistry and chemistry between the principals we saw on the opening night of the Georgian production was, on the whole, absent. Nino Samadashvili’s Odette, while perfectly serviceable technically, seemed to have little genuine feeling for Siegfried, possibly in tune with Oleg Ligai’s  sweet but bland demeanour in the role.  As Odile, Samadashvili came out of her shell somewhat, but not enough to make us really sit up and take notice.

Technically, there were some weaknesses among the corps, and a disturbing lack of cohesive musicality, of vital importance in this, of all ballets. The four cygnets were impressively drilled, and the three “Big Swans” danced expansively if not as a unit. Efe Burak as Benno showed significant potential; he has a strong technique but, again, his musicality was questionable. An unidentified dancer did very well in the Act 1 pas de trois and in the Neapolitan dance in Act 2; she has a magnificent jump, used her feet well and showed an incipient charm. The performance of the night for me came from a stunning young lady, again unnamed in the programme, who danced the solo lead in the Mazurka, filling the stage with commitment, lovely jumps and turns, and, at last, charisma. Marcelo Soares as Rothbart, hampered by a silly plumed headdress, still managed to be a commanding presence.

The artists were not helped by a lacklustre production with some very dull new choreography in Acts 1 and 3 that appeared to have no connection at all with Tchaikovsky’s great score. Sets, a sylvan scene in the palace grounds, an atmospheric lakeside for Acts II and IV and a grand ballroom for Act 3, were fine, the costumes generally appropriate, but the atmosphere is one of old-fashioned fustiness. The excision of the expositionary mime at the meeting of Siegfried and Odette always saddens me; stranger still was the mime used by the Queen, who repeatedly asked Siegfried if he were in love rather than insisting that he must marry. Some of the superfluous sections that make Western productions overly long were judiciously and sensitively cut, so that Acts 1 and 2, and Acts 3 and 4 after a single interval, could be given together, bringing the running time down to a sensible two and a half hours. 

I wondered why there was so little sign of the truly great Vaganova training method. Tbilisi’s principal school is named after Vakhtang Chabukiani, a central figure in Russian ballet history, the original of the virtuosic, very masculine style that pertained during the Soviet period. He took charge of the Tbilisi Choreographic School in 1973, training Ananiashvili,  David Makhateli and Elena Glurjidze among other notables, including the major star Nikolai Tsiskaridze, now the director of the Vaganova school in St Petersburg. What has gone amiss since then? At the very least I expected to see the beautiful upper body work we often miss in the West, but the noble head carriage and expressive necks and shoulders of the Vaganova method were absent here. 

Are financial constraints to blame? If so, I hope that they can be overcome. The programme describes the company as one of the 10 best in the world; news to me and, on this evidence, questionable. But there’s plenty of talent in Georgia and one day that may be the case.