“If I be waspish, best beware my sting.” Thus the feisty Katharine warns off Petruchio in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, but he's irresistibly drawn to her – or to the tasty dowry attached to her hand in marriage, having come "to wive it wealthily in Padua". I've already enjoyed one balletic version of Shrew this year – John Cranko's at Birmingham Royal Ballet – but Jean-Christophe Maillot's for the Bolshoi is altogether superior. It is no quaint doublet-and-hose period drama, but a slinky, sexy, sardonic take on the Bard's prickly comedy.
Unveiled in 2014, taking up Sergei Filin's challenge to create a new full-length ballet away from his Ballets de Monte-Carlo base, Maillot's Shrew has been an enormous hit in Moscow. It has made successful excursions to St Petersburg and Monaco, but was here receiving its London première as part of the Bolshoi's three-week Royal Opera House residency. And what a sharp contrast it provides to the fusty old Swan Lake production (though fabulously danced) the evening before – a liberal squeeze of lemon which demonstrates that this company is not content to rest on its imperial laurels, but can produce tangy new work.
The plot is much ado about nothing. Petulant Katharina – the man-hating shrew of the title – scares off potential suitors, causing her charming younger sister Bianca to despair that she'll never be free to marry, as tradition dictates the older sister must wed first. However, the roguish Petruchio fancies his chances of taming Katharina, especially if it means gaining her handsome dowry, and he forces her, if not into submission, then into an amicable truce. This allows Bianca to get hitched to her beloved Lucentio and all's well that ends well.
Ernest Pignon-Ernest's sleek set largely consists of a curvaceous white staircase, which splits in two, plus a few ivory columns. Costumes by the choreographer's son, Augustin Maillot, nod towards 1950s Hollywood glamour. The score is a patchwork of Shostakovich, mostly off-cuts from his film music, peppering the ballet with sardonic punch. Right from the raucous opening “A spin through Moscow” from Cheryomushki, the Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra played with real panache under conductor Igor Dronov.
Maillot's choreography takes the classical tradition and twists it askew. The two main couples dance contrasting pas de deux. Olga Smirnova's sassy Bianca may hide behind her tears, but there's no doubt she's the one calling the shots in her relationship with Semyon Chudin's Lucentio. In their Act I pas – to the bittersweet Gadfly Romance – Chudin was like a timid deer, necking and nose-waggling with Smirnova leading to a series of carefree lifts, eventually winning her affections by presenting a book of poetry – Shakespeare sonnets, I hope. Their highlight was the Act II pas, tender and elegant against a backdrop of luscious strings and a trio of smouldering saxophones (also from The Gadfly). Smirnova was lovely here, soft and supple.