The Australian Ballet has revived John Neumeier’s ballet about the “god of dance” for the first time since 2016, bringing themes of dance, madness, war and torment to the stage.
Vaslav Nijinsky was classical ballet’s “first celebrity dancer”. Born in 1889, in Kyiv, Ukraine, he began dancing aged nine with The Imperial Ballet School in St Petersburg. A few years later Nijinsky made his stage debut, then commenced a relationship with Sergei Diaghilev. Diaghilev founded the Ballets Russes in 1909, hand-picking Nijinsky to tour with the new company. In 1911, Nijinsky had an argument with the Imperial Ballet over a costume and was dismissed, becoming a permanent member of the Ballet Russes. In 1912, he choreographed his first ballet The Afternoon of a Faun, which is regarded as one of the first modern ballets.
In 1913, Nijinsky had his second workplace disagreement in two years. He was dismissed from the Ballet Russes, this time not over a costume, but a woman. Nijinsky married Romola de Pulsky; furiously jealous and betrayed, Diaghilev terminated him (some lax workplace protections in imperialist Russia, it seems). Regardless, Nijinsky’s dance and choreographic career continued to explode, with his Paris premiere of The Rite of Spring causing a literal riot. In January 1919, he performed for the final time, to a small group in a Swiss Hotel. Two months later, he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and committed to an asylum. He spent the next 30 years institutionalised, dying in London in 1950.
Neumeier’s Nijinsky opens with the final performance in Switzerland, where Nijinsky’s declining mental health is juxtaposed against the excess and frivolity of the hotel guests. Principal artist Callum Linnane gives the performance of a lifetime as Nijinsky, making his entrance wrapped in a bedsheet, both frail and magnetic. While not the strongest technician, Linnane brings a dark charisma and psychological power to the role, along with an explosive physicality. This is fitting, given the program quotes Nijinsky as saying “Music with feeling is God-like. I do not like pure technique without feeling.”
Coryphée Grace Carroll, as Nijinsky’s wife Romola, stood in stark contrast. Carroll is a beautiful dancer with impeccable technique, but her casting as Romola in this production was misjudged. Carroll’s dancing is gloriously light and ethereal, but she lacked the maturity and substance to portray the long-suffering wife of an artistic genius living with schizophrenia with the necessary impact.
This was particularly evident when on stage with dramatic powerhouses like Jill Ogai and Ako Kondo. Ogai brought an unparalleled intelligence and integrity of movement to her performance as Nijinsky’s sister, Bronislava (Bronislava was a genius ahead of her time, creating sixty works and expressing concepts of abstract ballet 20 years before George Balanchine). Ogai is in her element in contemporary ballets such as Nijinsky and Carmen that demand meat, fire, and darkness; she is in her prime and dilutes nothing. Jake Mangakahia was glorious as The Faun version of Nijinsky, all riot-inducing chiselled torso, open-palmed épaulement, and sexy roiling shoulders, beckoning in a new choreographic language.
It's impossible not to compare Nijinsky with Christopher Wheeldon’s Oscar, which the company performed less than six months ago (there’s currently no shortage in the repertoire of male protagonists who want all the benefits of marriage while also pursuing same sex lovers outside of it). Nijinsky soared in areas where Oscar fell flat: the pas de deux between Nijinsky and Diaghilev (danced with commanding and sinister presence by Maxim Zenin) had palpable chemistry and passion; the choreography had dynamism, contrast and vitality, with hectic, frenetic lurches and turbulent trios. Though, both Oscar and Nijinsky suffer from the same excessive reliance on historical details, which can be alienating.
Choreographically, Nijinsky analyses dance and madness, not just through the lens of Nijinsky as an individual, but through other ballet classics. Deep into the second act of Nijinsky, the corps de ballet melts into the choreography from the famous entrance of the Wilis from Giselle – the elongated arms and arabesques en fondu descend into the fragmented wrists, and tortured lines of the asylum.
The zenith of Nijinsky was when Elijah Trevitt as Nijinsky’s brother Stanislav (who was also committed to an asylum) performed a raw, searing, gut-wrenching solo of white-hot intensity, crashing and contorting his body against the stage floor – back arched, elbows bent, fists clawed – writhing in psychological torment, later mirrored by Linnane.
The lighting (original concept by Neumeier and reproduced by Ralf Merkel and Jon Buswell) generated an appropriately fractured and dreamlike atmosphere. The Opera Australia Orchestra, under Jonathan Lo, is spectacular, performing a thrilling score that blends composers including Chopin, Schumann and Shostakovich, taking the audience on a psychological rollercoaster from haunting violas to the thundering military drums of World War 1.
While there are some areas for improvement in pacing and casting, Nijinsky is a powerful tribute to movement and madness, performed with passion and technical finesse.
