Dance Review Chris Jones

TURNS OF THE CENTURY

Bolshoi Ballet's historical power explodes in Don Quixote

A windmill has been turning at the Bolshoi Ballet since 1869, when Marius Petipa first combined the story of Miguel de Cervantes and the music of Ludwig Minkus into a work of incomparable exuberance. At the turn of the last century, Alexsandr Gorsky built on Petipa's work to create an authoritative balletic staging of that most impossible of dreams.

Don Quixote has never left the repertory of its home company.

And Friday night in Chicago, the touring members of the Bolshoi blew away the cobwebs from this great Moscow tradition with such a burst of technical and emotional bravura that the packed-to-the-rafters Auditorium Theatre seemed engulfed by a wave of joy...

...Certainly, Nina Ananiashvili did not need the level of emotional sophistication she showed earlier in the week as Juliet. But her performance was no less extraordinary.

As her fans well know, this technically superlative dancer is capable of fouettes that make you feel ill just watching her spin. But look closely at the way she lunges for a perfect climactic posture and you see her precise body consumed by, well, sheer lust. Hence the prima in ballerina.

Andrei Uvarov’s tall, lithe and fiery Basil is a better match for Ananiashvili than anything in "R&J", providing remarkable one-armed lifts to order and delight. Also featuring superb work in Spanish and Gypsy Dances from Maria Isplatovskaya and Anna Antropova, this was one grand night that served as a reminder of the beauty of traditional staging. As re-created by Sergei Barkhin, painted drops have lost none of their emotional wallop.