Russian National Ballet Theatre Dances At The Jorgensen 3/31

Critics have called the Russian National Ballet Theatre, directed by the legendary Bolshoi principal dancer Elena Radchenko, "the real thing." Combine that with Tchaikovsky's version of Romeo and Juliet, the classic story of love nipped in the bud, and you have a night of passionate dance on stage at UConn's newly renovated Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts, on Thursday, March 31, at 7:30 p.m.

The beloved story of Romeo and Juliet begins when Romeo and his gang of friends and Montagues don masks and crash the off-limits Capulet ball. He meets and falls immediately for young Juliet. But trouble breaks out at the party, ending in a death in each rival clan. The young couple is torn asunder in public but will meet again in private to profess their mutual devotion and plan a future together, despite the odds.

As you know, plots, naiveté and horrific misunderstandings ensue. As Shakespeare wrote of his own star-crossed lovers: "For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo." Watching Romeo and Juliet danced with the passion of a Russian ballet troupe makes their double suicide seem all the more tragic.

Chopiniana, which premiered in 1907 in St. Petersburg, grew out of Chopin's Seventh Waltz. The favorite work of its creator, Mikhail Fokine, it has now become standard repertoire for many of the world's leading ballet companies. Chopiniana does not have a traditional plot. Fokine incorporated the cultural experiences of the past and the blossoming ideas of the present, thus saturating the work with universal significance. It is not the characters in the ballet that develop, but rather the themes, moods, and feelings.

The Russian National Ballet Theatre was formed in Moscow during the Perestroika
period in the late 1980s, when the nation's great dancers and choreographers were exercising a new creative freedom. The company was founded and is populated by talent from the upper echelons of Soviet dance academies and troupes. Many of its 50-some dancers have been with the company from the beginning. Radchenko was selected in 1994 to be its first artistic director and has developed a repertory of most of the great full works of Petipa, including this production of Romeo and Juliet.

Ballet master Alexander Daev, who dances the role of Tibalt in the production, said in a recent interview about the tour, "We have many performances and a busy schedule, but this is what we enjoy doing. The American audience is very cultured, and is passionate in their warm response to our performances." The company is on a four-month American tour this winter. After Jorgensen, the ballet will perform Giselle in Worcestor, Mass., and Swan Lake in New London.

Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts is located at 2132 Hillside Road on the UConn campus in Storrs. Regular tickets are $25, $27 and $30, with some discounts available. For tickets and information, call the Box Office at 860.486.4226, Monday through Friday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m., or order online at jorgensen.uconn.edu. Convenient free parking is available across the street in the North Garage.

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