rudolf hametovich
nureyev
1938-1993
Russian-born ballet dancer and choreographer, perhaps the most virtuosic
and charismatic male dancer of his generation
If you read Rudolf Nureyev's life story in a novel, you simply wouldn't
believe it. Imagine the synopsis: "A Tatar boy, born on a train,
starts ballet far too late, fights his way to prizes and stardom in
Russia, escapes from the KGB in a 'dash to freedom' in Paris..." You'd
have thrown the book across the room by now, even before you got to
the bit where the greatest ballerina in the world, who's twenty years
older than him, chooses him as her partner. But it's all true - surely
the most extraordinary tale in twentieth century ballet.
Born near Irkutsk, Nureyev danced professionally from the age of 15
and studied at the Leningrad Ballet School from 1955 until 1958, when
he became soloist with the Kirov Ballet (now the St. Petersburg
Ballet) in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). In 1961, while on tour
in Paris, France, with the Kirov, Nureyev fled from Soviet security
at the Paris airport and defected.
His life since that famous dash is documented almost by the minute,
but we're still learning more about the time between his birth in 1938
and the day he left Russia - a recent book of memories from colleagues
and teachers at the Kirov has helped a lot, telling for instance that
he already had a following of 'frenzied fans' in Leningrad when he
was no more than twenty, so that his instant popularity in the West
was maybe not such a shock to him. His first performances after his
defection were with the Ballet of Marquis de Cuevas, in an overdressed
production of Sleeping Beauty, but it was his appearances in London
with the Royal Ballet, and particularly his first Giselle with Margot
Fonteyn, that really established his reputation as a great dancer
as well as a media star.
For nearly thirty years Nureyev danced anywhere, everywhere, seemingly
every night - his passion for performance was insatiable and he drove
himself far harder than any maître de ballet would have dared.
He also danced with the American Ballet
Theatre, the Martha Graham Company, and
other companies. In the end the continual work took its toll on his
body and his technique, and the touring programmes of his final years
as a dancer saddened many of his admirers. But it was inevitable: he
was cut from whole cloth, and the will-power which kept him dancing
then was the same will-power which had made him a dancer in the first
place.
In parallel with his dancing career, Nureyev had spent much time both
on original choreography (The Tempest for the Royal Ballet, Romeo and
Juliet for London Festival Ballet, Manfred for the Paris Opera) and
on reviving 19th century ballets he'd known in his Kirov days. His
production of the Shades Scene from La Bayadere for the Royal Ballet,
and of Don Quixote in Vienna were the best known of his earlier successes.
He reconstructed and recast the choreography of Swan Lake (1964) and
other ballets of the 19th-century French-born choreographer Marius
Petipa. He was the subject of the film I Am a Dancer in 1972.
Nureyev became an Austrian citizen in 1982 and the next year he became
the Artistic Director of the Paris Opera Ballet (having previously
turned down the corresponding position with the Royal Ballet), and
he revived many of his own productions for them. He is credited with
bringing new life to the Opera Ballet, restoring it to a position as
one of the world's great companies and nurturing a whole generation
of wonderful stars.
His last production, shortly before his death in January 1993, was
a magnificent revival of the first three acts of La Bayadere. Some
of the photographs taken of him at the time, haggard and ill, still
haunt us: as an antidote, go back and look at the film of him in his
own Don Quixote, young, strong, and devastatingly good looking and
charming. Even the best film, though, doesn't convey the truth about
Nureyev the dancer: for the electricity, the danger, the astonishing
charisma, you just had to be there.
Article written by Jane Simpson for ballet.co.uk
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