Great Performances of the Year #2

If ever there was one ballet associated with the Bolshoi, it would be Don Quixote. No, not the long novel masterpiece by Cervantes, but a silly but fun display of ballet bravura, with a tuneful score by Minkus. In the 1950s and 60s, Maya Plisetskaya gave the role one trademark move that every ballerina has tried to copy since: in Act 1, Maya leaped into the air. But instead of simply doing a horizontal grande jete, she arched her entire body backwards, her free leg upwards, and so gave the impression that she was kicking the back of her own head.

I'm too young to have seen Maya, but this year I finally did see the Bolshoi phenom Natalia Osipova as Kitri. She not only lived up to the hype, she exceeded it.

Osipova doing the Plisetskaya head kick

I first saw Osipova last year as Giselle. Her Act One didn't make that deep of an impression on me, but in Act Two, I realized that youtube videos could only capture a fraction of what Osipova is about as a dancer. Her elevation and ballon are her two main distinguishing features -- not only can she jump higher than anyone, she has that ability to linger in the air, as if suspended by some invisible thread. As Giselle in Act Two she was neither a ghostly vision nor a weeping spirit -- she turned the whole act into an almost Balanchinean display of pure dance. During her initiation as a Wili she didn't turn flat-footed, but instead rose to demi-pointe, and then spun so furiously that it was indeed superhuman. For the rest of the act she just seemed to hang in the air, her feet never touching the ground, her airy buoyancy providing a wonderful contrast to the grim Wilis. Her entrechats especially just stayed in the air -- it was both supernatural and thrilling. Osipova's Giselle provided no sense of real tragedy, but it did give me one of the most memorable nights of dancing I've ever seen.

This year as Kitri she bounded onstage in one huge grande jete, and again suspended herself in the air. Kitri requires jumping, balancing, and turning. Osipova excels at all three. In Act One, as I said, she jumped and jumped, but also turned with amazing speed. Her characterization was a bit broad -- all big bright cheerleader smiles and flirty fan-waving, but the exuberance and charm was real.

In the tavern scene of Act Two she threw herself into the air headlong into Jose Manuel Carreno's arms without blinking. It was a thrilling moment of bravura, and I love the way she claps her hands in this video. Such relish, such a spitfire, such joy!

In Act Three for the grand pas de deux she completed an amazing set of endless balances, thrilling lifts, and a wonderful fishdive. I noticed how in her lifts she is one of the few ballerinas able to hold the position in the air in a freeze-frame and not have that effect seem vulgar. In her variation (a series of bourrees and releves) her feet literally seemed to twinkle. And finally, for the coda, her trademark set of fouettes that are not so much a grim counting exercise as a whirlwind of doubles and triples that left me gasping. Could anyone really be that much of a human gyroscope?

I know a few balletomanes who considered Osipova coarse. But a few weeks later I saw her give a sensitive, if imperfect Aurora. This is a ballerina who has prodigious natural gifts, but channels them in a way that makes one feel the joy of dance, of movement. She's not just a bag of tricks. Brava Natalia Osipova!