St Petersburg Ballet Theatre last appeared befor London audiences back in 2015, selling an impressive 25,000 seats across the season.
Set up in 1994, the company specialises in straight-forward touring crowd-pleasers from the classical repertoire.
Their Swan Lake seems to hit so many of the expected beats with precision and yet is a bizarrely unbalanced and ultimately unsatisfying experience
Its greatest strength is the company’s dazzling prima ballerina, Irina Kolesnikova, but this is also its greatest weakness. She dominates and demands the spotlight to such an extraordinary extent that the show can never take flight.
She is the company’s only prima ballerina with a double-page spread in the programme. She is also the wife of the founding director, Konstantin Tachkin.
Her presence is powerful, her footwork formidable, she is the star of the show and everything is constructed to make sure everyone on stage and off knows it.
Swan Lake’s glittering centrepiece is Odile’s famous 32’s fouettes in the party scene. Kolesnikova delivers them at a breath-takingly overdone speed that ended up feeling more like an attack than artistry.
The music then stops completely so she can prowl to the front and take yet another choreographed ovation while her poor Prince Siegried exits stage left rather than launch directly into his own show-stoping spins.
This is not the only occasion when the spell the ballet should be weaving is broken like this. As the fourth wall crumbles, so does the fantasy. The momementum and magic are lost.
Kolesnikova is a powerful technician and the show comes alive whenever she is on stage, but this leaves the evening feeling more like a series of set-pieces chasing applause.
Whether by design or default, the talented corps seem to be carefully marking their steps rather than unleashing individual or group artistry. It feels careful, controlled and does not communicate any real passion or power.
The role of the smitten Siegfried is shared across this London season between imported Bolshoi Ballet principals Denis Rodkin and Alexander Volchkov and the Mariinsky Theatre’s principal dancer, Kimin Kim.
Rodkin was our rentaprince for the night. He is an undeniably gorgeous dancer with coiled power in his jumps and sublime control in his spins but he seemed to be sleepwalking through his performance.
The Dance of The Little Swans is delightfuly done and the acrobatic Jester alone makes a real connection with the material and the audience.
Although the sets, costumes and lighting are strong and the company is evidently talented, the entire experience left me cold and, worse than that, disappointed that it so utterly failed to capture the sublime spirit of this most glorious of ballets.
The company prides itself on its mastery of the Vaganova method. This is the primary method still taught in Russia and focusses on a harmonious synthesis of upper body, legs and feet.
It’s a shame they missed out on the heart and soul.
St Petersburg Ballet Theatre Present Swan Lake at London Coliseum from August 22 to September 2, 2018
For more information and booking go to: www.londoncoliseum.org/swan-lake-st-petersburg-ballet-theatre