Cheap Stone Flower (Video) (Aleksandr Ptushko) Price

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Customer Reviews of Stone Flower

The Only Choice
If you desire to own a full-length version of this ballet in your video collection, then this is your only choice (at least at this time). When writing a review, I usually find it helpful to compare a ballet with as many other interpretations of it as possible. In this case, the only comparisons are with segments found on a few excerpt tapes. This performance has some nice things that make me want to watch it again, but the excerpts still make me wonder, "What if?"

This is a live performance by the Kirov Ballet at the Maryinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia. The musical score was written by Sergei Prokofiev, a fine composer with nine ballets to his credit. Even so, this is not his best work. It was written just before his death while he was under criticism from the Stalin regime for being a formalist and an elitist. The choreography is by Yuri Grigorovich. It's a revision of the original by Leonid Lavrovsky. The libretto was created by Mira Mendelson-Prokofieva and Lavrovsky. They cobbled together the story based on a couple of fairy tales by Pavel Bazhov. The morale is "that great art requires sacrifices."

The leads all have something nice to offer. Tatiana Terekhova dances the part of the Queen of the Copper Mountain. Her part is the most technically challenging of the two ballerina roles in this ballet. Terekhova is quite an outstanding leaper, and many of her jumps are impressive because of the position that she can hit in the air with an arched back. Terekhova is a very worthy successor to the original ballerina who danced this role, Maya Plisetskaya of the Bolshoi. A short excerpt of Maya in this role can be found on "Plisetskaya Dances" (1964). Terekhova seems to have all of Plisetskaya's technique, although I wonder if she is as good theatrically as Plisetskaya was. Terekhova's dancing with Danila (Aleksandr Gulyaev) is notable. Their partnering together is very nice, and I appreciate how well coordinated they are when they both jump together. Terekhova's picture didn't make the cover, but it probably should have based on the strength of her performance.

The other two leads turned in nice performances, although both of them displayed a few weaknesses by the time the ballet was over. Throughout the ballet, Gulyaev let fly with a number of excellent leaps: tour jetes, coupe jetes en tournant, and the signature leaps from the "Prodigal Son" ballet. Nevertheless, I thought his batterie and chaines seemed mediocre. Overall, there's a nice flow to his dancing.

The role of Katerina is danced by the beautiful Anna Polikarpova, who has a very pretty arabesque. It's interesting that Polikarpova doesn't have the usual Kirov finger and hand positions, but prefers the droopy approach. I found Polikarpova's dancing with the Fire-Fairy, Irina Christyakova, to be very cute. Unfortunately, Polikarpova's jump suffers in comparison to Terekhova's. Despite my objections, I still find myself still wanting to turn the tape back on to watch Polikarpova some more, so she must be doing a lot more things right than wrong.

The real reason that I've rated this title only three-stars is because of the excerpt of this ballet that's found on "Bolshoi Ballet '67." This segment, from a Bolshoi film, is only about ten minutes long, but it casts a real shadow of a doubt in my mind about the quality of the folk dancing on the Kirov tape during the fair scene. The Bolshoi folk dancing seems about as close as you can get to authentic Moiseyev-quality folk dancing from ballet dancers.

There are also some corps routines that are done in typical Kirov danse noble style--yet they don't hold my interest all that well. First of all, the costumes aren't all that great. The dancers have on unitards, but they aren't very flattering. The men look kind of ridiculous with flower wreaths in their hair. The women are supposed to be precious minerals. There's some partnering in the ensemble work, and they all dance in "crystalline patterns," but I don't like the choreography all that well. Generally speaking, nobody satisfies me like Kirov corps de ballet work, but not in this case.

I think that this is a worthwhile ballet to have in your collection. Don't get me wrong, this is certainly not the equal of Prokofiev's "Romeo and Juliet" or "Cinderella," but there are some good moments to be found here. I'm happy to have this ballet and still watch it, but I wish that there were more interpretations available to choose from. In the mean time, I'll be contented with Terekhova's flamboyant jumps and Polikarpova's beautiful arabesque.

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The last performance of the era
This is the last video made in the Bolshoi during the Grigorovich era. It was made in 1990, when the company had wonderfull veteran dancers and at the same time many new stars. Nikolay Dorokhov, who came to the Bolshoi from Uzbekistan is a surprisingly good Danila. His style is very secure and his acting abilities are very good indeed. Liudmila Semeniaka, the most talanted balerina of her generation is also shown as a surprisingly good actress. The wonderfull Nina Semizorova, who still dances as a prima in the Bolshoi is possibly the best dramatic balerina in the company since Plisetskaya. Her style is secure and light and her acting is as good as that of her collegues. Yuriy Vetrov, such a charming drosselmeier in the Nutcracer, is now an always drunk, evil Severian.

Some of the othe dancers are mostly the rizing stars of the company. A wonderfull gypsy dance is performed by Yuliana Malkhasiants and Gedeminas Taranda. A waltz on the "Bronze mountain" features basically all of todays stars in the company -Sergey Filin, Sergey Bobrov, Irina Zibrova and Elina Palshina among others. Other characer roles are performed by A. Loparevich, A. Melanyin, L. Okhotnikova and M. Sharkov.

The orchestra conducted by Alexandr Kopylov is once again proven as the best theater orchestra in the world. The subject is based on a number of stories by Pavel Bazhov - one of Russia's most famous fairy tale authors. Profofyevs music is unusially "classical" and "Russian".

Right now the company is very different. Artistiic director Vladimir Vasilyev and head of the ballet company Alexey Fadeichev are now making more and more new productions (in 5 years there were 16 new operas and 14 new ballets). The dancing of the new stars of the company is quitte different. Svetlana Lunkina, Maria Alexandrova, Angrey Uvarov and Nikolay Tsiskaridze are more romantic and yes, in some ways better. But this performanse illustrates one of the company's best periods.

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This Kirov "Stone Flower" was well worth it.
Not usually a great fan of Ballet myself, I thoroughly enjoyed this performance. A helpful booklet is included and the story line easy to follow. The medium of well performed Prokofiev, with colorful scenery and the genius of the choreography combine to make a lasting impression. The Stone Flower is a fantastic allegory of the contest between artistic and spiritual perfection on one hand and the brutality of the less than ideal conditions in which we live.